Is going to start out with city council or interviews.

Um, and I'm trying not to ruin any names.

Uh, we have Robert Glover, Edgar Baker, Sitlali, Nunes, Barrigan.

Okay.

I'm gonna destroy that.

I'm sorry.

Uh Janelle Thomas and Matt Greeley.

Those I I could do okay.

Okay.

Uh I think we have a list of questions that we wanted to ask.

Is the council already?

Yes.

Rochelle.

I just want to open us, open the meeting starts off with uh uh good evening, Mayor and Counselors.

Uh before we begin the interviews with the applicants for the vacant city council position.

I'm gonna review the process we'll follow to ensure fairness, consistency, and efficiency.

Uh to ensure that is fair and transparent process.

The same procedures must be applied consistently to all candidates.

This means that each applicant should be asked the same set of questions, provided the same amount of time to respond, and given equal opportunities to share their qualifications.

Counselors should avoid asking follow-up or additional questions of only one candidate, as doing so could create the appearance of bias or unequal treatment.

Maintaining consistency throughout the process helps protect the integrity of the appointment.

The interviews will be conducted in a round robin style.

For each question, uh counselors will take turns asking a single question, and each applicant will have the opportunity to respond before we move to the next question.

Uh, to maintain maintain fairness, the order in which applicants respond will rotate throughout the session.

Uh applicant should address the council directly and respectfully throughout the interview.

And please make sure your microphone is on when it's your turn to speak and off when it's your fellow candidates' turn.

Uh once all interviews are complete, there will be no discussion during the work session.

The council will move on to the next agenda item.

Deliberations and the formal vote to appoint a new counselor will occur during the regular session.

Um that's my disclaimer.

Um council, any questions?

I have one.

Umit for response.

That is up to you if you would like to set one.

Well, I can have a timer and we can set it consistent across the panel.

I I just want to say that we we do have a work session scheduled at 6 30, so within the bounds of that.

Um we do have a relatively hard stop then.

Right.

And I want us to be able to get and we have five applicants, and I think we have uh five quite five, six questions?

Six questions.

So it feels kind of like we probably should put like about a three-minute limit on a response.

You can respond more quickly if you feel that's sufficient.

Technically, two minutes if they want to keep it in.

Thank thank you.

I knew you could math me on this.

Okay, so we're gonna use two minutes, and uh you'll need to be brief to the point.

All good council good with that?

Okay, so we'll use two minutes.

Angelie's gonna keep that in.

Oh, yes.

Great.

Any other uh preamble staff?

Are we good?

I'm good.

City attorney, I'm just not used to having you here.

It's like there's never anybody over on this side.

Feels a little odd.

Okay, so I'll open up with the first question.

Uh what draws you to serve on the Cornea City Council, and what is your vision for the city over the next five years?

Uh Rochelle, are you gonna call the order or is it already predetermined here in the in this?

It is predetermined on your sheet, so just go top to bottom, and you're welcome to invite the easier as we get used to doing it.

Uh first response.

Uh Robert Glover.

Thank you for allowing each of us to speak this evening.

Good thing this is a nonpartisan position, so it will not be subject to the bias forms of question and answering.

We're fortunately seen on C SPAN lately.

I love this great suburb located in a larger metropolitan area.

Over the next five years, develop a larger tax base with good lifestyle companies.

In other words, like Omega Morgan, et cetera, on North Holiday.

This has been the this has the potential long term for increasing the tax base, but we may need to give some sort short-term incentives.

The eventual sites would not have an impact on some services, i.e., schools, and I'll discuss more of this during question number three.

Also, I want to work with other agencies on better enforcement of speed limits, especially along State Highway 8.

And most of the time I am the only person on the speed limit, and I'm not referring to drivers going slower.

The challenge is 4.25 speed limits in approximately 25 blocks.

Also, I would not bore you with a discussion of speed versus speed limit and Oregon basic speed law.

Excuse me, Oregon Basic Speed Rule.

Great.

Next up, Janelle Thomas.

Thank you.

Hope everyone can hear me okay.

Um so I've been a resident for close to 10 years now.

Um what's drawn me to serve is obviously being in the community for almost 10 years and seeing the progress that has been made and wanting to expand upon the 2045 vision, which I'm very excited about.

Um a little bit more the economic development would be great.

Um the parks, the trails, families, expanding on Oregon's family town is my big draw.

And I'm gonna keep it short and sweet.

Great.

Next up, uh Edgar Baker.

Hello, City Counselors, Mayor.

Um I am a Mexican American uh resident for the past 25 years when I was younger.

My mom would take me in protest against a previous mayor.

Um and then to serving the banking commission recently.

Um in the next five years, my vision for improving the city is more businesses uh occupying the core of the city, um discussions on a municipal broadband company and adding more community spaces.

Great.

Next up, uh sit Lolly Hi, thank you.

Um, I'm passionate about the future of the city of Cornelius because I grew up here with my grandparents and my um extended family.

But I also envision including um increased civic engagement into one of my priorities and finding ways that we can help residents feel empowered to voice their concerns, but also be a part of the solution process.

Um I would like to also put what I learned through the Cornelius Civic Leadership Academy into practice because it really had me going and thinking.

We had started out as a cohort to see how the city could work towards creating a city safety plan, and I would like to be involved in that process still.

And just taking consideration uh the interviews that we had with our members of the community, I would like to continue practicing in.

I don't think there's a word in English, but there probably is uh the Sarrollar, mi abilidad, is what I'm trying to say.

And I just really enjoyed participating in the cohort, so I I think it would be helpful as a potential city counselor, like to have that in my background.

Thank you.

Thank you.

And of course, Matt.

Good evening.

Uh I care a lot about community, and I want to ensure that everyone here in our neighborhood feels safe and heard and valued.

Uh and I think that civic responsibility is kind of a collective duty that we're all bound to, and uh being part of the process is important.

And I think Cornelius can grow sustainably.

Uh, we have our downtown economic center that I think we can do something with, and that will grow very well over the next five years if we uh pay attention to it.

And we can keep that small town focus without just blooming into a commercialized suburb.

Great, thank you, everyone.

Question two.

So city council work requires collaboration and compromise.

Can you give an example of how you've successfully worked as part of a team and how you would approach working with colleagues who have different perspectives?

And we'll start with Janelle.

Thank you.

Um for about 20 years I've been working on global teams in the high-tech commercial sector.

Um, so I would bring a lot of that with me.

I can't really discuss probably specific projects because I'm an insider and they're an NDA, but um, yeah, it's just working with global teams, you're working with a lot of different, not only backgrounds and opinions and aspects, but also you know, race, religion, culture.

Um, so you have to be very mindful, um, especially in communication.

Trying to learn the most about the people that you're gonna be working with so you can understand where they're coming from and and how to best communicate with them.

Great, thank you.

Uh Edgar Um I worked in a warehouse currently dealing um dealing with sewing packages through a post office.

Uh I train my colleagues for different roles in the buildings that I'm training for.

Not everyone is training for roles in the building.

Um day my manager uh came up to me seeking my help to unload the trailer.

I'm that's something I'm not trained for, but because I train other associates, they assume I'm trained for that role.

I let them know that I wasn't.

Um they weren't um because of their perspective on my role, they weren't all too happy about because they believe I should be trained in everything.

Even though um as it's not true, but instead of telling them that I play out an associate, a colleague who is trained for that role.

I offer to take over that role as a compromise.

Because it's important for me to have a successful work as a successful team and have a successful work experience.

Salali Um I would like to bring up my experience again in the leadership cohort for the City of Cornelius.

I was working as part of a team for a project to present to the city council, and we didn't always agree on what approach we should take for the presentation, but it made me put into practice the active listening skills that Steve did facilitate a lot.

And putting that into practice made me remove my own instinct to listen with an action to respond, rather listen with the intent to actually hear their words and where they're coming from.

And it made it more manageable to find common ground between us, but also build uh stronger trust amongst ourselves, which benefited us in the end.

So, with that understanding at the end of the day, uh I I knew that the project had the intent of benefiting our community, and that's what motivated me to continue finding common ground.

Matthew I have a military background, which obviously includes a lot of people from a lot of different places and working in complex tasks under pressure.

Um I recently helped with the Cornelius Library Foundation's fundraiser and uh now set up the library with a local nonprofit to teach dance classes, and I've been working on an international convention to help make sure it's accessible to all of the uh attendees with disabilities.

Um different perspectives are really important for different solutions, and like you said, listening to hear rather than just to respond, even if you may have a greater total understanding of the situation, somebody coming to you may very well have more information on their specific like perspective, what they see day to day that might be missing, even if again you have a greater overall understanding that does not invalidate their viewpoint at all.

Uh so listening and hearing them out before you discount that is very important.

Robert Well, since I didn't take close to my two minutes and for question one, I do want to digress a little bit.

Um because if I don't, my wife, my son, my daughter-in-law, my two of my grandkids will be upset.

Umstead of a splash pad.

Um and the reason I say that, or perhaps maybe figuring out a way to come be a part of uh Forest Grove rec district, because right now there's no rec district in Cornelius.

So anytime somebody wants to go swimming, either as an individual or family, they go to Forest Grove and pay out of district, which is hellacious, or they got to go to Hillsborough and pay out of district, which is fallacious.

So obviously the cost of a pool, maybe is cost prohibitive.

I used to work for um uh pool construction company, so I probably could get a good deal.

The city attorney probably wouldn't like that statement because that would probably be a little bit of insider trading.

Um so maybe we could you know explore maybe joining uh with um Forest Grove.

Kind of like Twilight Hills Park and Recreation District.

If you're in the Beaverno School District, you're automatically in the park and recreation district.

Um getting back to question two.

Due to my being OCD or like I like to call it CDO and logical perspective, I tend to initially see things as black and whiter than others.

This will be an added benefit as there are already some great gray thinkers on the council.

The blend will allow me to present the logical facts, which will help the gray thinkers, while they will help me to refine my views to not only just sometimes the sometimes polarizing facts.

Further, during my working years being in finance, I would first look at the financial facts, and then through discussion with others see reasons to include other thoughts.

As a follow-up, never mind.

Question three.

Okay.

Um how would you describe your leadership in conflict resolution styles?

And how do you see them contributing to a productive and effective council?

And we'll start with uh Edgar.

Oh, I changed the format to A became three.

So he is here correctly.

Okay.

Uh so just clarification.

This was question three.

Uh I'll read it one more time.

Just um how would you describe your leadership in conflict resolution styles and how do you see them contributing to a productive and effective council?

Edgar.

Thank you.

I would describe my leadership leadership style as servant, focusing on the needs of others.

Um I don't want I want people to grow, basically.

Um at my work, I call it game up to me during break crying because she wasn't getting paid.

Um I sat down and asked her to explain what's going on.

Um she called HR.

They couldn't help her.

And I sympathize with her because I called them too previously, and I we and they weren't much help.

Um I asked her to go through the steps to sign in.

Um I noticed that her login, she was using uh something different from her uh patch, which is inconsistent, so I let her know.

And then I asked her if your um information is correct, and it was.

I was able to point her to uh HR able to help her.

I said I said all and Spanish was I was very proud of because she um doesn't understand English.

And I point them to an HR in person who was able to hope because I understand not everyone and those positions are able to hope the individual.

And this person was able to ex had a good grasp of Spanish.

So I'm for my conflict resolution style, as I said before, I would describe it as finding a male crown.

Um from my both styles and beliefs will contribute to a productive and effective council.

See Lotley Um I'm someone who would define my leadership style as collaborative.

I can work independently, but I value the input of members from my community, and I do my best every day to be as informative and transparent as possible, just as a resident to my capacity.

I like when people around me feel comfortable enough to voice or share opinions and concerns, and I also value constructive dialogue where we work towards finding solutions rather than trying to win in an argument.

Matthew I think the uh first priority in leadership is maintaining a good awareness of our limit limitations and regulations we're working with in that's ethics, procedure, everything like that, because those are inflexible.

We wherever we're going, we've got to do it within those bounds.

Um but I do find collaboration and de-escalation to be very important.

Um I think that gives a better end result than direct confrontation generally.

Uh I think explaining the direction that we are going together will usually come to everybody generally wants to have the same outcome.

We just differ on how we want to get there.

And an open discussion of that and uh letting everyone feel that their input is valued, even if we go in a different direction, leads to uh good feelings all around.

Robert.

I'll use the word collaborative also.

Um I think that I take that set of logical facts and then massage those facts with input from others to get the best result.

Also, we are all here for the same reason.

What is best the best result for the city and its citizens?

Uh I will also discuss this one in more detail with what I'm calling question, you're calling question five.

Thank you to kind of expand what everybody's kind of already said with the collaborative, I would say situational.

Some things you have to kind of be a little bit authoritarian when it comes to life safety or you know compliance regulations, but otherwise, you know, lead with servant democratic mindset, try and collaborate.

It's easier to get something accomplished if you've got everybody kind of going the same direction.

So that's the take the path of least resistance if you can.

Uh get a win-win if possible.

But situational.

Question four.

All right.

So serving on the city council often requires learning new skills and staying informed.

How do you motivate yourself to grow personally and professionally?

And what areas would you like to develop while serving?

And we'll start with Sit Lowing.

I'm someone who has been interested in serving on city council since my youth, my youth youth.

So I have continuously looked for ways to stay involved in my community, whether that be by volunteering or participating in trainings or cohorts.

This is something I have a long track record of doing and being interested in.

I know that as a counselor I would have more opportunities to be involved in deeper workshops or um dietes.

I I guess that's also workshops related to local government and leadership, um, things that wouldn't be accessible as a resident.

So what motivates me to serving the city is that if this is a city I was raised in, so I feel an obligation to give back to the city that raised me and has supported me enough to survive up to this point.

Thank you.

And Matt I really value lifelong learning.

I think everybody's got an opportunity and a responsibility to improve themselves as they go throughout their lives.

And in my personal life, I'm constantly exposing myself to new things.

I love indulging in learning new crafts.

Um I really enjoy the process of doing research, listening to experts, make a plan and then give it a shot with a tolerance for failure.

You know, perfection is never required, uh just continual improvement.

Um as for where to develop while serving, obviously, educating myself on the details of the city regulations is important.

Uh and noting where those regulations are inflexible because they are protecting people's safety and where they might be improved upon, where it may be something that's got unintended consequences that might be uh benefited from review.

All right, thank you.

And Robert I often refer to myself as a sponge as I never can find myself satisfied unless I am learning new things.

I was great at playing trivia pursuit as I always seem to have a head full of obscure knowledge.

Two areas I want to learn more about because of recent activities are the relationship between property tax revenues versus increased assessed values due to new construction.

I also would like to meet with Representative McLean to better understand the size of House Bill 3991.

If current polling is correct, the repeal will make the ballot, which will cause an undue delay of over a year in raising the revenue needed and how to address the and I also want to address with her how to address the expansion of the urban growth boundary to help Cornelis grow.

Um mission, I've recently learned and not sure how we can work around it, but the state has in a lot of areas handcuffed cities and what they can and cannot do.

Thank you.

Uh Janelle.

Thank you.

Um I guess in my professional life, we're always pushed to continually learn and grow.

So I've come from a growth and a continuous improvement mindset, but I want to kind of also do something a little bit more analog um and get back into kind of the more day-to-day getting back into the community.

You know, I always talk about kind of before COVID.

So before COVID, I used to always come to community meetings.

Before COVID, I was in the police academy.

Before COVID, I was doing all the civic events.

So that's how I want to grow personally if I were to be in this role.

Thank you.

And Edgar.

Thank you.

I have a growth mindset.

I don't like staying stagnant.

I like learning more things professionally.

I work in an environment with change the information.

Uh not all this information always conveyed to my colleagues.

So I'm motivated to not only find out the answers, but uh ask questions to make sure everyone is able to have a successful work environment.

I in my personal life, I love learning new things.

I'm studying political science, and that's motivates me to figure out what's going on in the state level, uh local level and federal level.

Um it's very interesting what's going on on every level.

Sometimes it's too interesting.

Um develop more is budgetary.

Um it's a subject that wasn't focused on during my time in the Cornelius Vision Committee, or um or heavily in the planning commission.

Okay, it takes us to question five.

City council decisions affect the whole community.

How would you approach making difficult decisions when there are competing interests or limited resources or funding?

First up is Matt.

I think the first priority is to listen to those who are closely involved with the situation, those who kind of uh have contact with it on a daily or weekly basis.

Uh, and then listen to those who've been overlooked in regards to that program, prioritize the needs of the underserved.

Uh but I also think that uh oftentimes focusing on creating a permanent solution to one problem is a better approach than a bunch of stopgap solutions to a variety of different problems.

Getting something that will be persistent of benefit to everyone for decades to come uh is a high priority.

Next up, Robert This currently is a great diverse council, but it needs an add of square financial person to further round it out.

I've had to make those tough choices in my entire career.

The biggest aid is proper communication and to prevent festering, having those discussions as early as possible.

Again, we are all here to do what is and decide what is the best for the city and its citizens.

Uh Janelle Thank you.

Um I I would say gathering the main requirements, speaking to the main stakeholders, um, however big that pool is, and then trying to figure out by coming together what the best or closest you know bifurcation or win-win will be in that scenario.

I know it's not always possible, but the closest thing to to make the most sense and the most people happy that you possibly can.

Edgar I'm well aware of the different level of um government.

Um recently, I say recently because it feels recent.

Um Clean Water Services uh acts city council do raise rates, and that's not uh that's a hard decision because if you vote no, the city council will have to accept those rates as is.

If well, yes, the that costs will be passed down to the constituents on a plan commission.

I was faced with umplanting items that I wasn't fully agreed on, but um, I focused on how will this affect staff?

If um will the city get sued, and ultimately, what's the best from the worst options?

Because these decisions are happening in the backdrop of the city continuous growth and improvement.

Thank you for your time.

Thank you.

Uh Sit Lali.

Thank you.

When um approaching difficult decisions, I believe it's important to take into consideration um resident input in the decision-making process as much as possible, as well as considering the costs and benefits.

Um understanding what is in the best interest of the community is important rather than my own self-interest.

So I think it's always important to require dialogue input and addressing who will be impacted, especially those in vulnerable communities.

That's okay.

Finish your notes.

We're doing good on time.

So the last question is just do you have any questions for us for the city council?

And we'll start with Robert.

I don't have any um questions, but in conclusion, again, I just want to thank the council for their time.

And this will not be an easy decision.

But perhaps I can help you.

I received the following fortune last week from Panda Express.

You are a deep thinker with a knack for problem solving.

Thank you.

Tanelle.

What what would be the most difficult part of serving this position?

Counselor Lopez, do you want to start?

Um I I have two.

And I'll share now, maybe I'm stealing somebody else's.

One, um, as the mayor, and I know the counselors have some of this too.

Um, there is somebody that would like you somewhere every breakfast, lunch, dinner, and evening, and weekend.

There's somebody somewhere that would like you to be present at their event.

And uh you just can't be everywhere all the time.

Um, it's great to be asked, but um I found even sometimes I've been asked to speak when folks thought uh did not know that I might be against the decision that they're trying to promote.

So um it there are a lot of time demands.

I mean, there's civic events, there's the council meetings, there's there is um if you're gonna do a good job at this, and I've I've been doing this for a number of years.

I I think you do need to understand it's gonna take a fair amount of time to do a good job.

And part of that taking a lot of time, and what I think is um one of the harder things, and I'm sure you will bring others to it, is um the reading.

It's not uncommon for us to get 150, 200 page um city council agendas, and you get them about a week before council.

So there's time you need to be able to find that time um to read through that volume of material.

Um some of it gets easier, I'll tell you over time, having read similar documents hundreds of times, but um that the volume of reading can be uh a strenuous and and that time thing too is um a consideration for your family.

Um I've missed a lot of dinners and birthday parties and other things like that because they fell on a Monday night, and the first Monday is dedicated for city council.

Other counselors, yes, counselor.

Yeah, very similarly to that.

I'm sure you all are coming in with your own agenda of items that you want to see changed in your community, and I'm sure those are all coming from a great place.

Um, but sometimes it feels like you can actually do more from the other side, and that's not to say the work that we're not doing is important, but we have a lot of bureaucratic systems, right?

That kind of stop that from happening, and as you learn, there's budgets and there's um there's other priorities on the list.

And so you quickly I think realize that the changes that you want to make aren't impossible, but uh it's not gonna happen as quickly as you want them to, and that's just the reality of it.

And I think for me that's been the most difficult part because obviously we're here to do what we can for our community, uh, but just being realistic about what that looks like and what the timeline is.

The timeline that you all have for yourselves is not the timeline that the city is working on.

Next, Council Lopez.

Yeah, thank you, Mayor.

Uh, agree with uh the statements made previously and just underscore the the balancing of your personal life with that of the city council, I think.

Um sometimes be difficult, you'll miss some events.

Um and you'll get asked to join all kinds of boards, and you just have to be careful of how you manage that uh because you might um burn out if you don't manage that correctly.

Yeah, thank you.

Yeah, I would say ditto to everything you all said.

Um, I think probably one of the hardest things for me, and I've only been up here for not even a year yet, um, is both the hardest and the most enjoyable, which is seeing our community members come to the meetings.

Uh, but when they're here, they're usually here to talk about something that's sensitive, right?

So I love seeing people to get involved and come here, but from a personal perspective, I get so sucked into what their their story is, and then a lot of times we're not able to help them because of the you know the bureaucracies and the rules around what we have.

So for me, that's probably been the hardest is you know, hearing our community members struggling with something, and we're really kind of hand tied what we can do to help them in some way.

So all right, Edgar, do you have any questions?

Um just the one if I get appointed to the city council, how would you know I done a great job at the end of the term?

Who wants to start?

I'll start if go ahead.

Uh we when you choose to run for a second term and they elect you for a second term.

Um I say that lightheartedly, but I also think that there's some truth to that.

Um I think honestly, I think you'll know.

Like I believe that you would know if you had spent those last couple of years feeling like your time was used appropriately.

Um I don't know how to else to answer that differently, other than my smart aleck comment initially, but next, yes, counselor Cardinus.

Yeah, my answer's not gonna be much better, but um if you just based off my own experience, it feels like it's never good enough, you're never doing enough, and that's just me personally speaking, because I think people that are in this role, like if you're trying to get rich off of this, it's not gonna happen, right?

Like we're obviously here because we care about our community and we want to do everything we can to kind of break down those barriers and advocate for them.

And so similarly to what Counselor Vaughn was saying earlier, there's a lot of things that and a lot of comments you hear and changes you want to make that we may not actually have any jurisdiction to do so.

And so even because of that, it may feel like you're not doing your job.

And so I think it's just it's it's hard because personally, I think for me, it feels a lot of times like I I wish I could do more.

But uh similarly, if they continue to vote for you, then I would hope that's a sign that our community is backing us.

Council Lopez.

Yeah, I I don't have a clear or better answer than that.

I'm still waiting to find out.

I think this is year two for me.

So I I hope to know soon uh with the next couple years.

But um the closest thing I can get is just uh being thanked by the community.

Um and there are some things that you'll never get a thanks uh thank you on.

Eventually you'll see them get processed through the system, but uh that's the closest thing that I can think of.

Thank you.

All that cleanup.

When the community comes to you and asks you to go do something bigger because they would they want you to be a county commissioner or the governor or something else, you're probably making some good changes.

Um and I would say you gotta start with a small list.

I am still working, even after 20 years on one of them that was on my original list, and it's just because it's so enormous and so fraught with challenge.

I may not get it done before I leave office.

But um you you gotta have to pick some goals along the way that have different sized mountains, something that's small and you can walk up.

And uh my open one is obviously Mount Everest that I'm working on still.

So I think that's how you will know, and as far as how we will know, um you will see us at at the end of your term encouraging you to continue to run, right?

If uh if nobody from the if everybody in the council at your last meeting is doing this when it's time to turn in applications, that's a pretty clear sign that maybe you haven't haven't been the greatest city counselor.

But if the other counselors and the mayor are saying, hey, you really should run for more continue your office, there's there's more you can do.

That's a sign that you're doing a great job.

Yeah, and one thing I will add is if the community members are just coming up to you with more things, even if they're just complaining or they're coming to you, at least they're coming to you because that's that's them trusting that you're at least going to advocate or bring up the situation.

Because how many times have you been in a situation where you advocate to somebody and then you just give up because you're like they're never gonna do anything?

So even if you feel like you're not making any any legway on that, if they're still continuing to come to you, I think that's a good sign.

Um so Sit Lali, do you have any questions?

Yeah, um, what other opportunities do counselors get to advocate for our city and our residents outside of regular sessions?

Can you repeat the first part?

What opportunities or what other opportunities do counselors get to advocate for our city and its residents outside of regular session?

I'll jump in on I'll take the easy answer on that one.

Um participation, like Councillor Lopez says in um multi-jurisdictional boards, committees, or commissions that um uh like I said on JPAC.

Um, who's doing community development block grant?

Uh Councilor Lopez.

Um those involvements, there are um a number of opportunities.

There's other boards that may ask you to join them because of your position within council.

They want they want to have your input, right?

From what where is the city coming from and what that is?

So I think that's uh some of the other opportunities, and and you can go nuts with League of Oregon Cities, um National Conference of Mayors.

There's uh there's a whole nother level of stuff that I have not in my my 20 you know years on council delved into just because there's been enough high quality stuff to focus on here, Washington County or the Tri-County area for me.

So there's there's a lot of possibilities.

Yeah, and to that I'd add like different caucuses too, like the women's caucus, there's the um the people of color caucus, so the on different levels, and what's nice about that is that it's not just regional to where we are, but that's everybody in the state of Oregon.

And so it's nice to have those different perspectives on that as well.

You get to really give a lot of people are gonna come to you and ask you for your input, whether that be nonprofits, it's and it may not just be to join a board, it's just like as a city, what do you think about XY or Z or what have you heard about your community?

So people are really coming to you as that trusted expert to be able to have those conversations with them.

And I think that's really a crucial opportunity because it gives you that chance to really advocate for our community on a different level that we don't always traditionally get.

Anyone else?

Councilor Lopez.

Yeah, just uh you mentioned this, uh, Counselor Golinas, but uh just a lot of opportunity with our nonprofits.

You name the passion, and you could probably will get an opportunity to join a board of that type.

So um, yeah, definitely a lot of opportunities with nonprofits and their uh boards.

Counselor Vaughn.

Yeah, uh we get invited to a lot of stuff where you know, to the mayor's comment earlier, you can't do it all, right?

And so you kind of get to pick and choose how you advocate outside of these meetings.

Um I I think the things that come to mind is um you know, days at the Capitol going in and being able to spend an afternoon meeting with our representatives at the at the Capitol on behalf of our city, um asking for funding for for different projects, um, and even you know, even having coffee in the afternoon with with house representatives that come through.

Um, I think you know those those come up all the time.

So yeah, there's there's never an end to you know the opportunities to do that.

Yeah, and uh just to continue to add to that, um, you will make relationships with individuals that you may not have um realize how crucial those will be, and just through those conversations and those relationships will really allow you to to build bridges and help community members in different ways.

Sometimes I overhear conversations about somebody talking about funding or something that they don't know how to access because that's a barrier to them, but because now I'm more informed on those operations and how those systems work, then I can use my knowledge to help them, even if it's just me connecting them with somebody.

So there's a lot of opportunities that open up in those ways as well, of you being able to really help community members that wouldn't already know how to access that information.

Um Matt, do you have any questions?

Yeah, um, what current project is your personal highest priority?

And what is a project recently that has not been successful?

And what did you learn from that and how are you uh taking that forward?

Anyone want to go first?

Yes, Councillor Goodines.

Well, I think what quickly became my highest priority was when we learned about our public safety and um how underfunded the the fire department was compared to our police department, um, and really understanding the different shifts and how long we've had our equipment for how many EMTs are you were you would be surprised at knowing that there were times where people were going out and there wasn't actually an EMT going out.

So when what you assume from that public safety point, you're calling somebody and you're you're gonna get an expert wasn't always the case, right?

And so I think being able to fill in that gap, and even that's something we're still working on because our solution, like you were talking about finding permanent solutions versus a band-aid solution.

I would say what we have right now is a band-aid solution.

It's a levy, right?

And levies will expire, and we will hope that we can get that levy again.

But really, ultimately, what we need to find is that permanent funding that's gonna sustain that department for the future to come.

Good job.

Council Lopez.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um I think one of the toughest one is being landlocked as far as having industrial land.

I think uh we've tried at least once to try to petition to um see if there's other land that uh we could um we could get.

Um and uh hasn't been successful.

I think we're gonna continue to have those conversations.

I think it's a long-term goal, um, not one that we're gonna give up on, but um it's been definitely hard um not being able to be successful there.

Um I think one that's been successful most recently was just um acquiring the Central or the Grande Foods part of the this land over here with Grande Foods used to be at.

I think uh that's definitely gonna help us as as we develop this core area of Cornelius in the future.

So that's definitely a uh one that um I think has been highly successful.

Thank you.

Councilor Vaughn.

Yeah, not having been here as long as some of the others, I think my answer might be a little more limited, but I think um similar to the Grande Foods location, you know, the the partial school that's remaining from the old elementary school.

I think that's probably one of our projects I'm most excited about is being able to do something with that property for the community.

I think that would be super rewarding for me, I think.

As far as something that is um that is failed.

I don't know that I've been here long enough to see something not really work.

I will uh echo what Councillor Lopez says regarding land where we're landlocked, you know, and trying to get more land within our boundaries to be able to grow and grow that tax base and um not be such a bedroom community, I think um is gonna be a struggle, and I think that's one that we've struggled with historically.

1977, a year that we'll live in infamy.

We had 500 plus acres north of town, and then council decided to pull in the urban boundary to exclude those 500 acres.

And we have been fighting ever since.

That's almost as long as I've been alive.

50, six years.

Um we've been fighting to try to get that 500 acres back in.

It's been in, it's been out, it's been overruled, it's been lawsuited.

So I I would say one of our biggest challenges is land.

It was part of the stuff that we went into with the grand bargain in 2014 when I was here.

And um to get to a negotiated non-lawsuit truce, we once again gave up the 500 acres that were forecasted to be industrial land to help stabilize our tax base so that we wouldn't just be a bedroom community, was once more what was given up to gain the 123.

Yes, we gave up 500 acres to get the 123 that we now all know as Laurel Woods that uh was supposed to be a 20-year land supply that in 11 years is almost completely filled up because Cornelius is one of the fastest growing cities in Oregon, and we are growing faster than Washington County and faster than the state, and we also have a lower than average income than both of the previously mentioned.

So land is very important and to your question, um Robert.

Um industrial land comes on at one-to-one for its value for property tax.

Um houses and apartments come in 50 or 33 percent, so substantially less to their value.

So that's why we continue to strive so hard for land.

So that's really our uh big thing.

And then as far as um challenges, um, I would say the one that we you have to become comfortable with as a counselor is there is always substantially more good to do than there is money or time to accomplish.

So you're always doing a battle of what can we afford, what do we have time for, and then what is attainable, right?

What how far is unattainable past what we're trying to get done?

And we we've done some great things.

We have a utility assistance program that we thought about and talked about for a number of years, and we finally have a utility assistance program.

Um we have the Drake Learning Center.

We have a great library that's been a plan for 20 some years, and it's been here for the last five, seven years now.

Um so we have we've got some great accomplishments.

Virginia Garcia working with uh them to get the money through the feds to do the Virginia Garcia to go from a couple houses and a garage to a medical center in our community, the corporate headquarters for Virginia Garcia is here in Cornelius.

So there's a number of great accomplishments.

Um we continue to and I I will since we got a minute, I'm gonna take the time.

Um every time a Forest Grove person or business owner walks up to me and says, I wish I'd put my business in Cornelius, because you guys have got your act together so much better.

That is a tremendous boost that you know when businesses or residents are questioning the challenge of where they chose to live, and in retrospect, wish they would have picked here.

Um I've had friends from Hillsborough do the same.

They're like, you know, I could have lived in Laurelwood, but I bought a place in Bethany.

And I think I would have rather l lived in Lowerwood in that community.

That that sense of community.

So I think those are some other day-to-day accomplishments that we have that people look with almost an envious eye at the things we've done, the improvements in the couplet, right?

That we have so much that's been improved with the walking sidewalks, the lights, the appearance.

The people think, and that's why the businesses, you guys have seen the businesses start to prop up.

You know, we got three new restaurants that are almost ready to open, two ready to open, one's getting developed.

Um those things.

There's a there's a good head of steam moving right now, and uh like you said the challenge still is land.

I think that is all the questions we had.

I think you guys asked good questions.

I think we spent a substantial amount of time responding, probably 20-25 minutes.

Um you're all welcome to stay and witness the rest of the fun.

Um that is our evening, because we need to pivot over to our South Cornellas Collector Street update work session.

Council uh staff, was there anything else we needed to do?

I think basically that we'll uh discuss, deliberate, and decide later in the meeting, and like I said, you're absolutely welcome to stay and watch all the other fun.

And I want to thank you all.

Um, I will make a closing comment, and the rest of the counselors can tell me yay or nay, but um the good news is this isn't an easy decision.

We had a number of qualified candidates, interested people, and to have a number of people apply for the one position, and I would say in my in my closing um if you're not the one person picked out of the five of you, don't let that slow you down.

There's boards, there's committees, there's commissions that are still open, and we've got an election coming um fall of 26, and uh two of these seats will be up for election, and my seat will be up for election.

So um there's there's gonna be three opportunities in fall of 26.

So I may choose to run again.

I haven't fully decided yet.

I am not announcing or denouncing that I will run one more time, but um that there's possibilities that I would encourage more I would I would encourage I would encourage each one of you to look at if you're not the one selected tonight to to look for more opportunities, and I personally would recommend, and I think the council would agree, I would recommend you for any board, committee, or commission that falls along your line of interest if you're not selected or already sitting on one currently.

Council, any other comments?

Awesome, thank you.

You're you're you're released.

Thank you.

Okay, our next subject is the South Cornelius Collector Street update, City Manager.

Um, and uh Terry, Mr.

Keys.

Oh, there you are, Terry.

Thank you, Mayor and Council.

We'll just take a moment here to get re reconfigured.

Um I think it said that it's the dish it will immediately following.

Yep, you're right.

Thank you for that.

Good question though, Councillor Goodinas.

Oh wow, we get the whole, we're getting the everybody on the big screen.

All right.

Before you guys jump into it, it's not often I get to see the two of you together here.

Um I don't know about the rest of council, but I really want to thank you for the work on uh 19th and Davis, the roundabout.

I really think I don't know what the date is, I haven't seen it from uh our police department, but I I really feel like that was a substantial improvement in our community, and I want to thank you guys for getting a good idea in there.

I think not everybody may agree it's a good idea, but I I think it's a good idea, and I think it's working well.

So you got you guys got the floor.

Thank you, Mayor.

Peter Brandham, City Manager, along with Terry Keys, City Engineer and Kevin Openlander, assistant city engineer, and we're here to uh hopefully take about 10 minutes, maybe 13, and we'd like to if with your permission, just go ahead and get through it in the interest of time so that because there probably will be some questions and we'd like to leave enough time for that.

Uh, we're here to update on the South Cornelius Collectors work broadly.

So for about the last 20 years, the city's been working with the community to plan for this north-south transportation improvement and uh the aforementioned development in the southeast portion of the city, Laurel Woods really advanced this from what was existing in the in our local transportation system plan about 20 years ago.

So we'd like to talk about kind of kind of taking what's been an acute effort over the last few years, at least uh certainly since I've been here, and tying back into that longer context to kind of tell the whole story of kind of how we got here and where we recommend going.

Broadly, the objectives are pedestrian safety, vehicle flow, street improvements, all within the boundaries of available budget.

And I'll also mention by the way that we will be using this presentation in a uh community meeting that we'll uh tell you about here shortly.

And I should also say uh Terry and Kevin, please interrupt me if I miss something important.

So again, looking back to 2005, we're about 20 years in.

Uh and these points on the timeline uh really mostly since about 2016, so about the last 10 years, uh there have been a lot of substantial developments that have allowed us to consider this this new roadway.

Back in 2005, it was envisioned that there would be a north-south uh new collector called South 29th from baseline to dogwood interconnecting with dogwood and then kind of curving south uh and going back east to 345th at that time and those dollars, the estimated cost for that all would would have been around three million dollars.

So that's kind of the you know, back in the beginning.

So fast forwarding to 2016, um couple years after the the acreage came in to the urban growth boundary uh with the grand bargain um again reflecting that estimated cost when the new subdivision was proposed, uh just under a thousand new homes, and the subsequent agreement with the developer of Laurel Woods that the city would share the cost uh to uh to design and construct South 29th Boulevard 2017, the Hillsborough School District, so that that whole parcel for those who don't know is owned by the Hillsborough School District.

It had uh years ago been planned for for a new high school, but those plans changed.

And the district has essentially been banking that land.

It's just under 40 acres, and that that new road, that new collector was slated to be constructed um on the western boundary of that property, and the district did dedicate that portion uh at the end 2017.

The cost of that new segment, so it wouldn't be the entirety of that roadway that was reflected in the 2005 TSP, but rather from essentially the southern part of that school district property up to baseline would have been around a million dollars.

The expected revenue to come from the new development would have been 6.7 million.

And then later in that year, revisions were made to the transportation plan to include South 29th and Alpine.

I don't have a pointer, but you could probably point it out too, but so others can see it would be near the near the top of that parcel from the red line, which would be that new uh portion of South 29th just west to connect into the current Alpine and then east across to 345th.

So it would have formed essentially a T.

And the estimated cost for that would have been 4 million at the time in 2017.

So over the next few years there were discoveries made along the way, and as with any major road project, a lot of complexities and variables.

But in 2019, the preliminary design of South 29th began.

And that year a survey, the required survey discovered that there were grade issues where the new roadway would cross the tracks and connect into baseline, which ended up becoming a sizable barrier.

Essentially, the grade is too large to safely connect the roadway there without impacting the current railbed.

And so a new alignment was devised and a lot of effort went into it that would obviously, as you can see here, the red line, it would curve and go along the northern boundary of the school district parcel, and then it would have to sweep south there in order to connect with 345 appropriately.

It couldn't connect straight across because it would have been too close to the rail crossing.

So the estimated costs at that time grew again to just over 7 million.

And within that curved area where the yellow arrow is that was planned for stormwater treatment, as well as, and it was kind of a kind of a an opportunity for us to contemplate perhaps developing a second water reservoir.

And this was before the city made the commitment to develop the aquifer storage and recovery system that we have.

Yes.

Microphone, please.

Yep.

Thank you.

We were building the ASR, I think at the time, or it had been designed, but we didn't know if it was going to work.

We didn't know how much water it was going to give us.

Thank you.

Thanks.

And I think the other part was where was the appropriate place to store, right?

Now all the eggs were in one basket.

Water park and the ASR point.

Did we maybe need some water on that southeast side for fire service and other things?

We there was a lot of analysis, right?

So this was put on the options list.

I remember that's right.

Yep.

So the design advanced, even you can see on this on this map here, the the mini roundabout was envisioned there, tying in at dogwood, and uh, you know, pretty uh pretty mature design, and construction cost inflation really began in earnest around that time, and um between 2020 and 2022, updated right-of-way in agreement with the school district, property was pursued and mostly secured for the new alignment.

Uh and at that time too, the northernmost portion of 345th was annexed into the city to accommodate that alignment and that connection, and we achieved 100% uh plans for South 29th, and again, that estimated cost at the time was a bit more than what the anticipated revenue was, but just over seven million.

We uh we encountered uh another barrier at that time, which was the acquisition of the land inside the curve there, uh, where we were unsuccessful coming to agreement with the school district on the value of that land.

We had two very different appraisals and weren't weren't able to reach a an agreement on that, so that presented an additional barrier there.

And with the growth in construction costs, the in by 2023 the cost of the project had really ballooned to nearly 14 million dollars.

So that was almost double the anticipated revenue overall.

So although a lot of effort was put in, the the team sitting over here kind of went back to the drawing board and and really started to with our consultants started to think hard about you know what what else can we do.

And so we looked at those alternate alternatives, and since you know, we we had every intention as a city of having that egress from Laurel Woods designed and and constructed by then.

Um this has those especially those who live along South 20th and South 26th know it has added a lot of pressure to both those streets, especially, and there have been a lot of concerns about speeding because of the way those streets are designed and and pedestrian safety.

And so uh last year we began design conceptual design for traffic calming in the southern portions of both of those streets.

We have implemented some near-term changes, so we've at where you can see the circles here.

We painted new crosswalks at uh 20th and heather, 26th and heather, and 26th and ginger, and we put in new pedestrian crossing signs at a couple of locations as well, and we we feel like that that really helps as a near-term.

And as we looked at those, we began to devise some uh some longer term traffic calming changes.

And I'm gonna go through these pretty quickly.

Part of our anxiety here is that we don't want you to get into helping us design this yet because we're gonna have a public meeting here in a couple weeks.

Um, but we we do now have some and Terry and Kevin are recognized around the state and beyond, actually, for a lot of the treatments that we do and traffic calming around the community.

And so some of these treatments are are envisioned for some of these main intersections, 26th and ginger, curb bulbouts, 26th and dogwood, uh perhaps a mini roundabout, 26th and beach, where there's a lot of school crossing to free orchard school.

We would conceive potentially of some curb bulbouts there to protect that crossing, and then 20th and ginger curb bulb outs and 20th and dogwood as well.

So those are those are still conceptual at this point, but we are uh recommending that we uh allocate funding to make some really substantive traffic calming improvements there.

So I've mentioned this a couple times.

We do plan to have a public open house November 18th in the evening across the alley at the at the library to uh to explain to the community what kind of what we're thinking on this and to get their input on some of the proposed changes.

I believe we've posted this to the city website, and we'll be sending postcards to the most closely affected neighbors there, and also included in the Gazette.

And part of that will be the uh the fact that there is a development proposal coming now for that for that Hillsborough School District property, which really gives us the opportunity to take a different uh tact um at developing that egress, and not going into the north part portion of the property.

The the uh initial proposal would be for development to be on kind of the lower I don't know, 80% or so of that 40 acres.

Uh the school district would retain the north kind of the north-northeast portion of the property, about 10 acres of it, and it would allow us to uh partner with a developer to construct an extension of dog wood where we would tie the current South 29th in with a mini roundabout and then extend dogwood east to a mini roundabout at 345th.

From that point north, 345th would be improved to city standards at least half or three quarter street there.

And then you can see the diagram here in the lower right, which would envision a three-lane intersection with TV Highway, and of course, a proper controlled crossing at the at the rail crossing there at 345th.

So that that 2023 kind of cost barrier there at 14 million.

Now we we compare with we're thinking hopefully uh 2027 to be under construction with the improvements to 20th and 26th.

And at this set at this time estimating about a two and a half million cost for those improvements um.

And then um by 2028, would hope to be under construction to to construct the improvements, extension of dog wood and the improvements to 345th, and we estimate that at this time would be around 6.1 million.

So all total, we're talking about 8.6 million versus 14 million, which is within the budget if that development moves forward and we include the uh the anticipated revenue from the additional development.

We would we would be looking at around 10 million revenue.

Terms of the timeline, we would uh get going right away with design for both the improvements to 20th and 26th as well as to the design for 345th, that that whole scenario, and um and then by 2027 be under construction with the improvements on 20th and 26th.

Um ideally we would be under construction of the segment there at 345, but that's highly dependent on you know, kind of how quickly that development occurs and other variables um including you know working with the railroad, which which can be time intensive.

So, but that's kind of our view today.

So that was the presentation.

We're um happy to go back to slides as needed and answer your questions.

Yes, Councilor Gordinas.

How much of a contingency have we put on that budget in case because we've seen prices of construction go up and down, mostly up?

And um we saw what happened after the pandemic and just in the current um economic standpoint that we're in.

Uh I'm fearful that I mean we have 8.6 now, but um realistically, what are we looking at as a buffer for that and how much like if it if you know, in two years, by the time it's 2027, it's 10 million.

Um what are we doing to set ourselves up for success in those cases?

The 8.6 has a 30 percent contingency built into it.

Yep.

And on average, because uh I'm thinking about the other projects that we've had that we've come and had to increase.

I mean, not that much, but have had to be increased.

Do you see that 30 percent as being pretty realistic or I think it is the big the big cost increase in the last few years happened around the pandemic the whole economy went sideways and and the numbers went went crazy in the supply chains.

I think the problems they had caused uh all the numbers to skyrocket.

But in the last 30 percent, if we get started right away uh with design and construction, we should we we should easily be okay.

Okay, and then even with tariffs and things like that.

I'm just thinking about it because I know a couple people that work in construction and and I saw I didn't think that the tariffs would hit them as hard as they as it ended up hitting them.

So I'm just double checking that.

The beauty of roads is it's rock and concrete and it's all here.

Okay, perfect.

That's all I needed to hear.

Thank you.

Other counselors, questions.

Yes.

Councilor Vaughan?

It's kind of actually feels like two different projects, right?

You have the the 26th and the 20th improvements.

Is that going to move ahead regardless of what happens with the with Lorewood Crown?

Yes.

We uh we were before we even had heard that the school district was negotiating with the developer to sell off part of their land.

We Kevin and I were working on improvement, those improvements to 2026 and pretty much had them ironed out what we wanted to do.

And then and then the Laurel Crown came out and uh we said, well, we can we can do another another part here, and that'll give us our third leg, our third connection to baseline.

Other questions I will add that um you the three of you are probably blissfully unaware of the um soft promise that the prior councils made on your behalf that we would never go up 345th below the existing residents.

Um so I'm the only seated one that's left from that original promise.

Uh I'm just gonna let you know the um that that was part of uh the calming discussion that occurred about that expansion because there was a lot of concern.

But there's I mean, there's people that live there, they've lived there maybe their whole adult lives, and this will have uh I think a substantive change on the the quality of 345th and their personal experiences if we uh go through.

But I think we're down to four or six.

How many houses are actually six if we come in at dogwood and then go up?

Yeah.

Yeah, there's more if you if we do when we talked about coming across lower before.

Right.

Um just prepared that you may hear about you guys promised.

Um I'm I'm the last standing member of that promise.

And I think Terry and I, and I think you were the tech at the point, maybe when that was those kind of things were thrown around when we did the grand bargain in 2014.

So that's one thing.

Um, and I don't know if uh Terry or Kevin have input.

What's the likelihood we're gonna be asked to close something to expand 345th?

Because historically the railroad has always asked us for two closings for what every improvement, and that's kind of how we ended up closing off the street north of here is to get the improvement on North 26th.

So what do you what's the what's the weather, or what have you guys found out, or what do you think?

It's a risk.

And we won't know until we we meet with the railroad and O dot rail, which is the first step to set up a rail order.

Uh I have not encountered a crossing improvement project yet where they required other crossings to be closed.

I mean, we're taking a crossing with a yield sign and making it safe.

And uh, I told Peter, well, if if they play hardball, my response is fine, we'll leave the leave it the way it is and construct a new road up to it, and then there's a serious safety issue that's on the that's on the back of the railroad and o-dot rail for not letting us improve the crossing.

Yeah, because I think the South 26th improvement got is what we closed one or two streets on the south side about, and the North 26th crossing cost us a couple other ones up here for those two developments.

So I'm sure they'll ask for a lot, and uh we should tell them to pound sand.

I'm okay with your answer.

Well, I did that once and it worked.

We when we put our when we improved the 14th crossing and put a signal at 14th and baseline, they wanted us to close the 12th, including for pedestrians.

And I said no, we had a 1990s agreement that said that would stay open for pedestrians, and if they don't if they don't adhere to that, we're not gonna improve the rail crossing at 14th and ODOT convinced them that that was to bide by the agreement.

Yeah, and I'm I'll tell you I still have a burr in my saddle about uh North 26th, the North 10th, where they came and tore out all the infrastructure that we had to pay to get put in there for the trail.

I mean, there were beautiful lit crossings that we could have recycled for 345th, but they just let them come in and tear all that infrastructure out and leave us with a a really poorly um paved in crossing that's just turning into a jump.

So you you got my support on fighting with O dot rail.

I'm already not on their popular list because my comments on TV Highway about they can pound sand on it too, because they want to push all the bus stops out of the O dot rail easement on the south side of Tw of TV Highway.

So for the high capacity transit project.

Council, any other questions I've stirred with my comments.

Staff, thank you for uh so counselor Godina started.

Just last one.

So this doesn't include the improvements to the actual road of 345th, right?

Like that's not a conversation right now.

We're just talking about the adjustments to get the road up to that.

Well, this includes a six point uh one million includes going all the way to baseline.

It includes widening three forty-fifth between a railroad trucks and baseline three lanes, so we can have a right and left turn lane.

It includes a new rail crossing at the sidewalks or no sidewalks.

Sidewalk on the west side.

Okay.

With the other side on the east side, south of the railroad trucks is outside the UGB, so we can't do urban improvements.

The west side will do a sidewalk.

Ideally, I think when I do an eight foot or twelve foot sidewalk and will be pervious concrete, so we have less store more to do with.

To me, if you're looking for comparison, it it'll be a lot like Evergreen if you think about Evergreen up um just east of Glencoe, right?

The north side for a number of years has been no man's land, but the south side's all been developed, so you end up with green strip landscaping, all those kind of things that are normal city functions.

You've got a city-like road, which is evergreen, and then you end up with a ditch, basically on the other side.

Am I wrong, Terry?

And what we'd probably do.

The only difference is uh 345th next to the school property will not have curb and gutter.

It'll be a rural section because we don't want to deal with stormwater to put in curbing gutters, you gotta put piping in and sketch basins, and then we have to take the water underneath the railroad tracks, the baseline, get ODOT permits to go down baseline, and it gets very, very expensive.

Got it.

I think the last one I'll share with you guys.

I've been through the city manager, been poking these guys for years about 29th, because um they raised TV Highway to match you know 209th.

So I we know it can be done.

They did it actually for Costco too, right?

They rate they you know it I hate the Costco intersection in Hillsborough, but it works, right?

You can make a road, they can succumb to that.

And it I just think it would probably be.

I think you guys did the homework, and it would be very expensive.

And what would we use to motivate ODOT to raise TV Highway several feet, even on one side to meet up with the grade necess necessary for 29th?

And I don't think there is one.

No, it's very it would be way beyond our means.

Yeah.

Okay.

Well, there's nothing else.

I think we'll adjourn until our seven o'clock meeting.

Thank you.

For the city council, this is November 3rd, 2025.

We are on Zoom webinar.

We are on TV C T V live stream, and we also have the wordly live translation available.

Information for that is at the back counter.

And the first thing we do is we call the order and we'll start with the Pledge of Allegiance.

Please join me.

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.

Thank you.

Staff, would you please do roll call?

Councillor Lopez.

Present.

Councilor Vaughan.

Present.

Council President Claudines Valencia.

Present.

Mayor Delane.

Present.

All present.

Great.

That takes us into announcements.

All I can hear is the scout singing announcements, announcements, announcements.

Okay.

Uh Tuesday, November 4th is election day.

That's tomorrow.

In case you folks didn't remember, your ballots are due tomorrow.

And we are fortunate here in Cornelius.

We have a ballot box right outside the building here out in front of uh police services in the city hall.

Um get those turned in.

I think they got to be turned in, I think about before 8 p.m.

I'll drop mine off tomorrow.

Um Veterans Day, Tuesday, November 11th.

The city will be closed.

Um, we also will be having our Veterans Day ceremony at Veterans Memorial Park at 1 p.m.

So please join us.

It's usually a well-attended event.

Tuesday, the 18th of November from 5 to 7.

South Cornelius Traffic Calming Project Open House will be at the Cornish Public Library.

Saturday, November 22nd from 4 to 7 p.m.

will be the annual community dinner.

And that will be in the old Cornelius Elementary School.

Not the new in the old.

So it'll be in the gymnasium like it has been in the past.

And let's see what else we have here.

Monday, December 1st, City Council work session scheduled for 6 p.m.

And then at 7 p.m.

on December 1st, we have the city council meeting.

Takes us to consent agenda.

Do I have anyone wishing to approve?

Mo move to approve the council uh consent agenda.

I motion to approve the consent agenda.

Councillor Gardinas, do I have a second?

Second motion.

Second.

Why councillor Lopez?

All those in favor, please say aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Opposed?

Abstentions?

Passes unanimous.

Takes us to public comment.

Comments are limited to three minutes.

Speaking in person.

We have registered folks here that wish to speak in the council chamber, and they've uh presented notes, and I will call them up one at a time to come up to this to the speech.

We also have an option to speak virtually.

You need to uh contact the city recorder at Cornelius OR.gov no later than 3 p.m.

on the day of council.

Do we have anybody speaking?

No one's requested a virtual.

Okay.

All right.

I will take us into our two speakers.

Um Lolly, and I'm sorry, you're I will murder your last name, so please go ahead and um say it appropriately.

I promise I will learn this at some point.

Sit Lali Nunez Barragán.

Um somebody timing this.

Okay, cool.

She's got the time.

Cool.

Um good evening, Mayor Jeff Dalen and Cornelia City Council.

I speak before you today to voice my concern about the increase of activity in our city and the Greater Portland Metro area of immigration and customs enforcement enforcement and removal operations.

There is an immense fear among a cur our community members, especially those of the Latino community.

Fear of detainment and harassment is present even amongst those with of us with citizenship status, valid visas and lawful status.

The lack of accountability and transparency from ICER agents is interfering with many of my community's day-to-day lives.

Simple things like being able to take children to school, buying groceries, and going to work come with the fear of not returning home.

Homebread winners, workers, laborers, neighbors, parents, business owners are disappearing under suspicions of not being a citizen, with many of us left trying to track our people with no notice but empty vehicles and much confusion.

We are left picking up pieces of puzzles with minimal information as of whereabouts and case updates.

I urge you to please use your position as a city counselor to push for a state of emergency within our county or even if our city if possible.

Tackl tactics like that of masked agents dressing like civilians using unmarked vehicles and non-disclosure of agency or badge numbers damage the relationships between all levels of government and our residents.

I fear for what is yet to come, but we must protect each other the best we can.

If you want to know how to help our community members, please consider carrying a whistle with you with the following code when you see ice.

Blow your whistle in a broken rhythm, like pre pre pre pre pre to alert the ice is present.

And if you see someone being detained, blow your whistle continuously.

Print out take in here notices and save the perk hotline on your phone number as a contact.

None of this is legal advice, of course, but just a suggestion in this time of period of survival for many of us.

And thank you for your time.

Thank you.

Next up, we have Bertha Haas.

I want to address or just inform you a little bit firsthand of what happened at St.

Alexander Church on Sunday morning yesterday.

I think that's accurate.

Three events between 7 a.m.

and 9 30 a.m.

Uh I want to speak primarily to the one that I personally witnessed.

Um the um the government agency, we believe was border patrol because in all of the events, in all three of the events.

And we know that because that they were wearing the uniform, their jackets said uh border patrol.

Uh mass was in session at both times, the seven o'clock mass and then the nine o'clock mass.

Um the incident at the nine o'clock mass.

Uh a vehicle, I believe, entered the parking lot, followed by a border patrol vehicle.

And as he entered the from the 11th Street, uh another border patrol vehicle entered from what's this one right out here, heading toward Forest Grove.

Um, and then another border patrol vehicle at on uh 10th Street, headed north.

Altogether, in the end, there were five border patrol vehicles.

They did not give uh identification, they did not give their names when our pastor came out and addressed them, asked them for uh name, number, and agency.

Uh they told him it doesn't work that way.

It doesn't work that way to both answers.

Uh when one of our observers uh advised the young man who was being followed uh not to speak, he was told to shut up.

Um there were bystanders who immediately the pastor called Perk and the bystanders immediately began videoing and blowing their whistles.

Uh the one of the border patrol vehicles was had a license plate from Washington State.

I don't know what the others were, although my advice to the bystanders was to video the license plate numbers.

And the reason I did that was that there's been so many rumors in the community that it's ice or I never heard anybody say it was border patrol.

They either said ice or what they called bounty hunters, people who um have no authority but are collecting people and turning them over to ice.

So that was my motivation for coming to be able to say that in this particular event it was border patrol who um was here.

The young man they picked up.

I didn't see that because I was watching border patrol, but another one of our observers said the young man was an invalid.

He had he was using crutches, and he had a brace on one of his legs.

What I heard from the agent who was in the uh Washington State carry up, hurry up, get him in the car.

And so now hearing from another observer that this was an invalid clarified for me why uh they were having trouble.

Um they put him finally got him, put him in the car, uh they took his vehicle, parked it in the parking lot, and locked the keys inside the car.

Um, and all five vehicles disappeared.

I do not believe that this person was uh a parish member.

Uh relatives saw the video that was posted online and identified the victim as uh, and they contacted another parishioner who contacted me.

We got the keys for them, they were able to come and pick up the vehicle.

Twenty-one years old apparently, has only been in the country for three years.

Uh okay.

That was the nine o'clock.

During the seven o'clock mass, I was not there, but I was told that there were three vehicles.

What two in the parking lot and one on 11th street.

Um Father just happened to be coming toward the church, and uh somebody on the street also was honked their horn and indicated to Father that there was action in the parking lot as he approached the parking lot.

I believe this is accurate, both vehicles disappeared.

Uh Father went and talked to the folks who were in the car, and they said that the I the agent had told them that he was not the person that they were interested in.

Um so they left.

I don't know, I do not think that these people were parishioners.

And the other incident I'm not real sure about, somebody drove in again into the parking lot, realized that he was being followed, quickly got out of the car and out of the pickup and disappeared, ran.

Uh I wasn't there to observe that, so that's secondhand information as far as I know.

Um they left the vehicle in the parking lot, and we had to move it uh to an actual parking space.

And I can't remember if when I went back for the six o'clock mass if it was still there or not.

Anyway, at the time we thought that we were that we as a parish were being targeted.

I don't believe that anymore.

But at the time, that's so we set up patrols and for all the rest of the day we had patrols uh both in vehicles circulating the entire area and walking or yeah, pardon me, walking all around.

Perk did respond.

And Perk trained folks accompanied us all afternoon.

We were very pleased, and I want to say that clearly.

Very pleased with the community support that we got.

We even had community members bringing us food as for the as the day went on because we have a lot of activities.

For my own personal experience, I want to report the presence of a white pickup, I believe it was a Ford.

With no license plates at all.

And they've been seen in that vicinity oftener, but I personally saw it on the street.

It was a pickup, but it had, you know, one of those cages over the back, so it was an all closed in back.

And as we um patrolled also for the six o'clock mass, there was another vehicle, a brown vehicle spotted with no license plates at all.

Um what I want to my own, this is my own personal.

This is not a request from the church.

I put out the request to whether anybody other else was concerned.

Nobody people I think are just in shock today and um trying to get back on their feet.

Um but I would like to request that our police would be able perh possibly to patrol that area a little bit on weekends, because we're busy all day, and we have you know that we have thousands of people in there uh day and night.

Um thank you all for listening with the support in the community.

We're all in a tough spot.

But let's hang together.

Thank you.

Thank you for bringing this to our attention.

City manager, do we want to uh entertain the uh police to respond to that request?

We weren't planning on doing so, but yeah.

Um just uh to kind of close the loop is my understanding is um while our police can if they're present can document things and uh we actually per the video that we published that city you know the uh council president and I published um if people feel in danger, they absolutely should call.

Um if it's it's urgent, call the emergency 911 if they're it's not an emergency, they can call the non-emergency number.

But as far as our police interfering with the presence of uh immigration's customs or border patrol, um that is not within our purview, is my understanding to do.

So um, but I am concerned about this.

Um I've got stuff for more in my mayor's update near the end of the meeting uh that I want to share that I personally experienced this last week.

Um there's been several requests to me about what can the city do, what's the next step?

So that'll be part of my questions for staff.

Um, especially like as uh Lolly brought up, what can we do?

What would a state of emergency allow us to do that we can't do right now?

So I think there's definitely a call to action from our citizenry, and I've had a um a lot of people, people I didn't expect to reach out to me.

Um I've taken a little heat.

I don't know if you've taken any heat for the video, you too.

Um, but also I've been surprised by the number of people that have come out in support and thanked me, thanked us for uh doing those videos to do those uh basically public service announcements and uh to make the statements we did in those videos and to continue to see what else the city can do to support people that live here with that um that took us through our public comments.

We have no recognitions tonight.

We do have presentations.

First up is our Washington County update from our county commissioner, Jerry Willie.

Jerry, you have the floor.

And I'll give you more than three minutes.

Peter gave me two.

Well, good thing I'm running the meeting tonight.

Yeah, I know.

So just to continue that conversation, I think that subject matter has been top of mind with the county commission as well.

We heard a lot of folks at our last Tuesday meeting some really passionate testimony about the impact of ICE raids, immigration enforcement on our communities, and particularly about how it's impacting families and children.

And we we heard that, and we felt like we needed to take action to do that.

So later on in our work session, we had that conversation about what could we do to declare an emergency declaration.

And we proceeded uh to have that conversation.

Then uh Commissioner Snyder and I were appointed by the commissioners to meet with our attorneys and develop um those uh declarations, and we have uh we will be discussing this more tomorrow morning at our nine o'clock work session.

We will be taking action if uh approved at the board meeting.

These we have two declarations.

Um the first one is the immigration emergency declaration, and if it's passed would authorize us to allocate up to 200,000 to support immigrants and refugees in our county.

The second one is the SNAP emergency declaration would allow us to authorize up to 250,000 to combat food insecurity in the county due to the SNAP eliminations and reductions.

What exactly that's going to do and look like, we will find out tomorrow uh more about that, because there are restrictions.

We're saying we don't want this to just be a paper declaration.

We want there to be something behind it, and that's the reason why we put this one-time money uh up for both of these declarations and to be sending a very strong message.

Um so if you'd like to know more about that, um tune in tomorrow.

Our work sessions, of course, are on Zoom, and uh so is our board meeting.

So we'd certainly, and if you have comments, we take uh public testimony at the board meetings as well.

The beginning is three minutes and the end is five minutes.

So um please stay tuned for more information from that.

Something that's uh we were hoping is a little bit more uh positive is as the mayor said, uh tomorrow is your vote deadline.

We hope that you all have uh approved, voted for the library levy and the public safety levy.

Both of them are very important, obviously, to uh continue services in those two areas, and we're looking forward to providing some additional monies.

There's um there's a lot of flyers information about what exactly that covers, and I can certainly do that, but I'm not gonna take this time to do it because it's a lot, but we uh are very hopeful that um the uh voters of Washington County certainly would approve those two levies, and we can move into the next five years uh with uh some more options for services, continued services, and certainly enhanced services.

So we are definitely looking forward to that.

Umorrow at our board meeting, we're gonna be talking about legislative priorities and policies.

It's kind of hard to believe.

Seems like we just came out of the session.

It was a very long session, and here we are talking about the next one, which of course is going to be the short session.

Um we have set up um, we have established a number of those policies and um and priorities.

Um financially driven, of course, because um our state is gonna suffer some pretty strong financial impacts, I think, from a variety of things.

And we are concerned that um the partially funded and non-funded mandates that the state provides that uh makes the county do uh will not be funded as well.

And we are already in uh some very serious considerations for uh reduced services as we um as we go into the next budget season.

And again, we talk about budgets.

Uh we just finished up and just passed our budget just like you guys, um, and we're already in the conversation about what does the next budget look like.

Um this Thursday will be a presentation by our CFO and uh Tanyanji, our CAO on what they anticipate our budgets, our revenues will look like.

Um this Thursday will be a presentation by our CFO and uh Tanyanji, our CAO on what they anticipate our budgets, our revenues will look like there's been um information provided by assessment and taxation as to what our revenues will look like coming uh this November and uh then what some of the things, the demands that we're still going to have and whatever it is, it's um uh if it's new money, it's gonna be welcomed, but it's uh obviously going to be very difficult to backfill some of the services we've had to cut already, and we probably won't be able to do that.

And speaking of money, you know, um we're talking about we're continuing conversations with Metro on the SHS um funds that come in.

Um they're anticipating those will also be reduced, primarily because of job loss uh in the three county area.

Um I was in a session last week, a housing session, and they said that uh 10,000 jobs have been lost in Multnomah County alone, and 18,000 in the three county areas.

I heard a bigger number than that today.

Uh so that continues to have a significant impact, certainly on our state revenues as well as uh a variety of other issues like the SHS funding.

So we'll have to wait and see.

Um a much more positive um standpoint, we opened up our CAT.

Remember, that's the Center for Addiction Triage and Treatment.

Um that was the second facility that we've opened up this year.

Uh we're very excited about that.

If you have not seen that facility, uh please um be looking on our website because we are hosting open houses.

We want the general public to see what a beautiful facility and what a great facility that's going to be for uh those folks who are in need of those treatments.

Um just as a reminder from LUT, River Road is closed uh over there by the Rock Creek uh CWS uh station plant, and so that's gonna be closed for 18 months.

So figure out some other way to get down River Road 219 probably is gonna be your best shot there.

Um yeah, thank you, Mayor, for reminding them about the uh veterans um your veterans event that you're going to have.

Uh we also have one and in Hillsborough, it's at 11 o'clock on the 11th.

So you could actually do both.

But um I'm very happy that we have kind of amped those up for the last few years.

Actually, the North Plains one was the only one that we had available to us.

And so um I'm glad to see that we have those uh that's uh event happening again on the 11th.

Um I think that's probably enough information.

There's a lot of things going on dealing with uh our federal delegation as well, and uh we'd certainly like to see the government open up for business here pretty soon.

This is the 34th day, I believe, and tomorrow we'll set the record.

So we'd certainly like to see our federal government back in operations.

Council, questions for the commissioner?

Yes, Councilor Gardines.

Thank you for the updates.

I had a question about the first update you gave about the um state of emergency, and I know you mentioned some funding.

So two-part question.

How do we how are you all um thinking about that funding being allocated?

Is that something that would go to nonprofits that would help the community members, or is this something where you all have an idea of how you want it to be allocated and for example um to direct services?

My other question about the state of emergency is what else besides providing funding, does it actually do?

Like is it gonna allow our Washington County sheriffs to react in a different way, or is it going to um have policy changes that would require officers can't be masked in the county?

So uh I'm just curious as to what sort of conversations you all have been talking with that policy.

Well, that was exactly where uh the conversation went uh last week because we did not want this to be a paper tiger, so to speak, but those things that you were saying you were asking if they're going to do that, and the answer is no, uh, we're precluded from doing that.

Um we are trying to provide assistance to those folks that are impacted by this, but we cannot interfere with ICE.

Uh and we cannot have our sheriff's department, nor can you have your police department uh interfere with those activities either.

So we are that'll be more of the discussion.

I think you'll hear tomorrow.

And um that's the one thing that we did ask our county council to do is what does this mean?

And um I think we are going to be limited, but this is at least an effort for us to say we hear you and we're going to do what it is that we can within our guidelines.

Sorry.

Um another question I have has the county talked about because what I've heard and understood is that so the police cannot interfere unless there is actionable uh fear for that person's life or that person is severely in danger, then they can step in.

Um is this conversations you all have had or am I mishearing?

And the reason I bring that up is because we've seen videos where there is an excessive amount of force and people literally saying they can't breathe and being choked out.

And so I'm just wondering at what point can they actually interfere to help out, or if that's just not even something we're willing to touch.

Well, that would be a great question for our sheriff uh because uh I don't have the answers to those.

I just know that uh like I said, we are precluded from interfering with ICE.

And uh yes, if someone's life is in danger, I'd like to think that we could step in and assist, but um that's dangerous territory.

So um apologize that I can't give you more specifics on that, but that would be a good sheriff's question.

Otherwise, um Jerry, thanks for coming out as always and uh discussing with us.

Um I did appreciate the time that you and I got to discuss at the uh cat opening.

Yes, that's uh quite a facility.

Um the one I would share with you, and I don't know if uh Commissioner Treese, if Pam is shared with you uh basically we during her open house that we had last week, um we had a uh resident come in and cry cry on us, and it was very moving that um basically people are barricading themselves in their homes.

They're afraid to go out in public for fear of these kind of things like we heard about from the church this weekend.

Um of the things we talked with uh the couple of the people that showed up that day uh was actually all um Latino community members that came to talk with uh Pam and I that day.

Um is the possibility if we're thinking about things we can do to help is if we go it might hint back to COVID, where we were using uh public services to deliver food or medicine to folks in their home.

Um that would really be something because literally she was showing me text message after text message on her phone where people were having her go out and pick up groceries, soap, shampoo, tortillas, um, so that they didn't have to go out in public.

People are not walking their kids to school, they're not sending their kids to school in some instances because of fear of immigration's customs and border patrol.

Um so I I I would think that's something for us to talk about is could we bring back some of those helps for our community to be able to you know have somebody go and pick up some medicine or groceries for these folks, not to not to supply them that stuff, but to actually just be their gopher, you know, be their assistance in getting that.

So I think that's something for us because I know we use police and fire to help with those things during COVID.

Maybe there's an option that we could do something like that again to help these folks.

And then obviously there's um a lot of personal safety concerns and anyone that's seen any of the videos, some of them people are very poorly they were they're mistreated, right?

Um so I think there's some concerns about the treatment.

Um we heard the reports from the feds when they went and looked at Washington and looked at the outrageous conditions that some of these people are being kept in.

I think that's outside our direct sphere of flu influence and control.

Um, but uh I I think we'd be interested in figuring out, you know, whatever you guys figure out from your emergency clause, how can we be complementary to that if we choose to do something if we need to have a second meeting this month or something?

So just please keep us informed.

You know, you and I have each other's numbers.

We can call night or day.

If there's something you come up with or you need, please feel free like you can reach out.

You know you can.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um what I am hearing uh, because this is an evolving situation, as we all know, uh, that there have been uh a number of organizations that have stepped up, will do shopping.

Um the problem is is that oftentimes we don't know exactly where these folks are and how we can reach out and help them.

So that's gonna be a communication network that uh needs to be figured out.

But um, and I'm told today that the Oregon Food Bank has been basically overwhelmed.

Uh and that is why you didn't see in our declaration that the money was going to go to the feed food bank, because we felt like there were other organizations that could do some of the things that you're talking about, much more direct recipients and much more direct action.

Um I will certainly uh keep you apprised.

Give me certainly give me a call if you hear of anything.

Uh but this is an evolving situation that uh I think it's uh all hands on deck, and we're gonna see our nonprofits and certainly um our other organizations really step up to the plate, and that's that's why we committed some money to do that.

Where that money is exactly going yet, we don't know, but we wanted to make it available.

Well, like I said, just please keep the comment communication open so that uh whatever we do can be complimentary to whatever the county's doing, and I'm I'm sure several of the other mayors will join in um and councils to support whatever efforts in the way we best can all be collaborative and supportive of the folks that live here.

Yep.

Okay, thank you very much for the community.

Thank you.

Thank you, Jerry.

Um next up is state of the district update from Clean Water Services.

I have listed Joe Gallery.

Please come on up and introduce yourselves and uh make sure the microphone's green.

Green means good.

That means you can talk through it.

And it just takes a tape.

Good evening, Mayor and Council.

My name is Joe Gall.

I'm the Chief Utility Relations Officer for Clean Water Services.

Uh I've met most of you, but for the ones I have not met, uh we're very happy to be here in Cornelius tonight.

I'm the person that you get that monthly newsletter that hopefully you take a moment to read uh to try to update you on what what's currently going on at Clean Water Services.

I'm gonna turn it over briefly to my partner in crime here.

Yeah.

Good evening, Mayor and Council members.

I have not met most of you, and that's really the main purpose of me being here.

I am the acting chief executive officer slash general manager for clean water services.

So just thought um it was important to get an opportunity and jump in on Joe's talk about the state of the district, um, so you could see me and know that I'm certainly here and available to you all if anything comes up and really value the partnership um that Clean Water Services has with the city.

I've been with the district for about 12 years.

Um my prior role was chief engineer and technology officer.

So uh very much focused on a lot of the this planning studies that we've done with the city's major capital improvement projects um and that type of work.

So it's a different type of role for me, but I've gotten great support from my executive leadership team, certainly the board um as well, and taking advantage of um getting out and attending a lot of the Washington County leadership meetings.

I've met Peter at at a couple of those.

So um I'm here, I'm happy to uh fill this role, and um I'll let Joe speak, and then if there's any questions you have for me as an individual about some of the things that we're doing at Clean Water, I'm happy to uh try and answer those.

But thanks again for your time.

Well, there just in the audience just you're aware.

Um Daniel Ridersworp is our community engagement manager.

He's here.

And of course, Jerry Willie, who is here as county commissioner, is also here, but he also wears the board of director hat.

So just briefly uh I want to remind everybody who Clean Water Services is.

So we are a wastewater and stormwater government, so we guess we are a government.

We have 12 partner cities for one of those partner cities that we have.

We have a very unique watership based on that.

Also uh important relationship.

We work very closely with Washington County, but we are not part of the funded public utility.

The only thing that really ties us to the county is that governance.

We also have a services advisory convention commission.

That committee is represented.

And then individual representatives.

And that committee advises us on that would help.

Thank you.

And we have 468 FTE with our within our organization.

We have, they don't call them treatment facilities anymore.

They're water resource recovery facilities, and we have four of them.

The closest one uh to Cornelius is up the street in Forest Grove.

Uh your wastewater actually goes to two different facilities.

So some of it during the year goes to Forest Grove, and then uh at different times of the year, some goes to the Hillsborough Treatment Facility in Hillsboro.

I won't go through all of these priorities.

You can see them on the slide.

Umcreased accountability and transparency, I just want to touch upon.

Uh that's one of the reasons we are making the rounds and getting back out to the cities in person.

We used to do this prior to COVID, and we fell out of that, and now we're back to meeting uh with our elected officials.

So who receives services from clean water services?

Cornelius receives regional services.

Um I'll touch on regional and local in a second.

But the seven biggest cities that are represented uh in our service district get regional only services.

And then the smaller cities, banks, for example, King City, North Plains, um, they get regional and local services from clean water services.

And then also we have a number of industrial customers, Intel being one of them that has a special industrial permit that we regulate and work with those businesses.

I mentioned regional services, so all of the treatment facilities are considered regional services, and basically all the big pipes.

I am not the engineer, he's the engineer, so um, but basically all the large transmission lines, the trunk lines are our responsibility in terms of regional services, and then we do everything with the permit, which I will touch on in in a minute.

Um those are the regional services that are provided by Clean Water Services.

And then the local services are where Cornelius comes in.

So your crews basically take care of the smaller pipes, cleaning and inspecting those sewer pipes, and also dealing with uh stormwater facilities.

So it really is a partnership.

We co-implement the work that is contained within the permit together.

It's definitely a team effort, and we appreciate the partnership we have with your city staff.

I always, when I have a chance to meet with city officials, especially elected officials, I touch upon the permit because as you may recall, I was a city manager in Sherwood before going to Clean Water Services about four and a half years ago, and I thought I understood CWS.

I really didn't understand CWS until I got inside the organization.

And one of the things that I learned uh since joining CWS is how important that that five-year NPDES permit, which is issued by DEQ.

It really drives everything we do at the district.

Um it's a very rigorous permit and unique because it's watershed-based.

So it covers all of our treatment facilities and the MS4, which is the stormwater system.

This is a timeline where we are.

We're in the 2023 to 2027 timeline right now.

Uh we're about a little over halfway through this five-year permit.

We're getting ready for the next five-year cycle.

So we will apply in June of 2027 for another five-year permit with DEQ.

We're already planning for that.

And then in addition to planning for the next permit, we're also thinking about the permit after that.

So one of the things you may hear about is PFOS and what impacts PFOS regulation could have.

We're already thinking about that, trying to get ahead of the curve because we do not want surprises in our next permit cycle.

And that's something that I think uh again, I didn't understand necessarily when I was a city official uh here in Washington County.

Couple projects uh for last fiscal year, because this is a fiscal year report.

There were no specific projects within the jurisdiction of Cornelius, but we did spend significantly money, significant amounts of money at the Forest Grove facility, nearly 20 million dollars last year.

That was really for a new clarifier, largely.

That serves Cornelius.

So when we make these investments at the treatment facilities, uh it may not be in your community, but certainly benefits your community because you're within that service area.

So 19.6 million at Forest Grove last year, and then another three million at the Hillsborough facility.

Tomorrow at the Washington County uh board directors or CWS board of directors, the West Basin master plan is finally going to be approved, hopefully.

This is an effort that was done in coordination with your staff.

This is really our 20-year master plan for our regional wastewater system.

So this is a uh a cooperative project.

We basically go to our city partners and say, how do you want to grow over the next 20 years?

What kind of growth do you see?

Because we want to be able to provide the infrastructure at the right time to serve the community's needs.

So it's a uh master plan that basically serves the green area on this map, which Cornelius is a part of.

Uh what makes it unique is there are three facilities, three treatment facilities in the West Basin, as opposed to one treatment facility in the East Basin and the Durham facility.

But we could not do this planning without cooperation with your cities.

The next five years, we're going to spend about 44, almost 45 million dollars attributed to that regional system.

Again, major upgrades to the Forest Grove plant, nearly 40 million dollars over that five-year period.

Um another 2.8 at the Hillsborough plant, and then a small increase for the Cornelius Pump Station phase two project.

So these are projects again that will serve Cornelius and other communities like Forest Grove in the West Basin.

Another project that's just about to start is to take a deep dive in our billing.

So you bill on our behalf.

So the seven big cities we partner.

So instead of CWS sending a bill out and Cornelius sending a bill out, we've been using joint billing with the big cities for decades.

Uh for a variety of reasons, we want to evaluate the feasibility whether that still makes sense or not.

So we are going to take a deep dive over the next six, twelve months.

Uh, work with you as stakeholders, get input from our city partners about what works, what doesn't work, what other alternatives might uh be there.

You mentioned uh your low-income assistance program.

We are gonna look into that as well in emergency assistance programs as part of that feasibility study.

Um obviously we'll look at costs and what would uh doing the different alternatives over 10 years look like.

Just got the green light from our board a couple of weeks ago to move forward.

We will be hiring a consultant to do that project.

Again, we'll work very closely with the city.

Uh we hopefully about a year from now we'll have a final report with those alternatives, and then we will make some decisions about the future in terms of billing.

A very important project, actually, uh, over the coming year.

And then last just reminder, we have requirements in our permit.

Again, we will be working with your city uh officials.

We need to update specific stormwater sections and our design and construction standards by next November.

Uh we will not be doing that in isolation.

We'll be doing that uh with all of the city partners and then obviously different stakeholders in the community.

So that's about to kick off in the coming months.

And then we have to update all of our operating IGAs with all 12 cities in Washington County by November 1st, 2026.

Fortunately, we have completed that process with the city of Cornelius.

So thank you for doing that.

Uh we have a number of cities we're working right now with the city of Tualeton and Washington County and Tigers on the horizon.

So it's a pretty heavy lift over the coming year.

And that is all I have, and would be happy to take any questions you might have about anything CWS related.

Council?

Questions.

Yes, Councillor Vaughan.

I noticed the current spending and the projected spending for Forest Groves treatment center by magnitudes larger than the other locations.

What's going on there that is requiring that investment?

One of the big Joe mentioned primary clarifier, so I don't expect you to know exactly what that means, but without a little bit more detail.

So but basically that's a new treatment process at the beginning of the of the plan, and it's really driven by a copper permit limit.

Actually, we don't yet have a permit limit.

Um in incorporating this treatment technology will show that we're able to meet what um would have potentially caused a treatment plant limit for copper.

Um so it's a it's very much compliance driven.

Um and it's one of the reasons Joe mentioned we're working on the next permit today.

If we wouldn't have gotten ahead of this, gotten this installed, been able to get all the data that we needed to show we um will not have copper in our effluent.

We would have ended up with a limit, and it could have been uh more of an issue for clean water services.

So that's the big that's the big project out there.

Counselors, any other questions.

Nope, that's okay.

It's okay not to have them.

Uh thank you again for coming out.

Um I don't know why I feel better with an engineer in charge.

I just do that's my background too.

So it's um uh we look at things maybe a little different.

And uh, you know, there's always uh multiple answers to every question.

Uh it's just all a balance of what are you trying to get to and how much money is it gonna take you to get there and which path do we want to go down.

So I don't know why, but I feel better with an engineer there, so thank you.

And uh I think we've had a great partnership as we've talked about between the staff of really maintaining our you know services here in town and the the stormwater treatment.

Um we've always had I think whenever I've met with you guys, you had good feedback about how our staff takes care of things, and likewise, I think the the challenge has always been more at the upper levels.

It's like okay, where are you going with the billing?

Why is the billing?

I think some of that's um I think there's there's where the opportunity is for us to really understand to to uh counselor Vaughn's point um the investments that are being made honestly on our behest.

And I I I wasn't joking.

I'm a very jokey guy normally, but I wasn't joking that um I honestly think maybe the wrong people are sitting on your board because the primary people that receive your service are the cities of Washington County, right?

They're the primary users of what you have.

And if I could uh tap the magic wand, I'd have the count uh the county be a member of the board instead of the board, and then have uh a representative from the cities that you serve as your board members because I think it would get you closer to the customer.

Um what we've done is we've consolidated a city service, right?

If you rolled back the time machine far enough, we'd still have the digester down at uh public works, right?

And that's we did our own treatment.

Um but we've consolidated into a uh a service district, right?

The old original USA.

I mean, it was even on your slides on the Hillsborough that the facility still says USA on it.

Um so I think I think there's some opportunity to get closer.

And as we've talked with the county chair and I've talked to a couple of the other uh commissioners.

Um I think we need to get in the same tent.

Because right now it's it's feels very much us and them on uh between the cities and clean water.

And I think we need to work on that.

I think that's an opportunity to me the the easiest would be to reset.

And I know that would take work on the 451.

There would be things to be done there.

But um, you know, I'm allowed to have visions for what I think would be a better system.

Um but I think that's an opportunity definitely for us to work and understand those because it's uh tremendous part of our bill as the clean water services portion.

And we've gone through a lot of budgetary constraints, police, fire, different things like that.

And uh we just don't feel like we have any handle on the clean water services part of that, our water services bill.

So I I think we need to feel like we have some input, some opportunity to to understand.

We may not be able to make a ginormous change, but to be have a clear understanding of uh what our part in that is and and to Counselor Vaughn's point about you know how much of that is really our share, right?

These 40 million dollar upgrades out at uh Forest Grove, how much they really mean to our system.

Um just I think those are the things I would share with you guys.

Mayor, I really appreciate those comments.

Thank you for making those.

Cool.

Well, thank you for coming out always.

It's uh it's late, and uh we'll we'll let you go on if there's no other questions.

Thank you very much for giving.

Great to be here.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Any counselors, if you haven't been through it, absolutely recommend you go take the Clean Water Services 101 class.

It's good good good information.

Uh we have no public hearings.

That takes us to unfinished business.

We have resolution 2025-51, public facilities naming policy.

And I don't see Barbara in here.

I am uh you're being pitching city city manager.

I am pinch hitting baseball analogy there.

Um you'll recall in October this resolution was proposed and you had discussion, and so we have uh brought it back.

Uh what it does, uh what we have done is amended the language to clarify that the criteria are guides and that ultimately the ultimate authority is the city council, and so you have uh pretty much full spectrum ability to make determinations on naming a public facility.

So we hope that that addresses the direction.

Thank you.

Council, questions on uh that have you got a chance to read through those details and see if it feels like it made the adjustments we were requesting.

Cool.

Um well I would entertain a motion then.

I can make a motion.

Yes, Councilor Lopez.

I make a motion to approve resolution number 2025-51.

A resolution of the Cornelia City Council adopting a policy for naming of public facilities and repealing resolution number 2021-27, establishing criteria for naming city parks, and this action takes effect immediately.

Motion by Councillor Lopez.

Do I have a second?

A second.

Second by Councillor Gordines.

Any other comments?

Seeing none, all those in favor, please say aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Opposed?

Abstentions?

Passes unanimous.

That takes us on to oh my goodness, Here.

New business resolution 2025-54.

Employee food and beverage compensation policy.

City Manager Brandon.

Thank you, Mayor.

Excuse me.

So I I just want to provide a kind of a verbal intro and try to be efficient, so maybe kind of group this.

Uh speaking to resolutions 2025-54 and 2025-55.

Oregon Government Ethics Commission rules require us to implement policies that cover food and beverage benefits that we provide to elected and appointed officials and employees.

We have consulted uh both of our unions and we ask you to consider these policies to ensure our compliance with these rules.

And then I will speak to the I was gonna say, do you want to also go through 56-57?

I'll just go ahead and do that.

Uh 2025-54 pertains to city employees, and this policy complies with with those bargaining agreements.

Resolutions 2025-55-57 and 5-9 pertain to elected officials, and you have instructions to properly consider and vote for those since you will abstain from those that uh pertain to your seats.

And then uh resolution 2025-58 pertains to appointed officials.

Uh you will have to abstain from voting on the resolution that impacts you.

Uh so in addition to the employee policy resolution, um we we have this series of others, so I think that covers it.

Council.

The laundry list of these 54 through 59.

Um questions.

Nothing?

No.

Yeah, I mean, basically it says uh from time to time you're gonna get some food and it's gonna be compensation.

I mean, am I oversimplifying?

I hate to oversimplify, but that's pretty much what it says.

Uh city attorney, do you have comment?

You've been out here all night.

I feel like you gotta say something.

This is in response to a recent opinion by the Oregon Government Ethics Commission that essentially there is no de minimis exception for receiving uh benefits from as a uh a result of your position.

And so this is a way to um sort of continue receiving those while abiding by the new opinion by the ethics ethics commission.

And the one thing I would note is that um you must declare a conflict of interest for the resolution that impacts you, and then also abstain from any discussion and the vote okay.

Council, any other questions on this okay.

Well, for 54, we all can weigh in.

Is there somebody wishing to make the motion on 2025-54?

I can make a motion.

Yes, Councilor Gordines.

I make a motion to approve resolution number 2025 54.

A resolution of the Cornelia City Council adopting a policy regarding food, beverage, and other compensation for City of Cornelius employees, and this action takes effect immediately.

Motion by Counselor Gordinas, do I have a second?

Second.

Second by Councilor Lopez.

Any further discussion?

Seeing none, all those in favor, please say aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Opposed?

Abstentions?

Passes unanimous.

That takes us on to 255.

And let me read my little comment.

I have an actual conflict of interest with resolution 2525 because resolution 2025-55 concerns my receipt of food, beverage, and city branded items as a counselor.

Therefore, resolution 2025-55 will result in a private financial benefit for myself or a private financial detriment to myself.

In order to comply with the Oregon Government Ethics Laws, I will not participate in discussion regarding resolution 2025-55 and will not vote on 2025-55.

Passing the gavel over to our council president, Councilor Gordinas.

Sorry, I've never had the gavel, so I'm just gonna so um before we move forward.

The resolution was originally published without explicitly stating that it applies to the position of the mayor.

And so this language has now been added to ensure clarity, but no um substantive changes were made to the consent or intent of the resolution.

Um counselors, if you have any clarifying questions, please feel free to ask.

All right.

If there are no questions, I will entertain a motion uh I'll make the motion.

Go for it.

I make a motion to approve resolution number 2025-55, a resolution of the Cornelius City Council adopting a policy regarding food, beverage, and other compensation for City of Cornelius elected officials in the office of mayor.

And this action takes effect immediately.

Do I have a second?

Second that motion.

All those in favor, please say aye.

Aye.

Any abstentions, Mayor?

Oh, I am abstaining.

Great.

Passes humanimous unanimously.

Passing this back to you, Mayor.

Thank you.

Council President.

Uh, just for the record, so it's clear, uh, the motion was made by uh councillor Avon and seconded by Councillor Lopez on the previous motion for 2025-55.

That takes us on to 2025 56.

Elected food, yeah, food beverage compensation.

City Manager Brennan, anything to add on this one?

No, thanks, Mayor.

And I think uh counselor uh Godinas, you have something to read?

Yes, I have an actual conflict of interest with resolution number 2025 56 because resolution number 2025 56 concerns my receipt of food beverage and city branded items as a counselor, therefore resolution number 2025 56 will result in private financial benefit for myself or a private financial determinant to myself in order to comply with Oregon government ethics law.

I will not participate in any discussion regarding resolution number 2025 56, and I will not vote on resolution 2025 56.

Thank you.

So I if I find it funny because we said we wouldn't participate in either of those, you're on yours, but we still logged an abstention during the vote.

So I'm not sure if we're doing that right or wrong.

I don't believe it's necessary to abstain once you've declared a conflict, but I can check.

Okay.

Are we in any way a problem if we just log the abstention?

Okay, we'll continue with the way we did the first one.

Yes.

I believe if there's an abstention, it counts as part of the majority, so we they would not vote.

They would not abstain because they've recused themselves.

So don't vote.

Okay.

Great.

Is that all clear now?

Don't vote.

Don't vote.

Okay.

Um do I have someone wishing to make the motion on 255 56?

I can make that motion.

Thank you, Councilor Lopez.

I make a motion to approve resolution number 2025-56.

A resolution of the Cornelia City Council adopting a policy regarding food beverage and other compensation for City of Cornelius Councilor at large position, currently held by Councilor Golinis, and this action takes effect immediately.

Motion by Counselor Lopez.

Do I have a second?

Second.

Second by Councilor Vaughan.

Any further discussion?

Seeing none, all those in favor, please say aye.

Aye.

Opposed.

And I heard three yay, so there's no abstentions.

Takes us on to resolution number 2025 57.

Counselor Lopez, do you have something you want to read into the record for that?

I do.

I uh have an actual conflict of interest with the solution 2025-57 because of the resolution number 2025 57 concerns my receipt of food, beverage, and city branded items as a counselor, therefore resolution number 2025-57 will result in a private financial benefit for myself or a private financial determinant to myself.

In order to comply with Oregon government ethics law, I will not participate in any discussion regarding resolution number 2025-57, and I will not vote on resolution number 2025-57.

Thank you.

Do I have someone wishing to make the motion for 2557?

I'll make a motion.

Councilor Goodinus.

I make a motion to approve resolution number 2025 57.

A resolution of the Cornelia City Council adopting a policy regarding food, beverage, and other compensation for City of Cornelius Counselor at large position currently held by Counselor Lopez.

And this action takes effect immediately.

Motion.

Do I have a second?

Second.

Second by Counselor Vaughn.

Any further discussion?

Saying none, all those in favor, please say aye.

Aye.

Opposed.

And no abstentions since we had everyone that's uh unanimous.

That takes us on to resolution 2025-58.

Does anyone wish to uh that's an appointed official's food and beverage compensation policy?

City Manager Brandman, do we have any preamble?

It's all the same as we already been doing.

Uh for the at-home audience and those in the room.

This is just as awkward for us as it feels to you and as probably equally ridiculous, but it's the way we've been directed by council.

Legal council to proceed.

Anyone wish to make the motion on 2558?

I'll make that motion.

Councillor Vaughan.

I make a motion to approve resolution number 2025-58.

A resolution of the Cornelius City Council adopting a policy regarding food, beverage, and other compensation for City of Cornelius appointed officials, and this action takes effect immediately.

Second.

Councilor Lopez.

Thank you.

Any further discussion?

Saying none, all those in favor, please say aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Opposed?

Abstentions?

Passes unanimous.

Okay.

That takes us on to 2025 59.

Counselor Vaughn, do you want to uh read something to the record?

Uh I have an actual conflict of interest with resolution number 2025-59, because resolution number 2025 59 concerns my receipt of food, beverage, and city branded items as a counselor.

Therefore, resolution number 2025-59 will result in a private beneficial benefit for myself or private financial detriment to myself.

In order to comply with Oregon government ethics law, I will not participate in any discussion regarding resolution number 2025-59, and I will not vote on resolution number 2025-59.

Great.

This uh refers to both Councillor Vaughn and the vacant seat currently at the council.

Is there anyone wishing to make the motion?

I can make the motion.

Counselor Lopez.

I make a motion to approve resolution number 2025-59.

A resolution of the city of the Cornelia City Council adopting a policy regarding food beverage and other compensation for the city of Cornelius Councilor at Large positions currently held by Councilor Vaught and the currently vacant councilor at large position.

And this action takes effect immediately.

Do I have a second?

A second.

Second by Counselor Godinus.

Any further discussion?

Seeing none, all those in favor, please say aye.

Aye.

Opposed.

Abstentions?

There is none.

Passes unanimously.

Okay.

All that fun aside takes us on to resolution 2025-45, the elected official social media policy.

Rochelle Bateman.

Good evening, Mayor and Council.

Before you tonight is a proposed elected official social media policy.

The purpose of the policy is to provide clear guidance for how city council members use social media both in their official and personal capacities.

As communications or social media becomes increasingly common.

It helps ensure that cities online presence remains professional, transparent, and respectful.

You might remember with the public records management policy adopted last month.

That public records are determined by the content of a record, not the platform.

So combined the two policies aim to prevent confusion about what constitutes city business online and help counselors manage their online communication responsibly.

So staff recommend adoption of resolution 2025-45, approving the elected official social media policy as presented.

And I'm available for any questions.

Council, any questions for staff?

I just want you to know I'm live streaming this, so that's uh what I was just joking that I was live streaming this right now, making a real.

Um if there's no questions, do we have someone wish to make the motion?

I can make a motion.

Yes, Councilor Goodinas.

I make a motion to approve resolution number 2025 45, a resolution of the Cornelia City Council adopting the elected officials' social media policy, and this action takes effect immediately.

Do I have a second?

Second.

Second by Councilor Lopez.

Any further discussion?

Hearing none, all those in favor, please say aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Opposed?

Abstentions?

Passes unanimous.

Takes us on to resolution number 2025 60.

City Councilor appointment.

Ms.

Bateman, do you have anything else or you want me to kind of go through our appointment elections process?

I have a quick comment.

So uh as part of today's agenda, the city council will conduct the process to fill the vacancy on the city council.

The appointed counselor will serve the remainder of the current term ending in December of 2026.

Um our goal today is to follow a consistent, transparent and fair process for all applicants.

I'm not going to go into detail as Mayor Delane will guide the council through each step of the nomination and appointment process.

Um at any point during the process, council can uh pause and ask questions of city staff or legal counsel um to for any clarity or compliance questions.

Okay.

Let me go through step one.

Each member can either nominate or second one person.

Because there are only four sitting council members, only two applicants may successfully be nominated.

Counselors can indicate they are ready to nominate by raising their hand.

Once someone is nominated, the mayor will wait to see if there's a second.

If no one seconds the nomination, they will not move forward.

So it will die for lack of a second.

So suggested script as part of today's agenda.

The city council conducted the nominations and voting process to fill a vacancy of the city council.

The appointing counselor will serve the remainder of the current term, ending December 31st, 2026.

I will now open the floor for nominations.

Do I have any nominations to appoint the vacant city council position?

Yes, Councilor Godinis.

I would like to nominate Citlali Nunez Barragan for to be appointed as city counselor.

I would second that motion.

Are there any further nominations?

Yes, Councilor Vaughn.

I'd like to nominate Matt Greeley.

Do I have a second seeing none?

And the rest of us have burned our uh muni idols, that dies for lack of a second.

Um I think at this point uh that leaves Counselor Lopez with the option.

Yes.

So because the uh candidate did not move forward, uh Councilor Vaughn still has uh nomination or a second.

He gets he gets a renewed statement.

It's only when it's a successful nomination.

So right now we have one nomination and a second.

We have the opportunity to put in a second nomination and a second, if so wish.

So but the only two that can play at this point is Counselor Lopez and Counselor Vaughan.

Am I correct?

Yes, that's look at that.

I understand the rules of this particular uh opportunity.

Clarification, that's if we wish.

If you wish, you are not required.

Okay.

Sufficient awkward silence.

Okay.

Uh so deliberation.

Once all the nominations are in and the nominating process is complete, the council may engage in deliberation on any or all nominees.

You know, I'm going to vote for so-and-so because of this, or I'm gonna vote for so and so because of that.

So council, would you like to deliberate on this point?

Uh I will point I will um point out that we will need to have a majority of the council.

And please clarify, even though we currently only have one nomination, if we go to a vote, we're gonna need to get three out of four, otherwise it fails at a tie, correct?

That's correct.

Okay.

So these awkward times for these fun things.

This is what we get paid the big bucks for.

Okay.

Um so counselor uh Godiness, you made a proposal, I made a second.

I think we should discuss some of the why, so we have some open and honest uh deliberation here.

Would you like to start?

Yes, of course.

I'm going to vote for um Clali because based off her interview questions.

I think she did a very great job answering um in terms of everything from what she wants to see from the city to the next five years to really understand how to engage our community.

I know that she ran um and didn't get appointed or didn't get elected.

Um, but even during that campaign, she continuously showed up and um advocated on behalf of the community.

Also, I think the statement that she made earlier about everything that's going on with ICE really just furthers um her understanding as well as uh I think we need different voices.

I appreciate the fact that she is still in school and she is a work, I believe, uh cashier at Fred Myers.

And so it just brings in a different background that I think our council does not have and could really use great.

I I will follow on um why I seconded uh sit Lolly as you beat me to the the uh nomination.

I would have uh nominated her myself, but since you did, I was comfortable seconding.

Um, you know, she has uh a long history with the community, right?

She's born and raised here.

Um I think um as I sit here as our senior member, and I continue to advertise that um when I ran originally over 20 years ago, it was because I didn't think five old white guys were an accurate representation of our community.

And I I appreciate um the energy I see in her, the uh determination.

Um she was a member of our um civics, thank you.

I was struggling for the words, it's been a long day, 4 a.m.

It was a lot of hours ago.

Uh the civics group continued to be involved in activities.

Um just just her level of ongoing engagement.

Um just another example is uh the leadership cohort, active listening.

Um what are some of the other ones?

The collaboration, right?

And I and I think also to be honest, um we have I have had a lot of um exposure to Sit Lali as uh an engaged member of the community for months and months, uh you know, through these different activities.

It's she she is continuously showed up, she has been engaged, and um uh that community over the self thing kind of hit home.

And uh I I just think she's some of that new uh younger energy that we need represented in the council.

So those are some of the reasons I I will be voting for her to take the position.

Counselors, any other deliberation you'd like to share not any, I'm not gonna add anything, you just I agree with all the statements they haven't made.

Um and just uh add on that I think um uh I think we need that energy that she's gonna bring to the council and so that's that's why I would be voting for uh seatlightly.

Thank you.

Councilor Vaughn, any comments I'll just say that everybody was right at the beginning of this evening.

This is a very hard topic to work through okay.

Um with that in mind, council, we have a couple options.

We can vote by ballot or we can do an oral.

I I do counselors have any preference okay.

Seems like everybody's comfortable just doing an oral vote.

We have um we'll now proceed to vote the nominee.

Sit Lali.

Well uh each counselor will vote with either with a yay or a nay, and we will need three yes to proceed, or if we end up in a tie, um, then we'll go back to square one on this.

So all those in favor of seating sit Lali is our new city councilor, please say yay.

Yay, yay, yay, yay.

And do we have anyone opposed?

Do we have any abstentions?

Uh I acknowledge that we had a unanimous vote of the four seated councillors to seat sit lali as our new fifth counselor.

Congratulations.

Um I want to thank everyone that did apply to Councilor Vaughn's comment.

It it was definitely an opportunity to see an active group of the community uh and have a group of interested individuals.

Um it's good to have to look at it and and consider.

And I uh I would say for the first time in a long time, I feel like we have a bench.

And that's not something I would have said years ago that we actually have people that are willing, interested, and capable of stepping up and being counselors.

Um we just didn't have that kind of level of interest, and uh and folks it go back two, four years.

It was you know, we actually had an open seat.

We actually appointed somebody to council because somebody wouldn't vote run for a seat even.

So I want to thank everybody for doing this.

I want to thank you for all you're already doing in the community.

Um I know you're all involved in different ways already, and uh I want to continue to though you did not get seated at the council that you continue to please be involved because your energy, your emphasis is deeply appreciated, and that I think um there's still opportunities.

I I think we have openings on budget committee.

Uh I think is there a board or committee or commission that is not fully seated?

We have open positions on the library advisory board.

We uh we have one well now two vacancies on the planning commission.

Um and then the uh economic development commission has I think at least two vacancies.

So lots of options.

So there's still lots of options.

If you're not already sitting on one of those, um please see the staff.

Um I don't know if we can get to them tonight yet, uh, but they're obviously available online.

You can pull down an application for all of those boards, committees, and commissions.

I would just like to point out there's one final bullet point on that.

Um that we do need to appoint by resolution.

Oh, okay.

Let's see.

Maybe Dan is still me.

Majority vote.

The mayor will announce the result and request a formal motion to appoint.

Okay, do you guys have that script handy?

Is there anyone wishing to make the motion?

Counselor Gerdinez, you look like you're ready to do it.

Okay, Councilor Goodines.

So I just read this part.

Or is you read that and I just make a motion to I make a motion to nominate or to appoint C Lali um Nunez Barragán as city councilor for the remaining appointment date.

Sorry, I don't have that.

December 31st, 2026.

Yes.

Second.

Second motion by Counselor Gordinas, second by counselor Lopez.

Any further discussion?

Seeing none, all those in favor, please say aye.

Aye.

Oh wait, there was an actual motion.

I'm sorry.

Do you want me to read the formal motion?

It sounded very close.

I think we knew what we were doing.

I think it would be best if we move to approve the resolution that appoints.

You want to read that motion again for us?

Yes, happy to do so.

I make a motion to approve resolution number 2025 60, a resolution of the Cornelia City Council appointing C Lali to the Cornelia City Council to fulfill a vacancy to serve the remainder of the unexpired term ending December 31st, 2026.

And this action takes effect immediately.

That is a friendly uh motion amendment by the maker.

Do you agree in your second?

Council Lopez.

I agree.

We have a motion and a second uh appended.

All those in favor, please say aye.

Aye.

Opposed.

Abstention.

Passes unanimous.

Okay.

Um and as far as next steps, I think where we are on that is uh the staff had requested the next 30 days for training, um indoctrination and other such uh preparations for the new counselor, and that they at that point then could be sworn in and seated at the December meeting, correct?

Okay.

Great.

We got through it.

Uh reports that takes us to report city council.

Yes, counselor Godinas.

Thank you.

Um first of all, I just want to thank my um thank staff for putting together the video um that we shared for those of you that haven't seen on Facebook yet related to the ICE activity that's been happening in our community.

Um these are really really hard times for our community members.

There's a lot of fear.

We see it on a regular basis.

And I just want to also acknowledge that we we are noticing that people's civil rights are being violated.

And I also want to make it clear because I've seen a lot of comments, whether it be under the video or just in general, people saying, well, if you aren't a citizen or have legal status here, then you don't have civil rights.

And I would just have them reread their constitution because that's not what the constitution states.

So it does not matter whether or not you're here legally, you have civil rights, and if those are being violated, then that is a problem.

And I also really just want to continue to remind our community that you do have the right to remain silent.

And we've seen a lot of cases where people are being taken, honestly kidnapped, that are that have citizenship status that have been taken and have not been released, and it's been over a month.

We have seen individuals iced when they detain someone, they're supposed to update a record where somebody can go on and see if that person has been detained.

They have not been doing that.

So there are a lot of individuals out there who are currently missing whose families have no idea as to what is going on.

Um sorry, I would like to preface this, but this is my own opinions as well.

Um so I'm not here uh even though sorry, I forgot what I was gonna say.

So I just want to remind people that um we that those of us that have the privilege to do so to please utilize that, whether it be if you see any ICE activity, please call the PERC hotline.

That is the most important thing that you can do is call PERC because they will send over legal observers who can document what's going on and help provide um resources to those families in need.

And I would also ask that if it's safe to do so for you all to record as well.

Um, especially because by the time you call PERC and they send someone over there, a lot of times, you know, the individuals are gone by then.

So even if you can just ask for a name, again, this is always if it's safe to do so at a distance because your safety is the number one concern.

Please, if you have a whistle, use that as well.

Um I think it's just really important for us to remind our community that again they have the right to remain silent and they have a right to a lawyer.

We're hearing a lot of people say that they're telling them that they don't have those rights, and that again is not true.

So I would just continue to please remind our community no matter how stressful um it is to just stay silent if you can and do not sign anything, border patrol ice, whatever you want to call them, they're going to be asking you to sign a form, and you have every right to not sign anything and to ask for translation and to ask for a lawyer.

Again, they will continue to tell you no, and that is where I say that that is not you still continue to have those rights.

They will push you and push you, which we've seen them do until people sign the deportation papers.

Citizens are so scared that they're signing deportation papers.

So I am just continuing to remind the community that there's a lot going on behind closed doors that we don't know, but we are hearing about, and it's very, very scary.

Um and so I would say that if you can to please sign up for Echo, which is the equity corpse of Oregon, because um if something were to happen and you were be detained, then they can help get they'll already have your information in the system, which will make it easier to connect you with a lawyer.

Um the city has done a great job of updating resources.

So really shout out to ITEL for that.

Um again, we created a video, but if you go to our website, which I believe is the city of Cornelius um or governation resources, you will have a list of things available there.

Um there's a lot of community members who are scared to take their kids to school, to leave their homes, to go to work.

Um and so I would just ask that if you have close relationships with individuals around you and you're able to step in and do some grocery shopping, even I've been taking kids to school.

Whatever you can do, now is the time for us to stand up and be there for our community members who don't have the same privileges that we do right now, because the reality is that people are being profiled just for the way that they look, and that is not okay.

Um we know that SNAP benefits have been cut as of November 1st.

I know that um there's talks about partial funding, but I also know that partial funding isn't gonna give families what they need.

So I would just continue to remind you all that um Centro Cultural has their mercado.

Um so that is located um right down the street on what is that 11th and baseline.

So please utilize that resource if you need to.

I would say to just double check the hours on that because I know um that there have been some cuts and reducing to those hours, but still that remains as a resource.

So please utilize that if you cannot yourself for safety concerns, um, go to get the food yourself.

Please don't hesitate to contact me.

You can email me, or you can also call Centro Cultural and we can find a way to get you those food because that is important.

And again, any resources that you all need now is the time for us to be there to advocate for one another.

So thank you.

Thank you, Councillor Gornitas.

Uh other counselors, updates.

Yes, Councilor Lopez.

Yeah, just to tack on to what uh Councilor Golinas was mentioning.

Just um, if you can, um you know, if um if you can, you could also donate to these nonprofits that are working on these issues.

We have told two local ones.

Um, Central Cultura and the Latin Mujeres that are assisting um or community members that are impacted.

So if you can, that's definitely one way that you can contribute.

Um thank you.

Yes, Counselor Gardinas.

Sorry, I we've said this already, but I will say this again.

You the city of Cornelius is here to serve everybody.

We do not discriminate against whether or not you're here legally or not.

That does not matter.

Please, please, please.

If you need resources, if you need to call the police, if you need to call fire like, please do that.

That is so important.

And I won't don't want people because even though this information is out there, people are still in fear, and you can imagine that there's a lot of distrust.

So even though we say these things, I know that it's hard for our communities to trust when they see everything that's going on, but just please continue to remind.

And if they don't feel safe making that call, having someone else make that call, but these resources are here for a reason, and you have every right to access them.

Thank you.

Counselor Vaughn, anything?

Okay.

Um I will take it to the mayor's update then.

Uh a couple things.

Uh you'll only remember the first thing I talked about in the last thing.

So the first thing I'm gonna talk about is what you was on, you already brought up.

And I said this in the video, right?

Um police and fire service is for everyone in our community, regardless of immigration status.

And I use the example of Intel where I've worked off and on for a number of years.

There's people here from China, Israel, Ireland, other states, right?

So we have people internationally and uh within other states.

If they're in a car accident, if they're robbed, they can use our resources.

Same thing with the fire department.

If they were in a car accident, if they were have problems at their home, they can use our resources.

Anyone in Cornelius is available, has those resources available to them.

My biggest fear, and we've talked about this many times, is somebody won't call the police or the fire department when they need to.

And that's my number one fear right now is people are uh going unserved that need to be in there.

Um stepping outside Cornelius.

Uh I've attended the Metropolitan Mayors Consortium meeting consistently.

We're working on our legislative priorities.

I'll get a copy of that and send it out to the council so you can see what the Metropolitan Mayor's listed.

Um it's homelessness, it's uh financial stability, avoiding unfunded mandates, which this state has been pretty easy at chipping away new ones all the time.

So that's mostly what's on the agenda.

But I'll I'll send you guys a copy of it so you can see what what the Metropolitan Mayors are working on.

Um I'm attended Pam Trees's town hall in Cornelius at the library last week, and I did have a resident come um crying to that.

Uh she was a Latino woman, and she is currently doing some of the things you talked about, Counselor Cardina.

She's fetching food and medicine, and she's literally taking care of children from other parents who have been deported.

Um because you know, that's what you do when you take care of your community.

And I spoke about it earlier.

I think one of the things I'd like the city to look at is is there an opportunity if we go into some emergency, is there an opportunity for us to do some of the stuff I talked about for um like we did in COVID.

Is there a chance for us to help fetch medicine or fetch food for residents that feel like they can't, they feel like they're literally trapped in their homes here.

And I I think that's something at ground zero that we could help do.

And if that's either through releasing a little funding funding to a non-governmental organization, or if that's um actually using our police or fire resources to do that between critical calls, I think these are things I'd be interested in us looking at.

I'd also have some interest in us looking at what would we or could we do if we established our own local emergency?

Because I when I have people all everyone that came to Pam Trace's town hall was Latino, and they are concerned, and they were sharing their concerns about being basically trapped in their own homes right now.

So I think we do have a state of emergency that we're trying to address.

Um it's not a lot different than when we lost power and we said people could go to the library and could charge medical devices or charge their phones so they could talk and let people know they're okay.

Um if like we have a big storm and people need help.

It's we're in a it's a constructed emergency, but it's still an emergency for a significant portion of our community.

And I think we need to figure out what we can do within the means of the city to help with that.

And if I see some counselors nodding, so we'll I'd like the council, I'd like to have the city look into that.

And uh if that deems necessary, maybe that's why we have to have a third meeting this you know, meeting on the third Monday this month.

So City Manager Brennan.

We'll we'll take that, Mayor, for sure.

I had I had noted that.

Um Chief Coley would like to address you if that's okay, just on this topic.

So yeah, um, I will bolt him on right after city manager because we always usually, if there's something that comes up from staff that needs to get a hold of us at the end of the evening, we usually bolt them on.

So I'm sure we'll have time for that.

Um talked about that, I talked about that.

Um I think I'm actually talking also with uh, you know, I have a bit heavy involvement with scouts in the community.

Um there's about 1,150 youth involved in the program and about as many adults in Washington County.

I'm gonna be reaching out to them.

This is like I said, this emergency is no different than if we had a big storm or a hurricane or something and see what if those folks want to get involved and see if they could be uh help out with grocery shopping or help out with picking up medicine or something.

So I'm gonna reach out to my my scout community and see what kind of uh support I can drum up there, but I'd like to hear what the staff has to do also.

So I think that's where I'll park it for this evening.

Um City Manager, your turn.

I think given the time and and uh the fact that we're asking you to sit through another work session, I'll I'll just keep it very brief.

And um we are in the um actually late planning stages for our community dinner event coming up, and this topic has also been a part of that conversation, so we're actually um you know taking some measures that we might have be better equipped to to actually take food to people if if that opportunity presents itself.

Uh look forward to hopefully seeing some of you at the uh veterans event on November 11th, and then we'll be turning our attention to the tree lighting event.

So we're we're getting into event season, really excited about that.

And just real quick, want to take any opportunity I have to to thank the staff for all that they do.

We're uh I've never worked with people that do more with less and uh really appreciate it.

Thank you.

That would you like to take the dais.

Hello, I'm Chief Coley, and I serve as your uh Cornelius Chief of Police.

I think you all know that, but we have members that are in our community that are online.

Um I want to address some of the concerns that I've heard expressed uh here in council.

And while I can't speak to federal operations, how they're running operations or some of the the larger stuff that actually falls on our legislation and uh other members of our community to take that uh to take that up.

But what I do want to speak to is what you brought up, uh mayor, is that I do have a strong concern that there will be community members that will not reach out, and I would hate for somebody to be experiencing some type of assault, a violent crime, a child abuse case, a sexual assault, and not be able to reach out to the police for fear of being reported on their status, and that is not what we do.

181A820 keeps us from being able to do that, which is rightfully so.

We don't want to report on anybody's immigration status.

We want to help our community, that's what we're here for.

Um that's really important to me, and I think that that's that's probably been my biggest concern through all this is having somebody have need and not be able to provide that.

And I and I heard you very clearly uh council president.

So I I I hear all of your concerns.

I am limited in uh what my response can be to some of those questions that you've raised, but I I do want to echo the mayor's statement about we we want to care for the community and provide the the police services to them.

Doesn't matter what the immigration status is.

I had prepared that message.

Um sure to get pushed out soon, I hope.

Council, any questions for the chief.

Um Chief, uh the the one that was brought to us tonight.

I I'd like to have you show some interest in if possible, uh, when Ms.

Hass brought up that vehicles with no plates were uh driving around the church.

I I think that's within your purview.

Please correct me if I'm wrong, is if there's vehicles without proper documentation, your officers could stop them and at least initiate a a question and find out what's going on there.

And maybe that's maybe you find out it is a federal vehicle, maybe there is other documentation, but I think that's I correct me if I'm wrong, but I think you guys have the purview to stop any vehicle that doesn't have proper identification per state.

No, you're correct, Mr.

Mayors.

Uh if we find a vehicle that's not tagged or commits violation, we can stop it.

We can definitely be uh told that it's a federal agent, and then at that point, if they're operating under a different set of rules, and we find out find out pretty quickly.

Appreciate that.

Thank you.

Yes, you counselor Godinas.

Um I'm curious, is there any instances in which you all as City of Cornelius police would interfere in any ICE detainment?

So for example, if someone is being choked out and they can't breathe and there's fear for their life at that point, are you able to step in or are you still unable to step in?

No, um so and I and I heard that earlier as well.

That's that's really a hard thing to answer because I know that the lens of somebody watching or somebody experiencing something can be drastically different.

As a uh law enforcement officer in the state of Oregon, I have a duty to protect the community.

And so if we remove a federal agent out of it, let's just say another police officer that was assaulting somebody.

I have a responsibility to stop that from happening.

So that's that's just Oregon law.

Thank you.

Thanks.

Council, any other questions for the Chief.

Thank you, Chief.

Appreciate your all your your help at there in this uh challenging time.

Um I wanted to I've forgotten something from my update before we uh finish on.

I did have a chance to meet with Congresswoman Bonamici, and please communicate out into your communities if you have people that have been for lack of a better descriptor disappeared.

Um and the belief is they've been detained by ICE or uh the border patrol and you're not getting any connection or communication.

Her office is available for um engagement in that process.

They are interested, and uh they basically told me to continue past that word that if some families are having problems finding out where their loved one is or what's going on, to please reach out to Congresswoman Bonomichi's office.

She has local contacts here in town uh in Beaverton at their office and also in DC, even if she's back there working on something, please reach out and her office will endeavor to help out.

Um with that, I think we've in it finished our reports.

Uh we got an adjournment and a work session.

So we've got 15 minutes to do.

Is that going to be time enough, city manager, to do the work session, or do we need to do an extension before we do an adjournment, or how do you want to do the work session with our nine o'clock restriction?

Um I think that I appreciate you asking, Mayor, I think that it probably is is a bit short.

We can try and then see if we get there, or we can just go ahead and ask you to extend 15 minutes, but happy to make a run.

Okay.

So at this point I would entertain a motion to adjourn.

And motion to adjourn.

Motion by Council President Godines.

Do I have a second?

Second.

Second by Councillor Lopez.

All those in favor, please say aye.

Aye.

Opposed.

Abstention.

We are adjourned.

Session on utility services right-of-way policy update.

City Manager Brandum.

Thank you, Mayor.

And I'm going to acknowledge our consultant Reba Crocker, who's joining via Zoom again.

And I'm going to just start the slides here, which are basic.

So we're revisiting a topic that we talked about in September.

Uh so uh two months ago, and which generated some questions from you.

And so we've gone through and and processed some data to address the questions.

Um I also want to note that there are rules proposed at the Federal Communications Commission that have the potential to restrict local government regulatory authority in this area.

And so we uh we're trying to move expediently in that regard.

And uh, and with your concurrence tonight, with your head nods, we plan to engage with current companies that occupy the right-of-way to propose a license program, and I have a timeline to show you uh later in the slides.

So just to review, we have at least 15 private or public entities that utilize the city's public right-of-way.

That's probably low.

There are probably a number of occupants that we don't know of.

The services include telecommunications, cable, electricity, natural gas, cellular, and then water sewer and storm treatment that that we deliver, and then solid waste, which is regulated separately under the Cornelius Municipal Code.

Uh the city holds contracts with most entities to allow for and compensate for use of the right-of-way, essentially, like if you had a room in your house that you rented out or something like that.

And so some of the clarification points that we noted from the September work session, uh, we want to address what other benefits are there to shifting to this type of program.

Can we impose fees on long haul or backhaul users?

How are the fees factored?

Is cost recovery a factor?

What will this change mean to fees charged and to uh and the cost to the customer?

And what if or when the law changes?

So those are the things we'll address.

First of all, uh the benefits of moving to a right-of-way license program.

It's much lower administratively, the burden uh to staff, and we know uh through Reba that a lot of the the private entities will say that too.

It's easier for them actually because they have similar the same terms across jurisdictions.

Um for us, we would also have have consistent terms across entities, excluding cable and garbage, and uh that is actually more legally defensible and simpler for licensees.

We would have consistent rates charged to like entities or entities that are providing some uh the same services.

Uh major point is we would have fair and just compensation to the city for use of the right-of-way, uh, including, for example, a sub-lessie on an existing utility poll, more flexibility as as laws and technology change over time, uh better awareness of facilities in the right-of-way, who they are and where they are, and a better chance for us to gain compliance when needed.

Right now, it's it's more mysterious than it isn't.

We we know we have good grasp on uh on a few of them, but mostly not.

So the uh question about whether fees can be imposed on backhaul and long haul users, the answer is yes.

Um that actually supports fairness in the marketplace, so that one entity doesn't have a a better situation than another.

Uh this is really kind of the the bulk of this.

You you asked quite um understandable questions about compensation.

So on the kind of the left hand side of this chart is the current situation with a number of the entities that are in the right-of-way, starting with electricity and natural gas, uh Zipply Fiber and Verizon, astound and ZEO, those are also telecom providers.

Currently the percentage of gross revenue where grow where GR stands for gross revenue, and then if there is a perlinear foot or minimum fee where a number of them, as you can see, do not have that.

Uh the bottom row addresses water, sewer and storm, where we essentially compensate ourselves.

So we tr we have an internal transfer from those utility funds uh to account for uh the revenue there.

In the middle, you can see in the big row or the big column, you can see our current annual compensation from those entities, and then what we would propose then toward the right would be a new rate and an estimated annual compensation.

So what you can see here is that we would propose that the percentage of gross revenue for electricity, PGE would go from 3.5 to 5%, natural gas would stay at 5%, and then the telecommunications uh providers would go from 5% to 7%.

You can see uh the second from the bottom row, other telecom is is largely mysterious.

We know there are a number of other providers, but we don't have a good grasp of who they are or what their operations are.

So really this this is an estimate that that REBA produced based on other cities uh kind of uh average data and 98% of the population with the cell phone, which is a uh a national estimate.

So it just kind of gives us a sense um Reba does project conservatively, so that that kind of missing revenue is actually probably conservative.

And then on uh water sewer and storm, we we have the same number reflected there between current and estimated future, but there are other variables that come into play based on the customer base.

So it wouldn't be exact, but it's going to be similar.

It'll it could be a bit higher, a bit lower, but it's gonna be similar.

So I kind of threw a lot at you just with this chart.

I have a few more slides, but I just wanted to pause there and see if you have any questions.

Council questions?

Okay.

The one I have is um why are we raising the rate?

Because from my experience looking at my own bills, this just comes right out of our community, our taxpayers.

And right now they're struggling as it is.

That's correct.

Uh and it's a it's an understandable question, Mayor.

Um really 7% is really the standard now.

So we are charging below the standard.

The additional revenue would obviously help a lot.

We have some pretty big gaps that that our general fund cannot meet.

So that is not the reason why we uh are doing this, but it is to kind of bring us up into that average.

Some cities in this region have gone well above uh the 7% now as well.

We certainly wouldn't propose doing that.

Yes, Councillor Gardinas.

And I would doubt that they're charging differently for us than they would be for my assumption is, or at least I assume that even if they're getting charged differently at another city, whatever is going to the customer is still the same price.

They the general practice talking with any of them is they they bill according to residents and they just pass through whatever they get hit with.

So if it's 5% here, 7% there, and 13% well, we use surewood as the example of ridiculous.

They'll just pass that through by bill.

I mean, that's how they do it.

So I what I heard you add on here was you would get the ad polls, because that's one thing we've never been able to get a hold of, is like somebody really sublases space on the pole for another telecom or something else.

Well, we don't ever see that.

And then I think the others, I mean, would we then be able to access because some people have moved to Verizon or to um T-Mobile as their internet?

So they're doing basically internet over cellular.

I mean, they're not using our conventional right-of-way, they're using airspace.

So I wonder if that are they part of what we could address.

I'm gonna ask Reba to chime in on that one.

Did you hear the question, Reba?

I did is my volume okay?

Am I yelling at you guys?

Yeah, it's perfect actually.

Okay, great.

Um, so the any provider that is providing services in your city, whether it be cell phone or internet, the they're using the right-of-way.

Even that internet is using the facilities in the right-of-way, not just airspace.

So you will be able to access that along with uh space on the polls.

That is taking up space in your right-of-way, and the other people are actually using the facilities in the right-of-way to transport that up.

So that should be something you collect on.

So I'm assuming we have to go after Verizon or uh T-Mobile to request that from them to get an agreement, because I'm assuming they're not gonna come bringing it to us.

We're probably gonna have to pursue them.

Well, some providers will comply, some you have to fight with, and you have to chase them.

Um T-Mobile doesn't own facility.

So they're a little bit harder to get to.

Rise it owned facility in your right-of-way.

So that is part of the work going forward is that we would we would be actively managing something that we haven't been, and it's certainly not faulting anybody, it's uh it's a capacity thing.

Um, but but yeah, that that is what we would do, and and um that would be a justified activity for us to add on to what we do.

I I want to just pause here.

It um real quick, Rebe.

I just wanted to pause since it's 858.

If we want to go ahead and um extend for 10 or so minutes or something.

Do I have a motion to extend the meeting to 910?

I motion to extend the meeting to 910.

Motion by Counselor Gardinas to have a second.

Second, second by council Lopez.

All those in favor, please say aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Opposed, abstentions, meeting extended until 9.10.

Thank you.

Proceed.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Uh Reba, sorry to interrupt you there.

No worries.

I I would like to say though that some providers call me and say, hey, where do you visit the city?

You represent them.

They have a right-of-way.

So we have to pay.

Can we pay?

So some providers are really eager to comply.

Some you have to chase.

Okay.

I I suppose the one revenue thing I'm concerned about on this, like I said, is the upping of the percentage in the current environment we're in.

I don't feel like that's a good idea for our customer base.

Um I know these though, these agreements are more long-term.

I think I would be more comfortable with something that puts us revenue neutral for the where we're at with these ones.

So if it's five percent, we stay with five percent, but maybe we put into the contract that it gains a percent every year, every other year, something that gets us up to it.

Um, if we think we should be getting to 7%, maybe it's this is kind of like what I talked to the to ODOT and uh Susan McLean about 1% a year or every other year is a lot easier for our folks to digest than a big jump all at once.

So if if we could put that into the agreement that it's maybe it's five now, it's revenue neutral, and and then in a year from now or two years from now, whatever's appropriate, we go up one percent, and then another percent.

I don't know.

We can decouple that.

Um, what I'd like to do is just show you we did do some math.

Um, if if I can um just show you a little bit of math and then come back to that and and just see if if you still want to do that because we can.

Uh the other question about cost recovery, we we don't look at it that way.

The purpose is to allow use of the right-of-way for fair and just compensation, and that's actually in order to comply with the Federal Telecommunications Act.

So that's to clarify that one.

Implication for customers, we did do some calculations.

Um increase to seven percent uh uh factored on an average bill, which is about $70 per month would increase with that increase from five to seven would increase the cost of the customer about a dollar forty per month.

So that that'll just give you a you know some sense of of the real impact there.

Um and then uh Reba did find a League of Oregon City survey from 2019, so it's a little bit dated, but it did show the statewide average fee at that time for telecom at 5.6 percent, but within the metro region, so that's six years ago at 6.5%.

So already above where we are.

So that's just to give you some comparison there.

And I know Cornelius is not the rest of the region.

I'm you know, definitely hear you there.

And as I mentioned before, many cities are now um higher than seven percent.

Um and then just if and when laws change, uh individual franchise agreements are just much more cumbersome, yeah.

You know, and they lock the parties into the contract.

Uh normally, you know, companies want they really want to get at least 10 years.

Um utilities would like to be longer than that, so it really kind of locks you there.

And so the license approach just allows a lot more flexibility.

We can do that through a code amendment uh as needed when things change, and that change would then apply to everybody.

It doesn't apply to just one individual unit.

Um should we proceed?

Our next steps would be to share a draft ordinance and resolution with those stakeholders, so it'd be a consultation with them in November, and then in December, we would consider and incorporate the feedback from that, prepare the materials for city council consideration to come to you in January, and then thereafter, once we make a change, we would begin to really actively manage these things.

So I just wanted to get all that to you, and then you know, maybe we revisit that that um table, which I can go back and kind of get get a general sense of where you are.

Counselor Godinus?

So I know we talk a lot about this fee being transferred over to our community members, and I'm curious when we say that is it actually happening, like is there at the bottom of the bill it says service fee and then it's whatever it is being charged?

Okay.

So it would be a direct consumer.

Okay, I see what you're saying.

I think in my head, I was thinking that if let's say Sherwood has 13%, they just leave it at whatever that is for everybody.

So it is completely separate from the base fee.

Um then remind me you said it was at 7% was a dollar 70 or $1.70 adding on to that $1.40 if you just in that in that estimation, it would be about a dollar forty a month.

Yeah.

To go from five to seven.

Yeah.

Yeah.

If you're if I may, I think that answered the first question about the bill.

Sure.

Some providers will itemize the tax fee fees.

And they'll put that seven percent franchise fee or license as a separate item on the bill.

It's like the cable fee will have the peg fee set.

Some providers, I'm sure you've seen them advertise taxes that feed included.

We'll not itemize that.

So it just depends on the provider, what they went.

There's no regulation on what they have to list, what they don't have to.

But I will say they can live that fee, their um bonuses to their topics, their breaking supplies, they can itemize all of that if they want to.

Yeah, I know with um Xfinity, Verizon, the bills I have, they they break it all out.

So you can they they're very clear, you know, you know, government franchise fees.

Yeah, because government franchise fee, and then calls it right out for my bills, the PGE, Northwest Natural, Xfinity, those guys.

But you're right, uh Zipley's thing is oh, this is the total cost.

And they just roll it in under the and then adjust it, like you said, if it's 13% somewhere else, well, they just don't make quite as much in that jurisdiction.

Other questions?

So we have our five-minute warning.

Just think it out loud.

Just uh I think as you spoke, Mayor about doing uh gradual increases over a certain period of time.

I'm just thinking out loud again.

Does that make sense to me?

Um because we look at the $1.40.

Um that's on top of everything else has gone up for our community.

Um the cost of everything, the grocery store, the utilities, um so it might not seem like a lot, but I think once you add everything up, it it is impactful.

So we were speaking that it sounded right to me, at least right now, the the gradual uh increase.

Um but I also hear you uh city manager Brandon on the gaps that we have in our finances with the city.

So yeah.

Sneaking now, no comment.

Yes, Councilor Godinas.

Yeah, I would say that I am also kind of torn between this because I understand why this needs to be done, and I obviously want it to be more formulated.

Um formalized, I should say.

But my concern also is with the new property tax, right?

We just we're voting on increases of property taxes, and so I've talked to a lot of families that are even just having issues with paying this year's property taxes, and then we're adding the economy in the state that it's in, even though a dollar forty may not seem like a lot.

Um I remember when a dollar forty was a lot, and I think there's a lot of families in that same boat that are just kind of looking at all the bills and figuring out what they need to cut.

And so we might even see that you know, Verizon comes back and they're like, well, actually, we lost half of our customer base or whatever it may be, just because people are starting to really scale back on things that are not necessary.

Um so those are just some thoughts that I have.

Counselor Vaughn.

Yeah, make it quick, I hope.

Um I just want to say that I agree with the mayor's comments about you know being cost conscious on these and you know, getting to that seven percent for a lot of these eventually makes sense, but with the cost of everything else rising to everybody else's point, that dollar forty may not seem like a lot, but you know, everything else is going up a dollar forty two.

Um the price of electricity has gone up sixty percent in the last five years.

Um it's yeah, it's it's kind of kind of crazy out there.

I think you know, as a city entity, we have bills to pay, right?

And we need income to do it.

Um I would like to see us aim more towards the regional average rather than trying to lead it with a higher, considering the economic class of our typical resident, right?

So maybe meet more of that you know, median instead of trying to get ahead of it.

Um yeah, I think that's it.

And as we near our limit, I would say the um the what for is esoteric, right?

It's like, well, we need the money, but it's like okay, but for what?

So I think when you come back and talk to us, be able to show the the what for on it.

Um I think I would ask you to when you talk to the representatives from these, ask them about that scaling it, right?

If we do five percent now, six percent, seven percent, what's the time frame we do that in?

Um I would echo what everybody else said.

It's the double digits increases that we've seen across everybody.

I just got the notice in Eastern Oregon, so I'm sure it'll hit us too.

BPA is gonna roll out a 26 or 28% increase on their wholesale rate for electricity.

So that's gonna get to PGE.

We're gonna see that come through.

Um so I think it's just it's it's not the 140, it's everything.

And I think to our graph that I beat everybody with, we are the lowest dollar per capita already in you know, the county.

We race we're racing forest grove to the bottom, right?

And um that's a challenge for us.

I mean, we do have an economically generally economically disadvantaged um except for uh Laurel Woods that kind of bumping up our average income a little bit.

Um that's it's it's still generally a lot of the same people that are still struggling.

So um I I I feel we really need to justify hard before we turn up the the heat.

You know, we have to figure out what we given up so that the council can have a real discussion about what are we giving up if we don't go six percent or seven percent and then the phasing.

That that I think that's my last two cents.

Anything else, counsel?

That really does it for for me.

I think we can we can get the the mechanics in place and and stay status quo on the rate and bring that back to you.

So that that's really helpful.

Appreciate it.

Yeah, the mechanics seem like the biggest change, yeah.

The biggest bang for the buck.

Yeah.

And we're at time or 20 seconds to time.

I motion to adjourn.

Motion to adjourn.

Do I have a second?

Second.

Second by count motion by Councillor Godinas, second by Counselor Vaughn.

All those in favor, please say aye.

Aye.

We're adjourned.

Thank you.

Thank you, Reba.