City Council Regular Meeting

Star City Council Meeting Minutes August 7, 2018 The regular meeting of the Star City Council was held on August 7, 2018 at Star City Hall, 10769 W. State Street, Star, Idaho. Mayor Chad Bell called the meeting to order at 7:00 pm and all stood for the Pledge of Allegiance. Roll Call: Councilman David Hershey, Michael Keyes, Trevor Chadwick and Kevin Nielsen were all present. Approval of the Agenda: Chadwick moved to approve the agenda, Keyes seconded the motion. All ayes: motion carried. Consent Agenda: Chadwick asked about the wording on the Findings for the Comprehensive Plan, should it state Comprehensive Plan Text Amendment. Chris Yorgason, Legal Counsel, stated the findings would spell it out and there was no need to change the wording. Chadwick moved to approve the Consent Agenda consisting of: Regular Meeting Minutes of July 17, 2018, Claims Against the City for June 2018, Finding of Fact and Conclusions of Law for: Medley Property Annexation and the Comprehensive Plan Amendment, Keyes seconded the motion. All ayes: motion carried. Presentations: Ada County Prosecutor – Jan Welsh representing Jan Bennett, Ada County Prosecutor, presented the new budget request in the amount of $19,373. The amount is based on per case and not based on per hearings. Hershey asked about the misdemeanor count. Welsh stated it was 82 for the City of Star, it is over 1,000 for the entire County. Ada County Sherriff’s Office – Chief Jake Vogt presented the proposed law enforcement budget. The Police budget includes an increase of two first responder deputies and one vehicle. We have currently six officers, one detective and one Chief. Looking back, we started with one officer, then to four officers and then to a Chief and then two years ago a detective was hired. We currently have two teams – blue and silver. Crisis calls are dangerous calls and it drains resources. If an emergency happened in the hours without officers, it could take the Eagle Deputy fifteen minutes to respond. By approving the increase of two officers we would have them on staff. Also, the jail is all the way in Boise. The North County officer numbers are being increased. They are seeing more violent crimes. It will increase officer safety by approving this fiscal budget. Personnel wages are not the true wages along with retirement and benefits. Vehicles and personal equipment were reviewed. Christopher Saunders discussed the NIBRS which is a national data base that provides the City with all the crime numbers. The credit was discussed, it is when our officers help other cities or other officers help the officers here in Star. A lot of the support staff is financed by the Sheriff’s office. The Chief stated that the $996,717.95 is the total of the proposed budget. Keyes stated that people are concerned about not enforcing the City citations, do you think that could be increased. The Chief stated until two years ago there was a separate citation code, the citations are unified citations. The City did have forms for city violations, the issue was, there was no due process. The issue that came up was if the deputy filed a citation and handed the person an envelope if the person pays great, but if they didn’t there was no process for that. The City does not have a hearing officer. The decision became that we put the citations on the unified citations and that has caused a deduction in those citations. There is a way of fixing it, but we have to have the Prosecutors office on board and see what 1 they are willing to do. With increased staffing – yes we will have time because we will have time to investigate, right now there is no time. Old/New Business: Ordinance No. 270 Appropriations for 2017-2018 - The Mayor explained the Ordinance was to pull money out of savings to pay for the Maintenance Building. We put it in last year’s budget, but it was paid for out of this year’s budget. Chadwick moved that pursuant to Idaho Code, Section 50-902 the rule requiring an Ordinance to be read on three different days, with one reading to be in full, be dispensed with and that Ordinance No. 270 be considered after reading once by title only, Keyes seconded the motion. Roll Call: Hershey - aye, Keyes - aye, Chadwick - aye, Nielsen – aye – motion carried. Chadwick moved to approve Ordinance No. 270, an Ordinance of the City of Star, Idaho, amending Ordinance No. 263, the Appropriations Ordinance for the fiscal year beginning October 1, 2017; appropriating additional monies that are to be received by the City of Star, Idaho in the sum of $500,000; directing the City Clerk to file a certified copy of this Ordinance with the Secretary of State; and providing an effective date, Keyes seconded the motion. All ayes: motion carried. Public Hearing: Annual Budget for 2018-2019 – The Mayor stated that he would go through the budget by line item. The Mayor declared the public hearing open. The Mayor stated that before we start on the budget, he wanted to let the public know how much money the City has in savings. Cash on hand is $606,706 in cash, cash management is $1,178,843, Zions Bank I account is $415,120 and the second is $308,366 and the Local Government Investment Pool is $2,034,881 for a total of $4,543,881. The Mayor reviewed the budget line item by line item for revenue. (See attached) The total projected budget amount is $4,332,017. Expenses were reviewed line item by line item. Projected budget number is $4,332,017 for next year’s budget. The Mayor asked Council for comments prior to public testimony. Keyes would like to reserve his comments until everyone has spoken on the sign-up sheet. Theresa Tinsley, 10459 Achillea, Star, Idaho, stated she has a question, what she is seeing in maintenance salaries is that there is a 27% increase and the City is hiring another person for next year. Tinsley asked if Council could justify the wages? She does not believe the parks are looking any better than in previous years there are no more trees to trim or lawn to mow. The Mayor stated the increase in wages is due to the market place, we’ve put out job openings, and we could not get anyone for the wages we were paying. Tinsley stated you have a Maintenance Director, one full time, one seasonal and two-part time workers – so a total of five. She does not believe it looks any different. The Mayor disagreed, we keep wages the same. The Mayor stated that yes, we have more personnel. Tinsley stated that you didn’t tell me why you need all these people, Kathy Olson was doing all this work with two people. The Mayor stated that only two are getting benefits. The Mayor stated we were not paying enough. Mayor Bell stated that the employees have more things to take care of more than Olson was. Nielsen asked if there were specific things that are not being addressed? Tinsley stated that the flower beds have weeds, trees had suckers and trees need trimmed. The River Walk had not been trimmed or trimmed around the trees. She doesn’t see $100,000 worth of improvements. 2 Tinsley asked what the projection of building permits is. The Mayor stated it is 250. Did you do that in the past? The Mayor stated yes, we did. Tinsley asked if that isn’t that how Eagle got in trouble. The Mayor stated that it wasn’t – we don’t have to pay the inspectors if the building permits are not there. Tinsley stated you charge fees for every building permit now are you using that money. The Mayor stated that we use the money if we need it, but we put it in to savings if we don’t use it. Nielsen stated the City has reliable and unreliable accounts, if there would be a housing downturn we would be down in the budget, but it would be adjusted. Tinsley stated you are taking a 3% property tax increase, if you have four million in savings why are you raising the taxes. The Mayor stated that as we grow we need to build parks. Tinsley stated we could use the park funds. The Mayor stated that would not cover all of it and it can only be used for parks development. It helps, but it is not enough. Tinsley asked why you are building another park if you are raising taxes. Keyes mentioned the 3% and pointed out the inflation rate is barely over - it is flat at 3%. We have $600,000 in the foregone and we could raise taxes. Tinsley stated the 3% is a raise in my taxes. There are a lot of people that will struggle with the increase. Tinsley stated she has come up here for the past two or three years, where is the ice rink money of $15,000. The Mayor stated that the project is not dead. Tinsley stated that she believes the $15,000 is gone. The Mayor talked about it two or three months ago. We are working on the land right now. The feasibility people we have not spoken to them for a while. Nate Mitchell, 10305 W. Floating Feather, Star, Idaho, stated that he appreciates that we don’t have copies of the budget. He wants to talk about the property tax. The Mayor stated that the Ada County Assessor told us the number. Mitchell stated the Assessor did not have anything to do with the number. Building inspection fees are at $500,000 and inspector fees below are a total of $156,000 and you tell Tinsley you’re not going to spend that money. There is a $400,000 profit, what line are we spending it in. Mitchell asked what line items will not be spent if the housing market crashes. Keyes has done a breakdown of significant costs. Mitchell stated that the budget increase of $146,000 was significant. Mitchell stated you can’t spend the money if you don’t get it. Nielsen stated that Mitchell helped Ward in putting the budget together, we’ve got a quarter million increase in police budget. Mitchell stated that more people voted for Bell than Mitchell. Nielsen stated that $350,000 in fees are supposed to match our expenses. Mitchell stated that it cost more than what you pay your building inspectors. There are five of you that are being paid to know those numbers. Mitchell stated the park impact fees are $410,000 with transferring $225,000. Is it being spent in parks/development plans and equipment. The public doesn’t know where that money is coming from. Nielsen stated that we will be talking about the numbers, but we were just presented with a new budget tonight and it is different than what they wanted. Keyes has never built a government budget, he believes that corporate budgeting is better. Our processes are weak, and we need to fix it. Nielsen stated that Michell worked on the budget with Ward. Mitchell stated that he did not work with Ward on the budget. Mitchell stated that you invited all of us here and that you said the budget is different than what you are going to adopt. Mitchell hopes you do hold another public hearing. Mitchell asked if the 3% increase for employees is guaranteed. Mitchell asked if it was going to be given to everyone. The Mayor stated that it is not guaranteed. Mitchell doesn’t think we need to raise taxes and the maintenance budget concern is echoed; you are paying a lot more than before and he doesn’t think the Police budget needs increased. The Mayor stated that the Olson’s were not going to continue. Mitchell stated that it wasn’t them that decided that. The Mayor did give them the chance to bid and it was significantly higher. 3 Keyes stated this is not a fun conversation, but we need to put more rigor in our process, he thanked Mitchell. Nielsen thanked Mitchell. The Mayor stated that when we project the building numbers there is more information than that. Mitchell stated that it doesn’t balance without using building permits. It is Mitchell’s desire for the five (Council and Mayor) to be able to answer that question before you approve the budget. Mitchell asked to please have a better answer next year. Kevan Wheelock, 1480 N. Star Road, Star, Idaho, stated he can afford the three percent, but if there is a way to not raise it, he would request not raising it. The Mayor closed the public hearing and moved to Council deliberations. Nielsen asked where is the difference between the building inspection money? The Mayor stated we calculate all the staff in it. We pay the over in salaries and it is spread everywhere. Nielsen stated the salaries don’t go away unless the money is not incoming. Nielsen stated it is a mandatory number. Bell asked how much do we want to charge our citizens – we have people here that don’t believe it is necessary to spend the money. The things you want, are they important enough to increase the budget. Keyes stated that when the City went through a review of fees, there was a requirement that it had to reflect the expense items. Legal fees of development and professional services. The increases are a one- time cost for planning that money which is driven by development. If you go line by line you can come up with that number. If you look at income you can come up with expense items. We need to split the line items out. Keyes is surprised at the lack of detail. Do professional dues cover the engineer or another attorney? The Mayor stated that we do pass fees onto the developer, but we do not passing Comp Plan changes on to the developer. The Mayor stated we do not have it as specific line items. Nielsen stated that we need to have a budget that Council can answer questions. Nielsen wants to see depreciation. Regarding capital equipment, there is a fair bit of clean up that needs to be done. Keyes stated that when we publish our budget when there are no line items, we don’t need to publish all the line items. The Mayor asked if we have a defensible budget. Chadwick stated that some cities have more detailed budgets and some have less. Nielsen stated that it is the Council’s responsibility. Other cities do make budget line items. Chadwick stated when we look at legal, we have $36,000 and the other item includes $13,700. ICRMP appears under two-line items and can be pulled out. All agreed, we have a challenge with VRT - leave it or remove it for $10,000. Professional dues amount goes down to $31,385. We have pavilion plans for sprinklers and need to do the Comp Plan we have been working on. One of the things is the EDC Plan, a five-year plan. We are proposing $50,000 for the five-year plan for the first year, $30,000 in for transportation planning and $80,000 Comp Plan. Nielsen asked where is the amount of $100,000 for EDC and UDC plans? The Mayor showed where the amount is. We put $60,000 in for a planner next year. The Mayor spoke with Butler about this and the number is different. For professional services $52,000 for a planner, under the comp plan $40,000 and $10,000 for ordinance updates – is there room in the expense. What is the comp plan for over the cost of the personnel? Keyes stated that numbers have been split out for $195,000 and he has not seen those numbers. The Mayor noted if you’re going to spend the money for the planner and then go to another line item to spend – you’re double dipping on the plan. The plan needs to be revamped, we are not starting from zero. Keyes would like to see a written proposal from Butler and the transportation person and additional people for information and the expenses for mailings and doing that. He has no detail information and does not have a plan worth having. Chadwick believes it would be beneficial for the plan to line up on 409.42. Our engineer fees are pass through numbers. If we want them for extra work, then we have to pay for them. The Mayor stated the bottom line is if we feel as a governing board it is justified to do things for the city then we do it. Public safety is number one priority. It is our responsibility to keep our citizens safe. He has no problem stating that we need the police increase. The 3% is an amount to provide the citizens what they want or need, that’s what we are supposed to be doing. There will be people that disagree with us. This is the format of 4 the budget and it has been the same for 18 years, we have added a bit more. If you guys think it is inadequate then we need to revise it, but this budgeting process is one we’ve used for years. Keyes stated the city has grown. Keyes asked what would you think about having a workshop and republishing the budget. Hershey doesn’t talk a lot when it comes to the income side, we don’t need mass delineations. There were a couple years we did not take the 3% each year. Hershey is against using the foregone amount. Hershey is in favor of the increase of the police budget. It takes a lot of time. Certain things can’t line up in the budget. Growth in the way we want will require money. He understands government, not used to corporate budgets. Corporate budgets will go down to detail because they rely on the bottom line. Hershey stated he likes the capital expenditures listed and the break downs - it doesn’t have to be more than that. It doesn’t have to be 95 pages long. He likes the start we have in breaking it down, showing what we are trying to do. Nielsen stated that it would be helpful if we had an account for plans and identify what we are spending, we have too much confusion as to where the money is going. He would rather not take the 3% like last year. Bell stated there were a few years we didn’t take the new construction. We did take 3% a majority of the time. Nielsen wants to not take the 3% and take new construction. Nielsen suggested putting together another workshop. Discussion was held on the time to publish notices. Yorgason stated it needed to be published twice, seven days apart. The Mayor came up with the numbers from Mark and Dave. Keyes suggested a workshop this Thursday at 6:00 pm. Resolution 2018-04 Comprehensive Text Amendment – The Mayor stated that this was a Resolution adopting the text amendment for the Comprehensive Plan. Trevor moved to approve a Resolution of the City Council of the City of Star, Idaho, approving and adopting, pursuant to Section 67-6509, Idaho Code, Comprehensive Plan Text Amendments for the City of Star, Keyes second the motion. All ayes: motion carried. Reports: Staff - Yorgason stated the Star Fire Department is moving forward with both Ada and Canyon Counties. Ada County is moving forward. Canyon County is working through the process. The District would like the City to move forward with the Impact Fees and Intergovernmental Agreement. We also need to do an amendment to the Comp Plan to add it. It was asked if we need to change the budget for this. Yorgason stated that we can always take money in, we do not need to change it. Council agreed to move forward. Council – Keyes stated they completed the Purple Heart recognition. Chadwick stated the ACHD Bike and Pathways have wrapped up and they will be presenting to Council on September 4th for feedback. Mayor – The Mayor had nothing to report other than Valley Regional Transit will be speaking to Council on September 4. Chadwick stated that he, the Mayor, Mark Butler and Dave Szplett met with ACHD and ITD regarding the east corridor which will help with the economics. The Mayor stated it was a good meeting. The Mayor adjourned the meeting at 9:30 pm. Approved: 5  _____________________________ Respectfully submitted: Charlten Bell, Mayor ______________________ Cathy Ward, City Clerk 6