The Avondale City Council held a special meeting followed by a regular meeting on May 15, 2023. The special meeting featured introductions of new employees and recognitions, including a heartwarming reunion between a fire crew and a child they saved. The regular meeting included a public comment on infrastructure issues, approval of a minor general plan amendment and rezone for Live Communities Avondale, a wage amendment for the firefighters' union, and an update on multiple park development and improvement projects. All votes were unanimous.
Note on date discrepancy: The raw transcript indicates the meeting took place on May 15, 2023, while the instruction provided a date of 2025-10-22. This summary uses the date from the transcript.
Note: The meeting date per transcript is May 15, 2023; the instruction provided a date of 2025-10-22. This summary uses the transcript date for accuracy.
Whoa, quiet. Okay, I'd like to call to order the special council meeting of May 15th, 2023. Margaret, can you please do roll call? Councilmember Condi. Councilmember Malone. Councilmember Nielsen. Councilmember Solario. Councilmember White. Here. Vice Mayor Pineta. Here. And Mayor Weiss. Here. Thank you. Ron Item two, please. Thank you, Mr. Vice Mayor. Uh, first up is uh Larry Rooney, our fire chief, making a presentation uh introducing two employees. Chief. Thank you. Mayor and Council, it's my pro pleasure and privilege to introduce you to the two newest uh paramedics for the Avondale Fire and Medical. Um first is uh Brendan Weiss, which is no relationship to the mayor. Um and the annex is Jose Guzman Alvarez. And uh I just wanted to show you because it they were in a program for about a year, and uh uh along with doing their own jobs and everything else and taking care of their families. And uh they uh not only did well, uh Brendan here got the uh paramedic of the class. He came out on top. So uh wanted to introduce him to you and and just uh um say thank you to your time and and uh we appreciate it. Thank you pretty much. Is there is there anything they'd like to add? This is the this is the time where I say you can feel free to ask them any questions. Well, first and for first and foremost, as Chief Werner mentioned, uh aside from your daily uh position uh and the busy lives that you hold, the fact that you're out getting additional education uh to help you with your uh position uh says a lot. And so is there anything that you want to add into what you've learned or uh something that you've taken a little nugget you took away from the training. No that makes it really easy. All right, well, I appreciate you all being here tonight. Thank you so much. Uh Mr. Vice Mayor, next up we have uh Corey Lariva. I probably get that wrong every time. He's our assistant director of Parks Rec introducing one of their new employees. You did great on the last name. Uh good evening, Vice Mayor, members of the council. Tonight we are Brian and I are excited to introduce Mark Foote. Uh Mark joins our team with an extensive recreation aquatics and project management background. He has worked for the cities of Chandler and the City of Mesa. He holds his bachelor's degree in Parks Recreation Management from ASU and his MBA from GCU. He is the first member of Avondale's Aquatics Division and will be serving as the leader as our aquatics supervisor. Uh so with that excitement, uh Mark is also a data home to four kiddos to include three daughters and one son. So and the opportunity to asking questions. Let's let's use it. Sure.