[0:00] It's now called the order, Maria. Would you please call roll?

[0:04] I'm here. I'm here. Council member Lofon. Here.

[0:07] Vice Mayor McClure.

[0:08] Here. Council member Brown.

[0:10] I'm here. Council member Benning.

[0:12] Here. Council member Pothia.

[0:14] There. May orately. I'm here. Thank you.

[0:16] Thank you. We do have a full forum. Thank you much.

[0:19] Your town council provides opportunity for the public to speak during tonight's meeting.

[0:24] Please fill out a request to speak card, located near the entrance of the community

[0:28] chambers and return this card to the box. And it will be provided to the town clerk during

[0:33] the corresponding agenda item. You will be called to the podium limited to three minutes,

[0:38] only one comment, either in person or via email, per person, per agenda item will be allowed.

[0:44] Please ensure that the topics are within the town's purview. The town council is very appreciative

[0:50] of the honor to serve and appreciate the engagement and feedback from the public. This evening,

[0:56] we are honored to have the Queen Creek Fire and Medical Department with us and they will be presenting

[1:02] the colors for the pledge of allegiance if you would please stand. Gentlemen, would you please

[1:07] provide the colors?

[1:55] Please sit.

[2:03] When you in the pledge of allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the

[2:15] individual with liberty and justice for all.

[2:20] Hold up.

[2:48] Please be seated.

[2:55] This evening, we have President Ken Black.

[2:57] He is the Sanket Counselor for the Queen Creek Frontier

[3:00] State from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

[3:03] That will be providing the invocation for us this evening.

[3:06] Thank you so much for joining us, Ken.

[3:15] Our God and eternal Father in heaven.

[3:17] We come before the inhumility tonight with gratitude in our hearts for the abundance of blessings that does bestowed upon us.

[3:26] We're grateful for the opportunity and blessing of living in this community.

[3:32] For the abundance and freedoms and opportunities that we enjoy in this great land.

[3:38] We're grateful for our country to which we have pledged our allegiance.

[3:43] We're grateful for the opportunity to seek life and liberty and pursuit of lasting happiness.

[3:53] We're grateful for those who contribute so much to our community and make this a wonderful place to live.

[4:01] We invoke our blessings at this time on our town council members and our mayor.

[4:06] That they'll be blessed as they continue in their service and strive to build and strengthen the individuals and families of our community and the community as a whole.

[4:20] We pray particularly for they help tonight as they meet in council. We pray that we might be united as a community and as a country.

[4:31] We pray that if we disagree, we might do so without being disagreeable.

[4:37] We again express our gratitude for all that does given to us, and we do so in the name

[4:42] of Jesus Christ, amen.

[4:45] Thank you so much for being here and for that beautiful blessing.

[4:48] We do appreciate it.

[4:50] The next item on the agenda is ceremonial matters in the month of September.

[4:55] The town council has issued a proclamation recognizing suicide.

[5:00] Decide prevention awareness month. The town council is wearing purple and teal, ribbons tonight to bring awareness. If you or a loved one need help, please call 988. The town also recognize QC neighborly week and will be celebrating on our 37th anniversary, which is September 5th. Just a few moments ago, we have the honor of having the colors presented for our pledge of allegiance by the newly created Queen Creek Fire Medical.

[5:30] guard and to give a brief introduction of this group, I would like to welcome Queen Creek Fire

[5:36] Medical Assistant Chief Andy Malar.

[5:40] Thank you so much for being here, Andy.

[5:49] Good evening, Mayor and Council for the record, Andy Malar, Assistant Fire Chief.

[5:53] The honor guard was formed in 2025, the seven founding members have spent the last year

[5:59] so training with the Central Arizona Fire and Medical Department honor guard and they are

[6:04] very proud and very dedicated to the service of the honor guard.

[6:07] The honor guard's goal and their mission is to represent the department, present the

[6:13] colors, retire the colors.

[6:15] But their main mission is to honor the fallen firefighters and their families, and that's

[6:20] a mission that they take very, very seriously.

[6:24] Again, it's an odd, they train all the time, and it's an ongoing mission.

[6:28] And with that, any questions?

[6:31] questions from Council. They did a fantastic job this evening. Thank you so much. I kind

[6:36] of want to have them do it every council meeting. I know that would be a lot to have.

[6:41] And you have your own duties, but we do appreciate you when we can have you here and for

[6:46] all you do for the community. So thank you. Thank you so much. Oh, and we would love to have

[6:51] a photo with the council if you don't mind coming forward.

[7:26] Thank you

[8:56] again. Our Sanket ceremonial

[8:58] this evening as a recognition of a program known as cities empowered against sexual exploitation or cease.

[9:05] Employees from the town have completed training to become designated as a cease community.

[9:11] This is the third year that the town staff has completed its designation.

[9:15] This important training is presented by the Arizona anti-trafficking network,

[9:20] and we are excited to have their organization in attendance with us this evening.

[9:24] I would like to first, I'm going to turn over to Councilmember Mark No.

[9:30] really quick. She works in that she does a fantastic job in this industry and

[9:36] bringing awareness and so I just want to give her a few minutes.

[9:40] Really quick before I know they're going to come up.

[9:42] This is the other part of my life.

[9:44] So I'm on Council, but I've talked about that often.

[9:47] My other job is working for it is on anti-trafficking network and I couldn't be more proud.

[9:51] And I just want to thank our staff, our town staff,

[9:55] we're going through this training.

[9:56] It is so, so important.

[9:58] And I hope that you never have to...

[10:02] Thank you for being here this evening.

[10:30] We're both going to do team do this.

[10:33] Thank you, Mayor and Council.

[10:35] Good evening.

[10:35] My name is John Mayza, and I serve as the President and CEO of there's an anti-trafficking network.

[10:41] This is Stacey Sutherland, who is our trust director, one of the fine organizations within AATN.

[10:48] First of all, I'd like to thank Mayor Wheatley, Town Manager, Gardner, police chief,

[10:52] Bryce, and the entire town council for inviting us to be here this evening

[10:56] to recognize an important accomplishment.

[10:58] Tonight, we are proud to announce that the Tonic Queen Creek has earned its cease-designation

[11:03] for the third consecutive year.

[11:06] C stands for cities and power against sexual exploitation.

[11:10] It is a program of theirs on anti-trafficking network that partners with local governments

[11:15] to ensure their communities and are prepared to recognize, report, and respond to human trafficking.

[11:22] Our vision is to build a strong network of informed, equipped, and engage communities

[11:27] throughout Arizona. Human trafficking can happen in any community, no matter where someone lives,

[11:34] these crimes can affect individuals, families, neighborhoods, and a profound and lasting way.

[11:39] The reality is difficult, but it is not hopeless. Cities and towns have meaningful and practical ways to make a difference at the local level.

[11:48] Seas is designed to provide these tools. It begins with education and training. Then turns that awareness into action.

[11:55] We provide human trafficking training and resources for employees at every level of government,

[12:01] helping them recognize warning signs, understand how to report concerns, and to take

[12:07] part and see something say something approach to prevention.

[12:11] To earn the cease designation, an organization must train at least 75% of its staff, commit

[12:17] to annual retraining, and incorporate human trafficking education into new employee onboarding.

[12:24] The Tata Kring Creek has not only met those requirements, it has continued to exceed them.

[12:30] The town has recently reached nearly 100% of their employees participation.

[12:35] Once again, demonstrating an exceptional commitment to protecting the community and standing

[12:39] with victims of exploitation.

[12:42] This achievement would not have been possible without the leadership and support of Mayor

[12:46] Wheatley, Town Manager Gardner, Police Chief Bryce, and the entire town council.

[12:51] and all the dedicated employees of the Town of Queen Creek.

[12:55] Thank you for making this work a priority and for leading by example.

[12:59] On behalf of the Arizona Anti-Traffic in Network,

[13:02] it is my honor and privilege to present to you this plaque to the Town of Queen Creek

[13:06] in recognition of your continued cease designation.

[13:10] We applaud your commitment to helping end human trafficking in Arizona

[13:14] and made this plaque service reminder of the victims in our community

[13:18] whom we strive to protect and support and may it also remind us that no one person, no

[13:24] one department, or city, can address this issue alone. It will take all of us, working

[13:30] together, to create an Arizona where no one is bought, sold, or exploited. Thank you so much.

[13:37] Thank you. We appreciate you being here this evening and I would like to invite Council

[13:41] and to take a photo with you. Thank you.

[15:37] At least we had to say seated for the rest of the meeting. Next we will have our committee reports and those will be displayed on the screen. That's what's been keeping this council busy in between our last council meeting.

[15:52] Do any council members wish to comment on any of the items listed on the committee report screen.

[15:59] If there are none, then we will move on to Town Committee reports.

[16:03] Today we are joined with the Queen Creek Chamber of Commerce, and this is an outside partner

[16:12] agency, and I'd love to welcome our Queen Creek President and CEO Chris Clark, and he's

[16:18] going to provide us with that update.

[16:20] Thanks for being here today, Chris.

[16:22] Thank you Mayor Wheatley. Members of the Council are to believe that it's a whole

[16:28] another year, but here we are. We're going to go through this fast. I know you

[16:32] have lots of business today, but the Queen Creek Chamber of Commerce is a

[16:37] membership based non-profit corporation. Our Chamber Board of Directors provides

[16:43] financial oversight and strategic direction. And in fact, our Chamber is made up

[16:50] over 40 volunteers and four times four full-time staff members now. But that's what it takes

[16:58] to keep it running along with all of our interns as well. At the end of business on June 30th,

[17:06] which was our fiscal year, we had 298 members, which was about a 10% increase over the last time

[17:12] that I was here. But you'll see in a couple of slides coming forward that we're actually sitting

[17:18] at 310 now, just in the last six weeks and over the last couple of days, we've added even

[17:25] more.

[17:25] So we're reaching the stage where we're getting critical mass there.

[17:29] But they go from solopreneurs and the smallest businesses that you can imagine to a large

[17:36] scale industrial clients now at this point.

[17:40] So we're seeing more and more of them coming to us and that's good for the community.

[17:47] We divide our work up into three key areas.

[17:50] Queen Creek Connects, Queen Creek Works, and Queen Creek Leads.

[17:54] Connect is all about relationships and visibility.

[17:57] Develop is all about workforce and business capacity and lead is our advocacy and civic

[18:03] influence.

[18:06] On our Queen Creek Connects, it's all about building relationships and increasing visibility

[18:11] and welcoming new voices to the community, to the chamber, but particularly the business

[18:18] community and we're working hard this upcoming year in creating a true business community

[18:23] feel. We've reached the point now where it's easy to come to town and not know people,

[18:30] not just as a resident, but as a business owner. And we have a lot of businesses that have

[18:36] lot of synergy, and we've been busy putting them together.

[18:40] So building relationships, increasing visibility,

[18:42] and welcoming the new voices, doesn't necessarily mean

[18:44] an attendance of an event, either.

[18:47] There's many, many ways for them to participate

[18:50] because we realize everybody is going to have different needs

[18:53] and abilities to get out based on their type of business.

[18:58] Explore Queen Creek is an important part of Queen Creek

[19:01] Next, recently, Explore Queen Creek has gone viral, as you would say, with our social media platforms.

[19:11] We've hit critical mass there as well.

[19:13] Mondays post, I had 42,000 views, 1,200 likes, 1,600 shares.

[19:22] Restaurant Week, which is a part of Explore Queen Creek, 476,000 views.

[19:28] Several of the videos that were involved in Restaurant Week had over 100,000 views just on their own.

[19:38] So those total views were of the whole campaign, individual videos can have their own measurements as well.

[19:45] But it's all about reaching the residents, reaching visitors, supporting tourism, day trips, and as well as those people coming to town through the airport.

[19:54] I'm promoting members, but we promote non-members on Explore Queen Creek as well.

[20:00] But we're doing our best to tell the story of Queen Creek. The new magazine will be out at the beginning of the year, perhaps before the holidays, and will be redesigned. So, be looking for that. But it goes into a lot more about what makes the towns economy work and how to find things and do things now.

[20:23] We have an oversized social media presence on our chamber, as well, so we are just short

[20:30] of Chandler, these numbers are a little outdated, we've closed the gap, but can't quite

[20:36] get there, but we're working on it, and we intend to get there soon. But that would be just

[20:41] on our Facebook page combined. We have over 30,000 followers on all of our platforms.

[20:54] Queen Creek leads. We have a robust advocacy program and it's built on regional cooperation.

[21:04] I serve as the chair of the legislative committee this year for the East Valley Chamber of Commerce Alliance.

[21:13] We have our Arizona Chamber executives as well, which is the state organization.

[21:20] I'm on the board of directors for that.

[21:23] And we have ACCE, which is our national organization, and I'm on the membership and development there as well,

[21:29] so that we have presence at all the levels.

[21:32] But this year is going to be particularly interesting as some chambers are lining up for zoning changes

[21:39] in order to address affordable housing and their opinion in their community while looking

[21:45] for it to be a statewide thing, whereas the EVCCA and Queen Creek Chamber in particular

[21:51] are fighting very hard for local control.

[21:56] Queen Creek Works is our economic development through workforce development, so we had a recent

[22:08] Copa at work had 130 people come through 20 companies participate. We were limited in space

[22:16] and had many hires out of that. Nothing but positive feedback. In fact, we've been asked to do

[22:23] two more in the upcoming year. So that will become a regular thing as well as our student chamber,

[22:31] BZE4T, all of the things that you have come to know, but we've expanded those to include our employers and a regional effort where we're working with the Chandler Chamber and the Gilbert Chamber with all of the CTE directors for all of the districts from basically I tend to Kenworthy and trying to line up industry needs with those CTE programs.

[23:01] Some of the things on Queen Creek leads that are going to be important water infrastructure transportation, all of the things that are important to you

[23:08] And that you work at with your lobbyists. We work with your inner gov as well as our lobbyists.

[23:18] Our primary way of talking to our businesses is through some surveys face to face as well as phone interviews and polling.

[23:29] And what we find through those business interviews, inflation and cost spikes this year have been top of mind.

[23:39] Once again though, they're rating the country's economy as poor to average, whereas Queen Creek is rated as very strong or booming.

[23:54] So, it's a wide discrepancy, and again, I tell you every year it's thanks to your planning and

[24:00] executing of those plans. People feel that Queen Creek has strong momentum. We are running into growth problems.

[24:10] There aren't room to, there isn't room to expand, there isn't room to get small office space,

[24:16] even the ones that have been built have been leased out.

[24:20] And so redevelopment is also occurring for some of these smaller buildings, but those

[24:27] one-off projects are running into difficulties.

[24:30] And so that's something that we work with the town.

[24:32] When we identify a problem like that, we take it to the appropriate town department and

[24:37] see what can be done to work on those for the business community.

[24:41] We have a great relationship and town management has been exceptionally helpful in those

[24:46] regards.

[24:48] All right, so we have four main pillars that we use to guide all of our work, before we take on a new project we run it through these pillars and filters to make sure that we have the

[25:00] And capacity to do it, and that it's going to be meaningful. And we work on the business climate, regional cooperation, and member value.

[25:12] In this particular year, we're talking about building relationships, sharing issues, and expertise, volunteering, sponsoring, or serving,

[25:21] some of those ways that I talked about showing up that doesn't necessarily involve attending and

[25:28] referring businesses and growing the chamber further. Our goal would be to close the gap on

[25:34] some of the largest chambers in the East Valley. So it's been a great year. We thank you for

[25:41] your support and your guidance for the town and keeping it a friendly business environment. Thank you

[25:54] Councilmember Brown.

[25:55] Thanks, Mayor.

[25:56] Thanks, Chris.

[25:57] To you and staff for all that you do for our business community.

[26:01] I'm appreciative of the events, especially the QC luncheon, the QC chamber luncheon.

[26:07] If you could, maybe do a shout out for your next upcoming event.

[26:13] Take to put you on spot, but let's get the word out, right?

[26:16] And we appreciate it.

[26:18] And hopefully, I don't say hopefully.

[26:20] I know that most of the chamber members that I hear from are glad that we are at support

[26:27] of as a council and as a municipality of our business environment and total as we are.

[26:35] Our next event is September 8th coming right back from the break. We go straight to the luncheon,

[26:43] which is now a huge production and I believe that this one will be featuring mag and talking

[26:50] about transportation, October one coming up will be the town and a town management

[26:56] talking about all the great things that have occurred this year, and we'll follow that

[27:01] up with a school look, in November we'll be looking at all the school districts in the area

[27:09] and talking about some of the problems that are making headlines and what's actually happening

[27:15] here in our backyard.

[27:19] Excellent. Thank you again, Chris. Oh, Brian is on there. Okay.

[27:22] Vice Mayor McClir.

[27:23] I'll be quick.

[27:25] No, as a small business owner and who's been a member of the Chamber since 2009, I just want

[27:29] to thank you for the tremendous work your team does for the business community and preparing

[27:34] our youth as our future workforce.

[27:37] It's been a pleasure to work with you and see the influence that you've had on the

[27:41] community so keep up the great work.

[27:45] And when we're coming from Council Member Brown?

[27:46] One more.

[27:47] We have a lot of young people in the audience.

[27:49] you mentioned earlier e4T, which is Elevate for tomorrow, if you can just briefly explain what

[27:55] that is for those in attendance here. Elevate for tomorrow is a half day conference for

[28:00] juniors coming up a typically on the first Friday in January so that we can take over ASU

[28:05] Polly Tech's campus when they're on break and our students have just come back. We typically have

[28:11] about 800 students and it is excellent for career exploration as well as hearing from some

[28:17] younger folks that have already started their journey and have already been on twists and turns

[28:22] because we really want young people to understand the concept of failing forward, failing quickly,

[28:31] and to not be afraid of the twists and turns that are coming.

[28:35] And for those in attendance, if they want to know more about elevator 4 tomorrow for the next event, how do they get involved?

[28:42] You can find that information at queencreatechamber.com, but also through your schools.

[28:48] And so all of the juniors in your English classes will get information about that.

[28:52] That's not just Queencreate Unified.

[28:54] It's also Combs, Higley, Castile through Chandler Unified, ALA, Ridgeview, and a few other charter schools as well.

[29:06] Thank you.

[29:06] Thank you again, Chris.

[29:08] Thank you, Mayor.

[29:09] Thank you, council members.

[29:11] Our second presentation is from the Queen Creek Cultural Foundation, so I'd like to welcome

[29:15] the director of the Queen Creek Performing Arts Center, Molly Jacobs.

[29:23] Hello.

[29:24] Thank you for having me, Mayor, Vice Mayor, Town Council members, Town Manager, and everyone

[29:29] in attendance.

[29:31] I am so honored to be here.

[29:33] I love what I get to do.

[29:34] We have been here 23 years.

[29:37] Arts in our area.

[29:39] I think are doing great, and a lot of that is because of this incredible oops, which way

[29:45] do I go?

[29:46] There we go.

[29:47] Sorry.

[29:49] Let me try that again.

[29:50] Because of our incredible partnership between the school district and the town, and we just

[29:56] really appreciate what you guys do.

[29:58] And...

[30:00] I wanted to do something more theatrical to start off with, we talked about social media, we've had 14 million impressions on TikTok.

[30:10] All together, it's actually been more, if you see, when they've sliced this in, it's been more like 80 million.

[30:18] But this is a little something that was from the Queen Creek Performing Arts Center and went viral.

[30:27] Anybody has seen it?

[30:31] Yeah.

[30:33] That's actually the Clean Creek Performing Arts Center.

[30:38] So I'm going to stop it, because that's every night of the show that they did.

[30:42] It's sorry.

[30:46] There are so many things that we, I'm going to go to this one.

[30:52] So our goals with the town is to help economic support economic development, but also

[30:58] bring the arts to the community. With the school district, we try to take care of all their

[31:03] events and also again provide an audience for the future. The arts are in a bad way. There's

[31:11] a lot of ways we're not being supported like we used to. That's okay. There's, you know, new challenges

[31:16] everywhere, but not in our town and not through our school district. So we really appreciate that

[31:24] And it shows up by the people that come.

[31:27] This year, we hosted 450 events.

[31:31] I know.

[31:32] So I know you're thinking you do more than two events a day.

[31:36] Yes, because we have church on Sunday too.

[31:39] That's just, I mean, our goal is to provide opportunities

[31:43] anywhere and everywhere.

[31:47] We had over 250,000 people.

[31:51] Guys, when we do a dance recital, I don't know if you've

[31:53] driven by on a weekend. There's up to 10,000 people that will go through that building in those days.

[32:01] So it's pretty impressive. During COVID, we realized how important mental health was with

[32:08] everybody, not just teens, not just younger, but everybody. And so a real focus of ours

[32:14] became to about installing confidence, self-esteem, work and work ethic, all of those things.

[32:21] And we just did a show called Camp Rock with about 60 amazing kids.

[32:28] I'm going to show you just a little clip.

[32:30] I was going to have them come and do it for you,

[32:35] but this is just a small bit of the cast.

[32:38] But again, when you're in that, when you're in that arena to see how hard these kids work,

[32:46] I don't have to tell them to work hard.

[32:49] That's their work ethic.

[32:50] And that is a life skill that's a life long lesson, so we appreciate that you have given us the opportunity to continue.

[32:59] Our community theater ranges from 7 to 107.

[33:05] We produce 7 shows a year, which is a lot.

[33:10] And for the first time ever, if you knew theater, it's almost like being a theater company and a performing arts center, which is kind of fun.

[33:16] and drum roll please. My own little drum roll. For the first time we are doing a senior

[33:24] show, which is 55 and above. Because just because you get a little older doesn't mean

[33:30] you're not fun and still can't, you know, get out there. Right Robin?

[33:38] So that is a show

[33:40] we have coming up. Also, just recently, how you can tell the level of the quality of

[33:46] shows. We just got 22 nominations in the Arizona Awards. Two of them were for best over all show.

[33:53] One was for our school performances that we do with all the schools. We present to all the

[33:58] schools. That was Mithil's a junior and that's nominated a lot of times as well as legally

[34:05] blonde. So this is our series for this coming year. We already did Camp Rock and it was so much fun.

[34:13] we're working on Glee. Today, the cast list came out for by by Brutie. So I shut up my phone.

[34:20] And then, musical is this school show that we'll be doing. And when I say school show, I know you all are aware.

[34:26] But every year, the Queen Creek Unified School District brings elementary kids. So that in the two years, the 10 elementary schools all see a show for free.

[34:37] And again, I can't tell you how important that is because if kids aren't exposed, we're not going to have arts in the future.

[34:45] So I really appreciate that it is an important thing that everybody has taken time.

[34:50] We're doing little mermaid to the end of the year, and that's not the junior version, that's the adult version.

[34:55] Not the adult version, that you know what I mean?

[35:01] Now, you guys know that we used to do a lot of country stars, but it just became cost prohibitive. And last, you know, we, we brought things in like Lily on the end, Bell and Little Big Town. All of those. And really, those shows I was getting between 15 and 20,000 dollars, the last show that we brought in was Scotty McCreary, which was 52,000 dollars.

[35:23] And anything right now is for a big celebrity is above 50, which we haven't found that that's

[35:32] the need right now.

[35:33] We're filling up on our center stage series.

[35:37] We have changed this to a two o'clock show and we have lots of wonderful people coming out

[35:44] to see it.

[35:45] These are our shows for the center stage series.

[35:48] We also have special events like BYU young ambassadors, and then again, making art

[35:55] accessible to everyone.

[35:56] We were so excited this year to have the 250th celebration concert, you know, anybody

[36:03] that wanted to come with Chandler Symphony Orchestra, and then we of course are doing our

[36:10] constitution concert, yes, on September 12th, and then the last concert, the last concert

[36:17] that we will have that is free.

[36:19] We'll have a lot of stuff that's free,

[36:21] but we do move these sometimes.

[36:23] Chandler Symphony Chamber is doing a performance

[36:26] of Peter and the Wolf.

[36:27] I don't know if you guys remember,

[36:29] or if you did a skids go and see Peter and the Wolf,

[36:32] like to learn about the instruments, yeah.

[36:35] You're not that old Jeff, that's why.

[36:37] Mr. Brown.

[36:38] I beg to do.

[36:38] Sounds Council Brown.

[36:40] Sounds Council Brown.

[36:41] I beg to do that.

[36:42] Okay.

[36:46] And then one of the things that this is the schools, this is the school shows, which I already talked about.

[36:53] We also do an after school choir so that we teach the kids from our elementary schools.

[36:59] What theater is like they kind of do a show choir on the side of the stage.

[37:02] But a lot of those kids become our kids that end up coming on stage and eventually some of them become leads.

[37:08] So that's just a great way of growing our programs, too.

[37:14] This year we have a grant program.

[37:16] Every year, when we get a new soundboard,

[37:19] when the cultural foundation will pay for a new soundboard

[37:21] or something for the Performing Arts Center,

[37:25] we do take our existing step and refurbish it,

[37:29] give it to a school or something

[37:30] so we can continue and support the arts.

[37:33] And this year, we started last year in 2025, 26 with $15,000

[37:38] that we give in fine arts money to all of our different schools.

[37:44] Our summer camps, our fall break camps, our camps sell pretty well, and we started

[37:49] crew boot camp. Now this is something that started that actually comes by

[37:55] Mayor McClure started when he started the constitution concert.

[37:59] I thought that was such a great thing for choir members, but I'm like,

[38:02] the theater people stuff. So, um, a long time ago, I had to upstart the arts workshop at the

[38:09] her burger. So we are bringing it back. This year, um, we will be inviting the surrounding schools,

[38:16] high school festival events over for a two-day workshop, and we'll be bringing in Broadway,

[38:21] Tony, Award, nominated actress, Laura Bell Bundy. If any of you ever watch on MTV,

[38:27] finding out words she won. So, um, and we have two guest speakers and I'll tell you one is from

[38:34] the cast of Wicked.

[38:38] Yes, I know, but it's not the two you think. So, but it's still a really good one.

[38:46] Yeah, so, um, but this is going to be really fun. We are hoping to have three to five hundred kids come.

[38:52] This is something that we're doing at almost no cost. It is about giving back to the community

[38:58] because we are so blessed that we have had our community support us, not just the town and the school, but our community.

[39:07] So we want to keep getting back.

[39:11] Our rentals, as I told you, at any, we are blessed in lots of ways with all the rentals that we have from conferences or just speakers coming in and a lot of day and street sitals.

[39:25] These are our auditions coming up, as I mentioned, the Music Man December 4th and 5th.

[39:32] Baby is a musical and then the little mermaid is coming up.

[39:36] We always have volunteer opportunities and questions.

[39:42] Excellent.

[39:43] Thank you, Molly.

[39:43] Always a great update.

[39:45] Robin has a question or a comment.

[39:47] not a question but a comment. So as a council member for 17 years and former mayor of River City,

[39:56] I'm issuing a hard challenge.

[40:00] My fellow mayor and council members, I want to see all of you, even if it's just a small park in this, and yeah, I know, Jeff, you're not a senior yet, I can, but we need to do this, because I've got that, you know, the, the train songs, stuck in my head, when our family drives, we all cash for the hogs, said cast,

[40:29] again, that me John.

[40:31] blah blah blah. Come on, you guys.

[40:34] Auditions and later.

[40:35] All right.

[40:36] Thanks Molly for everything you think.

[40:40] I'll take the challenge and I'll bring my birth certificate

[40:43] because I do qualify.

[40:45] Yay. That would be awesome.

[40:48] You know, Don, Ola Font was in our dancing with the Queen Creek stars.

[40:52] Chip, whoopie, come on.

[40:54] You could do it. You and Brian.

[41:02] And Vice Mayor McLaren has a comment.

[41:05] Thanks, Mayor.

[41:05] Yes, I just want to thank you for your leadership Molly and the

[41:08] contribution to the community.

[41:09] It's incredible and a real quick question.

[41:12] So this September 12th Constitution concert, what is it cost and

[41:16] what time is it because everyone needs to come?

[41:18] Oh, it is.

[41:19] Did I mention that it was free and it starts at 7 p.m.

[41:24] Thank you.

[41:25] Yes.

[41:26] All right.

[41:27] Thank you so much Molly, having theater and culture

[41:30] exposure as we know is so important to a community. And I just love that our residents are not

[41:38] only able to participate in it. But also, I mean, I see all of those, you were talking about all the

[41:46] quinkric district students that are able to come and see that. Whether they have an opportunity with

[41:52] their family or not, they get to through the school. And that is the way that we carry that love to

[41:59] next generation. So it is such a great partnership and just love

[42:04] love everything you're doing. So keep it up. Thank you. Thank you all very much.

[42:08] And Councilmember Brown is one. I would just like to say that I would ask you to

[42:14] extend my gratitude. I'm probably for the rest of the council as well to your very

[42:20] strong supportive community. You have some people even in this room.

[42:26] that are really working hard all the time to make your endeavors successful and it's much

[42:36] appreciated.

[42:39] Thank you. Thank you. Next on the agenda is public comment. This is an opportunity

[42:45] to address the council on items not listed on the agenda as well as items on the agenda such

[42:52] final action. As a reminder, the opportunity for the public comment will adhere to the same

[42:58] meeting rules each time we respect everyone's opinion and everyone should likewise respect

[43:04] and acknowledge that the council meeting is meant to conduct town business. So please no cheering

[43:10] or applause outside of the ceremonial portion of the agenda. And as a reminder, the town council may

[43:17] respond to discuss or take action on any issue not on the meeting agenda. I do have several

[43:24] requests to speak cards this evening, but they are all for item 10, so we will have that later in

[43:30] the agenda. Are there any public comments specifically for the public comment portion Maria?

[43:36] Here we did receive one through email. Okay, and it will be attached to the public record. It was on

[43:41] and some are well-residents.

[43:43] Okay, thank you, thank you.

[43:45] I appreciate that.

[43:48] So seeing no public comment in the queue,

[43:50] I will move on to the next agenda item,

[43:52] which is our consent agenda,

[43:54] and do any members of council or staff

[43:57] would they like to remove any items

[43:59] for a separate discussion, vote or a presentation?

[44:03] If there are none, then I would entertain a motion.

[44:05] Madam Mayor, I moved to approve the consent agenda

[44:08] as published.

[44:09] We have a motion by Vice Mayor McClure in a second by Councilmember Benning.

[44:14] Please place your vote

[44:19] that does pass unanimously, 7-0.

[44:22] Great. We will move on to item 9,

[44:28] which is our public hearing consent agenda.

[44:32] And matters listed on the public hearing consent agenda are considered to be routine and are generally enacted by a single motion in vote.

[44:40] I will now open the public hearing. Are there any public comments submitted?

[44:44] I'm going to say Mayor, there are none.

[44:47] Okay.

[44:48] Seeing you know public comments,

[44:50] this public hearing is now closed

[44:51] and what any members of council

[44:53] like to remove any items

[44:56] from the public hearing consent agenda

[44:58] for a separate discussion or...

[45:00] Presentation, or staff. Mayor, I would move at this time for approval of the public hearing consent agenda is published.

[45:08] I have a motion by second council member Brown in a second by council member of Mark No. Please place your vote.

[45:21] That does pass unanimously, seven, zero. We have one final action item this evening. And I would like to welcome our Queen Creek Police Chief Randy Price and he will be providing a

[45:34] presentation. Thank you, Randy.

[45:37] I remember the council for the record, Randy Price, your police chief. I appreciate the opportunity to present this to you as part of discussion and also final action to really bring forward cutting edge action proactive something that both the council and the police department and town management have been working on to get this to this point and

[46:04] You know, really the way I want to start this is to remind both Council and the public, you know, one of the things that happened when we first created the police department or even when you guys were seeing that as a necessity is there was an important aspect that the police department really was able to connect with the community and when you look at our vision mission and values everything is surrounding that engagement connection success that comes from our ability to connect and work together.

[46:33] And in our mission, we specifically talk about three things, accountability, connection and trust.

[46:38] So what we talk about tonight is really designed to be centered around those things.

[46:44] In addition, when you look at our values, you know, the whole idea behind technology and the tools that we use

[46:50] is that we want to provide what you see to the right there is what the community expects from us

[46:56] and what's our commitment is that we have provided safe community.

[46:59] We decrease crime, we solve crimes when they do happen, and we reduce harm, whether that's from a crime, traffic issues, as, you know, we don't have any traffic problems in Queen Creek, so we're fine.

[47:11] So, it's one of our things we work with, obviously, hard at, but both crime and traffic, and the quality of life issues that we really look at are important, and they're part of that connection and mission that we work on together.

[47:24] but at the same time, we must be able to maintain that trust by not only having good

[47:30] safeguards and accountability in all that we do. So we are the first in the state to bring

[47:35] this forward to provide the guardrails and the accountability necessary to really manage the

[47:43] technology because what we do depends on that technology that it's timely, it's responsible,

[47:50] But we have to do certain things to make sure that we're accessing the reliability.

[47:55] We're always looking at the facts.

[47:56] Make sure that we're using right sources.

[47:59] We're documenting our work and meeting all confidentiality and constitutional and evidentiary requirements.

[48:05] But technology isn't necessarily just the only part of the way that we do our professional judgment.

[48:12] It is a tool.

[48:14] It does not replace it.

[48:15] It is an adjunct to something that helps us to make decisions.

[48:17] because of all of the immense amount of things that we have to deal with in the amount of data

[48:22] that's constantly coming forward. So, as part of our discussion tonight, we're really looking

[48:27] to identify a couple of specific things. Well, ALPR is going to be part of the discussion

[48:33] and certainly a hot topic in the community and across the nation. We're looking at a more holistic

[48:38] response and approach to this that we want to assess and protect all of the information that we use

[48:46] that is really that protected category that we're going to talk about, which includes some of the

[48:52] things that are on the screen up here, criminal investigation and evidence, things that have

[48:56] privacy or privacy concerns, personal privacy that may be have an individual safety component to it,

[49:03] all of the network and system credentials and things that keep our integrity of our systems.

[49:08] And of course, the physical facilities and operational security, but we want to make sure that

[49:13] We have a reliable access, but we want to make sure that it's only used for authorized

[49:17] official purposes.

[49:18] That's really the goal of what we're going to be doing tonight, not just an ALPR, but

[49:22] all systems.

[49:25] Now, again, as I mentioned, ALPR is a focus point, certainly, but we're looking at a broader

[49:31] spectrum of all of our systems that we have the right security and access oversight and integrity

[49:36] and that we are actually identifying the accountability component here.

[49:40] so that only this data and the systems are only used for a lawful purpose.

[49:45] So, as it said at the bottom of this slide here is that access also comes with a responsibility to protect that data and that information.

[49:52] So that's what we're doing tonight.

[49:54] Now it's important to understand what we mean by protected information.

[49:58] So as you'll see here in a second here.

[50:00] We're not every single thing that the Police Department has touches processes would fall into this category.

[50:06] What we're talking about is a specific group of information that is listed here, and it falls into one of these three categories.

[50:12] And the definition of the ordinance that we're bringing forward tonight is that one, it's confidential privilege by either a court order or some other recognized privilege

[50:21] that it's subject to legally enforceable restrictions.

[50:24] We'll talk about Siegis data here in a minute that is restricted by access use and dissemination and the one that we're really focused on tonight is where we have specific information that has access control because if it has an authorized access or use that it could compromise an investigation evidence privacy safety or security.

[50:45] So those are the things we're going to talk about but that's really the information that we're going to try to assess and the systems that contain that information.

[50:53] So, we're not talking about general purpose town networks, your email systems and the collaborative platforms that we may have some touch points with.

[51:01] We're talking about the police department systems that have very specific role-based and user access controls that have that data that we just talked about,

[51:11] and that where we, in some of it, when we talk about it on the left bottom there, you know, it may be criminal justice information,

[51:17] and certainly that's actually controlled by state law already, but all the PII, by a metric

[51:22] data that comes in from when we arrest people, the non-public investigative evidentiary

[51:27] information that we have, the intelligence, authentication credentials, all those different

[51:31] things.

[51:32] We want to make sure that that stuff is protected because if it's not, we could have some issues

[51:37] with our investigations and other security problems.

[51:40] But at the same time, we need to make sure that whatever we propose and whatever you're going

[51:46] approved tonight still has the the lawful access controls that are necessary through a public

[51:53] information request. So as you can see on the left side of the screen here, there is a process

[51:57] that we have for any record that we contain in any of these systems that is of this protected

[52:02] information can be accessed by the public but through a lawful process. As you can see, there are

[52:08] some things that have to be done in order to release that information. First, we have to identify

[52:12] what the responsive record is when it's requested. We have to go through and look at whatever

[52:16] or might be responsive or non-responsive based on the material,

[52:19] the stage of the investigation,

[52:21] all of the things that come along with that,

[52:23] and apply those confidential requirements.

[52:25] You can see on the right some of that may be supported

[52:27] by federal or state level restrictions,

[52:31] or the restrictions that we're gonna propose here

[52:32] in the ordinance.

[52:34] But inevitably, what happens is that almost everything

[52:36] that we have outside of the siegeist,

[52:38] which is the criminal justice information,

[52:41] is where that is protected by very specific laws.

[52:44] Everything else is publicly releaseable

[52:45] under certain conditions. So that's what we're going to talk about as we go through this process

[52:51] and how that falls into the town code that we're going to propose. Keep in mind that protection

[52:56] and transparency work together. They're not opposed to one another. But when you look at this,

[53:02] really what we're talking about is if a person lawfully receives a public record, that doesn't mean

[53:07] that they're given access to the protected information systems. So you can't just get user access and

[53:13] start going through all those different things.

[53:15] So you can kind of see between these two sides right here

[53:18] is that just because you can get a record,

[53:20] doesn't mean that you get access to the system itself

[53:23] because again, it has to go through a legal process to release.

[53:26] So when we talk about employees,

[53:29] other people that have access to these networks,

[53:32] really there's only the code that we're proposing tonight

[53:35] would restrict the access use, dissemination,

[53:40] processing whatever it might be to the people that are allowed to be in the network but for an authorized

[53:46] purpose only that is official, reasonably necessary and associated with their assigned privileges or duties.

[53:52] So that's really the nexus and that has to be all three of those things and again we'll

[53:56] talk about some of what those purposes are but what we're proposing tonight has not been done and is not currently in place

[54:02] outside of a criminal justice information system network that all of this protected information that's out there

[54:08] Right now it's not illegal to use that stuff for personal use.

[54:13] It certainly has policies in place that we will fire somebody for those kind of things,

[54:17] but there's no crime in anywhere in the state of Arizona for that kind of access or misuse.

[54:23] And so again, the reason we're here tonight and the wisdom of the council is to really

[54:27] both get that fixed and be a leader in that sector.

[54:33] So what we're talking about too is in addition to this code that we're bringing forward

[54:37] to talk about misuse and we'll get a little deeper into that is that we're wanting to make sure

[54:41] that the police department, the IT folks that support us and all the things that we have to do that

[54:45] we have reasonable risk-based safeguards. Now we already have many of these things but we're talking

[54:50] about continuing to find ways to enhance those and make sure that we're doing things in a appropriate

[54:55] manner which includes administrative safeguards, technical safeguards, and physical safeguards.

[55:00] And then some of that stuff on the right there is definitely a part of that process, too, that we have people with secure credentials, we have a secure system, we have a secure network, all the safeguards we talked about, but if there's a problem that we detect those things early through an audit process or anything that's automated that can catch those things, depending on the system, prompt reporting, and then a coordinator response when it's necessary, which would include charging people with a crime if they misuse this information.

[55:28] Now, the accountability is a little broader and we continue to provide this now, but we want

[55:34] to continue to enhance this to provide more and more safeguards and guardrails and everything

[55:38] that we do is that one, there's got to be training before you have access to any of these systems.

[55:43] And it's not a one-time thing.

[55:44] It's a continuous thing.

[55:45] You have to have continuous training, annually, by, annually, whatever the necessity is for

[55:50] that particular system and the complexity of so or if there's changes in the software.

[55:53] make sure that we're reviewing those things and this was an active way of seeing and using

[55:58] how we people use the system and that we can audit that. That there's refresher training

[56:02] and acknowledgments from the policy updates or training updates that might come and that we

[56:07] do a documented annual review at a minimum. Now keep in mind I say annual is the minimum because

[56:12] we're going to provide a report back to council on an annual basis per the code, but we're going

[56:18] to be doing audits much more regularly, weekly, monthly, quarterly depending on the capability

[56:22] of the systems, but it is a continuous process, not a one and done.

[56:28] Really what this is going to establish this code, again, first in the state, is that we

[56:33] are going to identify, you must use these systems, all systems, including ALPR for an official

[56:38] purpose only.

[56:39] If you do not use it for an official purpose, which would include personal curiosity, private

[56:44] benefit or compensation, whether they sell that or use it for their own purposes or providing

[56:51] improper benefit to another, a friend family member, whatever it might be, harassment, intimidation,

[56:57] discrimination, unauthorized private investigations. Any of those things are associated with,

[57:02] and even in that venue would be considered a non-efficient purpose. And then we're also looking

[57:06] at credential misuse. If you're knowingly share your credentials and able somebody else to have access,

[57:11] or you give, or you use somebody else's credentials to access. That would also be a crime.

[57:16] Now that the caveat to this is it's knowing misuse so they have to can't be accidental.

[57:23] It can't be inadvertent it can't be because there is a policy issue, there has to be a knowing action here.

[57:30] So that is a pretty common culpable mental state that we see in state laws or applying the same mental or mental state to this particular crime.

[57:39] But keep in mind that as we investigate these issues and we find this in an audit or an investigation or how it comes to our attention, the level one there on the right would be we'd apply the new town code and that would be a class one misdemeanor.

[57:56] But during the investigation if we determine that there was unauthorized access to a CGIS or CGIS data, which is the criminal justice information system that's through the state or the federal government, that would still fall under state law which is a class six felony.

[58:09] We also made discover that somebody may have had other charges such as stocking, computer tampering,

[58:15] identity theft, aggravated harassment, which are more serious felonies.

[58:18] So there may be additional charging or we may charge the higher crimes with the county attorney

[58:24] on in Superior Court rather than a local misdemeanor.

[58:27] But what this does is it brings in that knowing misuse, whether it's not the nefarious

[58:32] in there, but they misuse it for any other purpose, we can still charge them with a crime

[58:36] here in the town of Queen Creek.

[58:37] And that includes not just our police department employees, that's anybody that has authorized access or that gains unauthorized access to the system.

[58:51] So it would be applicable to anybody.

[58:53] The other part of it too is the pathway that's listed there under A is that's the criminal side of it.

[58:58] we would continue to apply in administrative and contractual items.

[59:03] We would do internal investigations for our own employees, where there would be everything

[59:08] up to termination, along with any criminal investigation, but that also includes other people

[59:15] that might have access to the system like town employees, contractors, anybody else that

[59:21] has authorized access would either be held accountable through contractual actions, remedies,

[59:26] lawsuits and so on. So we're gonna continue both pathways after this is. So I want to talk

[59:33] specifically a little bit about ALPR because again this is a component of what we're talking

[59:37] about and why we're here tonight to be it's more broad that this is one issue that we want to make

[59:44] sure that we're addressing for. Now keep in mind we have not had any issues in our organization.

[59:51] However we want to be proactive in making sure that we have all the safeguards necessary and

[59:55] this particular accountability measure.

[59:58] Now, ALPR.

[1:00:00] In the Queen Creek Police Department's program is used as a focused investigative tool. There's strict accountability and access controls, and we have limited retention. Right now, it's it's set at 30 days. We'll talk a little bit more about that here in a minute. But the metaphor that I like to throw out at this because we get a lot of people saying a lot of things, a lot of misinformation out there, even from officials in law enforcement that are saying things that are actually not accurate.

[1:00:30] So, what I want to do is talk about this in a general form and then we'll get into specifics,

[1:00:35] but think about every day in our community and in the nation, people use vehicles for all kinds

[1:00:41] of different reasons. We use them to get to work, to transport goods and services, whatever it might be,

[1:00:47] it is a critical aspect of our community and our lifestyle. But vehicles are sometimes used in

[1:00:54] appropriately. They people speed, people get into crashes, people commit crimes with them. Now

[1:01:01] with all the broad use that we have just because 1, 2, 3, 10, 20, whatever the violations are,

[1:01:07] if people misuse a vehicle, that is not grounds to get rid of every vehicle in the United States.

[1:01:14] It is certainly grounds to make sure you have the right laws, you have the right accountability

[1:01:19] mechanisms, enforcement, and so on. We're suggesting the same thing for ALPR. Is that it's a

[1:01:25] great tool? It can be misused, absolutely. But we're suggesting that we have the right

[1:01:30] guard rails just like we do now, but enhance those, continue to enhance them as necessary,

[1:01:34] holding vendors accountable, making sure that we have everything in place. And as I said before,

[1:01:40] adding an accountability measure that nobody has done yet, we're going to do that first tonight.

[1:01:45] So some of the things that we use under our current policy is that we use ALPR for an ALPR again is the automated license plate reader or recognition.

[1:01:56] So we use this for a lot of our routine patrol support when we need to have there's an investigation involving a vehicle road rage, hit and run accident, those kind of things.

[1:02:08] Certainly for stolen vehicles what through what we call hot lists, which are alerts if a system if a vehicle is stolen and it hits or it is identified by an ALPR device as passing through a certain area it will alert whoever's on the network that that was in the area.

[1:02:24] One of the more prolific things that we use it for is identifying a vehicle that an endangered person missing person through all the different alerts system that we have that might be associated with that vehicle.

[1:02:36] We have had time and time again here in our community and in our adjacent communities where that has actually found and brought back people that are missing.

[1:02:48] And I think it's appropriate for tonight. We celebrate the training that we did for the sea straining. Thank you.

[1:02:57] Because this is one of the real key things that we use ALPR for, is investigations where we have young girls and young boys that are possibly trafficked, that are leaving the area, being picked up by the various individuals.

[1:03:13] We have had at least a half a dozen over the last year or so that ALPR has become a component in our investigation that has provided us leads and to help us safely recover these individuals.

[1:03:24] In some cases, where we have real-time crime or activity that we need to work on, our real-time

[1:03:33] information center, does utilize ALPR to try to get a feel for a vehicle where they're

[1:03:39] going, depending on where the device is positioned.

[1:03:43] We can sometimes determine the best possible route of travel, at least get officers in the area

[1:03:49] to look for that.

[1:03:50] crime scene can this thing this is a common use that we have where there's a crime burglary theft

[1:03:56] even robbery some other violent crime where we have zero

[1:04:00] leads nobody saw anything

[1:04:02] LPR has had been a tremendous boon to help develop leads that we can follow up on and see if we can develop some

[1:04:10] some sort of information to who might have been in the area or flood the area

[1:04:14] But again, just a lead, and certainly to find warrants or fugitives that are that we're looking for for crimes that have already been committed and we have and they're out there in our community or adjacent communities.

[1:04:27] So, a lot of different uses, this is just a few of the big ones.

[1:04:31] Some of the myths that are out there, I hear this all the time, what ALPR does.

[1:04:36] In fact, I've had conversations with some of you where even to just this week there has been misinformation on major news media channels,

[1:04:43] social media, saying the things that ALPR is absolutely not that it is gospel that it is.

[1:04:50] So let's talk about ALPR. We've talked about this already, but it's an investigative tool.

[1:04:55] It's not a tracking mechanism, it doesn't, it doesn't GPS people's.

[1:05:00] The vehicle is not providing continuous monitoring or generalized surveillance. It only provides a real time source of information, a time and location where a vehicle has passed a certain point, and that's a lead that we can follow up on.

[1:05:13] It gives us only limited information, does not identify drivers, anybody in the vehicle doesn't tell us who's in the vehicle, who owns the vehicle, doesn't provide any facial recognition or biometrics, we don't use any of that stuff.

[1:05:24] and it certainly does not give traffic tickets for some reason people think it's a red light camera

[1:05:27] or gives traffic tickets or does all those. It does not, and it is only one source of information

[1:05:34] that requires human verification. There has to be a human loop throughout this process and we'll

[1:05:39] talk a little bit more about that here in a second. Our particular program, we have 62 cameras,

[1:05:45] 47 are under contract with one organization and we have 15 that are under a different organization

[1:05:50] or a vendor that we are testing at no cost to the town right now, and both of these vendors

[1:05:56] have rigorous data and security retention processes. Again, right now we're set at 30 days,

[1:06:03] and we'll talk more about that, but the data encryption both at rest and transit, and then it's

[1:06:08] held in a cloud-based server that has encrypted. So the only time that this stuff passes whatever

[1:06:16] retention rate that we would have. The information falls off after the retention rate, if it

[1:06:22] only saved, if it becomes physical evidence or digital evidence that we put into our evidence

[1:06:26] system, which is tracked through our evidence, a digital evidence system and management program.

[1:06:32] Now, I want to make a distinction that's important because this gets mixed up all the time in our

[1:06:37] community and other communities is that we do not have anything to do or have access to

[1:06:43] other private organizations that have these ALPR devices.

[1:06:47] We see homeowners associations, retail stores, other types of property owners,

[1:06:53] people of tow companies, bus systems, other types of mass transit

[1:06:58] that use these devices, whether they're static or mobile.

[1:07:02] We don't have access to any of that information.

[1:07:04] We do not buy commercial data that is readily available about there.

[1:07:07] We do not use any of that.

[1:07:08] we only use our network and any other data sharing that we have with other law enforcement agencies.

[1:07:14] And everything, again, is subject to our policies, the bounds that we're placing a tonight,

[1:07:19] the stuff that's already in place and all the constitutional bounds that we've talked about at

[1:07:23] Nazim. And again, we have all of this stuff that's associated with our devices. We have strict

[1:07:28] ownership and control over that. In fact, there is a new law that's coming into place. We'll talk

[1:07:33] here where it requires that all vendors have a contractual obligation that they cannot sell or

[1:07:39] disseminate to third parties. And we already have that in our contracts. Just give you kind of

[1:07:45] a feel for how we've used our devices. As we've mentioned before, we've actually been using

[1:07:50] ALPR since 2022, but I just pulled up some stats for the last 2025 and 2026 up to August 11th.

[1:07:59] We had about 37, almost 3,800 incidents where ALPR was utilized, either to develop a lead,

[1:08:08] resulted in an arrest, conviction, or was able to rule out certain vehicles in the area,

[1:08:18] or just generally try to resolve some of these situations.

[1:08:21] This is just a few categories.

[1:08:23] Obviously, these are high-level categories, but you can see that there's quite a mix of how we use these.

[1:08:28] both in real-time situation and investigations that may be after the fact, everything from

[1:08:35] again, like I said, are people that are missing or endangered, stolen vehicles, hit runs,

[1:08:41] hit runs.

[1:08:42] I can't tell you that happens on probably weekly daily basis around here where ALPR is providing

[1:08:46] leads, where we would have had nothing, because most people that it happens and they just

[1:08:51] they're too discombobulated to be able to get any information for us, or they said, I think

[1:08:55] it was a white car, but I don't remember.

[1:08:57] So this has been a tremendous way for us to actually solve those rather prolific crime here in Queen Creek when it comes to that traffic issues.

[1:09:06] So a lot of other offenses though that we have been able to utilize this again, not necessarily to full bone resolution but provides a lead where we can follow up with other means.

[1:09:18] As we've mentioned before and as we continue to talk about the types of guardrails that we have.

[1:09:24] We've already had this, but we continue to enhance this, is that in order to use ALPR systems,

[1:09:29] you have to have individual authentication that is rolled based, you have user logins, MFA.

[1:09:35] And there is no, we strictly prohibit any type of anonymous or shared access or anonymous shared

[1:09:42] access at all. It's strictly prohibited. And then case documentation, when they do a query or

[1:09:48] they create a alert or hot list, there has to be specific case documentation, where there is a

[1:09:54] case number that number identification number back to a specific incident for us and they have to have a specific

[1:10:00] Public purpose listed along with what we call a neighbors code. There's three different blocks of information that has to be done. So curiosity searches are not allowed. That's going to again be a crime after we, depending on how you guys vote tonight on that.

[1:10:15] Strict data sharing. Right now and we'll talk more about this here in a second, but right now we do not share with anyone outside of the state of Arizona.

[1:10:23] We do not share with federal partners and we do not allow this to be used for any type of immigration or reproductive investigations.

[1:10:32] And we vet everybody that we share with as far as the in state law enforcement agencies.

[1:10:38] So we make sure that that's a particular agency that that we have a relationship with and that we identify that that's actually what they're using it for and they have to follow all the same rules that we have.

[1:10:50] When we talk about alerts, I just want to give you a quick overview of this.

[1:10:55] So again, what happens here is that we'll use stolen vehicles, the example.

[1:11:00] A vehicle of stolen, you put in the information that's related to that stolen vehicle,

[1:11:05] make model, color, anything unique about the back of it.

[1:11:09] If it has some bumper stickers or anything like that along with obviously the plate,

[1:11:14] but not all stolen vehicles keep their plate on there.

[1:11:16] So we're looking for specific identifiers that we can use,

[1:11:20] but the plate is the unique one.

[1:11:22] And then that's put into the computer.

[1:11:24] And then anytime after that hit list or that hot list

[1:11:27] is put in, there's an alert that is sent out to the network

[1:11:31] if that plate is read by a ALPR device in our network.

[1:11:38] Now here's the important part.

[1:11:39] Is it requires a human in the loop?

[1:11:41] You can't just take that at face value.

[1:11:43] You have to have a physical match.

[1:11:45] Of the vehicle, the plate, all the information, you've got to verify the record to make sure that you're talking about all the same stuff from the alert and that's what you're seeing.

[1:11:55] There's a couple of really good cases here in the night circuit court where that was not done right by the law enforcement agency and they made some mistakes.

[1:12:02] They did not verify that with all the means that I just mentioned here and it's on the slide and they ended up having a search and seizure issue because they pull people out of gun points and

[1:12:13] and violated people's rights because they didn't do this stuff.

[1:12:17] That's why guardrails are so important.

[1:12:19] This is what we do now.

[1:12:20] This is what we will continue to do, and it's part of our culture, and it's certainly

[1:12:25] part of the case law that we have in our circuit court.

[1:12:30] Something that I want to make sure that we understand, these are not set up to be any type

[1:12:34] of drag net or continuous surveillance.

[1:12:37] We have multiple cameras because we have to do a strategic layering, because each camera

[1:12:42] only has a limited view. You only have a certain coverage area. And so the wider our street is,

[1:12:49] the less we are able to actually get. So typically a camera, just a standard camera can

[1:12:53] get one or two lanes, but that depends on how far away it is off the road where it's mounted.

[1:12:59] So there's a lot of things we have to think about. And then the context that direction where we're

[1:13:03] placing it. So sometimes you'll find some in an area where there's multiple because we're trying

[1:13:07] to get coverage in that one particular area where we have maybe a particular issue. So as an example,

[1:13:12] Well, we have a lot of crashes in and around the marketplace.

[1:13:17] So we set up a camera network in there to try to catch those hit and run issues and to

[1:13:24] be able to solve those crimes as best we can and it's been very effective on getting

[1:13:27] that information.

[1:13:29] But it is certainly we have nowhere near enough devices to do any type of drag net or complete

[1:13:35] surveillance is what the argument is.

[1:13:38] This is a, for a specific purpose and it's a minimal impact, especially in our community.

[1:13:47] Oh, sorry back to this real quick. Again, these are not life feeds.

[1:13:51] There are data point and it's activated as, as a vehicle comes into view of that particular camera and has a visible.

[1:13:58] But keep in mind, all these things affect our ability to capture that data or that device,

[1:14:05] a weather environment, speed, angle, nighttime,

[1:14:09] obscured plates, all of that stuff

[1:14:11] does make it difficult for us to use this system.

[1:14:15] So, again, everything is limited by technology

[1:14:17] as limitations, and we just have to work through that.

[1:14:21] Again, we talked about this already,

[1:14:23] but the national concerns that we hear a lot

[1:14:24] is, all right, you're going to use this

[1:14:26] for federal immigration enforcement.

[1:14:28] You're going to share across massive interstate networks.

[1:14:31] You're going to create forever data.

[1:14:33] and false arrest come from computer misleads.

[1:14:36] We've talked about this already, but all of these things we already have guardrails in place

[1:14:41] and will continue to modify and enhance those as necessary.

[1:14:45] But we don't share for immigration.

[1:14:47] We don't use anything outside of Arizona so we don't have these massive interstate networks.

[1:14:53] We have a very specific purge time where we only have so many days of this so there's

[1:14:59] for every data.

[1:15:00] And again, unless it becomes part of an investigation that is put into evidence, and that's not used as forever data, it's evidence at that point.

[1:15:07] And then we have to have that human elute verification, any time we have a reason to use this data or an alert.

[1:15:17] Okay, I'm going to beat this up again here is these are the frequent things that we hear.

[1:15:21] What's tracking everybody? No. It records a vehicle at a specific place in time and does not continuously track individuals.

[1:15:28] Now, again, there can be misuse, and that's why we have to have guardrails.

[1:15:32] We have to have limitations on how long the data is in there, how we use it, how the queries

[1:15:35] are done, that's all stuff that is part of our guardrails.

[1:15:39] Facial recognition does not do that.

[1:15:43] Can officers browse data at a curiosity, no, we're putting things in place, first of all,

[1:15:46] we have policy against it now, but now we're putting in the accountability of a legal issue.

[1:15:52] And then, they give tickets, no, they don't give tickets.

[1:15:55] that these are not used at any type of ticket or automated traffic enforcement.

[1:16:01] So what we're talking about tonight is part of this process is there are five specific things

[1:16:06] that we have discussed and we want to reiterate is that as we move forward with this code,

[1:16:12] we're going to continue to update our policy and we're going to look at what right now is 30 days

[1:16:17] but we're going to look at whether or not the retention period should be more limited or different.

[1:16:24] It's certainly not more than 30 days but do we need to go less.

[1:16:27] We are going to be limiting user access.

[1:16:30] So right now we have, you know, nearly, I think 160 users on the system, we are going to

[1:16:36] be taking that down to just a few people in the real-time information center and some supervisory

[1:16:41] staff and making sure that we limit the amount of people that have access to the ALPR data.

[1:16:47] We are going to look at how we modify our data sharing process and we're looking at a different way to share with

[1:16:57] Arizona agencies that will provide us a way to better determine the use case for each query.

[1:17:05] So more to come on that.

[1:17:07] Our auditing will continue to be very vigorous.

[1:17:10] Our policy currently states that will do quarterly through some technology enhancements and some additional

[1:17:16] processes that we put in place, we now do weekly, monthly, and quarterly audits, and obviously

[1:17:21] the code will require an annual report that we come back to you with. So we have actually

[1:17:26] increased the auditing process, and we continue to have good clean audits and modifying our process

[1:17:32] at any time we see that we need to change something or add new layers to that. And the most important

[1:17:39] reason the code is coming to you is that we're increasing accountability, not just for ALPR,

[1:17:43] but for everything, but certainly it'll apply to ALPR misuse.

[1:17:48] So the ordinance when we go back to the macro view,

[1:17:51] it's going to establish a legal standard that's consistent,

[1:17:54] and it formalizes that criminal accountability for knowing misuse.

[1:17:59] The operational procedures are controls that will put in place for policy

[1:18:03] will continue to be more restrictive than that,

[1:18:06] and will continue to modify those necessary to make sure that we're doing everything that you've asked us to do,

[1:18:11] And providing the most effective way to both audit and control the data and ensure that it's being used in the right way so that we can't find any type of issues of necessary.

[1:18:21] And as I mentioned before, the other thing that is going to be added in the code is that we're integrating the Arizona law that requires that.

[1:18:29] And we're mimicking that in our code that requires that our contractors are the contract for these vendors always have that.

[1:18:38] to safeguard is that they cannot sell or disseminate to third parties so that the data is ours,

[1:18:44] we say what happens to it.

[1:18:47] It also, this particular amendment is going to preserve our ability to do all the things

[1:18:54] I talked about before.

[1:18:56] You know, I can't say this enough.

[1:18:57] I live in this community.

[1:19:00] I was here at the beginning.

[1:19:00] We started this police department.

[1:19:02] My kids are here in this community.

[1:19:03] My friends are here in this community.

[1:19:05] We serve this community.

[1:19:06] I care what happens here.

[1:19:09] I'm just as much of a resident as I am a police officer.

[1:19:12] And my officers want to do the right things,

[1:19:15] but we want to make sure that we have the capability

[1:19:18] so that we don't miss crucial evidence,

[1:19:22] leads that will bring us to the necessary conclusion

[1:19:24] of solving crimes and keeping people safe.

[1:19:28] But we want to make sure that we have the right safeguards,

[1:19:31] and the council will be adopting those through this code tonight

[1:19:33] And that we clarify who has access, what our access is, and the accountability necessary so that we can have authorized system use.

[1:19:42] We still have public records disclosure that's appropriate, and we can identify and prosecute knowing this use.

[1:19:49] So at the end of this, I'm certainly have questions, but this is our ask tonight, is that we are recommending the adoption of this ordinance has stated on this slide.

[1:19:58] and I will pause there for

[1:20:00] Any questions? Great. Excellent presentation, Randy. We sure appreciate it. And we do have a few public comments on this item. Before we hear public comment, do council members, did you have a question before public comment? Council member Benny.

[1:20:16] Thank you, Mayor.

[1:20:17] Chief, can you just address one of the questions that has been raised by the public is, how do we determine or discipline the contractors that are

[1:20:29] providing the camera equipment and the backup storage.

[1:20:36] So what's the process for once we, we see that there's a problem with a particular vendor.

[1:20:43] How does that, how does that go?

[1:20:47] Sorry.

[1:20:48] Oh, that was echo for me.

[1:20:49] I heard something, and I thought somebody else talking.

[1:20:52] So a couple things.

[1:20:53] With the state law that is going to place in our adoption of this particular code, we do have

[1:20:59] requirement that they have that in a contract. So one, there'll be a contact breach. Our contract

[1:21:04] breach if they don't follow that and they use the information outside of what is expected

[1:21:10] or disseminated. So that could be both. We can terminate the contract for a breach. We can also

[1:21:17] legally sue them for whatever it might be. But what we're also doing here is they will actually

[1:21:24] be criminally liable as well if we identify who misused or did that.

[1:21:29] So this applies to anyone that has access to our data or system.

[1:21:34] So it doesn't have to be an employee.

[1:21:35] If a contractor misuses or knowingly misuses the data,

[1:21:39] we could go after them criminally as well as civilly

[1:21:41] and contractually for a breach.

[1:21:47] Yeah, there are questions at this point.

[1:21:49] OK, seeing none, we will move to public comment.

[1:21:52] Thank you again, Chief Bryce.

[1:21:55] We will start with Braden Peters, if you would like to step up to the podium and state your

[1:22:03] name and address for the record and you have three minutes this evening.

[1:22:15] Sorry, did you say name and address please?

[1:22:17] Thank you.

[1:22:19] Mayor Council members, my name is Braden Peters, I live at 1-1-5-6 East Sylvan Avenue,

[1:22:24] Mesa, Arizona. I am a cybersecurity professional who lives in the Queen Creek School District.

[1:22:32] I'm here to speak, represent myself regarding concerns on the policy around ALPRs and their

[1:22:38] use in Queen Creek. Many of our neighboring communities are terminating ALPR contracts and for

[1:22:44] good reason. To be clear, my concern is not limited to a specific company. ALPRs and enabling

[1:22:50] contextual image technologies are a major invasion of our communities privacy and I'm asking

[1:22:57] that an ordinance, excuse me, I'm asking that the city not pursue proven inadequate guardrails

[1:23:06] and instead pursue passing an ordinance prohibiting the city from deploying operating or using

[1:23:12] ALPR technology within our community. This technology goes far beyond a simple reading of licensed

[1:23:19] plates, but includes other contextual image such as date time, location, and increasingly

[1:23:25] make model bumper stickers, dense and other identifiable characteristics in some cases,

[1:23:33] facial or other person identifiers that can be picked up by AI systems embedded within this

[1:23:40] technology. It's an unprecedented invasion of privacy, creating billions of data points

[1:23:46] about millions of people in potential violation of their fourth amendment rights.

[1:23:50] Recent court filings suggest that this amounts to warrantless constant surveillance

[1:23:56] of innocent members of our community.

[1:23:59] To be clear, once you see how this plays out, logistically, it becomes real-time surveillance

[1:24:05] despite what we've seen.

[1:24:07] Almost daily, we are seeing evidence that this technology creates unacceptable privacy issues

[1:24:12] that extend to all ALPRs, not just flock.

[1:24:15] This includes Axon, Motorola, Genetech, Leonardo,

[1:24:19] and other ALPR companies.

[1:24:22] We see things like innovation, data control,

[1:24:25] where side channel access and proxy sharing agreements

[1:24:28] with other departments and other agencies.

[1:24:31] Meaning, you can't guarantee how the data is stored or shared.

[1:24:35] And cursory-level sharing agreements

[1:24:36] are easily bypassed without sufficient enforcement

[1:24:39] and independent auditing.

[1:24:41] Other areas of concern, from a cybersecurity's posture, there are well documented security

[1:24:47] compromises with this technology, including backdoor access by employees, data retention

[1:24:52] non-compliance, physical and other cyber attacks that compromise the units, lack of data

[1:24:57] encryption, et cetera, et cetera.

[1:25:00] There's also the concern around unethical usage. I point to the example that there is an ALPR that is pointed out a place of worship in our community on east rigs road that appears to be logging people when they attend their place of worship. To be clear, this is not anti-law enforcement.

[1:25:19] It's proven constitution. Thank you for your time.

[1:25:21] I urge you to, thank you.

[1:25:25] Next, we have Eric Fowler.

[1:25:28] Again, please state your name and address for the record,

[1:25:30] and you have three minutes this evening.

[1:25:34] All right, a little bit, 937, West Ivan Ho and Chandler.

[1:25:38] Good evening, Mayor and Council.

[1:25:39] I'm Eric Fowler, chair of the Maricopa County

[1:25:42] Libertarian Party, and I'm here for our voters in Queen Creek.

[1:25:45] Let's start with how Queen Creek got the cameras.

[1:25:47] Because most people in this room don't know how.

[1:25:50] April 2022, consent agenda item 8F,

[1:25:53] The $46,000 purchase piggybacked on Tempe's contract, it passed five to zero on one motion

[1:25:59] with a dozen of other items.

[1:26:01] The mayor was absent.

[1:26:02] There was no discussion, 14 residents spoke on public comment that night and every single

[1:26:06] one of them was about a LG plant, not a word about a camera, because nobody knew.

[1:26:10] Since then, four more consent votes, zero hearings, zero work sessions, in May 2023, your own

[1:26:15] staff reports said 23 cameras were already capturing 4.9 million plate reads a month.

[1:26:21] Tonight, sure told that there's 62.

[1:26:23] This town has never once debated whether surveillance network should exist.

[1:26:27] Tonight isn't that debate either.

[1:26:28] Tonight is a rule book for the people running it.

[1:26:31] The Fourth Amendment was written to abolish a British general warrant.

[1:26:36] One paper that let the Kings men search any colonist, any home, just to see what turned up.

[1:26:42] Arizona's Constitution goes much further.

[1:26:44] Article 2, Section 8, no person shall be disturbed in his private affairs without the authority

[1:26:48] of law.

[1:26:49] No warrant, no probable cause.

[1:26:51] No judge has ever authorized a single one of these 4.9 million plate reads.

[1:26:56] Four weeks ago on August 5, a federal judge in Mississippi struck down a cell phone tower

[1:27:01] dumped warrant as unconstitutional general warrant, even with the judge's signature, because

[1:27:06] the government cannot have access to the whole haystack, just because it may contain a needle.

[1:27:12] 62 cameras photographing every car on L'sworth and written house is the haystack.

[1:27:16] You don't even have a warrant.

[1:27:19] Now to the ordinance, read what it doesn't do.

[1:27:21] No warrants.

[1:27:23] No cap on cameras.

[1:27:24] No counsel vote to expand.

[1:27:26] The police could just add 50 more cameras tomorrow.

[1:27:29] No retention limit.

[1:27:30] The 30 days is in a staff report.

[1:27:31] Not in the code.

[1:27:33] The sharing rule is one my only.

[1:27:34] Any quote verified and authorized recipient.

[1:27:38] Not one word excludes a federal or out-of-state agency

[1:27:41] and Mesa already runs flock searches for DHS.

[1:27:44] This is in a safeguard.

[1:27:45] It's a permission slip for master valence with a misdemeanor attached to it.

[1:27:50] Tempies, who's contract you copied, shut it down last week, the Pound County Sheriff who covers half of this town, said he swore an oath to the Constitution, same as all of you did, and he canceled the contract.

[1:28:03] Please vote note tonight, then bring the actual flock contract back to the day's in public for the vote that it never got.

[1:28:10] Thank you.

[1:28:11] Thank you, Mr. Fowler. Next, we have Nathan Taylor Craft.

[1:28:18] Taylor Taft. Your name and address for

[1:28:21] the record and you have three minutes to see things there.

[1:28:25] My name is Nathan Taylor Taft. You have my address on the speaker card.

[1:28:29] Your city place.

[1:28:31] Oh, Chandler.

[1:28:32] My name is Nathan Taylor Taft. I'm the co-director of East Valley,

[1:28:35] so we've members all over the East Valley, including many here in Queen Creek.

[1:28:39] First, I'm not here today to give an opinion that is anti-police, in any way, rather

[1:28:43] I'm conveying concerns, shared by many of your constituents, about the dangers of

[1:28:47] flock and ALPRs, and might should immediately terminate the city's contract with it.

[1:28:51] I'm not here to oppose guardrails to ALPR systems, but the ordinance the police are proposing

[1:28:55] isn't nearly strong enough, and we shouldn't even need them at all, because they shouldn't

[1:28:59] exist here in Queen Creek in the first place.

[1:29:01] The reason something like this hasn't been implemented yet is because cities just get rid of

[1:29:05] on constitutional technology. I want to make it very clear that safeguards are much less

[1:29:10] than the bare minimum. The bare minimum would be to cancel the flat contract. As Sedona,

[1:29:15] Flagstaff, Sierra Vista, South Tucson, Penal County, Chandler, Surprise Temp B, Cave Creek,

[1:29:20] have all done. Arizona is actually the state with the third most flat contract

[1:29:24] cancellations and two thirds of Arizona voters with majorities across party lines

[1:29:29] oppose ALPR use. I want to address what the police claimed in their presentation.

[1:29:33] They claim that this is not continuous monitoring or generalized surveillance, that is demonstrably false. I'd like

[1:29:41] I'd like to point out that within two miles of here, there are 28 ALPRs reported on the deflock map,

[1:29:46] Flock and other ALPRs are cameras that capture information on every single vehicle that passes by. This includes not only a car's license plate,

[1:29:53] but date, time, location, make, model, bumper stickers, dense scratches, cargo carriers, and anything else that the AI system

[1:29:59] Thanks for watching, and don't forget to like, share, and subscribe to our channel.

[1:30:00] Flock's cameras can also create heat maps to track daily driving patterns, as demonstrated in Wisconsin. This is

[1:30:07] mass surveillance period. They also claim that ALPR's can't use facial recognition. I'm going to use

[1:30:13] Verkata as an example here, because the problem isn't a single company, it's all ALPR's, and because

[1:30:18] outside of Flock, they are one of the most widely used ALPR companies in Arizona. They do have facial

[1:30:23] Reconest, facial recognition abilities, and they advertise it too, further despite what

[1:30:28] flock claims, why it has found that their cameras can track people, including their race,

[1:30:33] height, clothing, etc. They also claims that data isn't used for immigration purposes

[1:30:38] isn't shared with federal agencies and isn't shared out of state. Their numerous cases

[1:30:42] were police departments searched data on the behalf of other agencies. This happened not far

[1:30:47] from here in Chandler. For reference, like Queen Creek, Chandler prohibits searching its

[1:30:51] for immigration purposes.

[1:30:53] Mesa searched Chandler's data on behalf of DHS, a federal agency,

[1:30:57] with immigration as the purpose.

[1:31:00] Given that data hops across agencies like this,

[1:31:02] I'd like to point out that pay centers data with 516 other agencies

[1:31:05] from Springfield, Oregon to Freeport, Maine.

[1:31:09] There are 140,000 ALPRs nationwide,

[1:31:12] and flocked again just one company scans license plates 20 billion times each month.

[1:31:16] Penal County, canceled its contract on the grounds of the Fourth Amendment.

[1:31:19] You should follow in their footsteps and going forward, cancel flock, pass an ordinance, banning

[1:31:24] ALPRs.

[1:31:24] Take what the police claim on this issue with a huge grain of salt and do independent research

[1:31:28] so that you get this extra tap to thank you.

[1:31:30] Thank you so much.

[1:31:32] Next we have Robert, Bartlett May,

[1:31:39] step forward, state your name and address for the record

[1:31:41] and you have three minutes this evening, sir.

[1:31:50] Robert Bartlett May, 21343 East Community Plata, Queen Creek.

[1:31:56] I oppose having ALPRs in our town.

[1:32:01] I think that while I don't think they are a constitutional violation as a retired attorney,

[1:32:07] he's been both a prosecutor and a defense attorney and an immigration judge, and have

[1:32:12] had to rule on search and seizure issues as well as train federal law enforcement officers

[1:32:17] on them, I don't believe it's unconstitutional.

[1:32:20] But the fact that something is legal doesn't mean you should do it.

[1:32:26] I think it is a privacy concern.

[1:32:28] I think that we should not have them because they record all the license plates.

[1:32:36] Chief Brice indicated, well, they don't give who the driver is or who the owner of the vehicle is.

[1:32:43] Well, if the police have the license plate number, they can get the owner of the vehicle in a matter of seconds.

[1:32:49] So, it's a slippery slope. Government surveillance is just bad when it's done in mass like this.

[1:32:59] I would encourage you if you have not ever read the book 1984 by George Orwell that you go home tonight and order it and read it.

[1:33:07] It will show you why McMaster government surveillance is bad.

[1:33:13] In clear, an adulterated proof, why it should not be allowed.

[1:33:19] It's a slippery slope that leads to more and more surveillance.

[1:33:26] This, that these readers help make the community safer.

[1:33:31] I would simply quote Ben Franklin,

[1:33:33] who stated that those who are willing to sacrifice some freedom for safety deserve neither

[1:33:38] freedom nor safety.

[1:33:43] I would ask that you,

[1:33:46] not instead of adopting a code that will not ensure improper use

[1:33:52] of the of this data that we instead eliminate these cameras in our community as many other

[1:34:00] communities have done in Arizona in the last few months.

[1:34:08] I would also ask that if you're

[1:34:11] not going to do it yourselves, that you suspend the use of them and put it up for a referendum

[1:34:16] of the citizens to decide whether this is something that is wanted in our community. Let the people

[1:34:24] decide whether or not we should do this.

[1:34:32] Think the vote would be overwhelming and it would

[1:34:37] be

[1:34:40] of people overwhelming majority of people oppose these readers and you should be responsive

[1:34:47] to the people and eliminate them in our community. Thank you.

[1:34:52] Thank you. Appreciate it, Mr. Bartel May. Next we have um

[1:35:01] Pass ma, all bar.

[1:35:06] Okay. Thank you so much. If you could state your name and address for the record, thank you.

[1:35:12] Absolutely. Hamza al-Baroudi, 4720 South orbit, Mesa, Arizona.

[1:35:17] As of two and a half months ago, I'm the longer employed by Flock. I was working for them for quite a while and just basically did not end on my terms.

[1:35:27] not happy about the way it ended. However, a strong believer of this technology as a resident

[1:35:34] nuts and minutes away from here. A couple of things you're going to hear today include,

[1:35:38] but are not limited to, is misreads of these license plates. I would love to know what chief

[1:35:42] prices policy is to avoid taking action on the streets and if I was a betting man,

[1:35:46] because that is one of the things that you're going to hear here tonight is that chief's

[1:35:50] prices policy is that to check and check and check again if a stolen vehicle was to get a hit

[1:35:55] to make sure that we're not pulling over the wrong person, right. There is some errors that

[1:35:59] happens with these LPRs, and I do know that Chiefs Price's policy is to double check before

[1:36:04] taking action on any floor kits. We're going to want to talk about some isolated misuse

[1:36:09] which are valid concerns that never impacted the town of Queen Creek though, and not talk about

[1:36:14] the vast number of stolen vehicles and that have been recovered or the children and dementia patients

[1:36:18] that have been reunited with their families. Like I mentioned, I live not 10 minutes away from

[1:36:22] and I want law enforcement to have the tools to protect them, to protect my family.

[1:36:28] Law enforcement does not have access to the haystack, your vehicle is not tracked if a search is not done.

[1:36:34] It's not tracking at all times a search has to be done for a record to be created

[1:36:39] for it to basically become mass surveillance at that point, right?

[1:36:42] And there has to be a law enforcement reason for you to conduct a search, otherwise the system does not allow you to conduct a search

[1:36:48] if you don't put a trackable and audible reason in the search box.

[1:36:52] Queen Creek PD was recently awarded a $1 billion plus grant for DUI enforcement, and I have seen that some of your officers from Queen Creek have been awarded a award recipients from others against drunk drivers.

[1:37:03] Now I'd like to make it known for those who don't know that Flox Safety has been endorsed by mothers against drunk drivers and national center of missing and exploited children.

[1:37:11] We're talking about weekly hit and runs, that's why mothers and drunk drivers are proponents of this technology.

[1:37:16] Flock doesn't sell data. They aren't supportive legislation that LPR companies doing business with law enforcement are not allowed to sell data.

[1:37:23] Hurt a Prescott Council meeting a couple of weeks ago that discussed

[1:37:28] a situation that happened here out of Penel County where a person stole a vehicle went into Phoenix.

[1:37:34] Then kidnapped a child drove her through Flagstaff who had cancelled the Flock system two weeks prior than through Sedona who had cancelled the Flock system a couple of months prior

[1:37:44] Then through Cottonwood who does have flock, and then they were able to get alerted on stolen vehicle.

[1:37:51] Make a stop, make an arrest, and then recover the child back to her family safely.

[1:37:56] That's the real consequence that we're talking about here.

[1:37:59] Not what may happen, or what could happen.

[1:38:03] Three minutes is just not enough time, but I really hope that I drove the point across here.

[1:38:07] This has important technology. I do trust your law enforcement. I trust Chief Price and the team that he leads here. Thank you.

[1:38:14] Great. Thank you, Mr. Hazma. We will next move to Craig Gardner. You can step forward

[1:38:24] state, your name, address, and three moments. Three minutes this evening. Thank you.

[1:38:30] Yes, ma'am. Great to see you all. My name is Craig Gardner. I live at 259-18, south-193,

[1:38:37] place in Queen Creek. Really love Queen Creek, love this area. My address is very near

[1:38:43] any flat cameras actually. So fun fact. I think there's a couple of things happening here

[1:38:49] and I think they're really interesting. But the biggest thing is like government is not

[1:38:53] keeping up with technology very well on a federal sale level. It's a hard thing for them to do.

[1:38:57] Technology is evolving very very quickly. One thing that I think I would applaud your police

[1:39:02] department on is their ability to be forward thinking in this endeavor. It's not by any

[1:39:09] means the Ferris use an LPR camera and the people here would act they're opposed to LPR cameras would act as if you're not carrying a self on your pocket

[1:39:17] There aren't cameras on every intersection like that you've seen. They're also being able to be recorded

[1:39:22] There's a lot of access to this sort of data, but the kind of core tenant that you have to have is a town within your police department to keep the community safe

[1:39:31] Stressing the police department

[1:39:33] So when your police chief comes in says we are not going to use it this way. We're making this mismere

[1:39:38] We're putting on self-regulating our access to these types of systems, for the good people

[1:39:46] to earn the trust of the public.

[1:39:48] You should believe them, because you trust them to be here in your presence with firearms.

[1:39:53] Right?

[1:39:53] I mean, there's a lot of stuff going on that we have to trust our police department.

[1:39:58] I'm an advocate of...

[1:40:00] ALPR being used in a specific way for law enforcement, where it's contained in a way that helps the public.

[1:40:07] Specifically, hot tag alerts that the chief was talking about are very, very important to be able to stop some vehicles.

[1:40:13] There's so many stolen vehicles that would come into our community from other places and commit crimes and do nefarious things.

[1:40:20] And we'd have no way of knowing that they're here until the crime was committed and they were gone.

[1:40:25] So, I would urge you to vote yes on this item tonight, I would urge you to support the police chief and the AOPRs that he has and allow him to do the things with technology that he needs to do within a confined, well trusted environment, well protected environment for the town and for the citizens of the town.

[1:40:45] There's 30, he mentioned 30 to have a 794 incidents

[1:40:49] where they've used LPR in a positive way to help the town.

[1:40:53] Imagine if we had the 3, 794 instances

[1:40:56] where we just couldn't find them.

[1:40:57] We don't know who did it.

[1:41:00] That would be stark.

[1:41:00] That would change the town.

[1:41:02] I advocate for you to please accept the self-induced parameters

[1:41:09] on the LPR sign.

[1:41:10] Thanks, guys.

[1:41:11] Thank you, Mr. Gardner.

[1:41:12] We appreciate your comments all this evening.

[1:41:15] And those are all the comments I have in the queue,

[1:41:19] any additional that we receive Maria?

[1:41:21] None yet, okay.

[1:41:23] So with that, I will turn it back over to the council for any remaining comments

[1:41:29] or a motion on this agenda item.

[1:41:41] Council member Murdoch.

[1:41:43] No, I never want to go first.

[1:41:44] And I will, because I don't know why.

[1:41:46] But I appreciate people being here tonight.

[1:41:50] We always love also when we have our high school students here and that are here for government class because this is

[1:41:57] This is the people's work being done and it's important to see this and we've part of that

[1:42:01] We appreciate all those who always show up to to share their opinion their voice on issues

[1:42:08] You know, this is you know, I've been on council and I think this was six year and

[1:42:12] You know when you when you send it to you something like this you you have I can't predict the future

[1:42:16] And you don't think you'll ever become experts in certain areas

[1:42:20] water was one of them, and I'm still not next for it, but I have learned more about water

[1:42:24] and these past six years than I ever thought. And these past few months, I feel like I have learned

[1:42:30] a lot about LPRs than I ever thought I would ever have to learn. And so with that being said,

[1:42:37] you know, with it all the sudden getting attention locally nationally, I have put a lot of time

[1:42:44] into hearing, I'm hearing lots of things, and I will say something that I do get frustrated with

[1:42:53] in society is we're really good at hearing sound bites and taking those sound bites and

[1:42:58] believing every sound bite. And so I truly do try to hear these things and do my homework. Now

[1:43:03] I know I can't be an expert at everything and I definitely am not claiming to be, but I do try

[1:43:08] to do my homework. And I just even give a quick example of this this happened to me last week.

[1:43:13] I was listening to a campaign out of somebody.

[1:43:16] Someone was accusing somebody that's running for something

[1:43:19] of something, and I thought, I can actually

[1:43:21] look that up and do my research on that.

[1:43:23] And so I did, it's been about an hour researching

[1:43:26] what this person was being accused of.

[1:43:29] And it was absolutely twisted.

[1:43:31] And I'm not even saying I was supporting this person

[1:43:33] or I'd pose this person, but what I'm saying is,

[1:43:36] this sound bite was false.

[1:43:38] And so that's what I get frustrated with in society right now

[1:43:41] social media and with everything is that we have lost soundbites. And so with that being said,

[1:43:47] I'm not thinking anybody here is trying to do that, but I'm just trying to say that I really do

[1:43:54] try to do my homework on things and so I have. And while I don't have all the answers,

[1:44:02] I just appreciate what Chief has brought forward to us because we can't deny that this is a great

[1:44:10] as some of you heard earlier, I worked for the non-profit, and so I've been at a conference

[1:44:15] for past three days about human trafficking, for people in Arizona, so a lot of law enforcement

[1:44:20] was there.

[1:44:21] So while we were there for human trafficking, I took the opportunity to talk to a lot of law enforcement

[1:44:25] and others about this topic as well.

[1:44:28] And we cannot deny the things that we have been able,

[1:44:35] the sites we've been able to do with LPRs.

[1:44:40] And I understand your quote, it's heard quotes,

[1:44:43] and whatnot, I've heard the debate on well,

[1:44:45] we have privacy and safety and all these things,

[1:44:48] and obviously, you know, I care very deeply about children,

[1:44:52] and so I am in that world of hearing of kids that do go missing.

[1:44:55] I work with teens who have been traffic and have been.

[1:45:00] And so obviously, I was something that's very important to me.

[1:45:06] I know I'm being long-winded and I'm normally not, but because this is such an important topic

[1:45:12] and I just want to be very open with my thoughts, I guess where I'm at with things is I can't

[1:45:19] just do a knee jerk reaction because all the sudden society is saying no, no, no to these.

[1:45:25] They've been around for a while, they've been around for several years actually, and we haven't heard peep.

[1:45:30] All of a sudden, I don't know, I'm not sure exactly what's sparked it, but now all of a sudden we're hearing this.

[1:45:34] We're having this anti, you know, LPRs.

[1:45:39] And so I'm not a knee jerk reaction person.

[1:45:43] And so with this policy tonight that's before us, it's giving us chance to continue to look.

[1:45:48] How can we fix? How can we, how can we continue with this technology?

[1:45:54] and good form knowing that it is doing and that we are doing art of diligence in protecting

[1:46:00] people and not doing some of these other things that people are upset with.

[1:46:04] And so just no, I'm willing to keep listening.

[1:46:07] I love people come to me and give me, you know, hey, well, there's this on this side and

[1:46:11] this on this side.

[1:46:12] I'm willing to listen to both sides.

[1:46:13] But I'm not willing to just chuck a tool that is doing really great things.

[1:46:21] So, with that being said, I know this is really just open for discussion right now, but because of that,

[1:46:28] I am stating that I will be in support of this policy tonight, because I want this conversation to continue.

[1:46:34] And I will keep doing my homework. I will keep listening to people, but as of now, this is what I believe is the right thing for me personally too.

[1:46:42] So, thank you. Sorry. Very long-winded. I usually don't talk this long.

[1:46:45] Thank you. Councilmember Martno. Councilmember Brown.

[1:46:48] Thank you, Mayor.

[1:46:49] I too have thought about this issue extensively, and because I know that there are very valid

[1:47:00] security concerns, and I value the residents very much that have asked me questions

[1:47:07] around this.

[1:47:08] I took the opportunity this morning to go ahead and write down some notes and I'll read a

[1:47:14] little bit from what I put down on paper as my thoughts rather than try to, to weighing

[1:47:19] it. After budget and fiscal matters, the highest priority of a council member is that of ensuring

[1:47:25] public safety. Every council member in the nation is continually being evaluated on whether

[1:47:30] they're funding their police and fire operations adequately, providing the necessary resources

[1:47:35] and equipment and technology, and then most importantly, what the crime stats are. I'm pleased

[1:47:43] to report that I've always taken that to heart and endeavored to provide our police and

[1:47:46] departments and our Park Ranger program with the equipment and technology to make them effective

[1:47:51] and at the same time supporting policies, procedures, and accountability for a public safety

[1:47:58] team that ensures the residents and visitors in town are protected from any misuse of those tools

[1:48:04] and technology. License plate readers are just one part of that set of tools and they have been

[1:48:09] helpful in investigating crimes here. Moving on, let's talk about policy, oversight, and accountability.

[1:48:20] If misuses the concern as it has been, we've seen many instances in the newspaper of people being human.

[1:48:28] Rather than take away that effective and legal tool, let's address the policy gaps,

[1:48:34] let's address the gaps in oversight, and let's address any gaps in accountability.

[1:48:38] Police departments at the end of the day are made up of humans. Humans are not perfect

[1:48:43] and cops are fowlable just like the rest of us. That said, we rightly hold them to a higher

[1:48:49] standard, and we spend a lot of time here in town ensuring that we hire well. I personally

[1:48:56] have the utmost confidence in our team. We send them out with the best technology and equipment,

[1:49:01] and then we have to trust that we hired well. This, so we can trust our professional law enforcement

[1:49:07] team when it comes to having to make a rest face a situation where they may have to use deadly

[1:49:13] force.

[1:49:14] We trust them with sensitive information all the time, where able to do that, I'm able

[1:49:19] to sleep at night because we put the right policy oversight and accountability measures in

[1:49:25] place.

[1:49:27] QC, Queen Creek, sadly, faces very specific challenges with respect to missing from care

[1:49:34] youth in our town, where we have a vulnerable population of young women and men that are prone

[1:49:40] to being traffic and put out on the blade for the sex trade or enlisted as drugmules.

[1:49:46] Taking away this technology would make our efforts to protect these kids so much more

[1:49:51] difficult.

[1:49:54] Is that really what we want to do? QC like the rest of the metropolitan air.

[1:50:00] Area around Phoenix is not Mayberry. We have seen crimes against our youth. We have seen road rage incidents involving firearms. We have seen shootings and even homicide sadly. Additionally, we have seen narcotics and human trafficking. After that, we have seen organized retail theft rings and auto theft. Add in some amber alerts and some silver alerts and a person quickly realizes that it's a good idea to enlist the help of technology as a force multiplier.

[1:50:30] While simultaneously, and this is the most important part, implementing stronger oversight

[1:50:36] that would require regular audits, tighter access, transparent reporting, and meaningful

[1:50:42] consequences for misuse.

[1:50:45] The safeguards that Chief Bryce has proposed here this evening would address those privacy

[1:50:49] and misuse concerns, while preserving a tool that helps us solve crime and keeps women and

[1:50:58] young men from being sex traffic in our town. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Councilmember Brown.

[1:51:10] Vice Mayor, I'm a clerk. Thank you, Mayor. I appreciate the comments that have been shared. I truly

[1:51:15] appreciate the value of feedback from the community and I understand the concerns presented and I am

[1:51:21] grateful for the solid work that our police department continues to do to prevent abuse of all

[1:51:32] This is why I'm going to support tightening our safeguards and properly using technology to effectively

[1:51:39] solve crime.

[1:51:42] Thank you, Vice Mayor.

[1:51:59] Here in no other council members interested to apply, I would move to approve that this

[1:52:05] time adoption of ordinance 895.26.

[1:52:10] We do have a motion and we have a second.

[1:52:13] I'll go ahead and make some comments, I didn't want to short change anyone, but I appreciate

[1:52:18] having this conversation today. This is so helpful for us and as we know this has been a topic

[1:52:26] as of late and we understand that our residents have concerns. We understand that there's concerns

[1:52:34] across the nation. What that has allowed us to do, it's given us an opportunity to take those

[1:52:40] resident concerns that we've received and approach our chief of police and ask him those

[1:52:47] pointed questions and get those answers. And, you know, after those discussions realizing

[1:52:56] what an incredible tool and we've talked about this for a long time, the benefits and the attributes

[1:53:03] of it and what I love about Queen Creek is we have, we've established great policies and

[1:53:13] guardrails and safeguards already as soon as we adopted this technology there is a lot

[1:53:19] of evolving technology and and so we've had those safeguards in place and you see that

[1:53:26] because we do not have misuse this is one step to take it further to say we hear you we hear

[1:53:31] your concerns, we want to continue to add these safeguards and in recognizing, I'm sure

[1:53:40] tonight we all learn something new, we all learn something, you know, what LPR doesn't do

[1:53:45] and what it does do and there's a lot of information out there so just making sure you have

[1:53:52] the accurate facts and so I have appreciated that conversation and at the end of the day this

[1:53:58] the tool we use. We use it as a lead. We still have to access and make sure that it's reliable.

[1:54:08] We have to confirm material facts. We have to establish a legal basis. We have to have reasonable

[1:54:14] suspicion, probable cause. All of those things that our PD has to make sure when they're investigating

[1:54:19] something. And again, this is these are the same proactive steps that we are taking for oversight

[1:54:28] and accountability across all of our information systems. And so it's been a great conversation

[1:54:37] today. It's great to acknowledge what we have been doing that we continue to be proactive. And

[1:54:44] These areas that we highlighted,

[1:54:50] they all are helping us to continue to have that information

[1:54:57] safe and secure and only in the hands.

[1:55:00] All of those that are trusted and trained.

[1:55:07] And so, just appreciate these additional safeguards, even to take it as far as establishing this as a crime. It would be the first within our state.

[1:55:17] And so letting our officers that letting our officers know how serious we are taking this.

[1:55:27] And so again, I appreciate our PD, every day they put their lives on the line for us to ensure our safety.

[1:55:36] And that is a top priority for this council.

[1:55:39] And it will continue to be a top priority for our council.

[1:55:41] So, again, appreciate being able to have this conversation, appreciate all the work and effort

[1:55:48] on into it to make sure that it is a tool used appropriately and at the end of the day,

[1:55:55] at the end of the day, our residents can sleep safely.

[1:55:59] So, appreciate your time.

[1:56:00] There is another council member, council member, Padilla, that does have additional comments

[1:56:04] as well.

[1:56:05] I want to thank all of you that have showed up today.

[1:56:07] I look at the young faces across the room here.

[1:56:11] I'm so impressed.

[1:56:12] I don't think I would have showed up at a council meeting

[1:56:14] in high school and advocated for something.

[1:56:17] I wasn't that involved that gives me hope for the future

[1:56:21] that you all care enough to show up to a council meeting

[1:56:24] and look at these signs.

[1:56:26] This is awesome.

[1:56:27] You guys are here advocating for something you strongly believe in.

[1:56:30] I'm also really impressed with the way around

[1:56:32] the applause with the snapping.

[1:56:34] I haven't seen that before, really cool.

[1:56:38] I also appreciate the comments that have been shared,

[1:56:40] not only by Queen Creek residents, but by those from Maysa,

[1:56:43] from Chandler, you're all part of our community,

[1:56:45] and I appreciate listening to you.

[1:56:48] So that's number one.

[1:56:49] It's thank you for showing up.

[1:56:50] Thank you for being involved in caring what goes on around you.

[1:56:54] The second thing I would say is,

[1:56:56] what is before me now, just to brief history here,

[1:56:59] I was not here at the time that ALPRs were approved.

[1:57:02] I'm a new council member, it was done just prior to my coming on board.

[1:57:09] However, what we have before us here is not an ordinance or a solution to remove ALPRs.

[1:57:17] What I see before me is a solution to put handcuffs on and restrict the use of ALPRs to make sure we are using them in a way that is legal

[1:57:28] and protecting of citizens and residents rights.

[1:57:32] I will say that it's a very good sign that we have a police chief that is self-regulating

[1:57:37] and putting restrictions and handcuffs on his own program.

[1:57:42] I would agree with many of the council members, particularly council member Brown, I agree

[1:57:46] with we put things in place, I would just add one more thing, we continue to monitor them.

[1:57:53] This discussion is not over for me, a lot of you have raised incredible points, I consider

[1:57:57] myself to be a libertarian leaning conservative. So I appreciate a lot of the points that have been brought up.

[1:58:03] What is before me is the is to vote yes or no, should I put restrictions further on ALPRs.

[1:58:10] And I'm going to vote yes because that's what's before me today. I will also take into account the

[1:58:15] comments that have been placed before us today from you, which were very well articulated by I say,

[1:58:21] you didn't yell up, get up in yelling screen. If you want to make a difference, you provide facts and

[1:58:25] evidence and convincing opinion, which all of you have done today.

[1:58:31] So I will vote two put these restrictions on today and I will continue to monitor the use

[1:58:36] of this program and that is why we have elected officials to oversee things like the police

[1:58:41] force to make sure we believe as members of the community that we also live in that these

[1:58:46] tools continue to be used in the benefit of our residents.

[1:58:51] So thank you so much.

[1:58:53] Thank you, Councilmember Padilla.

[1:58:55] I don't see any other comments in the queue.

[1:58:57] We do have a motion and I believe we have a second motion by Councilmember Brown,

[1:59:03] Senate by Councilmember Benning.

[1:59:04] So please place your votes.

[1:59:11] That does pass unanimously.

[1:59:12] 7-0.

[1:59:14] We are going to take a short recess.

[1:59:17] We have had back-to-back meetings.

[1:59:19] I understand there are multiple high schoolers here in the audience.

[1:59:23] I'm guessing you want credit for your history class.

[1:59:27] So if you want to go ahead and approach the Dias, we'll take a quick, quick photo, which

[1:59:31] usually satisfies your teachers' requirements.

[1:59:38] We're going to be so many counties out here.

[1:59:43] We'll have everyone join up front.

[1:59:49] There's a stair so we can kind of stagger and then Council will stay in the back so you can see us.

[2:00:00] I don't think so. I don't think so.

[2:00:02] I don't think so.

[2:00:07] Who's camera?

[2:00:08] Oh yeah, we won't phone them and then you guys can air drop into each other.

[2:00:13] More than one. I mean, I don't think it's like a few.

[2:00:29] If anybody needs it, thank you for attending.

[2:00:33] Thanks for coming. Thank you for attending.

[2:00:36] I'm glad you're welcome.

[2:00:52] more agenda item after recess we will

[2:01:58] now reconvene the regular session meeting of this agenda and we will

[2:02:06] move to our final item which is items for discussion we do have one item this evening and I would like to turn the

[2:02:13] meaning over to our Town Manager Bruce Gardner.

[2:02:16] Thank you so much, Bruce.

[2:02:18] Thank you, Mayor and Council.

[2:02:20] I appreciate the opportunity to kick this off tonight.

[2:02:24] Been thinking a lot last few months about this topic,

[2:02:28] probably the last seven, eight years actually.

[2:02:32] Just so I put it all together.

[2:02:35] And so bear with me, I put some notes down

[2:02:38] that I like to read, because that's the best way I think

[2:02:42] to write these things down. So tonight we'll be discussing water not simply as a resource or

[2:02:51] utility but as one of the most important responsibilities we have for the future of the town of

[2:02:56] Queen Creek. To quote to politicians and people are quoting politicians tonight one of my favorite

[2:03:12] vital to the welfare of the United States, then clean water.

[2:03:17] Virtually every aspect of modern life depends in some way

[2:03:20] on abundant and clear supply of this precious gift of nature.

[2:03:26] Town of Queen Creek has long recognized this reality

[2:03:28] and has remained well ahead of the curb and water planning.

[2:03:33] That is due in large part to visionary leadership,

[2:03:36] but also to the unique circumstances facing our community.

[2:03:39] For more than 20 years, this council and the councils that came before it have viewed water with the same sense of importance

[2:03:46] and responsibility expressed by President Reagan nearly 40 years ago.

[2:03:52] That long-term perspective has resulted in significant foreign thinking policy decisions.

[2:03:57] Those decisions have included the acquisition of private water companies with opportunities to serve current future growth,

[2:04:03] the purchase of water rights from Cebola, the acquisition of groundwater

[2:04:08] extinguishment credits, paying Cagrid, costs of behalf of customers,

[2:04:14] purchasing and developing recharge sites, and most recently the

[2:04:17] importance that the opportunity to be at the forefront of establishing new

[2:04:22] resource for water supplies from Harkehale, Harkehale Valley.

[2:04:26] Each of these decisions was made with the understanding that water planning

[2:04:30] can not simply focus on today's needs. It must anticipate tomorrow's challenges, and is that

[2:04:37] same long-term vision that brings us to the discussion we'll have tonight of how this vision

[2:04:42] is finally paid for. When we talk about all these projects culminating with the Harkaea of the Water

[2:04:47] Project, the numbers alone are difficult to comprehend. We're talking about securing water,

[2:04:54] approximately 100 miles from our community, transporting it through the central Arizona.

[2:05:00] Project canal, conveying across Maricopa County, and ultimately bringing it to Queen Creek where it can be recharged into the aquifer and protected for generations who will call this community home.

[2:05:13] But this project is about far more than engineering infrastructure, pipelines, or canals. It's about vision, it's about water security.

[2:05:21] Most importantly, it's about our responsibility to ensure that future generations have the same

[2:05:26] opportunity to live, work, race families, and build their futures here, just like we have today.

[2:05:34] For generations, Arizona communities have relied heavily on the Colorado River and groundwater.

[2:05:39] Both resources are increasingly constrained.

[2:05:42] Colorado River faces long-term challenges and groundwater regulations are becoming increasingly restrictive,

[2:05:49] as we collectively try to confront the reality of limited supplies

[2:05:53] as we prepare for growth.

[2:05:56] The question before our communities like Queen Creek

[2:05:58] is not whether water will become more important already has.

[2:06:02] This town council has already answered that question

[2:06:04] because you have had the foresight and courage to act.

[2:06:08] Well, before the choices have become fewer,

[2:06:11] more expensive and more difficult.

[2:06:14] The Harkaila Water Project is part of our answer.

[2:06:17] I recently had an experience about this project that gave me even a more new perspective on the magnitude of what we're undertaking.

[2:06:28] A couple of weeks ago I was flying back from Oregon and after a while I was there,

[2:06:37] some of the residents of Oregon were talking about the issues they have with water and all I could see is water all over the place.

[2:06:44] But as I was flying back and coming into the valley, notice that the location was near

[2:06:53] the CAP canal where we're going to put the water back into the canal. The plane took

[2:06:59] a left-hand turn, followed the canal all the way to the east, and then took a right-hand

[2:07:06] turn, and then I could see Queen Creek beyond. And so after following the canal, I don't know

[2:07:13] that's what the pilot was using, and then he took a right hand

[2:07:16] turned down the salt river to land.

[2:07:19] It was just amazing to see what this project really entails.

[2:07:23] We drove out there in January, but to see it from above is even more amazing.

[2:07:32] So at that moment, the scale, this project truly became real to me

[2:07:35] that you can only get from above and just reinforce

[2:07:38] just a extraordinary vision this council has.

[2:07:42] So we're talking about acquiring water,

[2:07:45] far from our community, developing the infrastructure necessary to move it to the CAP Canal

[2:07:52] and utilizing one of the most significant pieces of water and infrastructure ever

[2:07:57] constructed in the southwest and then delivering that water across the valley to Queen Creek.

[2:08:03] This is not a routine water project. This is the kind of long-term generational investment

[2:08:07] that communities undertake only when they're willing to look well beyond the immediate

[2:08:12] challenges of today. In many ways, what we're doing is comparable and

[2:08:16] vision to the construction of the CIP canal itself. We are building upon

[2:08:21] that remarkable infrastructure and using it to create a new chapter in

[2:08:24] Queen Creek's Water Feature, one designed to provide greater certainty and

[2:08:29] security for the next century and beyond. Our goal is simply not to find enough

[2:08:34] water for tomorrow. That's easy. Our goal is to secure a sustainable water supply that

[2:08:40] of this community for generations, including all these projects that I've mentioned over the recent

[2:08:45] past, a little bit of a quick week for a hundred and ten years.

[2:08:48] Think for a moment was happened the past hundred and ten years and a world war one, commercial

[2:08:56] flight, television, computer space travel, many of us in this room will not see the full

[2:09:02] impact of the decisions we are making today.

[2:09:05] But our children, grandchildren, and generations, we will never meet, may benefit from the

[2:09:11] foresight we're demonstrating now.

[2:09:14] That is what makes this project and these decisions meaningful to this community.

[2:09:20] This part of the overall water strategy, the Harkaila project, is a statement about who we are

[2:09:25] as a community.

[2:09:26] It says that Queen Creek is not willing to simply wait on outside forces out of our control

[2:09:31] and hope that the future works itself out.

[2:09:34] We are willing to confront the challenges ahead because of that we have been able to secure resources that in a long run will be much cheaper than if we did nothing.

[2:09:44] We are willing to make difficult and significant investments and we are willing to think about our own generation because when it comes to water doing nothing has never been a strategy.

[2:09:57] Our responsibility should be prepared.

[2:10:00] As we discuss the decisions today and for the upcoming months, I hope we keep the true significance and perspective.

[2:10:07] Yes, these are projects that are ambitious and expensive. Yes, the magnitude is extraordinary.

[2:10:13] And yes, it will require continued vision commitment investment beyond today also.

[2:10:20] This council has made landmark decisions in the past, such as creation of the fire department,

[2:10:27] the water department, the police department, annexing the state lands.

[2:10:33] Now, this is the next legacy project.

[2:10:37] My almost 20 years with the town, I have never seen the council make a decision

[2:10:41] in regards to money until the timing is right.

[2:10:45] While the council has purchased prior water companies, water resources such as

[2:10:56] millions of dollars in savings, we immediately say let's increase rates. Conversely,

[2:11:03] the council has always reviewed current rates and reduced or eliminated where it

[2:11:07] made sense. When the time was right to eliminate increases to sewer rates, the

[2:11:13] council chose to eliminate the last two or three years of those, arguing just

[2:11:18] because there's a five-year plan to do so doesn't mean we have to. This council

[2:11:23] This also made the same argument in relation to reducing the property tax for straight years

[2:11:29] and eliminated the downtown quarter sales tax because you knew charging that tax just

[2:11:34] to collect additional money did meet the reason to collect it in the first place.

[2:11:40] This council also could have increased the water rates but chose to hold off as the policy

[2:11:44] decision of water resources and water security and resilience was not quite answered yet.

[2:11:50] or the past year due to a combination of foresight and careful planning, the question I went to share these costs has now been answered.

[2:12:01] What customers will be paying for is something much greater than infrastructure.

[2:12:06] We'll be building a future where the generations who follow us can look back and recognize that at a critical moment in Queen Creek's history,

[2:12:13] this community has the vision to act not just for today but for generations to come.

[2:12:18] In many ways, that vision did not begin with the Harkhala Water Project.

[2:12:23] The began more than 20 years ago when a prior town council had the foresight to explore

[2:12:28] the purchase of a small water company, originally owned by a man named Taylor Owen's

[2:12:33] gardener, who built the system in the fifties with the shovel, then passed on to his grandson

[2:12:38] Paul Gardner, who built it with a backhoe in the 90s.

[2:12:44] Harkahaila Project and other strategic per-water purchases, the town is beta, the council's version of this shovel,

[2:12:52] my grandfather used to start the water system. The scale is certainly different.

[2:12:57] The challenges are greater in the best minutes, far more significant, but the principle remains

[2:13:02] exactly the same. The town's future will be determined by what the council's building.

[2:13:08] To end this council's building water security,

[2:13:11] It's building water resilience, and it's also building the town's water destiny.

[2:13:18] So for the remainder of the evening, I'll turn the time over Mark's gossipic,

[2:13:21] or utilities director introduce the strategies.

[2:13:24] Then onto Scott McCarty, deputy town manager, discuss the financing plans and options.

[2:13:29] And then to constants Helen and Wilson, communications marketing director.

[2:13:33] We'll discuss education plans to the community and customers.

[2:13:36] Thank you.

[2:13:38] Thank you, Bruce.

[2:13:39] Welcome, Mark.

[2:13:43] Thank you, Mayor.

[2:13:44] Council, once again humbled to be before you to talk to you about this.

[2:13:49] I'm going to run through some slides.

[2:13:51] It's the part of this initial part of the presentation to talk about a little bit of the history and the strategy.

[2:13:56] It'll bring context to your discussions that you're going to have with Scott McCarty and the consultants and also for the public who's watching to see kind of how we ended up getting where we're starting tonight.

[2:14:11] This is the presentation, is going to be outlined here on the outline and we'll sequentially

[2:14:17] just go through this over the course of the next several minutes.

[2:14:22] So the town utilities department is just for clarification, everybody is that we operate

[2:14:30] three, three areas of utilities in the town.

[2:14:33] We have water and we have wastewater and we have solid waste and recycling.

[2:14:37] The main financial objective we have in these operations, they call them enterprise funds and they're supposed

[2:14:44] to be structured around full cost recovery as a business type operation.

[2:14:49] We have master plans and a lot of strategies that go into the long term financial planning

[2:14:53] of each one of these utilities. One of the things that's important to talk about

[2:14:59] And just to...

[2:15:00] We go through this process. The utility system is much larger than the town of Queen Creek.

[2:15:05] Up here on the map that's on the board, you see the outline of the water service area is outlined at red.

[2:15:12] And we have the sewer area in the tan color and then the actual town limits are in the hatched.

[2:15:21] So there's an amalgam that was created when those systems were developed.

[2:15:26] The water system has about 46,000 accounts, $36,000, $36,000, $36,000,000, $36,000, $36,000,000 a revenue, waste water, about half that, $25,000 accounts with $12,000 in revenue and solid waste, is about $12,000, $27,000 for $5,000,000 in revenue, total annual billings for your utility systems is just north of $50,000.

[2:15:54] We do have capacity fees in place, they're paid at the time of construction for our utility system,

[2:16:03] the theory and strategy of growth paying for growth. Water was last adjusted in 2019.

[2:16:09] It's about $2,400 waste water was recently updated in 2025 and at $6,100 and we'll be talking a little bit

[2:16:22] The Queen Creek customers see on the water delivery site are in the $40 to $50 range.

[2:16:28] When you add in wastewater and solid waste somewhere between $120 a month, let me take

[2:16:35] a few minutes and walk you through the strategic planning that we've done relative to water.

[2:16:43] Queen Creek basically looked at this in three different pieces.

[2:16:48] We want to reduce our reliance on the groundwater replenishment district and I'll talk

[2:16:52] about what Kagrad is in just a second.

[2:16:55] We want a diverse portfolio that's sustainable

[2:16:58] and it's controlled locally.

[2:17:00] We do not, as Bruce said,

[2:17:02] want to be relying on the actions or events of others.

[2:17:05] And then all of this will culminate and culminate

[2:17:08] in us becoming a designated water provider.

[2:17:11] Essentially, that means Quink Creek

[2:17:12] is in charge of its own destiny.

[2:17:15] Quink Creek's water resource goals, generally,

[2:17:18] reduce our local groundwater pumping

[2:17:20] for current customers, move our customers away from the central area,

[2:17:24] area, groundwater replenishment district,

[2:17:27] assure a more sustainable and stable costs for our customers.

[2:17:32] We're going to talk a lot about that.

[2:17:34] Have a portfolio with a hundred-year worth of assets.

[2:17:38] And as Bruce said, that is multi-generational.

[2:17:42] Those assets are that we've acquired.

[2:17:44] We'll be serving many generations to come to come.

[2:17:52] One of the things we need to focus on and to assure our customers and those developers and

[2:18:00] developments in Queen Creek, Queen Creek has ample water.

[2:18:05] We have enough groundwater to meet over a century's worth of use.

[2:18:10] The issue is for Queen Creek is that groundwater replenishment Arizona is getting expensive.

[2:18:16] It's getting very expensive.

[2:18:17] And back in the 1980s, the state had a lot of vision in that we wanted to protect ground

[2:18:24] water and under the ground water management act.

[2:18:28] It is simply that if you take a gallon out, you have to put a gallon back.

[2:18:33] This is the aquifer that sits below the Quink Creek and the Phoenix Metro area.

[2:18:40] It is huge.

[2:18:40] Quink Creek is down there on the lower right and the gold and red outlined area just

[2:18:46] the foot of the sand tan mountains, the blue parts of the aquifer are the deepest parts of the

[2:18:52] aquifer. So Queen Creek sits in a very good position relative to the aquifer and again going

[2:18:59] back to a long-term available water supply. But as we use groundwater, under the groundwater management

[2:19:07] act, it's required to be replenished. And how Queen Creek is historically done it is under the

[2:19:13] ground water replenishment district. It's a separate entity. It's a subset of the Arizona

[2:19:20] Central Project, Central Arizona Project. It was established in the 90s and what happens

[2:19:27] is as developments come in, they have to enroll in the C.A.G.R.D. They pay a membership fee,

[2:19:33] and a replenishment fee is paid each year as properties within Queen Creek use water, and

[2:19:42] shows up on their tech, their property tech spills.

[2:19:45] Cagrid essentially owns all of the water

[2:19:47] replants from obligations for our customers.

[2:19:51] Unfortunately, Cagrid serves more than Queen Creek,

[2:19:54] and then I don't mean that unfortunately in negative sense,

[2:19:57] but they have more of a broader macro-responsible.

[2:20:00] The ability for the whole Central Arizona area, as an even outside the AMA, the active management area for groundwater.

[2:20:12] And their plan of operations is designed in a 10-year block of activity.

[2:20:18] And what that essentially means is that their vision is simply confined to 10 years.

[2:20:25] And what happens is there is a constantly escalating cost relative to

[2:20:31] Cagrad fees in maintenance of that 10-year plan of operations.

[2:20:36] It's not a bad approach, it is just the approach that the district uses.

[2:20:40] Quink Creek has embarked on a hundred-year vision, and Scott's going to talk about some of the pros and cons of that hundred-year vision.

[2:20:51] One of the things Council and I would be remiss if I didn't do this, this Council and Council's

[2:20:57] prior have taken great strides to protect and mitigate Cagrid cost for our customers.

[2:21:06] We're approaching, $70 million is where we're at today, and in the next couple of years

[2:21:11] that will probably exceed $100 million.

[2:21:13] Unfortunately, most of our customers are unaware of this.

[2:21:18] And we need to do a better job of educating our customers on the groundwater responsibilities

[2:21:24] and the assessments that they would otherwise be responsible for.

[2:21:28] I've come before you many times and the easy, and I've told you and you've been responsive

[2:21:34] and you've been strategic, the easy button is to do nothing.

[2:21:39] The hard button is to do something and we are doing something and we just need to do a better job of communicating that to our customers.

[2:21:49] In 2018, as we started this, we were 90% of our supplies around groundwater.

[2:21:55] That is not a sustainable plan.

[2:21:58] We are heavily reliant in 2018 on the Cagras replenishment and to that.

[2:22:04] So, what we did, as Bruce articulated, is we went out on a limb,

[2:22:10] looked at some vision and found water that really didn't exist.

[2:22:14] It's never been used before.

[2:22:16] And we acquired 5,000 acre feed of water in the Harkwell Hale Valley.

[2:22:22] It's never been done before, but as us going through that process,

[2:22:27] and painfully that was a 6, 7, 8-year process we went through.

[2:22:32] proving that there were over eight million acre feet of available in that basin to be drawn

[2:22:38] out over a hundred years. The brilliance of this water is its stored there. It is an asset.

[2:22:45] It is not going anywhere until we remove it. It is not subject to drought. It is not subject

[2:22:52] to what's happening on the Colorado River. It is only subject to our resilience on how we

[2:22:58] to get it out of the ground and transported 100 miles to the east.

[2:23:06] As building on that strategy, once we proved that that concept would work and we were authorized

[2:23:14] for the transportation of that water, Council again stepped out and said, we need to close

[2:23:21] the gap on our groundwater usage.

[2:23:23] And in September of 2025, the Council authorized an additional 1.2 million acre feet over the next 100 years.

[2:23:32] On an annual basis that's 17,000 acre feet that's available for us, that's non-ground water, that's a renewable supply.

[2:23:42] It is security and it is a legacy decision.

[2:23:48] Parkway, the work is is is is is is is is is going on we've been out there for the last six to eight months

[2:23:54] Site work is working. We are rehabbing wells. We are going through the the water quality process. We will have to go through a rather rigorous

[2:24:03] environmental review and

[2:24:06] We are working on the the first

[2:24:08] Transporters Association which will be quaint creek buck eye and ironically the central Arizona groundwater replenishment district. I almost have to say that twice

[2:24:18] And the central Arizona groundwater replenishment district.

[2:24:24] That's worth at least.

[2:24:27] Here's kind of a high level of the critical path we're going down.

[2:24:30] We have today, the future, a couple of years in between.

[2:24:33] We're working on our A-DOS application.

[2:24:35] A-DOS is our designation.

[2:24:37] So that's a regulatory process.

[2:24:40] We're working on with the Department of Water Resources.

[2:24:43] As part of that, we have to work on our relationship with Cagrad.

[2:24:46] While we won't, our customers won't have a relationship with Cagrid, we as the town will have a relationship with Cagrid, and we need to manage that as we reduce our reliance on Cagrid.

[2:24:57] Scott's going to talk about the water resource fee that we're...

[2:25:00] We're strategically implementing. And then, obviously, we have the Hark Wahila Valley Water Project itself that we're working our way through. And we also have the customer impacts in terms of what they are seeing on their property tax bills. And again, we'll talk about transitioning them off of that and onto our water resource fee.

[2:25:20] Again, the 2018 is on the left, that was our portfolio, 90% groundwater.

[2:25:26] Now we're looking at a portfolio that's about 6% groundwater and only 10% Colorado River.

[2:25:33] We have done tremendous work here and I think we should all be proud of it and now we

[2:25:37] just have to continue this effort as we move forward.

[2:25:41] Just to finish up my portion of this item, Council of Queen Creek, does have ample water.

[2:25:47] replenishment is just going to get expensive. You don't have to pick up a real or the new

[2:25:53] spaper, which we don't pick up anymore. I guess we do it all online. There are countless studies,

[2:25:59] articles about the status of water in Arizona. We have to work better and harder on customers

[2:26:05] realizing the impact of Cagrid on them and the town, and we can't continue to subsidize Cagrid forever.

[2:26:12] Harkway Haley is a unique water supply and it will insulate the town from drought and Colorado

[2:26:18] River Cuts not just today but for the next century. It is the legacy decision and it will benefit

[2:26:27] the system and the community for years to come. My last piece is the Colorado River update

[2:26:34] conditions on the river are not getting any better. Most recent federal action came out in August

[2:26:42] and it has Arizona as expected taking the brunt of the issues on the Colorado River.

[2:26:49] Unfortunately, if the Colorado River doesn't improve, those cuts will further impact Arizona.

[2:26:57] Arizona is on the bottom of the priority list because of the deals that were cut

[2:27:02] decades ago as part of the construction of the CAP canal.

[2:27:07] 24-month study was just out and that is kind of the Bible when it comes to water flow

[2:27:13] on the river. Unfortunately, it's not a 24-month study, it's like a eight-month look

[2:27:19] sea study. We're going to watch as we go and see how the snow fall occurs in the basin

[2:27:25] over the course of the next several months and then we will see how that affects our

[2:27:32] is going forward. Unfortunately, no disrespect to our town council, but litigation will be the rule

[2:27:40] the day in terms of there will be a lot of posturing and negotiations going on in this arena

[2:27:48] in the Serena. And just to kind of finish on this, there are more entities that are behind us

[2:27:57] in terms of looking at purchasing Harkway Hello Water.

[2:28:00] It is not just a couple of communities in terms of us in Buckeye and Cagrid.

[2:28:04] There are already two and three and other communities that are looking at Harkway Hello as well.

[2:28:12] So with that Mayor, I will pause if there's any clarifying questions you need.

[2:28:16] If not, I will hand it over to Scott and he will start going through some of the data on the water

[2:28:22] system and how the fees are going to go.

[2:28:26] I'm not seeing any questions for you, Mark, so.

[2:28:28] I will stand by the ready to welcome her.

[2:28:35] Thank you.

[2:28:35] Good evening, Mayor.

[2:28:36] And Councils, quite the introduction by Bruce and it does get to the magnitude of what

[2:28:42] we're going to be talking about tonight.

[2:28:45] We're going to focus on the new water resource fee and then towards the end of the presentation.

[2:28:49] We are going to cover all the other utility rates and fees that we're responsible for.

[2:28:54] But we are going to spend a line share of the presentation tonight on the water, new water resource fee.

[2:29:01] So before we get into the numbers, that fee is really predicated on understanding,

[2:29:07] and making sure that the fees are structured to be fair to who uses the water as who pays for the water.

[2:29:14] So we'll have a couple of slides here to set that foundation, if you will.

[2:29:18] So in terms of demand, and demand is measured in acre feet.

[2:29:23] So think of an acre foot of water as a football field

[2:29:27] from end zone, end zone, a foot high, full of water.

[2:29:31] That's an acre foot.

[2:29:32] And so when we talk about quantities of water,

[2:29:35] it's either an acre feet or thousands of gallons

[2:29:37] at the account level.

[2:29:39] So we're responsible for essentially replenishing 28 and a half

[2:29:44] 1,000 acre feet of water a year with our current customer base and to both mark and bruises

[2:29:52] point we now have enough water for our current customer base for a hundred years in terms

[2:29:57] of the water supply.

[2:30:00] That acre-feet is spread across our 46,000 accounts, and again, the water servicer is larger than the town of Boundary.

[2:30:08] So when we're talking about accounts, it's not residents, it's accounts, some of residents, and then some are outside the town.

[2:30:15] So this slide starts out with how much is indoor and how much is outdoor.

[2:30:20] So 67% of all the water that we're responsible for is for outdoor use.

[2:30:26] So think of anything from outdoor use mainly as landscaping and irrigation and quite honestly

[2:30:32] as you'll see in some slides tonight and down the road it's H.O.A.s and a lot of the common

[2:30:36] areas in terms of how they water their grass or other watering needs and then 33% leaves

[2:30:42] you before indoor use.

[2:30:44] If you look at it by customer category, single family is the most, the water is used there

[2:30:51] the most, then nature ways, and then everybody else.

[2:30:56] So smaller commercial projects, churches, schools,

[2:30:58] those types of things.

[2:30:59] And again, it starts to give you a flavor of who's using the water

[2:31:03] and or who's responsible for replenishing the aquifer.

[2:31:06] And again, that's important as we set the fee.

[2:31:09] A lot of numbers here, but one of the other ways,

[2:31:12] are one of the important ways that we approach the fee structure

[2:31:16] is we have water-only accounts.

[2:31:20] So sometimes they're a counselor outside our town boundaries, so we don't serve sewer.

[2:31:26] There's another provider, Ebb Core that provides the wastewater, and then a combined

[2:31:30] account are typically those accounts that are in the town where we're both the water

[2:31:35] provider and the wastewater provider, and that'll become important in terms of recharge

[2:31:41] responsibilities when we try to set the phenol, explain that more.

[2:31:45] But this gives you a sense again by land use type or account type about how the water use is allocated

[2:31:52] and again, predominantly, majorly used by single family homes.

[2:31:58] And then this is the slide I was just referring to a little bit we have it broken out between

[2:32:02] water-only accounts, about 53% and then combined accounts at 47% and that'll make more sense

[2:32:09] when you're looking at a fee structure, you're looking at a fee structure that reflects these

[2:32:13] two different types of accounts as we move forward.

[2:32:16] So now we can get into the resource fee itself, and that really starts with reminding ourselves

[2:32:24] as both Mark and Bruce have done about what we've already accomplished.

[2:32:29] So we have bought 3.1 million acre feet of water that is going to serve us over the next

[2:32:36] hundred years. If you add up the mortgages on all of those transactions, it's about

[2:32:43] $730 million that will be paid out over the next 30 to 40 years. And Mark and Bruce

[2:32:49] talked earlier about the Cagrid savings that we've effectuated for our customers in excess

[2:32:54] of $71 million. Because we've bought these assets and we're able to reduce their water

[2:33:00] replenishment by using them. So from a funding perspective, as we develop our own program

[2:33:07] to replenish the aquifer and not rely on Cagron anymore, we start out with these core objectives.

[2:33:15] And they're going to be applicable to two fees, a monthly bill, which is the water resource fee,

[2:33:21] and then a water resource capacity fee that I'll talk about later. That's a one-time payment

[2:33:26] made from development to ensure that we have new water for new customers that move into town,

[2:33:33] because what we've accomplished so far is the demand needs for who's here, but we also need

[2:33:38] to have a plan for anybody new who comes to make sure that we have 100-year water supply for

[2:33:43] those new accounts.

[2:33:45] So we've focused on these four components.

[2:33:48] One is we're going to recover the expenses, including the replacement water for red designation,

[2:33:54] and I'll talk about what that means in a minute.

[2:33:56] We want an objective of encouraging water conservation.

[2:34:01] One of the cheapest water you can buy is the water you don't have to buy because you didn't

[2:34:06] use it in the first place.

[2:34:07] And so there's a lot of emphasis through the town in which we continue to accelerate about

[2:34:13] working with HOA's and homeowners about using less water, whatever that might mean.

[2:34:20] We want the fees to be fair and reasonable.

[2:34:22] We don't want customers to pay our new fee and

[2:34:27] Cagrid for example at the same time and we also want based on who's using the water

[2:34:32] We want that customer class to pay their fair share and no cross subsidization if you will

[2:34:37] And because we're dealing with assets that are last thing a hundred years

[2:34:43] We want to make sure across

[2:34:44] Decades or generations

[2:34:47] Everybody's paying their fair share at the right time

[2:34:50] we don't want people paying too much early and not enough people paying towards the end.

[2:34:55] So we're trying to accomplish all of these as we've...

[2:35:01] Constructed these fees, and are ready to present those both to you and the public this evening.

[2:35:08] One of the components we spent so much time figuring out how to buy all the water we need, we also need to think about the water we need to maintain our designation.

[2:35:18] So the rules that we have to adhere to there is we have a hundred year designation and then we have to get redesignated every ten years.

[2:35:26] So for the water that we use in the first 10 years, we then have to buy that, so we have a new

[2:35:32] 91st to 100 year on the tail end.

[2:35:34] So not only did we buy the water to make sure we have it for the current customers, but part

[2:35:39] of the fee we're designing, we've got to make sure we've got enough revenues and resources

[2:35:44] to buy the 10 year water we're going to have to have for the re-designation.

[2:35:49] And that's a strong component of the fee.

[2:35:52] And if you were to use a series of estimates, at that time, we're going to use about 17,000

[2:35:58] acre feet over those 10 years.

[2:36:00] When we go to buy that, we estimate that that would cost us about $120 million dollars.

[2:36:06] So over this, as part of the construction of this fee, we're not only going to pay for the costs,

[2:36:10] we are actually incurring today, but we want to set aside enough money to buy the water for

[2:36:15] replacement to maintain our designation.

[2:36:18] So I wanted to make sure that point is made to and as we try to design the feet.

[2:36:24] In terms of dates, these are the foremost relevant dates that influence our cost structure,

[2:36:30] which influences our feet. So we're looking to start the capacity fee in December.

[2:36:34] We'll talk about that. The monthly fee, it would become effective in January.

[2:36:39] In other words, that would be the date at which the fee applies to your usage in January.

[2:36:45] And then you would use it for a month, and then you wouldn't see the bill until March.

[2:36:49] And I've got the dates a little bit later on.

[2:36:51] But that's the timeline we're on there.

[2:36:53] And then based on where we are with becoming designated and that whole process or water flowing from

[2:36:59] Parkway Halla, for planning purposes, we have both of those in years 231.

[2:37:04] And those have different influences on our costs.

[2:37:07] We have a cost structure while we're still in Cagrid.

[2:37:10] And then that cost structure changes when we leave Cagrid and again, I'll talk more about that.

[2:37:14] So those are some of the timelines that have influenced the expenses that we're trying to

[2:37:19] plan for.

[2:37:21] So we'll focus right now this section on the monthly bill itself.

[2:37:26] And again, it's a dedicated funding source to pay for the cost to replenish the aquifer.

[2:37:31] So water purchases we made, infrastructure, transportation through the CAP canal like

[2:37:37] mentioned and all the other operating costs that are required to extract the water from

[2:37:42] Harcohaila and move it into town. Back in December, back in December of 2025, or November

[2:37:50] and December, the Council approved Resolution 1650-25 declaring your intention to create this fee.

[2:37:59] If you remember, that was the around the time we finalized the transaction to buy our most recent

[2:38:05] water purchases from Harcohaila, and it was at that time as we went through the rating process

[2:38:10] for that debt issue that we committed to we're going to need a dedicated fee to pay for all

[2:38:16] this water and to implement this particular program. If you look at the program itself at full

[2:38:23] implementation and for planning we've got that out about eight years it'll have requirements in

[2:38:28] revenue is about $60 million a year. For comparative point, our current water program generates

[2:38:35] about $37 million a year. So you get the sense of the order of magnitude that we're dealing

[2:38:41] with to replenish the aquifer. We've broken the implementation down into three steps. I want to

[2:38:49] walk you through those steps. And my point of emphasis here will be mainly on the assumptions that

[2:38:55] occur as we go through and work towards full implementation but there's the

[2:39:00] initial fee and then there's replenishing the aquifer and then there's making

[2:39:05] sure we have enough to deal with the replacement that I alluded to earlier. So the

[2:39:09] first initial fee we have set up as a three-year period and during that time frame

[2:39:18] and we'll talk about these in a few minutes we want to really set some

[2:39:22] foundational issues around some key policy issues.

[2:39:26] Like our effluent water credit, a late program,

[2:39:29] and the Cagrid on behalf of payments that we'll talk about.

[2:39:32] So setting those policies in place is really foundational

[2:39:36] to help us initiate and set the first fee

[2:39:40] in terms of covering debt and water purchases

[2:39:43] and all the other operating expenses that I talked about.

[2:39:46] So during this phase, here's some of the key assumptions

[2:39:50] that we've been focused on. One is making sure that nobody pays twice, no customers are paying

[2:39:56] aggregate and paying our new fees in our recommend.

[2:40:00] Foundation there as we framed it as to make the payments of the cadred accounts where that would be applicable on there behalf of, and that would cost somewhere between 9 million and 11 million dollars a year.

[2:40:11] And the result of that would mean that nobody, no, none of our accounts have any kind of financial obligation to cadred. The only financial obligation is to us.

[2:40:21] We would hope.

[2:40:22] Can we get a question in general?

[2:40:24] Absolutely not.

[2:40:25] I can't remember.

[2:40:25] I can't remember Brown.

[2:40:27] It's probably semantics, but I just want to be sure that when we're talking about this,

[2:40:33] and specifically the K-Grid part, I heard you to say we want to ensure nobody pays twice,

[2:40:42] but I think it might be more accurate to say that we don't want people to pay the total

[2:40:49] amount in two different places.

[2:40:52] Better said.

[2:40:54] It wouldn't be twice.

[2:40:55] It wouldn't be overpaying.

[2:40:57] It's just that you'd pay part of it here and part of it there.

[2:41:01] Well said.

[2:41:01] Better said tonight.

[2:41:02] Thanks.

[2:41:03] We'll make sure we don't make that abbreviation in the future.

[2:41:09] And in during that process,

[2:41:11] we hope to see some improvements in conservation,

[2:41:16] starting to reduce outdoor use.

[2:41:18] We're going to roll out this new fee.

[2:41:20] people are going to react to that new fee.

[2:41:22] They might change their user habits at HOA's.

[2:41:25] They might take out turf and do all kinds of other things.

[2:41:28] So during this initial fee, we would expect some immediate reaction,

[2:41:34] especially from the large water users to make plans over time,

[2:41:38] to start losing less water.

[2:41:41] And the reason that's important to us is the point I made earlier,

[2:41:44] if we don't have to buy water at a more expensive price

[2:41:47] than we currently have bought it,

[2:41:49] That's going to help out with the fee and the long-term finances of the program.

[2:41:55] And then the other component is the intergenerational equity and financing of the cost

[2:42:01] of water.

[2:42:02] And there's a few slides on it later, but we've talked about this several times.

[2:42:05] There is a disconnect that we're paying for the water over a much shorter period than we

[2:42:11] actually get to use the water.

[2:42:12] We got the pay for the water over 30 or 40 years, but we get to use the water over 100

[2:42:17] So trying to figure out how to match those two time frames up a little bit better essentially results in paying less for longer and again could be perceived as a little as more equitable.

[2:42:30] When we get to phase two, this is where we actually start seeing water come out of Harcohaila and being delivered to the town from years four to seven.

[2:42:39] So what happens during that period of time, we will have had constructed all the infrastructure in Harcohaila, we'll have operating costs.

[2:42:46] We're also going to have in town facilities.

[2:42:48] We have two recharge pits that we're working on.

[2:42:50] They'll be located in the town.

[2:42:52] We're going to have operating expenses there.

[2:42:54] So during that four to seven year period,

[2:42:56] we're actually ramp up and you see the water being transported into the town.

[2:43:02] The key assumptions there surround the infrastructure itself,

[2:43:05] how much is it going to cost to transport the water from

[2:43:10] to the CAP, how much is CAP going to charge us to put the water in the canal, et cetera, et cetera.

[2:43:16] So a lot of these are making the best assumptions that we can, but every year we will be back in front of you saying we think the fee needs to go up by this amount because we now have more information on the cost of the program.

[2:43:29] And along the way at some point we will have a better sense of how much of some of the infrastructure that we're building is growth related and we could put our transfer those costs to the one time capacity fee and not have

[2:43:40] in the monthly bill. So it is predicated on a lot of assumptions and this is program that's going to be very

[2:43:47] actively managed by staff on many different levels. That takes us to the third step where we've got the

[2:43:54] water coming and then what our next immediate concern would be is, all right, how much of that replacement

[2:43:59] water, how much money do we have to buy their placement water, when do we need to buy it and

[2:44:04] and how do we need to make up that gap? That would be the third step and again the corresponding

[2:44:09] assumptions there, the timing and the availability of the water, where are we going to buy

[2:44:14] it from, what's it going to cost, and then again, trying to address that matching theory

[2:44:21] between the length of the debt and the length of the asset. So that's an oversimplified

[2:44:29] presentation of how we're going to get to full implementation of the program, but I wanted to

[2:44:33] that out because with that we can it'll talking about the fee will make a lot more sense in that particular

[2:44:39] context. So Mayor I'll stop there and see if there's there's any questions about really the program

[2:44:45] and all of the moving parts that it takes to replenish the aquifer under the program that we're getting ready to stand up.

[2:44:54] Did you have another...

[2:44:55] I don't have another one.

[2:44:59] It's clear.

[2:45:00] Perfect. We will keep on going. So now we're going to talk about the fee itself. And as a Bruce, very thoughtfully put in the context, we're not going to bring anything forward to you till it's very well thought out. And that's where we are with this. We're getting ready to start a public process tomorrow. But we feel comfortable. This is a really good jumping off point for people to react to, including including the town council and the importance of the decision.

[2:45:30] So we're recommending that the fee gets phased over five years for all accounts and you'll see

[2:45:35] some graphics of that in a minute.

[2:45:38] This gives people time to adjust to the fee, not only in terms of a financial perspective,

[2:45:44] but also from a water use perspective, especially back to those large water users.

[2:45:50] What is some of the low-hanging fruit, for example, that they could do to change their consumption

[2:45:55] in a water which would mitigate the effect of the fee and then on a financial standpoint

[2:46:01] he gives people to plan for something.

[2:46:04] We're going from here starting here we need to get to here and we're going to do with

[2:46:08] the systemic rating, increases for each of the next five years.

[2:46:12] We think and we believe that that's fair, we're spreading that out over a period of time.

[2:46:19] I talked earlier about all of the assumptions that go into these expenses.

[2:46:23] So every year that goes by, the assumptions will become reality, and we'll have a better sense of the revenues that we need, which will drive these annual fee increases.

[2:46:33] We have those estimated now, they're there for directional purposes only, but they're not probably going to be the exact fee that I'm back here a year from now.

[2:46:43] I asking you to adopt for years too. The other thing that's unique, and it has remnants of property taxes, as you've heard me talk about those for years.

[2:46:52] But the impact of this fee is going to vary by account and it's complicated.

[2:46:59] We have 46,000 accounts.

[2:47:03] Each one of these, the answer to what's going to happen to my bill, there's 46,000 answers to that question.

[2:47:12] And they're mainly driven by three things, two of them are up there now that I'm looking at the slide.

[2:47:18] The first one that's not up there is how much water do I use.

[2:47:22] The other is am I a combined account or am I a water only account where you get some

[2:47:27] of the town get some of the water back as effluent and we don't have to buy as much for

[2:47:33] you.

[2:47:33] So we have a different fee structure for you, we'll explain that in a minute.

[2:47:36] And then the other one that's most influential is, what kind of Cagrid account am I now?

[2:47:42] Am I a Cagrid account that's exempt or am I a Cagrid account that has to pay something

[2:47:47] to Cagre. So the answer to this question varies by account. If you'll remember back to when

[2:47:54] we raised the 50th of water bill, 15% about a year ago, we had an online tool where you essentially

[2:48:00] just typed in your address and based on your historical water use, it told you what the fee would

[2:48:06] be under that same circumstance. We're doing the same thing with this and that'll be a useful tool

[2:48:11] for our customers and you'll get a demonstration of that in two weeks.

[2:48:16] So, but we have to acknowledge that it's complicated because everybody's not at the exact

[2:48:21] same place and combined account and water is just one example.

[2:48:26] So how does the phasing work?

[2:48:29] Essentially, in the early years, we're not charging what we should to cover expenses and

[2:48:35] then we get to the point where it's about break even and then for a few years after that,

[2:48:39] We actually collect a little bit more than we need to cover the expenses because we're making

[2:48:44] out for the amount that we didn't cover in the early years.

[2:48:47] At the end of the summer during the eighth year, you sort of break even, and it all works

[2:48:52] out which you underpaid and you overpaid works out.

[2:48:55] I've just got a couple of illustrative years here in the first year where the first couple

[2:49:00] of years were collecting $12 million less than we should in terms of the expenses, but as

[2:49:04] you can see we close that gap in the ensuing years.

[2:49:07] And again, one of two reasons to do that is to allow the customers to adjust to the new

[2:49:12] fee both from a financial perspective and from a usage perspective.

[2:49:18] As we implement this program, that's essentially dealing with something that costs, that

[2:49:23] we're dealing with for 100 years.

[2:49:25] So we're taking a longer term of growth.

[2:49:27] We don't have to financially fix this in two years.

[2:49:31] We have a longer period of time to introduce this fee, get the fee where we want it to be,

[2:49:36] still protect the assets that we bought and the fairness that we're trying to create as

[2:49:42] we develop this program. So I think that's a really important point. One of the best places

[2:49:49] that kind of look and say, well, how does this affect me? As we look at through the lens of

[2:49:53] a single family account. There's two things to remember when we talk about single family accounts.

[2:50:00] The water only accounts that we have and others were not the water provider. They use more water. They tend to be our larger accounts and have more landscaping needs. So they use more water to begin with.

[2:50:15] And then the other thing that was really important to us as we built the structure of this program is that those accounts were the towns both the water provider and the wastewater provider.

[2:50:26] And about 40% of the consumption that we build and form on the water side, we get back through our wastewater system and we are able to recharge that through that process.

[2:50:38] We felt they should get a credit for that water.

[2:50:40] They're essentially paying a wastewater bill to do that.

[2:50:45] And so they're back to the point earlier about paying two places.

[2:50:48] They're paying to replenish the aquifer through their water bill partially.

[2:50:53] And they're also paying through their wastewater bill.

[2:50:55] And so this 40% credit acknowledges that relationship because they're getting that water back from a combined town account worth both water and waste water customers.

[2:51:11] So, when you see a lot of the impacts, it's going to be referred to as water-only and combined

[2:51:17] account. And so, we want to establish that difference. Two reasons that are better or more

[2:51:24] detailed, a lot of numbers on this slide, but the water-only accounts in the first column

[2:51:29] and what we're doing is piecing together the difference which has two pieces. One,

[2:51:40] they're

[2:51:40] and gallon rate, but there's more gallons to be billed in this particular example.

[2:51:45] Here at 13,000 gallons versus 9, so that element alone is $13 more a month, and then they're

[2:51:55] not getting the afternoon credit, which has a value of $11 a month.

[2:51:58] So they're billed all other things being equal is different, but it's different for two reasons

[2:52:03] one because they use more water and one because they're not getting the afternoon credit.

[2:52:08] So it's really important to make that distinction as you start seeing a lot of the information about rates and who pays.

[2:52:15] This is a very busy slide, but it summarizes from the average homeowner's perspective what the bill will look like over the six years, and I want to take a few minutes and explain this.

[2:52:30] So the first column there's headed new fee for combined account, so this is one where there's water and wastewater, and they're using about 9,000 gallons a month.

[2:52:41] So right now, they pay $41.

[2:52:45] With this new fee, they'll pay an additional $16 in the first year.

[2:52:51] So their total bill will be $57 for water from their perspective.

[2:52:56] You're two, they pay $24 for the new fee so their total water bill will be $65.

[2:53:03] That's how this entire schedule is set up.

[2:53:08] You can see the distinction between the combined account, increasing the first year at $16.

[2:53:15] And then at the 40, and that's the slides I just walked you through.

[2:53:17] The reason for that is water only uses more water.

[2:53:21] And again, in this particular case, it's 4,000 gallons more a month.

[2:53:24] and then they're not getting the effluent credit.

[2:53:27] So that's the reason of the $24 increase between the 16 and the 40.

[2:53:33] That, this, our separation continues throughout the entire phasing period and it's foundational

[2:53:40] in the fee that there'll always be that difference between the combined and the water only.

[2:53:45] Very important that I communicate that clearly as we go, as we go through the fee structure

[2:53:51] because it is foundational to having those revenues come in and again, that's as we try

[2:53:59] to make sure the money is coming from the places where we need it, where we're not

[2:54:03] having to buy as much water because we're getting back some of it through their wastewater

[2:54:07] payment.

[2:54:08] We don't think they should be paying as much on their water bill.

[2:54:11] If it's like I got a question.

[2:54:12] Sure, do you have a council member, Brad?

[2:54:14] For this slide, I would worry that one potential take away if it's not denoted as an

[2:54:22] astrosque might be that folks would think, okay, the first year my bill goes up by $16.

[2:54:30] So for a total of 57 as you mentioned, and then the next year it goes up from 57 plus the 24.

[2:54:36] So a cumulative, we need to keep referencing back to the original 21.

[2:54:40] It's not cumulative. Instead, the difference between year one and two would be eight dollars, for instance, and then nine dollars the next year.

[2:54:54] So really the increase year over year in year three is nine dollars from year two.

[2:55:00] Good feedback for us. Again, this is the first time the public seen these and as we go through these.

[2:55:06] It's always helpful to see how people look at things. So we will take that feedback and we can modify this slide accordingly.

[2:55:14] But council member, Pitya, you had a comment.

[2:55:16] So Scott, we talked about this earlier. One thing I could, I mean, you could do in addition to that is what's confusing is they might also think that

[2:55:26] Okay, it's the new bill on year one, $40, so it's going up by $40 for a total of 40 plus 57, so what I would do is actually separate it out and say, you know, baseline 57 year one plus 40 equals total 97 year to 57 plus 59 equals XYZ so that it's clear a how much it's going up and be what the new total is on a monthly average bill

[2:55:55] for each of the years.

[2:55:58] We can take all that feedback and develop the material according to both for what's going

[2:56:02] to be public facing as well as future council meetings and some people focus on the increase

[2:56:07] and some people focus on the total bill.

[2:56:09] So we'll cover them both by making these modifications.

[2:56:13] So again, looking at through the lens of a single family, an average, quote unquote, single

[2:56:18] family bill, here's a real life example.

[2:56:24] If you just use somebody who uses 10,000 gallons, which is a jumping off point, and I kind of want to walk you through this because this again draws the disparity between a combined account and a water only.

[2:56:37] But the first numeric column there is combined, so their current bill right now is 34, 39, 44, they pay a base fee, and then they pay a usage fee.

[2:56:46] The water resource fee, $30.70, because they're combined.

[2:56:51] They get the effluent credit at 40%.

[2:56:54] And so their new water resource fee is $18.42.

[2:57:00] And if you look at that over percent of their original bill,

[2:57:04] it's 47%.

[2:57:05] So this gets to the point you were just making about what's the increase

[2:57:08] and then what's their total.

[2:57:11] And then conversely on the next numeric column,

[2:57:14] It's the same all the way down through the effluent credit which they don't get because they're

[2:57:19] water-only so you can see there that they're fee from the new, they're amount from the new

[2:57:25] fees $30.

[2:57:26] In 70 cents total bills a little over $70.

[2:57:29] So again, there's 46,000 of these examples if we were to calculate everybody's bill.

[2:57:35] And that's like at simple level number one, if we throw in Cagra just to be illustrative,

[2:57:42] So, we have the same bill at the top, the same 57 and 70.

[2:57:48] Now we take a look at accounts where we're going to pay the Cagrid bill on their behalf.

[2:57:56] So, in this particular case, you have again varying results where essentially this person's bill

[2:58:01] is going to go down by 15 cents a month.

[2:58:04] And then the other bill, their bill is only going to go up $12 because they're getting the benefit of the Cagrid reduction.

[2:58:10] So, they'll pay us in the far right column, they'll pay us $70 and $14, and they won't pay

[2:58:19] Cagrid 1857, so that's the net to them not to us as the point I wanted to make.

[2:58:25] So again, trying to explain what the bill does and then what it does with Cagrid, it almost

[2:58:30] needs to be done on a one-off basis and for us to really explain that.

[2:58:35] So just wanted to provide that as an example of the disparate results that all of our

[2:58:40] customers are going to see and we will take steps as we do with property taxes and other

[2:58:45] things to try to explain to people how that all works and I think that tool online is going

[2:58:51] to be very helpful for people that really want to understand what the net of all these moving

[2:58:57] parts is going to be and then he's going to come up behind me and confuse it further more where

[2:59:01] we think we can make some changes to the current base and actually make some reductions to their

[2:59:05] But, you know, like moving the thing three and four times isn't enough right now.

[2:59:10] So, but just wanted to introduce these two, as we have more conversations and we can show

[2:59:16] you the dispersing graphs about the range of how many customers there are bills going to

[2:59:20] go up from ten to twelve dollars a year.

[2:59:22] We'll do that in future meetings, but I wanted to ground it with just a couple of real-life

[2:59:27] examples that you can kind of hang on to as you move forward and understand the lens,

[2:59:32] really of how the homeowner is going to look through this bill and the questions they might ask

[2:59:36] and how they want to see things displayed. That's important for us to listen to that and react

[2:59:40] to that. So that's single family homes and then on the other end of the spectrum you have an

[2:59:46] HOA and we just used Cortina here. So Cortina for perspective uses 220 acre feet of water a year.

[2:59:57] So they're going to pay to replenish that through our youth.

[3:00:00] This is these are the phased numbers. So at the end of full implementation, there are bills going to be $763,000 under this program. We're starting off at 2.18, and then phasing it just at the same proportionality. We did with the single family homes, but obviously the dollar amounts are much, oh, much greater.

[3:00:24] When Constance shows you the schedule, we're having separate meetings with HOA's, customers, and separate meetings with irrigation customers.

[3:00:34] Those are our two biggest, largest water users that have these kinds of impacts.

[3:00:40] And so we are very sensitive to that.

[3:00:43] And I think the work that we've done, starting with the phasing and some other structural changes.

[3:00:49] We are a structural thought that we put into the bill will help as we have those discussions.

[3:00:56] We will share that feedback with you in future council meetings, but this is a large bill, obviously,

[3:01:04] and it is an extreme case, but we have applied the same phasing and approach as we have to a single family home in the community.

[3:01:12] Everybody is being treated the same in terms of the relativness of the phasing.

[3:01:16] It is a point I wanted to make.

[3:01:19] So, Mayor...

[3:01:20] Councilmember Benning has a commenter question.

[3:01:24] I kind of asked her.

[3:01:26] I kind of asked this question earlier to you, but I'm going to go back to it.

[3:01:31] So, just for a kind of, I'm not, don't mean to put you on the spot, but I'm just saying,

[3:01:38] as we work with our large water users, the HOA's and school districts,

[3:01:44] and we try to encourage them to convert their landscape so that they reduce their water.

[3:01:53] Do you have kind of a feel for what kind of dent that would make in this?

[3:02:02] I'm just going to use a round number 300% over six years increase.

[3:02:12] in terms of the are you talking about this the phasing I'm I'm saying the the

[3:02:19] 2018 and 50 for Cortina right now is based on the amount of water that they use

[3:02:27] for maintaining all their landscaping throughout their community and looking at

[3:02:33] year six, it's increased by 300 percent, which assumes that they're still using water at the same rate.

[3:02:44] And so my question is, what's realistically could an HOA expect to be able to reduce their annual water use to offset some of this additional cost?

[3:02:59] I'll let Mark provide some respect.

[3:03:01] Thank you.

[3:03:04] Mayor Council Member Benning, just like Scott said, there's a lot of different variables that

[3:03:10] go into that.

[3:03:12] But let me just kind of give you a couple of conservation things that we see out in the

[3:03:16] field.

[3:03:17] If we look at our HOAs and we compare them to what water they're currently using, to what

[3:03:23] water they should be using if we put them on a budget based on the actual landslide

[3:03:29] keeping we have. The average is about 10% over. That may be different for

[3:03:35] Cortina or other communities, but on average, general better use of water is

[3:03:41] probably about 10%. Another one on a conservation basis, again, I don't want to

[3:03:47] touch any buttons here, but overseeding is about 20% of their annual use. So if

[3:03:55] They become more strategic in what they oversee and not oversee non-active areas, or they focus

[3:04:03] at, they can put there's a lot of low-hanging fruit in there, and then on top of that,

[3:04:08] you actually have the strategic recalculation of their landscaping.

[3:04:13] So there will be some natural 5 to 10 percent, just we're going to do better with our water.

[3:04:19] And then I think you start getting into a 20 percent by starting to make some changes.

[3:04:24] The one thing I do want to say though, if they're not going to drop by 50 percent, you're going

[3:04:31] to see some natural elasticity in that we're going to find that number a little better.

[3:04:39] But we would expect Scott says, as these numbers start increasing, the return on their

[3:04:45] investment from paying more attention will be greater.

[3:04:48] So I will probably, I will take the under on all of those numbers for Cortina, but we'll have to see how that goes.

[3:04:59] Is that hopefully that answer?

[3:05:00] Your question.

[3:05:01] Mark another question by council member.

[3:05:02] I have a question.

[3:05:03] I was just going to comment along the same lines that the variables are at least three, and it's

[3:05:10] hard to, and without a crystal ball, it's hard to figure out what will happen.

[3:05:15] The 10 percent, overage for most of the communities, that's the lowest hanging fruit.

[3:05:20] And then after that is better conservation.

[3:05:22] And then one other factor is statute at the,

[3:05:28] there's own revised statutes that are limiting

[3:05:31] and taking turf out of production by state law.

[3:05:37] So that's another factor that we don't necessarily need.

[3:05:40] That one is outside of Queen Creek's control,

[3:05:42] but under the management plan,

[3:05:45] the regulations are watering turf will become more an issue for each choice.

[3:05:50] So if you want to learn more about that, it's the fifth management plan you can just Google it'll, you'll, you'll know more than you want to.

[3:06:04] All right. Thanks for the question. Thanks Mark. So those were just a couple of examples to give you a flavor of of what the what the impacts of the fee will be.

[3:06:15] Embedded in the recommendations are these four policy issues that we wanted to go through

[3:06:22] And highlight for the council, some of whom I've alluded to, some of whom we talked about, so we can move some through some of these.

[3:06:29] Fairly, quickly, we talked about the effluent credit for a combined account.

[3:06:35] I did reference specifically to single family homes.

[3:06:38] We have different credit amounts for mixed use and building only there at the bottom, based on actual in-town examples of where we have that.

[3:06:47] So we pretty comfortable in those environments how much of the effluent actually comes back to

[3:06:53] the town and in some cases it's greater than the 40%.

[3:06:56] So again we're trying to be fair and equitable to those types of uses and accounts to give

[3:07:01] them the credit for the water that we know they're giving back through the wastewater system.

[3:07:05] Mayor, do you have a question?

[3:07:06] Thank you.

[3:07:07] I've got a question from a resident actually who's watching online and I think it's a good

[3:07:15] point.

[3:07:15] So for those that are water-only accounts or what some call fresh water that are not returning

[3:07:21] effluent to the town of Queen Creek, the concern is that there's no credit being given for

[3:07:30] the water that is going back into the ground to the septic. Can you address that point? I'm actually

[3:07:35] going to read this part. Caggers being framed that the town is paying this on behalf of each of the

[3:07:40] owners,

[3:07:42] the point is that it is just a cost of doing business, just like any other expense

[3:07:46] for delivering water, a little bit concerning about the way it's being framed.

[3:07:51] So can you address that for those who have septic mayor council member Padilla, one of

[3:07:59] the things when we become designated, the town, the town will receive what they call as a credit

[3:08:07] for instantile recharge.

[3:08:09] And that recognizes the water that's otherwise being absorbed

[3:08:13] within the community.

[3:08:16] And that is a standard, no questions asked, it's 4%.

[3:08:20] One of the things we would be doing

[3:08:22] is we'd be looking to based on the number of washes

[3:08:27] and other things we have in the community.

[3:08:30] For example, Chandler was able to negotiate

[3:08:32] a higher internal recharge.

[3:08:34] Unfortunately, that doesn't answer the customer's specific question, but we are receiving a benefit of an overall reduced level of consumption for some of that.

[3:08:46] The specific value the town is receiving, septic systems are generally like irrigation. The water goes away and it doesn't come back. So outside of that, we don't have anything built into the model for septic systems.

[3:09:02] If I understand you correctly, did you say the credit is 4%?

[3:09:08] Across the board for the entire system, so we get, so when we automatically get a reduction

[3:09:16] in our replenishment requirements by 4% for the entire system, recognizing the stuff

[3:09:24] that already, all the water that they're doing.

[3:09:25] And who's giving that credit?

[3:09:27] But ADWR, when they do our designation, if we state-wide, or is that simply our agreement?

[3:09:32] That's our agreement, and as I said, when we put in our application, it is 4% without

[3:09:40] even asking for it.

[3:09:42] We have to make an argument through hydrology that it should be higher because we have

[3:09:46] more water being recharged in our community.

[3:09:48] If we had more septic systems, if we had more, like I said, I think we could make an argument

[3:09:54] that there's more than 4% because of the number of washers and other things and we will be pursuing that.

[3:10:00] That is an option. What do you think realistically, so if I understand you correctly, you're going to be negotiating on behalf of the septic users to get as high as possible. What do you think is the highest percentage that we could get?

[3:10:12] I think I think Chandler got eight or nine percent reduction.

[3:10:16] It's not just for septic. It is for everybody in the town gets that whole benefit.

[3:10:22] Right. Okay. Any idea on the estimated number of septic users versus I think Scott. I mean,

[3:10:30] it would be the in-town water only is and I don't know that number off the top of my head. We can

[3:10:35] we can follow up with all park are we looking at 20% 10%. I'm just going to go from the master plan and I

[3:10:41] believe it was about 2,000 acre feet of water that's going to septic water only folks in the town.

[3:10:49] that was the conversion. When we did our last master plan, there's about 2,000 acre

[3:10:53] feet of septic that we're losing from the sources.

[3:10:57] What would that be percentage or fraction-wise of the total bottom line?

[3:11:02] House is again, we're probably 4,500,000 total.

[3:11:08] The 4,500 on septic out of a total of 46,000 customers.

[3:11:12] seven percent satisfied. Okay. Thank you. It's very specific for not knowing Scott.

[3:11:21] So the only other question and it's not a question, it's just a comment. As I do the

[3:11:25] math here for both H.O.A. Scott, you and I did it on my water bill, which was a disgusting

[3:11:34] example of usage. It's looking like at year six if there's no reduction in water

[3:11:42] across the board, I'm seeing a total of a total bill that will be six months, six years from now approximately 350% of the current bill, which would represent nearly a 250% because we subtract 100% for the actual cost currently.

[3:12:00] But a 250% increase or rather said in six years the bill would be 350% of what it is currently.

[3:12:08] I'm just

[3:12:13] going to do this one real quick, right, so that we've got the 138 plus 57.

[3:12:20] Okay, so that's 195.

[3:12:22] So 57 divided by 195, but you're six for the water on the account.

[3:12:28] Yeah, so that's, excuse me, let me try that in a different way, 185 divided by 87.

[3:12:34] So we're like, yeah, so 342 percent, you're six versus what they're at now.

[3:12:39] which is substantial. I think what we're probably going to see, I would doubt that users

[3:12:46] including myself will just continue to use the same amount of water. Unfortunately, I think

[3:12:50] that the end result is we're just going to see a lot more desert escaping, zero escaping,

[3:12:57] turf, you know, our town might become more brown when it comes to watering and landscaping.

[3:13:08] but that's the number I'm coming up with with the water only. We're not expressing these in percentage.

[3:13:14] It's kind of embarrassing to express it in percentage because it's so stark.

[3:13:18] But that's what I'm getting now is an increase of 242 percent.

[3:13:22] Am I wrong on that?

[3:13:25] I wasn't to be honest. I wasn't following the...

[3:13:27] Let me just do it real quick. So if we look at the new fee for a water only account,

[3:13:31] we look at the current bill of 57,

[3:13:34] right?

[3:13:34] Right. Yeah. And then we add the 138 year six. So 138 plus 57

[3:13:40] gives us $195. That $195 divided by the current 57 this 342 percent.

[3:13:48] That would actually be we would subtract 100 percent because that's what the current bill is. So the

[3:13:52] increase would be $242 percent. That's true same. That's okay. When I'm just pointing out that

[3:14:01] we could disclose that as a percentage it doesn't look very good but it's the truth.

[3:14:06] And that's probably going to result in a lot less greenery in our town.

[3:14:11] So what I would imagine?

[3:14:14] When we set the fee, the $40 is about 30% of ultimately where we need to go.

[3:14:21] And then it steps up from there in terms of how we structured the phasing.

[3:14:30] And we didn't necessarily, the point I want to make there, we didn't do that necessarily

[3:14:35] to the current bill we did it against the target so we needed to be at $138 here and we started

[3:14:43] at $30 and it increases by percentage is going to that point. I'm just sharing the perspective

[3:14:49] of how we designed the fee. This is a water replenishment fee and what we have now as a water

[3:14:57] delivery fee. So there's the

[3:15:00] There are different fees for different purposes. There's different costs behind each of those. So, yes, I understand that that's what the customer pays.

[3:15:08] But to look at one cost, the cost of delivering water to the cost of replenishing water is a different cost structure.

[3:15:16] And that's a little bit a lot of the slides where it's a completely different model. We're not having to buy $730 million worth of water through the current $57.

[3:15:27] So I understand it's the total bill, but we looked at the water resource fee relative to its cost structure, and essentially left the water delivery fee alone.

[3:15:36] So that was a point of one try to make.

[3:15:39] Mayor, as we're having this discussion, I would just point out that I did not coin this phrase, but I have been repeating it quite a bit lately, costs are the costs.

[3:15:54] And so, as much as I do, I'm not looking forward to any increased water bill.

[3:16:02] I'm not going to be embarrassed by the percentage anymore than I'm embarrassed when I go to the gas pump and where I was paying $2 a gallon.

[3:16:12] And not that long ago, now I pay $4.59 a gallon, more than 100% increase.

[3:16:20] That's not due to anything that I caused.

[3:16:24] Those are outside influences and the percentage just is what the percentage is.

[3:16:28] The cost is what the cost is.

[3:16:31] This is not a money-making endeavor here.

[3:16:35] This is simply, we know that we are required statutorily to provide water.

[3:16:41] And we have to go buy water.

[3:16:44] We bought water from Harcoa Hela,

[3:16:48] about the average of the amount per acre foot that we've spent there so far

[3:16:52] is $15,000 an acre foot.

[3:16:54] New people going to buy Harcoa Hela water right now are paying

[3:16:58] $30,000 an acre foot.

[3:17:00] That's already increased a hundred percent just in the short

[3:17:04] while since we invented this process.

[3:17:05] So it stinks, but unfortunately, we have to pass along our costs.

[3:17:13] Thanks, Mayor.

[3:17:16] All right, Mayor.

[3:17:17] So we were at the there was four policy items.

[3:17:20] We talked about the effluent credit.

[3:17:23] Here's some of the numbers on that.

[3:17:25] But that's about 4,500 acre feet of water a year that we get through our wastewater system,

[3:17:33] essentially so again they're paying those water bill. The next program is what we call our

[3:17:41] lakes program and this is where we're doing creative things starting way back in 2018 where these

[3:17:50] there's basically 10 subdivisions and town facilities where they put in a lake and they use that

[3:17:56] their irrigation system. And so the cutting to the chase here, we think they should be

[3:18:05] exempt from the new water resource fee because they're not really having an impact on

[3:18:10] the groundwater that we have to replenish beyond what they're already, or meeting through

[3:18:14] their lakes. So we are making the recommendation that they be exempt from the new fee.

[3:18:23] They've spent millions of dollars putting in the infrastructure, probably show the graphic,

[3:18:29] so that they could do their irrigation basically on-site through the Lake program, through

[3:18:35] a recovered effluent well.

[3:18:37] And so they're sort of handling their replenishment requirements outside of the bigger program,

[3:18:46] and they've spent millions of dollars to create that system.

[3:18:50] And so we're recommending that that system in those contracts we have in place with them stay and

[3:18:57] That we do not charge them the water resource fee

[3:19:00] So that's one of our recommendations and that's been built into the the numbers that you've seen

[3:19:05] The third item we talked about already and have a reference has to do with the post

[3:19:11] 2000 for Cagrid on behalf of payments and

[3:19:15] And this is the amount of the Cagrid Bill that we're not otherwise able to reduce because all of the assets that we own.

[3:19:23] So we've been reducing those everybody's Cagrid Bill's down as much as we could for the last several years.

[3:19:31] As much as you could, is $9 million a year.

[3:19:36] So to Council Member Brown's point earlier about the paying two different entities, what we're suggesting is that they no longer pay their obligation to

[3:19:51] Cagrid, we will make that payment on their behalf, and those costs will be recovered through

[3:19:58] our new Queen Creek War.

[3:20:00] A lot of resource fee. So, no payments will be made, the cagrid and everything will flow through us. That nine million dollars, and over time it grows to 11, those have been included in those expense requirements that I talked about earlier. So that was the third recommendation.

[3:20:18] And then the other thing on the intergenerational financing program, it's not a policy question other than to make you aware that this is really going to be key to managing costs in the long run.

[3:20:28] And I alluded to this earlier, but one of the challenges is we've, the debt we've issued to buy all the water assets we own was either 30 year or 40 year debt.

[3:20:38] In some cases, the assets that we bought subola, for example, is a perpetual water rate.

[3:20:43] So it never runs out, but we're going to pay for it over 30 years.

[3:20:47] And then with the certificates of participation that we recently did, we have a term at 40 years, but those assets last in excess of 100 years.

[3:20:57] So the way that the math works out, based on the debt service, we're actually paying for

[3:21:03] and buying the equivalent of 82,000 acre feet of water right now. We only need 25,000,

[3:21:13] but we're buying or paying for 82 because we had to buy 100-year quantity of water. And so at

[3:21:20] some point, you pay everything off and in those future generations there's really nothing to pay

[3:21:24] for, but they're using all the water.

[3:21:26] They're still using the water, I should say.

[3:21:28] So this program is designed to extend the debt

[3:21:32] to match the life of the asset.

[3:21:35] We can't do that overnight.

[3:21:37] We have to do that as the existing debt.

[3:21:39] We have comes up for ability to be refinanced.

[3:21:43] The markets have certain conditions

[3:21:45] that meet and makes sense to extend the debt.

[3:21:48] So it's not something we can just magically do.

[3:21:50] It's market driven and other things.

[3:21:51] But it is absolutely critical to manage the cost of the program.

[3:21:57] So in simple terms, if I had a $10 million or your debt service payment in the current fee,

[3:22:04] and in two years we were able to refinance that down, so it was $8 million.

[3:22:07] So $2 million or less, that would then affect the effect of reducing the fee that makes sense.

[3:22:14] So we have that needs to be a strategy that we do, but I can't do it now.

[3:22:18] I can't refinance something four years from the start.

[3:22:20] wanted to, I really wanted to underscore that point, and that's a big challenge for us.

[3:22:27] And, and he's going to come up here in a minute, Arkansas, and we were talking before.

[3:22:31] But that's what's unique about Arizona.

[3:22:33] He does work in other states where they don't have the hundred year requirement.

[3:22:38] So they can finance things or consistent with the life of the asset and we don't have that.

[3:22:46] So, it is unique to Arizona, it's not a criticism, it's just unique and it's something we need to try to solve and I think we're going to have to solve it ourselves.

[3:22:56] So, the part of the program is to try to get a lower fee for longer and use some of the tools that I've alluded to over time,

[3:23:03] but we're not going to be able to get that done right out of the gate.

[3:23:07] So, here's the calendar, I just want to hit the high points.

[3:23:10] Next week, our two weeks on September 16th, the process starts with what's called the adoption of a notice of intent to create the new fee.

[3:23:21] And then there's basically a 60-day notice period for the public to be aware of the intentions of the council for us to have all kinds of stakeholder meetings consciousness is going to show you that in a moment.

[3:23:32] And then that step culminates November 19th with a vote to actually adopt the fee and

[3:23:39] implement or adopt the fee with an effective date that would be January 27th.

[3:23:44] So anybody who uses water starting January 27th, that water is going to be subject to the

[3:23:50] new water resource fee calculation.

[3:23:53] And because the buildings are in for a month, then by the end of February, you close your

[3:23:59] your bill period and then they would receive those bills on around March 29th is when

[3:24:04] they'd actually see their bill, but it starts based on the water usage of January 27th.

[3:24:10] So there is quite a process here that is defined by state law.

[3:24:14] So Mayor, I'll stop there, see if there's any questions about the numbers, otherwise conscious

[3:24:19] now is going to come up and talk about the comprehensive plan and how we're going to target

[3:24:23] the education to some of our most impacted stakeholders or customers.

[3:24:31] One last one. I do agree with Councilmember Brown. This isn't a criticism of our of how we've

[3:24:37] structured the deal. The numbers are what the numbers are. We haven't increased the cost at all.

[3:24:42] But we've seen a rebellion in Gilbert about their recent water increases.

[3:24:50] Behavior changes. Zero escaping. And it's just good for us to be aware of that we just need to tell the

[3:24:58] the facts, disclosed as much as we can.

[3:25:00] We can't both in numbers and in percentage. So the residents are aware how much their water bill will be going up. Water in general is going up. We bought the cheapest water that we actually absolutely could.

[3:25:12] It has to be paid for. We're doing that. But I think disclosing it by dollar increase and giving examples of percentages will help people to plan ahead of time to know that he's six years from now if I don't make any changes on my water bill.

[3:25:26] You know, I'm going to be paying three to four times a day. I'm in water now. That was the

[3:25:31] part that I've referred to as embarrassing that it's, oh my goodness, we think 10% or 20% or 30%

[3:25:37] is a lot. How about 300 to 300-ish percent? That's significantly more. So that's just the cost

[3:25:44] of business going up and we got the best deal we could. But I think disclosing it is super important.

[3:25:49] And so I would just encourage just to put not only the dollar amount increases on average, but also

[3:25:53] percentage along with that so that people can make plans accordingly and it's good

[3:25:58] we're letting them know with the stair step what things look like so that they

[3:26:02] have time to make adjustments. And I think that I appreciate the feedback I think

[3:26:07] that intent of the phasing is its directional. You know it is going to have to go

[3:26:12] up every year we're going to look at it every year but it's going to be at the

[3:26:16] magnitude that we've outlined tonight because you're talking about developing a

[3:26:21] that generate $60 million a year, which is essentially twice the amount of money that we're

[3:26:26] generating from the current program. The directionally we wanted to let them know that it

[3:26:31] is going to be material and we can modify the material to cover the people who are focused

[3:26:38] on dollars versus percent to absolutely appreciate the feedback. I don't know if you have another

[3:26:42] question. And it really is communication as well. There's a great saying that has been very

[3:26:49] topical as of late. We're not running out of water. We're running out of cheap water. And I think

[3:26:55] continuing and you know, constants will talk about communication. But continuing to tell that story

[3:27:01] that we did secure it at the lowest rate possible. We actually set the bar literally today,

[3:27:08] those recognizing the situation that they're in today with the Colorado River are paying double.

[3:27:14] And so, while they will see an increase, it's a lot less than it could have been if we

[3:27:22] back to Mark's comment earlier, just hit that easy button.

[3:27:26] And so, really important that we just communicate, this is securing our future.

[3:27:31] What we're doing now is securing our future for 110 years, and that's incredible forcing.

[3:27:37] If I may respond to that, I absolutely agree, and one of the, I think, one of the important

[3:27:47] framing perspectives that we need to tell is, how does this relate to other communities

[3:27:51] that didn't take an aggressive stance on purchasing as cheap a water as they could like

[3:27:56] we did? What did their rates look like three, four, five, six years from now? We saw a recent

[3:28:03] graph, which I think is helpful, that at this time shows where Queen Creek is on our average

[3:28:07] water usage bill compared to other communities and we were a lot lower and then we had

[3:28:13] an increase and then somewhere around the average, do you have any insight on where that will be

[3:28:19] six years from now in comparison to our surrounding communities who didn't do an aggressive water

[3:28:24] purchase like we did? Because that would be the offsetting story to tell people is that,

[3:28:29] yes it's going up a lot guess what if we hadn't done it look at the surrounding communities

[3:28:33] and what what their bills are like do we have any insider perspective to share with

[3:28:37] residents we we haven't it's not in this presentation but it'll be in for two weeks we have

[3:28:42] as of the current as of today we have what the various surrounding cities water rates are

[3:28:50] the comparability to each city is unique because their supply of water is different than ours

[3:28:58] So, comparing one city to the next, without really, it's not the same source of water, they're

[3:29:03] paying for, etc., how they pay for replenishing water, may or may not be through a separate

[3:29:10] fee, it might be baked into their water bill in general.

[3:29:13] So there's all complications there.

[3:29:16] I think the one thing we can do a little bit of work on is understanding to the mayor's

[3:29:21] point is, we've bought the cheapest water we could.

[3:29:24] And we could recast if we had bought it in today's market what that bill would look like and that would give you some order of magnitude of wow

[3:29:34] That's sort of what we cost the waitens, but to try to compare that to another entity without knowing what their strategy is

[3:29:40] But I think we could say if we were to if we would if we would if we would have waited this hypothetical simple situation if we would have waited

[3:29:47] But all the water we needed from Harkway, Hala and paid

[3:29:50] 30,000 dollars in acre foot today. We could tell you what that bill would have looked like and that might be okay that that gets it's the spirit of

[3:29:58] When glad we bought what we did in it

[3:30:00] That's one decision, as I said, several times at this podium. That's one decision we need to be very proud of as

[3:30:06] buying the water we did when we did. I think. I just have one more question if I can.

[3:30:12] I'll add on to that. Do you think it would be fair to say, if we have that graph, we could

[3:30:18] put asterix on pretty much every community that they are either undergoing a rate study now or

[3:30:24] will be in the near future, either rate study or fee study

[3:30:30] because of the cost of water.

[3:30:32] So where we're out today compared to where

[3:30:34] we could be in a year could be very, very different.

[3:30:38] So it's just a moving target, right?

[3:30:40] As far as you're saying that each municipality is going

[3:30:45] to change the strategy each year.

[3:30:47] So I agree with you.

[3:30:48] The asterisk would look good.

[3:30:49] My question is, do you think that that comparison every year

[3:30:53] year will continue to reflect the other cities increase cost with

[3:30:57] Calgary versus our reduced cost because overall if we just take the average

[3:31:00] bill of the average household the same number of gallons across the board

[3:31:06] that should reflect our good decision to buy the cheapest water possible and

[3:31:12] then reflect on a graph should it not. I'm struggling answering that question. I

[3:31:17] think we'd have to do it and see what the result is and share that with you. It's

[3:31:22] from me to speculate, without knowing, I have a good sense of where ours would be. Obviously,

[3:31:28] we've shared that with you. But how we move relative to others would be, I'd have to think

[3:31:33] about that. I understand what you're trying to get to, but I think back to the mayor's point.

[3:31:39] Anytime you put that graph together, you'd have to just date it, because two weeks later,

[3:31:43] if there was a council meeting in Tempe, it might change. But that goes to the volatility of

[3:31:49] the industry or the rate setting that we're in.

[3:31:52] So we will, as we move forward, try to be aware and provide information about what's going

[3:31:56] on in the surrounding communities in terms of how they're looking at, at recovering their

[3:32:01] cost.

[3:32:01] I think there's, there's value to that, comparing the dollars I think is, it can be done,

[3:32:07] but it's going to need to be explained.

[3:32:09] So we'll take that as direction and continue to work with our consultants on that.

[3:32:14] Thanks for the feedback.

[3:32:17] So, now, communications, you get a break from numbers for a minute.

[3:32:21] We still want Andrew or we'll jump to, okay, got it.

[3:32:27] Good evening, Mayor and Council.

[3:32:28] Constance Allen and Wilson.

[3:32:29] I'm in the communications and marketing department for the town.

[3:32:31] So, you get a little break from numbers that I do have some numbers in my presentation.

[3:32:36] So, as you recall, we started back in 2025 talking about Harkway Hila Water.

[3:32:40] We had a focus group, a public meeting.

[3:32:42] We had a number of communications to help inform the community about what this water purchase was all about how it impacted our water supply and also that we would have a dedicated water resource fee.

[3:32:54] So that brings us to this evening and the town has a strong history of trying to inform all of our customers about what we're doing and why.

[3:33:02] And so the theme throughout my slides is talking about reaching as many of our customers as possible in a variety of formats to make sure that they know what we're doing and why we're doing it.

[3:33:13] So, we've heard a lot of information so far this evening starting with Bruce, followed by Mark and then Scott,

[3:33:18] and so I really just wanted to highlight some of the key points related to the town's water strategy.

[3:33:23] We're looking to develop water self-sufficiency. The town of Queen Creek has been making strategic investments in water for over a decade,

[3:33:31] and we own a safe and reliable water supply that's not subject to water cuts.

[3:33:36] We have reliable water, we're working towards local control, and all of that leads to a stronger future for Queen Creek.

[3:33:42] All of those points are important, but they become even increasingly more important based on the conversation you all just had.

[3:33:49] So some of you beat me to some of my slides here.

[3:33:51] But with the uncertainty of the Colorado River, we have more uncertainty about where water supplies are going to come from and the cost of water.

[3:34:00] So we've heard this phrase over and over and over again in the last month.

[3:34:04] We're not running out of water. We're running out of cheap water.

[3:34:06] The earliest reference I could find was an ASU law professor, so if I'm quoting someone that I shouldn't be my apologies.

[3:34:14] And then we're also hearing more about where those supplies are going to come from, that we need to find new supplies and that the costs are going to go up.

[3:34:21] And so I think, again, going back to the Y, we own those secure water supplies and now we're talking about how we're going to pay for it.

[3:34:29] And that's what our water resource fee.

[3:34:30] And so, our water resource will fund, as you've heard, the long-term water supplies that we've acquired, the related infrastructure to get the water from Harkway Hala through the CAP Canal to Queen Creek, the remaining replenishment and our water resource programs.

[3:34:46] It will also replace the Caggart assessment that 89% of our customers are currently assessed, including what the town has been offsetting since 2018.

[3:34:54] So water resource fee as proposed is $3.

[3:35:00] 777 cents per 1,000 gallons with annual increases. You've also heard about the wastewater credit, based on the water that the

[3:35:08] town receives back through the wastewater system. Waste water, customer, or season the wastewater

[3:35:14] credit will be based on the meter, so residential will be at 40% mixed use at 80% in building only at 90%. So the average

[3:35:24] customer impact and this is all things equal. So based on 10,000 gallons, not on the varying usage,

[3:35:31] is $30 and 70 cents in your one and $18.42 in your two or excuse me in your one with the wastewater

[3:35:38] credit. Taking into consideration all the feedback we've received tonight, we recognize that there's

[3:35:43] different ways that we can communicate this information. But I also want to underscore as what you've

[3:35:49] so hard is that it's complicated.

[3:35:52] So while the rate itself is set at $3.7 cents per 1,000 gallons,

[3:35:56] how it impacts direct customers very greatly,

[3:35:59] not just on whether or not they're combined,

[3:36:02] or what are only, if they're in-cagrid

[3:36:04] and also on the type of account that they are.

[3:36:07] So there are many different user groups

[3:36:09] and that's why we'll be working to ensure

[3:36:11] that we have broad-based outreach related

[3:36:13] to the water resources, but also doing direct communication

[3:36:16] to try to really articulate how this impacts

[3:36:18] different user groups.

[3:36:22] I'm going to share three phases of outreach that align with the schedule

[3:36:26] that Scott just shared, focusing primarily on the first phase. This assumes that there's a notice

[3:36:32] of intent adopted in two weeks. So keep that in mind as we move through this. So here we are tonight

[3:36:39] with the presentation to Council based on the direction that we received this evening. We will start a

[3:36:44] robust outreach campaign again with the goal of ensuring that all of our customers are informed

[3:36:48] of what we're doing and why. So we'll be sharing information across channels. We will be having

[3:36:53] public meetings. So following direction this evening, we'll be having an HOA board meeting

[3:36:59] next week in addition to a public meeting, an irrigation meeting. Those are sub user groups as we've

[3:37:04] identified and we'll be sharing that information tomorrow. Assuming that there's a notice of intent

[3:37:11] adopted on September 16th, we'll spend the next three months continuing to reach our customers in a

[3:37:16] very Asian of methods. As got referenced, we'll have a water calculator, so how it impacts

[3:37:23] our residential customers that'll be added to the website on September 17th. We'll also continue

[3:37:30] to update information across channels. Some of the recommendations from Council was to have an open

[3:37:36] house or office hours, if you will, for customers who can't attend our public meetings. So we're

[3:37:41] working to finalize that schedule, but we'll have two hours per week where customers can come in,

[3:37:45] ask questions, get information. We're also working on a two-part water workshop series that will

[3:37:51] go more in-depth. So similar to what citizen leadership institute does, but because that falls

[3:37:55] in early 2027, we want to create a mini version in October. A two-part series that I'll talk about

[3:38:01] water and the financing of water of course pancake breakfast. We're also working with our

[3:38:07] majorities on an SMS notification system. So we're trying to reach again. The goal is to reach our

[3:38:13] utility customers a variety of different ways so that they're aware of what's happening and why.

[3:38:21] If we move forward with approving any fees that would be as Scott said the earliest would be

[3:38:25] November 18th so we would be back in front of you to share updates on all the outreach that we

[3:38:30] had previously conducted as well as outreach with the decisions made in effective dates as well as

[3:38:42] all based on a notice of intense being adopted on September 16th if anything changes that would

[3:38:48] adjust the schedule. I'm also about halfway through the presentation, spoiler alert. So we wanted

[3:38:54] to really focus on the water resource fee and how the communication applies for that particular fee.

[3:38:59] You're going to hear some additional information tonight about other rates and fees. If any of

[3:39:04] that moves forward, we would roll that into the communication. So just note that that would be adjusted

[3:39:09] as applicable if that moves forward, but at the end of the day our goal is to ensure that

[3:39:13] all of our customers are informed of what we're proposing and why.

[3:39:25] That is a very robust communication plan and I greatly appreciate it because this will

[3:39:31] this will impact our residents and other customers as well and so just very important for us to

[3:39:40] to have those lines of communication and that transparency. So I don't see any other questions

[3:39:46] Thank you, Constance.

[3:39:52] All right, Mayor, I'm back.

[3:39:54] That'll close the chapter on the water resource feed the monthly bill.

[3:39:58] So, appreciate the feedback we got on there.

[3:40:00] And that will be the targeted information as constants just laid out the communication plan.

[3:40:06] There are some other fees we're going to touch on here through the balance of the presentation.

[3:40:11] I want to talk now about water capacity fees.

[3:40:15] We are recommending, we create an implement a new water resource capacity fee,

[3:40:21] and then we're also recommending that we evaluate the current water capacity fee.

[3:40:26] So, what is the capacity fee? That's a one-time payment made for the construction of new infrastructure that's related to new development.

[3:40:36] So, growth pays for growth. It's paid at the time, a building permit is issued, whether it's a single family house or a commercial building.

[3:40:44] And these fees are not paid by our current residents and businesses are paid by new development as they get permitted within the system.

[3:40:51] So, the new water resource capacity fee is an important component to the water resource

[3:40:59] program and an important companion to the monthly bill that we've been talking about.

[3:41:05] This fee, one time fee, would be dedicated for the purchase of new water and infrastructure

[3:41:13] necessary to replace the aquifer related to new development.

[3:41:18] So we talked earlier about, we have enough water now for the 46,000 accounts that we have.

[3:41:26] We need to, when we go to get redesignated, have enough water for the 55,000 accounts that we might have at that point.

[3:41:35] So when we grow by the 9,000 accounts, we need to have funding to be able to buy the water, the 100 year water supply for them.

[3:41:46] This resource capacity fee helps to provide that funding in terms of the numbers over the ten years, which is what we use to calculate the fee.

[3:41:55] About 21,000 new equivalent units, so that could be homes and apartments and commercial establishments.

[3:42:02] And that's about 64,000 population increase.

[3:42:05] Now again, remember that's over the water service area, which is bigger than the town.

[3:42:11] And so if you look at this from the perspective of don't do this fee, then the question

[3:42:17] would be, well, where's the money going to come from for these new water for these new

[3:42:21] accounts?

[3:42:22] And we have to get designated in essentially 10 years from now.

[3:42:26] And I, the answer to that would be, would have to come from the monthly water resource fee.

[3:42:30] So the more money you collect here, the more, the more tied this program is to the costs

[3:42:36] of new development, and the impact they have on having to buy new water, the board insured

[3:42:42] or protected, those costs are from being transferred over to the monthly, monthly, finally,

[3:42:48] monthly bill.

[3:42:48] I want to really emphasize that point of that's one of the purposes of the fee, and again

[3:42:55] the growth pace for growth mantra.

[3:42:58] The other thing we would recommend, and we don't have the fee number for you tonight,

[3:43:01] we'll share that in a couple of weeks.

[3:43:02] But we would also consistent with the effluent credit that we have in the monthly bill.

[3:43:08] We would also recommend that we have that same credit here.

[3:43:12] So if you're a water-only account, your one-time fee is going to be higher than if you're

[3:43:17] a combined account, and we don't have to buy as much water for you.

[3:43:21] And we would use the same 40%.

[3:43:24] So again, the timing here is the same that you saw in Consensus slide, and I want to make one point here of timing importance, but we're recommending that on the 16th year adopt the notice of intent to create this new water resource capacity fee.

[3:43:44] There's a new state law, in effect, that says if you don't have your capacity fees in place by the end of the calendar year implemented and adopted,

[3:43:57] that the process now that takes about 90 days now becomes two years.

[3:44:02] So if you don't have an adopted by the end of the calendar year, you would essentially have to take a two year hiatus from implementing this new fee.

[3:44:12] There's some amount of new homes that are going to happen over that particular year that would

[3:44:16] essentially be lost revenues.

[3:44:18] We'll share those numbers with you in a couple of weeks, but from a process and a

[3:44:22] approach standpoint, it is really important that Council is aware of that timeline, and

[3:44:27] we will be making recommendations to ensure that we have that new feet adopted and implemented

[3:44:33] so we do not have to have the two year hiatus.

[3:44:37] That would mean that you'd have to take action and adopt the November 18th public hearing, the same timeline that we're on for the other.

[3:44:46] So, and part of that process as we go through with our capacity fees, we have that standing stakeholder focus group.

[3:44:53] We're trying to get a meeting set up with them shortly after the meeting on the 16th, so we'll use that 60 day period with them.

[3:45:00] To get their feedback, including the Home Builders Association, and then we'd also make arrangements to have communications with the town of Santan Valley, because again, this is water service area wide, some of which is within their boundary, so they were going to want to know that we're increasing the cost of increase of development to Santan is going to be a result of having such a fee. And again, the implementation would be December 21st.

[3:45:27] Here's the calendar similar calendar to what you sawing in probably a reference slide at this point more than anything

[3:45:33] So that's the new water resource capacity fee and now I want to talk about the existing fee that we have

[3:45:40] This is essentially pays for our water delivery infrastructure. So it's mains

[3:45:45] wells storage tanks booster stations all those kinds of things right now. That fees just a little bit short of

[3:45:52] $1,400. It's due for a re-examination, re-invaluation. We haven't touched it since 2019.

[3:45:59] If you remember, we increased the wastewater fee about a year ago. So part of the process

[3:46:04] and taking all of these things forward at the same time, we're going to recommend in a couple

[3:46:09] weeks that we have increased to this fee under two methodologies. And we'll work that program through

[3:46:17] the stakeholder group over the same timeline that I just articulated. And we'll be able to share

[3:46:22] those numbers with you more in a couple of weeks. So Mayor, I'll stop there, see if there's

[3:46:26] any questions about the capacity fees, and then I'll turn it over to Arkansas, and Andy

[3:46:31] Bird, I'm he's going to talk about the rest of the monthly bills that we haven't touched

[3:46:35] yet, and then we will be done for the evening. So we are getting close. Any questions on

[3:46:39] capacity fees? I do want to underscore the importance of the new capacity fee to the water resource

[3:46:44] program. So I do not see any questions. All right, comments. So Andy will be coming up here

[3:46:51] just we've all sort of as we've been talking about this the amount of staff work and

[3:46:56] consultant work on all this have been very impressive I want to thank Andy, his staff,

[3:47:00] my staff, Mark, staff, everybody who's touched this tremendous amount of effort,

[3:47:04] townwide, to get to where we are and I just want to do acknowledge that and he'll take us home

[3:47:09] most of the rest of the way. Thanks. Thank you, Scott. Thank you, Scott.

[3:47:14] You're in council and my pleasure to be here this evening and to hopefully we're

[3:47:21] Some elements to the utility rates that we haven't yet talked about relative to existing fees and charges that you have for water waste water and solid waste the three utility systems.

[3:47:31] As part of the process of supporting the discussions on water resources, we've also been tasked with evaluating these existing fee structures.

[3:47:39] In many instances you'll see it's been a number of years and some things have been looked at in depth, particularly from a lens of cost allocation and making sure we have fair and equitable and proportional allocations of costs.

[3:47:50] between the different types of users, which I think in the context of what we're talking about with

[3:47:54] a lot of resources, it's important to make sure we're well grounded in that regard as well.

[3:48:00] So for the water rates, you did have a 15% increase that was done in October of last year,

[3:48:05] but before that, the last adjustment was in 2010. And so just for a frame of reference,

[3:48:09] there's an actual consumer price index series that tracks water and sewer across across

[3:48:13] the country and that's gone up about 70% since that time. So you're not alone in stealing a lot of

[3:48:20] cost of water resources. The typical single-family bills have been identified throughout the

[3:48:25] presentation. And again, I've indicated our intent here is really to try to make sure we

[3:48:30] take a look at your cost, use accepted industry practices as published by the American Water

[3:48:34] Works Association about how do you fairly allocate the different types of cost of the system

[3:48:39] to users to make sure that the rates are really reflective of those proportional allocations.

[3:48:45] So, you know, as part of the forecast for the evaluation for the water rates, we've also done a multi-year forecast, and so we've, you know, been working with staff to update the growth projections within that and with the updated growth projections.

[3:48:58] Actually, we see a good opportunity for after making some adjustments to reflect current cost of service, some stability for your water retail rates going forward.

[3:49:06] So, and we'll talk more about that in depth when we have some opportunities as we work through this process.

[3:49:11] but we did see just given the passage of time and I think that there hasn't been a kind of an

[3:49:16] in-depth cost of service study performed in a period of time for the town. Some opportunities

[3:49:21] to adjust the rates that are consistent with the cost of service outcomes. So that would mean

[3:49:26] notably adjusting your inclining block rate structure. You have three tiers as you can see there

[3:49:32] four tier one. It's up to 10,000 gallons of usage and then you have a higher rate when you use

[3:49:37] between 10 and 20,000 gallons and then your highest to your rate is for water use above 20,000 gallons.

[3:49:42] And right now that rate structure is applied to everyone the same way.

[3:49:46] And that's where I think there's some opportunities to really modify how you apply your rates,

[3:49:50] to recognize the different usage characteristics of your customers.

[3:49:54] So for instance, multi-family accounts generally have a separate meter for landscape and irrigation.

[3:50:00] The main meter to those complexes is really for indoor use. That's predominantly intended to be captured by that tier 1 rate.

[3:50:07] So larger multi-family complexes are actually working into the higher tier rates, and it's really their usage patterns are more reflective of indoor use for tier 1 rate.

[3:50:16] So that's one of our recommendations is actually from multi-family accounts to have them be built a uniform rate that's at the tier 1 rate intended for single-family indoor use.

[3:50:24] Similarly, for commercial customers, the tier structure applies, and scales up, and you

[3:50:29] typically have a uniform rate for commercial that's more based on the average cost of

[3:50:33] the system that's more akin to the second tier rate, as opposed to having higher tier rates.

[3:50:38] And lastly, for irrigation accounts, you would, again, not have necessarily a tier structure,

[3:50:42] but a uniform rate based on the cost of service for irrigation.

[3:50:46] And that's generally going to be associated with that top tier rate, because that's

[3:50:49] you incur the additional cost to meet those peak demands for those irrigation times on your

[3:50:55] system when those demands occur. So, a lot of these recommendations are kind of by the book

[3:50:59] recommendations to really make sure you have fairness and equity in terms of how these

[3:51:03] rate structures work, knowing the different types of demand patterns each of these types of

[3:51:08] customers placed on your system. In addition to that, Hygent rates was an area that using data

[3:51:14] from local communities, working with TemP, they've done some really good demand studies,

[3:51:18] using advanced metering infrastructure. Those customers as well place pretty acute to

[3:51:23] man's on the system because they're associated with construction. So we do have some recommendations

[3:51:27] to adjust those rates as well to bring them more closely aligned with cost of service.

[3:51:33] The good news through this process as well is that for single family we do have opportunities here

[3:51:37] with this tier structure to look at modifying the pricing slightly so we can lower that rate

[3:51:42] for the first 10,000 gallons and the second tier rate and the third tier provide that additional

[3:51:46] slight increase for conservation incentive. So what these structures effectively amount to for single

[3:51:52] family homes for the most part is actually a reduction for those users at that 10,000 gallon

[3:51:57] or that average level, about three to four dollars on that monthly bill for most users. So this

[3:52:02] actually is for single family homes and opportunity to offset those impacts for commercial and

[3:52:07] multi-family. This will actually lower their bills as well by taking them off of the tiered

[3:52:12] systems and many instances. Again this will be different for every accounts, but conceptually

[3:52:16] This is actually going to have some, I think, positive impacts to bills for many customers.

[3:52:21] However, for the, the hydrant rates in particular, they just have very high-peeking demands on the system,

[3:52:26] associated with construction demands. It's very acute. So there is a fairly significant increase there.

[3:52:33] And with the irrigation, again, it's just really, again, aligning the rate structure for irrigation,

[3:52:37] consistent with industry practice where, you know, they're not necessarily having that first

[3:52:41] rate intended for indoor use and it's really all priced at the higher tier rate for outdoor

[3:52:45] purposes. So a lot of moving parts again for water just to not necessarily to make the

[3:52:51] conversation anymore complex but really just to try to make sure we've got fairness and

[3:52:55] proportionality throughout the entire rate structure and that the rates in place are really reflecting

[3:53:00] how the cost are being incurred on the system.

[3:53:05] I'm happy to pause on water, wastewater and

[3:53:08] solid waste are actually a bit simpler. So we took the biggest challenge on first in this

[3:53:12] conversation on the retail rates.

[3:53:15] Okay, moving.

[3:53:16] Thank you, Mayor.

[3:53:17] So, relative to wastewater, there's been a few adjustments periodically over time.

[3:53:21] In 2019, there's actually a reduction in the bill for most customers associated with reducing the amount of build water use.

[3:53:28] That's build the wastewater charges from 90% to 70% implementation of a cap of a maximum amount of water use that's build wastewater charges.

[3:53:36] In 2015, the commercial rates were adjusted, and the current single-family bill for wastewater

[3:53:42] is $44, and that resets every July based on the three-month average water used from

[3:53:47] the prior year.

[3:53:49] All good practices there for the single-family application, and again, the intentional

[3:53:52] here was to look at industry-accepted practices.

[3:53:55] This time, it's guided by another industry organization, the water environment federation.

[3:53:59] It has great publications about fair and equitable approaches to allocate wastewater system

[3:54:04] costs.

[3:54:04] And that was applied here.

[3:54:06] So adjustments, again, we're recommended in keeping with that relative to the wastewater

[3:54:10] system.

[3:54:11] The adjustments here, we're really looking at multi-family in particular and having the base

[3:54:16] charge for that scale based upon units, but reflect a ratio of general occupancy per unit.

[3:54:22] And also to align the rates for multi-family, it's not to be billed at the commercial

[3:54:26] rate, but actually to be billed at the residential rate.

[3:54:29] Really trying to get the application of the rate structure for multi-family to just scale

[3:54:33] appropriately based upon the nature of the number of units and to recognize that residential

[3:54:37] waste, whether it's multi-family or single-family generally has about the same impacts on the

[3:54:42] system and it should have the same cost per thousand gallons generally. And for the commercial

[3:54:47] rates, I'm no change to the flow rate but really need to look at how we scale that fixed

[3:54:51] charge and the adjustments for commercial and multi-family on that fixed charge are similar

[3:54:56] for water, and that we're really trying to make sure that for those of you.

[3:55:00] Comments that have larger meters that have greater potential demands on the system that the fee's scale consistent with those potential demands at each respective meter size.

[3:55:08] And again, this is a very common industry practice for how those fixed charges are applied.

[3:55:13] But no changes to the flow rate. And the revenue increase that we're looking at for next year, a lot of it's associated with system growth. So on the wastewater side with the growth projections, we're getting probably about 5% a year for revenue from growth.

[3:55:25] As we move forward for wastewater, it's a little bit different than water in terms of stability.

[3:55:30] We do have to consider the greenfield water reclamation plant and those cost increases do increase fairly significantly each year.

[3:55:39] So this will be one just to keep our ion in terms of how those cost trend and are the growth in the system going to be sufficient to cover the increases in cost that we might see from that partnership on the wastewater side.

[3:55:50] So just something to keep our eye on that may represent more pressure and something to think about in

[3:55:57] future, but that's just something that Scott said to just monitor any way to see if there's

[3:56:01] anything else needed beyond some of these structural recalibrations that we've identified.

[3:56:07] Last one I have for you is for solid waste and so one thing on waste water before I leave it though

[3:56:12] no changes are recommended to waste water rates for single family. So this is a part where things are

[3:56:17] stable here. So the rate structure is good. The cost recovery is pretty well in alignment with

[3:56:22] the cost of service results. So we're not recommending any needed changes there from a cost

[3:56:26] of service perspective. We do have benchmarking included here for wastewater rates. You can see

[3:56:31] a comparison, and I think it's got mentioned we can grab information for water and have a similar chart.

[3:56:36] And similarly we can pull some literature relative to rate studies as the mayor mentioned and

[3:56:41] may or through to Council Member Podia might be able to identify some approved ordinances,

[3:56:46] But Scott was right to caveat that these ordinances are routinely updated each year to reflect changes and circumstances.

[3:56:53] So they'll give you an idea and an indicator and we can pull recent rate adjustments as well to give some context to it.

[3:56:59] But this snapshot's going to change every year, even with information available to pull about projected increases.

[3:57:07] Lastly, for solid waste and we're almost done. There's just a couple more slides in this 93 slide deck.

[3:57:11] So relative to solid waste, these rates for residential

[3:57:16] are last updated in 2013.

[3:57:18] So we're getting about 13 years on this system.

[3:57:23] The current single-family bill is $16.22.

[3:57:28] Based on the cost of service, which is largely driven by

[3:57:31] a vendor contract, I think that represents about 80%

[3:57:33] of our system cost, and that has annual escalators on it.

[3:57:37] We are at a point where we kind of need to rebalance

[3:57:39] and have a structurally balanced revenue versus expenditure stream for this fund.

[3:57:44] And so that would mean a $3.78 increase to get it to about a $20 monthly fee for solid waste.

[3:57:51] And that's really for vendor costs and to make sure that we're able to stay current with cart replacement needs that we have.

[3:57:56] We have to replace those from that point forward.

[3:57:59] It's going to be a matter again of kind of monitoring how your contract costs increase with those escalators and how your growth does

[3:58:05] and your ability to really make sure that the revenue stream matches the expense streams.

[3:58:09] For this comparison, you'll see that we presently have the lowest solid waste bill in the area

[3:58:14] with the $20 adjustment.

[3:58:16] Again, assuming no adjustments for anybody else, you could see we'd still have one of the lowest solid waste bills in the region.

[3:58:23] So, again, I'd expect that to continue, given what we're seeing for the fund.

[3:58:28] So, in aggregate, if I had to summarize everything from like a single family home perspective,

[3:58:33] of some reduction on the water bill for most single family humps, no change on waste water,

[3:58:38] an increase on the solid waste, but for most homes, this is going to be a pretty neutral

[3:58:42] thing.

[3:58:44] But again, individual homes and circumstances will vary based upon their water use characteristics,

[3:58:48] but just trying to give a general sense of what all these changes amount to on kind of a typical

[3:58:53] bill basis or an average bill, so for those that are listening.

[3:58:57] But we'll get more into this through future conversations as well, really dial into customer impacts

[3:59:01] and spell out some of these changes with some more bill examples as part of the process.

[3:59:06] So, that's what I have for you and kind of the retail rate side of things for this evening.

[3:59:10] Happy to answer any questions before I think we move on to the last pitch, which is just wrap up in calendar.

[3:59:15] Great, thank you for the presentation and the first half of this, we are very well versed in and have gone through multiple renditions.

[3:59:25] So, this is new to us, so I'm glad to hear that we will continue this conversation, but this gives us a really good

[3:59:31] snapshot where we're at today. So very well said and that's absolutely the

[3:59:35] intent is to to build on it from where and go into more depths.

[3:59:38] Good. And Councilmember Brown has a question in your comment.

[3:59:41] Yeah, Andrew, can you go back a couple of slides, I think it is.

[3:59:45] Yeah, that's the one. Specifically on this one, we talk about the contract

[3:59:54] vendor costs. This may be for staff. It might be for you with the car.

[4:00:00] Current escalation of fuel costs. Is that something that gets covered as an, an, an addendum to the contract? Or is that included in the contract? And I'm trying to figure out if there's how they're collecting, because the contract costs have gone up quite a bit for fuel alone.

[4:00:22] They have, yeah, there's a two part formula and Marcus can supplement this too, but the escalator in the contract, it's based in part on fuel cost escalation, I think it's for about 15% of the index adjustment of the 85% is on basically a CPI, but then if those two things or if there's exceptional circumstances, I think they can come back and make a request for a higher adjustment, but I'll get Marcus supplement anything I said, oh, even better we're filling back for you.

[4:00:49] it into this whole council meeting and you

[4:00:51] to the very end.

[4:00:52] Our amount of good things in our operations manager

[4:00:55] or public work, so we're in environmental services.

[4:00:59] So annually, the contractor can ask for a CPI adjustment.

[4:01:04] Yes, they could come back if there was a need.

[4:01:07] They have an up to 5% based on our awesome contract.

[4:01:14] Typically, like way back, they went up to 5%

[4:01:18] a couple of times over the, and this is our second contract with this same vendor.

[4:01:26] So only a couple times in the last 18 years have we hit the 5%.

[4:01:31] And even with the fuel costs, they've only been about 1.5 to 2% annually increase.

[4:01:42] We will be talking about it another point of time is that 2030 is the contract renewal and in

[4:01:52] 27 we have a one-time three year of this current contract.

[4:01:58] So you'll hear some more information coming back on the contract in that but the reason we've

[4:02:04] been able to keep it at 1622 is the growth is kind of help pay for itself and keep us going

[4:02:11] but also that we have a very good partnership with this vendor and we're able to do some innovative things to keep the cost low.

[4:02:22] Okay, so Ramona you're saying there hasn't been a time on a month in a month where they submitted a surcharge due to exigen circumstances and high gas costs.

[4:02:34] For instance, during avian flu went to the restaurant and I had like a 20 cent or a 25 cent search

[4:02:41] charge for eggs

[4:02:43] And you know, it was due to a very brief and a very brief spike in the cost for that

[4:02:50] And so I was wondering if we had seen any sort of search

[4:02:53] Arge request. They have only done based on the CPI during the the contract

[4:02:59] Renewal every year, not renewal, but CPI rate, and only a couple of times in the last 18 years,

[4:03:09] has been up to the 5 percent, typically it's been between that 1 to 3 percent increase.

[4:03:16] And that is based on fuel, other things, you know, cost of salaries, that kind of thing.

[4:03:33] to your point earlier, we only have a few more slides which is just really to kind of lay out

[4:03:37] what things are going to look like all the way up to November 18. So tonight serve the purpose

[4:03:42] of deep discussion on the water resource fee and the capacity, the new water resource

[4:03:48] or proposed new water resource capacity fee and then introduce a lot of all the things that Andy just talked about.

[4:03:57] The idea is we'll be back on the 16th to start all of these new fees and rating creases in motion

[4:04:04] through the adoption of a notice of intention and then over the course of the three meetings

[4:04:11] or the two meetings in October and the first one in November will be to come back and take a little bit deeper dive

[4:04:17] on solid waste and wastewater and water delivery provide updates on all the things that we've experienced

[4:04:22] as we've had the stakeholder meetings through Constances, communications plan, and then really

[4:04:28] tea everything up for November 18th when you'll be asked to make the decisions about these

[4:04:35] fees. And then after that it becomes staff's responsibility, assuming they're all approved

[4:04:40] to implement those as we've outlined. So we expect to be back here at every council meeting in

[4:04:46] some form on some component of everything we've talked about tonight all the way through November

[4:04:52] 18. So we appreciate your time on this tonight and it really helps us to get it all out there and I

[4:05:24] But thank you so much, Todd, and everyone that helped with that 93 slide, please.

[4:05:29] presentation. Any other comments from council? Like I mentioned, we have seen this

[4:05:38] lots before and it's something we definitely take, do not take lightly, take it

[4:05:45] very seriously and really cannot overstate the importance of water. You know, Queen Creek

[4:05:50] is a relatively young community but we've been working on this journey to become water

[4:05:56] self-sufficient for about a decade. We were actively working to diversify or water

[4:06:04] portfolio, reducing reliance on groundwater, which was as you saw the primary water

[4:06:11] source at the time for Queen Creek. And our goal was seeking sources that were less

[4:06:16] susceptible to drought conditions. It's interesting because, you know, Queen Creek has

[4:06:23] really gotten on the map, especially in the last, you know, 10, 15 years with our incredibly

[4:06:29] rapid growth where before not very many people had heard of Queen Creek and then your reading

[4:06:34] articles all the time about fastest growing community in Arizona across the country and Queen

[4:06:41] Creek really put Harkwahala on the map when we made this decision and in Harkwahala the water

[4:06:48] gives us in our community that certainty, that strategic investment, and that water self-sufficiency,

[4:06:57] which that is one of our strategic priorities, which is a secure future.

[4:07:03] So as the mayor, as a mom, as a resident, as a customer, ensuring that we have the stable

[4:07:10] and reliable source of water, is one of my top priorities.

[4:07:15] And not only for my children, but for my children's children, and really this is 110-year legacy.

[4:07:24] It's also really important to note it was touched on earlier.

[4:07:28] But as a council, we strive really hard to lessen our residents tax obligation as much as possible.

[4:07:38] You've seen that with lower property taxes that we've continued lower that rate over the last four years.

[4:07:48] Sales tax reduction in our town center.

[4:07:51] And for our customers paying their Cagrid bill on their behalf with the savings of $71 million.

[4:07:59] So we're really trying to do what we can to lessen the impacts that we're seeing across the board.

[4:08:06] And, and we've done a great job, but like we know, the cost of everything is going up

[4:08:13] and we've made the strategic decisions so many years ago, we're reaping the benefits

[4:08:20] of the better pricing, but it is still something that ultimately we have to pay for.

[4:08:27] And water is something that we use every single day, and we really don't appreciate its value until we don't have it.

[4:08:38] And so making sure we have that secure water supply, I can absolutely say the confidence Queen Creek is in an excellent position.

[4:08:47] Due to our planning and our commitment of this council to prioritize that vital resource.

[4:08:53] So, the bottom line here is that water is becoming increasingly expensive and certainty is becoming

[4:09:01] harder to ensure which makes our priority so many years ago so important today and just

[4:09:10] so proud of the work that has been done, you know, sitting here listening to this very

[4:09:15] long presentation but recognizing that we have the best minds and water, we're staring at

[4:09:22] best minds of water.

[4:09:24] Save Paul, of course, if you were here tonight.

[4:09:28] But with that, the best minds and finance,

[4:09:30] not only how do we do this, but how do we pay for this?

[4:09:34] And then we're going to see the best minds in our public works.

[4:09:38] How do we build this?

[4:09:39] And it's incredible.

[4:09:41] I'm very grateful that we didn't hit the easy button so

[4:09:44] many years ago.

[4:09:46] This is good for our residents and good for the future as well.

[4:09:51] So just so proud of the work.

[4:09:54] Thanks for this presentation.

[4:09:55] Thanks for staying with us tonight.

[4:09:57] That is the end of our...

[4:10:00] And we will be meeting for executive session, but that is it for our regular session today and this meeting is now adjourned. Thank you so much.

Town Council Regular Session

Agenda

Transcript