Council Bluffs City Council Meeting - November 21, 2025
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Council Bluffs City Council Meeting - November 21, 2025
The Council Bluffs City Council met on November 21, 2025, with all members present. The council approved routine items, debated a maintenance funding agreement for the Rivers Edge riverfront development, and discussed the process for filling a vacant council seat.
Consent Calendar
- Approved the consent agenda (voice vote), including routine approvals.
- Approved Resolution 25-297 adopting the East Manowa Declaration of Covenants, Conditions and Restrictions for the East Manowa Storm Sewer District.
Public Comments & Testimony
- Pete, project sponsor for the Rivers Edge development, testified remotely. He said he raised $60 million in partnership with the city and that donors wanted a reserve fund for maintenance. He committed to using savings (estimated $300,000–$400,000) to fund five-year extended warranties, but said that if the funding agreement was delayed beyond December 15, he would need to borrow money and could not guarantee the warranties. He also said the term "endowment" came from his nonprofit experience and that the substance of the agreement did not change.
Discussion Items
- Resolution 25-287 – Maintenance Funding Agreement for Rivers Edge: City Attorney Mimi explained that Iowa Code Chapter 540A created problems with labeling the fund an "endowment," so the agreement was renamed a "maintenance funding agreement" without changing substance. Council members raised concerns about having only seen the agreement days earlier. Council member Jill Schudak requested and received authorization to review a January 25, 2021 executive session recording to understand the original intent. Council members discussed warranty coverage, proposing to add sprinkler/irrigation systems and reduce the Sync board’s response time for accessing funds from 30 to 20 days. Pete agreed to those changes. Some members said they felt rushed, especially after Pete could not guarantee increasing the fund from $2 million to $2.5 million. The original motion to approve was withdrawn, and the council voted to continue the item to December 15, 2025.
- Vacant Council Seat Process: City Attorney Mimi confirmed that 716 signatures are needed to force a special election, and that a special election could cost an estimated $80,000–$100,000 (the primary alone cost the county $46,000, with the city's share $43,000). Council members debated whether to appoint a new member or hold a special election, weighing fiscal responsibility against public sentiment for a say in the appointment. No decision was made; discussion will continue at a future meeting.
Key Outcomes
- Approved the consent agenda and Resolution 25-297.
- Approved a motion authorizing Council member Jill to review the executive session recording; review must occur at City Hall under supervision, with no copies provided.
- Continued Resolution 25-287 to December 15, 2025, with planned amendments: adding sprinkler/irrigation to warranty coverage and changing the response time to 20 days. Questions and changes are to be submitted to staff by the following week.
- Held discussion-only on the vacant council seat process; no formal action taken.
Meeting Transcript
Um streamings on. All right, I'd like to call the meeting to order. Um, so all council members are in attendance. Um would like to entertain a friendly motion to um make uh agenda item number three, number two, and number two number three. So moved second. Is there discussion? All those in favor signify by saying aye. All right, aye. Pose same sign. Um Madam Clerk, you want to read the two resolution? So we're gonna use we're gonna do three B first, resolution 25-297 is a resolution adopting the East Manowa Declaration of Covenants and Conditions and Restrictions for the East Manowa Storm Sewer District. Motion to approve. Second is there a discussion. All those in favor signify by saying aye. I aye. Hi, Courtney. Uh and are we now on well, we can approve the consent agenda real quick. Yeah, is there a motion to approve the consent agenda? Motion to approve. Any discussion? All those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Oppose same sign, madam clerk. Now we have resolution 25-287, a resolution of intent to enter into a maintenance funding agreement with Southwest Iowa nonprofit for collective impact for the riverfront redevitalization rivers edge development. Is there a motion motion to approve? Second. Is it discussion? Yeah, I I still have a lot of questions. I guess I looked through this a lot since Monday and multiple. I mean, we changed it again yesterday. Changed it based on your suggestion request, right? Well, we we changed it from an endowment to a funding agreement because of how Iowa law treats endowments. So it's a semantics didn't change much. Mimi, could you speak to that a little bit? Sure. So we realized um that chapter 540A applies. I want to make sure. Can you hear me okay? Yeah, yep. Yep. Okay. Um under chapter 540A, if it was labeled an endowment, then the city would retain control, and that wasn't the spirit of the MOU. So we had two options, which was to renegotiate and call it an endowment and have the city retain control or keep the original spirit and rename it a maintenance funding agreement. So the substance itself didn't change. Um it's it was originally drafted sort of as a contractual agreement with contractual obligations on both sides and and not really as a charitable endowment um under chapter 540A. So it's correct that the substance itself didn't change that um it's largely just changing it from an endowment to a maintenance funding agreement and title. So I went back and listened to the February 8th, 2021 meeting and the February I think 25th, 2021 meeting. Um in both of those meetings it did talk about um that the endowment fund would be managed by the city's finance department. Um and Dick did confirm in both meetings that the city can have an endowment fund. Uh I mean by definition uh and sorry sorry to interrupt if there's a a lag.
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