Are you able to hear me?

It's 5 15 on November 25th, and this will be the Board of City Commissioners meeting in a moment.

But before we start, we'll have Chaplain Collis come forward if he can lead us in prayer and the Pledge of Allegiance, please.

On behalf of behalf of Crisis Care Chaplaincy.

There we go.

On behalf of Crisis Care Chaplaincy for Bismarck Burley County, thank you for the opportunity to open the commission with a prayer.

Would you stand with me as you are able and remain standing for the Pledge of Allegiance, please?

Heavenly Father, thank you for this day and for this evening.

Thank you for granting safety to each one gathered here as this winter season presents challenges to our travels.

And as many will be gathering with family and friends this Thanksgiving week.

We covet your grace for those traveling.

We are reminded during this week of Thanksgiving just how much we have to be thankful for in this state and nation.

Thank you for the freedoms we enjoy.

Thank you for your ever-present love for us, and thank you for family and friends and the opportunities to serve you and each other right here where we live.

Thank you for the privilege of being part of this city of Bismarck for the many blessings and opportunities that this local community offers for those of us who live here.

I pray for those who are in the offices that govern this community, and I ask that your spirit would guide as they make decisions and plans for the benefit of the community.

Thank you too for the freedom citizens have to speak up and be heard and be involved, and for the ideas brought forth.

Please protect them and their line of duty so they might protect those of us who have placed our trust in them.

So, Father God, we trust in your love and guidance for everything said and done this evening.

I am thankful for each and every one of these blessings.

In Jesus' name I pray.

Amen.

Thank you, sir.

Yes.

If we can call the meeting order, please call roll.

Commissioner Risch?

Here.

Commissioner Zenker?

Here.

Commissioner Connolly?

Here.

Commissioner Cleary.

Here.

Mayor Smith.

Here.

First item.

Um we have a proclamation and an award of a certificate of achievement.

And I don't know how much if she even knows, but uh it's a bit of a surprise.

That's why it wasn't announced.

Sister Kathleen.

Today we're going to award you a certificate of achievement from the City of Bismarck.

So it's my honor and privilege to award our second certificate of achievement this evening.

The particular recognition comes with a special twist as it was a surprise, I believe.

Um so sister, we hope you will forgive us for being a little bit sneaky, uh, along with all those who uh suggested you who were also a little sneaky tonight.

We're recognizing you for your extraordinary leadership and the unwavering compassion through your work with Ministry on the Margins.

This ministry was born from Sister Kathleen's deep understanding of the challenges faced by individuals preparing to re-enter society after incaration incarceration.

She saw the gaps, those critical spaces where people fall through.

She stepped in to fill them.

The spirit of responsiveness and care has defined her work ever since.

To understand the scope of her impact, consider just two of the many programs that gave growth that have grown under her guidance.

In January of 2022, during dangerously cold temperatures, Ministry on the Margins launched a pilot coffee house program.

That first night it offered warmth and safety to about 10 individuals.

Today, at that same coffee house, it welcomes an average of 62 guests each evening, offering not just shelter, but dignity and community.

In December 2013, the food pantry distributed 581 pounds of food to 22 households and serving 46 individuals.

Fast forward to this past October.

That same pantry distributed over 25,000 pounds of food to 1,792 households, reaching 4,846 individuals.

That's not just growth, that's transformation.

It's felt in the way the people are treated when they walk through the doors of Ministry on the Margins, as one board member has shared.

Sister Kathleen has deeply impacted the lives of those served by the ministry.

People feel respected and seen, not as homeless, but as children of God.

Families take comfort knowing their loved ones have a place to go for food, shelter, and compassion.

She and her team are mentors, connecting people to jobs, housing, clothing, even haircuts, as she opens the eyes of the broader community, volunteers, students, donors who leave with a grateful heart and a renewed sense of purpose.

Sister Kathleen, your investment in this community and in the lives of many cannot be measured.

As you prepare to walk prepare to your well-earned retirement at the end of this year, I hope you take a moment to reflect on the legacy you've built, one that continued to grow and inspire long after you have stepped away from your leadership.

And I hear there may be a book in the works sharing the story of Ministry on the Margins.

I, for one, can't wait to see it and read it.

I hope I get a copy.

On behalf of our city, thank you.

And if you would like to say any words, you're certainly welcome.

The floor is yours.

If you choose not to, we'll understand.

And many, many times I've been here.

Never so deeply touched, just to say thank you.

Bisbeck is home.

I've been blessed with Atkinson family enunciation, monastery, leaders, churches, uh community members.

Bismarck is good, and recently, past dozen years or so, been blessed by being embraced by the poor and people who are struggling and people who are raising families in great challenges in our community.

So Ministry on the Margins has been a great opportunity in grace to be able to come together with that which I love most.

Therefore, be it resolved that I, Michael Schmitz, mayor of the City of Bismarck, on behalf of this city commission, do hereby proclaim December tenth, 2025 as Sister Kathleen Atkinson Day, and urge the community to join in celebrating Sister Kathleen's remarkable heart and find ways to build a more just and compassionate world locally, regionally, nationally, and abroad, in her honor, signed today, the 25th of November, 2025.

Well, if we can get a photo, I would love it.

I think it's just a great thing that you know we're heading into Thanksgiving here in a few days, and we just get to say thank you to a very special person in our community.

Again, thank you.

All right, we'll move on to public comment.

Uh public comment would be restricted items on the consent agenda, the regular agenda that is not a um hearing, public hearing, or the prior city commission meeting agenda.

Anyone who wish to speak, please come forward.

A second call for public comment.

A third and final call for public comment.

Public comment period is now closed.

Commissioners, before we have the consent agenda action, I would like to pull item three E1 and item three J1, only because I have conflicts of interest involved, so I wish not to vote on those two particular items.

Um E1 and G1?

J, E and J1, E1 and J1.

Yep.

I'll make a motion to approve uh with removing E1 and J1 from the consent agenda.

Any discussion?

Hearing none, we'll call roll on that.

Commissioner Zaker?

Yes.

Commissioner Connolly?

Yes.

Commissioner Cleary?

Yes.

Commissioner Rish?

Yes.

Mayor Schmitz.

Yes.

Uh Vice Chair Cleary, would you handle those other two items, please?

All right.

Uh E1 is consider the request for approval from the Bismarck Airport for the following amendment of executive air taxi corporation development and agreement.

Any discussion?

I'll make a motion to approve items E1 and J1.

Second.

I mean, he's just removed himself because of conflict.

So wait, wait a minute.

J one or J1 and two.

Just J1.

Which is the permission to award the architectural services for the city county remodel to Endeavor North Design Architects.

So there's a motion on the table for both.

Any discussion on either topic.

Go ahead and call roll.

Commissioner Connolly?

Yes.

Commissioner Vish?

Yes.

Commissioner Zenker?

Yes.

Commissioner Cleary.

Yes.

Okay.

Thank you.

Moving to regular agenda item A, consider request to authorize the issuance and award acceptance of bids for the 2025 refunding improvement bond series.

You.

Eric, are you going to at least introduce this?

We're putting you on the spot, man.

I am.

Well, you know, two commission meetings and method podium, the second one, so major league baseball, I'd make a lot of money, right?

You would.

Are you going to hit a home run?

Of course.

I think it's a home run.

Excuse me.

Good evening, Mayor Commissioners.

Before you tonight, we have two separate uh authorizations for the bond annual bond issuances for our special assessment bonds.

The first one being Series U, which covers our street and stormwater improvement projects.

Um, and Sidewalk Kerb and Gutter 2024.

Um I have with me tonight uh John Lundby from Call Your Securities, and we also have our bond counsel John Shockley on the phone.

Um but just before I bring John up here, I'd like to touch on some part of this process is going through a ratings call with Moody's annually.

Um again, this year's city of Bismarck got a double A1 rating.

I think that's something that we should note and be very proud of as um city employees as an organization.

What this does is it it shows the creditworthiness of the city of Bismarck and reduces our interest cost for our citizens that help to pay for these improvements.

To my knowledge, that's the highest rated political subdivision in North Dakota.

Um just to note in part of the credit rating, the factors that could lead to a downgrade in our credit rating is our reserves reaching or starting to fall below our 40% reserve policy.

We're we're right there.

We're good.

Um, our long-term liabilities ratio in terms of our debt capacity in to our revenue stream, and then also our fixed costs where they look at what our annual debt service requirements are on an amortization over about 20 years, and that's in relation to our revenues.

Um if that the long-term liability ratio starts to approach 250 250 percent, um, that's where we start to look at a downgrade.

We're at about 130 percent right now.

So we have we have we're in a really good spot.

And then our fixed cost ratio, they look at 15 percent.

We're at about 8.6 percent.

So we're we're very strong financially.

We're doing a very good job.

Um, I just think that should be noted that we're in a good spot for the city.

Um, with that, I'll bring John up to talk about the details of today's bond sale.

Good evening, Mayor Schmitz and fellow commissioners.

Uh, it's a pleasure to be with you again tonight.

Uh again, my name's John Lundby with Collier Securities out of Bismarck here.

Um, and here to present the results of the two public sales that we conducted this morning for the city, one being the refunding improvement bonds of 2025 series U.

Um, we'll discuss that issue first.

Uh it was a financing permanent financing for an IM improvement districts.

Um please report that both sales went very well.

The first one with the rib.

Um, you know, all recent market volatility, uncertainty in the markets of tariffs, and uh thankfully the the current economic uh climate of we're in a declining rate environment uh as of today or lately.

The winning bid for the RIB issue resulted in a true interest cost of 3.135 percent to the city on a 15-year maturity.

The bonds are callable in eight years or 2033, and the final paramount of the issue is 15,295,000 as shown in your updated resolution.

Uh we saw a total of nine bids uh from across the country with this issue, firms located in New York City, Chicago, Milwaukee, Minneapolis, Dallas, and Philadelphia.

It's a very strong response uh from the market with very tight competition between those nine bids, and it's a direct correlation to the strength of the city of Bismarck.

The second sale was the Sidewalk Urban Gutter Warrants uh series SCG 2024, which was permanent financing of one district.

Uh this is a this being a smaller of the two issues, it carries a 10-year maturity, and we're there were four bids received for this sale, and the winning bid came in at a true interest cost of 3.2035%, with the bonds being callable in six years or 2031.

The final paramount of that issue was 1,835,000 as shown in that updated resolution.

Uh I also handed out a credit report uh credit report from Moody's.

I won't regurgitate what Eric said because he said it perfectly, but very strong, something to be recognized and to be proud of for sure.

Onstead Twitchell is your bond council has prepared the bond resolutions before you tonight with your approval.

We'll move forward to finalize all documentation for timely closings on December 9th.

Um and just a point of order, there the two issues will need two separate uh motions.

And uh I just and final saying thank I'd like to thank the commission again, Eric Dimitri Page for all the work.

It's been tremendous to work with the city once again.

I appreciate it.

Um and I'd like to ask if there are any questions at this time.

Commissioners, Commissioner Clanley.

Um either one, if Eric or yourself.

There's in the news lately, Fargo's kind of getting themselves with into rating questions.

So when you say that we're rated the best, what's getting them into trouble where we're not getting into trouble, just as a point of clarification the um one of the main factors in Moody's uh downgrade this year, they actually warned they put the city on a negative outlook last year.

If you remember, they maintained the A2 rating last year, but put out a not a negative outlook, and it was that they're primarily that the reserve policies were starting to encroach on that 40% or go below that 40%.

Part of that was obviously city commission driven.

Um, I believe that reserve levels were starting to creep down towards 25%.

You fast forward to this year, they were below or at 25 percent.

Don't quote me on that, but I'm pretty sure that was the main reason for the the downgrade to the A3.

But Moody's also maintained the negative outlook on that one because it seems like the city has intentioned to further reduce those reserves.

I appreciate that.

Because a lot of people compare.

Yeah, like Eric said, the um Bismarck is the only city that maintains a double A1 in the State.

The only other entity in the State that has a double A1 would be the State of North Dakota itself as an issuer.

Any other questions?

Commissioner, I just want to thank Eric and your team for and John for the excellent work you are doing up there in finance.

Complicated stuff, but you figure it out figure it out.

So thank you.

What are your wishes, Commissioners?

We have two resolutions we need to approve.

Um, I do that and number four.

Well, um, well, there's two different bond resolutions.

So we have to break the we have to break the memo apart.

I can move to award the bids for the 2025 refunding improvement bond series U for approximately 15 million two hundred and ninety-five thousand for the special assessment improvement districts.

Second.

Any further discussion?

Hearing none will call roll.

Commissioner Cleary?

Yes.

Commissioner Rish?

Yes.

Commissioner Zenker?

Yes.

Commissioner Connolly?

Yes.

Mayor Smith.

Yes.

And then I will also move to approve or award the for the series SCG 2024 for approximately 1,835,000 for a total of 17,130,000.

Second.

Uh is there any discussion?

I I think the motion would only be on the 1,835, the 17 million.

Not for the total.

Not for the total.

Okay.

Do you want me to just reread that?

Would that be best?

I will do it.

Yeah.

Should we just can we retract the question?

I'll retract my motion.

I retract my second.

Then I'll motion to award the series SCG 2024 for approximately 1,835,000.

Second.

Okay.

Any discussion?

Hearing them will call roll.

Commissioner Rish?

Yes.

Commissioner Zenker?

Yes.

Commissioner Connolly?

Yes.

Commissioner Cleary?

Yes.

Mayor Smith.

Yes.

Thank you, sir, for your efforts on securing those.

For securing the good rates.

Those are nice rates.

Very strong response.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

All right.

Item B is consider request receive a report from the Downtown Bismarck Community Foundation or the Downtowners relating to economic development services.

Kate?

Well, good evening, Mayor and Commissioners.

My name is Kate Herzog.

I'm with uh the downtown Bismarck Community Foundation.

With me, Dr.

Carl Svilveck, he's going to present a few slides as well.

I want to talk about the partnership that we have with you all and kind of get some end of the year numbers of some of the things that we've been up to.

I just want to just a reminder that we have this partnership with you all, as does the Bismarck Man and Chamber EDC, and do specific parts of the request for proposal that you all had put out.

These are kind of the three pieces that I'm going to touch on tonight.

And I always want to start with this is probably the bulk of a lot of our work, but these are all the committees and the groups that we sit on and assist the City of Bismarck with.

So the Transportation Steering Committee was done in our office.

Bismarck uh event center, we helped with um some of the consultant selections there.

We're part of the Bismarck Land Development Code Steering Committee.

So we spent a lot of time in this room for sure.

Um we're working with the Bismarck Parking Authority on a future parking ramp.

We're part of the the uh forestry advisory board with Commissioner Zenker.

Don in our office is on the uh arts and culture plan uh and helped with that.

Um we are working on the America 250 celebration that's gonna be citywide.

Uh we're part of the Bismarck 4th of July committee.

Um so anything with fireworks we're gonna be a part of.

Um we have supported your urban grant road program um for a number of years uh with letters of support to the state, and we help you with uh recruitment for your appointed boards and citizens academy.

So wanted to touch on a few things in the RFP that we've been working on.

Um as you all know, we uh worked with your planning department as well as some financial institutions in the city of Bismarck to launch what's called a neighborhood reinvestment initiative.

This essentially offers low interest loans to older homes under a certain dollar amount to keep them in good condition.

We know housing affordability is a is a big issue right now.

So the partners you can see here.

After he said 3.1% uh interest.

Now these these interest rates don't look as great, but um they're much lower than what you'd get on a home equity loan.

So for uh year one, these were the criteria that we had laid out, and we found that the 250,000 maximum value on a home was difficult.

Um there's just not a lot that is you know below 250.

So uh we met with the financial institutions in Lauren Oster and the planning department as your primary staff person that we work with here.

We raised that max value uh to 300,000 dollars with kind of similar um other criteria for people who could be a part of the program.

So in 2025, we had 13 applications that amounted to almost 400,000 in improvements.

The average was about $30,000.

Average property value of those that applied was about 221,000.

And about 75-year-old homes really is what the the average was as well as anything from 1913 to 1984.

So we've broken them down by zoning district as well.

So you can see R5, which is your basic single-family zoning in the community here, R 10, which has can be a duplex or triplex area, and then RM30 had two properties.

So when we look at the program overall for the two years that we've been able to offer it to the citizens of Bismarck, we've had 33 applications, and we've broken them down how many are each in each zoning district.

Uh we've had 1.3 million dollars in applications that we've been able to forward on to the two financial institutions that are a part of it, which is Gate City Bank and Capital Credit Union.

Um the rates for 2025 were lower than 2024, and so um the rate for this year was like four and a half to five percent, and that home equity right now kind of on the market is between six and nine percent.

So it gives them that um lower interest rate so that they can make improvements to these older homes in our community to keep them functional.

Um a couple things maybe coming up for 2026 that we'd like to do with the the NRI neighborhood uh reinvestment initiative.

Um there is a three-year remodel tax exemption uh that the cities had on the books for a long time.

And so I think it might be helpful for us as we're going through the application process for NRI to let people know that there is this other exemption there.

Um, and that's just an exemption on the increase in the value after the improvement.

So it might help them with financing.

Yeah, commission.

I've got a question.

So any home under the value of 300,000 dollars that are in the city limits would be eligible to apply for one of the loans.

And it has to be 30 years or older, the home does.

Okay.

Yep.

There's a couple other I mean, you have to be credit worthy and things like that.

The bank will take them through that whole process.

But yep, that's it's there's no boundary to it, so it's not um any specific location within the community.

So we'd like people to kind of be aware of that.

I don't know how well it's been used, and um it might help if there is a three-year exemption on the um the value after the either the remodel or the expansion, that might help them with their financing over over the life of that.

I'm gonna call it home equity loan, but it's not exactly what it is.

Um, and then we meet uh Lauren Oster, myself, and the financial institutions we meet usually in February to figure out what the rates will be for the year.

So the rates change every year, and they agree on and set those rates and as well as the timeline that they'll take applications.

This year we expanded it for an extra month, so it closes in a few days at the end of November.

Um and that's been helpful.

We've gotten quite a few in in the in the month of November.

Any have any questions on that?

I'm gonna fly through this.

I know I'm standing between you guys and a short meeting, so I'm gonna I'm gonna move.

Um we are also part of um the Lewis and Clark Development Group, a part of the North Cote Opportunity Fund.

So we represent Bismarck as one of the 38 consortium cities that are part of this loan fund.

And essentially what it does is it helps um it helps kind of get businesses over the line, I would say, in some capacity.

Um it could be loans, it could be real estate, um, it could be providing the community match to access lower interest loan programs through the Bank of North Dakota.

So just a breakdown of of that this year, and just a reminder that there are 38 communities that are in the consortium, and the city of Bismarck is able to utilize that revolving loan fund.

Um I'm the vice chair of the the steering committee.

These are the things we can use that North Cota Opportunity Fund for.

And then in 2025, we approved six projects.

Four of those projects were the interest rate buy down program, the local match.

So what the North Cote Opportunity Fund does is we at the fund will provide the match so that the Vision Fund of the City of Bismarck maybe doesn't have that money.

It doesn't fit the criteria.

We can still access that program through the Bank of North Dakota.

We did one interim SBA 504 loan and then we did one real estate financing loan as well.

Happy to report that we are accepting applications at the North Cote Opportunity Fund.

So if you know anyone and we've got money to lend.

So if you know anyone who is in expanding their business, a daycare, anything like that, please do send them forward.

Usually their bankers will send them forward.

But just so you know that is a great option, and that way we can kind of keep vision fund dollars.

If we need to, there's another opportunity to make the local match.

One of the RFP goals that we work on is a talent recruitment and workforce retention with the the Chamber EDC.

We have been doing what we call multicultural welcome events, welcomes new Americans, people new to the community.

And we just get together and show them something awesome in our community.

So we've taken them on the river boat.

Um we've been at the Heritage Center and had the exhibits open.

Um we've had rooftop parties.

We've had lots of folks, lots of languages that are spoken.

Um next week is our next one, uh, which will be uh at Gateway to Science, and we'll be inviting um those new American friends as well.

Heather May, who is a part of your staff as your community integration uh person is also helping us with that and finding the right folks to get to these events so that we can plug them into the community.

Um we're also helping with with Vinterfest, which is a multicultural winter slate of events, which has been uh really fun.

And here's just some pictures from our one of our last ones, which was Learn to Curl.

Um we do a lot of community engagement for you all, plus uh for the community in general.

We do our neighborhood welcome programs.

Um I want to mention that we have Burger Slam coming up, which is an effort to get people into the restaurants in the colder months, usually in January was the slowest month for a lot of the restaurants in the community.

So we've been doing that with the help of First Western Bank.

We also want there's a Saturday coming up this Saturday, which again urge everyone to shop local as um a part of their holiday spending.

We work with the forestry department um on the downtown pollinator program, which you see in the top middle.

We plant a number of different beds downtown that require less maintenance, so it's not as costly.

Commissioner Cleary, I put a picture of you there setting up on street fare, appreciate that.

And your brother wearing a shirt that says yeah, no, which was helpful for setup.

Um then we also um bring volunteers down downtown three times a year to help us put up banners, uh downtown seasonal banners and things like that.

Uh, folks from Dakota Community Bank usually help us with that three times a year.

And there's those guys in their ladders.

Um I'm gonna have Carl talk about a few things and then I'm gonna come back up and talk about a couple more things and then we'll wrap up with any questions.

But I want to introduce uh Dr.

Carl Solak.

He is a partner with us, as we are a partner with you and handles some of our um I would say more educational-based things that we're doing uh for the city, and we've got something that we'd like to pursue in 2026.

So Dr.

Professor Carl.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor, Commissioners.

Um of the things that we were we brought to our students' attention was succession planning.

And uh we had a group out to our school.

We found out this very interesting stat of almost 8,000 business owners, age 55 or older, uh, 80,000 employees, um, three billion in payroll, that's a B, 17 billion in revenue.

And this is from project equity, and and what I want to point out here is that in Burley County, um or I'm sorry, in Bismarck, yeah, Burley County, 828 businesses, and it's estimated there might be over a thousand businesses.

And what we want to provide in the first quarter is succession planning to let business owners who may not have an exit strategy put together uh some series of workshops so that we can meet those, though both be face-to-face and virtual, which will allow them to have an understanding so they don't just close the doors and leave some vacant buildings alone, um, leave employees without something.

We want them to have some options and know what those options are.

And if they choose that they want to go further, we'll make sure that there's some legal and accounting uh individuals for them to uh make some decisions on their strategies moving forward.

And so that's going to be coming up here in the first quarter, and we'll report back in our next session to you how well that went.

We're hoping to get as many of those individuals uh into those sessions and we'll make as many of those sessions available to to reach as many as we can.

We'll work through our list, we'll work through the chamber list, we'll ask the city to post those meetings, and again, we'll just make those opportunities available for them and uh come back to you with with what those uh numbers might be.

And it's all designed to help those businesses continue to thrive uh rather than just closing the doors.

Any questions on that?

Excellent idea.

Thank you.

Excellent.

I'll turn it back over to Kate, I believe.

Oh.

I'm still here.

I don't.

Thanks, Carl.

Um that's one of the things we're seeing as a challenge in the community in general is um a lot of folks don't have success a succession plan or how to turn that business over to maybe their employees and things like that.

So they might just retire and close.

And so we want to help them understand what their options are and and plan for the future.

I did want to put this up here, and I I have a a couple other slides, but this is um something that you might hear about a lot, and I did want to point it out.

A lot of people ask us, how are things going?

How are things going in the economy?

It absolutely depends on what sector or industry you went you're in, or you know, how you're attached to maybe certain federal things.

And so a lot of people call this a K-shaped recovery, and you'll see that it makes a K shape.

Some people might call it a bifurcated economy.

But there's certain sectors that are doing really well in the community, right?

Um technology, retail, uh health is doing is doing pretty well.

They've mostly recovered from COVID.

Um we are definitely seeing that the industries that are needing some assistance are still those ones that were affected by COVID and that might be affected by either certain tariff or employee type things that's primarily retail restaurant entertainment, things like that that haven't really some have bounced back, but some haven't.

And so I just wanted to make that these two um kind of terms aware if you're not aware of the K-shaped recovery and a bifurcated economy, because that is definitely something we'll see locally.

Um, you know, some folks will be doing great, and some are really, you know, could still really be struggling.

Um we had a conversation with one of our restaurant owners who um fish prices went up 30 percent, and it's like bing bang boom, you have to really adapt and you have to continually iterate.

And so um I think that's some of the struggles that are happening with the industries that are needing assistance as there's things happening outside of their control, but they need to react and figure out how to deal with um you know, either federal policies or things like that.

So I just wanted to put that up here because I think you'll hear more and more and more of that.

Um now you have a word or a letter for it, like Sesame Street.

Um wanted to just provide again a few other things that uh we track downtown.

Um we use our place our data as well as work with our property owners in the downtown area to talk about uh how they're doing.

Overall housing occupancy, especially for new construction downtown is basically completely full, which is fantastic.

Uh it does mean that we need to add more housing units within the downtown as there's really no additional capacity.

Um our 55 plus new construction building is also completely full, which is on uh first in Maine.

Um even some of our renovated buildings like uh the Prince Hotel, all of the smaller micro units are very affordable that have kitchens have all rented out.

And so they're adding kitchens to the rest of them in order to, I think rent those out.

So definitely need some more housing within the downtown area.

Again, stronger sectors are we're seeing our professional services, service providers, health, those kind of mixed sectors, retail and food service.

And then that entry-level housing affordability is still pretty low, even though we have NRI and some other programs.

That's just a a larger issue that everyone is aware of.

We have also uh been using our place our data, which is the locational visitor data to help some of the departments within the city of Bismarck.

Um we've pulled, we continue to pull very updated Bismarck Event Center reports and send those to your consultants that are helping you work on that.

We've also pulled reports for federal, state, and private grant programs so we can get some numbers, uh help you all to get those those grants if possible.

Um we pull reports for commercial real estate.

We've all pulled some reports for the parking ramp, which has been kind of fun to see who's in it and how how long they stay there, where they're coming from, um, and then just regular property insights.

Uh for the Bismarck Land Development Code.

Wanted to get the bankers and the people who make loans in front of the planners and see where the new land development code hopefully interacts with with financing and lending and makes that easier.

We also invited them to the street fair to get some feedback from the community and our corndog folks.

So I went through it really quick, but I know you got a short agenda.

Happy to answer any questions or or chat about anything else.

Wanted to give you some end of the year reports.

Um and let you know where we're at with some programs.

Any questions?

Commissioner Zenker.

Yeah.

Mayor Commissioners.

Um first of all, thank you for the presentation.

I do got one thing, and it's gonna I'm I'm gonna not gonna lie to you, it's gonna catch you off guard because you don't even know anything about it.

But part of our Moody's uh uh ratings, one of the credit challenges that they put on here uh was uh GDP growth legs the nation.

So from your um presentation about economic development, how are you increasing our GDP Yeah?

I think that's primarily the couple of programs that we're talking about with North Dakota Opportunity Fund and and um Lucent Clark development.

So those are specifically attached to creating additional jobs and additional capacity through those programs.

So I would say that's probably the biggest piece of where we create capacity in jobs and and GDP growth would be through those loan programs.

And that essentially allows them to access more financing, more funds, purchase real estate so they can expand.

Okay, all right.

So um in your next presentation when you come back, can you bring some data that shows that?

Yeah.

That'd be fantastic.

And then the second thing, if you could put the the K deal back up on the Gizmo thing there.

Perfect.

So I understand that's a snapshot of national scenarios, right?

Because our travel is pretty much if I'm sure if I can't do that.

Airport's doing well.

We're off the charts, right?

We're bursting at the seams.

Some of that stuff that's up there in the food services hospitality thing.

I think that's a people issue, right?

For us locally.

It can be, yeah.

Um, I mean, because I've tried to hire people the last 90 days or so, and it's really difficult to find someone that kind of fits in our niche, right?

We have a specific task type thing, no different than if you need an accountant, you know.

So I would I would um I would like to see the second part of your data that you bring with the GDP growth is what you've done to bring people to the city.

Sure.

Because that's it's critically important for that.

I think also there's one other piece of data that we can pull that our place or uh license gives us, and it's actually uh it's called COVID recovery, and it tracks like certain business and property sectors essentially, and seeing how they're recovering from pre-COVID, post-COVID as well.

But yeah, we can also see return to work, which I think would be interesting for your numbers if if folks are still working here, but they might not be living here, but they're full-time, so we can pull some of those numbers for you too.

Okay, perfect.

Thanks.

Commissioner Connolly.

Sorry, uh uh trying to get back to the back one there.

Just uh comparison things.

Yeah, just comparison things for me.

When you mentioned how many boards you're on and things, how many boards were you on before the agreement?

Oh boy, that's a good question.

I've seen you in boards even prior to that.

So uh I'd say maybe half of those have been added to our slate.

Yeah.

Or 50 percent.

Okay.

And then um when it comes to recruitment to advisory boards and things.

Um why does that have to cost the city more?

It doesn't necessarily have to cost the city more.

That's just one of the things that we do to help find folks to fill those uh volunteer roles for you all.

So that might be people that have a specific skill set.

So if it's planning and zoning, someone who kind of understands that um that we're able to get that information out to our membership so that those folks can apply and and serve the community.

Okay.

Thanks.

Yeah.

Any other questions?

Thanks, Kate.

Thank you.

Thanks, Dr.

Krisolvok.

Item regular agenda item C is public hearing and approval of special assessment policy.

Uh good evening, Mayor Commissioners.

I have a couple of slides uh relating to the changes that we've proposing for a special assessment policy.

Uh at the conclusion, I would recommend holding the public hearing and come back up if you have any questions.

Um so with that.

The first one are some just some terminology type things within the sections.

I guess within the agenda memo, it included a track changes version of the entire document as well as a clean version, which is going to highlight some of those things here, is what what the intent of this presentation.

Benefiting property language, we added some language talking about usually our uh assessments for for streets in particular is where this section comes from is bringing in property based on some level of adjacency or proximity to the improvement.

Um if we're doing a uh a street on the south side of town, we're not bringing in a property on the north side of town or vice versa.

Uh so generally it is some some very close proximity or even adjacency to it.

And then we just want to note that access is not a prerequisite for determining benefit.

Um, these are some elements that have been brought up in the course of discussion we've had with citizens, and so we thought it'd be beneficial just to clarify that piece as part of of the policy.

Uh the goal is not to narrow the scope or narrow the purview of what this commission or the special assessment commission can use, but we are at least setting the table of providing some guidance to the public as to what types of properties we bring in uh into the benefiting area.

Uh another uh terminology change is in locations where we previously called out reconstruction.

We meant that reconstruction to mean areas where we were reconstructing the pavement section, but without throughout the document, it was kind of unclear as to using that same word and having it mean different things in different places.

So when we are talking about a reconstruction of just the pavement section, uh that word has been removed and has been replaced with a full-depth rehabilitation in those instances.

So you'll see a lot of changes, but really it's just that word is being swapped out for a different phrase.

Uh we added a section uh for the local and collector streets for new pavement and right-of-way corridor reconstruction.

Uh, the right-of-way corridor reconstruction section has existed before, but it's been a subsection of the arterial streets because we've never reconstructed from right-of-way line to right-of-way line a local street or collector street.

Now we will be doing that when we start our Ottawa Street reconstruction project that's not an arterial.

Um so, but every other project we've worked on has been an arterial.

So this we thought it was prudent to add this section uh so that it's clear to the public that we don't subsidize the new pavement and any new construction, uh, you know, new new developments in the outskirts of town, uh, and that the subsidy for any right-of-way corridor reconstruction projects are on a case-by-case situation, as you have with your Ottawa Street reconstruction, as well as you'll have on on future projects and into the future as well.

The continuous district is a process that we use after property is annexed into the city where the city can uh charge that particular prop property for the infrastructure that was uh constructed that benefited that property um before they were annexed into the city.

So this there's an entire section on trunk infrastructure fees that was related to our pre-2019 uh policies, and we've kept it in the policy in case there was a change or a a reallocation that needs to be made for a uh a parcel or a splitting of of an existing cost.

Um but in because we really haven't used it since 2019.

The recommendation is just to remove that section from the policy moving forward.

Uh the uh last item for changes is the concept for the adjustments that we use on oversized or undersized lots.

Uh so on the residential parcels only, if a parcel is really, really small, they're really, really large, uh it gets a different treatment than a typical type parcel.

Typically, in our current policy, we would calculate the median lot of that group.

So if we have um a hundred lots, it's it's then the 50th largest or 50th smallest meet uh lot is the median, and then we compare all of the parcels to that median to make it then make our calculations uh in the policy, it kind of laid out what the the ranges are.

But in lieu of calculating a median lot for each unit or for each district, uh we would propose just using a 10,000 square foot number as the baseline so that any parcels uh it was we apply that oversized or undersized concept or just uh tied back to a steady number that doesn't change over the course of time.

Uh what we found is in one of our projects last year is if we had a property that had a consider uh a district that has a consistency of very of a lot of really really really small parcels or a lot of really really large parcels, it was kind of a policy buster for using calculating the median uh because it ended up being the median could be a condo sized lot, which made it very difficult for us to apply the oversized and undersized concept because it was capping the oversized parcels uh prematurely in in some ways that you could look at it.

So our goal here is to just use a static 10,000 square foot number uh so that we can uh not have to have another calculation would be another opportunity for an error in our spreadsheets.

Uh but by just using a 10,000 square foot number, we can just apply that consistently uh throughout the district.

So with those changes, uh our recommendation is that these changes would be effective immediately for all new districts, so anything that we haven't created yet, we'd want to just apply these concepts or these changes to, as well as the districts that we have created, but they're not under contract yet.

So it might be say that we've created a lighting district like we have here for 2026 lighting, but we haven't sent out letters to the landowners.

We haven't uh got anything under contract.

That would be one that we'd still want to apply these changes to.

But those projects that we've awarded that are under contract that we've already sent letters out to, we've already communicated with the public what their expected special assessment might be.

We don't want to have all of these policies change or that that in particular that median lot change take effect because that could change their formula and their their dollar amount based on if they're on the the wrong side or the right side of one of those dividing lines.

So our recommendation would be any of the projects that are under contract but not you know completed and bonded would follow the these new policy changes except for that 10,000 square foot residential lot comparison component.

So with that, I'd take any questions you may have and encourage a public hearing.

Our recommendation would be to approve the special assessment policy as presented.

Okay.

Yep, we're gonna we're doing right now.

I'm gonna open the public hearing now.

So this would be the public hearing on the special assessments policy.

Anyone wish to speak to that, please come forward.

A second call for a comment.

A third and final call for comment.

Seeing or hearing anyone, public comment periods now closed.

Commissioners, any further questions for Gabe, or what are your wishes?

Move to approve is presented.

Second.

Any discussion?

Hearing none will call roll.

Commissioner Connolly?

Yes.

Commissioner Cleary?

Yes.

Commissioner Rish?

Yes.

Commissioner Zenker?

Yes.

Mayor Smith.

Yes.

We are to other business.

Does anyone have other business?

I have one item, but go ahead.

I just uh the snow has finally arrived, and I just want to commend our professionals on the plows and the graders across the city.

Um it looks somewhat easy, but I see those guys and they're coming around with these cars close and not hitting them and going right down the road.

So I just want to give a shout out for their good work and uh thank them for what they're doing to clean up the city.

They're out there right now, so anybody else have anything?

I just have one plug for uh for us as the city.

The end of the month we're closing applications for all boards and committees in the Citizen Academy.

So any of those people who are interested, we certainly would love to receive your application so we can fill the positions and and fill the citizens' academy.

Uh there being no other business, meetings adjourned.

Yes, happy