[0:01] Welcome, everybody. It's so fun to have a full audience of people who are interested in talking about the library. So welcome.

[0:09] Welcome to our truth and taxation hearing. We are going to start off with an invocation by Council Member Smith, and then the Pledge of Allegiance by Council Member Campbell.

[0:25] Our Father in Heaven, we're thankful this evening to meet together citizens of Highland. We're very thankful for the opportunity that we live in a constitutional republic.

[0:35] we're thankful for our freedoms. We're thankful for the opportunity to meet

[0:39] together as we discuss our budget priorities. We ask you to bless us this

[0:45] night that we may have thy spirit as we deliberate that we may talk to one

[0:49] another civilly and with respect and these things we pray for name of Jesus Christ

[0:54] Amen.

[0:57] Please join me in the pledge.

[1:15] Okay,

[1:32] just reminder and for those of you who

[1:35] haven't been here before. Highland City believes in treating everybody with

[1:39] civility and respect and we ask everybody to act and speak accordingly and not

[1:44] applies not only to our comments to the council and to each other but also just

[1:50] in the respect for the meeting and the process in general. So we are so happy to have

[1:53] you here and we will go ahead and get started. So the one item that we are

[2:01] talking about tonight is the Truth in Taxation and our budget. So those will be the two things

[2:07] that we will be accepting public comments on. So if you're here to talk about anything else,

[2:12] we invite you to come back next week. On Tuesday, we'll be here same time, same place.

[2:18] So the way we're going to start this is we're going to have our City Administrator Aaron Wells do

[2:22] a quick presentation for those of you who haven't heard it before. And following that, we will open

[2:29] it up for public comment from people in the audience, then we'll go ahead and open

[2:33] it up for public comment for anybody who is online and then we'll bring it back to

[2:38] the council for discussion.

[2:41] And just before we get started with our public hearing, just so you know the way that this

[2:46] kind of goes is we're just going to listen to your comments, we'll be at back here taking

[2:51] notes and thinking about everything you have to say, but it is not an opportunity for a one-on-one

[2:56] dialogue.

[2:56] So, council members might write down questions as we go, but we don't respond individually.

[3:04] So, that's pretty much how it's going to go.

[3:06] So, if you didn't sign any yet, please go ahead and do so.

[3:09] If you have a comment card, please bring it forward.

[3:14] And we'll go ahead and turn it over to our City Administrator, Erin Wells.

[3:19] Thank you, Mayor and Council.

[3:20] While staff normally presents from the front, we thought it would be good for me to present

[3:24] from here today for our full audience, much

[3:27] fuller than we normally receive.

[3:29] Thank you for all of you in attendance.

[3:32] Many of you I recognize and have been

[3:34] to this presentation in some variation before.

[3:37] For you, I apologize for the repetition.

[3:40] We have tried to summarize it to keep it a bit more brief,

[3:43] but hopeful that this isn't totally new information for any

[3:47] of you as we have tried to do our best

[3:49] to advertise this information to our residents.

[3:52] High-level summary. What are we talking about tonight? So tonight the council is considering

[3:57] an increase to the dedicated library property tax. It would add an additional $172,488 of revenue

[4:06] to the library budget annually. The increase would be $2.38 per month or $28.49 a year for the average

[4:16] a child at home that's valued slightly over $1 million.

[4:21] The purpose of this increase or the proposed increase

[4:25] is ultimately to maintain the library's current offerings,

[4:29] what we are currently doing.

[4:32] First, it would transition one part time employee

[4:34] to a full time position,

[4:36] and then it would add an additional two part time employees

[4:39] to the library staff.

[4:41] This would allow us to keep pace with what's called

[4:47] collections with Pleasant Grove and American Fore can do a courier system every day that we

[4:53] are open, and then also to keep up with the demands of our regular programming that is currently

[4:58] going on.

[5:00] Finally, this additional revenue would help replace last revenue that was previously funded through

[5:07] the federal government for Libby, which is our electronic book application.

[5:12] that funding has gone away and so that would help to replace that and to account for the

[5:18] increases that we are seeing in Liddy. I will say that the library is a very different

[5:23] library than when it has begun and while we have grown our offerings to this point, what

[5:30] this ask is to maintain those offerings as it is currently. Where are we at right now?

[5:36] Our library staff cannot keep pace. We've already had to cut back on some programs in order

[5:41] to keep things going, so ultimately that's what this request is. It's about keeping up with what we currently have offered at the library at this point.

[5:50] The changes over the years have been varied and have ultimately been to provide service to our residents, to provide service to our card holders, and to stay relevant as a library, and to provide that for our community.

[6:03] that's not just a repository of books or materials or information but also a community gathering

[6:11] place and a place for programming and other things.

[6:16] As we talk about the library and the use of the library, Jay, it's not working for me.

[6:26] Let's talk about who is using the library.

[6:28] So we have the library staff pull our current list of card holders and say, okay, how many of

[6:37] those are unique Highland addresses? And compare that to our total number of homes. Over 63% of

[6:43] Highland homes have a current library card, which means they have used that library card in the

[6:47] past three years. On average, those card holders are checking out over 52 books per year, and every day we

[6:55] We see 209 people come into our library.

[6:58] And then annually, again, this is last year data ending in June, annually over 8,000 people

[7:04] attend our children's program.

[7:07] When we talk about the library, the library is a small part of the city's overall budget.

[7:12] It makes up just 2% of our entire city budget.

[7:15] Last year's budget, it was $332,000.

[7:20] A majority of the library where the library gets its budget, a majority of the revenue

[7:25] all comes from property taxes.

[7:27] Well, not all, 75% of the library's budget comes from property taxes.

[7:31] The other 25% is through other fees, non-resident card amounts, grants, things of that nature,

[7:38] but a majority comes from property taxes, which is why we're having this conversation tonight.

[7:45] The library, the city established the library tax rate in 2007.

[7:51] It was set up as a dedicated rate by the City Council at the time with the intention

[7:54] of ensuring that there was dedicated funds set aside for the library and that's the

[7:59] way that they felt like they could do it was by establishing a dedicated rate.

[8:04] The next year the library opened here in the city.

[8:08] In 2010, the last time the city council has adjusted the property tax rate was in 2010

[8:14] when it actually reduced the property tax rate at that point.

[8:18] And then here we are in 2026 where the city council is considering an increase to the rate.

[8:24] And again, those are the only times the city has touched the rate.

[8:28] Now I know many people will say that your taxes have increased during that time

[8:33] And while that absolutely is likely true,

[8:37] let me jump forward a minute,

[8:38] it is likely due to other entities.

[8:40] The only time that a property tax,

[8:44] an entity that does property taxes

[8:46] gets more revenue through property taxes

[8:48] is either through growth or if they adjust the rate up.

[8:53] That what we do every year is essentially

[8:55] the county gives us our rate based on inflation.

[8:59] So when you actually, if you look to see

[9:02] The orange line is the average home value.

[9:06] So as the average home value in Highland has risen over the years, the state automatically

[9:10] lowers our rate so that we obtain the same amount of money except for growth.

[9:16] Again, the only time the council has touched the rate since in 2012 when someone established

[9:21] the library tax rate was in 2010 when it lowered the tax rate but ever since then the rate

[9:26] has lowered.

[9:27] So, when you see your property tax bill go up, it is likely due to one of these other entities.

[9:35] So, the Highland City Library makes up 2% of residents tax bills on average.

[9:40] When you look at the city and the library together, we're about 10%.

[9:44] 73% of the average tax bill is made up of Alpine School District currently.

[9:50] And so, that is the bear of taxes in our community.

[9:53] I mentioned this earlier, but just to reiterate what this tax increase would mean.

[10:03] So the average highland home currently pays $54 annually using round numbers towards the

[10:10] library dedicated tax.

[10:12] This would be a proposed increase of $28.49, which would mean that the average home in

[10:20] would then be paying $83 annually for the library dedicated tax rate. It is a 52% increase for the

[10:28] library rate and then if you considered the city and the library together it would be a 5% increase

[10:33] to the city and the library rate as a whole.

[10:39] This graph compares and shows where we are at currently in

[10:42] terms of tax rates compared to where we would be at and this is isolated just to entities who have a

[10:48] dedicated library tax. We're not looking at other entities. So you can see where Highland

[10:53] is at currently in the yellow on the far right side of the graph and where we would shift

[11:00] to. The red line across the top is the average rate. Again, when you look across the state

[11:05] at the other entities who charge a dedicated library tax. If you're looking for any other entities

[11:12] that are nearby us, particularly you talk County, you can see Santa Quinn is right in the middle

[11:17] of us. Right now we charge less, we would then charge a higher rate than them. The next

[11:23] one in, again in Utah County of Provo City, you can see charges a rate that, and they

[11:28] are towards the top there above average when you look across. So, while this absolutely

[11:35] is an increase, it's a 52% increase of the rate. What I believe this shows is that we are

[11:42] Again, this is keeping up with the current offerings but not trying to become a massively

[11:48] large library or really trying to push above and beyond what other libraries are doing.

[11:55] The Council has considered and continues to consider are there other sources of revenue

[12:00] that can cover these expenses?

[12:03] One of the big ones we got asked, especially in the information sessions, that we've held

[12:06] previously was about increased fees.

[12:08] Can you charge a fee for library users rather than a tax of everyone?

[12:13] Can you just charge the users a fee?

[12:15] So Utah State Law dictates how public libraries can be funded.

[12:20] And essentially it allows, it does not allow for public libraries to charge for what we would

[12:25] call core services.

[12:26] So things that are directly the core part of the library.

[12:31] And our mind that means books.

[12:32] And so you cannot charge people to come in and check out books no matter the format.

[12:36] whether we're talking about digital books or whether we're talking about physical books.

[12:41] If we began to do that, we would lose our state certification. We would no longer be a public library,

[12:48] which would mean we can't charge our property tax anymore.

[12:51] We couldn't receive any grant funding through the state and we would lose access to the state's Libby collection.

[12:56] So Libby again is about electronic system.

[13:00] When you use Libby, you're not just using what Highland City has bought.

[13:04] you are using what the state of Utah has bought as well and that they have put in millions

[13:09] of dollars so that would be collection far and above what we can afford to do.

[13:14] Savings or reserves is another consideration that the council can make.

[13:20] Ultimately, what we're talking about when we're talking about the uses of these funds,

[13:23] they're ongoing uses and it's not best practice to use one-time money, your savings account

[13:30] for ongoing uses. Could the, another question we've received is could the city subsidize

[13:37] on the library? So we have different funds throughout the city, right? The general fund, could

[13:42] the general fund start paying the difference, right? And to pay into the library fund.

[13:47] And actually, if you notice in one of the earlier graphs, the city did do that this year.

[13:51] But it was a $20,000 in comparison with $173,000 that we're talking about. Ultimately, that

[13:58] That methodology is a possibility, but it would change the philosophy of what this city has

[14:03] done for the past 19 years in terms of the library funding.

[14:08] The council intentionally set it up to be its own dedicated source and it had to fund

[14:13] itself from that library tax, and that would change how the library would be moving forward.

[14:23] Donations are a similar story to the savings or the fund balance in that they're fantastic

[14:29] and we really appreciate the outside entities who do get the library donations, but it

[14:36] is not best practice to rely on those for ongoing expenses ultimately.

[14:40] As I can fluctuate throughout the year, the city does not control that ultimately and so

[14:45] relying on an ongoing budget for that proves risky.

[14:50] What about cuts?

[14:51] So a budget, a budget is absolutely the council's statement towards

[15:00] It's priorities and it's desired level of service. Yes, the library could cut its budget, the library could change what it is in order to not need this property tax. It's ultimately a decision for the city council or the pros and cons work that are the benefit or are the trade off between the lower level of service worth the cut that it would mean. And one of the questions was asked in our last information session, well, how much would these save?

[15:27] So, one of the things that the Council could consider doing is exiting TLC.

[15:33] To the NOGIS Library Consortium is, again, a shared partnership with American for

[15:37] Complasant Grove where we trade books amongst each other so that essentially we have access

[15:42] to all three catalogues of books.

[15:47] That service we've been doing for about a year now and it's very valuable for our residents

[15:53] but it is proven much more time-consuming than we realized for our staff. Hence the need

[15:59] to add additional staff. So exiting TLC would save $80,000 out of the budget. Now, there

[16:07] are implications, not just what we talked about in terms of longer wait times and less

[16:12] availability for card holders to be able to access books, but there would be negative implications

[16:21] with our partner libraries, not just with those, but also to nuplic the county, not full

[16:27] county library system, but where we also have access to Lehigh and Eagle Mountains systems.

[16:32] We would be jeopardizing our access there as well because we would no longer have the necessary

[16:37] amount of books to be part of that partner. We could eliminate programs. If we were to completely

[16:45] eliminate our programming budget as well as one person who is dedicated to programs, it would say

[16:50] in the library $36,000 per year.

[16:53] Again, programs are what, as libraries have adapted

[16:57] to our current day and age, it is one of the things

[17:00] that makes the library relevant.

[17:01] And as a reminder, we had 8,000 people attend

[17:05] our children's programs last year.

[17:08] In addition, we could reduce hours.

[17:10] That's been a question that we've been asked.

[17:12] So if we were to close four hours per week, for example,

[17:15] we are only open on four hours for Saturday.

[17:18] If we were to close four hours per week,

[17:19] it would save $10,000 per year.

[17:21] It's because the majority of our staff are part-time,

[17:24] and so being open necessarily for a short period of time

[17:28] is not a large money figure.

[17:30] And if you remember, the total gap that we're trying

[17:32] to cover is $173,000.

[17:34] So even if all of these were added together,

[17:36] it's about $125,000.

[17:39] We're still not quite there.

[17:40] So it would mean even additional cuts at that point.

[17:46] One thing that we are required to show

[17:48] There was a part of this truth and taxation process is what other entities are doing throughout

[17:55] the county that could have an impact on Highland residents tax bills.

[18:00] And so this is Utah County's notice again.

[18:02] We have these for you available in the back as well, but these are the other entities within

[18:09] Utah County who are considering a tax increase.

[18:13] The only other one that impacts Highland residents would be the central Utah water

[18:17] or Conservancy District, which they are doing a .71% increase or that is their proposal

[18:23] to del consider later this month.

[18:27] And this last slide just is an impact schedule that summarizes that you should have all received

[18:31] in your taxation notices that came from the county that summarizes what we just talked about.

[18:36] And from their mayor, that's the extent of my presentation.

[18:41] Perfect.

[18:41] Thank you, Erin.

[18:43] Before we get started with the public comment, I just wanted to say a couple of things.

[18:48] First, I want you to know that the City Council and I do care about this.

[18:54] We don't take it lightly.

[18:55] Somebody said to me the other day that this is the easy way out and I assure you this

[19:00] is not the easy way out.

[19:04] Everybody here has worked really hard to be physically responsible and do the best thing for you

[19:09] and recognize the impacts that it has.

[19:12] So we're going to go ahead and open up our public comment in just a minute.

[19:16] Just a reminder about that dignity, the statement that we take really seriously here, and then we'll go ahead and take public comment one at a time and your comments will be limited to three minutes.

[19:29] If you feel like you just want to say the same thing as somebody else, feel free to stand up and say, did oh, but we do try to not have any laughing, laughing, laughing.

[19:40] We can laugh, applauding or booing is what we're going to try to avoid here.

[19:46] We can laugh, yes.

[19:50] Let's see.

[19:51] So I think that's what I wanted to say.

[19:53] So we'll go ahead and open up for public comment.

[19:56] I'm going to start with our comment cards that I've been collecting.

[19:59] Once we're through the comment cards, we'll ask if there's anybody else in the audience who

[20:03] would like to comment as well.

[20:06] So saying that we'll go ahead and open up our public hearing and we will start with Mr. Jackson.

[20:14] Garth Jackson following that we'll have Kit Burton and Sean Flattery just so you can kind

[20:20] of prepare yourself. And when you come up just go ahead and restate your name for our recorder

[20:26] and welcome we're so happy to have you. Thank you. Garth Jackson, excuse me, fairly new resident here.

[20:34] We just moved in about three months ago and we've very much enjoyed this community has been a great change from where we came from

[20:41] One thing about where we did come from our property taxes were about five times which yours are here and

[20:48] 30 years ago they were about the same but one noble cause after another they added on to the property taxes

[20:54] Till I'm paying about I was paying about $1,400 a month for property taxes. That's almost rent for a lot of things and

[21:01] And so I think you just need to be aware of the cumulative effects of these taxes, one thing at a time they can get out of control.

[21:12] I do think that the library's legitimate purpose for the city to fund and to take care of.

[21:18] I do think they have to be careful about controlling the costs you are presented with a number.

[21:23] And I really think you need to debate each element of those before you pass it.

[21:28] One good example was the TLC. I think it's a good idea to share with the other libraries

[21:33] in the area, but I don't think it's necessary to have a staff person running around delivering

[21:37] books. It cost money a lot more than they expected, as they said. And if I checked out a book

[21:44] under the TLC, I'd take the seven minutes to drive here and take the 12 minutes to drive

[21:49] to another library. So I think the users would be just happy to pick those books out and

[21:53] and say that staff time for something else.

[21:56] As one of the other programs I think they had on there was the senior program, which

[22:00] is a really great idea and it's good that the library provides a place for them to meet,

[22:05] but it's a social program that's more a legitimate function of the city government instead of

[22:11] the library and it should be funded through the city government as well.

[22:17] I'd say I don't oppose the library, I think it's a good idea and there may be some classic

[22:20] that are appropriate, but I think you need to consider each part of it as you go along

[22:24] so that we get an appropriate tax increase instead of just an overall blank figure.

[22:29] Thank you for your time, I appreciate it.

[22:31] Thank you and thanks for coming to the information session and welcome to Highlands.

[22:36] Kit Burton.

[22:44] Hello, my name is Kit. We live over around 6,000.

[22:47] I've been here about five years. I wanted to start with the question, why should I pay for something

[22:51] I don't use? The same question could be asked about any of the lovely parks in our community.

[22:57] Maybe to bike paths, a certain section of sidewalk, I don't personally like to walk on.

[23:02] We fund these things with taxes because we invest as a community.

[23:07] To quote Thomas Jefferson, a small library in every county would do extensive good at

[23:13] small expense.

[23:14] I believe the library tax that's proposed follows that same principle.

[23:18] For the annual cost that I could spend to Amazon.com for one hardcover book, I could instead

[23:24] get access to the amazing resources and collection here. I would much rather keep my investment

[23:29] right here where it belongs, close to home, or suspending it to a big corporation in Seattle.

[23:35] Does this tax subsidize the use for some people more than others? Yes, it does. But for

[23:42] much of my life, I have been those some people, especially when I was a young father. I could

[23:47] never have afforded all of the children's books, nor could I have stored them in my small

[23:51] Department, nor would my wife have stayed married to me if she couldn't have a place to take

[23:55] our young kids and escape. The library was that place for us in many of the cities we've lived.

[24:01] Finally, why might I as a grown-up want to be exposed to the ideas and resources in the library

[24:07] when I could just get all the information I need from social media? I believe that question

[24:12] answers itself. Please support this increased funding for our library. Thanks.

[24:17] Thank you so much.

[24:19] We've got Sean slaughtering next, and after that we've got Paula Forbes.

[24:27] Hi, good afternoon. Good evening.

[24:29] Thank you for the opportunity to speak.

[24:30] The presentations that have been held were excellent.

[24:34] Administrator Wells.

[24:36] Director Lee, thank you so much.

[24:37] Great job. Really helped understand what this is about.

[24:41] As a resident of Highland for 10 years,

[24:44] is where that 36% that's never had a library card.

[24:48] Lots of reasons, but we personally haven't seen the value.

[24:51] What I did learn was there is a need for the employees

[24:54] for relief, there's need for increased staffing.

[24:56] That's pretty clear that an increase is needed for them.

[25:00] I would ask so much earlier, do we really need to pay for the rest?

[25:03] Do we really need to continue with Libby?

[25:04] Libby sounds like something that was paid for from the pandemic

[25:07] and we're trying to hold on to it.

[25:09] I'll ask, do we really need something like that

[25:11] or can we help the staff out with the funding

[25:14] and labor needs served there.

[25:16] So that's all I have.

[25:17] Thank you for your time.

[25:18] Perfect.

[25:18] Thank you.

[25:20] Paula Forbes, after that, we have Wayne Tanaka.

[25:24] So happy to see you.

[25:25] And then Kevin Tam.

[25:27] Hi,

[25:34] welcome.

[25:35] Thank you.

[25:36] My name is Paula Forbes.

[25:41] Have you lived here long enough to remember taking children

[25:43] to the monthly book mobile?

[25:46] Do you remember checking out books

[25:48] from the few shelves reserved for our city at the Mountain Ridge Jr. High.

[25:55] Do you remember paying an annual fee that was much more than $25 to a year to have access to the

[26:02] American Fourth Library?

[26:08] Remember how grateful we were to the Y City Council members who knew

[26:13] that the purpose of taxes is to benefit the greater community and made it so we had a small

[26:20] library in their lay-in-our-city building. And now I, my children and my grand children who

[26:31] came,

[26:34] get to have access to the programs that the library offers. We get online books through

[26:40] Libby and all the books in our library and all the books in the American pork library and Pleasant

[26:47] grow lives there each through the tip-knocker library consortium and it isn't so helpful to have

[26:54] those books delivered here and not have to drive everywhere to get them. As a recently

[27:00] retired school teacher and a literacy specialist, I recognize the important strong literacy

[27:06] skills on an individual and on the community. Also as a retired school teacher, I recognize

[27:14] a value of careful money management. I do not buy books on Amazon or anywhere else unless I

[27:23] can't get that book to the library. If that is the case, I buy youth books. I cannot afford to

[27:32] subscribe to Audible. I use the library. If people would check out only one book instead of buying

[27:41] that book that would nearly cover this small increase for the

[27:46] insect, that covers the entire household.

[27:49] I urge you to vote yes, on this low cost, high impact increase the

[27:56] benefits a large number of people in our city and people of all ages.

[28:03] We come so far in our access to library benefits in our beloved city of

[28:08] and thank you. Thank you so much. And thank you to any kids who came. That is quite ambitious to bring kids, so thanks to the kids for being here.

[28:19] We've got Wayne Tanaka, after that we've got Kevin Tam and Nicolena Tanner.

[28:25] Mr. Tanaka, I haven't seen you around lately. Nice to see you. I know you're working, but it's really nice to see you.

[28:32] Thank you. I've been a supporter of the library for about 12 years now.

[28:41] Books on tape and CDs and such, but the real blessing is the availability of the materials that the library provides, that one doesn't have to go out and purchase things.

[28:55] A lot of books, as you all know, cost $25, $30, and you can check it out for free here

[29:03] at the library because of the way the system is formatted.

[29:07] I would like to remind the council that this is not just for the city of Hyland.

[29:14] This is a broader exposure for the feeder hills and alpine.

[29:19] This is a big deal, a lot of use by a lot of people, and I think the people in

[29:29] general realize how important knowledge is. That is the foundation of the

[29:37] success of our children, our young adults, because they can read the world in a

[29:46] book. Of course, they can go on the internet, but I don't believe it's the same as having

[29:53] a book and turning the pages. I think that is much more relevant than looking at the

[29:59] Internet.

[30:00] In general, thank you very much for all of your support in the past. I think it's important

[30:06] that we support our readers, which are, as you can see in the audience, there's some children

[30:13] and young adults here. So it is a very broad application of our tax dollars for the community

[30:21] and not just for Hive, but Cedar Hills as well and Alpine. Thank you very much for your

[30:27] support. Thank you, Kevin. After that is Nicolina and then Brianna.

[30:38] Mayor and council city staff, thank you for all that you do. Part of what I wanted to

[30:43] share today is a little bit for the rest of the people who haven't been along this

[30:47] journey with us. So when I started on the library board five years ago it became

[30:52] apparent that we had financial challenges. I've run many teams, I run

[30:59] multi-million dollar budgets that work and it became apparent and we talked about this

[31:03] for five years and and it was a regular reoccurring thing in our in our board meetings how we're

[31:09] going to solve this problem how we're going to do this so I want everybody to know that this

[31:14] wasn't a knee jerk reaction this wasn't something that was casually discussed this wasn't something

[31:20] that was you know careless this is probably the most prudent and the most responsible thing

[31:27] that a city can do. And I think that's really important to say, you know, there are a lot

[31:32] of things that have happened recently that we talk about, but these problems started years

[31:37] ago. And they started and are lovely and amazing staff bore the brunt of it. One of the great

[31:44] things we have in Highland is we have great people who do great things who want to make

[31:48] Highland great. And this is where we lift them up. This is where we do the right thing for

[31:54] those people and we make sure that they know as a Highland City employee, they are loved

[31:59] and they are cared for and so I'm so excited for this. My children have loved the library.

[32:05] It has been a gift to my family. This is a gift that I want to give to other families

[32:12] and again everybody gets to choose whether they're going to use it or not but it's a gift and

[32:17] this is what we do because we're a Highland City and this is the right thing for Highland.

[32:21] So, thank you, appreciate your support and appreciate your diligence in being financially

[32:27] responsible and doing this modest increase.

[32:30] Thanks.

[32:30] Thank you so much.

[32:32] Nicolena, and then after that we'll have Brianna.

[32:35] Thanks for coming.

[32:38] Hi, welcome.

[32:41] I just want to say, could you please give your name a name?

[32:45] Oh, sorry.

[32:46] Nicolena Tanner.

[32:47] Thank you.

[32:48] Sorry.

[32:48] I really appreciate all the time and energy you put into our city.

[32:53] and how fiscally responsible you are. So thank you. I just had a few ideas and maybe this

[33:04] is not the meeting to share them at, but if you are a public entity, then you go to

[33:13] the government for funding and I think that's what has been done. But what about like looking

[33:22] at whether or not Libby can run ads, or maybe they can have twice a year, like what the

[33:29] PDA does, asking for donations, and then you could divide them up according to the usage,

[33:38] you know, because I know we share a Libby, so we could just get our percentage.

[33:45] Then the Friends of the Library, I think they have a Facebook page, maybe they could advertise

[33:57] needs like stools and couches and bean bags and vehicles to transport books or whatever.

[34:10] maybe they just say this is a need and we would love any donations for this need so I do know that

[34:20] sometimes the public funding through the government is the most reliable way but I really believe in

[34:29] the good hearts of the people of Highland and their willingness to support their community so

[34:39] So thank

[34:43] you so much. I love it when somebody comes with some good ideas and maybe things

[34:46] we haven't thought of before or that way. So thank you. I think those are things that

[34:50] we will look into.

[34:52] Brianna.

[35:01] Hi, I'm Brianna Hugh. I am a current parent and teacher in this school district.

[35:07] I teach ninth grade English. So obviously I'm a big fan of libraries. I read on average

[35:14] about 150 books a year, yeah, I'm a nerd. It's fine. And I would not be able to do that if

[35:23] I did not have accessibility or if I did not have access to the library. I read on average 50

[35:29] to 60 new young adult novels every year so that I have new resources to tell my students about.

[35:36] I do not have the funds as a school teacher to buy 50 to 60 new novels every single year.

[35:43] I also don't have the time or the funds to research the new young adult

[35:50] novels that are coming out every year. We have a library staff, that's what they

[35:54] do. They are really good at that. The other thing is, I don't know if you know

[35:58] this, but in Utah right now we are on the decline for early literacy. Our numbers

[36:04] are going down for rates of early literacy for the first time in 25 years, and

[36:11] And that is because in 2025 an average of one in four adults read a book in the year

[36:20] 2025.

[36:22] So I want you to think about that in terms of what kind of community do we want to have?

[36:29] Do we want to have a community that values literacy?

[36:34] The only way you do that is by providing those resources.

[36:38] That's just a reality. Most families, mine included, could not afford to come, we went

[36:45] to the library every week when my kids were little. And every single week my kids would

[36:50] walk out with 10 to 15 new books. I could never afford to buy 10 to 15 new books every

[36:56] single week for my children. That was just not a reality. Additionally, as the chair of the

[37:02] library board, foundation, we have dedicated a lot of money and time and resources to make

[37:10] sure that our library has what it needs, but we are very, very fiscal in how we educate

[37:16] that money.

[37:17] I want you to understand more than anything else, we need this resource.

[37:23] Our library has been limping along for at least the last five years.

[37:29] We need this resource, we need to show the community that we value literacy, we value

[37:35] community, and we value what it takes to put those things as a priority in our community.

[37:41] Thank you so much.

[37:43] Thank you.

[37:44] Those are all the comment cards I have, so now, if there is anybody else who would like to

[37:49] speak, yes, please welcome.

[37:51] Go ahead and state your name for our recorder.

[37:53] I'm Gailin Henderson, 74 years old. I've lived in Highland for 43 years. I raised my six

[38:02] sons here. They were on football teams and in music and we went to the library a lot.

[38:08] But we often had to pay for a card at Lehigh or American Ford. I paid for cards at Orham.

[38:16] And it's so wonderful. Now that I'm old and I don't want to be driving all over and I have

[38:21] issues to be able to come right here.

[38:24] I'm so grateful to Karen, our new librarian for the grant

[38:31] that she obtained for seniors.

[38:33] And so if you've been here on Friday morning, some of us seniors have been here,

[38:38] and some of the comments from the seniors says, we're lonely.

[38:41] And you wouldn't think, you know, with all the church activities and things

[38:45] that we have access to, that they're still lonely people,

[38:50] but one of my friends is a widow in Spanish work and the senior events are the biggest thing

[38:58] in her life. And so we haven't had that in Highland. And so I really appreciate that we've

[39:06] had some senior things. I use Libby almost every day of my life. I listen to it to get myself to go

[39:15] to sleep and to get me entertained when I'm working. So, I really value the services of

[39:23] the library. As far as being able to get books from other libraries, I want, I want

[39:29] us to be able to keep that because usually when I put a book into the index, we don't have

[39:34] it here in Highland. But American Fort Tasset, or Pleasant Grove Tasset, and I don't know if

[39:40] I can volunteer to go drive around the books, maybe I could, but you know with my vision

[39:46] it's not going to work.

[39:47] But I just think that these services are really valuable, so thanks so much for considering

[39:52] this.

[39:53] Thank you.

[39:53] Thanks for coming.

[39:55] Okay.

[39:55] Next.

[40:04] Hi, I'm Andrew Forbes.

[40:05] I've been living in Highland for about four years now, but actually I grew up here in Highland

[40:09] and it's been a number of evenings over at Dr. Smith's house sometimes, so I just wanted

[40:15] I wanted to say that as a father with young children that I really enjoy using Libby and

[40:19] using all the programs that the Highland Library provides.

[40:21] When I moved out of Utah, lived away for about 15 years and being active duty military,

[40:27] the military actually uses Libby for us to have access like the Marine Corps Commandants

[40:30] reading lists and stuff like that.

[40:32] So it's really nice to move back here.

[40:33] It's still of access to that.

[40:34] It's just a very valuable research that I think.

[40:36] And I think libraries make it community stronger and better.

[40:38] So I know I'm just one small data point, but that's just one of the voice my opinion that

[40:42] But I'm in support of supporting, I'm in support of funding the library and of this small

[40:47] increase because it's a much more from a selfish perspective, much more affordable option

[40:51] than having a subscription to Audible and Kindle Unlimited.

[40:55] But it's also a really nice improvement for the community I think with all the resources

[40:59] and activities it provides.

[41:01] So thank you.

[41:02] Thank you.

[41:06] Hi, welcome.

[41:08] Could you introduce yourself?

[41:10] My name is Hannah Bunker and I'm actually the courier that brings the books from

[41:14] American fork to Highland and the Pleasant Grove on Mondays and Thursdays, and while I

[41:21] am a A.S. resident, I'm really worried about how slippery slope this tax can start out to

[41:29] be. I love this library, especially with Karen involved. Karen's done wonderful and she's

[41:36] been handed a very hard deck against her. But once we start taxing on this, how slippery

[41:45] of a slope is the library going to keep just asking for things that maybe the TLC isn't

[41:53] in our budget right now, and we can work towards it again. I love the library. I work at a library.

[41:59] I'm primary teacher, Sunday school teacher, okay, I am all for reading and for the kids reading, but

[42:06] I think that we need to evaluate what is within our city's budget and that we can work up to it.

[42:13] It is not a right now or never decision. Thank you.

[42:18] Thank you so much for coming and thank you for your perspective.

[42:21] It's much appreciated. Other comments? Hi, welcome.

[42:28] Good evening my name is Bruce Smith, resident of Highland for 10 years, and nothing gets the

[42:35] public out to the council meeting and the topic of a tax increase.

[42:41] So it has the potential of devolving it to an emotional issue, who's for the library

[42:47] and who's against it.

[42:48] I think almost everyone here is for the library, but how are we for the library?

[42:55] I'm a public school substitute teacher, don't have the credentials of the young lady that

[43:00] preceded me, but I feel like I'm fairly in tune.

[43:04] And I come from the library industry, from the biggest in America to the smallest

[43:10] like here in Highland.

[43:11] I think I know what I'm talking about.

[43:14] The concept, again, is not who's for the library or who's against it.

[43:19] It's the concept of funding the library because if this tax increase doesn't happen, the

[43:26] library is not going to go away.

[43:28] Those people that have expressed their love for the library here, you're going to have

[43:32] your library.

[43:33] Regrettably, that little 2% sliver of that pie that Aaron showed is still part of the whole,

[43:40] is still part of the tax increase.

[43:43] You can't get away from it.

[43:44] Even a smidgen like a library book a year is going to come out of someone's pocket.

[43:51] My point is, in principle, not the dollar amount of another tax increase, no matter how

[43:58] small, no matter how small.

[44:03] It means simply that the library in Highland just might have to tighten its belt a little

[44:11] bit more. Just like I have to tighten my belt with the rest of the poop in this audience

[44:18] who are getting whacked on price increases in any number of ways. I do have a concern.

[44:24] The newsletter that just came out with our water bill talked about the City Council

[44:28] considering this. Having been to other council meetings and board meetings, such as our

[44:34] Highland School Board last fall, they didn't come to hear the public. They simply came

[44:39] with plugs in their ears because their minds were already made up.

[44:43] I have a fear based upon the very good sales pitch that we've been given that the minds

[44:49] have already been made up here.

[44:52] One last question, you said to write in the manual answer, please tell me and others who

[44:57] feel like me. What is the catastrophe that...

[45:00] So before the city of Highland, if this tax increase doesn't happen, thank you. Hey, excuse me, sir. Are you a veteran? Thank you for your service. And thanks for being here. Thank you.

[45:17] Hi, welcome. Thank you. My name is Vicki Sarvantes. I'm using Sarvantes because that was my maiden name, and he's a great author, a lover of the word.

[45:34] I agree with the gentleman that just was up here.

[45:36] I love the library.

[45:38] I love all the services that it provides.

[45:42] But one of the things that I think needs to be looked at

[45:47] is increased taxes should be, we should focus

[45:52] and revenue that we're letting slip through our hands.

[45:56] There's a lot of land that has been encroached here in Highland.

[46:01] Have people been penalized?

[46:03] haven't had they been taxed. That's money and revenue that could have bought a lot of books for

[46:10] Highland. Yet sometimes we let those funds slip away. What is the city's council doing? Did you do

[46:20] your homework and do diligence? I know you looked at the tax increase but I know for a fact for a

[46:26] little time that I've been here that there are a lot of people that are encroaching land in this city

[46:31] And that I'm not paying taxes on it, where others of us have been paying taxes for it.

[46:38] If you've you last week's meeting, I think that issue came up.

[46:44] And I know that when you were passing mayor bills, when you were passing and you spent

[46:49] over a million dollars, people were laughing.

[46:52] But you know what?

[46:53] Are we doing our due diligence and are we awarding taxes and money to the bidders that are the

[47:00] most cost effective or are we just giving money away. So I think we have to do a little

[47:06] bit more due diligence and do a little bit more homework before we start doling money

[47:12] and make sure that we're funding the right services for the citizens of Highland. Thank

[47:17] you. Thank you and thank you for the question and the perspective. Yes, come on up.

[47:30] I have

[47:31] I'm sorry. Hi, my name is Ray Forbes and I just want to say I don't have to pay taxes

[47:38] yet but I read a lot and I don't I go to the library and sometimes I'll check out some

[47:45] books but sometimes the libraries don't have all the books and I read a lot on Libby and

[47:51] if we increase the tax or whatever Libby will have more books and have to have less limitations

[48:00] and then I know some of the books that I have,

[48:04] it's like an eight month wait list

[48:05] for, cause everyone's like, we all want these books

[48:08] and there's only like two copies

[48:10] that we have like 32 people for each copy

[48:13] and if we have more money available for the library

[48:19] and then also for Libby,

[48:21] then more people can get these books quicker.

[48:24] Thank you.

[48:25] Thank you.

[48:27] Feel like at school.

[48:31] Scarlet Bushman, Highland resident. I just want to say this is really cool. I was just sitting here thinking being a naturalized US citizen.

[48:43] I didn't have. I wasn't born in this country and the fact that you are sitting there in a position of power and yet you're listening to people and you're not just making these decisions.

[48:54] It's actually really amazing, so I do think you're being physical, physically, whatever

[49:01] responsible.

[49:02] I think you are looking at everything, and I appreciate that, and that's one of the

[49:07] beautiful things in this country is that you don't just make these decisions, you actually

[49:11] listen to residents, and honestly, I don't think we can stop taxes.

[49:16] I think they're going to come our way whether we do this for the library or not, we're going

[49:20] to have to pay more taxes, whether it's for Highland or Utah or the US.

[49:25] And so for me and my family, if we have to pay taxes, I would rather have it go to a place

[49:32] where kids can be safe where moms can get a little bit of mental break during the week,

[49:39] where I as a single, or not single, empty nester, which feels like, can come and meet people

[49:48] and still have like adult conversations and have a safe place in our community.

[49:55] So I just, I don't think we can get away from taxes and I just think if that's the case

[50:02] then I would rather support the library with mine. Thank you.

[50:05] Thank you.

[50:06] Hi,

[50:14] welcome. Let us know your name, please.

[50:15] I need a patent. Thank you.

[50:17] My husband and I have been here for 28 and a half years and it's been some major changes.

[50:23] And you're right, we are not going to get away from taxes.

[50:26] I do have a couple of questions.

[50:28] I am wondering in the exploration of what you guys have done,

[50:32] which we do appreciate the information.

[50:36] When at what point, if ever, do we get to vote on this sort of decision?

[50:42] If we're the one funding this, why don't we have a say in this

[50:47] and not just leave it up to you?

[50:50] And you don't have to answer right now.

[50:51] Now that's fine, it's a bit of a rhetorical.

[50:53] I am curious too with the numbers of attending extra activities, 8,000 kids, that's the

[51:01] total of the kids in the city of Highland, about 8,200 kids under the age of 18.

[51:07] So every child attended or one child many, many times.

[51:12] I'm unclear on that.

[51:14] And 209 people a day come to the library, I would not have expected that.

[51:21] So, what are they doing and what is this influx of additional money going to do just for

[51:26] those two or nine little and all the ones who don't?

[51:29] So, I'm just trying to understand that because when money is suggested for any kind of

[51:36] an increase, usually a marketing plan, a budget plan is designed to see what that additional

[51:42] dollar is going to do for the people paying it and I'm unclear on that.

[51:48] The other part of my concern is this is 2%, it sounds small, I'll agree with 2%, but

[51:56] the next debate you guys are up for is a 36% increase in our public safety if I understand

[52:01] correctly.

[52:03] So where are we going to stop with that?

[52:07] You're shaking your head no?

[52:08] 23% to 36%, I read that on the website for public safety, for Highland City.

[52:15] We're happy if you want to send us an email after we're happy, maybe I'm missing a few

[52:21] information.

[52:22] So this is the only tax crease y'all are voting on right now for the city of Highland.

[52:28] Okay, well that's good because 2% is better than 38.

[52:32] I am just unsure that the information that has been presented while appearing to be very

[52:39] thorough hasn't been fully explored because all of us who are going to pay may not be

[52:44] receive what it's going to do for us. I took my kids to the library. They were the school

[52:49] libraries. I paid 73% of my taxes are going to Alpine School District and they all have a library.

[52:56] So I'm trying to understand what this one is doing that that one doesn't when we're already paying for

[53:01] that one. So thanks Mark. Listen to my ram. No thank you. And it's just so everybody knows you are

[53:07] welcome to email us all this city council generally or I'm happy to take a personal phone call from

[53:12] from anybody who still has questions after this meeting.

[53:15] And I'm sure the other council member are as well.

[53:18] Yes, hi, welcome.

[53:20] Hi.

[53:21] I'm Katie Davidson.

[53:22] I live in Highland.

[53:24] And 20 years ago, I was with my kids every week at the library.

[53:28] And we loved the summer reading programs.

[53:31] We raced around.

[53:32] That's where right there every summer,

[53:34] we went to the, when the businesses had their open houses,

[53:37] we were here.

[53:38] We did everything.

[53:39] And it was a huge part of our lives, and we loved it.

[53:41] And then we had a spell for a while where my kids grew up and they did use the public libraries and things like that, but I'm back at a stage where I'm here again.

[53:51] And just a question of what they do here, I'm here multiple times a week with my three-year-old who doesn't have any kids up in my neighborhood to play with.

[54:02] And so we come here for story time, and it is her favorite thing on the planet.

[54:06] And it's amazing. It's like a mini preschool for these kids.

[54:10] And I see grandparents and I see, I've seen some dads that,

[54:15] that new moms have had babies and I've seen all sorts of people.

[54:19] And in this room right here, there are like 20 people minimum.

[54:22] It seems like I'm sure counts are off on other days.

[54:25] And then I go into that room and it is chaos in there for at least an hour

[54:30] with these sweet librarians that try so hard with minimal staff to help everyone.

[54:35] because they are so excited to get Yodo cards and videos and adventure discovery

[54:41] packets. And I had no idea all of the things that were available until I needed

[54:46] them again. I have been so amazed to see all that they offer and overwhelmed

[54:52] so many times. So I am so grateful for all they do. I feel like we're in a time

[54:57] when the economy's going up and Costco used to be $100 trip and it's a two to

[55:01] $300 trip now and I can't take my kids out to the movies or to eat for

[55:06] $100 anymore and I've heard families telling me it's time to choose. We can't do

[55:11] singing and dancing anymore. We can't do this and that anymore and so it's time to

[55:16] choose and if I have to choose the library is going to be a big part of my

[55:21] family's life and I hope it helps others. So even though it may not help our

[55:25] particular stage if you're not using it, I know the overall benefits are huge

[55:29] and I'm so grateful what they really need is another person. I think donations are such a great idea

[55:35] but I've been in there during those crazy hours and they need another staff member in there and I'm so grateful for them

[55:41] and all that they do. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks for taking the time to come. Hi, welcome.

[55:50] My name is Chris Galley.

[55:52] I've lived here for 40 years. I was here when we had the library in the junior high because we didn't have a library and I was so glad

[56:00] to see the library here. I am standing up for the older people. For a while we had an

[56:07] end cap of large print books and I came in one day and they weren't there and I asked

[56:13] them, they said, well, we can't afford a neighbor on loan. We've put it in with the regular

[56:17] books and I can't find them. So we don't have a large print book area. Why not? Every that

[56:26] cheap. Okay. If Highland City can build a playground and a pickleball court, we

[56:32] can use my taxes for adequately supplying the library. I go to the library

[56:38] at all times of the day and it's always busy. I hope someday that we'll have a

[56:43] library to stand alone. And I'm sorry, but I own this agent and there's a lot of

[56:49] us older people that need those large print books and there's a lot of people

[56:53] use it and I just want to know, want you to know that I want my taxes to go to the library.

[56:58] Thank you. Thanks so much. Hi, welcome. Hi, my name is Rachel Fernsworth and I am a member

[57:04] of the Highland City Library Board. I think it's so wonderful that we have so many people from our

[57:11] community here and engaging in city politics because that is so cool. We have the library board meeting

[57:18] every month and while it is open to the public in my time on the library board in the last four

[57:23] years I think we have had exactly three visitors to which were our kids and a third was observing for

[57:29] a class at UVU. So something I know the council is well aware of this but I don't think the general

[57:34] public realizes just how much work has gone into this as well as just the fiscal responsibility that

[57:41] has gone into it. In the entire four years I've been on the library board this has been a topic of

[57:46] discussion every single month, the budget.

[57:49] How can we cut things?

[57:51] How can we tighten it?

[57:52] How can we maximize every dollar?

[57:54] When we look at the labor needs,

[57:57] that's really our biggest portion of the budget.

[58:00] Our library staff starts at a wage that's lower

[58:03] than my son makes, my 17 year old son makes

[58:06] at slim chickens.

[58:08] They are underpaid.

[58:10] We have never once given a merit based increase

[58:13] a library employee in 18 years. It's simply not in the budget. When we look at

[58:21] workload, it's largely based on circulation. We have a very similar

[58:26] circulation to the present growth library. However, they have a total of 35 staff

[58:33] members. We have 12. In addition, another thing that kind of has been

[58:39] glossed over a little bit that I think the public might find really informative is that

[58:43] previously there was something called the Institute of Museum and Library Services.

[58:47] This was a federal department.

[58:50] It was shut down last year.

[58:52] This department was largely responsible for funding Libby across the states, as well as things

[58:57] like book mobiles and books for the blind.

[59:00] So they passed the cost of that onto the state.

[59:03] Oh, they also cover all of our grant money for technology upgrades every year.

[59:10] We will no longer get that money.

[59:12] The state has decided not to dip into their budget and they passed it down to the cities.

[59:17] So every library across Utah and across the nation is facing this exact same crisis.

[59:23] Libby is an extremely popular service, extremely popular.

[59:28] The cost of WIVI is substantial because of the monopoly that publishers have on books.

[59:35] They used to allow us to just pay a large fee and then we own the book forever and can rent it as many times

[59:41] and now they do it per rental, which is absurd.

[59:44] But that's something that we would normally have the federal government to fight for for.

[59:49] So these are just the realities that we've faced.

[59:52] When we talk about fiscal responsibility, I tell you right now there is no more

[59:57] responsible, and

[1:00:00] Entity and city government. When it then when it comes to a librarian, they are absolutely magical. My

[1:00:06] variants are magical with money. Thank you.

[1:00:16] Hi there. Welcome. Thanks for coming. My name is Lauren

[1:00:19] Banger. I've married into a family that has been here for 34 years and we've lived in Highland

[1:00:25] multiple times. It's such a wonderful city. I really appreciate you guys. There's been a couple of times

[1:00:30] where I've actually reached out to you about crosswalks or stopways that have been dangerous

[1:00:36] and you guys have been incredibly prompt to respond, so I really appreciate it.

[1:00:42] Also your schools are incredible.

[1:00:44] You have Highland School which is number one in Utah and then in Ridge Line up in Highland

[1:00:49] you guys had the Utah principal of the year and he went to DC this past year.

[1:00:55] Highland is an incredible city and we've been so blessed to have lived here.

[1:01:00] Our kids have used the school library, they can use it, and take one book home a week

[1:01:08] starting at grades, at second grade, but before that they can go to the library and keep

[1:01:14] a book at school.

[1:01:15] Other than that, we are so grateful to have used the toddler areas like meeting up with

[1:01:23] mother mothers and story time in those programs and our kids will come and check out many

[1:01:29] books and unfortunately sometimes we have to take those books back together before bringing

[1:01:34] them back and that's part of this budget and it is something that we obviously do never want

[1:01:40] to happen but I would much rather my kids be reading books than spending time on screens

[1:01:47] and I'd read much, but I just, I'm so grateful.

[1:01:51] I actually told my son that it wouldn't take this long

[1:01:54] and he gave me this look and I said,

[1:01:56] I'll give you a dollar afterwards

[1:01:57] and he said, how would you just take me over

[1:01:59] and get me a book after this?

[1:02:02] This library is really, really special to kids,

[1:02:05] to families, to the growing generation

[1:02:08] and I want it to see it thrive.

[1:02:11] Thank you.

[1:02:12] Thank you.

[1:02:17] Name please.

[1:02:18] Wesley Warren. I'm also on the library board with Rachel. She's pretty great. I

[1:02:26] second large print books. I'm raging against needing glasses so we would both

[1:02:33] appreciate that a lot. For five and a half months I have secretly and quietly been

[1:02:39] keeping track on the note on my phone with every interaction I've had with

[1:02:44] of Highland residents regarding the library tax.

[1:02:47] It's been mostly a project I've been doing

[1:02:49] for personal use.

[1:02:52] I'm not going to champion idea

[1:02:54] that I believe is not supported and popular in the city.

[1:02:59] I just won't, I think the paramount to everything

[1:03:03] is do the residents, this is something the residents want.

[1:03:06] This is something the residents want,

[1:03:07] their tax wanting to go towards.

[1:03:09] I did the same thing with the Highland Family Park.

[1:03:12] I did the same thing with the alcohol issue.

[1:03:15] I need to make sure I feel bulletproof when it comes to the residents.

[1:03:19] And so for five and a half months I've been keeping track.

[1:03:23] 61% of my tally, I have first and last names for.

[1:03:28] And of course this is anecdotal.

[1:03:32] But I've spoken with 649 residents who explicitly support this library tax.

[1:03:38] And I've spoken with 46 residents who don't support it.

[1:03:40] and everyone except for one has been a really good conversation and I've learned a lot.

[1:03:52] It's been touched on, but by every metric, Highlands Library outperforms every other library in our area.

[1:04:02] When you look at circulation, when you look at program attendance, when you look at daily visits,

[1:04:07] This is when you look at library card adoption rates, we're outperforming all libraries in

[1:04:15] our area, and yet every other library is more robustly and appropriately staffed, and

[1:04:23] they're better funded, and they're financially healthier.

[1:04:29] Which library model is the correct one, and which one is the broken one?

[1:04:35] The way that literally every other library does things, or is it our small library?

[1:04:44] Is every other library grossly inefficient and negligently overfunded?

[1:04:49] And we're actually funded and staffed appropriately?

[1:04:53] Or is every other library staffed and funded correctly?

[1:04:58] And we're the ones that maybe need to do a little adjusting.

[1:05:04] It's also been mentioned that we so

[1:05:09] much from our library staff five

[1:05:20] seconds I did some job shadowing and you would be shocked by how much they do.

[1:05:25] We really need that extra full-time employee. So thank you. I'm glad I don't have to go any further.

[1:05:33] Thank you.

[1:05:34] Appreciate it.

[1:05:35] Thanks.

[1:05:36] Hi.

[1:05:41] Thank you for coming tonight.

[1:05:42] Hi. My name is Megan Olson.

[1:05:45] and I've lived in Highland for about seven years and for that entire time the library

[1:05:50] has been like a second home to myself and my siblings.

[1:05:55] We check out probably between Libby and the physical books about 200 books a year between

[1:06:01] four of us and the $28 tax increase would cover about two paperback books so for us it would

[1:06:12] be very worth it. My littlest brother is in elementary school and he has not been

[1:06:20] allowed at his school library to check out books that the school librarian decides

[1:06:25] are above his reading level even though he's a pretty high level reader so he's had to

[1:06:30] come to the Highland library to check out the books that he actually wants to read.

[1:06:36] My family goes to a lot of the social programs.

[1:06:42] It's just been probably the best thing that the city has for us.

[1:06:49] And I don't want to live in a city that doesn't value the curiosity and the community that the library fosters.

[1:06:58] That's all.

[1:06:59] Thank you.

[1:07:05] Hi, come on up and if you want to mind introducing yourself, I'm pulling that microphone down so I can hear you. Thanks.

[1:07:11] My name is Salisha Mills and I've lived in the community for over 20 years.

[1:07:16] And my kids are avid readers and love the library. My problem with the tax increase is the percentage.

[1:07:22] I agree that you have to increase costs because cost of everything is going up.

[1:07:26] But a 50% increase seems a little bit steep at a time when everything is going up.

[1:07:30] and it's non-essential service.

[1:07:33] It's very much enjoyed service but not essential.

[1:07:36] My other problem is my nieces and nephews

[1:07:39] have been exposed to pornography and other material

[1:07:41] that they don't like.

[1:07:43] And I have had to stop coming to the library

[1:07:44] because it's too hard for me to patrol all the shelves

[1:07:47] and what's put on there.

[1:07:48] So if we're going to keep the community library

[1:07:50] and we want to uphold some of the values

[1:07:52] that many of the residents hold,

[1:07:54] I don't mind having the books in the library

[1:07:56] but they need to be in a designated section

[1:07:58] so that kids are not inadvertently exposed to things that they do not want to see or read.

[1:08:04] And it's really hard for parents to keep up with a huge volume of new material out there.

[1:08:09] And I know that there are many people in the community who have tried to come and help the community

[1:08:16] realize the books that are more harmful, and they would be willing to help

[1:08:19] pull those books and pull them out so that they are not inadvertently exposed to other children.

[1:08:24] So I think before I want my tax money to go to more to the library they need to take some responsibility and make it a safe place for my children.

[1:08:32] Thank you.

[1:08:33] Thank you for the perspective.

[1:08:44] Anything?

[1:08:46] My name is Madeline Olson.

[1:08:48] I've lived here for about ten years and I love libraries.

[1:08:53] I've always loved to read.

[1:08:55] Some of my earliest memories are back when I lived in Florida going to their library and looking through all of the children's books.

[1:09:04] And I just want to say that if people don't think that the $28 increase is worth it, then

[1:09:14] you know, read two or three books this year because that's about how much $28 will get you.

[1:09:21] And it's just going to the library to read that many books.

[1:09:27] like that's about the cost of three books. So if you just read three extra books a year

[1:09:33] from the library, then I think it would be worth it. Thank you.

[1:09:38] Thank you.

[1:09:46] Anybody else like to make a comment?

[1:09:54] Good evening.

[1:09:55] Hi. My name is Will Robertson. It's not relevant that I served in the Army for 30 years

[1:10:05] I'm so grateful for a representative form of government and not a democracy that is ruled by the emotions of the mob.

[1:10:15] And I'm very grateful that you guys get to make the decision and not us.

[1:10:21] I'm a big fan of libraries, especially ours. Books and libraries are something that I owe my entire adult life to.

[1:10:28] and I've heard several arguments tonight that the proposed tax increase that I'd like to address some of them directly.

[1:10:36] First, the claim that it's only $2.38 a month or about the cost of one hardback book that framing makes a permanent tax increase sound small.

[1:10:48] But the real issue is not the monthly amount. It's what that money permanently buys.

[1:10:54] This increase is designed to expand permanent staffing and lock in higher ongoing salary and benefit costs.

[1:11:02] Once those costs are built into the budget, they almost never come back down.

[1:11:07] Governments tend to grow, but they rarely shrink.

[1:11:11] Second, I've heard that libraries are important.

[1:11:14] That books change lives and that Benjamin Franklin helped establish early American libraries.

[1:11:19] So knowledge would not be belonged to only the wealthy.

[1:11:22] I agree that libraries matter, shared access to books has real value, but supporting libraries

[1:11:30] is not the same as supporting this specific permanent tax increase.

[1:11:36] Those are two different arguments.

[1:11:39] Third, some have said that they would rather increase funding for the library than for anything

[1:11:45] else because an educated sexuality needs libraries.

[1:11:48] That is a legitimate value judgment that I would not disagree with, but it still does

[1:11:54] not answer the central question, which is does Highland need to permanently expand staffing

[1:12:00] costs to keep a strong library?

[1:12:03] The data that I've seen circulated recently may actually answer that question.

[1:12:08] Highland already checks out more materials per capita than the state median.

[1:12:13] It already has a higher early childhood program attendance per capita than the

[1:12:19] state median. At the same time it ranks near the bottom in local funding among

[1:12:24] Utah library systems. That is not a struggling library. That's an efficient

[1:12:29] library delivering strong results with the resources it currently has. Raising taxes

[1:12:36] to expand the permanent employee footprint would move us away from a lean model

[1:12:41] that has produced those results.

[1:12:43] It would create higher fixed costs

[1:12:45] that will be difficult to reverse later,

[1:12:48] even if demand levels off

[1:12:50] or technology reduces some sort of the manual workload.

[1:12:54] We can value libraries and still insist on efficiency.

[1:12:58] The current numbers show that a strong library

[1:13:00] does not require this permanent increase,

[1:13:03] and I urge the council to reject the tax increase.

[1:13:07] Thank you, and thank you for your service also.

[1:13:09] So would

[1:13:14] anybody else like to comment?

[1:13:15] We would love to hear from you.

[1:13:31] I've been here for over 30 years.

[1:13:34] And I think my only comment is number one,

[1:13:39] a tax increase for whatever reason.

[1:13:42] It's a wrong time to do that.

[1:13:46] The whole system is not as robust as everybody

[1:13:52] tells you in the media that it is.

[1:13:55] It's not the right time to raise taxes.

[1:13:58] It is the time to use our funding more effectively.

[1:14:03] When you look at the park that was built, you could have staffed the library for many

[1:14:08] years.

[1:14:10] It's not a matter that Highland doesn't have enough money, it's how we spend it.

[1:14:17] And the tax increases the wrong thing to do.

[1:14:21] Thank you, Mr. Beck.

[1:14:22] Anybody

[1:14:25] else here in the audience? Have any comments?

[1:14:37] Hello, I am Leanne Spencer.

[1:14:43] Great time. I

[1:14:48] moved to Utah in the 80s and I wasn't ever coming back when I left

[1:14:56] because I didn't feel included.

[1:15:00] I didn't feel a sense of community. And we came here due to the death of a son and helping

[1:15:13] to raise two grandkids with a widowed daughter. And I was so excited to come to Highland.

[1:15:21] And I was so surprised when I saw how small the library was, but the one thing that I hear

[1:15:30] the most here in Utah is, I don't want big government, I don't want the federal government

[1:15:36] determining where my money goes and what I do with it is

[1:15:43] exactly where this tax needs

[1:15:45] needs to be within this community in order to support the people, all the people, whether

[1:15:54] they have multi-million dollar homes or if they are renters in someone's basement.

[1:16:00] A library is a great equalizer of all communities and I am so grateful that I came back to watch

[1:16:09] this community use its rights as Americans to hear through all of the issues that we've

[1:16:18] had in the last six years that I've been here.

[1:16:21] So thank you so much for looking into this and hearing everyone's opinions, but I am

[1:16:27] for an increase in our taxes.

[1:16:30] Thank you.

[1:16:31] I'm so sorry about your son and so happy to have you back here in Highland.

[1:16:38] Would anybody else, who's in the audience like to comment?

[1:16:41] I want to make sure we get everybody.

[1:16:48] If there are no other comments, I will turn to Jay.

[1:16:52] Jay, do we have anyone who would like to comment?

[1:16:56] No one online?

[1:16:58] Okay, last call.

[1:16:59] Any comments?

[1:17:01] If not, we'll go ahead and close our public hearing

[1:17:05] and bring it back to our council for discussion.

[1:17:10] Okay, Dr. Smith, let's start with you.

[1:17:16] Thank you, Mayor.

[1:17:17] And I just wanted to thank everyone that came out tonight, and one way we save money

[1:17:23] in highlands, we don't pay for air conditioning in the city council building.

[1:17:27] And I don't know why I'm sitting up here with a suit coat on, because I'm roasting.

[1:17:31] So we ought to be saving some money.

[1:17:34] So I've been off and on the council now since 2010, not in consecutive terms.

[1:17:41] And it's been interesting for me over the years to see how much discussion we have about

[1:17:48] the library budget.

[1:17:51] And I just kind of want to put some things into perspective here tonight.

[1:17:57] And because I'm an avid support of libraries, I've served on the Friends American Fork Library

[1:18:03] Committee for 30 years.

[1:18:05] I'm currently the treasurer down there of the friends and they raised a lot of money.

[1:18:12] I helped design that building down there 30 years ago and I promoted including Highland

[1:18:22] in the Tempanooga Library Consortium.

[1:18:25] And there was debate in American Forks saying, hey, we're much bigger library so as President

[1:18:29] and grow, why do we want to use our tax funds

[1:18:33] to subsidize the Highland Library?

[1:18:36] And that's kind of what's happening to your agree.

[1:18:38] So I think you need to stop and think

[1:18:39] because being involved with these other two libraries,

[1:18:43] we increase our circulation dramatically.

[1:18:45] So let's just talk a little bit about perspective.

[1:18:49] One, I think you need to realize that Highland

[1:18:53] is repeatedly ranked in the top two or three

[1:18:57] safety cities in Utah. We also, in the last budget, we had the highest per capita income

[1:19:05] in the state. Pretty amazing things. When I ran for reelection last fall, and I've

[1:19:13] said this in some other meetings, I looked at all the certified tax rates. So let's explain

[1:19:18] how that works. So the way the county actually sets the certified tax rate, and so it's set

[1:19:24] up so property taxes really never go up they stay about the same so if your

[1:19:30] properties are praised more then the city has a lower certified tax rate so it's

[1:19:37] true at the same time that our property taxes have gone up from growth but we're

[1:19:42] almost at full growth now so we're getting pretty close that's why the library

[1:19:47] tax increases now so there was decision made in 2007 to fund a private library

[1:19:54] or a public library, I'm sorry, and they decided to come up with a dedicated property tax

[1:20:00] for the library. It's one of the smallest dedicated library taxes. If you go and look in

[1:20:06] the state, so we've shown some figures there. So in 2010, when I first was on the council,

[1:20:13] that we were in the middle of the recession, and we cut all the property tax in the city.

[1:20:19] And we went through every budgetary item.

[1:20:23] We spent eight hours in that particular session

[1:20:26] plus lots of other discussion.

[1:20:29] We were here until two o'clock in the morning.

[1:20:32] So at that time, and until recently,

[1:20:35] the library property tax has always been approximately 15%

[1:20:39] of the total property tax in the city.

[1:20:41] When I first went on the council at that time,

[1:20:44] the city got 16.8% of the property tax that people pay.

[1:20:49] Now it's down closer to 9.9 and a half percent.

[1:20:53] And why is that?

[1:20:54] The reason for that is we have not had a property tax increase

[1:20:59] in 18 years.

[1:21:00] In fact, we've had a decrease in 2010.

[1:21:03] But the other entities, the school districts, the county,

[1:21:06] all these other things who come in and raise our taxes.

[1:21:10] So I don't like paying taxes.

[1:21:12] I don't pay a lot of taxes.

[1:21:14] But you know, I think sometimes we need to stop and think

[1:21:17] that if you're paying a property tax in Highland and you itemize your taxes, what you're

[1:21:23] basically doing is you're bringing money that would have gone to the federal government

[1:21:27] of the state back into your city. So that's one of the things I don't think we think about.

[1:21:32] So a lot of people come in here and say we need to cut, cut, cut. We run Highland incredibly

[1:21:37] efficient. Our total budget with all the enterprise funds, which is sewer, culinary, all those

[1:21:45] other things and by the way the sewer fun keeps going up because our special service district

[1:21:50] raising it but we find ways to economize but if you compare us to other cities for example

[1:21:57] American fork, we're half the size of the population of American fork, their budget is four

[1:22:04] and a half times bigger than ours. Okay, so if you compare we're running this city very efficiently.

[1:22:11] In a month we're going to pay off one of our bonds and a year from now we're going to have both bonds paid off and we'll be essentially a debt-free city.

[1:22:21] There's not many cities in the whole America that can say that. Certainly none of the other agencies can do that on higher levels, certainly the federal government.

[1:22:31] So I think we have to kind of put things in perspective a little bit.

[1:22:35] We live in a really good place, I think is Council over the years, we've worked really hard to run this city as efficiently as we can, and we're blessed because of it.

[1:22:46] So, why do I support the library?

[1:22:48] Even with this small tax increase, and it is pretty small, and I hope that you've all looked at your tax notifications you got through the county auditor a couple weeks ago.

[1:22:59] I'm going to tell you about mine.

[1:23:00] So I've always been below average in height and now I'm below average in property value according to this.

[1:23:09] So they're saying that the average home in Highlands worth over properties worth over million dollars.

[1:23:14] That's pretty amazing. I think I'm down below that.

[1:23:17] So in Highland last year with the property tax for both my home here and the library and things,

[1:23:28] I paid $375.66 to the city.

[1:23:33] This year, the CTR for the 85% of the property tax is dropped.

[1:23:39] And so my property tax for the rest of the city stuff goes down about $14.

[1:23:44] Even with the library increase in minus $24.85 because my property is blow average.

[1:23:50] My property taxes go up less than $10 for Highland.

[1:23:54] That's $10.

[1:23:55] dollars. So why don't we compare it to some other things? So we all pay for the state

[1:24:00] charter school up in Alpine, and I like education, but we're going to pay $62.13 for that

[1:24:09] state charter school. If your library, for me, is going to be $72. I believe in paying

[1:24:16] stuff that benefits the citizens of islands. Only a few of the citizens are going to benefit

[1:24:21] from that charter school in Alpine, and you can go through and compare all that stuff.

[1:24:26] So we talk about the library being 2% of the budget, it's 2% of the general fund, but

[1:24:33] if you go back and put in all of our other enterprise funds, sewer, culinary water, all these

[1:24:38] other things we pay for, it's 1.5%, 6%, so a really small amount.

[1:24:44] Now, my property tax is going to go from 1.2% for the library up to 1.8%.

[1:24:51] And, you know, I don't like property tax increases, but I think the library, I think we

[1:24:57] get a lot of being for our buck, as I think we have a very efficient staff.

[1:25:04] We have, and there's been mention of it tonight about the fact compared to other libraries.

[1:25:08] We have a very small staff.

[1:25:09] We only have one full-time employee, and so we're just going to go up to two full-time and we're going to have someone to help us move these books between the three libraries because we benefit greatly from that.

[1:25:23] So, I support this. I support libraries. I think everybody in here said they support the library.

[1:25:30] But, you know, there's talk about switching the library to fees.

[1:25:34] all these other things the library could not be sustained if that happens it's

[1:25:39] a public library. So let's do some other comparisons even with this new budget our

[1:25:45] library costs are going to be one-thirteen of what we pay for public safety so

[1:25:52] public safety is police and fire. Essential services we appreciate all they do but

[1:25:57] is one-thirteen through that. It's one-third of what we pay for garbage. So come on let's

[1:26:04] just kind of do some comparisons here. We're not asking for a lot to keep our library open

[1:26:09] and it has lots and lots of benefits. So I just kind of wanted to bring some of that stuff up.

[1:26:15] I think we need to kind of put it in perspective. We're almost in debt for a city. We have this

[1:26:20] the other thing. We had when I went compared with the other 25 cities in Utah County last year

[1:26:27] are certified tax rate or so the fourth lowest. And let me tell you about the two cities

[1:26:33] were lowest, Cedar Ford and Fairville, I said that wrong, Fairview. So I still said

[1:26:41] it wrong, Fairfield. Okay, so the other one was Eagle Mountain, but Eagle Mountain is having

[1:26:47] a big increase this year, so we may drop to the third lowest even with this small tax increase.

[1:26:52] So, I think we're doing as much as we can in the city to be economical, to run things

[1:26:59] effectively.

[1:27:00] I don't like tax increases, you know, but at the same time, we've lived on a tax decrease

[1:27:06] now for 16 years.

[1:27:08] We're asking for some of that back for the library.

[1:27:13] Thank you.

[1:27:13] Council Member Courtney.

[1:27:18] Well, to start with, I've long been a strong supporter of the library.

[1:27:24] I believe that vibrant public libraries are good for our nation, they're good for our

[1:27:29] community, and they support families in Highland.

[1:27:33] The statistics show that the library has increasing usage across almost all metrics, the possible

[1:27:41] exception of in-person visits.

[1:27:45] And our library is at a point where either we increase revenue or we significantly cut services

[1:27:52] is that we provide. I believe the reports that I hear from staff, that the library staff

[1:28:01] is stretched in to meet the increasing demand. The question then is what we do about it.

[1:28:11] Certainly have been talked about the increasing private funding. I think that's a good thing.

[1:28:17] And I've long been a supporter and proponent of increasing volunteerism in the city and finding more ways for people to contribute some of their time to offset city costs.

[1:28:30] But the reality is that unless all of us here brought our checkbooks and are ready to write big checks, that's not going to be an answer for the immediate shortfall that we're looking at.

[1:28:44] We can increase public funding, we can have a general fund subsidy, we can spend down

[1:28:55] the library reserve, which even if we spend that all the way down, it isn't going to meet

[1:29:02] that shortfall in the coming year, or we can look at a tax increase.

[1:29:10] We can cut costs and I'm going to come back to that one.

[1:29:15] We can make a major change.

[1:29:17] We received an email from somebody who suggested that we basically contract out library operations as a way of controlling and cutting costs of the library.

[1:29:29] I have some significant concerns about giving up control and direct control over quality going that route.

[1:29:39] of, there may be other major changes that we could be making that we're not thinking about

[1:29:44] or I haven't considered or heard about, but the ones that I have don't seem like they

[1:29:50] are at least short-term solutions.

[1:29:54] So let me come back to cutting costs.

[1:29:55] I took a look.

[1:30:00] I woke up a couple of days ago thinking to myself, you know, you've done a lot of slicing of the data. You need to take a look at the increase in salary and wages over time, compared with the inflation and population growth rates. Apparently, I have really weird dreams.

[1:30:27] And I don't know if you can, I don't know how well this shows.

[1:30:34] But the big going on top is the growth in salary and wages with the library.

[1:30:41] This goes from 2009 through this current year with the proposed fee increases.

[1:30:51] And the salary and wage increases are running about a little over twice the combined

[1:31:00] population and inflation increases over that time period.

[1:31:07] There are some reasons for that.

[1:31:11] Partly, in 2019, we began accounting for some of the city staff overhead costs that

[1:31:20] are spent on the library into the library budget.

[1:31:23] There certainly has been a change in kind of what the table stakes are for libraries.

[1:31:30] That really, to have a viable library, it's no longer just having a room full of books

[1:31:37] that people can come and check out is some level of programming. I think it really is

[1:31:45] just table six for a successful functioning viable library these days. But that makes

[1:31:53] me wonder if we've grown larger and grander than it is necessary to kind of maintain level

[1:32:04] of service.

[1:32:07] And if so, is that something that we want as a policy decision going forward?

[1:32:16] Cutting costs will not be minor tweaks if we're looking to cut costs to make up the gap

[1:32:23] that we're looking at.

[1:32:26] That the number was $10,500 that was displayed earlier if we cut

[1:32:35] back four hours a week on hours that the library is open. I'm actually skeptical that it's

[1:32:42] going to be that big. And the reason is that those low usage times are opportunities

[1:32:49] that library staff uses to do some of the critical non-public facing tasks that are just necessary

[1:32:59] in the library. So, if we're cutting back selectively on the hours when we are getting

[1:33:06] relatively more of that done, I worry that we're going to have to fill in somewhat

[1:33:11] with staff during the rest of the hours in order to continue doing those critical tasks.

[1:33:18] In 2024, we had 233 programs. It's the data that we reported to the state.

[1:33:28] If we cut 10%

[1:33:29] of those programs, I think we're looking at a few thousand dollars.

[1:33:33] The number we saw earlier was that if we eliminated them entirely, it saves us about thirty-six

[1:33:39] thousand dollars a year.

[1:33:42] Thirty-six thousand dollars a year is not going to cover the funding gap that we have coming

[1:33:48] up.

[1:33:55] But I am very concerned about the growth of library salary and wage expense compared with

[1:34:01] population growth and inflation, that's over 75% of our budget. If you look at the rate

[1:34:10] of increase, just since COVID, it's average nearly 6% a year. If we go with a proposal

[1:34:19] that increases to about 9% a year over that same period. And I'm concerned about that being

[1:34:25] a sustainable rate of increase.

[1:34:32] To be honest, I should have been more on top of this,

[1:34:36] that should have been having sustainability discussions before the tax increase was

[1:34:43] proposed, and frankly should have thought to look at that, take that way of looking at

[1:34:51] numbers before my subconscious told me about it four days ago. I think we're a

[1:35:00] little late on really looking at that and having those discussions but at this

[1:35:06] point I see three options before us. One we subsidize the library for a year while

[1:35:12] we address the sustainable sustainability concerns and agree that after those

[1:35:22] discussions and actions are taken into account that whatever tax increases needed to sustain

[1:35:31] what we come up with will be passed next year.

[1:35:39] We significantly damage what's been built by taking a hatchet to the library.

[1:35:45] We're going to, if we have significant cuts, we're going to lose some really good staff

[1:35:52] and a lot of institutional knowledge and just skill walked out the door and we're

[1:35:58] going to harm a regional relationships if we pull out of TLC.

[1:36:06] It is to Scott's

[1:36:10] point that it is reasonable to look at this as our partners subsidizing

[1:36:17] highland. If we

[1:36:22] are into this, we decide that we are just pulling out and causing a

[1:36:28] bunch of additional costs for them. It's hard to see that they are going to be

[1:36:31] interested in doing that with us again.

[1:36:38] The third option is adopting the tax

[1:36:40] increase and then working on sustainability.

[1:36:45] Personally, I can't support just

[1:36:46] tacking away at the great library that we've built. I think if we do that, we're

[1:36:53] leave scars at last for at least a decade.

[1:36:57] And to Bruce Smith's question, that's a catastrophe that I see.

[1:37:03] If we do nothing to increase the revenue to the library.

[1:37:10] My inner vacuum inclination is toward subsidizing

[1:37:16] the library for a year, working on having

[1:37:22] the discussions on how can we adjust things, how can we slow down that salary wage growth

[1:37:29] going forward.

[1:37:31] I have been consistently against subsidizing the library out of the general funds, so there

[1:37:37] are probably, let me count here,

[1:37:41] six people sitting right here for next to me, if you were shocked

[1:37:43] to see him, we just say that, but that's in a vacuum, there's real risk there.

[1:37:53] If we expand positions based on that, then we may need to cut them back next year.

[1:38:03] And staff is going to know that.

[1:38:07] And so we run the real risk of losing good staff in that year as they move to more stable locations elsewhere.

[1:38:21] That's probably the biggest risk in that approach.

[1:38:29] I'm still a little bit up in the air and I'm looking forward to hearing what the rest of my colleagues up here are thinking and having some discussion.

[1:38:39] I don't think that not injecting more revenue into the library is a viable option.

[1:38:48] and subsidizing the general fund is a short-term solution.

[1:38:55] Again, that may be my favorite short-term solution

[1:38:58] at the moment.

[1:39:01] Just taking a quick look through the notes they took.

[1:39:06] I already addressed what's catastrophic without this.

[1:39:17] When residents get to vote on the decision, if we pass this, then residents have the option

[1:39:25] of filing a referendum, trying to qualify that, get it on the ballot, and then vote on

[1:39:31] it then.

[1:39:31] That is the only option that the state provides.

[1:39:33] The state does not provide us the option to actively put it on a ballot.

[1:39:41] The attendance and visitors, Karen, Erin, one of you can correct me, but I am assuming

[1:39:49] that those are not de-duped numbers, the 8200 child activity visitors a year, that we

[1:39:59] We have not de-duped them, probably because we can't.

[1:40:01] We just don't know.

[1:40:03] Likewise, the 209 daily visitors, we can reasonably suspect it, and then they give

[1:40:10] them day.

[1:40:10] There's very little duplication, but day over day, no, those are not de-duped numbers.

[1:40:21] The benefits of the tax, I think, were largely covered in Aaron's presentation to me, the

[1:40:29] But the benefit of adding revenue to the library is that we don't, again, just take

[1:40:37] a hatchet to the really great library that the city is built.

[1:40:44] And the question about the public safety increase, the 23 to 36 percent, I'm going to have

[1:40:51] to dig in and look because I don't know what that is or where that comes from.

[1:40:55] But I will do so.

[1:40:59] Madam Mayor, that's it.

[1:41:05] I want to start by saying when I first came onto the council, I had my perception about

[1:41:13] libraries and my background actually had two books with humanitarian services for the

[1:41:22] Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints where we were able to put programs together

[1:41:28] to put books into developing countries. So books were important to me. I would go to Simon

[1:41:35] Schuster and say, you've got a revision of this book coming. What are you going to do with all

[1:41:41] the ones that are on palace that haven't gone out yet? Well, they donated them to us. And then we

[1:41:47] donated them to 122 developing countries. That background would think that my feeling about

[1:41:56] libraries would be very, very strong, but it wasn't. It was, what's the future? I don't know what

[1:42:03] the future of libraries are. And I literally would have, if you would have asked me, I would have

[1:42:11] said, I've been in ten years, there might not be very many libraries around. Well, I got on the council

[1:42:19] and one of, we go through orientation to learn about public safety, about the library, about all the

[1:42:26] different public works and everything we have to learn about. And the single,

[1:42:30] greatest enlightening I had was the library. I had no clue what the library did

[1:42:39] and the extent to which they didn't. It was by far, it took me from zero to

[1:42:48] a hundred in light speed. I was just shocked and delighted especially for the youth the story time

[1:42:58] that goes on. I mean the list of everything that they do is profound. So as an average citizen

[1:43:09] libraries I had a certain thought. Most of you here appear to support the library and what we've heard

[1:43:16] from has been very positive, and some who do not want to have a taxed increase, of course,

[1:43:23] but majority seems to favor an increase. I will say that there was something that was

[1:43:31] said tonight, and I appreciate everyone's perspective, whether it's pro or against,

[1:43:38] I appreciate your perspective and and it had to do with when you do this little small increase is two dollars and thirty eight cents a month

[1:43:49] but it's forever and

[1:43:51] that

[1:43:52] Really kind of struck me. I thought whoa that kind of is isn't it now? We did have two thousand and ten where we did a tax decrease

[1:44:00] Are we likely to do that again in the future probably not

[1:44:06] so that thought

[1:44:08] I had to struggle with sitting here while everybody else was talking, I'm going through my mind.

[1:44:17] What are we really doing with these funds and then I look at how specifically, and this is what I had to go through because that got my attention.

[1:44:31] It has to do with TLC and funding TLC.

[1:44:35] Do we want to discontinue that?

[1:44:37] We can, but I think it's been clear that Doug's told us what impact that's likely to

[1:44:42] have, and that's not a likely that will have a negative impact on our neighboring cities

[1:44:48] and libraries.

[1:44:49] We would not be seeing favorably if we did that.

[1:44:53] Libby.

[1:44:55] I used to say five of my seven fidgetes, Libby, and then my other two.

[1:45:00] Corrected me. Seven of my seven children use Libby. And if I leave here tonight and they tell me that I'm making a decision that will defund Libby for Highland, I have seven children that would be really upset with me.

[1:45:22] So having recognized that I'm on the board so I have gone through the budget process that

[1:45:30] we've talked about.

[1:45:31] Talk about fiscal responsibility.

[1:45:33] I can promise you that we've done everything we can to make sure that we can't just continue

[1:45:43] operating away.

[1:45:44] we can, that we are with the current funding, yet reality is we can't.

[1:45:49] We'd lose Libby, we'd lose TLC.

[1:45:52] We'd lose even more than that in reality.

[1:45:58] So there's no question in my mind that we're making the right decision.

[1:46:03] My vote will be yes, and it's not that I don't listen to or care about opposing views.

[1:46:14] I do and I understand them. Some of the people I respect the most has a different view and that's okay.

[1:46:24] But if we don't do this, we have one full-time employee. Now, how long can we really operate?

[1:46:34] Now, we haven't increased the taxes for the city, and we were able to take a part-time

[1:46:41] position that had eight different people in five years in that part-time position.

[1:46:50] Because part-time by nature is not consistent.

[1:46:55] How the library has been able to do it with 11 part-time people and one full-time people,

[1:47:02] I have no clue it's magical and that word was used and I believe it's accurate.

[1:47:10] Our library director before Donna and then now Karen have been magical with what they've

[1:47:16] been able to do with the budget because we on the board looked at it every month and we

[1:47:20] looked at it critically.

[1:47:23] Kevin Tam's comes with a really great background, West Warren has a great background in finance

[1:47:29] and really what can we do, and we've looked at all of it.

[1:47:33] I don't know how we could have done anything different than what we've done.

[1:47:39] We're just going from one full time to full two full time,

[1:47:43] then we're adding two part time, but one of those two part time is four hours of week.

[1:47:51] That's one tenth of a position.

[1:47:54] So it's not, when I come back to that question, that really kind of got my attention and

[1:48:03] caused me to really think, is this something we really can sustain?

[1:48:09] Do we want to make a commitment that's so permanent?

[1:48:12] The answer is yes.

[1:48:17] Thank you.

[1:48:18] Councilmember Rice.

[1:48:21] The only bill vote on this.

[1:48:22] I'd really like to go last with your permission, please.

[1:48:31] I love this process, the Truth and Taxation, and I love talking about taxes as a budget

[1:48:37] analyst for the governor's office.

[1:48:38] This is something that we look at daily and we try to assess what is the economic factors

[1:48:47] that we'll play into, what are taxes we're looking at for that year.

[1:48:51] When I ran for Highlands City Council, I never made a promise that I would not raise taxes.

[1:48:55] And in fact, I made a promise that I would lean more towards being a proactive government instead of reactive.

[1:49:02] And if you did ask me about taxes, I would say that I feel like taxes should be raised in concurrence with inflation.

[1:49:08] We talked about the last time that we raised taxes in Highlands to do that was 2006 and we lowered them in 2010.

[1:49:15] So what does that mean?

[1:49:18] We've talked about how a lot of people think that if your property value goes up, your taxes go up, that is not the case.

[1:49:28] So, for example, just talking about inflation from 2006 through 2025, the U.S. CPI increased about 59.9%.

[1:49:37] So, in other words, something that cost $100 in 2006, which is the last time we raised our taxes actually, cost about $160 today.

[1:49:46] today. So if Highland had simply kept the 2006 general rate and adjusted it for inflation,

[1:49:56] that equivalent rate today would be 0.00222. But the current general rate is 0.00643. So essentially,

[1:50:07] what does that mean? It merely means that with the 2006 tax rate, if you had merely kept pace with

[1:50:15] inflation. Highlands current general property tax rate is about 71% lower in

[1:50:21] real terms. So what I'm saying is that when we stay neutral, it doesn't mean

[1:50:31] that we are not raising taxes. It actually means that it is a slow cut and that's

[1:50:38] the design of truth and taxation and it's a great design. I love it because we

[1:50:42] to public input, and we get to sit here and listen to everyone, and there are remarks

[1:50:49] about this and be able to hold public hearings and information sessions, but there's also

[1:50:54] that pressure also of figuring out how do we reduce every single year, how we manage

[1:51:01] our city. Our stuff, our stuff wages are increasing. Yeah, we're not keeping up with that.

[1:51:09] You

[1:51:10] Or are we going to pay for that with, you know, roads costing, you know, $160 versus

[1:51:16] $100.

[1:51:18] That's again, we're looking at costs have increased and yet we have not increased our

[1:51:24] revenue as property taxes.

[1:51:29] When I hear concerns that the council reaches for tax increases, I want to let people know

[1:51:34] that it simply is not the case.

[1:51:36] We haven't.

[1:51:37] This is the first library tax increase ever in the history of this tax.

[1:51:41] And it's not the council looking for revenue.

[1:51:44] It's a council that has consistently looked for how we can make cuts every single year and

[1:51:51] make less, make more work for less.

[1:51:54] We don't take this lightly.

[1:51:56] This has been something that's been in the work and that's been talked about for the past

[1:52:00] five years.

[1:52:01] We have looked at grants.

[1:52:03] One of my jobs is working for the state.

[1:52:05] state is federal and state grants and looking for those and how we can provide those for

[1:52:11] the city.

[1:52:11] And I will tell you right now with federal cuts and state cuts, those grants are just

[1:52:15] not there anymore.

[1:52:17] And so the cities are taking on more burdens every single year.

[1:52:21] So not only are we taking upon us inflation compounded over a certain amount of time, but

[1:52:27] also every single year the legislator is giving us more things that we have to do without

[1:52:33] any funding sources every single year and then the federal government on top of that is passing

[1:52:39] on more things that we are required to do but without any funding sources. Utah State Library,

[1:52:47] Division Report Timeless spends about $17.50, $17.15 per resident library services statewide meeting

[1:52:56] is 36.62. We are well below the median. We're not asking to catch up. We don't do that

[1:53:04] with it, or even our staff wages. We've never asked to have them catch up to median.

[1:53:09] We are always saying how far below can we stay. Yet the library seeing rise in circulation

[1:53:16] in print and digital, grown turnout for programs. And it's just not the library of, it's not

[1:53:21] such as books, it's the program's also of the story time of the senior citizens of the

[1:53:27] families all across Highland that have brought us together.

[1:53:29] This is our community center.

[1:53:31] This is all that we have and the library has an exceptional job of it with less and less

[1:53:37] resources every single day, 71% less resources since 2006.

[1:53:44] And so that kind of brings us there tonight of this process is working exactly how it should

[1:53:49] be the truth and taxation process.

[1:53:51] Being able to hear the public notice, being able to receive emails about it, information

[1:53:57] sessions, and we listen, and we don't take that lightly.

[1:54:02] We look at the data we've done this, and after all of this, and listening to your feedback,

[1:54:09] I still believe the right step is for a library to increase those resources and to stop asking

[1:54:16] our staff to take 71% decrease, but not just increase, not just a neutral, just a slightly

[1:54:24] catch up.

[1:54:25] Thank you.

[1:54:27] Thank you.

[1:54:29] Councilmember Rice.

[1:54:30] Thank you.

[1:54:31] And I do appreciate all of you being here tonight.

[1:54:37] These are hard decisions, but I appreciate those of you who have been vocal here and email

[1:54:45] and phone calls to me. This isn't about me, but I didn't need to explain to you that when I was

[1:54:52] elected last November, I told the people that voted for me, that I would not vote for a property

[1:54:57] tax increase, and that also includes a bond, so I want you to understand that. I also want you

[1:55:05] to understand that I was a school teacher, a matter of fact, I was an armed junior, or excuse me,

[1:55:10] I was at Mount Ridge Junior when the library was at Mount Ridge, and I would go in when I was

[1:55:16] late at night, seven eight o'clock at night, and help her put books away. So this library

[1:55:22] has come a long way. I asked permission from Mr. and Mrs. Jackson. They were the very

[1:55:27] first ones to speak tonight. And they just moved here, if you recall, they just moved

[1:55:33] here from Tacoma, Washington about three months ago. My discussions with them have been somewhat

[1:55:39] interesting. He said that his taxes when they left were $1,400 a month a month.

[1:55:49] We cannot

[1:55:49] continue to raise taxes for every noble or worthy cause. That's his comment and it

[1:55:56] is also mine. Sure, this is a worthy cause. Yeah, I'm for the library too. But we cannot

[1:56:04] not do this and not have some problems down the road and you're about to get hit with

[1:56:12] some other things that I'm going to bring up in a moment.

[1:56:16] I heard somebody say the other night at the Thursday night meeting that Libby was free.

[1:56:21] It's not free and I think we need to do a better job of educating the public.

[1:56:24] I know people that love Libby.

[1:56:26] I have a sister who loves Libby.

[1:56:27] She lives in Boise, Idaho, but she loves it and I know that I have friends that love it.

[1:56:33] and I don't want that to go away either, but it's not free.

[1:56:44] I'm going to read part of this because I don't want to be misconstrued and I do have a copy for you, Stephanie, even a moment.

[1:56:52] I, too, have spoken with or received emails from approximately to at this point tonight and including you, 267 people who are against the tax and

[1:57:03] 65 people who are for the tax. Most of those individuals currently serve or have previously

[1:57:10] served on the library board of the City Council. I have never served on the library board.

[1:57:16] My responsibilities are in other places. This city has promoted this as a relatively small

[1:57:24] increase. However, my own property tax increase would be higher than the examples that have

[1:57:30] been presented. Since I'm the only no vote on the council, this tax increase will pass,

[1:57:36] but I want you to know a couple of things. On my property tax thing, that percentage reads 52.65

[1:57:44] percent increase, and you need to take a look at your percentages, please. My dad used to say,

[1:57:53] we dig our grave of debt one shovel full at a time. You're right, not a big tax increase,

[1:57:59] really isn't. But I want you to make sure that you're watching your percentages.

[1:58:05] So yeah, let's put this in perspective. I'm voting no for several reasons.

[1:58:11] Many Highland residents oppose this property tax increase.

[1:58:14] This is not an isolated group or simply an echo chamber on Facebook.

[1:58:19] These are residents from Clara Cross Highland, including people on fixed incomes

[1:58:23] and families who are already facing increasing financial pressures.

[1:58:28] They are not two income households.

[1:58:32] Many of them.

[1:58:33] I am a single household income.

[1:58:38] Okay?

[1:58:39] The library, I believe, has other financial resources available.

[1:58:43] The library has a foundation, along with reserve funds,

[1:58:46] that could help cover these expenses for at least a couple of years.

[1:58:51] In addition, the annual file and fling book sale generates revenue.

[1:58:54] paying benefits through to Utah retirement systems represents a significant long-term cost for

[1:59:03] Highland taxpayers. I was told that the City and Council did not want to pursue this proposal

[1:59:10] during an election year. We also have written grants. I know that they have, they've tried, they've

[1:59:18] look for them. That's probably true, which Karen has been a master at so far. I am concerned

[1:59:25] about people on six incomes. As mentioned above, we continue to raise taxes and fees

[1:59:30] on people who are already struggling to remain in their homes in Highland. You will be soon

[1:59:35] paying for pressurized irrigation. While this is not a property tax, it will result in a higher

[1:59:42] monthly utility costs. I expect those fees particularly during July and August to be considerably

[1:59:49] higher than what many residents currently anticipate. There are going to be some additional taxes

[1:59:56] is from the new Aspen School District.

[2:00:00] Based on the information I have received, this is at least a 20% increase. I hope I'm wrong on that, but that's what I've been told. I have personally supported the library. I donated part of my discretionary council funds to purchase a cover for the pickup truck used to transport books between American, Florida, Pleasant Grove, and Highland. While the consortium has increased library usage, I am not convinced that the arrangement has been entirely beneficial for Highland tax

[2:00:29] taxpayers. This property tax is permanent. One implemented taxes don't go away. We need

[2:00:38] to be more conservative and deliberate in our spending decisions. I am a true fiscal

[2:00:44] conservative. While many people hold library cards including myself, not all want the tax

[2:00:51] increase. Community programs can often be funded through partnerships. I believe that the city

[2:00:57] She should explore additional partnerships with local businesses before asking residents

[2:01:01] to pay higher taxes.

[2:01:06] I love our new events coordinator.

[2:01:08] She is a full-time person.

[2:01:10] I have worked with her on the America 250 and the fling.

[2:01:14] And the last month, she's really awesome.

[2:01:17] And I think we did an amazing job on the colonial village and everything that we did.

[2:01:23] However, I am aggressively concerned that our events coordinator who is full-time will be running

[2:01:30] programs for the library. So the city will be paying for a third full-time employee for

[2:01:34] the library. I'm not saying this is going on now, but that needs to be separated.

[2:01:41] Current

[2:01:41] library tax revenues should be sufficient. I expected to see a proposal that included compromises,

[2:01:47] such as adjusted hours, or other cost-saving measures. While some elected officials point out

[2:01:54] that Highland has not raised property taxes in several years, we also face other higher priority

[2:01:59] infrastructure and community needs that will require attention in the near future.

[2:02:06] We cannot continue increasing taxes simply again because this is a worthwhile cause.

[2:02:15] I am really disappointed that what I believe are reasonable fiscal concerns have not received

[2:02:22] more greater consideration by the Highlands City Council.

[2:02:25] I also want you to understand that American Four Library had to cut hours.

[2:02:31] They reduced their hours, yes, they did reduce their hours, and they had one

[2:02:37] person that retired and they did not replace that retirement person in order to

[2:02:43] cut personnel costs. So I want you to be aware of those things and pleasant

[2:02:48] growth also had to cut a few hours. So my vote is no. I believe I've laid out

[2:02:53] sufficient reasons why that vote is known. I do believe that what Miss Walker said, I don't

[2:03:00] mean to call you out. It's your last name, Walker. I beg your pardon. Yes, our career, the career,

[2:03:05] but I beg your pardon. It is a slippery slope. I would agree with that very much, but I appreciate

[2:03:15] serving for highland all of highland and I want you to know that this is a

[2:03:23] really big concern for me and it should be for you as well. That's all I have

[2:03:27] thank you. Okay, thank you. I'm gonna just say a couple of things. First off I

[2:03:34] want you to know what a fantastic council you have and I think that the fact that

[2:03:38] we may think differently on this issue doesn't change the amount of concern that

[2:03:43] we have about the residents and doesn't change whether we're physically conservative or not.

[2:03:48] We are all doing the best we can and making the best decisions that we can.

[2:03:53] I do not believe it's in our best interest to do bad policy which to me would be taking

[2:04:00] money out of our general fund to subsidize the library.

[2:04:04] To me that idea like then is that we have all this money in our general fund that we could

[2:04:09] take to use the library.

[2:04:11] We don't have that money because we've cut back everywhere we can.

[2:04:16] I think it's bad policy to rely on volunteers, donations, or grants when we've been looking

[2:04:22] for that for the past since I've been on the council six years and have done everything

[2:04:28] that we can to do that.

[2:04:31] Again, this isn't something, the truth and taxation process started earlier this spring but

[2:04:36] this is not something that we started talking about this spring or last month.

[2:04:40] This is something that's been talked about for a really, really long time.

[2:04:46] I also just would like to say thank you to everybody who came and shared their perspective.

[2:04:52] I think it was a great meeting and everybody was super respectful, which I really appreciate.

[2:04:59] I think a lot of other issues were brought up, things about our public safety, things about

[2:05:03] our general fund encroachment.

[2:05:05] I was super interested, but that got brought up.

[2:05:07] But I would love to talk to any of you about any of those things.

[2:05:12] If you want my phone number, I'm happy to give it to you.

[2:05:14] I'm happy to talk to you anytime and I think the other council members are to you on all

[2:05:19] of those issues.

[2:05:19] And I would encourage everybody to remain engaged.

[2:05:23] And if this is something you care about, volunteer at the library.

[2:05:26] Help us look for donations, help us look for grants, participate in the book sale at the

[2:05:32] Highland Sling.

[2:05:32] I think there are lots of ways that we can all participate.

[2:05:36] The last thing, and then I'll turn it over to Council for a motion or further discussion

[2:05:41] is I would also like you to know how proactive your Council has been in some of the other

[2:05:50] boards that they sit on.

[2:05:51] So some of the things you may not see or that are visible, we have our TSSD, where our

[2:05:58] see where it goes. We have our garbage. We have our public safety that is separate raises.

[2:06:04] We have our 9-1-1. There are a lot of different boards that these council members sit on and

[2:06:09] I want you to know that at every single meeting they go to, they are fighting for you and they

[2:06:14] are pushing back on those, you know, what are called small increases, but they are working

[2:06:19] every day to save you money in every way that they can. And I just want to acknowledge that because

[2:06:25] I think there's a lot of work that goes on

[2:06:26] with our Council and it's appreciated.

[2:06:30] That's really all I had to say.

[2:06:33] So if there's further discussion,

[2:06:35] I'm happy to take that.

[2:06:36] I'm also happy to entertain a motion.

[2:06:45] I've just got a couple,

[2:06:49] one point and then a question perhaps,

[2:06:53] maybe two questions.

[2:06:56] If first on, we had heard that folks didn't want

[2:07:01] I have this issue come up during an election year.

[2:07:05] If you all were listening to me, that's actually my first choice.

[2:07:09] In fact, having it come up during an election year, because putting it off

[2:07:13] a year before doing it, it puts it smack dab in the middle of an election year.

[2:07:22] With regard to the one year subsidy out of the general fund,

[2:07:32] I do have some concerns about that approach in some of the risk that we have.

[2:07:38] How would you characterize the risk to long-term stability in the library if we were to go

[2:07:47] that route to use one-time money to bridges for a year during which year we really

[2:07:58] We work to look at what we can do to restructure something to bring down that rate of salary

[2:08:08] and wage increase with a commitment that whatever we come up with at the end of that year,

[2:08:16] we would be raising the library tax to what's needed there, which hopefully would be at least

[2:08:23] a little bit less than what we're talking about now.

[2:08:25] but what would you see as the risk there?

[2:08:37] I would say the risk to that would be the uncertainty

[2:08:41] for an additional year.

[2:08:43] I think that you mentioned previously,

[2:08:46] Council Member Courtney, about what will that do

[2:08:49] for our staff, long-term will they want to stay?

[2:08:53] As we've discussed tonight, one of the things

[2:08:57] that this would do would be to transition one position from part time to full time.

[2:09:02] I would, as a staff member, I would feel apprehensive.

[2:09:07] I would caution against making that type of a move with funding that is not consistent

[2:09:17] and certain.

[2:09:19] And so it would be, of course, that's the council's decision ultimately.

[2:09:23] So it was said by multiple people tonight that while some members of the public may just

[2:09:32] be learning about this discussion, it's been going on for a number of years and so my

[2:09:38] concern would be more additional uncertainty for a longer period of time.

[2:09:43] Financially, the general fund budget could do it for a year to use one-time monies to do

[2:09:48] it and still stay within a range that staff would feel comfortable from a rainy day standpoint.

[2:09:54] It's the intangible concerns that I would worry about.

[2:10:01] And just as a budget analyst for the state, we would never use one time running for

[2:10:05] ongoing projects for your creating structural deficits.

[2:10:09] So I would never vote for that.

[2:10:14] That's all I have, Madam Mayor.

[2:10:20] Okay.

[2:10:21] I can have further discussion or I'm happy to entertain a motion either way.

[2:10:24] I

[2:10:32] move the City Council approve the resolution adopting the fiscal year 2026, 2027 certified tax rate of 0.00775 which includes a 0.00630 for city operations and 0.00145 for library operations.

[2:11:01] That was a motion by Councilmember Campbell, and now we're looking for a second.

[2:11:09] I'll second it.

[2:11:11] That was a second by Councilmember Smith, and we are ready for electronic voting, or

[2:11:16] we voice voting, Erin.

[2:11:18] Electronic voting.

[2:11:19] You're electronic.

[2:11:19] Not perfect.

[2:11:20] Thank you.

[2:11:35] That passes.

[2:11:37] Four to one.

[2:11:39] Thank you.

[2:11:40] And again, thank you, everybody, for coming.

[2:11:43] I think even if we end up with different points of view at the end of the day, I think

[2:11:48] you've given us a lot of really good information and things to think about and things to consider

[2:11:53] as we go forward.

[2:11:55] And I know that I will take that seriously and I'm sure the council will as well.

[2:12:02] If there's any specific issue, feel free to call us, email us, we would all love to talk

[2:12:06] about it.

[2:12:07] That being said, we can move on to item 1B.

[2:12:11] This is a public hearing as well, so there will be more time for comment.

[2:12:15] This is the adoption of the fiscal year 2026, 2027, final budget.

[2:12:20] Erin, that's over to you.

[2:12:22] Thank you, Madam Mayor. I only have this slide.

[2:12:24] So this summarizes the changes from the interim budget that was approved in June to the final budget before you.

[2:12:33] The only changes have to do with the library property tax that we just discussed.

[2:12:38] We did some slide adjustments based on updated numbers from the state, which we previously

[2:12:43] talked about in which we put in our impact schedule.

[2:12:46] And then secondly, the state required us to essentially set up some holding accounts

[2:12:50] until the council made the final decision at the Truth and Taxation meeting.

[2:12:53] And so those accounts have been removed, again, have been removed pending the potential decision

[2:13:03] on this.

[2:13:03] So those are the only changes in the budget from what you saw in June to what is in part

[2:13:07] of you tonight.

[2:13:12] So just in summary, this budget contemplates the tax increase having passed, which just

[2:13:19] occurred.

[2:13:21] Okay.

[2:13:22] Thank you.

[2:13:23] And I am so sorry, Erin.

[2:13:25] I neglected to do this earlier, but thank you so much to staff for all of the work you and

[2:13:30] David.

[2:13:31] Jay has been amazing.

[2:13:33] Karen has been fantastic, and we appreciate everything you do.

[2:13:36] So, this process is laborious for you all, and it's appreciated.

[2:13:41] All right, let's move on.

[2:13:43] The budget is something we've talked about several times, but let's go back to Council

[2:13:47] and see if there's any further comment, and let's start with you, Council Member Courtney.

[2:13:54] No, this is essentially the same budget that we have looked at in the past just with those

[2:13:58] minor tweaks.

[2:13:59] So, after we have the public hearing, I'm ready to vote on it.

[2:14:03] Okay.

[2:14:03] We're going to take quick comments, and actually, you know what, you're right.

[2:14:06] Let's go let's go to our public hearing and then we'll see if we have anybody online. So we'll go ahead and open the public hearing and

[2:14:12] This is for our adoption of the 2026 2027 budget

[2:14:19] Would anybody like to comment? Hey,

[2:14:24] I don't see anyone Jay. Is there anybody online who would like to comment?

[2:14:27] No, there's not hey, we can close the public hearing and move on to council member Campbell

[2:14:35] Excuse me as a council. We've kind of lived in breeds

[2:14:38] this for the last number of months. I don't think there's any part of it that I haven't gone through.

[2:14:48] And I support the work we've done. I've support the work that the staff has done. I appreciate David's

[2:14:54] diligence and adjusting things as we ask the...

[2:15:00] May be adjusted, and I fully support this budget. Council Member Rice. I still stand by everything

[2:15:09] I said before, and I don't have any further comment. Thank you. Council Member Radella.

[2:15:14] No comment. We've gone over it a bunch, so I don't have anything else. And Council Member Smith.

[2:15:21] Well, we've passed the general budget back in June, and we just had to do the truth and

[2:15:32] I just wanted to express my appreciation one for everybody that came and gave us a lot

[2:15:39] of interesting ideas and comments and certainly I think of things differently than I did

[2:15:44] when I walked in this room, so I really appreciate that.

[2:15:48] I appreciate the comments that every council member has made.

[2:15:52] I think everyone made some interesting points.

[2:15:56] Doug, you're always so thorough.

[2:15:58] And my goodness, Liz, you had a very thorough presentation.

[2:16:03] And I was impressed with all the stats and statistics

[2:16:06] that Kim had and all the things that Ron did.

[2:16:10] So I really appreciate this been a long process.

[2:16:14] I think we worked together as a council.

[2:16:16] Every council I've been on works hard

[2:16:18] to keep our costs low in this city.

[2:16:21] I think we run it very efficiently, or there are ways we can improve, of course.

[2:16:25] And we all work, as you mentioned, to try to keep our costs down through the special service

[2:16:29] districts and things.

[2:16:31] So I just wanted to thank everyone for all their work and their comments.

[2:16:35] And I just think it's been good to hear what everybody's had to say.

[2:16:41] Okay.

[2:16:42] Thank you.

[2:16:43] If there's no further discussion, we can head for a motion.

[2:16:55] I'll make that motion.

[2:16:57] Is that okay?

[2:16:57] Yes, please. Okay. I move that the Highland City Council approve the ordinance adopting the Highland City

[2:17:03] fiscal year 2026 2027 final budget as discussed. I'll second. That was a motion by council member Smith and a second by council member

[2:17:12] Brogela and we can move on to a vote.

[2:17:36] Okay, and that passes of four to one and

[2:17:39] With that, I think that's all we have on our agenda for tonight. I move that we adjourn

[2:17:48] Perfect and all those in favor. I perfect. Thank you all for coming

City Council Meeting - Truth in Taxation Hearing

Transcript