Councillor Colvin. Here.
Councillor Evelyn. Here.
Mayor Fitch. Here.
Councillor Nielsen. Here.
Councillor Osborne. Here.
Councillor Wedding. Here.
Councillors Wicker. Here.
And we'll stand for the blessing with Reiki Partitioner Denise English from the Sacred Lotus.
As we gather here today, may the wisdom and guidance of the sacred directions embrace and illuminate your path.
To the east, may the energy of the rising sun inspire clarity of vision and new beginnings
in your endeavors.
To the south, may the warmth of the noonday sun infuse your decisions with passion,
creativity, and the fiery spirit needed for positive transformation.
To the west, may the calming waters remind you to navigate challenges with fluidity
and adaptability.
To the north may the strength of the mountains grant you
resilience and stability as you build a foundation for the prosperity and
well-being of all. Above may the divine masculine cosmic energies shower you
with inspiration and insight connecting you to the boundless possibilities
that exist beyond our earthly realm. Below may the nurturing embrace of
of Mother Earth and the divine feminine energies,
ground your actions in sustainability
and respect for the natural world.
Finally, let us call upon the place of within,
the place of the heart and the universal soul energy.
May you be blessed with the energy of love,
unity and compassion.
We give thanks for your willingness
to serve this community.
May these blessings guide your decisions,
illuminate your path and manifest
us a city of prosperity, harmony, and joy.
Thank you.
Kat, could you leave us in a pledge of allegiance?
So are there any city announcements?
Seeing none, we'll proceed with the comments from citizens.
And the first one we have is Eve Ponder.
Hello, my name is Eve Ponder.
I live at 3060 Northwest 19th Street.
I'd like to talk about trees, natural features,
and preservation.
Thy desert is a beautiful and unique place.
preservation of this landscape is important for all of us as the city has aptly noted
natural and existing features add character to developments. Communities like Eagle Crest,
Brasada, Pronghorn, and some neighborhoods in Bend show us that you can build houses
without completely removing all the trees and rocky outcroppings. Understandably these
places I have just mentioned are all expensive, but living and having access to a more
intact landscape should not only be for the wealthy. Replacing older conifers and deciduous
trees that are 10 inches or more with a half inch, mostly maples, doesn't begin to mitigate
for the loss. Since the city has arborists on staff, I'd request that with any new
development the city would do a site survey and inventory or at the very least check
the developer's information. I'm thankful that the council and city staff have spent time working
on the issue of maintaining a natural landscape through preservation as opposed to a more contrived
after-the-fact approach. I'll close with words from Joni Mitchell. Don't it always seem to go,
you don't know what you've got till it's gone. We've paved paradise and put up a parking lot.
Thank you.
Next we have Jay Patrick.
Hello,
I'm Jay Patrick.
I live here in Redmond at 304-49, Southwest 36.
I just wanted to say I wanted to add the comment to the packet tonight.
Just for you to be able to read what I said, I put it in the paper, but hopefully I explained
my thoughts well enough.
I know it's a different position than most of you took, but hopefully you found it worth a read.
I was a bit surprised when the council moved forward the way it was the last couple weeks ago,
but I want to say thank you to Councilor Nielsen for bringing forward the idea to break
the vote up in the election to at least two topics rather than just be all of them in
a bundle.
It kind of reminded me of watching the federal government where they throw everything
into one big bunch and vote on one thing. Let me say I know that's not the way the
Marin Council do things in Redmond and I would say for transparency, I suggest when you get
down the file voting on the wording that you think about maybe separating them into three
different topics rather than keeping something bundled up. It just adds clarity.
I believe
And then you're going to possibly do that a little bit later than I.
But anyway, our citizens will look at the topics,
and they may think totally different than you or even I think,
and would like to have the opportunity to vote on each topic separately.
So I hope you consider that when you make the final decision.
Thank you very much for letting me talk.
I watched an interview on Fox News with Will Cain and the Commissioner of the Equal Employment
Opportunity Commission.
Herein referred to as the EEOC.
Her name is Andrea Lucas.
The title of the piece is EEOC Commissioner Fires Back at Mark Cuban, star of the popular
show called Shark Tank, for his remarks on his diversity, equity, inclusion, also known
as DEI.
What did he say that she needed to fire back at?
Here is the quote from Mark Cuban, I never hired anyone based exclusively on race, gender,
religion.
I only ever hire the best person that will put my business in the best position to
succeed, and yes, race and gender can be part of the equation. I view diversity as a competitive
advantage." This was her response to his hiring practice. Many corporate leaders and our cultural
elites constantly misunderstand this key point. Race and sex cannot be part of the equation
If they are any part of your decision, you have violated the law."
In my study of DEI, I have learned this is nothing more than discrimination against the white race.
It is a wolf in sheep's clothing. It is here to make us whites feel guilty for being white.
I heard of a woman who got raped by a black man, but she would not say anything. Why?
She said she felt she deserved it because she was white.
Because of DEI and this white discrimination, plus the fact that young healthy males have no qualms about threatening old ladies, I soon learned that I need to identify as a black woman in these chambers.
I also learned that if I am ever threatened again here, not to count on counsel for any help, but to call the police myself.
I am saddened that our own federal and city government along with our public
education promotes such lawlessness and I get to pay for it. I believe there will
be a day coming that school districts as well as city councils get sued for this
unlawful practice of using and teaching diversity equity and inclusiveness
us, instead of us all being treated equally, including white people.
Thank you.
Next we have the Consent Agenda, which comprises the minutes of January 23rd and approval on
a building risk insurance policy on behalf of the city for the construction of the new
public safety facility of 253,352.98.
Is there anyone that wants to discuss anything on the Consent Agenda before motion?
Seeing none, is there a motion to approve the Consent Agenda?
I move to approve the consent agenda.
I'll second.
Moving to second.
All those in favor, sing a part by saying aye.
Aye.
Opposed?
Motion carries.
Next we have a presentation on our financial audit results for the year 2022-23.
James.
Rob still on?
Yep, I'm here.
Oh, there he is.
Look at that.
Okay.
Okay, all right, so I'm gonna get started here then.
Good evening, council, Mr. Mayor and citizens.
My name is James Wood.
I'm the city of Redmond Finance Director.
And tonight I'm gonna be presenting
on the annual audit report for fiscal year
and did June 30, 2023.
Alongside me, up on the screen here,
you'll see that we have Rob Trimper.
He's the external financial auditor.
And I'm gonna touch on a couple of things briefly
and then passed off to him for the audit findings.
There we go.
So what does a financial audit mean to the city of Redmond?
Specifically, let's talk about what a financial audit is looking at.
Well, here at the city of Redmond, we have tens of thousands of transactions that are occurring annually.
And with the auditor, when the auditor comes in,
he's going to select a certain sample of our transactions to look at.
And these samples are going to be based off of our internal controls.
These are the policies and procedures that we have.
He's going to consider the inherent risk, which is the implicit risk of something being incorrect.
And he's also going to consider his own auditor judgment.
And so the external auditor takes these three things, develops samples, and then looks
at the activity during the year.
And that's what actually gets seen by the auditor.
One of the things I want to remind everyone is that the goal of an external financial audit
or the goal of the financial audit is to determine if the financial statements are reasonably
presented.
It's not to find fraud.
However, if Rob were to have found fraud, he'd be compelled to report that to city
council.
So why are we being audited?
And this is going to continue to happen each year and that's because ORS says that
annually cities municipalities need to file a financial report for the year
ending June 30. Not only do they say that we have to file a report but we have
to have it in a specific format and that's going to be pursuant to gap
which is generally accepted accounting principles. In addition to both the
requirement to file and the formatting being outlined in ORS we're also
required to be audited by an external financial auditor that's approved
that's licensed in the state of Oregon.
One thing worth noting in terms of why
we get audited to is the fact that we have some debt covenants out there so
anytime we've borrowed money we also report to the the borrowing agencies our
financial position.
So when is all this happening? Right now we're presenting
tonight the presentation it's in the winter but the work for this audit
it took place starting back in spring and summer of last year.
It rolled into the summer and fall.
That's when we started developing the numbers.
The auditor came on site in the fall.
We developed an audit report, and then we're here tonight bringing you the results.
So the takeaway there is that there's always an audit going on, whether it's last year
or next year.
And with that, I'm going to pass everything off over to Rob, and he's going to go
over the required communication.
Okay, but thanks for that nice summary there James and thank you council for having me I just kind of really want to start out to say that the audit went really well this year there were we delayed a little bit in in getting fully started because we had some there
was some changes in staff and other standards to implement but I think once things were all said and done we're really happy with the results.
A couple of things that we have in our reports to you, but overall I think we're real happy
with the results.
So you'll have a required communication to those charged with governance is what we're
touching on now.
It's a separate letter outside of the financial statements.
Just that I've
A few quick items to point out in there is that, you know, the, first of all, that management
selects is responsible for selection and use of appropriate accounting policies. They also
are ultimately responsible for the financial statements. Our job is to give an opinion that
whether they're stated reasonably correct. So this year, there were, there was one new
standard that was implemented in regards to subscription based long-term
subscription based information technology arrangements and that was
required by the governmental accounting standards board. They issue
statements all the time that kind of update your reporting and then
internally there were some changes on how the city accounted for
investments whether it's at fair market value or amortized costs. We
We also have, you know, inside the financial statements that they'll always contain estimates
in there.
So major estimates are things like, you know, your capital assets, other post-employment
benefits, the subscription-based agreements that I was mentioning, and the big one being
the unfunded actuarial valuation related to PERS.
You know, if we had any significant difficulties or disagreements with management, we'd
be reporting those to you.
Probably would have been reporting those a while ago.
So happy to report there were no significant difficulties
in completing the audit or disagreements with management.
Also, there were no material adjustments
that were posted as part of the audit process.
We do have a few past audit adjustments
or uncorrected misstatements.
We usually set a threshold and anything over that amount
gets attached to this letter.
And so there's, you know, a few past items that are going to clear themselves out in the next fiscal year
Also as part of this, I think there's a printed it earlier. I think it was about 208 printed pages for your financial statements
A few sections in there, but the main item in there from us is the financial statements themselves and the opinion on the audit
That opinion is broken down by different opinion units, but we did issue a clean or unmodified
opinion for each of your individual opinion units inside your financial statements.
We also, in towards the back of the report, have separate letters on internal controls
related to internal controls and compliance in accordance with government auditing standards.
There were no material weaknesses or significant deficiencies reported, which is a big positive.
Most of our audits have some items that are in there.
There's also a separate letter on tests that were required to do for Oregon minimum standards.
And most of those items came out with no findings.
There were a couple of over expenditures related to your budget that the cities, you know, will look at there and I think they've already made changes in the budget for this year to make sure that those don't happen again.
We also do a special audit called a single audit, which is a special audit over federal awards and selected two major programs this year to give a really fine look at.
one was the airport improvement project and the other was a community
development block grant project. The airport improvement project had no
findings on internal controls or compliance. We did have a couple of
significant deficiencies in the CDBG program in that they have a pretty
complicated reporting requirements and we have some suggestions in that area
to kind of fine tune that process and they also have requirements on the use
of program income and reporting of some of those pieces and that you know I
think making sure that we use a program income before we draw more funds so a
couple of easy fixes for next year and then the last section that we were
testing on controls and compliance was over passenger facility charge
audits, passenger facility charge collections and use of those monies and we had no findings in that
section either. So apart from a couple of significant deficiencies in the CDBG program,
the audit went really well. I'd still give it probably a high B or low A, maybe a mid A on
on where we ended up for the year. So as James mentioned there's you know thousands
of transactions and for a couple of pieces to fall through there that was I
think a pretty positive deal.
James on the CDBG, could you just explain the
differences and how they're corrected?
Yes I can go ahead and kind of elaborate
on that. So if anyone has any questions about the actual findings
findings themselves are at the back of the aquifer, but the big overview with the two
findings was the first one was in our quarterly reporting to CDBG to HUD, we would report the
numbers in the best way possible, and it sounds funny when I say it that way, but the tool
that they use to collect the information cannot take negative numbers, and so we have to
to put in zero numbers or leave them omitted
and then leave narrative explanations around that.
And so what the finding was circling around the idea
that when we go to leave that narrative explanation,
we can leave better notes and be able to further explain
what the number should be in the case.
And so there is a, this has been fixed
and going forward, it shouldn't be an issue.
And then the other significant deficiency
see that came up was in relation to program income and program income.
So fancy way of saying cash on hand.
And so we had a little bit of cash on hand in the CDBG program.
And we should have been spending that first.
But we ended up drawing down additional funds after we spent some money.
And so we have since corrected that in fiscal year 2024.
And so there's no issue going forward.
Okay, any other questions?
Are you good, Rob?
Yeah, I'm good.
Okay.
Alright, so I just want to give a quick appreciation to city leadership, council and city administration.
If we didn't have strong financial policies and procedures, the audit wouldn't be as strong
as it is.
So, I do thank you for the financial stewardship and then also quick thanks to the department
heads and staff.
You know, they're the ones getting the grants and so they're then involved with
us and having to work with me and the auditor and they did a fantastic job, airport
NCDBG. And then lastly is central services, which has the finance and the budget teams.
And they're the ones really cranking out all the numbers. So a special thank you to them.
Next steps, there's no resolutions required, no formal action since it was a clean financial
audit. And I get to go back to work working on 2024 audit prep now, unless there are
any questions I can answer.
No, I think we all think you and everyone in finance and Jason one of the strengths of the city has been our financial department
You guys do a great job. I agree and that's been around a lot longer before me. So I thank you all
Okay, next we have a presentation on the Village Squire redevelopment
Megan and
Chuck good
evening Mayor and Council Chuck Arnold urban renewal program manager for the city
Tonight's item on the Village Squire is just a quick update to give you some status of what's happening with it.
And I am going to hear you going to click through the slides.
Okay, thank you.
So just for tonight, this is in preparation for what we expect is going to be a request from the development party that purchased the property.
So I'll go through some site basics, talk about the ownership status, and then the expected timeline of what we're looking at.
No, anticipated ask.
Site Basics, you know, this property, there was a conversation amongst the staff and the
previous owners, actually two owners ago now, about what they were achieving there and what
type of contribution they were making for themselves as a business and what contribution
was for downtown.
It was a very challenging property right at the entrance of downtown to Highway 126
in 97 and really didn't make the strongest statement and leave with our best foot.
So they chose to close down the business and sell the property and now a new development
team has gotten in there.
The property is this half acre site with two buildings, about 14,000 square feet, 24
rooms previously.
And now the new ownership status is the developer that purchased it is in diligence.
They are wrapping that up and they are committed to moving forward with converting the property
to housing with a mix of workforce and market rate with primarily market rate.
When this project does come forward to council, there will be probably a request in March
with some planning review in the summer and a renovation complete for late this year.
We will be working very closely with Durak and with Council on the
Urbanal Agency to make sure that there are adequate protections for any
investment that is put on the property and that the workforce units are deed
restricted and also tied in to making sure that they are the right demographic
and right area median income rate that we want to have in that property
downtown. So a lot more to come on this is really just initial kind of bring it
to your attention. We don't have any solid proposal from the developer yet
so there's nothing really else to report on. I can say that we anticipate
that it will be about a 1.4 million dollar renovation. They are spending
about a little over 1.4 million to acquire the property so they're going
to be pretty significantly on trying to revitalize this property so we're
looking forward to great proposal from them that can lead to a good
partnership. Any questions on the bill square? Thanks Chuck and next we have the
ice rink. Thank you and on the on the ice rink I'm gonna bring up Dusty to the
table from facilities and get a little bit in on that. So no visuals on this one
tonight. This is really just something that I think the whole community is
aware that the ice rink kind of had its demise and so giving that sense of like
where we are with it currently I wanted to start it off with Dusty kind of
discussing what's happened with the ice rink and what it looks like to try to
repair the current situation so if you want to lead in with that and then I'll
carry on from there. So the current system is about 15 years old and
I'm sorry, so Dusty Hood, Parks and Facilities Division Manager.
So the current ice rink is about 15 years old.
I believe, I don't have the exact numbers, but it was around $200,000 initial cost actually
for the ice rink originally.
And over the last three years, we've put a significant amount of maintenance into it.
Last year we completely rebuilt the whole foundation on it.
This year, we replaced 12 coils as well as one compressor, one circulation pump, and as
of right now, we actually have another compressor out, and the programming is actually kind
of a glitch.
So there's a programming within the chiller itself.
So we're looking at about $12,000 to $15,000 in repairs right now that haven't been done
just to get it back to operational.
With that said, not saying, you know, who knows how long it'll last.
You know we could be in the same position we were this year. It was up and down this year two or three different times
we had to you know shorten the season because of
You know some of the issues that we've had with the mechanical issues we have with it. So as of right now
It's just going to be continuing to you know to be kind of a thorn in the side of
maintenance and
Cost to keep this thing running 15 years is pretty much the the life expectancy on any age back system
So that's basically what it is.
And do we have to replace the cooler?
So we don't have to replace it,
but it is highly recommended to replace it
because we'd be in the same position where we are right now.
Next year, it may run all season, it may not,
it may run for just a couple of weeks.
So the recommendation is definitely a new chiller.
And that cost is between 100 and $150.
$150, yeah.
Do we know what the lead time is
on a piece of equipment like that?
I mean, if we were to say,
Let's go get one right now. Do we have any idea how long it would take to get one?
It would be ready by next my next winner
Dusty it because you mentioned the word HVAC and as things age out parts aren't always necessarily available for what you have is there a
cost
Differential because we'll have to upgrade because they don't make the parts you need anymore
Or is this something that we'll be looking at. We'll just need to upgrade it to stay current
Just need to upgrade it, stay current.
The parts are about the same, you know, cost-wise.
It's just finding them is the difficult part,
as well as a programming, you know, for it.
So, Dusty, in your professional opinion,
do you think we're investing too much money into it over time?
My personal opinion,
I think there needs to be a permanent ice rink.
That's just my opinion on it.
I do believe that even if we do upgrade the Chiller,
there's gonna be consistent maintenance,
you know, this can be required.
We're going to spend an average of probably between $5,000 and $15,000 a year just on
the maintenance of it, replacing parts, and so on, but that doesn't include the staffing
time that's involved.
We spend probably between $75,000 and $100,000 taking this rink up and putting it down every
year.
Okay, so, sorry.
Blind spot over here.
So you said it was $200,000 about 15 years ago.
What is a comparable price for that same?
I don't have that number. I could get that number for you all, but I don't have that number
right now. And I wouldn't want to speculate on the number of costs. Fifteen years to now,
it's pretty big, quite the big difference, I think.
So the idea of tonight was really give us a status of where we are, and also urban roll
has begun to look at those cost numbers. They vary widely, right? All the way from,
You can start with your own backyard ice rink that you can get from eBay for like $50,000
all the way up to spending $5 million for an enclosed facility that's a hockey rink.
So it's really going to depend on site specifics.
It's going to depend on what we try to achieve with this facility from an urban oil standpoint,
which is the agency that originally funded this project years ago.
The idea of the ice rink was to really create a sense of place and attract people
downtown and create that habit of people coming downtown and experiencing downtown and enjoying
it and seeing our businesses in our wonderful city and all the improvements that we've made.
If that is still the goal, then we need to think about how we want to move forward with
either a new facility or repairing the old.
And so what we wanted to do is just give you an update and start to get your okay
and direction on moving forward with the subcommittee of Durak as well as involving
some city staff and perhaps even the public a little bit maybe the downtown
businesses and get some direction on what how we'd like to see this project go
forward because staff feels that the community really loves that asset and
trying to find a way to have it come back alive would be a really good thing
to do rather than just let it go to bed I was gonna check do you have do
Do you have any numbers for some utilization?
I mean, the community may love it,
but that doesn't necessarily mean that they use it.
So do we know how many people take advantage of this rank
when it is functioning?
Yeah, I would have to get those numbers
from Parks and Rec who do the programming, right?
And get those numbers.
And I imagine they have those numbers tracked,
but I don't know those offhand.
I'm sorry.
So I wanna play off of something you said, Dusty,
about your preference being a permanent ice rink.
In your opinion, what is the diminishment of life
by putting the ring up every year, taking it back down?
Do you think that impacts the life expectancy
of a temporary ice rink
versus having a more permanent one?
Would that be a more viable capital investment?
So a permanent rink, you can actually,
it could be a basketball court in the summertime.
It's kind of multiple dimensional.
Anytime you take something apart
and put it back together and fight it.
The more you do that,
It's just parts and pieces this wear out. It's just like a you know an engine kind of the same thing
The more you take it apart put it back together. It just wears out that much quicker. So yeah
We do I do want to say is that John we do have that new Zamboni still so
Still promised a ride on that. Yeah, I
understand that one of the priorities of
Dirac is a family fund center and I know that it's a priority of the community
So with that being said, I would be interested in you pursuing more information for us.
Yes, and to that end, Councilor Osborne, I do want to point out to Council that while
an urban oil expense would be legitimate, urban oil expense to put in a new facility,
putting urban oil money into maintaining an existing facility that was already purchased
would be a big challenge in order to have that pass the straight face test.
So, really, if there's going to be a role, then it would really be toward the goal of
doing a new facility.
If the city on the city side of the funding wants to work on, you know, keeping the old
system working, then there would have to be other funding sources required to do that.
But yes, thank you.
Okay.
Clifford.
What I would like to see is something multi-purpose taken into consideration.
I think that would be a good idea as well.
So I think the consensus we need more information and see what the options are great
Thank you. Thank you
So the next item we have is a bid award
It's for the cinder hollow neighborhood project master developer contract award to rooted homes and authorized
Negotiations of a disposition and development agreement
Linda
and Jackie
Good evening, Linda Klein, housing coordinator for the city.
And with me is Jackie Keogh, the executive director of Rooted Homes, and Rick Hayes from
Lux Homes, which is partnering with Rooted Homes on this project.
We'll start with this slide right here, just a frame of reference of where Cinder
Hollow is.
It's a piece of property just to the west of the cemetery, the city cemetery, kind
of up the hill from the cemetery.
It's approximately, let me get the next slide.
It's eight point three five acres of that approximately five of us buildable
You can see faintly on there the topography of the area. It's quite steep on the backside
It's about five acres is buildable
the city purchased this in
2023 in May
after really our housing committee helped lead this because we purchased it with CDBG funds or community block grant funds and our housing committee did
community outreach by hosting a community meeting on that and then it was
also discussed in several of the committee's meetings as well. The vision
at the time of buying this was for approximately 30 home ownership units
affordable to folks living at 80 percent area meeting income or less so folks
in that range of income was typically kind of your middle management or case
managers or teachers or nurses kind of fit into that area of income.
And then because we bought it with community development block grant funds, the developer
needs to be a nonprofit organization.
Just on the developer selection process since that's what we're here to talk about tonight.
In December, we put out an RFQ looking for qualified master developers.
It was out for all of January.
we had one submission from Rooted Homes and staff first vetted that and found
it to be a good submission and then we had the Housing and Community
Development Committee also go over it and they are forwarding their
recommendation to you to accept Rooted Home as the developer. At this point I'm
going to turn it over to Jackie and Rick to kind of talk about Rooted Homes
and Jackie you can just tell me when to hit new slides okay.
That would
help. Thanks for having us. I'm Jackie Keough, Executive Director of Rooted Homes. You can
advance the slide. So, many of you know, but for those of you who don't, we are a non-profit
affordable housing developer. We build sustainable and affordable home ownership communities
throughout central Oregon. We are a non-profit. Our board is led by the homeowners,
majority who live in our homes as well as community representatives.
Ruta Homes has a long history of working in the city of Bend. Last year, we
committed to expanding into Redmond. We have four projects that total 98 units of
affordable housing coming to Redmond starting this year. This would be one
of those four. We work very closely with our partner Housing Works who
develops properties with us and acts as our guarantor as we significantly expand
our pipeline. We have about a million dollars budget organizationally and then
five million dollars in assets. That's separate from on average we're managing
about 60 million dollars in project expenses on an annual basis. We are your
our land trust, and what that really means is that we own the land under which we develop
the homes.
We do that using a deed restriction, and it really is a tool that allows us to ensure
that we're not just building affordable housing for this generation and for the city of Redmond.
It's for multiple generations, so every time the homes resell, they will be required
to go to another low-income household in perpetuity.
And so the goal with that, you know, model is that you essentially create two pipelines,
one of our new construction homes and the other of our resale homes and essentially
you double the homes that City of Redmond residents have access to.
Our homes are a little different than typical affordable housing.
We are founded on a dual mission of both affordability and sustainability.
And so what we are developing is very high quality homes.
Our homes are priced on average at $250,000, but they're praising for more than double that.
And that's because all the homes we build are goal net zero,
which means the home emits or uses as little energy as it produces.
Think very sustainable design features, you know,
and on top of that we have solar panels on the roofs that negate any energy consumption by the homeowners.
This is good one because you know the City of Redmond has this long-term asset
for its community that will always kind of stand the test of time of quality
and sustainability but also we all know an affordable mortgage can quickly
become unaffordable when you're paying hundreds of dollars in utility bills and
so our homeowners average $12 a month and that makes the home even more
affordable. We serve a range of households. Generally we're serving
having folks under 80% area median income just because the state requires that on the majority
of our projects.
However, we're able to reach households as low as 30% area median income, which is unheard
of for ownership because we partner with housing works.
So we have about a third of our entire portfolio.
Our clients who are ready to move out of a housing choice voucher, commonly known
section 8 housing rental into a home ownership unit with us. We give priority to them and they
are able to take their voucher with them and essentially it acts like a second earner in
their household who's paying down their mortgage for 13 years. That is a really unique partnership
but it allows us to serve a much wider range of households, not just the groups that Linda
to describe, but also folks who are on disability, retired folks, single parents who ownership
wouldn't be possible otherwise.
Next slide, please.
Oh, I think that was the last one you had. We just had those.
Oh, yeah. Oh, well, okay. There was one piece.
Is there anything else you'd like to cover or questions from the council for you?
Yeah, I did. I know there was an initial question about resident-driven design and
how we get the community involved,
and so I just wanna address that.
So, Ruta Homes, in every community we design,
we have two resident-driven design meetings.
The first one, we produce a site plan in home designs,
and we have interested residents and neighbors
who give feedback on that plan.
We then make those changes in real time,
and before we submit our building permits,
we have adapted that based on community feedback.
We did this for one of our sites in Redmond,
and it had almost 50 residents give feedback.
And so we would plan to do this like we always do
for the Cinder Hollow neighborhood.
Great, any questions?
Catherine?
Can you just give a brief breakdown
on the project funding sources,
like where the money comes from for this,
or lift dollars utilized, et cetera?
Yeah, so Rude Homes,
essentially think of it as three buckets.
So the first bucket is our pre-development financing,
funding to design the site in the homes and funding to put in the infrastructure.
A major portion of that is contributed by the city on this project because the
land would be donated and there's some significant pending grant requests for
infrastructure managed by the city. We would take out a pre-development loan,
a low interest like 3% from one of our funders who would allow us the
additional funds to get the pre-development work done.
We do this because we don't wanna wait
on the state for money.
If we do it in this way,
we essentially reduce our build time by a year.
And so by doing pre-development first,
not waiting on the state,
it speeds up the production of affordable housing.
Then, yes, we would apply to the state's lift program.
This program, unfortunately,
because it is tied to appraised value,
is not enough in the city of Redmond
to fund the construction of the homes.
It's just a policy that could be improved upon.
And so we have to bring a number,
generally about a million dollars in addition,
of grants to complete construction.
And then we take out a construction loan,
just like any other developer,
and then a majority of that loan is paid back
by the home sales, not all.
We also have to put in funding operation from rooted homes to be able to pay that back
I had two questions
Timeline you said that these would be built within this year. Is that accurate? No
So I want to have Rick Hayes introduce himself and he's joining us as our partner
So we can meet the city's timeline. So I want to use you
Yeah, Rick Hayes with NLB working for rooted homes as a development consultant
and HACE project management.
But anyways, it's a pleasure to be here.
Thank you for the opportunity.
So the site requires some offsite improvements
and some onsite development.
So the kind of mandated timeline is mid-2027
to have the units completed.
So that'll be the timeline that we'll be looking at
aggressively beginning the project
as soon as we can moving forward
because everything takes more time than expected.
And so we're going to push quickly to meet that timeline, but 2027 mid 2027.
I just wanted to ask because we've asked it of all of the other developers who've kind
of come before us recently on in terms of you talked about sustainability.
Are you guys committed to zero escaping?
And kind of smart water use when it comes to landscaping and kind of the scenery.
Yes, that's at minimum what we do. We also give every home buyer an electric vehicle,
excuse me if I wish, an electric bicycle. One debt. We also have community gardens.
We have extra-scaping. We also have EV charging. So extra-scaping is the tip of the iceberg
of what we do for the goal of a carbon neutral site.
Thank you. Okay any other questions? We have a motion to take up. Anything else
Linda? Do you if I speak for just a moment on the financing Jackie mentioned
some pending grants and we do have a pending grant with HUD that we're
still hoping to hear from that will help pay off for infrastructure. We also
put in a request a congressional spending request that will be pending
but so it is because of the nature of the site being a cinder pit it will take
significant infrastructure help and so the city that is while we have no
general funds going into this project at this time we do have CDBG money at
this point in this project and and we do hope to come alongside with some
grant money to help with that infrastructure for rooted. Is there a
motion from page 38. I move to award the Cinder Hollow Project Master
Development Request for Qualifications to Rooted Homes and authorize the City
Manager to enter into a Development and Disposition Agreement consistent with
the requirements imposed by the Housing and Urban Development Community
Development Block grant program. Second. Moving second. Any further discussion?
All those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Motion carries. Thank you very
much.
So next we have a resolution approving the property tax exemption for
VBT, Redmond Landing, LP is authorized by Oregon Revised Statute 307.15 to 307.535
and City Council ordinance 95-05. Linda. Again Linda Klein, Housing
Coordinator for the City of Redmond. This conversation has been before you
at two previous council meetings.
It's for a affordable housing project.
They're asking for property tax abatement for 20 years
that will be translated completely into savings
for the residents of this apartment complex.
Get to the meat of this.
So Redmond Landing is on Umatilla Avenue.
It's actually the best place to really see this.
It's on Canal.
canal, just south of Beimar, basically. There's a very large area between Highway 97 and canal.
They are proposing building 156 units. They've gotten all the way through planning. They're
in permitting at this point on this project. They are asking for this abatement so that
they can keep the rents affordable to 60% AMI or less. And so this request is, it's
a state ORS that allows us to do this for a 20-year exemption.
Through our due diligence, we can see that it meets the Oregon revised statute requirements
of being 100 percent of the units being affordable at 60 percent or less, AOMI, that the rents
will reflect the entire tax abatement, but it does need to be approved by 51 percent
of the affected taxing entities in our community, and we'll get to what that means in
just a second.
It also meets the requirements of our city ordinance and code.
It's consistent with the ORS.
And for an enforcement mechanism to ensure the housing is maintained in a decent, safe
and sanitary condition for occupants.
When this developer closes their – does their closing paperwork with their lender,
the lender is going to require them to have a reserve maintenance account.
We will enter in – if this is approved by 51 percent of the effecting taxing entities,
we will enter into an agreement with this developer that they will have to show us
that they have entered into this maintenance agreement with their lender
before we'll okay the tax abatement.
So kind of the path to this is if you do
approve this tonight it will move on to another step. If you don't then it's
done and there will be no tax abatement. If you do approve it they
will next need to go to the school district and ask the school board to
approve it, that will get them over that 51% threshold of the taxing districts.
If the school district turns them down, then there will be no tax exemption, and it will
become a market rate apartment complex.
If they do say yes, then they will have that threshold to meet what they need to
have an approval of a 20-year exemption.
And do you have any questions?
By the way, the pictures used in this PowerPoint are pictures of their properties
in other communities.
too much grass. Yeah, Western Washington. Yeah. Do you have any questions for me?
Okay, any questions or discussion? If not, is there a motion?
All right. I move to adopt resolution 2024-04, approving VBT, Redmond Landings Tax Exempt
Request of the City, and if adopted by at least 51% of the taxing district,
to authorize the city manager to enter into a tax-exempt agreement with the developer
to ensure the property is maintained in decent, safe and sanitary conditions for the occupants.
Second?
We didn't second it.
One comment I'll make is we are very challenged in housing not only here in Revman but almost
everywhere right now. And the only solution to getting the people housed that work at
these wages and these salaries is to have these type of programs. So it's a very, very
good plan. So any other comments or questions? All those in favor signify by saying aye.
Aye.
Okay, motion carries. Thank you, Linda.
Thank you.
Next, we have a resolution in the city of Redmond referring to the voters of Redmond a ballot
measure proposing city charter amendments related to the council and mayoral term limits adopting
ballot titles and authorizing related matters.
This would be the one just on term limits in the mayoral term.
Is there any, is there a motion to get this at least before the council?
Do you want to make the resolution is that we are asking motion or the motion? Yeah, and then we'll have discussion after. There's a motion. Okay, I moved to adopt a resolution 2420 24-05 submitting to voters a ballot measure to amend the Redmond City Charter as it relates to term limits for council and term length for mayor.
second all second so this is the one for the mayoral term and there was a
question as to whether or not we should split out the mayoral term and the term
limits I honestly have no preference if you want to split them that's fine but
what would we have to do to do that to you do
more paperwork and our timeline
is March 1st right it is so we don't have the time we don't have a lot of
time. I don't think we have any time. We don't have much time. My preference would be to go with the
two just because it is drafted and ready at this point but if you want to
split it out I'll do the paperwork. Well we'd have to have a different council
meeting. You could just direct, I mean you could amend it here and direct
was modified. What's the preference of the council?
I'm gonna suggest I feel that
if you give people a choice to vote on each item individually they'll feel that
it was the most transparent way to do it. I think that's the simplest way. So three
ballot titles one for the term limits for council and mayor one for the mayoral
term and one for the family. Yeah it'll end up being just because of the
the way the Charter's written.
There'll be one that just applies to Mayor,
one that applies to Council,
and one that applies to...
So the mayoral term of four years
and the term limit would be in one section.
Correct.
Count it.
So do we want to amend the motion
to reflect three ballot titles?
Yes, so this one will just be for two
to split the amendments for sections
eight and nine into two different ones.
And then we already have a separate one for you.
So is that okay with you, Tobias?
Yeah.
All right, and who's seconded?
Cat did, okay.
So you got that, Kayla?
Okay.
All those in favor, signify by saying aye.
Aye.
Okay, so that takes care of the term stuff.
Let's do resolution 2024-06,
a resolution of the city of Redmond
referring to the voters of Redmond.
A ballot measure proposing city charter amendments
relating to council qualifications,
adopting ballot tiles and authorizing late matters.
Is there a motion to approve this one?
I move to adopt resolution 2024-08, submitting to voters a ballot measure to amend the Redmond
City Charter as it relates to qualifications to hold elective office.
Second.
Wouldn't second.
06.
Second.
Bad glasses.
Any further questions or comments?
All those in favor signify by saying aye.
Aye.
Okay.
Motion carries.
Now is the time for the East Side Arturial Project Memorandum of Understanding between
the Oregon Department of Transportation and the City of Redmond.
Jessica?
Let me just set the policy context for this one.
So this is initiative the council began in 2023 and what it reflects as we look at
kind of today is that the mayors talk frequently about the state transportation funding otherwise
known as STIP funding being about 70 million over the next decade. That's ODOT who helps us build roads
such as 97, such as 126 and making improvements along them.
And the council asked us to begin the initiative to begin to look at tools such as the car rental
tax to be able to finance this. So what it is is the construction of a section of an arterial
that really reflects we need to take control
of our own destiny on unlocking congestion
and finding other opportunities for freight mobility.
And the other thing with this project,
there's two other notes I wanna make.
This is expanding the system
and the money we're using to pay for it
is money that isn't used for paving.
So whether it's the creation of the new car rental tax,
whether it's the use of system development charges,
it's resources associated with expansion
not winning in the clinical gravel off the streets
or fixed potholes which I haven't seen
in the decade that I've been in Redmond.
And then the other thing, and I mentioned it earlier again
and this is just kind of to make sure people
that are maybe in the audience or watching online
that what we control are streets such as,
I'll probably get this wrong,
fifth and sixth evergreen ninth street, right?
what ODOT and the State Highway Department controls are those roads to get us you farther
distances like I mentioned, Highway 126, Highway 97, US 20. So I just wanted to clarify
some of those things as we get into the details tonight of this partnership with ODOT
on moving forward with this project. Well Keith, if you want to experience potholes
just go to bed.
Alright, good evening Mayor and City Council, Jessica McLeanahan, Director of Public Works.
As Keith mentioned, the action before you tonight is to enter into Memorandum of Understanding
with ODOT to just be a first step in our partnership on this important project.
So we wanted to take the opportunity to just highlight again why the project, we believe
it's important and now is the right time to do it.
So as a refresher, the project is shown here as the red line that's on the east side of
the highway there.
It begins with a roundabout at Airport and Veterans Way, an extension of Ninth Street
through the old Juniper Golf Course, a roundabout on Highway 126 at Ninth Street, and again
that's the portion of this project that would be controlled by ODOT, and then a
continuation north and a modernization of Ninth Street from Highway 126 up to
Hemlock.
The project really does help us resolve safety and congestion issues.
It's an alternate route to Highway 97.
The long-term solution for Highway 97 comes at that million-dollar price tag
that the state is actively trying to seek federal funding for.
But again, as Keith mentioned, we're feeling the need to invest in our community ahead of that time.
And so this alternate route helps provide that safety and congestion relief,
while also opening up currently undevelopable lands
because a connection of 9th Street through the old golf course does not currently exist.
So we also see an economic driver here as part of this project.
We're currently in the pre-design phase.
I'm actually very excited to report that we're opening proposals for a progressive
design builder tomorrow, and so you'll be seeing us again here in late spring with
a negotiated contract for initial design services for the project, and that will
really kick off the design in earnest this summer and through the end of the
calendar year to set us up for success to begin some portion of construction, hopefully,
in the next construction season.
We are also hopeful that the project in total could be complete within the three to four-year
horizon, which is incredibly fast, I will say, for about two miles of roadway, two
large roundabouts, and one of which is on the state system.
So it's going to be really fast and furious, and the progressive design build model
is really what helps us facilitate that fast pace and that schedule growth.
And then a little bit more about how the project is funded. You've seen this slide before.
This really is meant to highlight that these large infrastructure projects are funded from
a variety of sources. In this case, the largest of those sources is our transportation SDCs.
So those are the system development charges that we collect from developers that can only
be used towards improvement in adding capacity to our system. You'll also see the water
and wastewater funds there, and that's because when we build a new road, we put the water
lines and the sewer lines underneath the road before we build it. And then back in August,
we presented to Council on the use of one-time general fund dollars, and that's the red piece
of the pie here, that $4 million that was in excess, that we're allocating towards
this important project to make it a reality, as well as the rental car tax. And that
was something that just a few weeks ago, Council also authorized, that's helping
make this project complete in total. With that, I'm happy to answer any questions.
any questions for Jessica thank you and the reason we have the memorandum with
ODOT is because of the intersection with 126 I'm assuming yes that's correct and
I'm glad I should have talked more to the actual action here sorry so this
MOU is again it's the first step towards outlining our partnership it talks
about who owns what the city owns the local roads the state owns the state
roads and it also outlines the intent which is that the city is building the
entire project. However there will be a maintenance agreement where ODOT will
assume maintenance of their facility and that's again the roundabout at 126. It
also outlines a partnership for mutual reviews and permitting things like that
and the agreement that we will work in partnership to actually develop an
intergovernmental agreement and that's really going to be the document of
importance that's quite a bit longer than the MOU before you tonight and
and outlines the nuts and bolts.
And so it's just both staffs coming together
and agreeing that we're gonna partner on this
and work towards an IGA
and then hopefully a successful completion of the project.
And I would say that we've talked with ODOT a lot about this
and they were very supportive of the project.
John?
So I guess that's actually a question for Jessica
and for Ed.
If we're moving forward with this project,
are we confident that ODOT is not gonna use
as an excuse to push the South 97 to kind of rebuild further down their priority list
given their funding search.
No, I really think they're separate.
ODOT has applied twice for a federal grant for $40 million.
They're doing it again this year to rebuild South Highway 97.
They do see this as completely different projects.
And I'm confident one of these years will get the money to do South Highway 97.
Well, I approve of your optimism.
Thank you.
Okay. Thank you, Jessica.
So is there a motion regarding the ODOT City on OU?
Yeah.
I move to enter into a memorandum of understanding with the Oregon Department of Transportation for the Eastside Artillery Project.
Second.
And any further discussion?
All those in favor signify by saying aye.
Aye.
Okay, motion carries and now we have additional comments from citizens, are there any comments?
Okay, seeing none, we'll go to Keith.
Alright, I just have four quick updates as we talk about other people's money.
First of all, as the short session begins to wrap up over the next week or so,
So, we still have an ask that's alive, which is $3 million, which would go toward North
Point, and Representative Everson Levy is doing an incredible job on our behalf, moving
that through, and so that's exciting that it's in the bill that's currently amended
and looking like it's in very good shape.
The other thing associated with the airport, you read recently that we did receive $7
million from the Federal Infrastructure Bill that's been around for a few years now, and
by getting that 7 million that'll go towards the terminal, it gets us kind of in the room
to get more federal money for the project. So while 7 seems small in the context of a
$155 million project, it puts us in really good shape. So I appreciate the airport's
work on that. And we asked for 13, and we got 7 just as a relative piece. And then
And the airport is also putting in $10 million for the State of Oregon Connect Grant, which
will be done in the end of this month, so I guess that would be in two days.
And then, this is already mentioned tonight, but the Congressional Directive Spending,
which is the modern name for earmarks, those always come in about $2 million at
most and we do have an ask-in for the cinder hollow infrastructure and then
rooted homes and housing works also have an ask-in that we've supported for the
Antler project that's just nearby the dog park off of Antler.
Clifford, do you have a question?
No, no.
Alright, Tobias, let's start with you.
Just some updates from the different committees.
GOLF approved their annual plan today, so that was a good thing.
So they have marching orders for the year.
Planning has a lot of big stuff coming this year with, you know, big projects being approved.
So we're waiting for those to come through, but we have a very good group that we're working
through. Tourism, we have an RFP coming soon.
for those tours and dollars and the Farewell Festival just announced their
lineup for this the summer headlining by Brandy Carlisle on Sunday so should be
a pretty good lineup if you like that sort of music.
Just some committee
updates as well from Parks Committee the Parks Master Plan update is kicking
off this week so be on the lookout for open house invites for the spring
and then there will be a council workshop this summer regarding that project.
The central dry canyon design is nearing 60% completion currently and then another project
Valley View and Sam Johnson the Tennyson pickleball courts resurfacing is slated to start on April
1st.
I have nothing.
I'm good.
Thank you.
Keith kind of stole my thunder for the airport.
But that's okay.
That's alright.
That's good.
I do want to just acknowledge, again, the city staff, especially James and his team for
the audit, that it's not an easy task to make sure that all of the beans get counted in the
appropriate way all year long, and they did an amazing job.
So thank you, and please extend our gratitude to your team.
I'm still reading about diversity, equity, and inclusion.
You know, to me diversity means that all sectors of society participate and
I would encourage
all sectors of our community to participate with the city and their committees and commissions,
run for council.
That's what diversity means to me.
It's having representation for all our people in our community.
equity is to me, wow, for
white people to think that they're being treated just unequally
as shocking. When you look at the history of our country, white people have been on
the upper hand for so long in so many ways.
It just is amazing. The opportunities we
have so unlike people of color historically so
anyway I don't have
anything else but we'll adjourn