Edmonds City Council Committee A Meeting - December 2, 2025
Edmonds City Council Committee A Meeting - December 2, 2025
The City Council Committee A met on December 2, 2025, at 3:00 PM to discuss seven agenda items: lease agreements for Anderson Center tenants, a supplemental agreement for the Highway 99 Revitalization Project, a stormwater capacity grant, a Microsoft Enterprise Agreement renewal, a fire ILA modification, restoration of vacation hours for a rehired employee, and parking permit fee increases. All items were unanimously recommended for placement on the consent agenda for the December 9, 2025 regular council meeting.
Lease Agreements: Toddle Time's Main Street Kids, Olympic Ballet Theatre, and Olympic Ballet School
- Shannon (Parks, Recreation and Human Services) presented three lease agreements for the Francis Anderson Center. Main Street Kids' new monthly rate: $7,229.22. Olympic Ballet combined monthly rate: $7,568.34. Annual increases are based on the Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue CPIU (June to June): 2023 (10.1%), 2024 (4.6%), 2025 (3.8%), 2026 (2.7%). New this year: water fee increased 30% and electricity fee increased 15% in addition to CPIU. Olympic Ballet requested separate leases for its nonprofit (Theatre) and for-profit (School) to apply for a leasehold tax exemption, saving about $90/month.
- Councilmember Will expressed support for the community services but raised concern about the term length given potential future maintenance at the Anderson Center. He suggested shorter terms; staff noted limited benefit of shorter terms as rates increase annually regardless. Councilmember Angie highlighted that the city charges $15.36/sq ft/year compared to a commercial average of $30/sq ft, and recommended focusing staff energy on other city-owned facilities with minimal lease payments. Councilmember Susan preferred letting tenants choose term length. Council agreed to forward to consent, with a minor correction to update the city clerk's name in the agreements.
Supplemental Agreement 3 with SCJ for Highway 99 Revitalization Project (Stage 3)
- Bertram (Engineering) presented. This supplement adds $242,000 to the existing contract, raising the total to over $4.6 million. Funding: $136,000 from WSDOT contribution for complete streets elements, $106,000 from Move Ahead state funds; no local contribution. The supplement extends project management through December 2027 (from December 2025) and adds design analyses for lateral clearance reduction, deceleration tapers for left-turn lanes, low-profile barrier curve terminal sections, travel lane width reduction from 11 to 10.5 feet (saving 2.5 feet, reducing right-of-way take), and bike lane crossing revisions with separate curb ramps and signal phases. Councilmember Will asked about planter strip maintenance; staff noted hardscape options are being considered. The item was forwarded to consent.
Department of Ecology Agreement – 2025-2027 Biennial Stormwater Capacity Grant
- Mike (City Engineer) presented a $120,000 grant from the Department of Ecology to support NPDES stormwater permit compliance, including catch basin cleaning (30% annually) and equipment like pipe inspection cameras. Previous grants received. Councilmember Susan appreciated the grant and asked about future opportunities; staff indicated next cycle in 2027. Forwarded to consent.
Microsoft Enterprise Agreement Renewal
- Brian Thule (Information Services) presented the renewal for the city's Microsoft Office 365 enterprise agreement for a three-year period. Individual license prices did not increase (previous renewal had a 20% increase). The agreement includes Teams dial-out at no additional cost and adds Microsoft Copilot AI for about 400 licenses (based on usage survey: a dozen users currently using AI). Total cost approximately $160,000 including tax; $168,000 budgeted. Councilmember Will confirmed per-person licensing model. Councilmember Susan asked about tax; staff noted tax is unavoidable. Forwarded to consent.
Fire ILA Modification
- Ted (Planning and Development Services) presented a resolution to amend the Interlocal Agreement (ILA) with South County Fire (RFA) to delay the start date for collecting fire protection service fees from June 2025 to January 1, 2026. This formalizes a verbal agreement and aligns with a newly adopted Edmonds-specific fee schedule (approved in early November). The amendment also corrects the fee remittance timeline: 60 days to collect, 30 days to remit. Councilmember Will noted the six-month delay helps the city. Staff confirmed the fee schedule is now a model for other RFA jurisdictions. Forwarded to consent.
Restoration of Vacation Hours
- Human Resources presented a request to restore 8.6 years of prior service for a rehired employee, increasing vacation accrual by 2 hours per pay period. Councilmember Will praised the employee's contributions to major projects. Staff noted a communication gap with a prior director. Forwarded to consent.
New Parking Permit Annual Pricing Increase for 2026
- Councilmember Susan presented the item, based on work by the Economic Development Commission (EDC). Rates had not been updated for over a decade; previous rates were $25/year for residential and $50/year for employee permits. The proposed increases were discussed last year but paused for further review. The EDC provided a thorough analysis. Councilmember Will asked about implementation; staff confirmed notices (45 days) have been sent, and council approval will enact the new rates. Councilmember Susan emphasized the rates help rotation and revenue. Forwarded to consent.
Key Outcomes
- All seven agenda items received unanimous committee support to be placed on the consent agenda for the December 9, 2025 regular City Council meeting.
- Meeting adjourned at 3:51 PM.
Meeting Transcript
I got a minute still. Oh, I see. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. No, I'm not sure. Oh, time for a joke. We have enough time for a joke. I don't know. All right. Three o'clock. Welcome to the uh council committee A meeting uh here on uh December 2nd, 2025. Uh we have present uh council member Chen, Councilmember Payne, myself, Councilmember Dodge, and uh Council President Tibbet, among other um city staff that are helping us with this meeting today. Uh and the first item of business is the Total Times, Main Street Kids, Olympic Ballet Theater, and Olympic Ballet School Lease Agreements. Shannon and I assume that's you. That's me. Take it away. Thank you. Thank you so much for having me again today. Um I'm presenting two lease agreements. Well, technically three lease agreements for two tenants. Um the Anderson Center is home to six tenants here, um, and each has their own lease agreement ranging in duration from five years, one year to five years. And this year, only two of them have are expiring and need to be renewed, which is the Olympic Ballet and uh Main Street Kids. Um interestingly, these are our two highest paying tenants. They uh lease the most amount of space in the Anderson Center. Main Street Kids uh new monthly rate is $7,229.22 cents per month. And the Olympic Ballet combined lease agreements are $7,568.34 cents per month. Um, so to give you kind of a scale for what we're talking about with these two tenants, all of the lease agreements are um indicate CPIU is their annual increase. And that has been going on for quite some time for the Francis Anderson Center tenants. So um to give you an idea of the types of increases these tenants have seen over the course of time. Um in 2023, each of their leases were um increased 10.1% because that was inflation in 23. In 24, it was an additional 4.6%. In 25, an additional 3.8%. And this year it's uh 2.7%. And that is all predicated on the Seattle Tacoma Bellevue CPIU from June to June. Um and that's how the lease agreements are written. They've all been reviewed and approved by our city attorneys as well. Um a couple of things new this year, two in particular to share with you. One is that we have increased their fees for water by 30% this year in addition to the CPIU index increase. And we've increased the fee for um uh power or electricity by 15% in addition to the CPIU increase, just you know, uh as I mean it's to keep up with uh the expenditures uh in the building. Um all of our tenants receive these increases every year, regardless of if their contract needs renewed. So these are annual increases built into the agreement. So our other tenants who do not have lease agreements up for renewal right now also receive the same increases each year. Um there's really no benefit to signing a long-term lease, if you will. It increases every year. Uh the benefit is just not going through the paperwork and the time that it takes to have them approved. Um the other significant increase is or sorry, significant change this year is that the Olympic Ballet, they do operate a nonprofit and a for-profit business. Um their nonprofit, the Olympic Ballet Theater, only utilizes one room in the Anderson Center. Uh their for-profit, the Olympic Ballet School utilizes the remainder of the rooms. And Olympic Ballet is eager to um apply for and hopefully be approved for a leasehold tax exemption for their nonprofit portion of their business.
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