This meeting of the Cedar Rapids City Council will come to order.

Welcome to the Cedar Rapids City Council meeting for Tuesday, June 23rd, 2026.

Councilmember Marty Hager is absent.

The mayor is in Washington, DC with city staff talking with our federal representatives.

I'd like to welcome our acting city manager or city clerk or city attorney.

Thank you to city staff attending and for being available by phone or email to answer questions that citizens may have.

Please turn off any cell phones or other electronic devices that might interrupt this meeting.

Please note that city council meeting agendas, minutes, and videos are available on the city's website.

Regular sessions are also available to watch live and replay through Facebook Live.

We'll start with an invocation.

Councilmember Ann Poe will give the invocation followed by the Pledge of Allegiance.

Thank you, Mayor Pro Tim.

Dear God, when loud words filled with anger, hate, cynicism, disingenuousness, and pettiness fill our minds and take away hope and joy, and replaces it with despair, doubt, and discouragement.

Let your words, God, sustain, transform, and renew us with kindness, respect, and compassion.

Let us acknowledge the opportunity at this moment not to lose faith in each other, but find it again.

God, remind us to take time to see each other.

There are no enemies here.

Let us all hold close the values of integrity, honesty, and honor that make us worthy of being your heavenly servants through the communion of love.

During this time, dear God of Juneteenth and Pride Month.

Let us celebrate our diversity and uniqueness as part of our human experience, not as a weapon to divide us, but rather to embrace the compassion you have given us for our differences.

Let us welcome with an open heart any challenges before us to find acceptance and love through those differences, being mindful and worthy of the importance of your grace.

We ask God that you bless and hold close fire chief Greg Smith as he enjoys the next chapter of his life in his retirement, and he carries with him the blessings of a grateful community and council for his service.

We pray and thank you, God, for your blessings as this council and city team work every day for your people.

Amen.

First item we have on the agenda is a presentation on Axon, Chief Dostel and Captain Doyle.

You are in order for your presentation.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem and City Council.

Since being appointed to this position in 2024, one of my goals has been to establish a real-time information center.

Technology and public safety is advancing every day.

Typically, with law enforcement, we lag behind in keeping up with the technology.

This initiative allows us to incorporate the systems we already utilize while improving the technology, efficiency, and interoperability.

This will provide for a citywide increase in overall public safety, officer safety, crime reduction, and crime prevention.

With that being said, I would like to now turn this uh presentation over to Captain Doug Doyle.

Thank you, Council.

Thank you, Directors, for allowing us to present to you this uh Axon Technology Package.

It's uh a partnership between not just uh the police department, but also um other city departments as well, including fire and animal control, and then also incorporates other divisions within there through some of these systems that we're gonna we're gonna present today.

So, as part of this package, it's it incorporates a lot of the items that we already utilize.

So when we're talking about body cameras, talking about fleet cameras, uh we're talking about drones, we're talking about uh other technologies.

It's just an enhancement on that technology itself.

So when we talk about the drones, we already do a patrol deployable drones, but the project we're talking about today as part of this package is drones as first responders.

It's important to understand that drones as first responders is not just a system that is just in a flag above our city, but it's one that's responding directly to calls for service.

It's not a surveillance tool, it's just meant strictly for we get a call for service to be able to respond quickly and get eyes on that scene for not only for officer safety but also for citizen safety as well, and to make sure that we have the appropriate response to those uh to those calls for service, and with this package, there's also an additional technology package, including AI features that uh that we'll speak of.

Uh, it's important to understand that this is an investment into uh meeting city city council goals as well.

So when we're talking about fostering a safe community, a clean community, so we're talking about keeping our city uh clean, reducing crime, and improving our officer response.

But we're also talking about transparency and accountability.

So every tool within the Axon system is uh the axon ecosystem is a fully auditable system.

So every little click inside the system is tracked, but then also the data that's presented from it.

So any data that we incorporate, whether it be through the body cameras through the drones or any other system within here is owned and operated by the CRASP police department.

So nobody, no exterior uh entities have access to any of these systems at all unless given privilege by the CRASP police department.

And then as we spoke of uh as I spoke of just a little bit ago, it's multi-departmental.

So we don't look at this just as a system built for the CRASP police department, but it's also built for fire for uh animal control and other entities within the department.

So if we think of natural disasters, the ability to address that and look at that from an environmental standpoint from above and give faster response from all city departments, and it also goes beyond that of just law enforcement.

So if you look at the the ability to incorporate our schools and our campuses through through, you know, a better response to you know, high high-risk situations.

So, if we can incorporate any type of camera systems that they may uh have and want to share with us, we could bridge that gap and be able to have more appropriate response to whatever situations reported within there.

But then also local businesses, the same same thing.

If we think about our downtown district or any other area within our city, having the opportunity to make sure that we have an appropriate response to whatever system or whatever complaints they have, and then bring them into the loop as well to make them part of the solution in being uh you know addressing the issues that they're having within their neighborhoods and their areas, and then from a neighborhood standpoint, having a transparency portal that presents the uh drone flights, gives you the flight paths, gives you that, presents information on all of the systems that we're looking at operating, but then goes above and beyond as well when we talk about use of force data, traffic stop data or any of that, being able to incorporate all this data into one portal where the the city can access it.

And then from a financial standpoint, uh there's not many systems that can state that the payments within this are gonna be the same throughout the entire 10 years of the contract.

So there is no increased cost based on some of the uh the technology we get.

There's not a three percent increase each year.

It's a sustained cost across and it's predictable across the board for the city.

So why did we look at Axon?

Axon not only is the leader in the technology uh realm, but they're also um look to make sure that they have uh you know the ability for us to grow as a city and store the data.

So on-premise storage is a large expense previously.

Now we can have a cloud base that allows us as we gain officers or gain or technology, the data source gets larger, we can gain that and we can hold that a little further and a little bit more, but then they're continuously innovating.

So when we talk about the AI packages that come with this, is there's the opportunity as they evolve and get new technologies that we can evolve with them at no additional cost.

And then everything operates within the ecosystem.

As Chief was stating, we already operate a lot of these systems, but right now it's multiple clicks and multiple different areas.

Well, this is putting into one platform that we can quickly and easily access and give it putting it at the fingertips of the officers for once again for their safety, for the community safety and appropriate response to different situations, but also the transparency side for the community itself.

And then immersive training.

So when we're talking about the ability to uh continue to adapt and train officers in a in uh in all situations, we're not just talking about force-on-force situations, but we're also talking about uh the growing mental health needs and to be able to address those and do so in an environment, a stagnant environment that uh we can incorporate and bring into as part of our mental health team and our mental health training, and then as mentioned before, the smarter spending.

So when we look at Axon, it's one platform from the start to the finish.

So we talk about the overlay of the CAD or over the 911 uh system.

So somebody calls in, we have a system that's that's taking it, is transcribing the information, is presenting it in a faster, quicker environment to the uh the fusis or the live crime uh operation or live operations center or informational center.

So that information is flowing from the 911 to the operations center and out to the officers in a much more efficient manner.

And then it's incorporating camera systems that can bridge that gap and give the officers the information uh that they need, and then as mentioned the drones as first responders, so the respondent resolve is the ability to respond to those scene quicker, gather information quicker, uh gather the evidence that we need a little faster, and then the investigating close.

So making sure from the response stage to the close stage is a seamless process and giving us all the tools that we can do so to make sure we have a prosecutable case or to be able to clear people uh sooner based on the information we have.

And when we talk about AI, uh we want to make sure that we that everybody understands when we're talking about an axon product is that there is always a human that's part of it.

So at no part in any of these these projects does the the AI system make the decision.

It's always a human that's making the decision.

Uh and it's generally uh if we talk about a report system, the report is gonna be uh reviewed by the officer, but it's all gonna be also be reviewed by the supervisor as well.

So there's multi-levers levels to make sure that the human is the one that's that's approving everything that's part of this.

And then as mentioned before, every click in the system is AI is logged uh through there.

And then Axon's technology that has an ethics board that's uh not part of tech uh axon itself, but it's an exterior comp our group that reviews all this to make sure uh that it's lacks bias, fairness, and and um you know, demographic equity as part of this too.

And then all the data is stored in a in a CGIS compliant manner.

And as I was mentioning with the ethics and equity advisory council, uh this is this is the group, this is what they're made up uh made up of, and and they're all across the country and abroad as well that are making sure that Axon's operating in a in a proper manner.

So at this point, I would open up to any questions that the council may have.

Thanks, Captain Doyle.

Council of questions or comments.

Council Member Van Orney.

Yeah, thank you.

Um, you know, I had the opportunity, as you're aware, to go to the Axon facility where they create most of this uh in Phoenix or outside of Phoenix last year.

And I'm really glad we're pursuing some of the tools like the taser 10.

Um, it gives us a better reliability with non-lethal uh use of force measures that provide a greater, a significantly greater distance, uh, which ensures that we have a better reliability of using a non-lethal um tool uh, you know, in terms of uh practice.

Um, additionally, uh some of the body cameras and things like that are just light years ahead.

I know that there were some issues with the contracts prior where we had gotten a contract and then new technology came out right again then.

So I believe in this iteration we've solved some of that so that we're getting the latest um technology for you all, which is really important.

I still have uh some concerns though about the AI transcription, and I just really want to make sure that we tread very carefully on that.

Um, some of the rule that they're saying right now is you know, 30%, no more than 30% is transcribed in that 70% is still legwork for the officer doing this.

Um part of that reason is of course, uh, there's the Herbert City Police Department case where it picked up on some ambient background noise and it turned the officer into a frog and people didn't catch it, right?

So part of that AI uh use at the National League of Cities, there's a public safety um presentation where they were talking about that it's the data is uncertain if it actually saves any time right now, because of how much oversight human oversight has to still go into it to ensure that it's the best reporting and and most accurate.

Um so I'm at this point uh at best ambivalent, really unconvinced that it's it's exactly what we need it to be.

Um, and I just really want us to tread carefully on that.

Really, you know, um tying in our city attorney Vanessa Chavez to make sure that everything that we're doing with it would stand up in court um and making sure that we're using it very carefully, because again, in the test cases that I had, uh the ability to participate in, um, it was misgendering people and saying things that were plain language as nonsensical in there.

And so it's just really important that um we that this um a little bit better than we did some of the other tools that we've recently gotten.

Um, and I say that because uh we want to make sure that we always have a very secure system with this.

So if we're doing anything cloud-based, like part of this presentation was we we need to prevent what we uh missed with the cameras that went up where people were able to get into them for a little bit there before we discover that vulnerability.

So I I'm just expressing that that I want us to proceed with caution here.

Council member Olson.

Yeah, thank you.

Um I think that you know, as mentioned, everybody gets nervous about technology, but unfortunately, that is the future of what's going to happen, whether it's in policing, fire, I don't know.

The things that it's beyond my fathom, a lot of these things that are happening, and and so I always you know look the same way.

One of the things that interested uh me from uh earlier information was provided uh was the way the body cameras operate with translation capabilities and things.

Could you explain that a little bit?

Because I uh that wasn't in part of your presentation, but that was one of the things I found that you know helps the officers as well as people that need help and that we're going to make those calls and how we can make sure that we understand what their concerns are, and if especially if there's a language difference.

Yeah, so the the body camera itself has an auto-detect feature of it.

So uh Axon has certified up to 60 different languages that it will transcribe from.

So it has an auto-detect feature that uh the officer can push a button and uh the the subject of the person that they're talking to would speak to it.

It would identify that language and allow for an opportunity for the officer to speak in English, uh, translate into the the language of the native language of that person and then vice versa.

And then the flip side to that is then all that is transcribed into English so later the officer can utilize that for you know to be able to remember what it was and and be able to answer that, and then it can also be uh, you know, transcribed into the native language that it is.

So providing an opportunity for for both parties uh in those interactions to to understand and uh you know maybe cut out some of those gaps of uh missed information or misdirection there.

So one of the the thank you very much.

That was one of the interesting parts for speeding up what we do, but some of the uh interest that was coming out of this system plus other companies doing the same thing is that you know improving the efficiencies of the officers so they spend more time on the street, and I think you know, we have to determine is that gonna happen or not.

Uh but uh just give me quickly overview like a typical report when there is an incident or when an officer normally writes a report.

I've seen them in the cars type in a way and back at the office.

So how is that gonna be different?

What parts as is mentioned will they be doing and how do they screen it?

Do they review it in the car?

Do they go back to the station?

How does that work?

Yeah, so all the this entire ecosystem is about improving the efficiency of the officers, uh, to be able to get them back out in the street to be able to assist uh assist uh everybody.

Um and I fully heard uh all the conversations we've had with your concerns regards to some of this technology, but what it does is it takes the uh audio recording, not the video, just the audio recording from the body camera, it uploads it into evidence.com, which is the platform that uh stores all the videos uh that come with the body cameras.

It takes that audio and it puts it into what is called a first draft.

That first draft will formulate it into um you know what it what it believes that that police report based on the transcription, the information that was there.

And then the officer is required, we put safeguards in place that the officer is required to uh you know remove um they'll put sentences in there such as you know the unicorn was going down the street out of the skateboard.

So the officers got to read through the report to be able to capture that, capture that, and then it has inserts, it's got blanks that require the officers to fill in to fill in there.

Uh right now we're doing a trial period with the axon body cameras, fleet cameras, and some of these systems, and the draft one is part of that.

So we put parameters on there to start to be able to test um, you know, some of the concerns as far as you know, is it hallucinating putting things in there?

Because it's not a learning uh generative AI system, it is one that's built within it's not reaching out to the internet and gathering information.

Um, so right now we put it on just non-arrest reports is the only time officers can utilize it, so that we can look at it internally to see what that is, and as part of that, they have a tracking system where they have to put how much time it took them to do that, so we can see they really want well, they well, uh tracking is to how long did it take you to do the report, so then afterwards we can see is it efficient or is it not efficient?

Thank you.

I and again, we all know technology is in all of our professions, and so it's interesting, you know, and we just have to go through it.

And I think uh, you know, with this system has been tested across the country and is is the top rated one, I think, from what I understand in the country, and uh hopefully it's something that will uh make us a better and safer city.

And so uh I appreciate all the efforts on the background.

I know you've done been working on this for months to look at different options, different companies, and so I I hope I think it's important that we try to step into that future and uh make sure and that it works.

Number one, and then number two, that I think it will make a difference personally, but we're gonna see, I guess.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Councilmember Todd.

Thank you.

Mayor Pro Tem.

I I appreciate the uh presentation.

I I must admit I was somewhat skeptical in the beginning to a degree, simply because it's the largest expenditure uh for PD that we've ever had.

But I I look at this as part of the series of improvements that we have made over the last couple years, and with the first being the accreditation, and uh at the same time, the city has grown.

I mean, it to get to the roller dam, uh it it takes some time, and uh uh to get to other places in the community.

Uh we there's times when we our resources are are scarce.

Uh and so one of the things that really uh helped me through this process was the term that was used was the the appropriate response.

Uh by using this technology, oftentimes we can instead of having to send five, six squad cars to a call, we can gauge that in real time and make sure that it's uh it's an appropriate response so that we're not having to allocate resources from different places.

Uh it also helps for uh, you know, I I think of situations like uh uh not too long ago when we we had a situation in Cedar River, and uh we were trying to locate where that individual might have been.

Uh the the opportunity that we have to decrease a lot of the crime, the quality of life crime, whether it's garage break-ins, shots fired, or uh uh you know, large scale disturbances at night when the bars close, I think it's going to help us uh and not just by protecting the police, but by being able to protect the public at the same time.

And so I think it's uh uh I'm supportive.

Uh it's what you do, I mean, my constituents believe that public safety is important, it's an important core group in terms of what it is we do.

It's a priority.

And uh anything that we can do to decrease crime and improve the quality of life for for everybody, uh I'm gonna be supportive of.

At the same time, and correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe that we're gonna roll out uh a citizens committee that's gonna help us with uh, you know, with the process in terms of the technology as we move forward on this.

And so it'll be uh helpful to get their insight as we move forward.

But at this point in time, I think it's necessary to keep us on the cutting edge of of policing.

Councilmember Meyer.

Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem.

Um and thanks again for the update.

And for folks in the chambers and for folks that may be listening on Facebook, and um Councilmember Todd referred to it.

Uh, you know, we've been we've been having conversations with police department for months about this.

So this is a great example of my opinion of teamwork.

So not only have council been meeting with um CRPD and sharing feedback, but also other departments, and I have to give a shout out to our finance director who's now our acting uh city manager today.

But the feedback that you that I received from the police department was what an excellent job Avi did, and he stepped in at the end and was like ace negotiator to get more components and a lower price.

So thank you, right?

So this is all this working together.

And also one of the things that we talked about at these sessions uh before today was the positive impact it will have on recruiting and retention, right?

So if you're thinking about we're recruiting top talent into our police force, having the best technology is going to be something that is going to be exciting for them.

And then to the extent as as we become as the software becomes more sophisticated and we master it more, less admin time, right?

So they're actually on the street, we're you know, serving our residents and visitors, and not um, you know, in the car in the office doing paperwork.

So uh I'm I'm excited for the new technology.

Thank you.

All right.

Thank you very much for your presentation.

Thank you, council.

Yeah.

It is now time for the public hearings.

I remind everyone who wishes to speak today, whether during a public hearing or during the public comment or public input periods of a few matters to ensure we have an orderly meeting.

First, please remain at the lectern.

If you have any documents you wish to share with the council, please hand them to the police officer to your right as you are walking up.

The officer will take the documents from you.

Second, comments will be limited to three minutes per speaker.

When the light on the console in front of you turns yellow, you have one minute to finish your comments.

When the light turns red, your time is up, and you should leave the lectern.

Third, please be aware that all comments must be directed to the matter of the public hearing, and that abusive, obscene, loud, threatening, or irrelevant comments are not allowed.

Finally, we need to hold an orderly hearing.

So there should be no applause, booing, cheering, or other noise or disruptive conduct from anyone in the audience.

We appreciate your um abiding by those rules.

Does the clerk have any written comments or objections in regard to any of the public hearings on today's agenda?

For your honor, there were no written comments or objections filed.

Thank you.

Alright, thank you.

A public hearing, uh, public hearing number one.

A public hearing will be held to consider amending chapter 63 of the municipal code, offenses against public safety by repealing section 63.10B, fireworks and enacting a new six section 63.10B in its place to conform with Iowa Code.

Steve Mast, you are up.

Um, that's better.

Um, thanks for having me.

This is something we've been working on.

Updates chapter 63 um relating to fireworks uh in our city uh code related to changes in state law.

We've seen this once before.

I'll go through this quickly.

If anyone has any questions, um please let me know.

Um 6310B addresses fireworks use within the city.

Um this was amended in uh 2025 with the state law changing and it presents a uh prevents the city council from prohibiting or limiting the use of consumer fireworks on July 3rd, July 4th, and December 31st.

Current municipal code prohibits the use of consumer fireworks within the corporate city limits at all times, must be amended to comply with state code.

Uh another background, Iowa Code um also gives power to the Iowa Department of Inspections and Appeals to regulate the sale of consumer fireworks.

Uh section 6310B of the municipal code should be amended to reflect this regulation of power and refer to Iowa Code sections accurately.

So, what are the results of updating uh this ordinance?

Um it will align the municipal code with what is mandated under Iowa Code.

The ordinance still prohibits the use of fireworks outside of the dates of July 3rd, July 4th, and December 31st.

The ordinance still prohibits the use of fireworks on city property and the property of another person without their consent.

The city will still review and permit display, uh, fireworks, commercial grade fireworks, and the ordinance clarifies that a seller of consumer fireworks must have a consumer fireworks license issued by the Department of Iowa Inspections and Appeals.

Um the fire marshal's office recommends that we uh adopt this ordinance.

Thank you.

This is the time and the place for a public hearing on this matter.

Does anyone in the audience wish to address the council?

Let the record indicate that a public hearing on this matter has been held with no objections shown in the record.

That brings us to any council comments or consideration.

Seeing none.

The uh okay, so we have a I think this is the third reading of the ordinance.

Yeah, third reading of the ordinance, amending chapter 63 of the municipal code.

The adoption of the ordinance on its third reading has been moved by Councilmember Olson, seconded by Councilmember Todd.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Those opposed, no.

Motion carries.

Thank you.

Public hearing number two.

A public hearing will be held to review the status of the Catherine McAuley Center and Willis Dady Generator Projects funded through the Iowa Economic Development Authority.

Jennifer and Jay are here to present.

And when you're ready, you can go ahead.

Thank you and good afternoon, Council.

Jennifer Barton and Jay Wilson, community development.

We are here to provide the status of funded activities update for the CWG DR generator projects for Catherine Macaulay Center and Willis Daddy emergency shelter.

The community development block grant disaster recovery funding requires a mid-project update on all projects, including accomplishments and expenditures to date, remaining work to complete, and any changes to the project.

To provide some background, the state of Iowa, Iowa was awarded 57.5 million dollars in the disaster recovery funding in response to the August 2020 deratio.

Of that amount, the city received approximately 28 million, 15 million for the roots program, 9 million in multifamily new construction, 3.5 million for tree replanting, and 400,000 for the generator program.

The generator projects are installed at critical use facilities defined as places that help the community in a time of crisis.

The four funded projects are the two we are talking about today, Catherine McCauley Center and Willis State Emergency Shelter, as well as Eastern Iowa Health Center and the Salvation Army.

Okay, so council today we'll begin by looking at the developments at Catherine McCauley Center.

So as of to date, the accomplishments include the installation of one generator, including the accompany slab.

We were awarded 100,000 in CWGDR funding for this project, and to date our expenditures total out to 100,000.

And the remaining work includes uh final hookup and inspections.

Secondly, at Willis Daily emergency shelter, uh, our accomplishments to date include the installation of one generator.

Uh the total award funding for this project was 100,000 in C D B G DR, and the expenditures to date total out to 100,000 as well.

Uh the remaining work at this site includes again just final hookups and inspection.

And then lastly, as far as uh changes to the projects, we did initially uh encounter a delay as far as just shipping, but with our timeline, we're expected to be completed in the summer of 2026.

Thank you, council.

Thanks, Jennifer and Jay.

This is the time and place for a public hearing on this matter.

Does anyone in the audience wish to address the council on this matter?

Seeing none, let the record indicate that a public hearing on this matter has been held with no objections shown in the record.

That brings us to council comments, questions.

Councilmember Van Orney.

Thank you.

Just a quick reflection at Chief's uh goodbye celebration last Friday.

Um it reminded me that uh and was humbling to know that one of the more profound experiences in your career was also uh certainly one of mine, but you you have a little more tenure on me.

Um, I bring that up because when you and I went door to door um with the fire trucks illuminating uh the three buildings that lost their roofs on 12th Avenue, uh, knowing that we had nine languages, two translators going with us with flashlights and whatever floodlighting we could get from uh the engines.

Um, that was an incredible experience.

And uh all of those people ended up being relocated to Catherine Macaulay, um, and after which I got to know the families really well because it was through relationships that we earned their trust to move them to a safe location.

Um, I continued to visit them for I think it was probably three months, uh, until the last person through a lot of help with specifically Jennifer Pratt finding uh housing that was comparable or long-term shelter, particularly for those who had you know any mobility issues and and needed certain modifications to their homes, which we were certainly in short supply of housing, particularly short of supply of that.

Um but Catherine McAuley, I mean, you're not gonna get a more deserving place.

I just appreciate the resiliency that all the teams have done to share this up.

Uh both Willis Stady and Catherine McCaulay were light workers during this, and so I'm really glad that we will share this up so that should we have another event, we don't even have to think about that.

They'll just be um ready for whatever comes next.

So thank you and thanks, Chief.

All right.

There's no vote on this, so thank you.

We appreciate it.

Item number three: a public hearing will be held to consider the disposition of city owned land at 220 Ellis Boulevard Northwest.

Uh, Noah Zecker is here.

Noah, I'll recognize you.

Thank you, Council.

Uh, here presenting on the potential property disposition for 220 Ellis Boulevard Northwest.

Uh you can see the site overhead here outlined in blue with the yellow.

Uh, the site's about 0.7 acres, uh, is just one parcel, is currently uh a vacant lot with no structures, and is zoned uh UVR, which allows for multi-unit development of up to three stories in height, has access to all city infrastructure and is located in the 500-year flip line.

The city received an inquiry for potential uh multi-unit development in the location, um, and sensitive city property disposition must go through the competitive process.

Proposals would be evaluated uh through objectives outlined in the RFP, which are alignment with the Northwest Neighborhood Action Plan.

Preference for housing development, particularly higher intensity residential development is shown in the Northwest Neighborhood Action Plan and zoning compliance as well as financial feasibility.

And you can see on the right here an image of the map from the Northwest Neighborhood Action Plan with the lot uh in that red circle.

As for timeline, a development committee recommended this item to city council on May 28th, um, currently holding the public hearing proposals due a month from tomorrow on July 24th, uh, anticipating uh August 11th to come back to City Council for consideration and selection, and then the development agreement would uh follow in the summer or fall this year.

Uh in conclusion, staff recommends the approval of the resolution to initiate the request for proposal.

And with that, I'll pass it back to council.

Thanks, Noah.

This is the time and place for a public hearing on this matter.

Does anyone in the audience wish to address the council on this matter?

I do.

Great.

Please approach the microphone on the lectern, state your name and the community where you live for the record, and you have three minutes.

My name is Kimber.

I live in Cedar Rapids.

I'm standing here today to address the specific plans on today's agenda for the disposition of city-owned properties 220 Ellis Boulevard, 1026 Ellis Boulevard, 1221, 1223 Ellis Boulevard, and 1216 6th Street Northwest.

The resolution before you seeks to advance these properties through proposals presented by the city.

Noah Zeker, while uh City Hall is framing these dispositions as routine native neighborhood revitalization.

The community sees right through it.

This is a targeted blueprint to clear the historical working class time checked neighborhood and make way for a hand pick to development package.

Look no further than systemic attacks against AJ Dittmer and her family.

For years, AJ has stood at this very microphone, exposing how this city uses code enforcement.

Lobo offers an aggressive threat of eminent domain to force legacy residents off their land.

You push families out who have held these homes for generations.

Only to turn around and have staff, no offense, Noah, like Noah, present packages for the very parcels for redevelopment.

And at the last meeting, when Melissa and I stood up to question your transparency, you tried to weaponize your gavels and cut off our microphones.

You wanted to quiet the room because you did not want public comment and the public connecting the dots.

You didn't want them to see the connection between an outdated nine-year-old environmental data and Cedar Lake and predatory property grabs along Ellis Boulevard.

But you failed to keep it quiet.

The exposure of city halls overreach has gone completely viral.

Well over 500,000 people, which is far outpacing the population of our entire greater metro area.

The eyes of the entire state are on this chamber as we speak.

And how you handle this public land is front center front and center stage.

As a process server, my entire livelihood is built on legal compliance, accountability, and protecting due process and pushing residents out of time check while fast tracking corporate dispositions violates the core spirit of this community.

This council needs to put a full stop on the targeted enforcement against residents like AJ Dintmer and cease using city planning as a weapon for displacement and start protecting the families that actually built Cedar Rapids.

I lay in my plane.

Questions?

Councilmember Olson.

Yeah, noah.

As I remember, I think I drove by this piece just to check it out.

Is it's a vacant piece of property?

Yes, it is.

Thank you.

Seeing no further questions, the adoption of the resolution has been moved by Councilmember Todd, seconded by Council Member Van Orney.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Those opposed, no.

The motion carries.

Item number four, a public hearing will be held to consider the disposition of city owned land at 1026, 1221, and 1223 Ellis Boulevard Northwest and 1216 6th Street Northwest.

Noah, you're up.

Thank you, Council.

Uh shown here, you can see the properties in question 1026, 1221, 1223 Ellis Boulevard Northwest, as well as 1216 6th Street Northwest.

The sites are uh each approximately half uh or about half an acre in total.

Sorry, not each altogether.

Um it is four city-owned parcels.

Each are currently a vacant lot.

Uh, they are zoned UVG, UNR, and UVR.

They all allow multi-unit and mixed-use development of up to uh three to four stories in height, depending on the district, and sites have access to city infrastructure and are all located in the 100-year floodplain.

Uh the city received an inquiry for small-scale multi-unit residential development.

Uh, because your city owned property, the um they must go through the uh competitive process for disposition and will be evaluated uh per the objectives outlined in the request for proposal, which are alignment with the Northwest Neighborhood Action Plan, a preference for housing development, particularly higher intensity residential development as shown in the Northwest Neighborhood Action Plan.

Um the image shown here on the right uh circles roughly the area that the four parcels are in.

Um they will also be evaluated on zoning compliance and financial feasibility.

As for timeline, uh development committee recommended this item to city council on May 28th.

Uh, we are currently holding the public hearing.

Proposals would be due in uh a month from tomorrow on July 24th.

Anticipating August 11th to come back to council for consideration and selection, and then the development agreement would follow in the summer and fall of this year.

In conclusion, staff recommends the approval of the resolution to initiate the request for proposals.

And with that, I'll pass it back to council.

Thanks, Noah.

This is the time and the place for a public hearing on this matter.

Does anyone wish to address the council?

Sir.

Please approach the microphone, state your uh name and community.

Joshua Chandler, and I live on the northeast side, but I care about all of Cedar Rapids because I have family that lives on the northwest side.

These properties used to be single plot homes, correct?

Well, I'm gonna encourage the council and encourage uh this everyone in the city to maybe instead of trying to make multi- multi-uh-functional, multi-unit systems that are so expensive that nobody in their right mind in today's freaking economy can afford them, and maybe now is the time to encourage independent one house, maybe two duplex type units being put in so that maybe we can get some of this housing issue that we have throughout the city, throughout the state, throughout the country sorted out.

A little bit of that might be a little bit of assistance for people in this in the entirety of our country, because you know, we don't have 15 million dollars to make an apartment building.

We can't afford some of us can't afford three, four, five, six, seven, eight hundred dollars in rent a month just because some jack-a-hole in Chicago thinks that that's what this place needs.

No, we need local.

Everything needs to stay local and affordable.

With that, I'll leave you.

Thanks for your comments.

Is there any other input?

Please approach the microphone, state your name and where you live.

I just wanted to commend you on your decorum today, Mr.

Olson.

Thank you.

My name is Kimber.

I live in Cedar Rapids.

I wanted to also play off of what Mr.

Kari was saying, that we do need affordable housing in this city.

I'm not against the city getting rid of city lots.

Uh I actually have engaged in a deal that you don't need to know about till it's done that's gonna require an offer on a city lot, however, I don't understand why we're selling these to a private developer.

Why can't we give them to somewhere like I don't know, Habitat for Humanity, so that we can have some single family homes here that are affordable?

I mean, what better way to cause a homeowner to take pride in the place that they live than to be part of building that home?

And if this floodplain, which you guys said it's a floodplain, wasn't suited for people like AJ Dittmer, which is why you wanted her out.

Why are we putting high rises down here?

The real question is who's getting the kickback?

Somebody is it you, you, you?

How about we start serving the people of Cedar Rapids?

And by the way, everyone, I'm running for councilwoman at large, Kimber for council.

Thank you.

Is there anybody else that wishes to speak to the council on this matter?

Please approach the microphone.

State your name and community where you live for the record, please.

Hi, my name is Could you thank you?

My name is Kira Little Sky, and I was born and raised here.

I grew up on First Avenue, like right there on First Avenue.

If you lived here a long time, you know who I am.

Because you've driven up and down First Avenue and seen that little brown girl riding her little orange oli thing up and down the sidewalk.

These were communities, these were neighborhoods.

You go in there and you trash them out, and oh, it's all cleaned up now, and you want to put in big projects, and that's what they are.

They're not condominiums, these are low rent high rises in 20 years.

From what I hear, they're already that.

The brand new one by the library heard the security doors are broken.

People, homeless people wandering the hallways, peeing on floors, harassing people.

I live in just a smaller building, which was all in the 40s, made into a really nice, you know, fiveplex.

We had a lot of those.

You tore those down for development.

We need more single homes.

What did we lose during the flood?

We lost thousands of tiny homes, small homes that were built here in the 30s that were affordable, that people were proud of.

They had their own little space.

I haven't seen any of those rebuilt.

I haven't seen one neighborhood rebuilt.

That tells me you don't care about the community.

That tells me you don't care about the people that live here.

You only care about bringing in.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Anybody else wishes to speak on this matter?

Please state your name in the community where you're from.

Melissa Duffield, First Amendment reservation.

Um I know some of you are from Chicago and you're not around here, and I know some of you don't care because I have you on recording saying you don't care.

But you know, people like Skye, people that come in and spend their time to speak on this.

You guys have created a paper trail and a video trail all the way back to the flood.

And if you think there is no Statue of Limitations on fraud and defrauding the federal government, and telling someone like AJ that she has to sell her house because it's in a flood plane, and the bullying and harassment that is happening with elderly citizens who have those homes that are their lives along this river.

So you can put up your, as Skye was saying, pretty uh little projects that are not good for our community because everybody deserves to have grass and safety and not be put in a pine box to die, which is what these are.

Our rent is also doubling in this town because of the data centers that you all claim are so good for us.

So these are not good for our community, and it will be handled.

You already have one lawsuit.

There are more that are going to be coming.

And I don't trust you in your FOIA's as last time.

You guys said you were gonna FOIA, and we got Chavez over here charging uh $350 on the mayor's baseball bat incident to get even a name or an actual report number because you gave me a fake one.

So we have some serious concerns about these projects, and we do have serious concerns, as I spoke before, about these cookie cutter projects going to the same developers, and some of these developers having criminal backgrounds.

That's very serious to us, um, because I want to put a past them on who they're putting in there, and I do believe we have mortgage fraud and embezzling and all kinds of lovely little organized crime syndicates going on here, and that's why you guys don't want to listen.

But the problem is we're gonna start getting louder and simple things like this taking a home lot to put a little buddy on to make a bunch of millions of dollars and make crappy complexes that they are now selling, by the way.

Don't think we're not stupid and we can't figure it out.

They get all the TIFF money and then they sell them, and there's no accountability for building pieces of crap, and a lot of them like Van Orney's little friend and what he's doing, they're not even should be passing permit or code, but yet they are because of it's all who you know.

So, number one, please listen to your constituents, build communities, not profit, and you guys do have a responsibility to that, and the types of crimes that have been committed are going to be called out.

Thank you.

Is there anybody else who wishes to speak on this matter?

Let the record indicate that a public hearing in this matter has been held with four objections shown in the record.

That brings us to council comments, consideration, Councilmember Meyer.

Thank you, Mayor Portam.

Uh no, I have a question.

So can you just clarify when we say we're authorizing the disposition of this land?

So that basically opens up the RFP process.

Yes, and then and then any developer or individual who's who's interested in building on that property can submit a proposal.

Yeah, any individual or organization could submit a proposal for development.

Okay, thanks.

Um, and then uh I also have to say to think that anyone on city council or city staff is trying to bully and make life difficult for a resident is absolutely absurd.

Um, and I would also say, too, which was this, this really surprised me.

I went, I know there was a reference to Habitat for Humanity.

Uh recently, I went on a tour with um Cedar Valley Habitat for Humanity, and um there are actually more homes than demand for for those houses.

Very surprising.

Um I just thought I would share that note.

Thanks.

Councilmember Van Orney.

Thank you.

Uh Noah, just to clarify, you talked about the fact that um part of this RFP can can allow for some small unit multi-residential.

Is that correct?

Uh yes, that's correct.

And to clarify, you said that up to three, was it three or four stories?

Uh yes, three of the lots are up to three stories, and the one on sixth street is up to four.

Okay, and duplexes are considered multi-residential, correct?

Uh yes, that is correct.

Okay.

Um, thank you for clarifying that.

I think there's just some confusion before.

Um, to Councilmember Meyer's point.

Um, if Habitat for Humanity would like to bid on these, like they have in many other projects, would they be eligible to do so?

Certainly.

Great.

Um, and also just to further a point that council member Meyer brought up at the last development committee meeting.

Um uh director Pratt had shared that we do have many units available still for purchase.

That is it's a city incentive program where we can co-share the cost of that, uh, but we don't actually have a lot of applicants that are applying for those.

So there are units that are available uh for that that would certainly be cheaper than uh most rents are, um, but we are we're looking for people who would like to have those homes.

We'd like to put them in homes.

Um, and just lastly, if you can uh help me clarify as well.

Uh, what was the reason that these properties became vacant?

Was were these FEMA buyouts?

I cannot speak to that, I'm not sure, but I can get that for you.

Yeah, if we can follow up the next time that this comes to council, I think that that would be helpful.

Um, I know that we have at least one council member who uh you know spent their childhood in time check.

So it's certainly important to us.

We we understand the history of this area.

We're sensitive to you know all the different uh floods that this uh this area has had to weather, and um what city staff has done a really nice job of is exactly that building up communities.

Um it's been a labor of love.

Um this community this part of the community, the Northwest Neighborhood Association area has been hit repeatedly and probably the most ferociously uh through all of our various floods and further exacerbated by the Doracho, um, but it is rebuilding.

Um I do believe that the Greenway Project is going to significantly uh invest in this area, which is is something that is much needed.

I know it's been a long time coming and a lot of patience on this neighborhood, but um I do believe that the homes that are there are very well built.

Um, they're built with integrity, and certainly um it's it's been a pleasure to see the neighborhood come back live.

So thank you to city staff.

All right, I think you know, another good point here, kind of jumping off from uh council member Van Orney's comments is is the involvement of the neighborhood association.

It's a very active neighborhood association, and as you pointed out in the presentation, I think it's a great um kudos to you and the city team.

That one of the criteria is compliance with the neighborhood action plan uh that has gone through a lot of community development, particularly with the neighborhood association, and then the neighborhood association and will be involved in scoring and evaluating those applications as well.

Um it is a great neighborhood and it's uh a lot of energy there.

I think it's really one of the one of the jewels of Cedar Rapids and a lot of a lot of energy there.

Seeing no further questions, the adoption of this resolution has been moved by Councilmember Van Orney, seconded by Council Member Poe.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Those opposed say no.

The motion carries.

Thanks, Noah.

Item number five, a public hearing will be held to consider a change of zone for property at 2400 37th Avenue Southwest from AAG Agricultural District to SRL 1, Suburban Residential Low Single Unit District, as requested by Curtis and Colleen Bar Baines.

Seth, you're up.

Thank you.

Uh Seth Gunerson zoning administrator.

Um, as mentioned in the agenda, uh, the request is for a change of zone from the AG district to the single residential low single use district for property um that's located between 33rd and 37th Avenue Southwest.

This is an approximately just under six-acre lot.

Uh the rezoning request is being made to allow for a lot split.

The uh applicant who's the property owner is wishing to build a new single unit detached home on the property.

Here's a map showing the future land use map.

The property in question is outlined in blue here.

There's an existing home kind of in the center of the parcel accessed off of 37th Avenue Southwest.

Beverly Park is located to the south here, 33rd Avenue to the north.

This is in the urban low intensity land use area.

And here's the zoning showing the surrounding areas.

Most of the uh larger lot homes that exist in this area south of 33rd are zoned AAG agriculture, uh, which is um essentially land that comes into the city is zoned agricultural, and this land um has not really been developed within the city um since annexation.

So since they're requesting to do the lot split, uh they're required to rezone the property to a zone district that conforms with the comprehensive plan.

Uh the SRL one district that they're requesting matches um some of the existing single-unit residential homes in the area around it.

Here's an aerial uh showing the property where the new lot they're requesting is roughly in this green area here.

They're looking to build a new home accessed off of 37th Avenue Southwest.

And then here's a street view from 37th Avenue showing the area where the home will be built.

In terms of rezoning criteria, the requested zone district is um consistent with the comprehensive plan.

It's one of the zone districts that's permitted in that land use area.

Uh the city has no concerns with the ability of the land to um be served by city services.

Uh, there is uh water and sewer available um in the vicinity of the property, and the requested zone district is um of a similar character to other um development in the neighborhood that's happened in the last 10-15 years.

Uh, this went to the city planning commission on June 4th and was unanimously recommended for approval.

Staff and the city plan commission do a recommend approval of the request pending today's uh decision by city council.

The second and third ordinance reading could occur on July 14th.

And with that, I'll turn it back to the mayor perto.

Thanks, Seth.

This is the time and the place for a public hearing on this matter.

Does anyone wish to address the council?

Seeing none, let the record indicate that a public hearing on the matter has been held with no objections shown in the record.

That brings us to council comments.

Councilmember Van Orney.

Thanks, Mayor Partem.

Um Seth, this will be quick, but uh I don't have any objections to the zone.

Can you go to the okay?

Thank you.

Uh I grew up in this neighborhood and really familiar with uh this area before 33rd connected, um, you know, it used to just only turn off into 18th, um, and familiar with this plot of land as well.

One of the things that the neighbors have been talking about that I think we should address as part of this zoning or adjacent to it, is uh how it was built by a developer and now it's becoming uh uh maintain or maintained by the city, and they were talking about some uh stop signs in between some of the throughputs.

So, as like Royal Drive, I mean, that was years after you know I had lived in this area, it was built and connected to 33rd and then 33rd connected all the way down.

It's become full enough that there are still some of the development um streets where there are not stop signs at the end of them, and and people just uh anecdotally have explained that you know, cars are flying through there.

So, if we're going to add more housing, I think we do need to do a traffic study as part of this and just look for that.

I have specifically on Royal Drive been requested, I believe at that intersection of 37th and Rural Drive to have a stop sign there.

Um, so if we could just take a look at that and make sure that the neighbors are aware, again, as we intend to uh, you know, uh put more homes there, that would be really helpful.

Yeah, I'll pass along to traffic engineering.

Seeing no further questions, the approval of the ordinance on its first reading has been moved by council member post, seconded by council member overland.

All those in favor say aye.

I suppose no.

Motion carries.

Public hearing number six has been canceled at the request of the applicant, so there will be no staff presentation or vote.

However, does anyone in the audience wish to address the council on this matter?

Okay, we'll go ahead and move on then to item number seven.

A public hearing will be held to consider the proposed plan specifications form a contract and estimated cost for the FY26 downtown sidewalk repair project.

Estimated cost is 110,000.

Eric is here.

You're up.

Uh thank you, City Council.

Uh Eric Turnquis with Public Works.

Uh the downtown uh sidewalk repair project.

So the city is bidding as part of the citywide program to repair damage and effective uh sidewalk panels.

This contract will have 19 properties in downtown area that are being replaced and repaired.

Public Works has met with and sent out notices to the properties impacted.

We've met with property owners to discuss their options to repair the panels on their own or to be included with this contract that the city has for the repair work and to be assessed.

This project is to match the city council's priority for strengthening and stabilizing neighborhoods by making improvements to the right-of-way sidewalk for everyone to be able to travel safely and have full accessibility.

As noted already, the public works has coordinated these project these sites with property owners as well as reaching out to like the downtown SMID and others to coordinate on the construction timing and the work around planned events.

Public Works recommends the approval of the resolution to adopt the plan, specs, foreign contract, and estimated cost of the project.

Thanks, Eric.

This is the time and place for a public hearing on this matter.

Does anyone in the audience wish to address the council?

Seeing seeing none, let the record indicate that a public hearing on this matter has been held with no objections shown in the record.

That brings us to council comments or questions.

Seeing no further questions, the adoption of the resolution has been moved by council member Overland.

Seconded by Council Member Meyer.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Opposed no.

And the motion carries.

Item number eight is a public hearing.

The public hearing will be held to consider the planned specifications form a contract and estimated cost for the railroad surface crossing improvements for 1st, 2nd, and 3rd Avenue Southeast at 4th Street Southeast project.

Estimated cost $290,000.

Eric, you're up again.

Thank you, City Council.

Air Turnquarts of Public Works.

This railroad surface crossing improvement project is the first, second, and third avenue, southeast at 4th Street Southeast.

Just some background on city geography for those not familiar with 4th Street.

It's the right-of-way between third and fourth, where the existing railroad tracks are as long as uh existing trails and sidewalks.

This project is uh place the approach to those railroad crossings as well as sub-install subdrain for improved drainage along the track area.

Uh this uh project is a partnership with Union Pacific Railway to do the repair at the approaches to the crossing.

They're at the same time the railroad is replacing the crossing panels.

Uh, these panels have reached their life expectancy and to ensure that the railway crossings have a smooth uh transversable surface.

Uh, the city's been working um hard to coordinate this project with UP IODOT farmers market and other downtown events.

Uh just kind of going back to that map.

Uh, second and third AV has been definitely a key area that public works has been working to coordinate with the farmers market since that is within their area of operation.

Uh, estimated cost for this project is 290,000 with a bid opening of July 1st.

Uh, construction is starting uh August 17th.

Uh, construction will start on second and third crossing first.

This is what's been coordinated with uh Union Pacific.

Uh, and then due to additional projects in the area, first Avenue will occur in October.

This is also the coordinate around the especially for e-race um later uh at the beginning of October, just to make sure construction for that first avenue crossing is not impact that with that uh public works recommends the approval of the resolution to adopt the plan specs foreign contract and estimated cost of the project.

Thanks, Eric.

This is the time and the place for a public hearing on this matter.

Does anyone in the audience wish to address the council on this matter?

Yes, Ms.

Dono.

So my father worked for the Iowa Department of Transportation for more than 35 years, and specifically in planning and safety.

I understand the importance of taking care of these railroad crossing arms before they eat reach the end of their life cycle.

However, I think $300,000 to replace six, basically six ramps leading up to these railroad tracks and concrete is an awful lot of money.

And I was actually just down near the train tracks on Saturday at Cedar Lake, and I saw an awful lot that we're gonna talk about later.

I would highly advise that this council redirect those funds to cleaning up what's going on down there in the train yard.

And with that, I land my plan.

I'm assuming that's an objection.

Should I write?

Okay, thank you.

Any of anyone else wish to address the council?

Seeing none, let the record indicate that a public hearing on this matter has been held with one objection for the record.

That brings us to council comments.

Councilmember Meyer.

Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem.

Uh thanks, Eric.

Um, and just to clarify, too, right?

So the 290, 290,000 is an estimate, and we often see actual bids come in less or significantly less than those bids.

Um, and sometimes they're over, and when they're over, um, we'll revisit, sometimes we'll revisit the scope of the project and you know, perhaps go back out for bid.

Like we we did, I believe, for the roundhouse.

Um, so we can, you know, we look forward to uh the actual bids coming in and see uh what the scope of the work is and if we can find a uh a qualified bidder for this work that's needed to keep our community safe.

Thanks.

Councilmember Vanorney.

Yeah, thanks, Mayor Potem.

Um Eric, how do we come up with these cost estimates?

Are they experts?

Are they lay people taking a wild guess?

What's the answer?

So I mean, every cost estimate is broken out by bid item.

So I mean, you have a lengthy list of bid items, and then each bid item is based off of um bid history that the city has.

Um if we don't have a bid item history, we can also reference DOT.

So I mean, there's quite a bit of thought that goes into creating these estimates.

We're just not pulling numbers out of thin air to come up with a cost.

Um, as kind of mentioned earlier, it's also includes drainage, not just the concrete approaches to those crossings as well.

So there's a number of um elements that the public doesn't always see when coming up with these projects.

But with these estimates, uh the engineers uh develop on definitely take some time and consideration to make sure we're relatively close as we can.

But it is hard with uh different um economic um movements of either materials or labor.

Um, if a contractor's busy or not to really figure out how it's gonna be bid.

Thank you.

Councilmember Overland.

Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem.

Just one quick question.

Do we have any indication upon completion of this project when the quiet zone will be able to take effect?

That's the question we've been asking for years.

Thank you.

Understood.

Uh and that questions um with these three being part of that phase A, um, understand the question.

Um, right now the city just finished up recently um some improvements to stickle drive, including installation curb and some concrete there.

Um, the city is coordinating with the railroad there to install the hardware for the crossing.

Um, that includes like the safety gates and flashers, and once that is installed, the city is able then to move forward with a notice of establish a quiet zone.

But um, we have been in coordination with the railroad um to get that completed as soon as possible.

Your honor.

Yeah, council.

Just one uh comment.

Incredible job on the Eighth Avenue.

Uh work.

That was done in a relatively complicated project, but at the same time, you were able to get that road open relatively quickly.

So congrats.

Thank you.

Seeing no further questions, the adoption of the resolution has been moved by council member Meyer, seconded by Council Member Olson.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye, those opposed, no.

And the motion carries.

Item number nine, a public hearing will be held to consider the proposed plan specifications form a contract and estimated cost for the 7th Avenue at Cedar River Water Main Improvements Project.

Estimated cost 2.56 million.

Grace Gutenkoff is here.

Grace.

Thank you, and good afternoon, City Council.

Grace Gutenkop with the Utilities Department.

This project is located at the Cedar River in the 7th Avenue Corridor between Valor Way Southwest and First Street Southeast, north of the Eighth Avenue Bridge.

This project includes the installation of 1,000 feet of 16-inch water main across the Cedar River.

Construction will include open-cut trenching of the water main with a coffer dam in multiple stages while maintaining river flow.

The purpose of this project is to replace the existing water main attached to the Eighth Avenue Bridge in advance of the bridge replacement project.

The engineer's opinion of probable cost is 2.56 million dollars with a bid opening scheduled July 8th.

Construction is expected to start in the fall of 2026 with completion in the spring of 2027.

The utilities department recommends approval of the resolution.

Thank you.

Thanks, Grace.

That sticks look a lot like an eight.

I needed the glasses for some reason.

This is the time and the place for a public hearing on this matter.

Does anyone in the audience wish to address the council?

Seeing none, let the record indicate that a public hearing on this matter has been held with no objections shown in the record.

That brings us to council comments.

Seeing none, the um the resolution has been moved by council member Olson, seconded by councilmember Todd.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Those opposed, no.

And the motion carries.

Thanks, Grace.

Here in the city of Cedar Rapids, we have two public comment periods.

The first period is an opportunity for the public to address the city council on any subject pertaining to council action scheduled for today.

A second public input period will come at the end of the meeting for residents, property owners, and business owners to speak on issues that are germane to the city but not on the agenda today.

Council members and city staff make themselves available by phone or email, but at this time during public comment, we are here to listen.

Please remember that all of the matters I addressed prior to the first public hearing today apply to the public comment periods as well.

And I think Ms.

Donahue, did you did you sign up to speak about that public hearing that you already did, or do you have another item that you wanted to speak about?

Okay.

Uh so please remain at the lecture.

And if you have any documents you wish to share with the council, please hand them to the police officer to your right.

Public comments are limited to three minutes.

All comments should be directed to the manners you wish to address, and abuse of obscene or ill relevant comments are not allowed.

There should be no participation or disruption from the audience today.

There's one person who signed up to speak during this public comment period, Ms.

Donahue, if you'd please approach the microphone and begin.

If you could also let us know which agenda item you're talking about, that would be appreciated too.

So I'm here to just speak on the overall items being passed today, which is allowed on the packet.

Um I'm gonna need you to identify a specific agenda item.

It says that this is a public comment period for anything regarding council action today.

Yeah, so I need to know this.

I need to know that just if you could please identify an action that we're taking today that you're gonna speak about.

Right.

So I am speaking about the action that you just took, which was to pass the preliminary statements about the properties along Ellis Boulevard and in the time shack area.

We had a public hearing, and you were able to speak during that time.

This is just for agenda items that are the public not the public hearings.

If you'd like to speak on an agenda item, we're happy to listen, but I need you to identify an item on the agenda to which you're speaking.

Thank you.

Alright, so I'd like to speak about your resolutions for payroll, transfer of funds, and payment of bills.

Thank you.

Yep.

All right.

So if you've watched my videos or see me at this microphone before, you know I don't sugarcoat things.

And I'm a small business owner in this city, and I want to talk to you about your payroll that you're processing today.

You have several city employees, including your union negotiations manager, Edward Herman, that are attacking small business owners and citizens in this city.

Mr.

Meyer, I know you said earlier that you didn't, you find it very hard to believe that any member of this city staff or council would be harassing or trying to make life difficult for anyone here in this city, but I am here to tell you that the reason that I come back and back and back is because I live it every single day.

And when it comes to the overwhelming amount of information that I have about Mr.

Herman and what he's done, by the way, on your clock on company time, while clocked in here at City Hall, it would make your head spin.

There are several members of number one, your W-2 staff, number two, your elected staff that really need to be looked at with a microscope.

And as somebody who has a human resources degree and has worked in global HR, I'm gonna tell you right now that it does not look good when we're paying market lead salaries to people like Mr.

Herman, who attacks small business owners in the city, and he's negotiating union contracts.

My husband's in the union.

So that means that he's attacking a union family-owned small business while on company time for the city of Cedar Rapids.

Now, I'm not gonna charge you for this, but it is my professional recommendation as a highly respected international speaker on the subject, multi-award-winning thank you, that Mr.

Herman's position should be terminated immediately, and this should be his last check.

Because as you know, Mr.

Olsen, you're an attorney.

This is a huge liability.

And I have a lot of evidence.

Thank you.

That closes out our first public comment period.

Acting City Manor Deshpande, are there any changes to the agenda?

No changes to uh to the agenda on it.

Any council members need to recuse themselves on any agenda items or make changes to the agenda.

Councilmember Poe.

Yeah, thank you, Mayor Pro Tem.

Um I would like to recuse myself on consent agenda item 21 C, line items 47 and 35, and on 22i.

All right, thank you.

Anyone else?

Councilmember Meyer.

One of these meetings, I'm gonna remember how to do this.

Yes, thank you, Mayor Pro Tem.

You're welcome.

Um, as previously communicated, uh, I would like to move um agenda item two I.

Oh, no, no, no.

I think it's signed the wrong thing.

28J.

Yeah, idemnification agreement with Google LLC for its use and operation of building one of the data center campus from the consent agenda to the regular agenda.

All right, thank you.

Thank you, Councilmember.

Thanks for your help.

All right, seeing none, that brings us to the motion to approve the agenda as amended.

The approval of the agenda is amended, has been moved by council member Todd, seconded by Councilmember Van Orney.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Those opposed, no.

The motion carries.

Thank you, council.

That brings us to the consent agenda.

The approval of the consent agenda has been moved by council member Van Orney, seconded by Councilmember Poe.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Those opposed, no.

This motion carries.

Thank you, Council.

That brings us to the regular agenda.

First item on the irregular agenda is item number 28 J.

Um, then if you guys just want to hold on just one second, we're gonna start with item number 28J.

Um, and uh Ms.

Chavez, if you would um address the council.

Yes, sir.

So this is an agreement that the both the city and the airport commission are signatories to.

The airport commission is the zoning administrator based on the proximity to the airport.

This was approved by the airport commission at yesterday's meeting.

The agreement allows Google to occupy the building while ensuring the commission retains full authority to take any action necessary to maintain its operations.

Thank you.

Thank you, Ms.

Chavez.

Are there any questions or comments?

Councilmember Meyer.

Uh thank you, Mayor Pro Tem.

Um, so I had a chance to read the um addemnification agreement.

Uh, and the one point that troubles me the most is were the sentence that reads, um, the nature and extent of potential impacts of building one through six have not been fully identified.

And when I, you know, if we don't fully understand the potential impact to our neighbors and visitors, um, you know, I think it's premature to uh issue an occupancy permit, even if it's a temporary permit.

I think we should better understand the risks, uh, identify the likely um impact and consequences if a risk were to occur, and really what we need to do to mitigate those risks.

Uh, I believe it is morally wrong to say in a fact that we are okay moving forward um with a data center to go live, even though those operations may harm our community, as long as we say you can't come back and hold the city responsible.

So uh based on that, I am voting uh not in support of this resolution.

Thank you.

Further questions, comments?

I think I just want to I just point out it I think there's a there's a number of things that are in the indemnification agreement, really led by uh the airport, which has the subject matter and expert jurisdiction.

Um this process is a little bit different because of the proximity of the site to the airport, in that um the zoning code, the city zoning code specifically calls out the airport as the zoning administrator to take the lead on these kinds of questions.

And um the agreement uh includes a number of things, um, the main item of which is the process by which the airport is going to go about determining the answer to that very question.

Um, and so the agreement actually puts in place that process that the airport will use to determine whether or not there is an impact um on operations, and so um I think it's important to move the um move the agreement forward so that the airport can go ahead and and get about that business.

Councilmember Van Orney.

Yeah, thanks, Mayor Pro Tem.

Um since the conversation's been open, I I do support exactly that.

Um I do think that as a council though, it is important for the same reasons I said cautioning about uh getting too excited about AI tools and getting ahead of ourselves without fully betting them.

I think the city staff has with great care, while interest has exploded in in just this year with data centers.

Um the city staff has taken great care for the last five or six years negotiating a lot of these terms and contracts.

And I find that they did that with this agreement as well.

Um my understanding is it actually puts us in a better position to answer um and uh get the results that residents have also been asking for about uh efficiency, reducing water consumption, um, you know, having a less uh lower energy strain on our residents.

Um, but I do think that it's important, and I have made uh this known to City Manager Pomerance that I I think we should really hold.

Um, I'm not a poker player, so if I'm using the terms wrong, I don't gamble.

Um, but uh just anecdotally, um, I don't think that we should continue outside of these two contracts that we have to uh be excited about adding more data centers.

I think what we've done has done a really nice job uh of you know monitoring these, but I do think as we're all learning, there's a lot to be studied with data centers, and I would encourage us in a separate conversation to uh pursue perhaps a moratorium and hold with these two projects and see how they uh hold up, make ensure that accountability that they do what they said that they were going to do for us.

Um otherwise, with regard to this indemnity agreement, I will be supporting it.

Councilmember Todd.

Council uh member Meyer, you pose a good question, uh and one that the that's fair to at least entertain.

I would I will be supporting this one at this time because uh there there's been a significant progress between the city and the operator in terms of the construction uh of the facility, and that has included the airport, and uh it comes at a time when the the whole concept of the design and development of these data centers has been fundamentally transformed in how they're doing these things, and I would suspect that by the time the whole process is done, they'll actually be doing them even differently than what they're doing now, all in the hope to put less strain on the things that you mentioned, the grid, uh the water in the area, and to minimize the impact on the airport.

And so I uh I I support this this uh this agreement at this point in time and welcome the discussion as we move forward on others.

Council member Olson.

Thank you.

Uh I think that uh it's a great question that David raised and uh what uh I did some research myself on looking at why it's here.

Well, we're in a unique position in that these data centers are located next to an airport.

So what it does is it puts an extra regulation on the data centers because of the federal government's air requirements for flights.

So what we're getting, besides us watching things, they have to go through a separate process doing the same thing.

That means they're getting double watched, and so I'm uh that's why I I support the fact that we want them to do that and to help us and help them uh determine that we're heading the right direction.

So it's nice having an extra eye on it besides us.

And I think uh I you know we have a great airport commission, great our airports doing well, and we and they don't want to be impacted.

We do not want them impacted, and so I'm I'm uh pleased with this agreement in the sense that uh they were working as a team to double watch them, and so that's what I support.

All right, seeing no further discussion, the resolution is moved by council member Poe, seconded by Councilmember Overland.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Opposed no.

And the motion carries.

Agenda item 29 report on bids for the Cedar Lake Amenities bid package three recreational amenities project.

Estimated cost is 3.95 million dollars.

Um Ben, I'll recognize you.

Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem, Ben World, and Matt Johnson with the public works department.

This bid package included habitat and wetland restoration on the north end of the lake, as well as a viewing platform for wildlife, which we're calling a bird walk, uh, overlooking that habitat as well as some vegetated floating islands.

The package also included trail reconstruction and accessible kayak launch, uh, ADA accessible, some of the site work associated with the challenge course that was bid as a separate bid package and uh restroom shelters with picnic benches and some fishing piers.

Here's an overview of the habitat improvements that were included on the bid package uh with native vegetation, and uh overview of the nature viewing platform uh which is a pier and uh floating islands, which again include native vegetation.

And here's just uh pictures of a couple of examples of ADA accessible kayak launches that uh can be used by uh all people.

This project bid on June 17th.

We only received one bidder, and uh the bid came in over the estimate.

The bid was five million seven hundred ninety-six thousand six hundred and fifty-four dollars and zero cents.

Uh we are currently recommending that this be rejected, and that will give us time to discuss with the interested contractors that didn't submit a bid uh some value engineering opportunities, how we can cut costs and also see if there's a way to repackage this work and get more interest for more contractors on a future bid.

Public works department recommends approval of the resolution.

Thank you.

Thanks, Ben.

Questions?

Council Member Meyer.

Thanks, Mayor Proton.

Can you go back to the first slide?

It had the picture and some bull.

This one.

Um I have to be grounded by where the sag wagon is.

Can you can you give me some?

Is it like below that accessible dock and kayak launch?

Is that yes?

Yeah.

So that's kind of like right here.

Okay.

Um that's what I thought.

All right.

So then the um the habitat wetland restoration.

And my apologies if you had shared detail about this in our uh previous meeting.

Can you share some information about like the scope of that project and the nature of that project and how much of this?

Yeah, just if you can just provide some detail there.

Thank you.

So it includes some wetland plantings, and uh would basically re-establish a wetland area that would be habitat for wildlife, especially waterfowl in mind.

Uh we've been coordinating with the Autobahn Society and and uh some folks that are really interested in seeing this area with trees and the wetland plantings uh be restored.

That's great, that was helpful.

Um, so this doesn't really include any um cedar lake cleanup per se, right?

This is okay, all right.

Thank you.

Councilmember Poe.

Thank you, Mayor Protam.

Um, so Eric, um, one real quick question.

Um I was down there yesterday, and I and I I like re-establishing the idea of reestablishing these wetlands.

I think it's gonna be important because we have lost some of that, um, that would be able to manage some of our waterfowl.

My question, I guess, maybe goes to Carrie as well.

Um, in that um, what are we going to do to maintain that area as we're attracting more waterfowl there?

And everybody has kind of a giggle because you have to dodge a lot of the bird feces uh just to get a walk around the around the lake and on the trail.

So I I really would like to know what the plan is in the future, and you don't have to answer that now, but if you could get that out to can't uh council, how are we with adding these wonderful amenities, which I think are great.

I also want to have a clear understanding of how we're going to keep it clean so that people can be down there to enjoy it, not feel like they're in the middle of all of the goose stuff.

So thank you.

Councilmember Van Worty.

Yeah, thank you, Mayor Partem.

Um, can you go back a slide?

Okay, um, so if you look at, for example, Google Maps, um, it's actually including uh on the other side of the Chicago Central and Pacific Railroad line as Cedar River or sorry, Cedar Lake.

Uh, what part do we own and what part does, for example, cargo own?

My understanding is they own the South part.

No, it's all ours.

Yes, okay.

Um, and so for this project though, we're only talking about the improvements to the northern part, yeah, and uh this is an amenities project, uh mostly around the lake, uh, majority of it.

Okay, thank you.

Councilmember Todd.

Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem.

Uh, thanks for the presentation.

Uh this piece simply handles the has nothing to do with the water, uh it handles the recreational amenities on on the shore.

Um one was more disappointed at the bids than probably me and the rest of staff when they came back higher than what was anticipated.

And the lesson we learned was a couple things.

We bid it out in the middle of the busiest season.

And if you look at the bid, it's a complicated bid.

There's 78 separate items, and you know, just to speak to some of the contractors, that's pretty labor-intensive for guys that just move dirt all the time, and so uh uh they uh we we believe that we can break it out into smaller packages to continue with the uh the progress that's going on down there.

Council Woman Poe makes a good observation.

Now, if you notice that some of the recent improvements there, there is a lot of riprap.

Geese don't like riprap, but until the entire lake, until this this project's done, you're gonna see geese on one site.

They're not dumb, they're going where there's no riprap, and then they go over where people feed them.

And so they're they're there because of uh they get a lot of food down there.

And so, but that will be a piece, and we used to have a pretty a little bit more of an aggressive strategy for geese mitigation, and I would suggest that we'll probably see that again, but we'll bid it back out.

Thanks for your help on all this, and we'll see you soon.

All right, seeing no further questions, the adoption of the resolution rejecting the bid has been moved by council member overland, seconded by council member Meyer.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Those opposed, no.

The motion carries.

Thanks, gentlemen.

Item number 30 is report on bids for the Tower Terrace Road Northeast Interchange with I 380 West Median Landscaping Project.

Estimated cost is $380,000.

So welcome back, Eric Turnquist.

Eric, you're up.

Thank you, City Council.

Uh, just an overview of this project.

Uh, this is to improve the medians on the west side of Tower Terrace Road and I-380 interchange.

Um, this project will include the installation of pavers, concrete splash guard, uh trees, shrubs, and ornamental grass.

Uh, city uh works to ensure the vegetation selected um is uh native um and also to prioritize um species that would be um durable for these areas.

Uh the project late start date is August 17th, with construction completion date of uh October 12th.

Uh the bid opening was on June 17th with three bids received.

Uh, these bids bids ranged from 369,480 to 396,984,000.

Uh public work department recommends the approval of the resolution to the ward the contract to the parent low bid of Rochi Construction Company, the amount of 369,480.65 cents.

Thanks, Eric.

Any questions?

Seeing none, the resolution, the adoption of the resolution has been moved by council member Olson, seconded by Councilmember Todd.

All those in favor say aye.

Those opposed, no.

The motion carries.

Item number 31, report on bids for the Jordan Well number one ASR system project.

Estimated cost is 3.7 million.

Brandon Jennings is here.

Brandon, go ahead.

Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem.

Council Brandon Jennings with the utilities department.

To recap, this project will drill a new well approximately 1500 feet deep into the Jordan Aquifer for a new aquifer storage and recovery, also known as an ASR system at the Northwest Water Treatment Plant.

This project is limited to the drilling and development of the well only.

The construction of the well house building chemical feed system process piping and other site improvements will be performed as part of the Northwest Treatment Plan Expansion Project, which is currently in design.

The well is expected to be completed in February 2027, and the overall well house and ASR system is expected for operation in late 2028.

The engineer's opinion of probable construction cost was $3,700,000.

Three bids were received for this project on June 10th.

Uh two bid alternates were included.

Alternate one was for a different grade of steel for the well casing, alternate two was for off-site hauling and disposal of construction waste.

The bids, including alternates one and two, ranged from five million one hundred and ninety-three thousand five hundred dollars to seven million eight hundred and twenty-one thousand one hundred dollars.

Gingrich Well and Pump Service was the low bidder.

We believe, um, just as a side note, that the bids came in higher than estimate because of several factors, including cost uncertainty related to the construction material market and fuel currently, as well as several unavoidable site-specific risk factors that were difficult to estimate.

We had also budgeted six million for this project, uh, based off of bid results of nearby projects.

So this bid result still falls within our budget.

The utilities department recommends awarding the contract for this project.

With that, I'll turn it back to the Mayor Pro Tem.

Thanks, Brandon.

I appreciate the clarification on the budget number as well.

Are there any questions, comments?

Council Member Olson?

Yeah, I I know this is one of these unique projects.

It's hard to find, you know, it's a specific bid here.

And I would hope, I don't know who the engineer was, that uh if there was that range, I think that should show on your presentations.

You know, if it's gonna be a range, because we've had these happen before at the public uh the waste facility where there's you know it's so unique or just one bidder, and the in the engineer, you know, it's just all timing and how busy are they and with all these things.

But I think you know this needs to be clarified because it's hard for the public to understand, you know, one way or the other.

And we knew there was going to be a difficult project, and so I think the clarification is important to note that we did have a range before which has been budgeted.

We were hoping for the lower end, I assume.

All right, seeing no further questions.

The adoption of the resolution has been moved by council member Todd, seconded by council member Van Orney.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Those opposed, no.

The motion carries.

Item number 32, report on bids for the 2026 J Avenue water treatment plant roof replacements and repair project, estimated cost of 2.1 million dollars.

Terry Tatemans here.

Terry, you're up.

Good afternoon, Prot Mayor Pro Tem.

Good afternoon, Council.

Terry Tedon with the utilities department.

The utilities department has nine structures that require roof rehabilitation.

Eight of these structures circled here in red are located at the J Avenue Water Treatment Facility.

And the other is the dam gatehouse located at the west end of the E Avenue Bridge.

Roof replacements are required on three structures, and roof repairs are required on six structures.

This improvements project also includes replacement of damaged coping stone, new gutters and downspouts, and masonry tuck pointing.

Two bids were received on this project on June 10th.

The bids ranged from 1,267,140 to 2,297,750.

The Black Hawk Roof Company was a low bidder.

The engineers' opinion of probable construction cost was $2,100,000.

The work is anticipated to begin in July of this year and to be completed in August of 2027.

During the bidding process, the 1949 building, which was to have a roof replacement, was removed from the contract due to considerable structural repairs that were above and beyond what we were ready to that we were bidding out at the time.

Hence the much lower low bid than our original item.

The utilities department recommends awarding this contract of the two uh 2026 J Avenue Water Treatment Roof Replacements and Repairs to Black Hawk Roof Company in the amount of one million two hundred and sixty-seven thousand one hundred and forty dollars.

With that, I'll turn it back to you, Mayor Proto.

Thanks, Terry.

Questions?

Comments?

Seeing none, the adoption of the resolution has been moved by Council Member Van Orney, seconded by Council Member Poe.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Those opposed, no.

The motion carries.

Thanks, Terry.

That now brings us to the ordinances.

Uh item number 33, an ordinance vacating a.053 acre parcel of street right-of-way adjacent to Fifth Street Southeast between 10th Avenue and 11th Avenue Southeast is requested by OFBLC.

The approval of the ordinance on its second reading has been moved by Councilmember Overland, seconded by Council Member Meyer.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Those opposed, no.

Motion carries.

Thank you, Council.

Councilmember Poe.

Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem.

I move the role requiring three readings on three different days be suspended and the ordinance be adopted on its third and final reading.

The adoption of the ordinance on its third and final reading has been moved by Councilmember Poe, seconded by Councilmember Meyer.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Those opposed say no.

The motion carries.

Before we vote on the resolution for this items, council have any further comments.

Seeing none, the adoption of the resolution has been moved by Councilmember Olson, seconded by Councilmember Todd.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Those opposed say no.

And the motion carries.

That closes out our formal business today and brings us to our final public input period.

This is an opportunity for Cedar Rapids residents, property owners, and business owners to address the city council on any subject pertaining to council business.

If you are not a resident, property owner or business owner, you will not be permitted to speak.

But we encourage you to email or call council members and city staff with your comments.

As with the earlier public comment period at this time, we are here to listen.

I will remind everyone to remain at the lectern.

Comments are limited to three minutes, and there should be no abusive, obscene, loud, threatening, or personal comments.

If you have signed up to speak, approach the microphone when called upon.

The first person signed up is Thomas Peake here to speak to us about trails.

And Mayor Pro Tem Olson, City Council members, citizens of Cedar Rapids.

I want to give you five seconds on a Cedar Rapids trail.

It is a beautiful day, and a young mother is with headphones on, is taking her three-month-old child and Labrador Retriever for a stroll.

Second one.

A 25-year-old e-bike rider with no helmet, shirt, or shoes comes over the top of the hill doing a wheelie at 50 miles an hour.

Second two.

The dog is smart.

He has seen this scenario before.

He immediately exits the trail.

Second three.

The mom does not hear the e-bike and is pulled down on the trail by the dog's lead.

Second four.

The mom pulls down the stroller as she falls.

The three-year-old child spills out onto the trail.

Second five.

The e-back rider is still doing a wheelie at 50 miles an hour.

He tries to avoid the child, but just as he leans to the right, he hits a large crack in the trail and goes airborne.

Then I woke up in a cold sweat.

I've had this nightmare before.

So I don't know how anything about maintaining a trail, the governance of trails.

I can only give you an opinion of what I see.

I get on the trail every other day and ride my bike.

Okay.

The first thing is child helmets, child helmets, and child helmets.

The first three things.

Children should be wearing helmets on the trail.

And I have passions about that.

If Cedar Rapids ever wants to give away helmets to children on the trail, I'll donate the first hundred helmets.

Okay.

That needs to be done in there.

There are about, I rode today, but there were about a third of the children had helmets on.

The others didn't.

Um we have uh a uh new bridge coming across the Cedar River.

I never did hear that uh we had a boat or bike accidents, but we're gonna have a new bridge.

I would suggest if you get any more bridge money that you might spend it on the um 380 and 42nd street crossing.

I almost got killed there a couple of times, so that's all.

My time's up.

Is it or do I have another minute?

It is up, it's up.

Yeah.

Thank you very much for letting me speak.

Thank you.

Next is Daniel Franklin talking about police reports.

I'm not a public speaker.

My name's Daniel Franklin.

I live on the Northwest Side.

I've been here back in Cedar Rapids for about five years.

I came from uh Las Vegas during the pandemic.

They closed the, they closed the strip down.

I came back, I moved in the Westdale apartments.

I took a 85 year old to get a free phone in front of the Westdale uh office.

A man attacked him because he had a uh an American hat on, Vietnam vet, he was extorting money from him.

I'm an alpha male, and we need more alpha males in this city, and they are extinct.

Uh I saw him attacking this man, call raising his hand, calling him all kinds of names, trying to get money from him.

So I went over there and told him, you know, bunchly, he's a Vietnam vet.

Why don't you leave him alone?

He turned his aggression towards me through a punch, nicked me in the uh jaw.

I picked him up and slammed him to the ground.

Uh I walked backwards, he got up, pulled a knife on me, came at me.

When the police got there, they told the old man to shut up.

They told me to shut up and stand there.

When someone pulls a knife on you, your adrenaline is up to here.

I've been trying to get that police report.

I finally got it.

It was a generic time, had no mention of the knife.

I saw it the day of it.

They had a mention of the knife, but it was at the very bottom.

That's one incident.

Uh drunk driver hits me.

Uh, and I saw him switch drivers, and the cops that were there, I said they switched drivers.

The guy came back in his truck.

I say, there he is right there.

And that man said to me, sometimes an eye witness isn't the best witness.

The far left police department and the far left city council.

I'm angry.

That's two incidences.

Uh it made it very difficult for get my money because the the my insurance agency uh, can't think of his name.

I'm sorry.

Uh he was in cahoots.

These far left people do things in cahoots with each other.

Absolutely unbelievable.

Uh there's seven other incidences.

I was at a house that renting a room, a man came in and uh well while I was sleeping, and what was one uh to assault me, it was uh Christine Dooland's ex-boyfriend.

I jumped on the bed to buy time because I just woke up.

I put him on the ground, I waited.

He took, bit me on my chin.

When the cops got there, they backed me up 25 feet to take a picture of my bite mark on my chin.

Absolutely unbelievable.

Uh I also play poker at Riverside Casino.

I wore a Trump hat in there and got so much action and so much money, it was unbelievable because of the far left.

DD holdings, special people, real special people.

Got me kicked out for a year.

I moved into one of their residents at 1834 First Avenue.

When they found out that I was there, they moved me into a garage with a hole in the roof.

I took pictures, all every one of the garages.

Your time is up, thank you.

Time is up.

Is that three minutes?

That's three minutes.

Your time is up.

Well, three more minutes.

Well, you can't.

So you can come back.

You can come back in there.

I said they already inspected the place.

Thank you.

I took the next up is Kira Little Sky speaking about policing.

Who are they?

I know who they are.

Mr.

Franklin, please sit down.

Your three minutes are up.

Thank you.

Hi, I'm Kara Little Sky.

I'm here to back him up on policing.

The police here are crooked.

I'm sorry.

I drove all the way to New Jersey shore last year.

Visit a friend, spent some great time.

Before I lost my old dog.

She got to run on the beach of the ocean.

So we had a good time.

I come home, you know.

I'm 50 years old.

I do not drink.

I do not do drugs.

So I decide I'm gonna take my friend out to get some dinner.

And I got a cup on me.

That's fine.

He follows me probably 10 blocks.

Turn, turn, turn, turn.

When I finally go to turn into Jim's foods, his last chance to pull me over, he pulls me over.

Not only are they rude and aggressive, the guy screamed at the top of his lungs.

Shut up to my passenger when my passenger was trying to ask a question.

This man was the most rude, aggressive person I have ever met, and he was half my age.

He accused me of having no license plate light, crossing the yellow line, and the car reeking of marijuana.

Well, none of that happened.

I have a dash can.

And I gave him my license.

He finally goes back to the car.

He comes back later.

Mad.

Madder than he was when he came up and started yelling at me.

You know why?

Because he pulled me over because I'm brown.

Those were all three lies.

He gave me the license back, and then he looked at me and said, You shouldn't be out tooling around with your friends.

You want respect?

You've got to give respect.

Especially the leaders.

You wanna why the things are coming back on the officers?

It's because we've got too many bad ones out there.

For every time that happens to one of us, we go home and tell our friends, and then you got a whole group of people that don't trust the cops.

Thank you.

Next up is Kimberly Donahue talking about Cedar Lake.

Good job, girl.

Thank you for coming today.

The last time I stood at this microphone, I didn't get to finish my three minutes because I dared to look you in the eyes and demand transparency on developer deals.

I was forcibly escorted out of this room.

You thought ejected me would quiet things down.

You thought cutting my microphone would make the truth disappear.

But you forgot one simple rule: you can't lock the truth out of this building.

When you kick me out, I didn't stop.

I went straight down into the community to dig deeper.

And what I found isn't just a lack of transparency and it's an active public health crisis, and you're trying to cover it up with a four million dollar marketing campaign.

Well, you were silencing me.

This council voted to advance the Connect CR Cedar Lake revitalization program project, pushing forward amenities package number three.

You are preparing to break ground on a playground, a nature walkway, and a kayak launch to invite families, children, and pets directly into a highly contaminated industrial shoreline.

We tested the water at Cedar Lake and specifically in the watershed runoff by the SAG wagon and on the southern portion.

By the way, the water connects under the train bridge, everyone.

It's all the same water.

It doesn't matter if they clean up the north side, it's dirty.

Your PR campaign says that the lake is stable, but the chemistry says that you are lying.

Our testing found a lead rating of 50 parts per million in the runoff zone.

That is 3,333 times higher than the EPA safety threshold.

The lead is a permanent neurotoxin, and you're building a children's playground next to a catastrophic heavy metal hazard.

Furthermore, our tests detected high levels of QACs and chlorine.

This definitive chemical proof shows industrial wash off water and heavy factory sanitizers.

Your defense will likely be that a pH of nine is legal, but your data is artificial over 11 years old.

The pH of nine is caustic enough to force heavy metals to settle.

You're running a chemistry experiment on a public lake and passing it off as safety.

You chose to protect municipal marketing over the people here, and we're demanding that you issue an immediate halt moratorium on all of your projects.

If you want to take your money and spend it somewhere, how about Manhattan Park in Ellis Harbor instead of a toxic lake?

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next up is John Lee, Morgan Valley Power Plant.

Hi, my name is John Lee with Save Morgan Valley.

I'm here about the Morgan Valley Energy Center.

This is the fourth time that I've stood here asking for one thing a public conversation about the city's role in water and sewer for the project.

When asked whether the city had any confidentiality agreements with the Morgan Valley plant, the answer was no.

When asked the same thing about the data centers inside the city limits, the QTS and Google, the city didn't answer no.

They said they needed time to gather them.

So it does seem the city holds confidentiality agreements just on the data centers on the on that side of a very thin line.

And the data centers planned out here next to the plant, rumor has it, is QTS, the same QTS.

So the city's planning to send Cedar App as water past the city limits to serve this build out.

I've asked, I shouldn't have to guess.

Mayor O'Donnell a month ago at the state of the city.

She mentioned something about data centers and the city's future.

She said that people who question them could be acting out of fear or mainly misinformation.

And that leadership means decisions grounded in facts.

So let's have the facts.

Release the water report alliance stamped confidential.

Tell us what the city has already committed, because rumor has it the data centers are moving to permit by year's end.

Whether this plant happens or not.

This is the fourth time I've asked.

If misinformation is the worry, a cure is a public meeting with the facts on the table.

My neighbors and I would live with the results.

And most of us live outside the city limits.

So under your rules, we don't get to stand here.

I get three minutes.

They get none.

So for the fourth time, put a public meeting on the schedule for water, this plant, the development around it.

Announce it within seven days.

And hold a special session after 5 p.m.

So working people and rural neighbors can be there.

It doesn't have to happen in seven days, just on the calendar with public notice within seven.

On the schedule within 30, please.

We'll hold it ourselves in Cedar Rapids.

Everyone speaks.

City limits or not.

No three minute clock.

You're all invited, the mayor, especially.

The public will notice who shows up.

You say you want facts.

So do we in public.

Thank you.

Next item or next speaker is Robert Hog.

Talking about sludge on property.

I'm wondering if I can pass around my containers here.

These are not peanut butter and potato salad.

They are sludge, brown, muddy sludge that poured down to our property, 2750 Otis Road Southeast, and settled on our property during the recent rainstorms on June 10th, 11th, and 17th.

This is from three square feet behind our garage.

And the sludge covered thousands of square feet in and around our garage, in our vegetables, and down the driveway, and our neighbors, the olders and the others got it worse.

This is from Kestrel Heights development that the council approved.

Over the objections of neighbors and the neighborhood association who told you that the Laneshka farm was not suitable for the style and density of residential development because of topography and soils, and who told you, among other things, there would be runoff problems.

And guess what?

There have been runoff problems.

So we knew there would be problems, but but this council dismissed those concerns.

We've had water before, but never brown muddy sludge pouring over and onto our property.

That's one of the things that happens when the city council dismisses the concerns of neighbors.

And allows development to destroy all the vegetation and remove all the topsoil and leave bare clay without a buffer, without detention, and without adequate silk fencing.

And you all know this is not the first time the council has dismissed the concerns of our neighborhood.

I could get into that.

New limits, new time limit.

So when you dismiss the neighbors and the residents, harm results.

Some of it is irreparable harm.

We certainly hope the city will make sure the developer is acting to prevent this from happening again.

But as a practical matter, we're stuck with thousands of square feet of sludge on our property.

Please start listening to residents and neighbors and stop causing harm.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next speaker is Melissa Duffield talking about corruption.

I'm gonna ask the audience to please observe the rules of no applauding so everyone gets their chance to speak.

Thank you.

Everybody else does it.

You guys don't allow it.

Transparency is not a slogan, Council.

We are not misinformation.

Transparency means subpoenas are answered, open records requests are answered without giant fees, contracts are public, exemptions are public, water data is published, flaw camas, audit trails, TIFF development, increment payments.

It's all public and transparent, but you guys seem to have a problem with this.

The Iowa Constitution says all men and women are free and equal with the right to life, liberty, property, safety, and happiness.

It is also says all political power is inherent in the people, and the government exists, meaning you for the protection of our security and property and benefit, not the other way around.

That means you work for us, not for data centers, not for developers, not for camera vendors, not for consultants, not for corporate donors, not for yourselves, for us.

And we are done being told to trust you because we've caught you in multiple lies, and we are done, including your preaching lecture at the beginning of this.

You should listen to it yourself.

You want to push data centers, power plants, and wells while residents face rising rents, rising utility bills, rising debt per resident, and almost a billion dollars in tax rebates and abatements.

You tell us this is good for us, but we can read and see the truth.

If these deals are so good, release every number, every water use analysis, every sewer capacity analysis, every well record, every rebate projection, and every public cost in detail.

Also, accept the liability of your decisions.

Dale Todd, do not call water concerns misinformation.

By the way, we can read actual data reports that yes, super funds go into our water.

Boom, you can take a look at it if you want to.

And um, Cedar Rapids Downtown is a documented contaminated site, the entire soil system of non-biodegradable dirt.

So congratulations on that, too, and ignoring it.

And residents like me just tested their water, and we have a nitrate level over 10 out of our tap water, yet the city advertises we have the best water ever, and it tastes so great.

The mayor tells us it's safe, and she even went stalking on one of my pages to try to pretend it's safe.

And we reject retaliation as go ahead and say whatever you want to say, Meyer, but I'm gonna go ahead and give these to you because this is the mayor directly telling a gang rapist to sue me.

And this is a mayor uh email I've received that said I should be raped and that I should be sanctioned and thrown in jail for asking questions.

So clearly, this um generational targeting of Cedar Red opinions, I'm sure Skye and many other speakers that have been speaking for decades, is well documented and well organized.

And while um public records requests go unanswered, well, we will continue and we'll start the lawsuits.

We will also pursue every lawful remedy available, including chapter 66 removal against any official, including all of you, okay, where the evidence supports willful neglect, misconduct, corruption, and abuse of office.

Do I have five people willing to stand?

Thank you.

Anyone that has any evidence, please contact me at LiveLaughLove007 at ProTime Mail.com.

The city belongs to the people.

Ms.

Duffield, I'm asking you one more time, please sit down.

More accountability and Christ is king.

Next next speaker is Joshua Candler, speaking about Cedar Lake and LGBT.

So the Cedar Lake has been called one thing for years.

It's been called the SLU.

Why is it called the Slough?

Because it's frickin' disgusting.

Why are we putting more recreational access there when people can die in that water?

But that's not my main point today.

My main point, I just am voicing support with the rest of the group because I agree.

We need to slow down.

In fact, I'd say pump the brakes until we completely clean out the water at Cedar Lake, pump it out, clean it out, get it done.

Be that as it may.

My main issue is two council meetings ago, we had a gentleman, the last gentleman on public comments come up and rally against the pride celebrations coming into Cedar Rapids.

One thing that Cedar Rapids has always been, and I am proud to say it, is open to everybody.

Not open to just a select group of people, not open to just straight people.

It's been open to everybody.

In fact, on this council, we have people on the LGBT spectrum.

So guess what?

I celebrate that.

For the gentleman that was here last on the second most recent council meeting, he asked the city to bring and allow the appeal to heaven flag to be used in city in official city methods.

I am here to say unequivocally, and I think I speak for everybody in this city when I say this.

We do not support any white supremacist bull in our city.

The flag of the appeal to heaven is now being used as a dog whistle to those who believe that white supremacy needs to stay.

Two, the civil war and the World War II, about this idea that white people are supreme to others.

No, it is not true.

It is not a fact.

And the fact of the matter is, we as a city reject it.

Now I need you guys to officially say that Cedar Rapids is not friendly to white supremacists.

Thank you, Mr.

Candler.

Our last speaker today is Julie Whitting talking about data.

Hello.

My name is Julie Whitting, live rural Cedar Rapids, and I'm not comfortable behind this microphone at all, but just to let you know that you're bringing a lot of farmers out of the woodwork with this data center, worrying about our animals, our family, kids, neighbors, everything.

This AI is nonsense.

We don't need that.

People are under the impression that we won't have our cell phones, won't be able to use Wi-Fi, all that.

All it is is pushing through quick to make big money for these predatory AI centers, using up our farmland, it's gonna harm health.

There's so many sites on that we can see in real time people that are living this and have been living it for the last year.

The devastation, and once that farm ground's gone, we don't have anything, and these will be decommissioned at some point, and we'll be stuck looking at them.

And the impacts are way too great.

So I hope you guys really stop and think.

We're not gonna go away.

And if you don't do the testing, we're gonna get it done.

So just so you know.

Thank you for your comments.

That's the last animal.

Are you a Cedar Rapids resident?

Yep, he is.

If you are you a Cedar Rapids resident, sir?

Yeah.

I'm a human.

Okay.

Yeah, we're only Cedar Rapids residents are allowed.

You're not allowed to that would be in violation of the 14th Amendment, you fascist bastard.

Would you please sit down so we can close out our meeting?

Thank you very much.

That closes our second.

Okay, everybody.

Okay.

That closes, that closes our that closes our second.

Council Member Meyer, okay.

That closes our second public comment period.

Before we move on, I just want to thank, I just want to thank the fire chief.

Okay.

Councilmember.

Councilmember Meyer.

We're gonna wrap up our meeting.

Please, okay.

Okay.

All right.

We're gonna take it in the mirror.

Seeing no further business to come before the council, Councilmember Meyer moves to adjourn, seconded by Council Member Poe.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Opposed, no, motion carries.

We're adjourned.