I'd like to call the regular meeting of Monday, January 8th to order.

Would you all see you please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance and a moment of reflection?

I would ask you to keep in your thoughts and prayers.

The father of former mayor, council member, and vice mayor Chuck Wolfe.

His father died unexpectedly on Friday.

Thank you very much.

Marcella, do you want to call them?

Thank you, Mayor.

Councilmember Condi.

Councilmember Malone.

Councilmember Nielsen.

Councilmember Solario.

Councilmember White.

Here.

Vice Mayor Paneba.

Mayor Weiss.

Here.

Ron, uh item two A, please.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

Council.

Uh, first we have new employee introductions, and I believe we're gonna start.

Yep, there she goes.

We're gonna start with our city clerk's office.

Uh Marcella.

Good evening, Mayor, Vice Mayor, and Council.

I have the privilege of introducing two new employees to you tonight.

First, on my left, I have Veronica Moreno.

Veronica joined the City of Avondale in November 2023 as our administrative assistant, also known as our passport agent.

Prior to joining Avondale, Veronica served the city of Nogales for over eight years, working within their public works department, where she served as the executive assistant to the director and also as the procurement specialist.

Lastly, I'm proud to announce that Veronica just received her certified election officer certificate through the Arizona Secretary in State just in time for the 2024 elections.

And then on my right, I have Julie Knoll.

So Julie joined the City of Avondale today.

So today is her first day.

So she knows everything already.

Um she is our new deputy city clerk.

Prior to joining Avondale, Julie served as Gl um served the Glendale City Clerk's office for over three years with extensive knowledge in records management and public records.

Prior to that, Julie served various public agencies to include the Glendale Union High School District and the Washington Elementary School District.

Julie earned a master's degree in public administration from Grand Canyon University in 2023.

And she has a bachelor's degree in social work from ASU.

Julie is a certified municipal clerk through the um International Institute of Municipal Clerks, and she is also a certified election officer through the Secretary of State's office.

Welcome to you both.

We're glad you're here.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you, Ronica.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

Up next, I believe, is our finance and budget department with Renee introducing the new employee.

Good evening, Mayor, Vice Mayor and Council.

Um I'm proud to introduce our newest member to the Finance and Budget Department with me.

I have Allie Bland.

She is a senior accountant and um she brings over 20 years of financial experience.

Most recently, she worked um in Alaska in the business office for a native health um consortium.

Allie has a bachelor's degree from Dickinson State University with a double major in accounting and business administration, and we're happy to have her here with us in Avondale.

So the weather the last couple days has made you feel at home a little bit more, or I'm glad we could do that for you.

Welcome aboard.

Thank you.

Next up is the fire medical department chief uh Rooney.

Good evening, Mayor, Vice Mayor, and Council.

It's my privilege to introduce you uh the newest members of the um Avondale Fire and Medical Department.

We're gonna start with Amelia Torres.

Amelia Torres is our new fire and medical spell uh specialist.

She was raised in California, which I I was as well, so it's not all that bad.

No.

She's from Huron.

Here on Huron, California, which I don't even know where that's at.

So um, but uh she previously previously worked at the senior assistant as a senior assistant, center sorry, as a senior citizen.

Never mind.

I can you tell I didn't write this.

Um she worked for neighborhood and family services for six years.

How's that?

And uh she received her bachelor's degree in public administration.

And uh let's see.

Her favorite holiday is Halloween.

So when you came over to the fire department, she had it all decorated.

There were there were spiders and crickets jumping out all over the place.

So we'd like to welcome Amelia.

And I'm sorry that I butchered your last title.

That's okay.

Okay.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next we have Richard Kimmy.

And uh Richard Kimmy is our new fleet program manager.

And uh Richard worked for uh the county of Maricopa County first and uh before he took this job, and he oversaw 493 vehicles, and he and his uh span was the whole county, and now he has 14 fire apparatuses to take care of, and it's just the city of Avondale.

And um Richard and his wife are uh Avondale residents.

In fact, Richard lives right behind Station 175, so his walk to work is very quick.

And uh he's our new uh fleet coordinator.

And he belongs to the NAFA, which I do not know what that stands for.

National Association of Fleet Administrators.

There you go.

Uh and he's also a fleet pro, and he's a certified automotive automatic fleet manager.

So uh we'd like to welcome Rich.

Uh he's done a great job.

He's been here about a month or two.

Four.

About four months.

But it's gone by so fast for me.

It's been quick.

He's done an excellent.

Seriously, I uh it's a two-drink minimum tonight.

This is awesome.

I I wish I had that problem.

Mr.

Mayor Chief, uh, we have two assistant chiefs if you needed some assistance, Chief.

I just in case.

This is what a week in Kawaii does to you, I guess.

So thank you, Richard.

Well, Richard, I do have a question for you.

So when they talk about Maricopa County, I looked over to Andy and Andy smiled.

Did Andy have anything to do with this?

With Andy, I'm not sure.

Yeah, we have he has no idea what you're talking about.

Welcome aboard.

Thank you.

Well, hopefully I'll do a little better on this next one.

Um Nathan Williams, come on up, Nate.

Nate Nate uh is our new support service technician, and uh he was raised in Phoenix.

I can say that well.

Nathan previously worked for the finance department of the city surprise, and most people do not know, but he started his government care career working part-time in Parks and Rec here in Avondale.

So we uh welcome Nate and uh you've only been here a couple months, right?

Yeah, about it.

Hey Nate, what year did you work here in Parks and Rock?

I was about 18 or 19.

So three years ago?

Five now.

Okay.

Long time ago, you know.

I'm old now.

You always come home to Avondale, that's awesome, thank you.

Thank you.

Thanks, Nene.

Chief, thank you for everything that you just did.

That was awesome.

I've just started, I have one more.

Next, I would like to call up Scott Miller.

Scott Miller's our new fire marshal.

And Scott has over 30 years of experience in the fire service.

He started off as a firefighter in Indiana.

Um he was a firefighter uh EMT.

And prior to joining Avondale, he spent 15 years in the Glendale Fire Department uh in the fire marshal's office and uh was an assistant fire marshal.

I actually know Scott.

Scott worked in Peoria as a fire inspector way back when I was a young boy.

And uh but we're really happy to bring Scott here, he brings a lot of experience, he's got that common sense approach too, and it's a very important position for the city for the fire marshal, so we're really excited about him, and we will be swearing him in tonight after I get off the stage here.

All right, Scott, did you work with uh Chief Burdick over in Glendale?

Yes, all right, good man.

Uh you're not gonna pin me, are you?

Not this minute.

Okay, I don't know what it's down.

Okay.

That is all, thank you.

Well, Andy's yeah.

Woo.

Good luck to Andy to follow that.

But next up is our uh human resources department.

What do we get ourselves into?

Good evening, Mayor, Vice Mayor, and Council.

It's my privilege to introduce to you Priscilla Pimentel, who has joined the human resources department uh as a human resources specialist on November 27th, 2023.

Priscilla's primary responsibilities are onboarding new employees, entering personnel actions, and providing exceptional customer service.

Priscilla has an associate's degree in communication from Glendale Community College and a bachelor's degree in communication from NAU.

Prior to joining the city, Priscilla most recently worked for the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office as a human resources specialist from September 2022 to November 2023.

And prior to that, Priscilla held a variety of positions with Peoria Ford between 2019 and 2022 from Lod attendant, HR payroll assistant, and biller.

In her spare time, Priscilla volunteers as a youth leader, choir member, and board member at her local church.

And we're excited to have Priscilla as part of the EHR team to help support other employees and make lives better for our community.

Welcome aboard.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next up we from the Office of Public Safety.

Good evening, Mayor, Vice Mayor, Council.

I'm proud tonight to introduce to you your newest municipal security officer.

This is Nancy Moreno.

She grew up in the Maryvale area, but uh quickly found out where the right place to be was and graduated from La Jolla High School.

So she has family members who live in Avondale.

We were able to woo her from Maricopa County uh Sheriff's Office.

She was a detention officer for several years, and now she is our security officer at our new community center.

So this is Nancy.

Nancy, welcome aboard.

We're not going hmm to you.

We're doing hmm to Maricopa County and all the new employees.

I hope you understand that.

Andy.

Thank you.

Next up is Parks and Recreation and the library with your assistant director.

Corey, is anybody from Maricopa County?

No, not that I'm aware of.

Good evening.

Tonight I am excited to close out the employee intros with the addition of two more employees from the Parks Recreation Department.

One is our earlier advisor that we are going to introduce via video.

So I'm going to cue that up first.

Uh oh.

There we go.

Hello, my name is Jacob Andrata.

I work in the Parks and Rec department as a maintenance worker.

My hire date was December the 11th of 2023.

And my favorite things to do are uh be with my family and play some golf when I have some time.

And that video was shot this morning, I'm guessing, because the jacket, the hat, the scarf, the gloves.

Uh we are much more prepared than that.

It was shot on Friday.

Joining me in person tonight is Stephanie Flood, our new arts, culture, and libraries manager.

Stephanie has 20 years of experience in the library business with a variety of backgrounds, including academic, medical, and public library systems.

Stephanie holds her bachelor's in anthropology and her master's in library sciences.

She and her family are relocating to Arizona from the Garden State from New Jersey.

So she's bringing some of that weather with her as well.

She's been on our team since October, so we're excited to have her here for the last couple months getting caught up in her spare time.

She enjoys walking with her two dogs, uh, traveling with her RB and being outdoors.

Welcome aboard.

Thank you.

Thanks.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

That's all of our introductions.

Now we're gonna move back to the fire chief.

Um I'm a little nervous about this, but we have some uh chief.

We have motions to announce.

You know, God love you.

So while he's grabbing his thoughts, he did just spend a couple weeks in Hawaii, so that may be part of the fog.

I actually had 17 days off, so I have absolutely no idea of how to come back to work.

Okay, so I have to ask.

We we know that everything that's happened with fire over the last year and all the transitions and you coming on board.

Was it weirder the first day after you're on vacation or coming back?

Like what was the most difficult?

Was it cutting loose and just putting everything aside, or was it coming back?

Cutting loose was extremely difficult after this last year.

Okay.

But uh I got really used to it sitting on the um coming back today.

I almost had to put it into my GPS.

Paul, and you came back today.

Your plane landed today.

No, it landed, it landed uh Friday night.

Okay, welcome back.

We're glad it was safe.

Thank you.

Thank you.

So, first off, we're gonna introduce you to your new engineers.

Mayor, Vice Mayor, Council.

It's my pleasure to bring up Brendan Weiss, Ryan Newtzmann, and Brent Riggs.

I'll start with Brendan Weiss.

He was born and raised in Phoenix and has uh been with uh Avondale Fire Medical for five years.

Uh Brendan attended paramedic school this last year, so he's had a busy year.

He not only became a paramedic, he also studied really hard and became and now is being uh promoted to engineer.

Uh while he was in medic school, he received the Kyle Bayer Award for uh paramedic student of excellence.

In other words, he was the best student in that class.

In his free time, he enjoys spending time with his wife, his daughter, and his mountain bike.

In that order.

Brendan is decided to take on the challenges and responsibilities that come with being promoted to engineer.

We congratulate you, Brian.

Next, we have Ryan Newtzman.

Ryan was born and raised in Phoenix, has been with Avondale for five years as well, attended paramedic school about two years ago, and Ryan enjoys spending time with his family and enjoys going to the lake.

He's excited to take on the challenges as well of being promoted to engineer.

Congratulations.

Thanks, Chief.

Next we have Brent Riggs.

Brent was born and raised in Glendale, Arizona, and has been with the department for six years.

He attended TRT school and has been a tech for the last four years.

Brent enjoys spending time with his wife and kids.

Oh, Ryan and the son and daughter.

Bo Bo and Ryan is son and daughter.

Congratulations.

So now we'll have Marcella swear the three of them in.

Can you stand over here and have your voice?

Okay, raise your right hand and repeat after me.

I solemnly swear.

I solemnly swear.

That I will support the Constitution of the United States.

That I will support the Constitution of the United States.

And the Constitution and Laws of the State of Arizona.

And the Constitution and Laws of the State of Arizona.

The Charter of the City of Avondale.

The Charter of the City of Avondale.

That I will bear true faith.

That I will bear true faith.

And allegiance to the same.

And defend them against all enemies.

And defend them against all enemies.

Foreign and domestic.

And that I will faithfully.

And impartially.

And impartially.

Discharge the duties.

Discharge the duties.

Of the Office of Fire Engineer.

Representing the city of Avondale.

Representing the city of Avondale.

According to the best of my ability.

According to the best of my ability.

So I do affirm.

So I do affirm.

Congratulations.

As you can tell, this doesn't happen every day in the fire department.

Next we'll be uh swearing in our new uh fire captains.

So I'd like to bring up Randall McCullough, Robert Maturk, and Daniel Guerrero.

We'll start with Randall McCua.

Randall has been a part of the Avondale fire medical team since twenty sixteen.

Um he has a combined total of eleven years of experience, which began as a reserve firefighter in Black Canyon and a full-time firefighter in Page.

He has served the rank of firefighter paramedic engineer and now captain.

As the son of two Romanian immigrants, he was always encouraged to maintain a mindset of humility and gratitude.

His wife Kara and son Micah are his greatest success and supporters.

He looks forward to serving the community at the rank of captain.

Congratulations.

Next we have Robert McTurk.

Robert has been serving the community of Avondale for close to ten years and is currently a captain paramedic.

Well, he is now going to be a captain paramedic.

Robert has served as a trustee for the association and is currently uh Avondale Firefighters Charity executive board member.

He is married to his wife of Jam wife Jamie and has two daughters.

He looks forward to continuing providing excellent service to the citizens of Avondale and making Avondale Fire and Medical a great organization.

Congratulations, Robert.

Next we have Daniel Guerrero.

Daniel Guerrero has been an uh uh an employee of Avondale Fire and Medical for 10 years.

He grew up in Avondale, where he went to Garden Lakes Elementary in Westview High School.

He went on to graduate from Arizona State University.

Daniel currently has a home in Avondale with his wife Rachel and his two beautiful daughters, Elena and Ava.

He likes spending time with his family riding bikes in the park with his daughters, and he also enjoys mountain biking.

Congratulations.

We will now do be doing the swearing in ceremony.

Okay.

So raise your hand and repeat after me.

I solemnly swear.

The charter of the city of Avondale.

The Charter of the City of Avondale.

That I will bear true faith.

And allegiance to the same.

And defend them against all enemies.

And defend them against all enemies.

Foreign and domestic.

Foreign and domestic.

And that I will faithfully.

And that I will faithfully.

And then partially.

Discharge the duties.

Discharge the duties.

Of the office of fire captain.

Representing the city of Avondale.

Representing the city of Avondale.

According to the best of my ability.

According to the best of my ability.

So help me go.

So we got.

Congratulations.

And last but not least, we will call Scott Miller up again so we can swear him in and give him his badge.

And when that happens, all positions in the fire and medical department will be filled.

I solemnly swear.

And allegiance to the same.

Foreign and domestic.

So help me go.

Congratulations.

Thank you, Marcella.

Before we do that, just there's a lot of the fire family in the room.

Thank you for everything that you do every day.

Um truly are a family.

And seeing the promotions, seeing the pinning, seeing the families that are here to the families, thank you for sharing your husbands, your wives with us on a daily basis.

We know it's difficult.

We know they'll work long hours.

Um, they talk about their days and they do the best that they can to spend time with you and the kids and do everything that they can.

But they are part of our family, and we're proud to have them, and it's moments like this that just kind of bring that all home.

So, Chief, thank you.

Thank you to all our firefighters and the support staff.

So going forward and and it it can change depending on who is here in the seat a year from now.

But there are times where we do proclamations, and it should be from the mayor.

It'd be it's it's it's one that is just it it carries that.

But there are times where you want the entire council to have a voice and you want the entire council to show how important that proclamation is.

So what I've asked for this proclamation is that it'd be signed by all council and going forward we'll kind of do it that way for the next year.

Um but I've asked Councilmember White to read the proclamation tonight.

So Councilmember Thank you so much, Mayor.

Proclamation, Martin Luther King, Junior Day, January fifteenth, twenty twenty-four.

Whereas Dr.

Martin Luther King Jr.

lived his life in service as a Baptist minister, nonviolent activist, civil rights leader, and philosopher to advocate for the rights of black people, the poor, and other marginalized people, and to eliminate all forms of discrimination throughout our country, and whereas Dr.

King beckoned us towards nonviolent civil disobedience to eradicate Jim Crow laws and force social change and opportunity for all with a consistent, persistent use of nonviolent resistance.

And whereas Dr.

King was a great minister serving as the inaugural president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, superior order and leader whose messages have influenced this country to integrate peacefully.

And whereas Dr.

King's words, from the streets of Selma to the walls of the White House share, the ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in a moment of comfort or convenience.

But where he stands at times of challenge and controversy, the true neighbor will risk his position, his prestige, and even his life for the welfare of others holds true today.

And whereas the City of Avondale, in conjunction with others throughout the United States of America and across the globe, acknowledge the Tuesday following Martin Luther King Jr.

Day as the national day of racial healing and urges all citizens to promote racial healing and transformation individually and collectively as means of working together to ensure the best quality of life for every child.

Now, therefore, the mayor and the council of the City of Avondale, Arizona, do hereby proclaim January 15th, 2024 as Dr.

Martin Luther King Jr.

Day in Avondale and urge all residents to support the principles of justice and equality as we continue to realize Dr.

King's dream of a more equitable society for all the questions.

Thank you, Councilmember for doing that.

I'm sorry.

Thank you, Councilmember, for doing that.

Ron Item 2D, please.

Thank you.

Next, we'll have a presentation by your Parks and Rec Director on the Department of American with Disability Acts access access audit and transition plan.

Good evening, Mayor, Vice Mayor, Councilmembers.

In 2022, the Parks and Recreation Department received accreditation through the National Recreation and Parks Association Commission on Accreditation and Park and Recreation Agency Standards.

During the accreditation process, it was determined that the City's Americans with Disabilities Transition Plan, our ADA plan, was not current, and that a new plan would be need to be developed to meet standards and more importantly to meet the Americans with Disabilities Act.

This was the only standard we missed of the 154, so we wanted to correct that quickly.

To that end, we engaged uh John McGovern and the WT group, uh nationally known for their ADA accessibility uh transition plans to uh do an audit and prepare a plan for us, and he's here tonight to try to kind of walk us through that audit, uh the results and what our plan will be moving forward.

John?

Thanks, Brad.

Thank you, Mayor, Vice Mayor, members of the Council for the time tonight.

Uh my name is John McGovern, and I lead the accessibility practice at the WT Group, and we help cities and counties navigate through the sometimes not so crystal clear requirements of the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Uh tonight, I'm just going to briefly talk about our project team and yours, talk about how the Americans with Disabilities Act requires you to treat existing sites as well as new construction.

Talk a little bit about the transition plan, the process that we used, our deliverables, and then talk about the cost implications of those, and then end with some strategies and some conclusion remarks.

Feel free to interrupt me if I strike something that you would like to dig a little deeper in.

I worked in local government for a long time.

I started my career in Albuquerque and then worked in the Chicago suburbs, so maybe I brought some of the weather along here too.

Tatum Story is an MSW, she's a certified ADA coordinator, and she was our project manager for the Avondale Parks and Recreation Project.

WT Group was formed in 1971, and the accessibility practice was created in 2008.

And since then we've helped more than 600 cities and counties meet the various requirements of the ADA.

The Avondale project team was excellent.

Dominic DeCono was the project manager on this.

And if he didn't, certainly Corey did.

And if he didn't, certainly Brian did.

So all of the staff were a pleasure to work with and made our visits here productive and enjoyable.

So how does the ADA treat existing sites?

There's no such thing as grandfathering under the Americans with Disabilities Act.

So all existing city facilities and parks do have to be audited against two sets of requirements.

The first is the Federal 2010 Standard for Accessible Design.

And the second is any Arizona requirements that are more stringent than the federal requirement.

So there might be a parking requirement that's more stringent, for example, and if that's the case, we would adhere to that.

Facilities include everything.

It includes sidewalks.

There has been a trend recently to both in Chicago and in some other major cities where sidewalks and traffic signals are becoming part of the ADA settlement agreement situation.

The Title II is the portion of the ADA that applies to the city, and it does require you to create a phased plan for how you're going to do your retrofits.

If you called the Department of Justice tomorrow, they'd say you have to do it as soon as possible.

That's not very helpful guidance.

So we usually recommend when it's a parks and recreation plan only, somewhere in the range of seven to ten or eleven years.

A key part of the transition plan requirement for existing sites is to conduct community engagement activities.

So we did that early in the fall.

Our goal there is to hear from your residents who have a disability and identify their access preferences and priorities.

In other words, do they think playgrounds are more important to be retrofit than restrooms at a facility?

So we did that in two ways.

We held meetings here in town, and we also did an online survey that gave us some pretty solid direction about how to order your retrofits.

Completely different set of requirements if it's new construction.

New construction has to strictly comply.

We often find that in new construction, accessibility is a function of three things.

The first is the design.

Did the architect or the engineer get it right?

The second is construction.

If the architect or engineer did get it right, was it built that way then?

And then the third is all under the control of the city, and that's maintenance.

So in every new site that we saw, we did see some things that were noncompliant.

Some are easy to fix, like relocating or remounting at a different height, the signs that denote that a restroom is accessible.

Others might be a little bit more complex.

The Title II requirement in the regulation published by the Department of Justice is on the screen.

I'm not going to read it to you, but it's it's really pretty ambivalent or pretty clear about how to treat existing sites.

Our process, we don't have digital feet or eyeballs, so we evaluate everything.

We use pretty simple tools, a two-foot digital level, not a four-foot digital level.

That's a little more forgiving.

A tape measure, a door pressure gauge, and on our phones, we have an app.

So the app downloads the Arizona requirements, the federal requirements, and our own smart practices that we've added to the checklist based on our local government experience.

Five of the seven of our team worked in local government before.

So think broadly about the term programs.

Playgrounds are a program, for example.

So you're clearly told that you do not have to make every existing playground accessible, but you have to make enough accessible so that no matter where I live in Avondale, the accessible sites are dispersed throughout the community.

So don't think of a program as a thing that I register for, pay a fee, and it meets for a certain duration.

A program can be a picnic table, making public comment at a city council meeting as a program.

So think of it as an opportunity that the city has chosen to make available to the public.

The Department of Justice won't give a ratio or a percentage of again playgrounds that have to be made accessible.

We always use a minimum of one of three as a starting point.

And then certainly as new construction occurs and new playgrounds are added, those have to be fully compliant.

Transition plan factors, these are just some of the things that other jurisdictions have considered, severity of the barrier, something is lacking, things that are low-hanging fruit, easy to do, like relocating a sign, for example.

We've seen a lot of jurisdictions pick high use sites as a higher priority than lower use sites.

Public spaces are usually a higher priority than employee spaces.

So we built that in based on the public comment into our transition plan as well.

Sorry, I have a question for you.

Can you go back to that screen?

Pardon?

Can you go back to that last screen?

Yes.

Sites with other protections.

Tell us about that.

Sites where there are protected flora and fauna or endangered species.

Those it's not an exception, but it allows you to, if meeting the technical requirements for access would danger would endanger the endangered species, then you don't have to do it.

I appreciate that.

I should go back here too.

There are some sites that are still not yet subject to a design standard.

And these are prominent within Avondale.

Trails most specifically is one of those.

So the Federal Government has not issued a final trail guideline.

We do use the pending trail guidance because you still have to make the program of trails accessible.

So even though the federal government hasn't finished the rulemaking in the recreation area, you're still obliged to make trails accessible.

The transition plan has to include four things an identification of every barrier, the method to make that site accessible, a schedule for the retrofit, and an indication of the person who is responsible for barrier removal.

The Department of Justice doesn't say that you have to include a cost, but we know no local government can create a plan like this without knowing the cost.

So we did provide cost references for planning purposes.

So our deliverables were a transition plan and a pivot table that sorts them for ease of review, a final report that goes into a little bit of detail about everything from the Department of Justice regulations to our process.

The community engagement survey final report.

So instead we suggest that you call it an access and inclusion solutions process.

It gets the same thing done, but it's a little more customer friendly.

So we gave you a sample of that as well as a sample service animal policy, which is, by the way, the single most frequently asked question at the Department of Justice.

What is a service animal and when can I tell it it can't be in the building and where does it have to be able to go?

Fiscal perspective, uh the first three phases are what we think the city, the department has to do, and that totals about just a shade under a million dollars.

We did include smart practices and then some issues that are not yet subject to a final enforceable standard like trails, and that brings your overall total to a shade over a million seven.

Strategies, I think what's been important for not just this city but other parks and recreation departments and other cities is to build and maintain relationships with the disability community.

It's not a monolith.

People who have Alzheimer's have very different interests than people who use a wheelchair.

They have very different interests than people who are blind or deaf.

So reaching out and developing a rapport with those groups is really important.

We also think certainly every year, budgeting and expending FUDs towards the transition plan is important.

There are a number of cities that have not done this.

This is just like a maintenance backlog if you want to think of it that way.

And they get a knock on the door from the Department of Justice and they wind up back in the settlement agreement.

So making this an annual part of what you do is important.

I think also, gosh, Avondale Parks and Recreation has done some great things.

Four awards at the Arizona Park and Recreation Conference this year.

So brag about your work.

Brag about what you're doing with regard to accessibility and inclusion.

You know, do it online, do it in print.

And exceed the minimum requirements.

I think I'll close there from a strategy perspective.

Doing just enough to get by.

That's not what I see as the Avondale way.

So don't do that with regard to accessibility either.

This is a first but important step.

It's consistent with your attention to disability issues in general.

Like I said, don't just do the minimum, do more than less and address the unfinished business that we've identified for you in the transition plan.

And do watch for other rulemaking.

There is other rulemaking underway regarding website accessibility, public right-of-way, and those will be important for you to be aware of and then take steps like this to make sure that you're in compliance.

I'll stop there.

If there are any questions, I know Brian can reach us whenever he wants, and certainly questions from you are welcome, and I'll answer them now or later.

Hey Brian, do you mind coming up?

For me, I I just have a couple questions.

One is did anything jump out at you when this report was finalized?

Uh mayor, vice mayor, council members, uh no, nothing substantial.

A lot of little things, as John alluded to, the things that can be fixed.

Some things will take a little bit more time, uh, but nothing major.

And the reason I ask that is a lot of times when I ask that question, not only here but in in my private life, um, it tells me how well my employee knows what's happening in their area.

So when they're surprised about a report that comes down, whether it's OSHA, whether it's something else, it's a surprise to them, and that gets me concerned.

You and I have talked about this before.

Corey, you and I have talked about this.

Um I think we're being proactive on this.

I think it's something that we have to do.

What is have you put together an implement implementation process yes for yet for this?

What are the priorities, or is that coming back to us at a later date?

Uh mayor, uh, we haven't prioritized everything yet.

John did prioritize everything in his report.

Um, to that end, uh, as he brought up, you know, this could take eight to ten years to implement all these strategies uh and repairs or corrections.

And uh we're kind of being aggressive with it.

We've actually, and we talked about this in our budget presentation.

I think we've budgeted uh $300,000 in our request for next year to kind of really get a jump on it.

And if we can do that each of the next six years, we can wrap this up pretty quickly.

It may take a little bit longer depending on funding availability, but um it's all things that we can uh we can tackle.

My last question, council, I don't want to take all your quick questions.

When we look at Donna Tella and we look at Citic Civic Center Library Park, that will be part of what we're trying to do with these ADA issues, correct?

Correct.

Okay.

Council, any comments?

Next.

Mayor, thank you so much, John, for the presentation, Brian, for the work and getting the project accomplished.

I think uh it's really important to know that uh the disability community is not a monolith, and so John, when you pointed that out, I think that's very important.

Um, but I I also want us to um kind of approach this in a way where we're looking at just I the I want us to do the low-hanging fruit as soon as possible.

The things that we can do that are low cost that are um putting stuff in place, that to me is so important and it it adds value.

One question I do have is how much how much public response did we receive?

How many people from the public attended any of the open houses or meetings that were hosted to kind of dig deep?

Uh Mayor, Vice Mayor, Councilmember, I know we had uh a few people in the public meeting, uh the the open house, or there wasn't a lot of attendance, but she decided she did represent seven families um that had uh accessibility issues.

I don't recall the number that we had from the online survey, but that was significantly more.

27, I think.

27.

So yeah.

So, Mayor, just as a reminder, we are going to uh wrap this up.

This was uh kind of a draft plan tonight.

We'll bring it back, the final plan back to you guys for adoption at a future meeting.

Appreciate that.

Okay.

Thank you, sir, for all your work on the project.

Thank you.

Thank you very much.

Ron?

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

Council.

Next up, we are going to be talking about our uh photo photo radar program, and I believe our police chief and our court administrator are here to present.

Good evening, Mayor, advisemary council, and happy new year.

Today, Abril and I will be provide providing you an update of the implementation of our photo radar program.

This item is for discussion only.

As you may recall, on May 2nd of 2022, you approved that recommendation to implement the photo radar program to mitigate speeding vehicles in our city.

However, due to supply and demand concerns, along with technical and logistical issues, we are just now getting ready to implement the program.

If I can remind you of what our program will consist of photo enforcement use as a camera system designed to capture and record speeding vehicles who are later cited via mail or by a process server.

The cost of this program is a flat fee of $5,250 per device per month, which is the equivalent to $63,000 per year per device.

If I can draw your attention to the photos that I have up there, to my left, we have what the devices will look like minus the decals, and I'll show you the decals here in one second.

In addition to that, the photo that you see to the right on the right side are signs that we will be required to post, and they are posted uh 300 feet prior to arriving to the location of the uh photo radar device.

Again, to the left, you have what the devices will look like, and these are the decals that will go on the devices.

At this time, Abra will cover the cost of the citations.

Good evening, Mayor, Vice Mayor, and respective council members, and happy new year as well.

Moving violations such as speed increase by five dollars from the last update provided due to a surcharge increase that went into effect December of 2022.

This slide shows a breakdown of a speed, not reasonable and prudent violation for going at least 10 to 15 miles per hour over the speed limit with a 255 dollar fine amount that would be paid on time.

This slide shows a breakdown of the diversion fee paid to the Abendel City Court for attending defensive driving school if the defendant is eligible to attend.

Approximately 15% of mood violations were resolved by attending defensive driving school last year.

And this last slide for courts shows a list of the current 79% state surcharges, flat fees, and possible additional fees assessed in the overall fine sanction amount.

Mayor, Vice Mayor, and Council, if I can emphasize the objective of Avindel's photo enforcement program, which is to discourage drivers from speeding.

In other words, if we place one of these devices at a problem location, and after a day or two or a week or so, we see that the number of citations is decreasing.

What that is telling us is that we are being effective in changing drivers' behavior, and that's exactly what we want.

That is our objective to discourage drivers from speeding.

With that being said, phase one of the implementation of the photo radar program will consist of uh social media and marketing campaign that will start tomorrow.

The campaign is designed to educate drivers on the dangers of speeding and the capabilities of photo radar.

Phase two of the implementation of the program will consist of education via warning citations.

And what I mean by that is that the devices will be strategically placed at problem locations.

However, instead of drivers being issued a citation, they will be issued a warning.

Phase two will start in April and will last a month.

For phase three of the uh of the program, we will go live.

And what I mean by that is that once again the devices will be uh placed uh strategically throughout throughout the city at problem locations.

However, at this point, the devices will start issuing actual citations.

We anticipate to go live sometime in May.

And at this point, Abril and I are here to answer any questions you might have of us.

Chief, I guess one of my questions would be in a brill thanks for being here.

Um you say strategic locations of the devices, will that be based off of officers' observations, complaints from residents?

How will that happen?

Mary, that's a great question.

On a regular basis, we get complaints from our residents.

So the first thing that we do is we assess those complaints by using our traffic unit.

Uh we have uh technologies that we place uh out on the the particular streets where people are complaining about the speeding vehicles.

We'll uh assess that uh data from those devices, and then we'll make the decision, we'll make the decision whether that we should put the uh photo radar devices there or not.

So one thing that's come up in the last probably two weeks, and Liz, this is something that I think I know you're aware of.

Um Senator Rogers out of I think out of Flagstaff Northern Arizona has uh proposed two bills this year.

One is the bill she runs every year to ban photo radar.

The other one is that she's gonna that she's looking to put directly to the to the voters.

Um I'd like to get kind of updates on that as we go forward.

If you can work with uh Memo and Abril and their teams.

You heard me say this in May of 2022.

One of the largest complaints that we get, the most complaints that we get from residents, one is noise and one is speeding.

Okay.

We were out on Saturday.

I know you were out on Saturday in the Crystal Gardens area, and there are people talking about speeding, and it was one of the number one things they talked about.

I I I think when we go, uh I think there has to be an understanding, and and this is me getting on my on my soapbox, so let me do it for a minute.

Driving is not a right, it's a privilege.

It's a privilege that is authorized by the state, which allows the cities to put into implementation uh parameters of that privilege, speed limits, um, local laws, and then penalties.

I've been driving for 40 42 years.

I've never had a speeding ticket, and there's a really good reason why I've never had one.

It's because I don't speed.

So as we get further in this, and I know we might get some complaints about us using this as a money generator.

The truth is you can avoid this cost by not speeding by following laws.

And we would expect that from all of our residents.

Secondly, if you look at the cost on this, the biggest cost of this is not the city of Avondale, it's the state of Arizona and all the fees that they assess on this.

So I want to make sure that that gets out there too if we start getting complaints, is because I think that we're not making money on this.

Our job here is to change behavior and make the streets safer.

If I look at 107th Avenue between Buckeye and Van Buren, if I look at Thomas Road between 107th and Avondale Boulevard, and then Avondale Boulevard from Thomas to McDowell, I'm guessing those are some of the biggest complaints in the biggest speeding areas we get.

We have to do something to correct that behavior before someone gets killed, and people have gotten killed, people have gotten hit.

So I'm all in favor of this.

I wish it would have happened sooner, but I understand the the issues with this.

Council, any comments on this?

Uh Councilmember Malone.

Thank you for the presentation.

Um you said that you guys are going to determine it by like um you're going to determine the sites of these locations for the camera or the photo radar based on um what was it, what was it that you were how were you gonna do that?

Uh uh Mayor and Vice Mayor, uh, Councilmember Malone.

One of the uh technologies that we use is let's say a resident calls us and tells us there's just one resident.

Hey, we uh have many speeding vehicles uh on our street, we uh deploy a covert box that captures data, vehicle data, it captures uh the number of vehicles, the speed, and different things.

Then we'll take that information, our traffic unit takes that information, they uh determine whether we do have a problem area, and then uh they'll devise a uh or they'll deploy um a strategy.

One of those strategies could be, depending on the level of uh uh of the problem, we could deploy a traffic officer, or in this case, we could deploy a uh photo radar unit.

Okay.

And when you say um it so it's like that survey, like when we do a traffic survey, is that like the thing?

I think in one of the areas that I I got received a complete was I think it was on Broadway.

So we did a uh survey, right?

So is it like the sticks that go at the bottom?

Is that what we're talking about?

Mayor, council, uh Vice Mayor, Council members, yes, it's it's the same kinds of devices, whether it's bias traffic unit or engineering department, depending on what we're looking at.

Do we know how many speeding tickets uh we process or we get our officers give on a monthly um basis?

Do you have that input?

Okay.

So um Vice Mayor, Mayor, Vice Mayor, and Councilmember Malone.

Um last year we had um about two thousand and twenty-seven moving violations.

That includes speeding, red light, unsafe lane change.

Um there was nine hundred and thirteen speeding violations and one thousand seven hundred and nineteen other civil traffic violations filed in fiscal year twenty two-23.

Okay.

And does it give us a specific area or just throughout the entire city?

And do we even track a specific area?

Um, we do not at the police department.

We do not track specific locations.

Uh we can't get those uh uh stats.

It would take us a little bit of time and uh, but we can get them if uh you have a particular area you want us to look into.

You don't have to do that.

Um but I appreciate the information.

I just wanted to just kind of see how how how much traffic uh I know we're as we grow and people um are driving out in our uh roadways and whatnot.

Um I just think this information is very helpful.

Thank you for the presentation, I appreciate it.

Thank you, Councilmember.

Curtis.

Chief, I just have one question about item number the third phase right there, issuing citations.

Is that gonna be mail, text, physical officer dropping off something?

How do you anticipate or how is what with the way of you know whether it's citations or later on, whatever it might be.

How is it gonna get from the machine?

Well, I know how it gets from how it gets to me at my house.

I don't speed either, okay.

Curtis, I would never assume that council member Nielsen.

What happens is that the device out will take your photo, take a photo of your uh plate, and we'll uh estimate your speed or calculate your speed.

That data is then transferred to the third party vendor, the third party vendor then will issue you a citation, and that citation is sent to you via mail.

I think one thing also we have to look at here is in doing speed enforcement for our officers.

And I know they're well trained.

Um I know they know it's part of their daily duty.

But the truth is our officers are much better, better much better resource when they're deployed in a very proactive means walking beats, meeting with residents, meeting with business owners instead of enforcing speed, and I think this helps us redeploy those officers ours into more productive.

We also have a blue card here tonight, and I don't she didn't want to ask to she didn't want to speak, but it's a one from Alamar, who I think has written us before and talks about the speeding along Broadway Road.

Can someone follow up with her?

And I don't know if she's listening to the uh the meeting tonight.

Can someone follow up with her?

And I'll give this back to Marcella and just let her know that this is what we have planning, this is what we're doing.

I think um Broadway Road between the raceway and Lower Buckeye is a incredibly dangerous area.

So um I think having that public information campaign is important for not only for us but for the residents, obviously.

Anyone else?

Let me go to Mike first and then Veronica.

And Councilwoman, yeah, Councilwoman White.

Um, just two things.

The first is um, and I know you just answered uh Councilman Nielsen's question in regards to the method on how they would receive notice.

Um, but what would be the difference between the mail and the process server?

And does that come later in uh after May where a process server would be utilized?

Vice Mayor Panetta, what it will happen is that that notice uh via email will go to the uh uh defendant.

If they don't answer back to uh to the courts, uh then a second notice will be sent after the second notice.

A process server will get involved and will attempt to uh serve that uh citation in person.

Thank you.

And I'm just I just appreciate the education and then on the social media post um, in addition to maybe something to that fact, uh I was not aware of the 300 feet uh distance, so I appreciate the number that you provided.

And again, is just as much education as our public can receive.

Um I think would would benefit all of them considering that I am a proponent of uh these speed radars uh not only for uh the safety of the other drivers, but more importantly, um just so that folks are aware that Avondale um doesn't tolerate you know being utilized as a as a racetrack.

And we hear that all the time, or at least I know I have a lot recently uh while being out in the community where um that's one of their biggest concerns, and so I think if we're gonna mitigate it, uh we just take you know all opportunities, and this is one.

So thank you for doing that, and I appreciate the education.

Thank you.

Veronica, let me go to Max first and then I'll give you the last word.

Thank you so much for the presentation.

Um Chief, I just wanted to know how many traffic officers do we have right now?

Ma'am, we currently have uh a total of uh six in a sergeant.

Those are the allocations that we have out of the six officer positions, we have four that are uh um in service.

How often do they take out their radar guns?

When they're on duty, they take them out on a daily basis.

Okay, yes.

And are other officers able to check out those uh radar guns to provide them backup support when we have higher volume concerns?

Councilmember White, uh yes, we do have extra uh radar guns available to our patrol staff at the beginning of their shift, they'll check them out uh via their sergeant, and they'll utilize some uh uh it is our expectation that they utilize them when they're not responding to calls for service.

And then um thank you so much.

Bro, thank you as well.

I had one additional question.

I know you said it, but I did not hear it.

What percentage of the folks who are cited in Avondale go to driving school again?

So approximately 15 percent of moving violations were resolved by attending defensive driving school last year?

About half of 15 or 50.

15 percent.

Fifteen.

Okay, thank you.

So the total of uh moving violations was uh 2,632.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Um you answered you asked one of my questions, and so did uh uh vice mayor.

But um on the photo radar, the sign is 300 feet, so that's like a law.

Is it by law that we have to put that there?

Uh Councilmember Malone, that is correct.

It's under state statute.

You are required to put at a minimum of two uh signs warning uh drivers that there's photo uh photo radar ahead of them.

Okay.

That was it.

Thank you.

Thank you again for the presentation.

Chief, thank you.

Abril, thank you.

Thank you.

Marcella, do you want to read the unscheduled?

Thank you, Mayor.

I have received one request to speak from Diane DiCarlo.

She does not want to speak, but rather me read the comments to council.

I will start the timer.

Um, but I'm sure I'll get through the comments.

And I quote, good evening.

I'd like to draw your attention to the needs of the Alamar Division.

Racing continues on Broadway near the new school and along Avondale Boulevard, especially during rush hour and after dark.

As well, speeding in the subdivision itself is a problem.

Mornings when the buses come through.

We do call some of these into the police, but the cars are mostly gone by the time we call.

Cars are racing by putting kids and the elderly at risk.

Request consideration of speed bumps in the subdivision and regular traffic patrols on Broadway and Avondale.

Thank you for considering our new neighborhood safety and security.

In quote.

Thank you, Mayor.

Thank you.

And I would ask that someone would get back with her.

Appreciate that.

Item number four is consent agenda.

We do have one item that has been removed by staff, and that is item 4M.

It will come back to us on January 22nd.

Can I get a motion on the is there anybody who would like something removed from consent agenda?

Seeing none, can I get a motion on the consent agenda, please?

I have a motion from Councilmember Solorio, a second from Councilmember Malone.

Any further discussion?

Vice Mayor is not absent.

Are you absent?

Okay.

Um those in favor, please vote.

Passes 7-0.

Thank you, Council.

Ron, item 5A, please.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor and Council.

Next up we um have a public hearing for annexation, Tolles and High School District, presented by Michelle, our senior planner of development services.

All right.

Uh thank you, Vice Mayor.

Uh Mayor and Council members.

Tonight I'm presenting item 5A, Tulison Union High School District Annexation Application PL 23-0266.

The purpose of this item is to conduct a public hearing on the proposed annexation of approximately 55 acres, generally located at the southeast corner of Alamar Boulevard and Dysart Road.

No action will be taken this evening, and the adoption of the annexation ordinance will be considered on February 5th.

So the site is outlined in red on the left.

It's located at the southeast corner of Dysart Road and Alamar Boulevard.

It's currently being used for farming.

In terms of the surrounding zoning districts and the land uses to the west of Dysart Road, there's some vacant land zoned the Three Rivers Ranch PAD, which is a planned future residential community.

And then to the north of Alamar Boulevard is land currently being used for farming, zoned Alamar PAD, and then to the west are single family homes under construction in the Alamar PD PAD, and to the south is also farmland within the Alamar PAD.

To give you some background, there is one property owner for the site, which is the Tullison Union High School District number 214.

No adjacent right of way is included in the request since it's already annexed into the city.

The site is zoned Rule 43 in the county, and it will be assigned the city equivalent zoning of R R 43 upon annexation.

No rezoning is requested, and the proposed use is a public high school, which is permitted in the RR 43 district, and we have not received any plans for review at this time.

The proposal does meet the state requirements for annexation.

And lastly, we did file a blank petition and all required notifications have been completed.

So this is the first of two public hearings.

The hearing will need to be opened hearing and any testimony testimony along with council discussion, and then the hearing will need to be closed.

And then as a reminder, no action is required tonight.

The second public hearing and consideration of the ordinance adoption will be on February 5th, and that concludes my presentation.

Well, just to be clear.

No, Mayor, they are not part of the public hearing.

So just continue as we would a normal public hearing.

Let me go ahead and open the public hearing.

Is there anybody in the audience or online who'd like to speak on this issue?

Mayor, I have not received any requests to speak.

Marcella, thank you.

Council.

That being said, I'm going to go and close the public hearing.

Thank you.

Thank you, Michelle.

Ron 5B, please.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

Next is a presentation by Andy, your director of human resources on amendments to the personnel policies and procedures, Chapter 18 discipline.

Good evening again, Mayor, Vice Mayor, and Council members.

The item before you is a proposed amendment to the city's Chapter 18 discipline policy that will afford all employees the opportunity to have a representative present during an administrative interview and/or a predisciplinary hearing.

To give context, the purpose of an administrative investigation is to impartially gather and compile relevant facts and evidence related to allegations of misconduct or other policy violations.

Ultimately, the investigation will be used to support a decision to take or not take disciplinary action.

A predisciplinary hearing is afforded to an employee once an investigation has concluded and a decision has been made to suspend an employee for 40 or more hours, demote or terminate an employee.

To ensure consistency across the city, the proposed addition of Section 5 representatives to Chapter 18 will provide the option for all employees to have a representative present during an administrative investigation and/or a predisciplinary hearing.

The option of having a representative present does not apply to counseling instruction, an informational verbal admonishment or other routine or unplanned uh contact with the supervisor or any other employee that occurs during the normal course of duty or during the preliminary inquiry stage to determine the scope of allegations.

Previous requests received by employees for a representative were denied as no policy existed allowing for representatives to be present.

Currently, only law enforcement officers and detention officers are provided this option under the Peace Officer Bill of Rights.

This request was brought forward during APFFA negotiations, and based on our evaluation, we felt that this option would be best considered as part of a chapter update that applied to all city employees.

So our counter proposal uh as part of our counter proposal, we committed to bringing this item forward for council consideration prior to finalizing the MOU with APFFA.

The role of a representative is to be present to observe, but will not participate in the interview.

Representatives may take notes during the interview, however, notes taken by a representative are not the official record of the interview and shall not be disclosed until the investigation at subsequent appeals have been completed and allegations have been resolved.

Lastly, representatives are prohibited from interrupting or hindering the interview, separately recording the interview, conducting their own investigation, and discussing the investigation with any unauthorized person except the person for whom they are functioning as a representative until the investigation has concluded.

In order to be eligible to serve as a representative, the individual must be an Avondale employee, not an attorney, who is not a material witness to the matters under investigation.

Unit members of an employee organization recognized by the city may choose to have their organization president or designee as their representative.

The individual must be available on reasonable notice, and they may attend interviews on duty so long as the operational needs of the department are not negatively impacted, and under no circumstances will there be any unauthorized overtime.

In summary, the proposed revision ensures consistency by providing all employees with the option of having a representative present during an administrative interview and/or a pre-disciplinary hearing.

Additionally, no employee may be subject to discipline or retaliation for requesting or serving as a representative as outlined in the proposed policy amendment.

Mayor, Vice Mayor, and Council, this concludes my presentation.

I'm happy to answer any questions you may have.

So, Andy, can you go back to the screen that shows the what the representative can and cannot do?

Yes.

So I guess I'm wondering.

Give us an example of what the representative would do then.

So if they can't be a material witness, uh let me give you an example.

An employee is accused of doing something wrong by another employee.

Their representative has knows that that's not the case, but they're not allowed to give testimony at that point.

What role does that representative then serve?

I'm just trying to figure out.

So assuming that the representative is in a uh a material witness in that particular instance, um, their role would be more of a support role for the individual.

So in in my experience, there's instances where somebody uh participating in administrative investigation could be very stressful for them and be something that they're unfamiliar with.

So having somebody present with them, being able to help provide that support.

I mean, if there was a break or something in that interview and they wanted to talk through some information with them, that's that's certainly permissible.

It just wouldn't be a situation where that representative would be able to share that information outside with other individuals uh during the course of the investigation or while uh it's it's under resolution.

So the employee, the representative must be an Avondale employee, correct?

The only potential problem that I see, and I'm fine with this policy change.

I am.

But I think there has to be some exclusion to which Avondal employee can be there.

You obviously couldn't have a council member be the representative.

I don't know if you could have a department head be a representative.

How far off the chain does this policy stop where that person can be a representative?

Uh mayor vice mayor, council member.

So we don't have any specifics outside of of it not being an attorney other than being an Avondale employee.

It would also be in in my um in my assessment, it would be that individual would feel uh appropriate to be uh a representative serving in that capacity.

So if an employee identified another individual that they wanted to be the representative, but that individual was uncomfortable or didn't feel as though their role would would really um be appropriate given their their position within the city, then they at that point would um indicate that you know they're Mr.

Mayor, uh if I can clarify a couple of things.

The uh witness has to volunteer very voluntarily join the process.

So they have to the uh employee being investigated or or spoken with has to ask the other person to be with them, and then they have to be willing to do it.

There is no restriction on who that employee is other than an attorney, and of course, we wouldn't recommend a uh city council member get in the middle of this process.

The the whole role of this is like he said is really just to be another set of ears to listen.

Um you know, when you get bad news or you're in stressful situations, you don't hear very well sometimes, and so it really provides that resource.

Any actual the reason a witness can't be involved is they're gonna be uh interviewed separately.

So you don't want them in the in the same room at this the same time.

And I'm not I'm not concerned about council.

I mean I I I guess I could see sometime in the future where someone may ask a council member.

I I don't know, which I think would Mr.

Mayor, if I can interrupt, uh the city attorney uh doesn't believe in this instance they would be considered employee, so they would not be allowed.

Okay.

Because undue, unfair, just the just the council member being there could skew.

But I also think a department head could skew.

I think if I'm using an example.

If if someone was in the process and they were friends with the department head, and that's not unheard of in a smaller city like the city of Abigail.

You have employees with our that golf that that hang out that do things with department heads, there's a relationship there.

I think it would be very hard for that department head to say to a friend or a colleague who they have a relationship, a friendship with, I can't represent you.

I think that puts them in a position that I wouldn't want to be put in.

But I also think having them be part of that representative process puts an undue influence on the other department that may be conducting the investigation.

It's your department that's going to be doing the investigation.

Imagine a department head from another department sitting in as a as a representative.

I I don't know, I don't know if I'm comfortable with that.

Mr.

Mayor, uh counsel, um trust the process.

Um our directors are are professionals and they'll be able to tell their friend yes or no.

Um if that for some reason um the the um department director felt comfortable sitting in there, I wouldn't want to tell that employee that that person couldn't do it.

It's up to the director to make his own life decision, his or her own life decisions.

And if that's what his friend wants and the director feels comfortable with it, um I I would uh allow it.

I I think we want to be very careful not to limit this.

For one, is we're trying to mimic the state laws, uh, state statues with um the uh officer bill rights.

And so we don't want to have two different standards for one group of employees and another.

It's very hard to where allowed or where I can to create the same set of rules for all of our employees.

It's easier for us to administer and to do.

So um I agree with your sentiments.

It would be very hard for a director maybe to be in there, but I don't think uh at this point we want to um get in the middle of that.

We'll let our directors and the uh employee um work that out.

They uh the employee uh directors need protecting sometimes, but this isn't one of those cases.

Council.

Max, I was hoping you're gonna raise your hand.

Thank you so much, Andy.

Thank you so much, Mayor.

Um I I appreciate uh this type of transition.

I um have uh is this contingent on whether the MOU will be approved?

So if this is not right.

So we uh uh mayor, vice mayor, council member white.

So our our um proposal to them was to bring this before council to include it in chapter update so that it was uh applicable to all uh employees, but it's not uh that was our that was our counterproposal that they that they agreed to um as part of that process.

So the MOU will be coming before council, I believe next meeting.

Okay.

Mr.

Mayor, Councilmember White, just to clarify, one of the reasons it's not an MOU in addition, is it's not negotiable.

So discipline process is not part of the MOU process.

So uh I my original proposal was just to put in an AP, you know, policy, and they were like, I don't think so.

And so we thought we would uh clean up the uh the discipline for the chapter council policy.

And um I'm I'm I am from private industry, and so normally having a witness is is um pretty standard, but we would normally source that from our HR department.

Um is it something that is that something a current practice that you have normally two people from your area if you're doing investigations already there?

Because I would hate for um you to be the sole man in the room for um HR and then they have two people in the room kind of staring at you if you're conducting an investigation.

What's that gonna look like?

I have no idea.

Yeah, so very uh mayor, vice mayor, council member white.

Yes, we currently have a at least uh two typically two investigators in the room at any given time to ensure that one can focus on you know asking the questions and and having that interaction with the individual, the other there to help take notes, make sure that we cover um all bases as far as the information that we're gathering, but that's our current practice.

I would hate for that witness to ever uh have to suffer discipline, but uh do we have good guardrails around the the prohibited activity for the witness?

Because I saw the list I think it's the next slide.

Um you have eligibility.

Um but I I think that people are people.

Um and if I got kind of called into something and somebody's like, hey, what's going on?

Well, you know you saw what happened the other day because they saw they were the witness and then they saw me go in.

Well, what kind of guardrails are you going to put up around this process?

Because this seems kind of light.

Right.

So uh mayor, vice mayor, council member white, we would anticipate implementing a form that the individual would be signing with that outlines what their responsibilities and prohibitions are as being a representative for that individual that they sign so they understand from that perspective it's it's a little more formalized and what those roles and responsibilities are, and then you know, if in the event that they were to breach that, then there's there's um an option for recourse or um follow-up to be had with that individual based upon what that infraction looks like.

Uh Curtis Yeah, I kind of look at this just slightly different uh only because not as a witness, but just somebody to be there.

In my previous life I've had to deal with teenagers, and uh they're kind of hype to talk and communicate with.

But they have, as I've talked with them and visited with them.

Can I bring my friend in here just so they can be with me?

And just with a friend there, they're able to talk and communicate, where just with me, they mumble and stumble and whatever else.

So I think it's more as just, you know, my buddy, my friend, somebody coming in there just not as a witness necessarily, but somebody as a support, and to see that their rights are taken care of.

I mean, you're not gonna jump on them and accuse them of that.

The other person says, no, wait a minute, the two of them right there were so I've seen it there with teenagers, young people, and then I mentioned earlier today that in my career as is in the mining industry.

Again, that gets back into unions and other such things, but there was always a union steward or somebody there just to listen as I was with that individual there.

So I see it more of a a help, a protection for you.

If you I mean if it's you and the and and the and the member of the staff, that truth may get skewed up around, whatever.

But if there's a third person in there, it now helps to validate what goes on.

Absolutely.

Thank you.

Thank you, Andy.

I appreciate that.

Uh council, can I get a motion?

Oh, sorry.

Mr.

Mayor, I just want to also clarify because I think it was alluded to, but I want to clarify.

Uh Andy, we record all of our interviews.

So the it's recorded in the room.

They can't bring a separate recorder in the witness, but but we record and transcribe when needed uh every uh interview.

So there's always a document of what happened.

Why can't we record?

No, we record, they can't.

Why can't they record?

I don't know the law.

It um to uh the um I'm not using the right word, the validity of the recording will will be more insured if we have the one agreed upon transcript.

I have a question then is um is uh person that's being um questioned, do they get a copy of that interview of the information that you guys recorded and whatnot?

How does that work?

Um mayor, vice mayor, council member.

I don't think I've had that request since I've been here.

However, typically it's something that would um once the interview is completed or that investigation is completed and then that it's part of a public record that then that individual can make a request for, whether it's the report, whether it's transcription or anything related to that.

So you uh you don't automatically give the copy to them.

I as an employee would have to go and do a public records request.

How um how long do we keep that on our records and how long can they request that?

What's the what's the time frame?

Uh mayor.

30 days.

Uh Councilmember Malone.

So uh essentially we would refer to our um Arizona Records retention schedule.

Okay.

I don't know what that is off the top of my mind.

No, no, I yeah, okay, I get that.

Thank you.

Appreciate it.

Can I get a motion on this item, please?

I have a motion from Councilmember Malone.

A second by Councilmember White.

Any further discussion?

Please vote.

Passes 7-0.

Thank you, Council.

Ron?

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor Council.

Next up, we have a presentation on the amending the city code chapter 25.

I don't have my glasses on procurement from our finance director.

Good evening, Mayor, Vice Mayor, and Council.

So I am here tonight to talk about amending the code, Chapter 25 for procurement.

The procurement code authorizes the city's procurement agent to procure contract for or an execute agreements within a certain dollar threshold.

So tonight we're here to propose some changes to those threshold limits to make the city more agile to actually make the procurement process a little bit more efficient for staff that procure goods and services.

So before we jump into the background, I want to make sure that we're all aware what these thresholds are impacting.

So in our code, um the threshold is set for the amount in which you would need to go through a formal procurement process as opposed to informal.

Informal meaning you can go get three competitive quotes and select your your vendors and move forward.

Versus with this threshold, which is currently set at 50,000, anything over that amount would require a formal solicitation, the advertisement, the panel, the selection, and adding those that time and resources to that process.

Through the budget process, we have an administrative award document that gets presented and approved with the process.

So as we go through some of these things later, we'll point out where it seems like maybe some of those things don't get done, but they do because they're packaged in with the budget process.

So going back and looking at Chapter 25, which was created in 1995, that limit that we're talking about was set at 10,000.

And then was increased in 2002 to 25,000, but quickly thereafter was doubled to 50 in 2006, and that is where we stand.

But you can see since 2006 to 2023 that inflation is increased by over 50 percent.

Um and so that kind of leads us um to where we are tonight where we feel that we could improve the procurement process.

And um in 2022, um a 31.5% of our formal procurements fell below that hundred thousand um dollar mark.

So with the proposed limits, our limit and our award authority, we are proposing to doubling the amount from 50,000 to 100,000.

Um so that entails um purchasing needing the formal solicitation, the signing of contracts by the procurement agent, the sole source approvals is also part of that.

And that all the purchases currently, over 50,000 do require um city council's approval.

You may say, wait, I don't see all of those things come through.

Well, you do because most of them are put through the budget process on that administrative award.

Um a change order limit.

Uh so that is currently set at 100,000.

We're proposing to increase that to 200,000 for change orders to contracts.

And then a JOC limit.

This is job order contracting for construction.

Um we currently follow the statute, which is at one million, but you will see off to the the left on this, we have some comparative agencies.

Um the state itself has increased their own JOC limit to um $2 million per their own policies, and that's kind of why we're here to do as well.

They did that back in um 2013.

Um the city of Tolison, City of Peoria, City of Buckeye have all increased those limits, and they did so in 2020, 2017, and 2022.

Um we did include good year being um next door.

They do still have a $50,000 limit and a one limit one million dollar limit on JOC.

However, they have an increased limit for their procurement agent to sign contracts, which is a little different than us.

That even though their um procurement threshold for a formal solicitation is 50,000, their procurement agent can sign up to, I believe $500,000, which ours right now is the same.

In addition to that, um our proposal is to change some language and move towards our administrative policy.

So in the code, it explicitly defines nominal value as $25 pertaining to the receipt of gifts and services from a prospective vendor.

However, if you look at city administrative policy, it states that we employees should always decline gifts regardless of the value.

So we are proposing to rather refer to administrative policy.

So that does conclude my presentation, and I will take any questions that you may have.

I think I I think I you referenced 2006.

I think that was one of the first things that I voted on as a as a council new council member.

And I remember the discussion being there, and it's exactly what you laid out.

It was the city being a little bit more nimble, a little bit more responsive as needed.

It's interesting that we've gone up 50% inflation rate in how many years?

2000 is right.

I'm okay with the change to 100,000.

I think that I think that makes sense.

I can't remember the last time we had any kind of issues in procurement.

Um our audits are always good.

We don't really have any, I don't have any concerns there.

The JOC I'd almost like to see that higher.

I I think that's being proactive.

Um JOC, we use it for um parks and rec a lot of times.

We have contracts with that.

I think it allows Joel, I'm looking over there, and there's times where utilize those to have a little bit more flexibility there.

And we have we have processes that help eliminate any kind of concerns that I have.

So uh three million dollars, I think is fine, but I'd like to I'm okay with it right now, but I think that makes sense.

But going to $100,000, I think is it makes sense for me also.

Council.

Any thoughts, any concerns?

That was a great presentation.

No one had any questions.

All right, thank you very much.

Yeah, we have to take a motion on that.

I have a motion from Councilmember Malone, a second from Vice Mayor.

Any further discussion?

Please vote.

Gloria is coming back now.

I think no?

Gloria, we need you.

7-0.

Thank you.

Does it still show you as absent?

Absolutely.

Um, it doesn't show like a present.

And now the one we've all been waiting for.

Ron, 5D, please.

Thank you.

I saw the wrong name, sorry.

We have a setting fees for short-term rentals and the aquatic center.

First, we're going to hear from uh Ron, before we get started, can we take a five-minute break?

You're in charge, you bet.

Okay, we're gonna take a we're gonna 715, which is five minutes mayor time.

Mayor math, okay?

That's fair.

Mayor math.

I didn't know what this meant.

Team anybody?

All right.

Are you ready?

I'm ready.

Let's go.

All right, good evening, Mayor, Vice Mayor, Council.

Um tonight's resolution modifying the city's fees and charges have two items associated with it.

So one is establishing the or modifying the fees or short short-term rental licenses, and the second would be establishing the fees for the aquatic center.

Um the short-term rental license program, um, there was an ordinance that was adopted by council on October 23rd, 2023, um, with a delayed effective date of February 1st.

So the proposed fees tonight um are in coordination with that ordinance and the uh applicable regulations within that ordinance.

Um staff looked at the what other municipalities around us were charging.

Additionally, there is state statute which um sets a maximum for what the city can charge for this, and we also looked at the cost of service for the um the program, which includes personnel equipment and software.

So with that, we are proposing to modify the current short-term license rental fee from $50 to $250, which is the max we can charge under the state statute.

And we are proposing to modify the short-term rental license renewal from $25 to $250, which is also the maximum under the state statute.

And this would have an effective date of February 1st.

So I will now hand it off to the parks team uh to present the aquatics interviews.

Before we go there, before we parks, appreciate the enthusiasm.

Anyone on council have any comments on this?

Veronica?

I just have a question.

Do we know how many short-term rentals we currently have?

I do not have that number off the top of my head.

I apologize.

Can we get that for council?

We we can we have an estimate.

Um I don't have it with me right now.

It is a ballpark.

Tell us what you think.

A thousand?

I don't want I don't want to.

I I don't remember.

I'm I really can do we have the number of things.

That's a no, that is.

Oh, here we go.

Awesome.

I I don't want to.

I because I could be so wrong.

Uh, your finance director has an answer.

Mayor, Vice Mayor.

Um, last time we checked that estimate, it was over 400.

So close to a thousand is what you're saying, Renee.

Can I go?

Can we go back to to that?

Sorry.

So um how how many how okay?

How often are they having to get a short-term rental license?

I'm sorry.

Are you every year?

Yes, it would be annually.

Okay, so when are you guys like sending a message out to them now, sending an email?

How how are we communicating that?

We're switching from $50 to $250.

Mr.

Mayor and Council, uh, Vice Mayor and Council, um, we're currently not charging.

This is a new program, it'll start February 1st.

So it's not a change to them.

That's just your regular business license fee, and so we're making a special fee for the short-term rentals.

So once we notify them, we actually, once this goes into effect, we only have 30 days to get them all registered.

I think it's 30 days.

We have a short amount of time to get them registered.

So we're waiting.

Um we're finishing the implementation of our new uh software program.

We're getting our ducks in a row.

Once we're ready to start uh processing their applications, we will begin we'll begin the process.

Okay, thank you.

And we've got lots of leniency built in there.

Thank you.

I'm just thankful we're doing this awesome move for the city.

Thank you.

Sure.

Cool.

All right.

Parks.

Good evening, Mayor, Vice Mayor, Council.

Um here to talk about fees and some operational updates.

So uh you'll be voting on fees, but we wanted to make sure that we're giving an operational updates as well for the aquatic center.

Um so the background, city staff recommends designating the Avondale Aquatic Center as an inclusive facility accessible to all.

However, a resident priority access system will be implemented.

Um, we're gonna do that in two sort of steps.

First would be an online priority access, so residents will have access to pre-reserve for daily admissions.

Uh we'll reserve a portion of our capacity of $550 for that pre-registration that'll be Avondale residents only.

They'll use our online registration system that's already implemented for our recreation programs to be able to do that.

That will open up a week before each one of those sessions and close 30 minutes prior to the start of that public swim session.

So then our staff would pull that list and would check those people in as they come in.

But essentially it would guarantee residents a spot at the pool that day.

So if I'm uh I'm a dad, I can come and say, hey, I want to take my kids to the pool on Thursday, I can sign them up as an Avondel resident.

I'm guaranteed to be able to walk in that pool even if there's at capacity for that day, they've reserved that spot for me.

The second level of priority access would be um for walk-up.

So if we're getting close to our capacity number as we're letting people in, we're gonna reserve a chunk of our total capacity for Avenue residents only, in which those people would need to show that they do live in Avondale and our residents of Avondale to be able to access the pool without having to wait in line.

And then we would monitor who's coming in and out and let people in as we have the ability and and there's capacity.

Um resident uh discount that's for programs only.

So public swim is just the three dollar entry admission for everybody, whether you know, notwithstanding residency.

However, residents will receive a discount off our program prices for swimming lessons, swim team, any of our programs that we offer at the facility.

Um that's not part of this fees that will be adopted tonight.

It's part of our recreation fees that have already been adopted.

It's a recreation program fee, and we'll be utilizing those fees that are already standardized across the recreation um division.

And then our age policy, um, there is no standardized law or rule or guideline for this, and so um we've taken that information from a bunch of our our local municipalities that are around us to develop something that we're comfortable with.

And so we're uh proposing that ages 11 and up are permitted to come to the facility by themselves.

Ages 10 and under must be accompanied by a responsible person age 15 or older.

And again, our the the model aquatic health code and our certifying body don't have recommendations on those.

15, that 15-year-old age group age is because we hire lifeguards at 15.

And so if we're requiring them to come in with somebody older, it doesn't necessarily make sense that we're putting 15-year-olds up in the stand to watch them as they come into the facility.

And then we'll go through our fees really quickly.

These fees, because it's a new facility and because we've not operated an aquatic center, many of these fees are based on market analysis and our anticipated costs.

However, we are gonna be have to be very nimble and agile with these.

Estimated revenues for these new fees are budgeted at 300,000 for the aquatic center.

So pool admission proposed fee is a range that gives us the ability to be nimble to be able to do some off-season changes in there as we turn on heaters.

But our anticipated P for fee for pool admission will be three dollars per person.

That's it regardless of age coming into the pool.

And it'll include a variety of programs, public swimming, lap swimming, drop-in fitness classes.

Uh lane rental, proposed fee from one to 30 with our $15 per hour per lane for our groups that come in and utilize the facilities.

So club swimming teams, club diving teams will use that fee to charge them.

Um we have some room fees for our multi-purpose rooms from five to 150, and that'll vary based on the event and the type of booking it is.

We'll have different party packages so that you can book it during public swim for a birthday party, but we'll also have the ability for swim teams to book it during times so that they can do dry land activities.

Uh a booking fee just as an administrative fee for our staff that have to book those reservations, and then the aquatic facility staffing fee.

And this is a fee is tied to how many lifeguards it will take to run whatever activity it is at the pool.

So if it's a pool reservation for a pool party, and we know that they're gonna book the entire facility, we know how many lifeguards that needs to take, and so there'll be a fee based on the number of lifeguards that it takes to staff that reservation.

Um and then aquatic merchandise is just the things that we have at the pool that we'll need to have, swim diapers, swim caps, those things to be able to provide that to people who are coming to the pool who may not have those things.

And then again, just our fees in comparison to some of the municipalities that are around us.

Our three dollar fee is pretty standard.

Um, however, we are proposing that $3 across the board.

And then these are fees, again, these will be program fees that aren't voted on for tonight.

Um, but these are part of our recreation program fees, but we just wanted to make sure that you guys understood what those were and whether they are in comparison to those other cities around us.

Um so this is the resident fee for summer swimming classes.

Um it's a 20% discount off the the fee that um a non-resident would pay.

And then we'll have a registration system priority access for our Avendale residents for these programs.

So they'll be able to pre-register before we open this up if we have additional space for anybody else.

So there'll be a two-week window where residents will be able to register before we open it up to anybody else.

And then same with our summer recreational swim teams.

Um, and again, a 20% discount, and they'll have the additional um benefit of being able to register early.

So here's all the fees that will be adopted for tonight, and that concludes my presentation.

If there's any questions, I'll answer them now.

I think we're gonna have some questions.

I'm sure you will.

So I kind of want to start and end the conversation.

Um, thank you to all this.

I uh starting a completely new facility, an aquatic center is not easy, and I know you've done this before, correct?

Um for us as a council, it's new.

It's exciting, it's what our community has asked for for decades.

Um I also want to take a moment and thank the council members and team who went to Goodyear and thank Goodyear staff for sharing all their information.

They opened up, they welcomed you with open arms, correct?

Um, and kind of went through the good and the bad, what what they've learned over their two years being open, three years?

They opened in 21, I believe.

And I had a conversation today with Councilmember Stip, who is great in Rosalva, who's the mayor's assistant, and got back information really helpful as we move forward.

But I kind of there's a couple questions here that I think we need to look at.

One are the rates, and and not the rates maybe that we see here because those have already been set.

But can we go back to the comparison of city rates?

For which one?

Uh for individual, just the three dollar one.

There we go.

So I I think there's I think there's a couple questions when it comes to rates.

One are one is are these rates reasonable?

Right?

Secondly, do we want to do a three-dollar rate across the board for resident and non-resident?

And I think that's one thing that we probably need to answer.

The other part of this discussion is with the aquatic center.

Well, we while we know that Avondale residents will have priority access.

That doesn't always guarantee that every resident will be able to use the pool depending on who's there.

So I I for me I want some assurances, but I'm leaning in a different direction.

But I want to have the discussion on the rates first.

So any council members have any questions or comments about the rates.

Let me go, let me go down the line because I think we're all gonna have it.

Max, so much.

Um I appreciate your presentation, all the work that's gone into this.

I'm just taking a look at the the rates, and I'm I'm you know, of the mindset that um our residents should as everything else in parks and rec has a discount for residents.

I think entries should have a discount for residents.

So if I'm looking at open swim, I'm thinking it's five dollars if you're coming off of the street and you don't live in Avondale because this should be generating revenue for us and for residents, yeah, it can be three dollars across the board.

I don't have a problem with that, but to me it doesn't make sense to open up something to the public that we were really hoping you know, and and paying for in our tax dollars, and then you know, giving the public the same benefit as the taxpayers here in the city of Avondale.

That's just my thought on the rates.

I have many more thoughts about other aspects.

Thank you, Mayor.

Curtis.

One of the things we did find out at Goodyear over there is that they had a limited time, they could only be in there for two hours.

This three dollar time here for Avondale, is that all day?

Is that for two hours?

How does that's for as long as they want to be the facility when we're open for those those public hours?

Okay.

And I think Dan, one other one just on cost, not on this particular one.

Somewhere talked about rental facilities that could be rented out.

What happens if PepsiCo or somebody else wanted to rent that whole place for a company party?

Is that available?

Is that so we will have rentals available after our public swim hours on on Saturdays and Sundays?

So we'll the pool closes, I believe, with scheduled to close at 6 o'clock on both those evenings, six or seven on both those evenings, and we'll have those times after those public swim hours that are available for the pool to be rented out for any of those sort of activities.

Thank you.

I guess just uh it's at Goodyear, even though they're paying, they get their three dollars or whatever good year is here, three dollars to get in, but after two hours essentially they have to leave.

Correct.

Three dollars would let it.

That's what I understand.

Until we found out a need to do something like they did.

Curtis, do you want to do a just because I want to make sure that we get all the information?

Do you want to do a standard three dollar rate across the board for resident and non-resident, or do you want to look at what council member white has I like what council member white had to say?

And since I like the other column over here because I look like one of those, can I get a 25% discount on seniors?

Sorry.

No, I like what we can put a visual in my head that I don't need.

You look like one.

Mr.

Mayor, if I can also add just for clarification, the information we're getting is very helpful.

And and but what you guys are approving is the ranges tonight, and then we'll take back this information received for the majority of council on how to actually set up specific rate.

Correct.

But want to give you some guidelines here and council and so far, very helpful.

Thank you.

Tina.

Thank you, Mayor.

Thank you for your presentation.

I I agree with council member white in regards to making sure that our residents have a special rate.

And people that aren't from Avondale, they should have to pay a little higher amount.

I agree with her.

Okay.

Varneca?

I'll go in favor of things that I'm in favor of uh schooling the non-resident to resident.

Mike?

So we're only gonna do on rates right now.

We'll get into the meat and potatoes here in a little bit.

Um I'm also gonna go with uh council member White in going on that tour.

I think it's essential when we're looking at their fees and such, while I understand that you know it's just you know, we're gonna try to make it accessible to everybody.

I think the residents, if anything, deserve an exclusive rate because they've been asking for this for years, since prior since being on council, and if we're going to tell everyone they can come, then they can come at a different rate, and we offer that exclusivity to our actual residents.

I agree.

I I'd like to have two rates.

It's no different than what any other club golf course, anything does.

If I'm a member of the Wigwam, I play pay a lower rate than someone who's walking in off the street.

Um at the Wigwam we used to sell um pool passes, so during summertime.

So a resident could use the pool, and we had water slides, not to the extent of what we're doing here, obviously.

But that rate for a pool pass was $35 a day for a family.

So it was either one person or like five people.

So while we're talking about rates here, I just want to keep that in the back of my everyone's mind that we talk about tourism, we talk about the sports center, 600,000 people a year.

I can see where maybe not to the extent you and I have discussed this.

If if I'm a if I'm a if I'm coming from the East Valley and my daughter has volleyball, but I have two younger kids.

Hey, Avondale has this incredible new aquatic center.

There for me at the sports center, we should offer a day pass for that for that for the aquatic center.

So if someone wants to drop their kids off, it's a revenue generator because the cost on this facility is going to be really high, folks, to operate it every year.

And there has to be the ability for us to recoup some of those operational costs.

We're not going to recoup every dollar of it, but there should be.

And that onus should be very minimal on the City of Avondale residents and should be higher on people outside of the city of Avondale.

So I'm okay with the $3 and the $5.

I think Ron, what you hear there without voting on it is just a consensus of where council wants to go.

Mr.

Mayor, I appreciate that.

We'll we'll look at that absolutely loud and clear, a higher rate.

Um whether it's five or higher or some some number in there, but but I'll let council know what we land on depending on.

I think our system is currently set up to give a 20% discount.

So the 3-5 doesn't exactly work, but we'll try to get to the five and and three is our our goal.

We just might take us a minute to finagle the uh system.

Veronica, did you have I saw you?

So I I guess I have a question about the system.

So if I go to Planet Fitness, and I have the membership that allows me to go to any planet fitness there is.

So if I go to a Planet Fitness, I find a facility, I click on it, say check in.

Usually I do it when I'm in the parking lot.

Or I'll do it from home.

The reason I do it from home is it'll tell me how busy that facility is.

So the one in Avondale, I know that at two o'clock in the afternoon, it's not gonna be that busy, but I know at 5 30 it's gonna be really busy, so I'm gonna time my day, my workout, depending on where that's at.

Does this system as our as those people make reservations and our staff at the aquatic center will check off that Mike Panetta and his three kids are here?

Will it change availability?

Will will it it'll open up more spaces, or how does that work?

I I guess what I'm trying to figure out is I'd like the system to be more proactive.

So residents and anybody else who's using it can click on it and go, man, that pool is really busy right now.

I don't want to take my kids there.

Or hey, it's pretty slow right now, let's go.

Does the system have the ability to do that?

Um I'm not a hundred percent sure, but I do not believe the system is that robust at this point.

It's there, you're talking two different systems.

One of them's uh like a class registration system we utilizing, and the other one just our daily entries are is a point of sale system.

Okay.

Um so in the past when I've done this, I implemented a similar system during COVID at one of our Chandler pools, um, and it was a manual process that we used to monitor and adjust those numbers and those those availabilities as needed.

And then um, you know, obviously we we communicated that when when patrons would would call in or any of those things.

Uh Mr.

Mayor, you gave us a goal, we'll work with IT to see.

I think it's actually a great idea.

They've got some they got some wiggle room here, right?

They have some space.

I mean how long in there for that part.

Oh, I guess another question that we have to decide is I can remember being a kid and Brian knows the park, Rocket Slide Park in Oklahoma, Illinois.

My mom would say go hang out at the pool all day.

So we'd go fishing in the morning, go home and change, and we would be at the pool when it opened at 10 o'clock in the morning until three or four o'clock in the afternoon.

I think I have a and I guess it's gonna depend on how busy this facility is going to be.

But I think there has to be the maybe not now because we don't know, but I think there has to be the option for for us to put a time limit on how long you can be at the facility.

The aquatic center is not a babysitting center.

It's not.

It's an amenity for our residents and possibly a tourism generator for funds.

But it's not up to the staff that's gonna be there, your staff that's gonna be there to worry about kids running around who have been there all day.

That's not what it's there for.

So is council open to having a backup plan that says, okay, right now we'll do open swim all day long, but if we need to, we restrict it to two hours during busy seasons?

Mr.

Mayor, um if you just let's uh see how the operations work out, because we have other breaks in there as well, lap swimming, we have other issues, we might have staffing issues, and so um we also don't have the number of hours that were open evenly divided always.

So let us um work that through.

Um but that is one of the options we're ready to do is to go to a limited amount of time if um our his capacity.

Because I really see at 550 it turning over at least twice during the day.

So my guess is we'll be able to get about 11 to 1200 uh people in the pool on a super busy uh weekend.

Next.

Are we off of rates?

Are we talking about it?

Fran has his direction.

Thank you, sir.

So thank you so much.

I just uh uh can you go back to the slide where it talks about um the age limits and and how they can so um with the age policy, I think we need a swim policy.

If if there is a person at the aquatic center who is not able to swim, and I'm not sure if we're gonna do swim tests, or maybe have a wristband system, they should have to have an adult within 25 feet of them.

I was just looking over some of our prior um water bills, and I noticed that um the fire department had put out the flyers and they do it normally once a year, or you know, um, you know, watch kids around water.

Um that's not gonna be your job.

And so if we're having kind of a loose policy around this, I'm very, very concerned.

We need to make sure if a child is there at 11 years old that they are a swimmer, because if they are not a swimmer age 11 below, we need your parents to be within 25 feet of you.

We are not your babysitters.

So I think that that is a big concern for me.

I don't see any policies that speak to people who are capable of swimming, and that is something that we must speak to because we do not that is not gonna be on our hands.

And so I think that that's something that we want to be proactive as we look at this process, and I saw nothing written about that in this whole presentation.

So if if we have non-swimmers at the pool, I need an adult supervising them.

That is not our lifeguard's duties.

Okay.

So and and that's very, very important for me.

And we will we will be risk bending non-swimmers and implementing a swim test.

Yeah, and those would be operational policies that wouldn't come back to to council.

Um he's probably done it a million different ways at the pools he's operated.

And remember the um play area is a shallower area, um, so most of them hopefully will be able to stand.

Um in one of the pools I uh was at, you had to um to be able to use the actual pool, you had to be able to swim across it.

Um so it kind of there's different things that they'll come up with uh operational to make sure that um we're safe.

And I would ask as we get further along, we're looking at with in a soft opening sometime in April to train your staff and kind of go through procedures.

I would ask between now and then that as we learn as you learn things, because again, this is a new facility for council, that you just kind of update us.

And it doesn't have to be this formal, it can be just hey, this is what's happening, and we go from there because I think it'll help alleviate some of the concerns.

Because Max, I had the same question when you said 11 years old.

What is 11 year olds sometimes 11 year olds know how to swim, sometimes they don't.

Mr.

Mayor, one of the neighboring cities, uh, their age I think we figured out was eight today.

So uh at our age uh 11, we're actually on the higher end.

Oh, Councilmember Condi was at the meeting.

She she all switching when we were talking about this.

I I I just can't because I know I have a nine-year-old at home and I could not even fathom leaving her somewhere for three hours or four hours.

And she's a swimmer, but first of all, unsupervised, but that's just me.

But I'm I agree with um Councilmember White wholeheartedly.

Like I just want to make sure I know that we're that they're being that we're safe, that we're we're being wise.

I know that you've had experience, and so we're depending on that.

But I just also want to make sure that if we implement something and we do see, hey, we need to we need to make changes that we're able to pivot and make those adjustments necessary for the safety of our community, our residents, our children.

But I also think for us, because we are engaging with the community all the time, and we get questions all the time.

I've probably gotten more questions about the aquatic center in the last six months than I have about pretty much anything else in the last five years.

Hopefully you're recruiting them as lifeguards.

Correct, recruiting lifeguards.

Well, I told them the pool is gonna be heated to 92 degrees every day, and I found out today that it's not, so I'm disappointed.

No, kidding.

Um, but we want to be able to answer questions accurately and say these are the rules, especially for swimmers and non-swimmers, and these kind of what we're doing.

Because I don't want to build up people's expectations, and again, it's not a babysitting service.

So let's move on from that.

That answers your question.

Yeah.

I know you said uh 11 years old for age.

Um how did we come about that?

Because I looked at like Phoenix guidelines, and it's 13.

If it's two, if eleven years old, you can be by yourself, but I also think in my mind, maybe like much like you said, the eight-year-old question.

An 11-year-old child can't be at home by themselves.

So why not like 13?

Yeah.

Yeah.

My daughters were home.

Yeah, my daughters are home for a little bit at their for maybe an hour at a time.

It's not even a policy.

Like a latch key kid can go home at five, five years old, six years old.

It happens.

So we took, again, we took some of the information from our surrounding municipalities where we have ones that are very, very young.

There's some that don't even have a necessarily uh a policy that they're implementing, and then we have some that are young, and we have some that are a little bit older.

Um, and then based on our experience how we've managed pools in the past.

I've been doing this for almost 20 years, and my coordinator has been doing this for 10 years, and so we use that experience to say, you know, hey, where are we going to be comfortable in being able to try and enforce some of these rules?

We want to make sure that we're being accessible for everybody for those residents that that know it's not a babysitting service, but we want them to be able to access the facility.

Um we wanted to pick something that we felt was reasonable, but that we can also enforce when we do have issues.

And so we're not just saying they're gonna come into the pool.

If they're coming in the pool and we're having issues with them, obviously we're gonna address those those things when we're doing it.

Um and to address Councilmember Condi's um concern as well.

We we're building everything in in our operations to be nimble because we just don't know what the impact of this facility opening is gonna be.

Everything we're doing is trying to be very, very nimble, and we're expecting that we're gonna have to go in and change things on the fairly regular.

We're not setting really anything in stone so that we can make those adjustments so that we can be operationally nimble.

I think that's and and I appreciate you your feedback because again, we're relying on your expertise and your team's expertise as we go forward.

Um I think the next thing I think we need probably need to talk about is resident versus non-resident, and I know that's not part of this policy discussion.

It was rates tonight, but I think it's important for you to hear from council on how we feel and kind of what we've heard from other communities.

So I kind of want to go down.

Does every council member have a comment on this?

I just have a question or a comment on the swim um the 11-year-old age and the swim test.

And I don't want to pound it through the ground, but the swim hours, you say open swims like six to or six o'clock or seven o'clock in the evening.

Is that for Saturday, Sundays or it's it varies?

We'll have open swim every single day during the summer.

So we'll be open seven days a week.

It'll vary.

We'll have some programming in the morning.

It'll be lessons and swim team, and then we'll open in the early afternoon.

I want to say it's noon or one, and then we'll go until I believe it's five o'clock, we'll have some swimming lessons, and then on a few days we'll open up again in the evening, so we'll have a nighttime swim as well.

Okay.

So there's a variety of hours, but most of the public some hours are during that heat of the day that that 12 to 6, 7 o'clock, and then we'll have a few nighttime swims that go till 9.

Okay.

Um that answers my question because I just feel like a lot of the times we do a lot of programming, we forget our tweens that have nothing.

They always say we there's nothing to do, right?

So allowing the aft the evening hours would be helpful.

And and mayor, vice mayor counsel, that's one of the things that I implemented in Chandler's.

We had a few pools that did nighttime swims, and those tweens, and that was very, very popular with those with those age groups, and we were able to facilitate that during some of our night swim hours.

Thank you.

I appreciate that.

So let me give you my thoughts on resident, non-resident, and we go from there.

When we and I and the in the I guess the easiest one to for us to compare it to is Goodyear.

It's the newest one.

It's the one that we've toured, it's the one that we've had discussions with.

Um they opened up, they opened up for everyone.

And for the first couple days, they were inundated beyond capacity.

Now those numbers get skewed a little bit because they were beyond capacity because if you look at their facility, it's not just an aquatic center, it's also a recreation facility that has pickleball, I believe it has pickleball courts, it has softball, it has an indoor recreation facility, it has all those things that go along with that.

So they were throwing out numbers like 2,000 people a day, but that's for the entire facility.

But they quickly pivoted to residents only.

And as part of their policy, and I know you're aware of this, it's part of their policy.

A resident can bring a non-resident, but that non-resident has to go with the resident.

When they sign up, they have to, they can't go by themselves.

To this day, two years later, it's still resident only.

I know we want to be inclusive.

And I know we say to people who are non-residents, come to our Kid Fest, come to our winter fest.

It's open to everything.

It's open to everyone.

We don't really have a capacity limit.

If you look at what we did for Christmas, we had people from all over.

I'm guessing over the West Valley and maybe from over the valley.

And what were those numbers in the thousands?

5,000?

A little bit more?

Not a capacity level.

In this pool, our capacity level is 500 to 550, correct?

Correct.

We have no idea how well this facility is going to be accepted by the residents.

We assume it's going to be accepted.

We assume they're going to be excited.

We assume that they're going to embrace it and be there all the time.

That's why we're building it with their tax dollars.

For me, I don't want to stop non-residents from coming here, but I think for me, for the first we're going to open up in May, middle of May, you think for residents?

Our grand opening will be over Memorial Day weekend.

For the end of May.

Correct.

So I think it makes sense for us.

In hospitality, we do soft openings, whether it's a restaurant, whether it's a hotel, we do a soft opening.

We allow, we limit the number of people who come in, we allow our staffs to learn, to make mistakes, to pivot to adjust to get used to what's happening.

For me, I think I'd really like to see a 60-day where it's residents only.

And after 30 days, if staff goes, you know what, we're just not getting the level of people coming in that we thought, then we can open it up to non-residents.

I think for me, I'm very comfortable with that.

I don't want to go through what Goodyear went through, and I'm not blaming good year.

It's in it's a great problem to have.

I'm very comfortable with a 60-day residence only, and then let's see how it goes, and then allow staff to pivot and say, you know what, 30 days we're we're good, we can handle what's coming in.

I don't know how council feels about that, but I want to kind of get some input there.

And again, this is a this is a rate discussion, but council should be.

Yeah, Mr.

Mayor, I just want to clarify though that uh first couple days, that was upon advertising two weeks of free swim to everybody.

Um we do not plan to offer to kick off with uh free swims.

Um we we begin we will kick off with our programming.

We'll begin with our open swim, we'll begin with um charging, we'll from day one operate it like we plan to operate it all year long.

So that also made a big difference from what I've been told by the Goodyear staff.

So does council have any input on the resident non-resident, or do you want to keep it for what you see right here?

Max.

I agree with you.

Okay, Curtis.

Again, you're talking just a sh a short time period, 30 days or something.

60 days.

60 days and allow allow staff.

It could be after two weeks, staff goes, we got this, we're good.

We don't anticipate any issues with this, allow them to do what they need to do.

They're the experts in this.

I just don't want to run into the same issues and talking with Goodyear over and over about this.

This was a huge issue for them, and it took up a lot of councils time and a lot of staff's time, and I don't want to have that happen.

I just want them to have the flexibility to see what they need to do.

Understood.

But if if if if if it can be done in 60 days, fine, I don't want that as a hard number.

Agreed.

If it's done in two weeks like you suggest, I think that's fine.

You're talking about June, July, if it's 60 days, that's you know, hotest part of the summer, that would be the time.

And if it's not full, they need to see because you're gonna have the lifeguards out there, and if you've got 15 lifeguards, how many 60 lifeguards, whatever they are, watching over a hundred people?

That's not effective.

Ron?

Any comments?

No, Mr.

Mayor, other than um 60 days is two thirds of our swim program.

Uh it's pretty excessive.

Um if we don't have things figured out in the first few days, first few weeks, then we don't know what we're doing.

Um so again, with the direction that I'm hearing so far is to to uh possibly start out as a um dry run for employ uh residents only, but be ready to open it up if need be.

Agreed.

Council, are you okay with a 30-day because if we're 60 days in, and and I understand.

After after 30 days, you're gonna be able to figure out kind of where you're at.

Is council fine with 30 days, Tina?

Well, we're gonna open it up to pre-registration before, right?

Correct.

A couple weeks before.

Um I'm okay.

I'm I'm okay because again, we're this is so new to us, like, but I I'm glad that we're able to pivot and make some changes and adjustments.

And I'm just curious to see how many people we do get set up before opening day.

So I think that's gonna for me gonna kind of deter, determine do we do it for 30 days, two weeks, at resident only, what that looks like.

Um but I'm okay with doing resident only for a short time.

30 days?

And then opening it up to residents because I want to make sure the people that have been waiting all this time for their pool have access to their pool.

I'm also curious as to how many people will use the online system as just opposed to showing up, which is always it's the same thing with restaurants.

Make a reservation and guarantee you have a table, but let me show up at Friday on at 7:30 p.m.

and try and get a table.

I think that's what we just we don't know.

That's the unknown factor.

Veronica?

And please counsel the in my experience we're implementing a similar system in Chandler during COVID, is it was very popular in the beginning, and then as people were understanding what the daily capacities were and if they needed to do it or not to be able to show up at the pool, the usage started to wear down.

But we will implement it to start just so that people have that option to say, I know I can go to the pool on this day, and then we'll see and adjust and ba based on its usage.

Ronica, are you okay with 30 days?

I'm okay with 30 days.

Um I do have a question though.

How uh how are we doing the marketing and um are we doing I know we'll probably do social media marketing?

Um what other uh forms of marketing are we doing um to make sure that they can one make a reservation, um have access to it.

Is it gonna be in on internet?

Is it gonna be on their um what is it, their water bill or something like that?

Um we have been utilizing, we'll be utilizing our social media channels.

Um right now we're getting ready to launch uh in our water bill, some lifeguarding recruitment, that's obviously our priority right now.

But then once we pivot from lifeguard recruitment, we'll pivot to pool opening once we finalize some of these details and the the mechanics of of how to do that.

So we already have a database where we've had a bunch of um our residents um who've already signed up for um programs so we can probably have their email target them out and that's probably what you guys are going to do right we have our we have our registration system in addition to our newsletters and and whatnot.

So we'll be utilizing all those methods and and and forms of communication to reach out to the residents.

Do we know how many um do we know how many people are utilizing the programs or what what does that look like?

How many um residents do we have that are using the programs that we have data on.

Do we have any of that Brian Corey Mayor, Vice Mayor, Councilmember we have I think data on at least thirty five hundred participants from the past fiscal year.

So yeah we have we have quite a bit of information whether it's soccer or whatever type of programming we do advanced classes things.

So yeah we have a a pretty robust database of again people who've participated already so we'll we'll utilize that and then use some different methods to attract people who haven't participated in our programs yet.

But we're going to hit everybody because we've got all age limits inside this database right?

Right.

Okay.

Perfect.

Thank you.

Like 30 days good for you?

30 days is good for me but I'm also confident in uh leadership here that they will be able to direct and guide us through uh the opening whether it be 30 days, two weeks, what have you again our residents are a priority but um I also am confident in in leadership here that will uh guide us through what we need whether it's less than 30 days or 30 days.

So I look forward to to the reports.

Gloria I'm I'm totally in agreement with Councilmember White and you the 30 days sounds like it's a doable I know after um initially seeing that and having questions and going to do the tour and hearing from them one of the biggest things that stood out to me is let's not we have the time and we have the ability to not create the same mistakes to learn from other people's mistakes and that was my biggest thing before any of the you know when this discussion first came up not in the lack of confidence in leadership but in the fact that we blatantly see things through other people and where the mistakes if not mistakes I would say where the ability to open it up to everybody because who wouldn't want to do that for everybody but then the demand exceeding you know their ability to handle that.

I think 30 days is plenty of time you know I'm pretty sure that you guys are going to be equipped and ready to go with your systems and such but I think as a Avondale resident for almost 20 years and this popping up on social media when are we going to get a pool like when Goodyear got a pool how nice would it be for you to say you guys ask for it this is for you for the first now I would like to see marketing collateral not only that the sp you know pool is opening but that it's exclusively going to be for residents for those 30 days to kind of get them up there.

Not like it's open.

But that way you know say it is open and the non-resident says gets here oh you know I'm here to swim or whatever well you know it will be open for you guys in the future.

So it would be nice to have that collateral created so that they know that for the first 30 days it is specifically for residents and they also know like you know they're making it for us right now.

We appreciate that but in the future it's going to be open for everybody.

So I do think there does need to be some type of big marketing effort behind that because people have been asking for this for decades.

My last thing I would ask is that Goodyear um allows allow Goodyear gives um allows their employees to use the pool they get an access they get access to it for all Goodyear employees.

I'd like to find out how many good year employees avail themselves of that and see if it makes sense for us to do it for Avondel residents.

Torah nothing against you but I can't picture you from Gilbert or Queen Creek, whatever East Valley city you live in, with your wife and your and your new baby coming out to the Avondale Aquatic center to go swimming.

But I think there's res there's employees who may utilize the pool with their families.

We saw a lot of firefighters here tonight with young families.

They may not live in Avondale we have lifeguards.

Ron you and I talked about that today and that was a great point that you brought up there's there's employees that will work at the aquatic center that may not be able to use it but let's see what's available for us that to allow them to do that as as as an additional perk.

And I'd like to see how many people how many employees from Goodyear utilize that.

Mr.

Mayor we can look that up but um that'll be in our administrative uh process on figuring out how we and who we allow because it's not just the employees it would be their families uh probably that we would allow in day one I think of one of my employees who lives in Tullison and they don't have an aquatic center yet.

They don't have something as beautiful as ours yet I know they're working on one.

And I would imagine that if she wanted to come to the pool and bring her family on a day off we would absolutely let that happen.

Um I appreciate council's direction, um, prioritizing um city residents, uh being flexible to to respond.

Do you need anything else from us?

I do not, Mr.

Mayor.

We're excited, you can tell.

Thank you very much for everything that you've done.

We're very excited, Mayor and Council, and we appreciate the opportunity to open this pool for you guys.

Are we naming the bacon something?

Are we naming the awning something?

It is early as the wave.

We need to have stuff like that.

We need to have a I interrupted you, Mr.

Mayor.

What's the name?

The wave.

The the wave.

No, so discussion came up between Nicole, Ron, and myself.

The this discussion was on rates only.

So how are we doing the nodes?

How do you want us to word that, Nicole?

Because we're not talking about accessibility to it, but we're talking about the rates have been changed as what was proposed.

Mr.

Mayor, Council, nothing has changed as far as what you're approving, because you're approving the ranges.

The rest will be done administratively by by my office or my designee.

Okay.

Can I get a motion on this item then, please?

Just for an example, you're approving the rate for the pool admission in a range from zero to fifteen dollars.

Okay.

So it allows staff the flexibility to implement what you just discussed.

Do you want us to verbalize that?

No, if you just can um adopt the resolution 1011 012.

Max, do you mind just for the just for the record, just reading uh 5D as part of your motion?

Uh 5D motion to adopt resolution 101124, setting fees for short-term rentals and the aquatic center and authorize the mayor and or city manager, city attorney, and city clerk to execute the necessary documents.

I have a motion from Councilmember White, a second from Councilmember Nielsen.

Any further discussion?

Seeing none, please vote.

Mike, you voted.

It's good to know.

Passes 7-0.

Um any updates from council item number six.

Any updates from council on any current events?

I do.

I just wanted to thank Kirk and his team for um I went out one morning um early in the morning with your team.

Great great group of guys.

I learned a ton, and um they just kind of went around the city and they do an awesome job.

So thank you and tell them thank you as well.

Perfect.

That's awesome.

Um is along the similar vein.

PD and FIRE worked their asses off on New Year's Eve.

There was a lot happening in this city.

Um I know it's one of the most stressful nights of the year for both departments, both agencies.

And I just we don't get a chance to tell individual firefighters, individual police officers, thank you.

But Chiefs, will you let your teams know how much we appreciate everything that they did?

It was a we were out with friends and um their son was at Phoenix Raceway for the concert, and then I got the notification that someone was hit and they were panicking for a little bit because they couldn't get a hold of their son.

They're able to get a hold of them.

But yeah, just a lot of things happening that night.

But just appreciate, I mean that the teams do.

Any further?

Seeing none, can I get a motion to adjourn?

Somewhere.

I have a motion from Councilmember Condi, a second from Councilmember Solario.

Please vote.

Sorry, I messed up.

We're fine.

It was Condi and then Solario.

Correct.

Okay, try it again.

Sorry about that.

Thank you.

Passes 70.

Mike, do you want to know the score of the game?

No.

Okay.

We are adjourned.