City Council

October 24, 2022 Council Work Session The City Council of the City of Idaho Falls met in Council Work Session, Monday, October 24, 2022, in the Council Chambers in the City Annex Building located at 680 Park Avenue in Idaho Falls at 3:00 p.m. Call to Order and Roll Call There were present: Mayor Rebecca L. Noah Casper Council President Michelle Ziel-Dingman Councilor John Radford Councilor Tom Hally Councilor Jim Freeman Councilor Jim Francis Councilor Lisa Burtenshaw Absent: Also present: Bryce Johnson, Police Chief Rome Stiffler, CIT Detective Randy Fife, City Attorney Ryan Tew, Human Resources Director Corrin Wilde, Accounting Clerk Jasmine Marroquin, Deputy City Clerk Mayor Casper called the meeting to order at 3:00 p.m. with the following items: Calendars, Announcements, Reports, Updates, Questions, and Discussion: October 25, Shade Tree Committee, Noon October 25, Development Workshop 50th Anniversary 6pm October 27, City Council Meeting October 28, Last Day for Early Voting October 29, Homeless Stand Down, 9-12 SAC October 29, Real Heroes Trunk-or-Treat, 3-5pm Mayor Casper stated AIC updated email saying they will be putting out the elected official booklet and would like to remind everybody to update profiles by December 1st so make sure your profile reads the way you want it to. On the 29th of November ATI (Associated taxpayers of Idaho) meeting and the day before that is the AIC legislative summit and is for elected officials prior to the session where they review things that are legislative in nature. AIC (Association of Idaho Cities) newsletter is advertising a property tax town hall on November 14th for 2 and a half hours from 9am to 11:30am at the canyon county courthouse in Caldwell. This meeting is being conducted by the state tax commission. Mayor Casper noted that our Legislature have been working hard during session but may not have a good idea about what cities do and we will be interacting with them this fall and reminded council members to provide the reason that we may want them to pay attention because they may not understand everything Cities do. When 1  October 24, 2022 Council Work Session talking to them about something they are responsible for that impacts cities make sure to make that nexus clear. Mayor Casper will find out more about the legislative agenda that AIC is putting together. Liaison Reports and Councilmember Concerns: President Councilor Dingman Noted she is thankful for everyone that attended the Idaho Falls Airport master planning open house at the college of eastern Idaho. About half the attendees live near the airport and had questions about potential future use of area property and was able to explain the master planning process and the other half was a mixture of journal aviation interest and community interest and they had read a flyer that talked about what we need at the airport to fulfill some goals and there was a lot of good questions and great feedback. Councilor Dingman also mentioned that tonight’s meeting will be talking about security improvements, and it will be a presentation from the TSA advisor, and he will talk about there recent business in Idaho Falls and some suggestion that they have made for security improvements at the airport etc. This is not a town hall format, but folks will be able to get questions answered and we are expecting good attendants. It starts at 6pm to 7:30pm tonight. Councilor Hally gave an update on 25th they are in the final stages and should be paved and open soon. Councilor Radford Stated Idaho Falls Zoo is extending the season and tonight and tomorrow from 6pm to 8pm you can take advantage of the Zoo lights and you can walk though and see the lights. The Zoo will be open starting October 29th to November 27th on Saturday’s and Sunday’s from 11am to 5pm (weather permitting). There will be a reduced admission of $10 for adults and $4.50 for kids. Radford also noted that the leaf schedule is out so look for that, so you know when to get your leaves out for pick up. There are also a few trails that are listed on the new Idaho Falls App and if you ever want to know about urban heights available in Idaho falls the AllTrails App has our river walk and pathways you can take and gives a nice opportunity to use that. Councilor Francis stated there is a swearing in of three new officers tomorrow afternoon at 2:30pm at the training center. Councilor Francis stated 3 or 4 years ago last time the school bond was up council not as a resolution or anything, but people signed a statement in support of it. I wrote something up if you want to look at and want to put your name in than Lisa Burtenshaw will get it to the school bond people, and it will go out one more statement of support. Councilor Freeman stated that the fire department is hiring 12 new people and the deadline is October 29th if anyone is interested in becoming a fire fighter this is a great time to apply. Councilor Burtenshaw stated planning and zoning has opening on there commission if anyone is interested in being involved. 25th and Saturn will be paved soon. West hill was paved last week. Water tower will intend to open November 10th. The Dewater plans are still planning on going out early November. Councilor Hally noted that the bid for the intersection of woodruff and 17th is ITD and that is tomorrow, and we will know if we have any bids. Idaho Falls Police Department-Discussion: Proposed changes to police Personnel manual. Chief Johnson is presenting two housekeeping changes to the policy manual the first one is stand by pay. The manual says that stand by pay currently only applies to detectives. Stand by pay is when we need to limit an employee's behavior so that if they need to return to work, they can return immediately. The employee cannot have alcohol, cannot travel, and must be within a certain distance to respond to work. There is a set compensation for people that limit their behaviors. Chief Johnson stated they found that they need to use standby more than just with the detectives and have had to keep swat team on standby on occasion, our public order unit and dispatcher have had to be on standby on occasion. This change would reflect what the police department needs to do and not just limit stand by to the detectives. This way if they do have to put someone on standby they can be compensated as per the police manual. Chief Johnson then presented the second item regarding compensatory time. This change would upon promotion the city would pay the comp time on the book and would be paid out at the rate they earned it in. I then would be made clear that Exempt employees which would be lieutenant and above, executive assistant, Chief, and the public information officer do not have compensatory time. Councilor Radford wanted to know if we 2  October 24, 2022 Council Work Session were trying to do this for other departments as well. Ryan Tew stated almost every department compensatory time is down to zero but it’s a little more difficult with the police department. Mr. Tew noted that this makes a lot of sense for the city because there are a lot of police officers who earn comp time at $20 an hour and then get promoted and get paid out at there current rate as a captain and it is very expensive to the city. Chief Johnson stated that exempt employees are not eligible for compensatory time so there are a couple of exempt employees that have time on the books and so they would get paid out for that time and they have a couple options they have for that. HR has been good to work with the employees by helping them decide if they want to just take cash or if they want to roll it into deferred compensation or put it in a health savings account, so they have some options. This change in the policy manual would make it so those exempt employees would have to get paid out on that. The current sergeants though would keep their comp time and use it however all future promotions they officer would get paid out on there compensatory time upon promotion and they would know that is coming before they get promoted so it would be part of the decision they can make before they decide weather they want to be promoted or not. Mayor Casper stated this is a positive step and we have bee working on this off and on for 3 years, trying to figure out the right solution and the right time to implement it and am grateful to the police department for figuring out this kind of a solution and to Director Tew for working on this. Chief Johnson presented a third change to the policy manual regarding holiday time. The city went from eleven holidays to twelve holidays, so it simply updates the mention in the police personal manual from eleven to twelve. Chief Johnson noted that these proposed changes as you know would need to be publish to the employees and they would have 30 days to comment and then it will come back to council sometime after those thirty days. It is the consensus of the Council to begin the thirty days for the employees to review and make comments. Mayor Casper noted that if employees have comments that need to be addressed, we will see this item again at a future meeting however if no significant issues are brought forward, we may see this item at a council meeting for approval. Idaho Falls Police - Department Update: CIT (Crisis Intervention Team) Detective Activates. Chief Johnson stated two budgets ago the Council funded and authorized a Crisis Intervention Team detective position and there was a lot of work to get that done and is very grateful for it. Chief Johnson gave an overview, Crisis intervention team is the standard response from police department for people struggling with mental health or having mental health crisis. Crisis intervention was born out of Memphis following a tragic event where a schizophrenic individual was shot and killed by the police department. They went back an reviewed the incident and it was determined that the police department did everything they were supposed to, but it wasn’t the outcome people wanted. They came up with the idea of Crisis Intervention to try to handle these situations better. Crisis Intervention has been in place for several decades now in Idaho Falls and Bonneville County have been involved for some time and it has grown over that time. Chief Johnson noted about a year ago as a police department they joined the International Association of Chiefs of police one “One Mind” campaign. “One Mind” is a model of what law enforcement agencies ought to be doing. It involves having a partnership with one or more community health organizations to develop and implement policies based off best practices, it has a lot to do with training, getting at least twenty percent of the department trained in CIT (Crisis Intervention Team) and one hundred percent trained in Mental health first response. Chief Johnson stated the police department has achieved all these things and then we added the CIT Detective and the idea with the CIT Detective was going to do is we take the different mental health calls and try to find a solution for people in crises so that we are not responding several times and provide a time saver for officers and in addition to hopefully provide better service for the person in crisis. The though behind that is if we respond several times and nothing changes, did we really provide the services needed. Detective Stiffler gave an overview of how he gets dispatched to these calls. He stated Patrol officers and dispatchers will give names and case reports if they have been dealing with an individual several times and feel that something may be going on. Detective Stiffler stated he will take the names to Health and welfare to see if there is 3  October 24, 2022 Council Work Session any backstory on the individual and try to get any diagnoses they may have and see what kind of resources they are currently using. Detective Stiffler noted some people are not using any resources. If it’s an immediate need, then he will coordinate with health and welfare, and they will send two people as per there policy to go out with Detective Stiffler. He Stated The three of them will go out and talk to the person and do an evaluation right there. Detective Stiffler stated he will talk to them a little bit and when he is done, Health and Welfare will use their expertise to go over a little more. Detective Stiffler stated there is a high percentage of people that are homeless struggling with mental illness, and he says he tries to find them resources like housing and other recourses. Council President Dingman asked if when talking with people who are unsheltered, are they open to having a conversation with you to find resources? Detective Stiffler stated once he established a repour with them and they know that he is trying to help, they will talk to him, he noted that some people don’t want help they talk about it but when it comes down to it, they are more comfortable where they are at. Detective Stiffler stated he does have hygiene kits and blankets that he will hand out to people. Detective Stiffler stated that he along with health and welfare and Bonneville County are doing trainings every 6 months and are getting officers trained this training academy is open to the Valley. Detective Stiller stated there is a project called “Home Safe” that will kick off soon and will help with mental handicaps, children with downs syndrome, people who are prone to wonder and people suffering from dementia and Alzheimer’s and will be a phenomenal resource for the city. Chief Johnson noted Prior to the CIT Detective program we would coordinate with the state so we show up and they would do what they do and there was really no coordination. What we have been able to do Detective Stiffler has been able to take those names that we encounter frequently in the field and as our version of a co-responder model, we aspire to a full co responder model, but have been able to do what I think is a very good co-responder model. Chief Johnson stated Detective Stiffler has had 135 calls for services from April to October. Those are calls that are diverted from the field but out of those 135 calls those people are calls that would be several calls to dispatch so instead of sending several officers responses which usually includes fire responders as well. They can just go to Detective Stiffler, and he can coordinate with the state department that is responsible for health and human services and try to get them some real help. He noted Both on the aspect of getting people help and that reduction of work. It is working the way we envisioned it working and we as a police department were not aware how much partnership we get from the state until we spent the time building the relationship and they have been good to work with. There being no further business, the meeting adjourned at 4:22 p.m. s/Corrin Wilde s/Rebecca L. Noah Casper Corrin Wilde, City Clerk Rebecca L. Noah Casper, Mayor 4