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

Welcome everybody to the Cedar Rapids City Council meeting for Tuesday, July 28th, 2026.

I'd like to note my council colleague, uh Councilmember Tyler Olson is excused from today's meeting.

I'd also like to rec welcome our acting city manager, our city clerk, and our city attorney, and thank you as always to city staff for being here today.

Appreciate that.

A reminder to those of you who are here to turn off any cell phones or electronic devices that might distract us from our meeting.

And as a reminder, the city council must remain an orderly meeting.

So we'll ask you to kindly review the rules of conduct for persons in attendance that are available at the entry and then project it onto the screen during those comment periods.

Disruptions to council proceedings will not be tolerated.

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

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

We will begin as we always do with an invocation by public safety chaplain Rick Gale, immediately followed by our Pledge of Allegiance.

I'd say thank you for the quality of leadership that we have in this community.

For our mayor, city council members, God, for the leadership of this of the departments.

God, they come in week after week and make themselves available to the citizens of the city.

Thank you, God, for their availability for us.

And now, Lord, I pray that this will be a time where quality things happen.

And I thank you for it.

Amen.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands.

One nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

We'll begin with a proclamation today.

This is uh the day of celebrating home ownership and community.

I'd like to invite those of you who are here to mark this proclamation to join Councilmember Poe here at the Dais.

Come on up, everybody.

Come on.

Just come on right up here.

Come on up and join us.

There we go.

This is fine.

Perfect.

Look at this is great.

Wonderful.

Thank you all for being here today.

This is a great crowd.

Congratulations.

So a proclamation from the City of Cedar Rapids, whereas home ownership plays an important role in building strong neighborhoods, supporting families, encouraging civic pride, and contributing to the continued growth and prosperity of the city of Cedar Rapids.

And whereas the City of Cedar Rapids has long been shaped by residents, businesses, and organizations committed to expanding access to home ownership and strengthening local neighborhoods.

And whereas in observance, dedication dedicated to home ownership, offers an opportunity to recognize the residents, neighborhoods, and organizations whose investment continues to shape Cedar Rapids.

And whereas celebrating home ownership and neighborhood pride encourages residents to take an active role in the well-being and the growth of their community.

And whereas the City of Cedar Rapids values initiatives that bring residents together in recognition of people and places that make our communities strong and welcoming.

I therefore, on behalf of Mayor Tiffany O'Donnell and the entire city council, hereby recognize August 7th, 2026 as 8-7 day, celebrating home ownership and community.

The observance recognizes the lasting contribution of homeowners, neighborhoods, businesses, and community organizations, while encouraging continued investment in the people and places that make Cedar Rapids a welcoming and vibrant community.

Thank you all.

I just want to say thank you very much.

We're with Real TA7W.

Thank you very much.

And homeownership, you said it very well.

And so thank you for your support.

And I see there's some things on the agenda today, neighborhood finance, some other things, all encouraging homeownership and support.

So thank you very much.

Thank you for all you do.

Thank you.

Thank you very much.

So we before we move on to our regular business of the meeting.

What a tremendous loss for a community.

Many of you, whether you saw him at the Mother Mosque or you saw him here as chaplain, oftentimes in our city council, it is a tremendous loss to this community in leadership.

And just want to extend our heartfelt thank you and gratitude to him and his family for all that they have done and supported the city.

And certainly to the Imam for his constant peaceful presence in what can be often chaos in these chambers.

So our thoughts and prayers are with our Muslim brothers and sisters in the coming days and months.

So all right, let's go ahead and move on with our regular uh meeting proceedings, beginning with a presentation we do have on the Neighborhood Finance Corporation.

Thank you so much, Laura Shaw.

I'll recognize you for uh getting us underway today.

Okay.

Hello.

Since 2018, well, let me first tell you, Laura Shaw, community development.

So since 2018, the City of Cedar Rapids and NFC have worked together with the local community to invest in neighborhood revitalization throughout our community.

Stephanie Murphy, the executive director of NFC is here today, and she is going to share a progress report and some updates on the work that they're doing.

Thanks, Laura.

Yeah.

Great.

Well, what a perfect day for us to be here since we're all about home ownership.

So so excited.

Thank you.

And so I just really want to start off with a thank you because what we're doing is only possible because we have the support of the city.

So I really appreciate it.

And it's been consistent and vigorous.

So we're very thankful.

So I am Stephanie Murphy with Neighborhood Finance Corporation.

We're a nonprofit mortgage lender that operates in Cedar Rapids.

We also are a neighborworks member as stated on this slide.

We updated our mission this past year.

Scott Overland serves on our board of directors, and we had a retreat and we updated it.

We're really proud of it and really figuring out like what we want to lean into.

And so we establish some values and what we feel that we bring to the table with a with the communities that we serve.

Our exciting news was that this spring we had increased our forgivable loan in Cedar Rapids a while ago to 15,000.

So every loan that we do has, I'm not going to go through all of our loan products because hopefully you know them, but we are a renovation lender.

Um we help people that are buying homes as well as people that are own the homes in the neighborhoods.

And I have our lending map soon coming up, but we um do a $15,000 forgivable loan that comes from the City of Cedar Rapids funding that is paired with our own capital.

And so we increased to match that our down payment assistance that we provide to home buyers to 15,000, so they also can get that when they're purchasing a home.

And we've really seen that change as well as some other changes we've made, get people across the finish line that weren't on home buying as we see prices rise and interest rates remain high.

This is where we lend in the city of Cedar Rapids.

I do want to say, like if you're ever working in your um area and you feel like we're not covering an area that we should.

There's older homes there, people are um struggling to find financing to fix them up or to purchase homes because you see turnover.

We're we're open to changing these areas, but we do cover a good chunk of the city, and um it has led to some success here.

This is what we did in FY2026 as far as the update.

Um we have experienced really a lot of growth.

You may know our story from me being here previous years, is that we were doing great when we started.

We closed our first loan in January of 2019.

The Giracho came, and we really pivoted to patch working with that group because people weren't focused on getting home improvement loans.

It was a tough time, as you know more than anybody here in this community.

And so we leaned into what we felt was important at that time, and then we've restarted our core lending programs.

We continue to offer them, but it wasn't where we were focused.

So we really we met our goals, exceeded our goals last year for Cedar Rapids.

We're working towards 75 closings a year.

The goal for calendar year is 55 for Cedar Rapids, and we believe that we will meet that.

So last year we did 1.2 million dollars in renovations and 462,000 in forgivable loans.

And you can sort of see like how we're leveraging your funds as well as the increased value that we're seeing for each loan that for each dollar that you all are investing.

Like I said, we do offer down payment and closing costs.

So the majority of those down payment loans go to our home buyers.

I think 100% of the purchases in Cedar Rapids last year were received down payment assistance through us.

Sometimes it's not even just our money.

We partner with the Federal Home Loan Bank because we're a member of that.

So we have loans that can get up to $60,000 worth of subsidy when we start rolling in all the different programs that we bring to the table.

And then we also offer journey to homeownership that some of our banking partners can take advantage of, even if they don't get the loan through us.

A few years ago with ARPA funds, we launched the Energy Advantage Program.

This has been a great program for us because as we realize we can't control the interest rates, we can't control the price of housing, but we can control people's energy cost or electricity and gas bills once they get into the home.

So this is allowing people to do repairs where they are improving the comfort of their home as well as lowering their energy bills.

We do a lot of weatherization, we do insulation, some folks have done solar, we do a lot of windows.

And with this, we're launching a new program, which is a 4% loan next week on National Night Out.

And so people can get a lower interest loan and pair it with this if they are interested in really leaning into this work, if that's the focus of their home improvement loan.

We started in 2024 commercial lending line of business.

We've done a lot of this work in Cedar Rapids.

We've lent on the Doratio response homes.

There's a picture of the abode, townhomes sort of in light at the bottom.

So we do a 0% construction loan because there's just not enough subsidy to build homes to make them affordable.

And so we thought, well, if the builders don't have to have any construction financing costs, there's about 40,000 per unit of subsidy.

So we raise the capital to do a 0% construction loan if it's being built in low-income communities or for affordable housing.

So we're really proud of that.

Um then we also have some capital to do pre-development loans and things like that.

If folks, so if you're have projects that you're not finding the right financing for in the community that are really focused on home ownership or housing, um, we would like to talk to you if you're aware of projects.

So the two things that are sort of new that are happening is our phase two offering.

I brought a copy of it here.

So we raised when we first came here, we raised $8 million from local financial institutions.

We've almost gone through that as well as selling loans to Fannie Mae.

So we've done a lot more than $8 million of lending in Cedar Rapids during that time.

Um we're now raising our second round of eight million dollars, and we fully expect to raise that from about 10 to 11 financial institutions.

And that should wrap up later this summer, early fall.

And then, like I said, we're launching our new energy upgrade loan, which is a 4% interest rate loan.

Um, and we received a million dollar commitment from the Iowa Energy Fund to be able to do that program.

We had planned to launch this because we were on track to get when there was the greenhouse gas reduction fund money.

We were supposed to get um $8 to 11 million, and we didn't get it for reasons that we all understand.

But so we're like, what can we still do?

And that's where this came from.

And this is our team in Cedar Rapids, though I am here about three times to four times a month, um, and other staff is here very often.

So usually there's somebody from Des Moines here at least once or twice a week doing um closings and things like that.

But this is Bryce and Taryn and Nikita who have been amazing team members here, and hopefully you see them out in the community.

I that's all I have.

I went pretty quickly because I wanted to leave time for questions if you have any.

No, that's great.

Thank you very much.

Council.

Councilmember Norney.

Thanks, Mayor.

Um, I I think this continues to be a really fantastic program.

Um I have have shared with my colleagues in different meetings that we've had that I'd like to see it continue to push what it can do.

Um, having looked at what it might be able to do for me, I still think there's an opportunity to partner personally with NFC for and improve like my childhood home that I live in.

But I think that there are some we're a little bit upside down in construction costs right now, which makes it difficult for more people to leverage it.

I think as fully as it could be.

Yeah, we would love to be able to get the word out more on our home improvement product with the realtors here.

Thank you, have done a great job with our home purchase product.

Um but we did just hire a communications, our first ever, you know, we're a small nonprofit, like we're operating at the margins, but we just hired three weeks ago our first communications marketing person.

So we're really excited about some of the new materials and hopefully ways that we'll be getting the word out to the community.

Councilmember Meyer.

Thank you, Mayor.

And thank you, Stephanie, for being here.

And shout out to you and your team, you know, especially especially Bryce, um, who I've known probably the longest of your team members.

And although you haven't had a designated head count for marketing and communication, Bryce is so visible in the community.

Um, and you know, we as a council, we do what we can to help spread that message.

And thank you for being innovative in the types of products that you're offering based upon what the market needs are.

Um, you know, I do have one interesting question.

So I've I've a couple of people have said to me um that NFC is essentially a modern day redlining tool.

Um, I believe it's because they're saying it's targeted to certain neighborhoods.

Um wanted to get your thoughts on that and you know, help me with a message that I can share with people when I hear that, or you know, next time I see people that have brought that up.

Yeah, thanks.

So our history, um, you know, I think everyone knows we started in Des Moines.

I don't know if everyone knows I was there when we started, so I've been doing this for a while.

And our history is is that we really were set up to bring capital to neighborhoods that had been redlined.

So those tend to be the low and mod census tracks and the older home neighborhoods, and we lend in all of those neighborhoods first.

So um some people say like it's reverse in that because the whole idea is how do we bring capital to neighborhoods in a way that's effective to um council member Bernard's point, like because you need that subsidy to make it work, right?

Um I think the other thing is is that our history has shown us that when we go into neighborhoods that aren't the older neighborhoods or that the market's working well, people just don't take advantage of us because I mean it's not easy like to do a purchase and a renovation loan at the same time.

Like we've both done, we've probably a lot of us have done one or the other, and both are hard.

And so to combine them is and most of our home buyers, you don't have to be a first-time home buyer, but they are.

So we've just found that people don't take advantage of our program when we do go in, like sometimes we'll be asked to go into higher income or newer home area, and the markets working.

So Councilmember Todd.

Uh Stephanie, thank you for your help.

Um I I would be remiss if I didn't give a shout out to Councilman Scott Overlin, who I think has been on your board from the beginning.

And I would suggest that since he's retired now, he might have more time to assist you with your efforts there.

Um Councilman Meyer, I I just I wanted to to sort of piggyback on your comments because I've heard some of the same things too.

And uh, you know, um it's not to suggest that there wasn't a time in the city's history when redlining didn't exist, but I don't know a banker or a realtor who is not trying to make a deal, trying to sell a house.

And and and these folks have come in, and when I look at you know, I'll I'll suggest Wellington Heights and some of our other ones, they all go through cycles.

And I have to suggest that right now we're in a pretty good cycle in terms of uh revitalization and stability, uh, more so than I've seen in the in the past.

Uh there's still stuff.

Uh you still get nuisance abatement, and you still get absentee landlords, but in terms of homeownership, I've seen that improve over the decade.

And uh you guys have been quietly chugging along, uh doing your part of helping to make uh the the whole picture work.

And so thank you for coming to Cedar App.

It's when you did Stephanie.

Yeah, it's been a pleasure.

It's been great.

Councilmember Overland.

Well, I'd just like to thank Stephanie.

She's the first person I met in 2015 when I went over to Des Moines when I was thinking about running for city council.

And it took a lot of hard work and getting a lot of the right people in the room to get this off the ground.

And we're and once off the ground, there was no shortage of hindrances as far as um various matters like interest rates and the storm and things of that nature.

But I'd like to uh simply have a big thanks to Stephanie and all the people at NFC, not only the folks here in Cedar Rapids, but the ones in Des Moines from my perspective.

It's one of the best run, if not the best run, nonprofit I've ever been associated with.

And uh they're making a tremendous impact.

And as time goes by, it's just getting going.

So uh thank you very much for sticking with it.

It was a heck of a lot of work.

And uh certainly you can't control everything, but I think we are controlling speaking for NFC as much as we possibly can.

So thanks.

Oh, well, thank you.

It's been a pleasure.

Yeah, I my I just want to also say thank you.

It is always nice to be able to point to NFC when people um have a desire to purchase their own homes.

And I think um I'm glad you have a communications person, because I feel like if there's any opportunity here, it is that people know about it.

And I happen to people reach out to me all the time um about housing and affordable housing, and and oftentimes they don't know about this.

And Bryce has been extremely helpful in sort of being the point on that.

So I'm I'm really looking forward to having more people know what you do because I do believe we all believe that you know it's a generational shift.

Homeownership can you know change the trajectory of family for generations.

So um anything we can do to spread that message out, um, you know, let us Laura's great, but but let us know, even as council members, um, if there are opportunities for us to speak on your behalf.

I wonder if like we mailed you like annually or quarterly, like just our most recent flyers.

So if you're going to neighborhood meetings, you have a few.

I don't know if that would be I think we'd take it on a little thing.

I don't know, like little thing, you know, I mean, or maybe some of our free giveaways with our QR code because it I mean we we try to get to as many meetings as we can and events, and I think you see us, and um, you know, we're thankful we get to do the farmers market every year, but just really letting people know and letting people know that there's no income guidelines.

At the end of the day, the majority of the folks we help are not you know higher income, but anybody can come because we're interested in revitalizing neighborhoods.

Wonderful.

Councilmember Pope, yeah.

Just real quick, I to that point.

Um Stephanie, I I've noticed some yard signs.

Yeah, and to me that really catches my attention.

I'm going, oh great, there's another house I just sold, or they were part of.

So I really like seeing your yard signs out, and I think that's gone a long way in helping raise awareness as well.

So good, good idea.

I deliver some myself last year.

Absolutely.

Well, thank you.

Thanks for all you do.

And Councilmember Overland, thank you for your leadership in that.

We're definitely better because it's here.

All right, we'll go ahead and move on now to our public hearings.

I remind want to remind everybody who wishes to speak today, uh, whether during a public hearing or done during one of our um public comment input periods of a few matters to ensure we have an orderly meeting for everyone who's here today.

A reminder to stay at the lecture, and if you have documents you want to share with the council, give them to the officer.

She will get them to us.

Um, second comments are limited to three minutes per speaker when the light in the console in front of you turns yellow.

Uh, that indicates you have one minute left.

And when it's red, we'll ask you to take your seat once again.

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

And finally, we need to hold an orderly hearing.

So we ask for no participation from the audience in terms of cheering, booing, uh, other noise or disruptive conduct that might take us away from the proceedings.

So we thank you in advance for that.

Does the clerk have any written comments or objection in regard to any of our public hearings today?

Your honor for public hearing number five.

Uh, two letters of objection and one petition and objection containing 15 signatures were filed.

And no other written comments or objections were filed.

Thank you.

Okay, two letters.

Petition.

What else?

That's it.

Okay, great.

All right.

We will go ahead and move on to item number one, which is a public hearing to consider urban renewal plan for the proposed Caledonia Haulers Urban Renewal Area.

This is at 420 to 550 French Court Southwest.

Scott Mather, I'll recognize you.

Thank you, Mayor Council.

Uh Scott Mather with the city manager's office.

I would request to combine items one and two as they are related.

Yes, thank you.

Okay.

So with some background here, uh June 9th, City Council approved standard incentives for a new transportation and logistics building with Gavin CR properties LLC, an entity of Caledonia Hollers Incorporated.

On June 23rd, uh there was a resolution initiating the establishment of an urban renewal area and TIFF district.

Um we also held uh on July 2nd City Planning Commission, which was unanimously approved.

And then June 3rd, I'm sorry, July 13th.

We held a consultation with affected taxing entities, no comments or objections.

So today we're here for a public hearing and resolution as well as first TIFF ordinance reading.

So this is a 14 million dollar capital investment for the construction of a 40,000 square foot transportation and logistics building, which includes full drive-through bays, automated bays, office space, and parking for semi-trucks and trailers, a commitment of 27 new jobs created with 15 or more that would be at or above the state's wage threshold of 3041 per hour.

The standard incentive provides a 10-year 50% rebate of increased taxes generated.

We're estimating roughly 3.3 million in total taxes over the over this tenure period, of which one million would be rebated back to the company.

Here's an aerial view showing the location along sixth street, uh, just uh west of I-380 and south of Walford Road, and a couple of renderings of the new building.

So for agenda item one, I'd re uh recommend approving the Caledonia Hallers Urban Renewal Area, and then also approving the development agreement for agenda item two, but that'll return it back to the mayor for the right.

Thank you, Scott.

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

Does anyone here wish to address council?

All right, let the record indicate a public hearing on this matter is held with no objections for the record.

Uh that brings us to council comments.

Councilmember Van Orney.

Thanks, Mayor.

Um, Scott, I just can we go back to the aerial.

Okay.

Um, so there's still quite a bit of uh family farmers that are in this area around Walford and South.

Um, what I always hear from them is just uh a request about light pollution.

Um and so anything that we can do there just to be mindful of that to kind of redirect the lights in, especially if there's gonna be in and out would be greatly appreciated.

One, because we've grown around them, and uh certainly appreciate and respect all the the folks that you know are still farming here.

Um but I don't want to I don't want to take away the night sky from them and uh impact their animals.

That's some of them still have some animals out there.

Um so anything that we can do in that development agreement just to honor that as much as possible would be appreciated.

Thank you.

And Scott, it might be helpful.

Can you remind us what the light ordinance is there?

Do you know that off the top of your head?

Uh I know it has to do with like a one candle uh illumination at the property's edge, but I will tell you that's not an area I'm an expert in.

So, but we would also want to make sure that they are following our our ordinance ordinance absolutely for sure.

Yes.

We have an ordinance for that.

Thank you.

I just wanted to point that out.

Thank you, Scott.

Anyone else on council?

All right.

Uh let the record indicate a public hearing has been held with no objections to the record.

Um adoption of this resolution will have been moved by council member Scott Olsen, seconded by council member Todd.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Those opposed say no.

And this motion carries.

Thank you.

Before we vote on the ordinance on this item, does council have any more questions, thoughts on the ordinance?

All right.

There's nothing further.

The approval of this ordinance on its first reading has been moved by council member Todd, seconded by councilmember Van Orney.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Those opposed say no.

And this motion carries.

Thank you.

Um, okay.

We will go ahead and move on to item number three.

Oh, two.

Sorry.

We need to move on to the adoption of the resolution.

Any questions on the resolution resolution, council?

The public hearing.

Anybody here wish to address council on this item before we move ahead with a resolution.

All right, let the record show a public hearing has been held with no objections for the record council.

All right.

Seeing none there, the adoption of this resolution has been moved by Todd, seconded by Van Orney.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Those opposed say no.

And the motion carries.

Number three is a public hearing to consider a development agreement with the Parkland LLC, which is an entity of Tyler Oswood for a housing redevelopment project on city-owned property bounded by Ellis Boulevard, J Avenue, 6th Street, and I Avenue Northwest.

Scott Mather, I will recognize you once again.

Thank you, Mayor.

For a little background on this project, uh July 22nd of 2025, uh City Council accepted proposal and sale of development of several properties to include 1015, 1017, and 1035 Ellis Boulevard Northwest, 609, J Avenue Northwest, and 1012, 1018, and 1034 6th Street Northwest.

On March 10th, 2026, uh City Council accepted the proposal for sale and development of three additional uh properties in that block, 604, 614, and 620 I Avenue Northwest, with both RFPs being awarded to the same developer single development agreement has been finalized with the parkline LLC, an entity of Tyler Oswood.

So this is a 7,850,000, 7,850,000 uh investment for uh includes four four multifamily um buildings for a total of 36 units.

These are a mix of one and two bedroom units as well as a four-plex, which is a mix of one and two bedroom units, and and then additionally a three-unit town home that are all two bedroom.

This would be phase construction uh to begin by fourth quarter of 26, uh, complete by third quarter of 2030.

Um disposition of city property for one dollar as the housing redevelopment provides a mix of 60 percent AMI, 80% AMI, and a few market rate units.

In addition, all parcels are in a hundred year floodplain and will be need to be elevated by two feet above that floodplain level.

The city incentive would provide a 15-year 100% rebate of the taxes generated based on the assessor's post-development value estimate.

Uh, we are looking at roughly 1.5 million in new taxes over a 15-year period, of which 1.3 million would be rebate but rebated back to the developer.

So here is an aerial view.

This would be looking from the Cedar River.

Um, so facing west, we have Ellis Boulevard here to the west.

We have I Avenue on the left, J Avenue, and then Sixth Street here.

So there are three homes that would remain that are privately owned.

So here is the site plan showing the four buildings here, as well as the three plex here and the four-unit um plex, four unit here.

Um of these circles represent trees.

So you'll uh I believe there's anywhere up to 81 trees to be planted uh to basically offset the impact of some of the larger trees that are currently on this property that need to be removed in order to be able to allow for this redevelopment.

So they're really putting a lot of trees onto this property, and then if they can't all for whatever reason they cannot meet the relief requirements, they would be then participating in the relief program beyond that.

But it appears as though they've satisfied all the requirements on the property itself.

Some renderings, these are what the uh larger apartment buildings would look like.

Um this is the fourplex to really kind of really resemble more of a single family look from the street, and then the three-unit townhome.

So staff recommends approval of the resolution authorizing the development agreement with the parkline LLC, and I'll return it back for any questions.

Thank you, Scott.

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

Does anyone wish to address council?

All right, let the record show a public hearing has been held with no objections for the record council.

Councilmember Poe.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um Tyler had done some um units on, I think it's 10th Street, Southeast, um, between 7th and 6th, um, right there by the Link Lane County Public Health Building, I think.

And they're absolutely beautiful.

And they they have this feeling of connectivity, feeling as though they're part of the community.

And in this area of our community that was so devastated in 2008, this is the kind of development that I was hoping would come back to that neighborhood.

And so I'm just thrilled about this.

I like the look of them.

I like the uniqueness of them.

I like the feel that they are almost like individual homes.

And so I I really love this project.

And I'd like just to give a shout out to Tyler for being very creative and innovative and giving us that community feel.

So I love this project.

Thank you.

Councilman Orney.

Yeah, thanks.

Scott, can you go back to the overlay uh picture?

So okay.

So do you have a total calculation of like what we would you said 81 trees, and and this does look very dense, which which I appreciate.

Um, do you know what we require them to put in offhand?

I can tell you that, and I want to stay in my lane, but um, this was what was required in order to meet the um the number of inches of caliper that was re being removed from the property.

Okay.

So it they didn't put 81 trees in because that's what they thought necessarily was needed, but they found a way to be creative to get it done and meet the requirements of the relief program based on the number of inches being removed in order to do the project.

Okay.

I just there I guess the way that I received it at first in your presentation is that they were exceeding that, but they're meeting it, which is I mean, it's still which is fine.

Um always encourage people to go above and beyond, but I mean it's still is a very dense um you know area, and so I appreciate that we have those protections with our relief um you know requirements.

Um will you go forward in the presentation then too?

Um the one that looks like the single this is so nice.

Um I think that there was a a comment at one of the last council meetings about um, you know, what multifamily housing, what um you know what it would look like and a sense that it would it would not feel good, it wouldn't look like it would meet the neighborhood.

But I don't know if anybody who wasn't from town would come in and see this if they would necessarily know that this is actually multifamily residential.

And I hope our Cedar Pidians would feel very good living in a space like this because it's very nicely done and gives that feel.

And so just appreciate projects when this, I hope they do put in some similar landscaping or something like that to tie it in, but um, really just appreciate the intentionality um with with thoughtfulness of this project.

Thank you.

Council Member Todd.

Scott, do you remember the the percentages of 60, 80 and market rate units?

The one thing I do know is um all but three of the units are 80% and below.

Um the only my understanding is the only ones that don't fall below 80% or the are the three unit townhome.

I don't recall exactly how many were 60 and 80.

I want to say it was about half.

I want to say most, if not all, the one bedroom were both were at 60 and below.

I think the two bedroom tended to be at the 80 percent.

Okay, thanks.

Great context.

Councilmember Olson.

Thank you, Mayor.

I you know, I I think the projects that uh Tyler and his group have done over the last several years prove that they know what they're doing and and they do improve all the neighborhoods.

And I I, you know, as uh Ann said um this area was devastated, but yet what we're seeing now is uh product that is high quality, serves a cross section of individuals within our community in this neighborhood.

If you can drive down over there now, and then you had the casino in in the near area, and some of the pictures are older with the mill gone.

Uh in this area is really dynamically changing.

And I think it'll be one of the really fun areas, especially with the parks and everything that'll eventually come after the flood wall's done.

This can be one of the nicest areas in the city to live uh next to the Cedar River.

So this is pretty exciting, and and I appreciate the work that this group is doing to put up a quality product.

All right, thank you so much.

Any other comments, questions?

If not, we'll go ahead and adopt this resolution by Councilmember Van Orney, seconded by Councilmember Poe.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye opposed, say no.

And the motion carries.

Number four is a public hearing to consider a change of zone for property at 1027 and 1033, 8th Street Northwest, from traditional residential single unit district to traditional residential flex district, as requested by Matthew 25.

Seth Gunnerson is here.

Seth, I'll recognize you.

Uh thank you, Mayor.

Uh Seth Gunnerson's zoning administrator with the development services department, as noted in the description.

This is a requested change of zone for two parcels on the Northwest Cedar Rapids.

The request is to go from TR1, which is a single unit uh residential zone district to TRF, which is a uh flexible multi-unit zone district.

These are two parcels um which were acquired by the city after the 2008 flood and um later sold to Matthew 25.

The uh total lot area is 12,800 square feet, which is um around a third of an acre.

Uh the applicants proposing development of two duplex buildings on the property.

The green star shows the location of the property near the corner of J Avenue and 8th Street Northwest.

The urban or the land use um typology area in the future uh land use map of the comprehensive plan is urban medium intensity.

Here's a zoning map showing the property.

Um you can see to the east of the property, um, the form-based zone districts along and near Ellis Boulevard Northwest.

Uh the actually the property we were just talking about in the previous public hearing is right here.

So this is in the same vicinity.

Um the two parcels left are part of three parcels, which were purchased by Matthew 25 a couple of years ago.

You can see here in the aerial in the first property, they built a um what is conforming to the single unit zoning, which is a single family home with an attached accessory dwelling unit and a dwelling unit above a garage.

So actually three units on this parcel.

Uh, what Matthew 25 is wanting to do with the remaining two parcels is develop something that's more of a traditional duplex where both of the units would be over 1,000 square feet and size.

Here's the street view showing the location.

This is J Avenue and 8th Street here.

Um here are the two properties.

The new um three unit uh the home with the accessory dwelling units um was created after the street view image was taken, but is located here.

Here's a conceptual site plan that was provided by the applicant um showing um duplexes on each property with a two-car garage at the rear of the property.

Um, as part of the development, they will be paving the alley um behind the property.

They provided some renderings showing the homes, um, largely two-story buildings um with gabled entrances facing the streets, um, largely matching the size and massing you'd expect for single family homes within the neighborhood.

In terms of rezoning criteria, uh the district is permitted to be considered within the urban medium intensity land use typology area, provides infill housing in the northwest neighborhood.

Uh city has no concerns with those with the ability to provide services to the property.

Um, it provides a the request provides a transition from higher intensity zoning to the east along Ellis Boulevard.

Generally fits in with um recent existing development within the neighborhood.

It's one to two story construction, detached homes or two to four unit townhomes are generally what's being built in the Northwest neighborhood.

Uh the existing zoning would permit the three units on a single parcel.

So actually the development of six units.

Uh the request for a rezoning is because uh essentially what they are proposing would not count as a home with an accessory dwelling unit because both of the units are larger in size.

So therefore, in order to do two larger units, it's required to be rezoned.

This went to the city planning commission on July 2nd and was recommended for approval.

Um, pending today's action, second and possible third ordinance readings could occur on August 11th.

And with that, I'll return to the mayor.

Thank you, Seth.

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

Does anyone wish to address council?

Let the record show a public hearing has been held with no objections for the record.

Council.

Councilman Warney?

Yeah, can we go back to the renderings?

Okay.

So uh a contrast from the last ones that we saw.

Um I just want to leave it at that.

I I love everything Matthew 25 does.

Love their cafe food.

My teams love their cafe food.

I just I want to make sure that because I've seen other designs that they've done that, maybe these are just simple drawings, but I hope that there's a little more substance behind them.

The important stuff is what's inside the walls.

Um, but I just want to make sure that when we're looking at subsidized housing and affordable housing, people don't feel like they have to live in a certain type of home, and that they are they elevate this a little bit more.

Uh maybe that's through landscaping, maybe it's through a couple of features or something like that.

But just something so somebody doesn't look at this and say, like, oh, that's probably subsidized housing.

Thank you.

Councilmember Meyer.

Thank you, Mayor.

Uh Seth, you you mentioned that they'll pave the alley.

So does Matthew 25 cover all the costs for paving that alley, or is that a do you know if that's a shared expense between the city and Matthew 25?

Um, I'm not so I'm not super familiar on what the terms of any development agreement we might have with them are if they're getting tax incentives that might cover that cost, but it is generally something we've been requiring for new development.

Okay.

And the same thing with the sidewalk, right?

I mean, you saw a picture and um it's fine, but when you start to build new properties and you have this 80-year-old sidewalk, um, hopefully they'll that'll have some attention to.

And with sidewalks, is that always a shared expense with the city, or again, is that just since this is a development.

So sidewalks would be the responsibility of the applicant.

Um with any project, really, if they were to damage.

So I know I I actually live a or well, recently up until a couple weeks ago, I lived a couple of blocks away from this location.

So I know, for example, the city a couple years ago marked the sidewalks in my neighborhood, and whereas deficient the property owners were required to um improve them.

And um, when from development services side, when we have development, if they were to damage the sidewalk, uh part of kind of our process is to make sure that they would repair it.

So it would be the applicant's responsibility to repair and restore any damaged sidewalk.

Yep.

Counselor Poe.

Yeah, thank you, Mayor.

So, Seth, um, in terms of maintenance of the alley.

Whose responsibility would that be?

Um, generally, well, I mean snow removal.

Uh snow removal is the responsibility of the property owners.

The city, um, I can tell you from experience, the city does snow removal um in advance of uh trash collection.

Otherwise, it's the property owners take care of that.

And that's pretty much the same with any alley in town.

Okay, thank you.

Councilmember Todd.

Nobody does snow removal in their alleys that I'm aware of.

Uh they either wait for it to melt.

Or if it's if it is a significant snowfall, public works will, or solid waste will, or whoever can put a plow on a city truck will hit that alley.

My understanding right now, this is just the rezoning, right?

So they're gonna come back to us with the development agreement.

And the development agreement, I would suspect concurrently, you can ask for drawings that are a little bit more, for instance, maybe done by an architect.

Uh, and have some of those cost hammered out a little bit, specifically based on you know what wide income limit they're trying to appeal to.

Uh maybe there's other state grants or other grants that are gonna help do it.

But yeah, um, it seems to make sense at this point in time.

Uh but we've talked about alleys over in this neighborhood a lot.

And so um day, uh, we'll probably have to bite the bullet and do that on a larger scale.

So thanks, Seth.

All right, thanks everybody.

If there's no further questions, the approval of this ordinance on us first reading has been moved by Poe, seconded by Overland.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Opposed say no.

And the motion carries.

Item number five is a public hearing to consider a change of zone for property at 1756 Mallory Street Southwest from traditional residential single unit district to urban village residential district, as requested by OFBLC.

And Seth, I will recognize you once again.

Right, thank you.

Um, as mentioned in the description, this is a change of zone again from the TR1, which is a traditional residential single unit, uh single family zone district, um, in this case to UVR, urban village residential, which is a flexible multi-unit zone district.

This is an a little over 8,000 square foot parcel um located in the southwest Cedar Rapids in the vicinity of Czech Village.

Uh the proposed use is for uh four-unit residential structure, um, also a uh detached um or a uh garage four-unit garage um as well.

Uh the existing land use is two single family dwellings.

Um existing land use is actually non-conforming, um, but two homes on a single parcel.

Here is the future land use map.

Uh the star is the location of the property.

It's located within the urban medium intensity uh land use typology area near it in the Czech village area's urban high intensity.

And then here's the zoning map um showing uh the neighborhood kind of around Czech Village is predominantly the TR1 traditional residential single unit district.

Uh to the west of the property is the Krasny Square development and other um homes and townhomes and businesses within the Czech village area.

The requested zone district is this light blue color urban village residential, which is a form-based district um that allows for residential development.

Here's an aerial showing the subject property.

Um currently there's a home, and I'll show in a street view too, a home facing Mallory Street.

There's also a home on the property along Barber Street and a garage along Barbara Street to the west.

Um this is a Krasny Square development I mentioned over here, which is a town home development, which was completed in the last few years.

There's also a four-unit town home that was completed a couple years ago on D Street here, as well as shops and apartments in the Czech village area to the north and west.

Here's a street view along Mallory Street.

The home in question is this one here.

This is the property in question.

You can see predominantly single along Mallory Street.

It's predominantly single family homes, one and a half to two stories in height.

This is the view along Barber Street.

Barber Street really functions more like an alley, as you can see, all of the homes, the majority of the homes in the neighborhood have garages, which back up to Barber to the west.

The site plan proposed by the applicant shown here.

What they're proposing is a four-unit building which runs east to west on the property here, and then the garages where the facing Barber Street function, which I mentioned kind of functions more like an alley as the property opens up.

It's a kind of trapezoidal shaped property that is narrower towards Mallory Street and then opens up on the west side.

Here are some of the building elevations, which were provided by the applicant.

What I will note, uh so what they're proposing is two unit or two-story residential structure.

What I will note, um what the applicant proposed, and also driven by the and kind of the intent of the form-based zoning district is that what you have visually when you're looking at Mallory Street would be the mass and um kind of view of a single family home, or at least the unit at the far east end.

Um there's a requirement that there's an entry door that's oriented toward the street, so that makes this unit look much more like the single family homes along the street.

Um here's a building elevation interior to the site, um, showing the additional three units, which would be oriented interior to the site or toward the garage.

Um in terms of the existing site, there are three existing structures, uh, two homes and a garage.

The homes were built in 1890, 1949 and the garage in 1950.

Uh the city assessor lists the conditions of those homes is very poor.

Um, those homes have gone through the HPC's um review process, and the demolition hold was placed on the property and was allowed to expire on July 9th.

Um, the applicant has worked with Safe CR Heritage, who has gone through the homes and removed um historic features such as woodwork and other items from the homes.

Um, also noting the cities received a petition, which was mentioned by the clerk at the start of the meeting with 15 signatures objecting to the rezoning.

Um, staff evaluated the petition and determined that it contained um the owners of more than 20% of the land, which was within a 200 foot radius of the structure as a result per state code section 414.5.

This requires a supermajority of the council or seven or more affirmative votes to pass the ordinance or to adopt the ordinance.

Um, what I will also note is the state did recently pass a law which effectively changed and removed that provision from state code, but the application was received prior to that provision going into effect.

Um, so it's um being reviewed under the rules that were in place at the time that they applied.

In terms of criteria for the rezoning, uh, the proposed zone district is considered to be consistent with the urban medium intensity land use typology area and as a district that's permitted to be considered.

Um it's located just outside of the Czech Village New Bohemia New Bohemia area action planning area, um, but it does provide uh in fill missing middle or smaller multifamily housing in the vicinity of the Czech Village area.

Uh staff notice no concerns with the ability of the city to provide services to the provider to the parcel.

Um, in terms of character, the proposed zone district and the existing zone district allow two to three-story construction.

Um the height limits are very similar between the two zone districts.

Um the existing lot could be developed with three dwelling units, a single family and the two ADUs by right without any rezoning.

The rezoning request is to allow for four um distinct units in the townhome configuration as you saw.

Um this would be the only parcel on the block face on Mallory.

There would be a multifamily construction, um, and is noted the massing of the structure staff finds is generally consistent with the massing, the height of um other structures which exist facing Mallory Street.

Um city staff recommends approval of the request.

This went to City Planning Commission on July 2nd.

The CPC also recommends approval of the rezoning request.

Um, pending action by council today.

Second and third reading could occur on August 2nd.

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

Thank you, Seth.

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

Does anyone here wish to address council?

Okay, I'll ask you individually to approach the dais.

Give us your name.

Yeah, there you go.

My name is Michelle Kessler.

And I oppose the zoning change for that property.

I've lived on Mallory Street, which is four houses up from that for over 34 years.

And it is a residential neighborhood, single family homes with pets and children, fenced in yards, and this is not the place for that to be put.

I have so many things to say.

That house does not look bad on the outside at all.

There is no uh nothing falling apart or anything.

The inside might, but the outside looks perfectly fine.

Um Barber Street, that is not like an alley.

That is an actual street used by a lot of traffic because when you come around, if you don't, you can't turn left when you come down to the end of Mallory Street.

It's D Street, you can't turn left there, so you come around that little curve, so you can turn either way.

U rental properties that would they'll want to take out and put another uh big building in, and then that alley right there is four oaks where Hayes School was eventually.

It's my opinion, because that's old, they're gonna want to take that out, and that whole area will be apartment buildings, multiple ones, and then right there is Hayes Park.

There's a splash pad, there's a playground, there's a baseball field.

This is not the place for these big apartment buildings.

The Czech Village side is not like the new bow side.

The Czech Village side is homes, historic homes.

They all have unique things to them.

There's not businesses on the Czech Village side, like there is on the new bow side with restaurants and tattoos and um bars and stuff.

The Czech village side is family homes, and so I I oppose it.

I signed the petition.

I I oppose it.

I don't want it in any way, shape, or form.

Um what they've done already.

All he showed, it looks different in real life than his drawings.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you.

Anyone else?

Good afternoon.

My name's Mary Treshnak.

I reside at 2516 26th Street Drive Southeast.

And I am here today speaking on behalf of Save Cedar Rapids Heritage.

Many of you are familiar with our uh efforts advocating to preserve the city's resources, you know, using education, uh, assistance, advocacy, and action for individual buildings, but we also um advocate to keep the character of neighborhoods as a whole.

Um, we're here today voicing our opposition to the proposed rezoning request for the home and accessory dwelling located at 1756 Mallory Street from the traditional residential single unit district to urban village residential.

I think there's some irony about the fact that earlier in today's meeting that um we were celebrating home ownership and community through the through the council's uh proclamation, as well as the presentation from NFC promoting home ownership at this time when there's a lack of affordable single family homes in Cedar Rapids.

We have to ask like, why is the city considering allowing the demolition in the middle of a core neighborhood of a single family home?

This seems to lead to like spot zoning.

We you saw the picture where there's two single family homes, and we're gonna put a four unit um rental property between two single family homes.

And it seems like that sends a signal from the city, if this is approved, that we don't value our neighborhoods.

I see I've got 30 seconds.

So the neighbors have overwhelmingly voiced their opposition to the zone to the rezoning.

The neighbors are hardworking individuals who purchase their homes in good faith and they work hard to keep them up and they take pride in their homes.

And if this application is approved, it'll be the first domino in a gentrification of this neighborhood with affordable homes being replaced by multi-unit rental properties.

And I ask you if it's once this neighborhood, what about the next neighborhood?

And I thank you for your time.

Anyone else?

Thank you, council and mayor.

My name is Teresa Michelson.

And I'm really excited that I went to the study and picked up my letter because I hadn't known about this specifically for reasons I won't get into.

My concern is, as has been mentioned already, that this is a single family unit area.

And in the area that we have, my husband and I have a bank building that we have currently in that area.

And we have seen the condos go up, and we were told by builders that that would be beautiful, and there would be landscaping, and we'll stay off your property line, and you won't have to worry about it.

It's brand new, and everything will be great.

And we took them for their word.

And I'm not saying that this particular builder will do the same, but it absolutely did not turn out the way that we were sold all of the information.

So I would just caution the council to really take a hard look at whether or not having this unit in the middle of single family dwellings is wise or maybe wiser than lending a hand for some landscaping or some ways in which to develop that area with better trees or better streets because we've got a lot of potholes.

Maybe just dress the area up for the single family units versus bringing in multi-units in a single family dwelling area.

I am opposing this specific rezoning.

Did you sign the petition as well?

I did.

Okay.

Excellent.

Thank you.

Yes, thank you.

Mary, did you sign the petition too?

No, I did not.

Okay.

We did file one of the objection levels.

Got it.

Thank you.

I just want to make sure I get my math right.

Anyone else wish to address council on this?

Okay.

Hi, Council.

My name is Josh Bass, and I'm one of the members of OFB.

I think the main thing I want to say to you guys is that intent matters.

We do not buy this uh property to destroy it.

We don't buy it to tear it down.

We bought it to remodel it to improve the neighborhood.

We own the fourplex across the street on D Street, and then when we purchased the property and got into it, it wasn't economically viable for us to remodel it.

I think it's also important to note there are two homes on it.

So they keep talking about single-family dwellings.

This is a uh there is a single-family house and a non-conforming legal structure on the back.

Excuse me.

This is also a nuisance property that was owned by a landlord that was later in life, and when she passed, is how we picked it up.

So, yes, this neighborhood is full of single family homes and homeowners, but the history of this property is that it's been a rental forever and a problem, and you can verify that in police records.

I think the last thing that I want you guys to know is at the CPC council.

I met Cindy Haddish there, we agreed with the CPC council that the proper path forward would be for them to salvage it.

That's great.

We want the artifact, the historical artifacts to be preserved.

In my opinion, they should not have salvaged the property if they were going to continue to fight the fight.

That's all I have to say.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Anyone else wish to address council?

All right.

Let the record indicate a public hearing on this matter has held with two letters of objection filed as well as a petition with 15 signatures.

Council.

Councilmember Van Orney.

Yeah, thanks, Mayor.

I appreciate the characterization of the neighborhood of them being hardworking individuals because I live very close.

So thank you.

This I I consider this my neighborhood.

This is uh down the street.

It's not in my district.

Councilmember Todd wins again.

Uh but uh this is the neighborhood that I grew up playing in.

And I have to uh contest with a little bit of some of the characterizations of uh Chuck Village because having grown down the street there too, they've got multiple bars there.

There's family restaurants, everything like that.

Both sides are, I don't get into this whole never have this this side of the river versus that side of the river.

Both sides are great.

The the Czech area, whether it be New Bohemia or uh Czech Village is fantastic, and I'm happy to have it within Arms Reach.

I love the homes on D Street.

This uh neighborhood, I remember taking a motorcycle ride with my late father through here when it was ravaged by the floods.

This area got hit the hardest.

If you all remember, it went up uh a couple streets, a couple streets more into Hamilton, but not all the way.

Um I was on top of the hill behind Wilson.

And so the hard part is is that to the history, which I appreciate, Josh sharing, um, not everybody was able to weather those storms.

And and it was multiple.

It was the flood in 93 and then 2008 and 16 and 18.

These homes got hit repeatedly, and not everybody was able to manage that.

And there already are a lot of rentals in this neighborhood because I have a very great neighbor, Jeremy, who has been a longtime renter, and he's fantastic.

And so I also just want to contest with the concept of who is a renter, who lives in multifamily residential as well.

I don't think if you're somebody who lives in multifamily residential, you're uh this kind of person or that kind of person.

So I just want to really just kind of silence and and you know, mitigate that kind of NIMBYism because I think we just need people who need shelter uh and and homes that they can live in in a great neighborhood that fits in across the street from that.

Um I do understand, having driven that, that it probably doesn't, you know, is used like a street, but I don't know that um based on what Seth said, I don't know that if that Barber Street is really meant to be a main street, it is really an alley that has become over time just used more like that.

Um I've taken it myself uh on the way home from work.

But I think a lot of these folks here have done a very nice job of being very thoughtful in how they're trying to add to the neighborhood.

Um, I think when we know that a property has been a nuisance property, a long time rental, it has it's a foregone conclusion that people gave up on it a long time ago.

So now what do we do with this neighborhood?

There's an opportunity here, whether we decide that it's this project or another project to invest in this neighborhood.

Looking right across the street from, you know, seeing these the multifamily residential across the street and around the way, it's hard to say yes there, but not immediately across the street.

That's difficult.

I do think that the people who live that I've seen and drive home every day through this area along Hamilton and along D Street are very cute.

They've they've decorated their homes, they're great neighbors, they take care of it.

I see them out with their animals just as much as anybody else further up the street.

And so I don't have any reason to uh to see this being an imposition with that.

And I really appreciate that the developers have allowed Save CR to come in because this is a conversation we have all the time about salvaging those parts.

It does feel a little disingenuous though, if we've already taken those pieces out and now we're asking to save the whole.

And certainly if somebody wants to help move the structure, which Save CR has been fantastic at, there are other places around town that it could be moved to on this side of the river, I'm sure.

But you know, that also takes time and money, and maybe that's a conversation that somebody would participate in.

But again, given the projects that have gone so beautifully, different developers, it sounds like, but the ones on Hamilton Street, we had talked here at council about saving those trees, and they saved in that right-of-way these huge historic trees.

And I had no idea how they were gonna do it and build the uh the the multiple stories that they had, but they did, and it's fantastic.

And so I just I I want to find that marriage where we work with the neighbors.

That's always going to be really important because we do have enough folks here that it's gonna require a more intentional vote from council.

Um, so I think that there's still more work to be done there in that relationship building.

But I've seen you do really nice work on the other street just nearby.

And so I don't have any reason to oppose this at this time.

Anyone else on council?

Councilmember Poe.

Yeah.

Seth, can you go back to um the rendering please um and how um and then um I need to see uh something that shows the houses um adjacent to that.

My my question is um is exactly I think what what Mary um had pointed out to um the the transition.

We've always talked about transitioning um into these old historic neighborhoods.

So the height of these of these buildings to me becomes a little problematic and feels like it doesn't quite fit um there.

Um so you'll see that uh go back to the one you just had, Seth.

Thank you.

Um while I recognize um and I love that neighborhood, I absolutely love it.

My grandma lived up the street.

Um I I worry about I'm looking at the third house and the fourth and the fifth as you go up the street from the one that would be demolished.

It it just the the transition of the homes, it just feels very I best word would be awkward.

A little awkward.

So I guess with existing, you've got I think these may be roots homes here, uh, just because of how they look.

Two-story homes, and then I'd call this one and a half story where you have kind of the upstairs.

But it would be, but it would be replaced the one you just had your marker on.

Replace this one would be oriented toward the street would be two-story home.

This would be the view.

Well, I agree with uh councilmember Van Arney.

I think there's just a lot a little more work to do um with coordinating with the neighborhood.

And and it it again, it just isn't quite feel a hundred percent right to me.

It's not that we don't need it, it's not that it wouldn't it couldn't fit.

I I'm just not there yet.

Thank you.

Councilmember Meyer.

Yeah, uh I agree with Anne Poe, our council member Poe.

Um I I'm gonna listen to the voices of the neighbors, and with that many neighbors not comfortable with what is perceived will damage their neighborhood.

Um at this point in time, I I do not support um the rezoning.

I I encourage more communication with the neighbors and the developers to come up with uh a more agreeable solution.

I'm not saying that there has to be zero people on a list um that don't support it, but um 15 um neighbors, including a business owner.

I I I'm just not comfortable supporting it at this time.

Thanks.

Councilmember Olson.

Uh Seth, could you go back to the when you started the presentation as to how this property is currently zoned?

I just had a question.

So the back to the existing back back to that original page here.

So the existing land use is two single family, but you also mentioned that under uh the um uh the current zoning, you can build more than two units.

You could have two units plus an age.

What can you have on that property without changing the zone?

Uh without changing the zoning, you could have um and I would need to look closer to see if one of the existing homes may be able to be considered an accessory dwelling in it based on the rules.

But you could have a single family home, and then you could have two accessory units.

One of them would be attached to the single family home, one of them would be detached.

Um, I think the um I go back a few slides to uh what we showed on the previous one.

Oh, yeah, I know what you're doing.

Yeah, so we we've got several of those built around in in neighborhoods, and so they could have up to three units on that site, one regular and two attached units, correct.

Um under the current zoning.

Yep, under the current zoning.

So my uh my comment is again uh you know the the sad part is that the houses have been toasted, you know, on the inside.

And so uh, you know, probably um I mean it's gonna be tough to rebuild a house like that and make the things work, and and then if they just leave it, then that's not any good for the neighborhood either.

So I, you know, I would uh one of the things that I I've seen we've done well in many of the neighborhoods is that type of unit that would fit this zoning, which would not require rezoning, but would allow them to build some new units there of a different type that would fit maybe with the surrounding houses.

I totally agree that uh, you know, I think the front view is good, but the side view is just overpowers the neighborhood and and is probably out of scale.

But uh I would rather see I don't oppose something being developed on this property now.

And I I would hope uh and sort of uh I I don't like voting no on things when the it does stop it and they can't come back for a period of time, the property's gonna sit.

Well, I so I would like to what I would like to do is as I think the developers can see right now, there's we we don't have the seven votes.

Well, I don't know about that.

I'm just gonna what I'm hearing is that we're gonna need to defer this to a later meeting.

I'm not calling for any votes.

Good, thank you.

Yeah, I'm not asking for anything.

But I I just want to remind the neighbors or the the developers that there is a chance to redevelop that site with more units and get up to three potential units on that site and to enhance the neighborhood rather than have a house that's sits there and who knows what will happen to it.

So uh the I I agree.

I would appreciate that kind of direction, but I wanted to bring that up as an item.

Councilmember Todd.

I I don't want to sound harsh, but uh uh I'm I I think it's no secret that something was gonna happen there.

This has been a long time coming.

Uh this is this is a neighborhood that uh got hit hard during the flood.

Uh but prior to that uh it uh one of the one of my most controversial votes was when the city wanted to take over the ball field at Hayes Field from the school district.

Uh the neighborhood fought me on that pretty uh pretty loudly.

And uh the city parks department took it over and the world went on.

And uh there was pushback when four oaks went in, and I would suggest that there was a point made about what happens someday if four oaks goes from that side.

That is that's a real concern that people should folk should should think about.

Um there were also uh some allusions made to you know that the city was you know and uh encouraging um this type of development in this neighborhood.

The city didn't do anything.

My understanding is the developer purchased the property from willing sellers, right?

I believe so.

And then went into an agreement with Save CR heritage to salvage the properties, at least salvage those materials that were in the property, and now the organization is saying that the developers should not move forward on this property.

To me, that that that lacks uh a level of integrity that I would hope one would see uh in these type of agreements.

And to also suggest that the city, because we would allow this, that we don't support historical preservation is a misnomer.

You can do both.

You can be supportive of historic preservation, you can also be supportive of change and increasing density in a neighborhood and stabilizing a neighborhood.

You can do all those things.

You can uh, you know, you can do both.

Uh there are some good points in terms of where the neighborhood goes.

It's a challenge neighborhood.

Uh many of the people that have owned homes there are starting to pass, and the these properties are getting, you know, they're getting bought up by speculators, they have been, and you're seeing deterioration.

And so with that, that's when development department comes in and tries to put a neighborhood plan in place.

Uh, if there's nuisance properties that I heard are a problem, uh, or people are not maintaining their properties or their landscaping, then there's a formal process to do that.

But from what I've seen in these selective parcels in this tip of the neighborhood, I think I've seen some enhancements.

Uh I've seen some property uh valuation increasing.

And and and so I mean, I uh you can argue about some of the the little things, but the reality is the change is happening in this in this in this area.

Now, can you draw a line like a DMZ and say we don't want to go anymore any further?

I mean, in terms of a planning, I mean, I think we could sort of designate a zone or just to make sure that there's not additional uh engroachment on some of the other single family homes, uh, and also encourage those folks to go seek out the neighborhood finance corporation for loans to maintain what they have there.

But uh at this point in time, if there was a vote, I would be in support of this one.

Councilmember Hager.

I'll just speak a little bit of um with my resume of being with neighborhood development corporation for nine years, and that's all we did was in fill housing.

And it's expensive and it's hard.

And with today's cost of construction, we've seen the last three projects, every one of them's creative, and try to do in fill housing, and then we're also asking them to be 80% or 60% below medium income.

And so I I'm not saying if this is the right place for four units or if they can do three units and not have it rezoned.

Um, but I want to commend all the developers tonight that come in with creative plans that fit within the neighborhood.

I think the height is, I mean, we've got a row of one and a half stories and two stories.

So this is a street two-story plan.

It's not a three-story plan.

It's it's not a concrete box that we're trying to wedge in there.

So um I I know we're probably not gonna vote tonight, but I would also encourage the developers to get.

We saw one elevation on the uh park line at LLC that I think that front elevation towards the street matched more to the historic neighborhood than what this one did.

Maybe that's the elevation.

I think that maybe the parties are related with the development.

So uh I'm just I wanna commend all the developers, but I also want to say, you know, the neighborhood coming out and speaking and giving their voice.

It's being heard, and um, I think there's gonna be something that is gonna be um appropriate for both parties that will work.

So that's what yeah, I agree with most of what's been said today.

Um I think the communication though, as actually as evidenced by the participation of the group today, has been um excellent.

So I would also like to commend city team, developers, community members for all being a part of this conversation, because without a doubt, uh, you know, we learned some new things today.

Um so I am going to recommend that we just defer this to a later meeting based on the questions and concerns that we had come forward, right?

All right.

Thank you, Seth.

Uh we'll move on now to item number six, which is a public hearing to consider the proposed plan specifications form of contract and estimated cost for the Ellis Park parking lot project.

This has an estimated cost of 900,000.

Rob Davis is here.

Rob, I will recognize you.

Good afternoon, Mayor City Council Rob Davis with the public works department.

Uh, this project, uh, this map here is showing the overall uh area of Ellis Park, Ellis Lane, uh, that the flood control system will build.

Uh we've built the first phase now, so this is one small piece of it.

Um just as kind of a refresher, Ellis Boulevard has been part of it's been built uh up on top of a levee.

Uh we'll have a future levee come along the riverfront here, and then there'll be uh a wall in the levee combination across here.

Uh so this is a kind of a 2D map here, but uh this is about a 15-foot high to keep the floodwaters out.

Uh, in order to come down with this road off of the levee, it's uh we're really focusing on what's airy here, bounded in red.

There's a parking lot there that's actually in the way.

Uh so uh what this project will do is relocate the parking um as shown there in red out of the way so we can continue Ellis Boulevard coming down off the top of the levee.

I want to thank the parks department for their uh uh hard work on this as well.

Uh, we can't can't do these projects around the parks and make them feel like a park without uh that coordination.

So uh what we'll be doing is removing uh the parking office there and putting a new concrete parking lot in, and that will um allow for the relocation.

Uh once all said and done, again, we hope the fog control project leaves things better than we find them.

Uh there'll be an increase of 79 paved parking spaces at the Ellis Park area.

Uh, this is uh kind of a blow up just of the area.

This is there's 85 spaces that this particular project will build.

We've already built parking uh near the softball fields.

Uh we will maintain access to at all times to the uh uh softball fields, and then with uh the relief program, we'll be planting 38 trees here as well.

Uh I do want to point out also that we've uh coordinated uh the schedule of this to get after the pool season as well as all after the uh mostly after the softball season.

So we're trying to squeeze this project in between uh you know now and the end of the winter um when the park usage is the less.

Uh as Mayor mentioned, the engineer's opinion probably cost of 900,000 dollars.

Uh this is uh the last project that will have ARPA funding that the city council set aside for flood control in the northwest side.

Bid opening is tomorrow, July 29th.

The late start is September 21st, uh subject to acceptable bids.

Again, trying to get after most of the use of the park for the year, and then construction is scheduled to be completed by November 20th of this year.

Public works department recommends approval of the resolution for this uh item.

I'll turn it back to you, Mayor.

Thank you very much.

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

Does anyone wish to address council?

Let the record show a public hearing has been held with no objections for the record.

Council.

Councilmember Meyer.

Um one quick question.

Uh with the uh RFP, are we encouraging permeable papers or some more friendly options other than straight concrete?

That is not currently in the contract, it is a concrete lot.

What why is that?

Why why wasn't a more environmentally or ecologically friendly option considered?

Well, the uh I would say that the options that we did over at the Northwest Rec Center, you know, that actually had to be taken out.

Those are have auto maintenance and they do not hold up very well with assault.

Great.

Thank you.

Uh I appreciate that clarification.

Councilmember Hager.

Can we go back to the uh aerial real quick, Rob?

So this one or then um this one's fine.

Um, just for clarification, nothing happens to the Hall of Fame building, right?

It stays as it is today.

That is correct.

Um, we have met with them last year.

Uh this project doesn't build anything for the Hall of Fame Building, but it doesn't preclude any new work or refurbishment.

It's really kind of neutral to the Hall of Fame building.

Perfect.

That's good to communicate that out there.

But um, and then the next thing is is when you say the end of construction for November, that we're just talking about that proposed parking, not the road and the levy.

Because right now it's kind of a road to nowhere, right?

And correct.

The uh ULC later on, very end of the year we'll come back with a contract for paving the road.

This contract, end of the year is just that parking lot in red, and then we'll come back with the uh the work for to get the road this direction, and then also kind of tie it back in over here, and that's a 2027 planned work.

Perfect.

Thank you.

All right, anything else from council?

If not, uh the adoption of this resolution has been moved by Hager, seconded by Meyer.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye, opposed say no.

And the motion carries.

Seven is a public hearing to consider the proposed plan specifications form of contract and estimated cost for the Fourth Avenue Southwest Gatewell project with an estimated cost of 390,000 dollars.

Ben Warrell is here.

Ben, I'll recognize you.

Thank you, Mayor.

Ben World Public Works Department.

This project is to construct a gate well on a storm sewer outfall to the Cedar River.

It's a buried structure that'll be flushed with the ground.

And the intent is to be able to close a gate in the event of a Cedar River flood and uh prevent backflow.

Uh the gate can be operated without confined space entry.

So, in comparison, the current flood response plan.

Uh city staff have to go out and put in a temporary plug while the river is still at a very low level and still uh the pipe is still accessible, which can be challenging.

Um, and so this gate will be able to be closed at a much higher uh flood level, and the storm sewer can remain open longer.

Project was coordinated with venue works and the schedule of events at McGrath Amphitheater.

Engine opinion engineer's opinion of probable costs is 390,000.

Bid lending is scheduled for August 5th.

Construction is gonna be from October 19th through May 28th, but the contractor has to be done with all work except sodding by March 31st.

Those dates are specifically set uh to coordinate with the schedule events at the amphitheater.

Uh, one lane of traffic in each direction will be maintained on first street.

Public works department recommends approval of the resolution.

Thank you.

Thank you, Ben.

This is time to place for public hearing on this matter.

Does anyone wish to address council?

Let the record show a public hearing has been held with no objections for the record.

That brings us to council.

Seeing nothing further, the adoption of this resolution has been moved by Meyer, seconded by Olson.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Opposed say no.

And the motion carries.

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

The first is a chance for the public to address the city council on any subject pertaining to council action set for today.

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

Council members and city staff make them available by phone or email.

But at this time, as a council, we are here to listen to you.

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

Please rant the lecture, and if you have any documents, uh given lieutenant, she will get them to us.

Um all uh comments are limited to three minutes when it's get to when you have one minute left.

It turns yellow.

It's red.

We ask you to take your seat and all comments uh must be directed to the matter you wish to address.

So abusive, obscene, irrelevant comments will not be tolerated.

And we ask for no participation from the gallery as well.

If you sign up to speak, approach the microphone when called upon today.

And today we have a few names on here, but I believe we've heard from most.

So I'm just gonna read them off because I think we've heard from them.

I have Joshua Bass, Mr.

Bass spoke, Teresa Michelson spoke, Mary and Michelle.

I think they all spoke already.

Um and I have nobody else listed for this public comment period.

So I will go ahead and officially close out that public comment period.

Acting city manager Angie Charper.

Any changes to these agenda?

No changes, Your Honor.

Do council members need to recuse themselves on any giant agenda items or make changes.

Councilmember Poe.

Yeah, thank you, Mayor.

I'm going to recuse myself on consent agenda item 22A.

22A, rock the block.

Got it.

Councilmember Hager.

I will recuse myself from 22C.

22C.

The beats of beer run.

Okay, got it.

Anyone else?

Any changes?

Okay.

That brings us for a motion to approve the agenda.

The approval of this agenda has been moved by Olson, seconded by Todd.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Opposed say no.

And the motion carries thank you, council.

That brings us to our consent.

The approval of the consent agenda has been moved by Todd, seconded by Van Orney.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Those opposed say no.

And the motion carries thank you, council.

Moving on now to our regular agenda.

27 is a report on bids for the third street southeast from 8th Avenue to Fifth Avenue pavement rehabilitation project.

This has an estimated cost of 590,000 dollars.

Doug Wilson is here.

Doug, I will recognize you.

Thank you, Mayor Doug Wilson, Public Works Department.

This project includes asphalt resurfacing, curb and gutter replacement, storm and sanitary sewer, along with water main improvements, driveway alley approach replacement, along with pedestrian enhancements in the corridor.

Bid opening uh was July 15th.

Construction is expected to start this fall and be completed this fall.

We had a public information meeting on May 21st of this year, and we've reached out to all the businesses in the corridor prior to the project being let.

We had uh, as I said, uh bid opening on July 15th, 2026 with four bids received, ranging from $616,487 and 65 cents to 861,927.55 cents.

Public works department recommends approval of the resolution to the ward of the contract to Valentine Construction Company.

Thank you, Mayor.

Thank you.

Doug Council, any questions?

All right, seeing nothing further.

The adoption of this resolution has been moved by Poe, seconded by Overland.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Opposed say no.

And the motion carries 28 is a report on bids for the FY27 Sanitary Sewer Project Repairs Project.

This has an estimated cost of 250,000 dollars.

Ben Warrell is here.

Ben, I'll recognize you.

Thank you, Mayor.

This is an annual project that the city does to repair damage to sanitary sewers that are discovered mostly during routine inspections.

This package includes a replacement of 167 linear feet of sewer, seven man holes, and a correction of two protruding taps in preparation for future lining and pavement replacement as needed.

This project bid on July 22nd.

We received four bids ranging from 234,402 and zero cents to 521,202 and zero cents.

Low bidder was BG Brecke.

Public works department recommends approval of the resolution.

Thank you.

Thank you, Ben.

Uh council, any questions on this?

All right.

If there's nothing further, the adoption of this resolution has been moved by Poe, seconded by Overland.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Opposed say no.

And the motion carries.

29 is a presentation resolution of support authorizing financial incentives under the city's targeted district economic development program for an adaptive reuse project at 219 2nd Street Southeast as requested by Evolution LC, which is an entity of Steve Emerson.

Scott Mather, I will recognize you.

Thank you, Mayor.

Council, Scott Mather, City Manager's Office.

So we received Evolution LC and entity of Steve Emerson requested city incentives under the targeted district economic development program for the adaptive reuse project at 219 2nd Street Southeast.

Due to the decrease in demand of commercial office space, uh the upper three floors would be converted to apartments while the first two floors would remain the same.

This would be a 4.1 million dollar investment as stated the upper three floors would house 21 market rate rentals, mix of one and two bedroom, first and second floor would remain as is.

So today we're here to consider the resolution of support.

If approved, then I would amend the uh central consolidated urban renewal plan and bring a development agreement back for council to consider, but that'll return it back to you with any questions.

Thank you.

Thanks, Scott.

Council, any questions?

Councilmember Pope.

Yeah, I I think this is a good decision by by Steve to um do this change.

Um I I like it a lot.

Um, so I'm gonna support it, but I'd like to say happy birthday, Scott.

Oh, happy birthday.

Thank you.

This is where I wanted to be.

We're all business.

Sorry.

No, just kidding.

Anyone else?

If there's nothing else, happy birthday to you.

And the adapter, this resolution has been been moved by Overland, seconded by Hager.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Opposed say no.

And the motion carries.

Um, as you'll note that item 30 has been removed at the request of our economic development department.

So we'll go ahead and move on to item number 31, which is a presentation resolution accepting a proposal from MJ Restorations LLC, which is an entity of Jeff Kenny for the redevelopment of city owned property at 416th Street Southwest.

Jeff Bosencraft, I'll recognize you.

Thank you, Mayor.

Jeff Wosencraft Community Development.

Um, as stated, this is a resolution to award a proposal at 416th Street Southwest.

Um, so the parcel in question is here in blue.

Um, this is near the intersection of Fifth Avenue Diagonal and Sixth Street.

Um, you can see Cedar River Academy across the street on the lower left-hand portion of the image.

Um the current zoning is TRF or traditional residential flex, which allows for small-scale multi-unit buildings up to eight units.

Um, the property is in the 500-year floodplain, so it does not need to comply with our floodplain ordinance.

Um, and then I'll move on here.

Um, so the RFP outlined objectives um standard aligned with uh existing neighborhood plans, in this case the Six Street Corridor Action Plan, which encouraged uh multi-unit housing uh along this stretch of the corridor and improving pedestrian connections across 6th Street to Kingston Village over here.

Um, a preference for housing design that meets our zoning requirements uh and one that is financially feasible.

The city received one proposal from NJ Restorations LLC, an entity of Jeff Kennedy uh for a duplex.

Um so here are the elevations and then a site plan and then back to the elevations and getting ahead to the uh future slide.

The review group of a non-competing developer and commercial lender did recommend uh that the proposal be uh awarded with the condition that uh porticos or entrance hoods be added above the doors here to add uh a little more character to the front of the building.

Um so as I stated, this was reviewed by non-convened developer and commercial lender.

Um, they did make that recommendation to award the proposal with that condition, which um working with the applicant had agreed to um and noting that the scale does align with the neighborhood.

Um so with that, staff would recommend approval of the resolution to award the proposal, and I'll pass it back to the mayor.

Thank you, Jeff.

Council, thoughts, questions councilman Van Ordy.

Go ahead.

I think you're all just looking at me.

Um, no, I I mean it's the same conversation we've had, right?

Uh, we we know we need this um housing.

I would ask people, we need housing of all types, all income levels.

So any net new housing is great.

Um, but let's go back to the rendering again.

And and so we talk about this pretty extensively at um at development committee.

Um what what is the the AMI on this?

Uh no rent levels were uh established.

Um these would be three bedroom, two and a half baths.

Um I only say because it in in this neighborhood, we don't need more buildings that look like this that are basic that end up.

I'm not uh not characterizing this developer or anything like that, but we we need more character in this neighborhood.

There are plenty of very basic buildings that become very dilapidated buildings pretty quickly because they don't have that kind of uh dignity in their dressing, if you will.

And and then what happens is people don't treat them.

It's kind of like if you wear your your Sunday clothes or your your nice clothes for picture day and everybody starts behaving better.

The nicer the the outside is while the inside matters most, people respect it more and it lasts longer.

And so I just hope that we don't ask them to do kind of the door coverings because that'll be great if they're picking up a door dash outside or something like that for the three seconds they need that coverage, but it's it's like the bare minimum that I hope to see improved on this, um, just so that people feel better about the places that they get to live and not have to accept this as a place to live.

I'm going to out of an abundance of caution and encourage the developer.

I'm gonna defer this as well, because this is not this is this doesn't work.

So let's encourage, let's encourage some work on this, and we will come back and revisit it at a future meeting.

Councilmember Pope.

Yeah, can I just make one comment?

Jeff, as you're talking with these developers, we talk a lot at development committee about 360 design standards and what this building looks like all the way around the building.

And not very often am I seeing what the side of the buildings look like.

So when we see some of this, please encourage the developers to give us a 360 view of the building, because to the mayor's point to uh uh Councilmember Van Orney's point, the side could be just nothing.

So um have them come back and but show us a 360 design, please.

Yeah, agreed.

We we did some of these uh in that neighborhood immediately after the flood.

They were put up quick.

And if you go back and look at them now, you would say, who was on the city council when you guys did that?

Because we want to talk to them, you know.

Uh, and so uh I would I would concur.

Okay.

And if it doesn't work, I have no problem with us continuing the land bank, this property.

Yep, agreed.

Yeah.

So we'll just we'll go ahead and defer that if you want to bring this feedback back to the developer.

And and again, staying in our lane as a council.

This isn't asking for changing of zone.

This really is just accepting that proposal.

So I'm comfortable saying we'll defer.

You can give us the feedback and we can revisit at a future meeting.

Thank you so much, Jeff.

Okay, that brings us to ordinances.

Uh ordinance number 30 32 is an ordinance amending chapter 61 of the municipal code, traffic regulations to establish revised speed restrictions on various streets in section 61.029 and authorize temporary speed restrictions within construction zones.

The approval of this ordinance on its second reading has been moved by Olson, seconded by Todd.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Those opposed say no.

And the motion carries.

Thank you, council.

Councilmember Poe.

Thank you, Mayor.

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

The adoption of this ordinance on its third and final reading has been moved by Poe, seconded by Todd.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Opposed say no.

And the motion carries.

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

And this is a chance for Cedar Rapids residents, property owners, and business owners to address the city council on any subject pertaining to council business.

If you're not a resident property owner or business owner, you will not be invited to speak, but we do encourage you to email or call council and city staff with your comments.

As with the earlier public comment period, we're here to listen as a council.

I'll remind everybody uh to remain at the lecture, and comments are limited to three minutes and no abusive of seeing loud, threatening comments.

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

And we have one person set to speak.

Um, Tamara Krug here to speak on data centers.

Hi, my name's Tamara Krug.

I recently purchased a house here.

Um, I'm speaking in behalf of Save Morgan Valley.

On Tuesday, August 11th, from 6 to 8 p.m., we're holding a community meeting at Users Ushers Ferry Lodge on water, air, and health.

All of you are welcome to come.

Lori Hanoitsen is a professional geologist with more than 30 years in environmental protection and regulatory compliance.

She managed the groundwater program for the Department of Energy's Los Alamos Cleanup, and she's an expert witness in hydrology and water law.

Our second speaker is Dr.

Brittany Keyes, Clean Air Policy Manager for the Healthy Climate Wisconsin.

Second, what is now in the public record?

On July 15th, Alliant filed its rezoning application with Lynn County.

Attachment 7 is a letter on Cedar Rapids letterhead dated March 31st, signed by Roy, excuse me if I mispronounced Hessaman, this city's utility director.

The letter says that the city has been in discussions with the line about water and sewer services to the Morgan Valley Energy Center.

It says Cedar Rapids is designing and building additional capacity at the Northwest Water Treatment Plant, which will be the primary source of water for that plant.

It says sewer capacity is now is available now.

It says a capacity fee will be charged for the capacity being committed.

And it closes by saying the city looks forward to working with a lion.

That letter is four months old.

For three months, we've asked this council about exactly this, and we've been told there's no agreement and no contract.

That may technically be true.

But technically true isn't the same as transparent.

We're asking, and this document existed before the whole time frame.

That's not how you build trust.

So we're going, we're not going to ask you a question you won't answer tonight.

We're asking two things you actually can do.

Put the water and sewer records for this project where the public can see them.

The letters, the capacity work Northwest plant, and what it costs.

Not because anybody's forcing you to, because we shouldn't be finding this out on the county's website.

And tell us about changes going forward.

When the city plans infrastructure or project this size, at what point do the people affected hear about it?

Right now, the answer seems to be whenever somebody else files it.

On a side note of my own, I've gone through a lot of shoe leather walking up and down these streets.

And your civic attitude right now is terrible.

They hate the data centers.

They think no one's listening.

And they're joining us in our fight against that.

We don't want the data centers.

I'm a farmer.

I grow corn.

I don't grow data centers.

Thank you.

All right.

And that was our only speaker signed up to speak.

So that will close out our final public input period.

Acting City Manager Charper.

Any communications today?

No, Your Honor.

All right, thank you.

Seeing no further business to come before council, Councilmember Overland moves to adjourn.

Seconded by Hager.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye, opposed say no.

And the motion carries we are adjourned.