Welcome to our meeting.

The date is March 10, 2026.

The time is 7 p.m.

This is an open meeting of the Grand Island City Council.

The City of Grand Island abides by the Open Meetings Act in conducting business.

A copy of the Open Meetings Act is displayed in the back of this room as required by state law.

The City Council may vote to go into closed session on any agenda item.

As allowed by state law.

At this time, please stand and join us in the Pledge of Allegiance.

Councilmember Sheard.

Present.

Councilmember Stelk.

Councilmember Conley.

Present.

Councilmember Nickerson.

Present.

Councilmember Brown.

Present.

Councilmember Hazi.

Present.

Councilmember Mendoza.

Present.

Council President O'Neill.

Present.

Councilmember Pollock.

Present.

Councilmember Lanfier.

Present.

And Mayor Steele.

Present.

Also present are Jill Grenier, the city clerk, Patrick Brown, the city administrator, Carrie Fisk, the city attorney, and Keith Kurtz, the public works director.

Individuals who have appropriate items for city council consideration should complete the request for future agenda items for them located at the information booth.

If the issue can be handled administratively without council action, notification will be provided.

If the item is scheduled for a meeting or study session, notification of the date will be given.

Council members, do you wish to remove any of tonight's consent agenda items?

Yes, Mr.

Hawsey.

Thank you, Mayor.

I'd like to remove uh item six C, the payment of claims.

Certainly.

And before I proceed, Mrs.

Fisk, do you have a change to our agenda?

Yes, Mayor.

Um on item 11A, it references an executive session to receive litigation status updates from the city attorney.

I'm going to handle that at the next meeting, so I'm pulling that from tonight's meeting.

Thank you.

A sign-up sheet was available in the lobby for individuals wishing to provide input on any of tonight's agenda items.

If you did not sign up to speak on an agenda item, please come forward, state your name and the agenda topic on which you will be speaking.

So we shall continue.

Council members, we have a large group of people here from venue works, and uh to accommodate uh them.

Right up to the first part of our agenda in front of the consent agenda so that they can present uh what they have to say and not have to wait around unnecessarily.

So we'll start out with resolution 9A venue works annual report and funding request.

Thank you, Mayor Steele and City and Council members.

It's always an honor to be here and talk to you.

Um it's a little bigger honor for me tonight because tonight I get to bring with me some people that help um support everything we've talked about since we've started talking about it about a year and a half ago.

Um and I'd like to just take a minute to introduce them to to begin with.

And um as you can see, we are a really large team.

Um our team of five.

We have one person that couldn't be here tonight, but the rest of the team, this is this is the group of people that make everything that we do happen at the event center.

And first here is Carson Dahland.

Carson's our director of operations, and uh, if there's anything that goes right or wrong, it's Carson's fault in the building.

He's the one that when we have the HBAC go down, he's the one climbing up on the ladder trying to manually adjust the actuators to get some fresh air in here.

He does all of that.

So we couldn't do it without him.

And I think he's averaged about two hours of sleep over the past two months.

No joke, no exaggeration.

Next we have Kaylee Van Hoosen.

Kaylee Van Huusen is our box office manager and will be shifting to events management here very soon.

She's done a great job.

And I will note too that both Carson and Kaylee were the only two people that we inherited when we took over the building.

Kaylee was a part-timer, and she grew up in the building.

Her mom used to be the box office manager there.

So couldn't do it without them.

And just a quick add for the love volleyball game that we had just recently, the infield seats collapsed and broke before the event.

So we had to come up with 186 new seats somewhere to get all these people in for this sold-out event.

So a combination between Carson and Cayley to figure out and manufacture where to put them.

They figured it out.

And I'm so glad and so thankful for them and what they're able to accomplish.

Next, we have Liz Johnston.

Liz is our food and beverage director.

So if you've eaten it, it's her fault.

So as you know, we've had at the Nubegraft beer station and things like that.

And she's she's come in and um has done a great job in really getting our food and beverage up to speed and continues to make changes daily.

Um next we have Chelsea Steinkey.

Um Chelsea's our director of finance slash HR.

She didn't know that she was going to be HR until she started, and I told her about the slash HR part, which is probably what half of your job, if not more.

Oh yeah.

At least of course, this is Tom Richter, which we all know.

Tom's the vice president of our company and a great support uh resource and ran the Brookings building for 20 years doing what I do, and now he's an over oversight over everything we do at VenueWorks.

One other thing that's a little different.

VenueWorks always hires our own people to run the building.

Um we came to here to Grand Island.

I met this lady named Sharon Dreer who's sitting right back here quietly.

She told me, do not make me speak or I will walk out.

But I'm gonna embarrass her anyhow because she has she and her team have been absolutely critical to our success here.

She was critical in our ability to bring in Lindsay Sterling.

Lindsay Sterling has 20 plus stalkers that are dangerous stalkers, um, and her ability to secure our building and keep us safe and and uh their confidence in her and what she provided changed that whole game plan.

So little old Grand Island was on there on the list of other big cities like Colorado Springs, Austin, Texas, Houston, Texas, and a lot of that is her fault.

Um, and she keeps us safe every day, including with these love volleyball people that we just had in the building.

So this is the Heartland Events Center team.

So I love what you guys do.

Pat, I might need a little help with.

Is this my how do I pull up what I need to pull up?

Um down to the Chrome symbol.

Yep.

Here?

Here I see it.

Thank you.

First, I'm going to do something else, though.

It's hard for people to understand how much work goes into doing an event.

You come in for volleyball match, it's about an hour and 10 minutes, hour and 20 minutes, in and out, right?

Well, the work that it takes to get to that point is massive.

And I will say this: I've averaged about six hours of sleep over the last two months.

I'm getting more sleep than any of these guys here behind me.

Um, Carson, no joke, is averaging about two hours of sleep for the last two months, no joke.

Um, there was one day he had 45 minutes of sleep.

One day I walked in and actually flipped on the light, and he had dragged a couch into the locker room showers and was just trying to catch a 10-minute quick nap in between the work that he had to do.

So it's crazy.

And I'm so thankful they have the energy and strength to pull that off.

Um, but I'm gonna try to give you a little idea of how difficult this is.

So I'll start with Scotty McCreary, January 31st.

Before that, we had to put in a stage for Scotty McCreary.

As soon as the stage was done that evening, Carson and his team started breaking down the stage to get it out because we had to start loading in dirt for a demolition derby the very next morning.

Then comes Corn Husker Chaos, it runs for four days.

As soon as that's over, same night that it's over, they start to load the dirt out.

That takes a whole lot of time, so it's dirt out.

Then the stage has to go up for three dog night.

Uh soon as three dog night is done.

Two days later, the stage has to, or the stage goes out, and two days later we have a basketball game coming in, Heartland Hoops.

So the stage has to go out before 6 a.m.

the next morning.

Basketball court comes in.

Um as soon as Heartland Hoops is over, we got a real long break, about three days between hoops and the cheer and dance program.

So the the court got to stay, but the cleanup still happened.

And as soon as Cheer and Dance was done, uh the floor goes out, and we start loading in dirt for Grant Rodeo Grand Island.

Um that takes about three days to bring in dirt.

Then we have Rodeo Grand Island from the 27th through the 28th.

And then on the evening of the 28th, dirt starts to load out for Rodeo Grand Island, and the stage comes in the very next morning.

So the stage gets set up, preparing for Ian Munzik.

As soon as Ian Munsick's over, the stage then gets unloaded.

The basketball court now comes back in, has to get put down.

That the work there is immense.

And then love volleyball shows up and um and uh comes in and sells a sellout crowd of 55, 52, 19, I think was our number of the sellout.

So if you think about dirt in, stage dirt in, dirt out, stage in, stage out, basketball floor in, basketball floor out, back to dirt, back to stage, back if you can see the pattern of this, it's absolutely and this is over a span of 38 days.

So when I talk about his no sleep, literally at midnight when the concert's over and we're all going home, he's still there down breaking down these stages.

So it's a really tough task for them to pull off.

And I'm real fortunate to have this team.

Okay.

Um I'm gonna start with our annual report, which is up here on the screen.

And I'm going to condense this because you guys have heard me drone on many times, way too long, and I'm gonna try not to do that tonight.

So you'll see me skip through a few things.

If you have questions, we can certainly back up to that.

Um, but we're gonna go with this for now.

There's our team.

Okay, the first topic of worth um of discussion worth discussing is the actual economic impact to our community.

Um I sat down with Brad Melama, a visit Grand Island or visit Grand Island, and we took several hours to work through his program and the the details on coming up with this economic impact.

Um, and um here's what we came up with, and there's a few numbers throughout this presentation that we'll hit.

But in general, in 2025, um, the economic impact of the product, the product that we bought in turt brought into our building was 18 million dollars in change.

Um that accounted to approximately 35,000 room nights, about a half a million dollars in local tax contribution, and about a 12 million dollar impact in direct impact of dollars coming into our market.

Next, I'm gonna highlight um you know, when we first came on board, winning over our promoters to the Heartland Event Center is one of our biggest challenges.

Um I'd say we've gotten a pretty good handle on doing that.

The promoters now know that Grand Island is a viable market, that people will show up and attend the events, they'll spend their money here, so they the promoters are no longer afraid to bring something to Grand Island, and that's a huge victory, and something we really had to.

It took us probably six months before we started to turn that tide, and now we've got a pretty strong tide to where they're they're interested in coming back.

Um there's a quote in here, and once again, um, great work out there.

The Heartland Event Center is the hot venue right now.

Um, with number with numbers you pulled in with Lindsay Sterling, you're the darling of at Mammoth.

Mammoths was about the number four promoter in the country.

Um, and you actually they actually made money.

Keep doing what you're doing.

That is such an endorsement to our to our efforts.

Um, and that's what will help us bring in new acts and new talents like Dwight Yoakum and Zizi Top.

Next, I wanted to highlight just a couple of the highest attended events.

Um, right there at the top is Nebraska State Fair, of course.

You know, I believe the Nebraska State Fair brings in about 300,000 plus to the campus and to the city.

For us, we did the best we could to track those numbers of the people coming through our door, and that's roughly around 16,500, give or take.

Um, but that's a lot of traffic coming into our building.

Next on that list, believe it or not, is the USA wrestling, which is happening this next week.

Um, not this weekend, but next weekend, correct?

So once again, he'll be setting up the basketball floor and getting the wrestling put in play, and that's a big event for us just from a financial perspective to an impact in the community.

It's a massive event that brings in almost as much as what we bring in during the state fair.

And I won't go through all those numbers, but they're pretty significant.

One thing I will highlight is the walkers.

You know, we opted to have the keep the walkers in our building for the morning.

We've estimated approximately 4,000 walkers go through our door every year.

Um sadly, that number should go down with the more events that we get because we won't have time to actually allow the walkers in.

But um, that's a good community give back, and they seem to be pretty um thankful that we continued that program.

Um in total attendance, just 75,000 over the course of the the 2025 year.

On that same page, you should see you can see that can't, yeah.

On the same page, there's some testimonials.

I want to read just a couple because they're these are the payback when they when they put in these kind of hours and we get these comments from the public either on Facebook or in person, it makes a difference.

So I'm gonna read just a couple.

This is great news for Central Nebraska.

I'll be making regular trips from Lincoln from Lincoln.

Um Michael Scandra Sandra, and he's talking about the Siege uh Arena Football League that we brought in.

The next one is um from Kelly Ranyak.

I don't know your last name, Kelly, but I'm gonna go with that.

Um, and what she wrote was some incredible shows coming to GI.

I love seeing the change.

Brings excitement to GI and keeps people staying local for entertainment.

Um next one is this is hands down, the best event that's ever been in the HEC.

Nice job.

Heather Reese Roy, Lindsay Sterling attendee.

Um this one concerns the Rodeo GI.

Great time, and it was packed.

Great for GI.

Um, and one last one I'll highlight is um I went yesterday, was fun time, and the place was well set up.

Can please continue to do this.

That was concerning our skate and shop or shop and skate event that was a craft fair and skating rink event.

So people in the public and the community, they're noticing.

Next, I'm gonna hit this media release.

I won't hit on this a lot because I think we've talked a little bit about it, but um, we have a tenant football team.

Um we have four games scheduled right now.

Uh looks like we're going to schedule a couple of pregames, and there could be some postseason games that come along with this.

And if you haven't seen this, our coach is one of his best friends is John Harbaugh, which I have a video that I can show you, and I won't do it tonight.

But he was connected in the world that we that typically does not happen at a at the level of what this arena football is.

And um I think you're gonna see amazing things out of our football program.

I'm gonna hit a couple little uh number notes here on our concessions.

Um we had an investment of roughly 300.

Um, and you'll note you'll see it says 350, it was 300, 300,000 in comprehensive upgrades to concessions and so on.

Um jumping down to the technology technology and cashless innovation.

Um, approximately 125,000 in uh state of the art POS software.

Toast is the brand that we use, and you may be familiar with that.

They use it in a lot of restaurants.

Um, but that was at zero cost to the city.

Um we also renewed the partnership with Pizza Hut, our only partner within the building that is an outside vendor that continues to be a fan favorite.

People look for that, and uh uh Dave Staub, the owner of Pizza Hut, is just an excellent partner, and they continue to support us in every way.

Ummediately upon taking over the building.

Chris Carton, our vice president of food and beverage, secured a deal with Pepsi uh for 135,000 over the course of five years, really just to make and the only what we have to give back is promotional credit to Pepsi.

We can't advertise Coca-Cola, but that's well worth it to get 135,000 brought in just by having Pepsi as our exclusive provider.

Um and food and beverage partners in general um uh contributed approximately 235,000 in equipment from freezers, refrigerators, the Pepsi um refrigerators that you see at our building, all of the um the grab and go locations and the structure for the grab and goes, but I got about a quarter million dollars of contributions that didn't cost us or the city anything that was by our vendor partners.

Uh giving back to the community, it's it's really the underlying goal of this building, in my opinion.

This is a this is a community get.

We we provide this not to go earn millions, we do it to provide um entertainment and uh a resource for our community members to enjoy it.

Um we like to find different ways to do that as well, and one way we do that is with the um partnering with uh certain nonprofits.

Um the Imagination Bacon event, um, Heartland Way, it's Heartland Way's um one of their largest events of the year.

Um, and it's basically supporting child literacy through the Dolly Parton um, I can't remember the anyhow, the Dolly Parton program to where every child I'm I'm at hold on one second.

Imagination library.

Um so we support that, and it's a great event.

Karen Rathkey, which most of you probably know is such a great supporter.

Um it's hard to tell that woman no, too, by the way.

If you know Karen, no is not a word that she likes to hear very often.

Um, but we're really happy to partner with her, and we will do that again this year.

Um area that you may not know that you're contributing to is um there's a program called Vet TICS, it's for veterans.

So when we have a an opportunity to provide comp complimentary tickets, we can provide a certain number of tickets to veteran to veterans to actually come to the event so they don't have to pay for the events.

Um we gave out roughly $30,000 in those tickets over the course of last of 2025.

Um and just a quick quote from um a U.S.

Army veteran, Gene is his name.

Thank you to VenueWorks for helping make this event possible.

My wife and I had a great time.

It's a simple little comment, but I think that um as you'll see some of those, it just it shows that these sort of things matter.

Um I'm not gonna dig into this, but um, the headlines right there on the left side.

We had an outstanding amount of um, I'll call it the free advertising.

This is all the PR for any kind of announcement we made, any kind of discussion we had here in this room, um, any kind of discussion that we had in the public limelight, talking about what we're doing, what we're not doing, what we want to do.

Um, the amount of headlines that we were able to capture was uh almost unprecedented, but it it shows the hunger that people have to see some good things come into the Heartland Event Center.

These numbers are important to take a look at.

Um Jack, who um obviously has a strong marketing background.

Um we have email subscribers, and these are opt-in email subscribers of 105,000 in change.

We distribute almost a million um emails annually to get the information out to our people about the events we're doing and the things that we're doing.

And the astonishing part is a 35% open rate.

Um we all get junk email and typically go I go delete, delete, delete.

People are opening the emails that we send out.

And I'm gonna do a little quick call out to Spencer Schubert, who helps us with a lot of this.

Spencer and Cayley often combine to get these letters out, these emails out to let people know about it.

Spencer has been a resource that Pat and you have allowed us to use at the events center to support some of our marketing efforts.

Spencer's done a great job for us, and he hasn't charged us a dime.

I'm gonna jump over here to the 33 million in marketing spend.

We didn't spend 33 million of our money or your money, but when we work with promoters, some of that would be ours when we're promoting an internal show like Shopping's Gate and those kind of things.

But most of that would be a promoter that comes in and wants us to advertise the program for them.

So we build uh marketing relationships with the media.

Um we have a good relationship with GI Family Radio to where we have some cash trade and some uh some cash um support and also some trade support.

So when I buy a marketing package from GI Family Radio, um my promoter will actually get $10,000 worth of value for their $5,000 in cash spend because of the trade agreement that we've made with Alan Usher and his team over at GI Family Radio.

That's another element that's helped us ingratiate ourselves with the promoters because they can turn their five grand into 10 grand in promotional dollars.

I do want to hit this too.

Followers, this is all on Facebook.

Um we have 17,000 followers on Facebook.

That's a 16.8% increase from the day that we took over.

Um we've had a total of 5.6 million views, and this number, once again, this is something Mark or that uh that Jack can really understand or can appreciate.

Um we've had just shy of 400,000 engagements.

That's a 320% increase over what we've done before we took over the building.

And an engagement is literally somebody clicked on it, either a like, a share, um, some sort of celebration, a comment.

So it literally is them actually seeing the page and making some sort of reaction to that page.

Demographics.

I'm not gonna hit a lot of these.

I think I think one thing that's really interesting, and men, um, I was married for 31 years.

Um we know this.

My wife made the decisions.

The women make the decisions, they make the buy-in decision.

60 per 66 percent of the people making purchasing decisions and activity on our website are coming from women in our market.

Um, I do want to highlight this right here: the income range.

Um, you'll see this is basically who is buying the tickets in our our venue.

Um that 125,000 uh household income is our highest demographic of who's buying our product.

That's a real opportunity for us to find some other sort of events that can target those other people that uh the other uh demographics that don't make quite as much money and bring home quite as much money.

We're not hitting that market for some reason.

So I have to do a better job of finding some events that have a lower price tag that can get everybody into the community.

And I and I think that includes the the Latino market.

On the right side there for website traffic, I am not going to bore you with all these numbers.

I will let you look into them as you like.

Um, but one thing I think that's really interesting was when we get a good show like a Lindsey Sterling, um, you can see the number of engagements.

Um, coming to the Heartland Event Center just in general is about 21,000 um sessions to where they're just coming to browse the Heartland Event Center website.

Everything underneath that is they came specifically to look at Lindsay Sterling or to Lone Star.

So it kind of shows you what items are of most interest of all the items or all the events that we brought into the building over the course of the last year.

One thing that I think is really interesting is um uh I love that ticket office is fourth on that list, which means they're looking at things and they immediately go to the ticket office to buy something.

Um Cornhusker Chaos, a new event that we put in is five on that list, just after um the Dos Amigos tour that's coming up.

These are some pretty strong numbers for what we're doing.

Um sales by location.

It has been we have 55,000 people in Grand Island, which means we have to get 10 percent of the population to fill the house.

That's not real likely consistently.

So we have to reach into Carney.

We have to reach into Hastings.

This is an actual heat map here on the left that shows where our tickets are being purchased.

And you can see we've done a pretty good job of catching capturing Hastings, and we've done a pretty good job of capturing parts of Kearney.

We still have some work to do there.

Um, and you can see there's some other areas that start to feed in, but we're doing a good job of actually reaching outside of just our own dark demographic and bringing in some outside dollars.

And of course, we have sponsors, and we can't do without sponsors.

Um it's uh it's critical, and you you know some of those obviously on this list.

Other good partners for us.

They they share um they share revenues, they share ideas, they share um campuses and so on, but uh we can't do without our partners.

And that will conclude the presentation on the annual report.

Thank you, and thank you for bringing your team for us to meet.

Council is there a motion regarding resolution 2026-58.

Mr.

Hawsey.

Thank you, Mayor.

I move the resolution 2026-58 for approval.

Thank you, Mr.

O'Neill.

I second the motion.

And discussion, Mr.

Sheard.

Thank you.

Uh thanks for giving us the report.

Uh I will add my kudos to uh some of the shows.

The Lindsay Sterling show.

Uh, I always kind of gauge the people around me and think, you know, I want to know what they think.

And that show was full of happy people, and we were in the back.

Uh I mean, it was just stunning, and everybody I talked to that went to that show had a great experience.

Didn't just like the show, had a great experience.

And then this weekend was phenomenal.

Uh I my wife and I went and we wanted to stop by the casino.

We thought, uh, we'll go to the casino.

You couldn't get in the casino with all the people going to volleyball.

Literally, you couldn't sit anywhere in the casino.

So we just walked on through, and all the fawner people seemed to be leaving Fawner and getting in line.

It was it was a great day for Fawner Park as a facility, and a great day for Grand Island to have uh such phenomenal event and a great turnout.

I heard that that was the highest attended game in their league history.

Um by two thousand patrons.

Um and this is when we talk about um well, the lead for love volleyball actually told me she was talking to the the GM in um Atlanta, Georgia.

So we're talking Atlanta, and she told that person that we had 5,200 some odd tickets sold, and the the GM in Atlanta said you had how many?

And they have it roughly about 2800 is what they do on average.

Nobody's touched the 5,000 mark.

We absolutely blew it out, and we are the number one selling market for all of Love B.

That's Grand Island, you what's that?

That's Grand Island, yo.

That's awesome.

Grand Island, yeah.

That's phenomenal.

Um, so uh you know, I think I've seen a difference in just the quality of shows.

I had some friends go to a Tuesday night concert uh a couple weeks ago.

Uh you know, I I've I've helped with promotion of some shows, and to get people to show up on a Tuesday night is impressive.

So I just I think what you guys are doing is it's exciting to see.

You know, I'm excited about football, maybe hockey down the line.

Um, but just impressed with what we've seen so far.

Uh so just thank you and your whole team.

Get some sleep.

HR, what are you doing letting them only get 45 minutes of sleep?

I am a terrible.

Well, don't do that.

So thank you guys.

Thanks, Jack.

I'm gonna add one more thing to the Tuesday night concert because this is another demographic we're trying to get into.

Um that's probably the first 20-something event that we've had.

The people that walked in that were fighting to get to that front of the stage were all that 18 to 28-year-old range, and and Ian Munzick is not somebody that's I'm real familiar with until I started booking him.

But it was like an Elvis party up front.

It was all he the ladies love him, and these young 20-somethings were up there and just packed around this arena, and it was probably one of the loudest concerts we've ever had.

So he's a great show.

Um, I hope to bring him back.

I think he's one of these on his way going this are way.

Um, that I think we'll see some really good things out of him.

So um, that was a nice little demo ad.

My friends are in their 40s and they were there.

So well done.

Thank you.

Mr.

Nickerson.

Well, I would echo some of that as far as the change that I'm seeing, the excitement at the event center.

You can just tell that there's a change, that there's uh revitalization.

There's a lot of more excitement than what we've had.

I mean, that's you guys are in the business, and and that's what you've got in front of you.

I'm very impressed with your um presentation tonight with the annual report, and I think we have a lot to be proud of, and you have an awful lot to be proud of all the work you've done.

I would just say again, Carson, these bodies don't last forever.

So, and I hope you guys are getting paid salary to not buy the hour, or we're in trouble.

So, there you go.

Uh I'm impressed with the analytics that you have, and I know that's what helps us run a business better.

And I I look at the things like the 35,000 room nights.

That's an important number to remember because we're gonna have another topic coming up here probably in a few weeks.

That we're gonna be questioning how many people are we getting in rooms at night.

This is a pretty big number.

I don't know what that equates to financially, but that's a pretty impressive number for me to see 35,000 room nights.

I look at the statements made that it's the hot venue right now.

These are these are real statements that mean something, and I think that's very important for the success of an organization.

Having said all that, the annual report is one part of this presentation, but the real thing that we're talking about is an is a funding request, and we've just kind of skipping over that.

I don't want to skip over that because you are requesting 145,000 to help make up a deficit that we that you've experienced.

And so I just want to touch briefly on that.

I think we laid out you laid out things well in the financial side.

And one of the things that I noticed, and and you're very well aware of is that the naming rights, you really weren't able to get anything done on naming rights during this year, and that was about 82,000 you were hoping for, which is about 57% of your shortfall.

What do you feel about that going forward?

Do you see any excitement there?

People wanting to jump on board, or what do you what do you feel about that?

I do.

Um, and one thing about naming rights that's really critical is a naming right partner won't sponsor a an empty building or a building that doesn't have activity, so it's almost the chicken and the egg.

You have to have the events to get the interest to get the naming rights.

Um, so I think doing some of that has really helped us.

Um, and uh we just recently, and really time related, have just recently started to focus on that.

And uh it is with great pride um that I get to tell you tonight, and in light of that, um we have agreed to a 15-year deal worth 2.1 million dollars with big iron auctions and realty.

And I believe Mark Stock.

Mark is here, Mark.

Would you mind coming up for just a moment?

Do you mind talking?

Mark Stock, the owner and co-founder of Big Iron Auctions and Realty.

We just we just recently signed a deal or agreed to a deal.

We haven't formed it up with the paper with Big Iron to change the name from Heartland Event Center to the Big Iron Auctions Event Center.

So, Mark Stock.

Yeah, so to answer your question, yes, we come very good.

Um thank you.

Um here's what I learned in my history of being in business.

Uh you're only as successful as your team, and your team is only as successful as your leader.

That's a hell of a good guy right here.

Okay, so he's got more things going on in that building than I've seen in the last 20 years.

So uh I think you've got a good, a real good guy to lead this thing forward.

His enthusiasm is one of the reasons why we took a serious look at this opportunity.

We're a Nebraska-based business, and uh, of course, we've got a national footprint now.

And uh to have uh the big iron name on that building uh is just our way of giving back to this community that's seated in not only uh the businesses here in Grand Island, but because of the affiliation with the Nebraska State Fair and the farmers and ranchers all across this great state, we're excited about the Big Iron Event Center.

I I'm I'm thrilled.

These are wonderful people.

I've had a chance to meet them the last couple weeks.

I was my wife is uh just a little younger than I am, and she was in the front row of that Ian concert.

Just so you know.

Uh I sat back and I went, Oh my gosh.

But um uh and having that uh parking lot so full this past weekend with that volleyball game.

I was the nice guy, dropped my wife out the front door, and I walked, I think, three and a half miles to find a place to park.

But uh it was wonderful.

But I'm I'm honored to be here.

I'm excited about this new opportunity.

Uh I know it's been the Heartland Event Center for a long long time, and uh we're excited about uh the big iron name on that building for a long long time as well.

Thank you.

Very good, thank you.

So you were saying that uh anticipating 15 years, 2.1 million?

Yes.

Okay, and you were expecting about 82 five.

My math tells me that's about 140,000 a year.

So I think you were going to exceed that.

Probably sounds pretty good.

We're going to exceed it.

Not bad.

All right.

Well, congratulations on that.

The other thing that stood out in the report, and I'm not sure I can flip back and forth on my screen here without getting screwed up when it comes time to voting.

But there was something about the suites that were rented that showed a very positive variance that you were able to rent those more.

How are those rented?

Why was that such a big number?

And are they rented per event?

Are they rented for long term?

Or because that was a pretty impressive number that I saw there.

That didn't show the whole picture.

We've we've increased suite revenue roughly 85 to 90 percent, almost double the suite revenue.

Um, and what we've done is we upped the price, which was not received well by suite owners to start with.

Um, they certainly thought it was a it was a difficult price increase, and we had one or two that decided not to renew, but they're done annually.

Um the difference was we decided that um we would up their suite price, but along with that, tickets were included with all the the shows that we have.

So all the tickets are included.

The reason that's valuable to us from an entertainment perspective is people forget sometimes the entertainers are they're just like us, they're people.

So when they walk out on the stage and they see the dark suite, you know, half the suites are dark and the chains down, and a crowd that's not into it, that affects them too.

They the show kind of goes down, they're just kind of ready for it to be over, they don't feel like the crowd's into it.

So part of the incentive for us to give those tickets along with the suite uh lease, is so we have those suites full.

And what happens is the owner will either use those suite tickets if they don't want sweet tickets, then they hand them to employees.

If employees don't want them, they hand them to vendors.

So those suites are active for every event, no matter what that event is, and it changes the dynamic of our building and just makes it a more fun place.

And we all have to remind ourselves sometimes by the time that the event starts, we're tired, we're already worn out.

But you got to go click and turn on the smile, and they're there to have fun.

We can't we're not supposed to be a hindrance to that.

We're supposed to be helping them have fun.

So and I'm gonna call out Kaylee on that one too.

One of our best at doing that, I have seen her literally pulling her hair out, once again creating 186 seats from nothing to where she can be stressed and just going half nuts in her own mind, and all of a sudden the customer walks up and goes, click, and she looks like she's just as smooth and yes, I'll take care of you, no problem at all.

Come with me.

And uh, she's great at it.

So this team makes this thing work, and um, I can't give them enough credit for this.

Out of curiosity for the suites, and I've actually enjoyed some of those suites over years past with companies I worked for that that rented those, and it was very nice to be part of that.

When you factor in the cost of the tickets versus what you're renting the suites for, is there a net there to where it's still positive?

Or you end up losing a little money because you're throwing tickets along with the suite.

Just just wondering how the net effect is.

There's almost there might be a five percent reduction in um income because and the only reduction comes in that those 12 suite members might have otherwise bought a ticket.

But the odds are good that they wouldn't have bought a ticket or not bought all 12, they might have bought four or six and then used the suite.

Um, but I've made arrangements with our promoters, and once again, this is part of that creating a good relationship with the promoters.

The promoters give us those tickets for those suites at no cost.

Um, there are occasionally a promoter that will require some payment for those, but so far we've not encountered that at all.

So those tickets that I give to our clients, they have a value, but it's not a cost to the city or to venue work.

So it's a it's a it's a I'd call it a 98% um improvement without any cost to us at all.

Okay, so then for the rest of us whose memories are short and you have so many things going on out there, and so many things on the sideline ready to come in.

Let's talk a little bit about football.

Kind of remind us again, the audience and those of us here, where's the football play into this whole thing now?

But the football team is um, and everybody knows the Nebraska siege.

Their first game will be May 30th.

Um there will be four team four games, four official league games, most likely two preseason games that we're working on right now, which the preseason in arena football, they're just as exciting as the real games.

Um they will be like adding two additional games.

If they do well, we'll have some postseason opportunities.

Um with all the craziness going on, you you know you're right, and they it's almost been overlooked.

We just landed a tenant football team in our building again.

Um so uh it's outstanding.

So I think that's it's something we haven't even really put our radar on.

We've just been focused on today's work today.

Um more really important element with that football team is it runs um May through July.

Well, in arenas, most concerts want to play outside venues during spring and summer.

This gives us a little bit of spring and summer uh what might have otherwise been a dark building.

We now have events going on in the building, which once again helps our sponsors.

It helps our sponsors want to spend money on those times that are typically dark.

It also helps promoters realize oh, you've got stuff going on, so that continuity of keeping events in the building, it reinforces with promoters that no, we can do this even all spring and summer.

So we've got a lot of work to do in spring and summer, but they sure short up some of those dates that would have otherwise been dark.

And the one that we're not a hundred percent sure of there's potential hockey somewhere down the road if if ever all the stars align just right, and so that's still kind of hanging out there as a possibility.

I uh I was talking to Tom just today, and he said, How's hockey going?

Is that still kind of on the books?

And I showed him my phone, and literally um I get a call weekly um from the FPHL saying, Do you have ice yet?

Um they're absolutely continuing to push to bring that in.

That would be a massive um quarter million plus in revenue stream just on rentals for that.

Um we uh it looks like um some of our other buildings are um adding the FPHL to their um locations as well.

And I I would say it, but I don't want to really bring up in case there's a secret issue to that.

But um the FPHL is has signed again in Topeka, and they are averaging there in Topeka anywhere from 3500, I think their max.

I think they reached 10,000 tickets sold in Topeka for this exact same league.

Um so they're averaging you know three to five thousand tickets per patrons per game.

When I was in Topeka before, it was usually about twelve hundred to fifteen hundred for that developmental league, that high school league that they're trying to get into D1.

It was less than two thousand.

This is a pro league, it's a prospect league, a pro prospect league, and they're bringing in three to five thousand every game.

So imagine what we did with Love volleyball four times, just at the minimum, four times this spring and summer.

It's a big impact.

Well, it's definitely a happening place, and again, congratulations to all of you that are make this make this happen, made it a success, and it's going to just continue to just continue to grow.

It just you can just tell it.

So thank you again for all that you guys are doing.

And as to for the request for 145,000, I think it's been part of that learning curve and all the things that have gone through it.

It's money that I think is fair to make sure that you can keep yourself in operation, and I support that.

Mr.

O'Neill.

I've been spending a lot of time kind of asking a lot of questions over there the last couple months, and I've been at several events as well.

Um it seems like you guys have really picked up a lot of momentum this year.

Uh I'm seeing more things than I have ever seen in the last 20 years of stuff going on over there.

I've been very impressed.

Uh I checked out the demo derby.

I had a kid play at Heartland Hoops.

I was there at the volleyball game.

All think we're very well run.

Um, I think sometimes there's some misconceptions that people that go to these events don't stay in hotel rooms.

Uh, from what I could tell, especially like the demo dermy, there are a lot of people from out of town in Grand Island and going up and down South Locust, it looked like hotels are very full, all the restaurants out there are extremely busy.

And uh last volleyball game, I was downtown before the game and after the game, it was completely packed, way more than normal.

And uh you can definitely feel the the local economic impact when these events happen.

Uh very impressive.

And I'm I'm curious to see some of the future numbers you guys get out of that as well when when you have them ready.

Um just a couple of things too.

I know you guys work very hard.

I've seen a lot of transitions when we did like the when you had the demo derby there, there's all that dirt hauled in there that looked like a ton of work, and then you know, a week or two later, you have a basketball court out there, and then a volleyball court, and then you have dirt again for a rodeo or whatever.

So it's really I know you guys are putting a ton of work out there.

I definitely see and notice it.

Um, just one other question I have too.

So, this event center, you know, I I I appreciate the demographic info you have here.

I'm not exactly sure how you get those numbers.

Um, and you know, this is event center for the whole community.

Are there other demographic groups you guys are still trying to hopefully break into in the future as well?

Or do you have any comments on that?

Or absolutely.

Um it's you know, I'm from Texas, so it's a demographic that's uh um it's just a normal part of life for me, but the Latino market is so strong here in in Grand Island, and if you think about it, our building has no Spanish signage anywhere.

We don't have a Spanish concession stand, so it's part of our initiative to to have one line that is all Spanish speaking, and maybe one of our grab and goes being Spanish speaking, at least um bilingual, but catering to them putting the menu in Spanish.

And right now, I don't think that that community necessarily feels like this is their building, and that's that's a shame.

Um, it needs to be.

This is our entire community's building.

And uh, we did see this.

One great thing about rodeo is rodeo does bring out that demographic, and I would say 30 to 40 percent of the people that were at Rodeo Grand Island were of Latino background.

Um, and the great thing about the Latino uh demographic typically they don't show up just with me and a buddy, they show up with the wife, the kids, grandma, everybody shows up, but they go, they go together.

Um, but we have to provide the place and the the uh entertainment for them to want to come out.

And uh I'm working with some um Latino promoters right now to try to get some uh events in, and I had some planned for this year, but with all of the ICE issues that have come up, um several of them backed out.

Um so it kind of got put on hold for 2025.

I expect for 2026 and 27 to be a major focus to add to our building.

I appreciate all you guys are doing out there and looking forward to seeing what other shows you bring to town.

So thank you.

Mike, can you vote?

Motion adopted.

Thank you, everybody.

I want to thank and congratulate venue works for its success.

I also want to congratulate the city council's policy decisions, which have resulted in a revitalization and renewal of the Heartland Event Center.

The City Council has shown wise leadership, which laid the groundwork for tonight's excellent report.

We will now proceed with our consent agenda.

Is there a motion to approve the consent agenda with the exception of six C.

Mr.

O'Neill?

I move to approve the consent agenda items A through B and D through J.

Mr.

Stelk.

I second the motion.

Any discussion?

Please vote.

Motion adopted now take up six C approving payment of claims for the period of February 25, 2026 through March 10, 2026, in the total amount of 3,959,898 and 62 cents.

Mr.

Hawsey.

Thank you, Mayor.

Uh I would like to amend that motion by removing a claim from on page 13 from the Central Nebraska Humane Society for kenneling per diem of 7,903 28 and move to approve 3,9515.34 cents.

Mr.

Sheard, are you going to second that amendment?

I am.

I'll second that.

Any discussion.

Uh Mr.

Hawsey.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um the reason I had pulled the the kenneling uh per diem payment is we went with a new contract with the Central Nebraska Humane Society about six months ago, and it had a per diem request that and the bills come in every monthly, every month.

I went through the first six months.

I kind of let six months get built up because when we approved this August 1st, it didn't get approved by the Humane Society until September 29th.

So it took a couple of months to get it approved.

Um but I did review it, and a number of things came up as concerns about the billing system or the payments that were making to them.

And so I sent an email off to the city administration uh detailing my concerns.

And one of the first concerns was just some of the year-to-date numbers weren't right, you know, and so I'm kind of a numbers guy, so I noticed it just initially there.

So then I was curious, and every time I look at something, and I I'll look a little bit deeper if one number isn't right.

I went through and looked at the six months for the data, and I and what I noticed was uh we were paying the thing provides for uh 45 dollars per night up to three nights for a domestic animal, and we were paying for a birds and chickens and a snake, and and those kind of things got my attention.

So I'm you know, most of them are dogs and cats.

Um, but I did see the other things, and so I'm not sure how much a 45 dollar a night fee for a snake, you know.

I I'm not sure what the fairness is.

So that was why I asked the question.

The bigger part of my question on what are we paying them is the animals that are handed off to the humane society.

I went back and I looked at the contract, and the contract under uh Article 3 uh section B says the city will make a per animal placement payment as set forth in the detail for animals placed by the city, but not reclaimed within three full business days.

So under Article 3, it talks about that.

And then in Article 5, which is the payment part, it also says, you know, we're getting priority placement for up to 2200 animals per year, but it also says the 45 dollars the city will make a per animal payment and the amount of 45 dollars per day placed by the city at the shelter.

So I've been on the city council a long time, and there's a distinct difference between the Humane Society and their function and role in animal control.

And the animal control is a city responsibility under Stenton Nebraska statute.

It falls under the police department.

So if you have a wild animal running around Grand Island, you're going to get a call into the police department.

And so the city's responsibility is for the animal control piece.

So when I went back through and I said, okay, so we we placed, we got billed in the first six months, 702, maybe 703 animals in the first six months.

But what I did notice most of all is that half of those or rough about half of them are public drop-off.

These weren't the ones dropped off by an ACO or a CSO or a police officer.

These were public drop-offs.

And so that my question to the staff in my email a week ago is the city of Grand Island responsible for a public drop-off.

I mean, that's a essential function of the humane society and not animal control.

So I went back and I looked at some of those things.

So that's kind of like my question is out there.

I don't want to pay them wrongly, but I do think we need to pay them fairly, and we need them to be in our community.

So that's part of my question question.

I also noticed that one of the animals was we paid them for 23 nights for one animal.

That's a thousand over a thousand dollars.

And so I did find in the contract that if you appeal something that you can hold them up for the length of this appeal process.

And so I think maybe the 23 days was correct.

But the problem that I had is that the animal owner didn't take the animal at the end of the 23 days.

The taxpayers had paid out over a thousand dollars to house that animal for 23 days, and then the owner didn't pick them up at the end.

So I I did see a 23-day issue out there.

I saw a 10, I saw some six night payments for one animal for, you know.

So there was enough questions.

I think we had 19 animals that were in there for two times, and I also saw some that were there for three different times in the six months, the same animal.

You know, and so there was enough questions that I don't want to continue paying the wrong bill until we've had an opportunity to go over what is the right amount to pay.

And I want to make sure that everybody understands the difference between the the role of the humane society and the role of the police department and the city of Grand Island in animal control, because there is a difference, and the the city doesn't run the humane society, so that's why I pulled it from the agenda.

Or are you seeking a further study and clarification?

Correct.

Mr.

Nickerson for this information just to come before the council.

I find it pretty difficult.

And right now, the way we have it said, I don't know how you say no, because it's not an amendment, I don't think.

I don't think she has this as an amendment, does she?

This is just saying I'm modifying the current, I'm modifying the current payment of claims.

It's not it's not amendment.

It is actually so we're really going to be voting for an amendment here, the first thing.

Yeah.

Because that's not what I understood him to say.

Okay.

But he made a motion to amend.

Nobody made a motion to approve.

So it was an amendment.

I didn't catch that part.

I thought he just wanted to modify the payment.

Well, I know he made a motion to that as an amendment.

Right.

That's do you want to do a motion to amend?

That's how I did it.

To pay the 3,951, 995 34.

Right.

I made a motion to approve the 3,951,995 34, which includes everything in our packet but that one line, but that one claim.

I don't know the technical side of the because to me it seems like an amendment you'd be amending.

We didn't ask for that.

I didn't hear that.

So what I see before us is you're basically tying the whole payment of claims included in this, and if we vote no on this, we vote no on the whole payment of claims.

That's that's what it appears to me.

I just need clarification.

And then I'll tell you why.

I feel the way I do.

So I just need to know from Jill's standpoint is this an amendment, or we is this the payment of claims bundled together with the modified amount?

I have it as an amendment to approve the payment of claims, subtracting the 7,009 three and the amount of 3,951,995.

Okay.

So if it's an amendment, I want to deal with the amendment.

And don't discount or not believe anything that was shared.

I just think for us to all of a sudden make a $4,000 adjustment or whatever it's going to be here.

I don't even know what how much it's going to be different.

From a humane society that's expecting those funds without knowing why we would be holding them back.

I would rather see I would rather see us pay it and reduce it later than I would to just suddenly say we're not going to pay it, unless there's a way we can still make that up.

And I suppose we can do that either way.

Without just saying no, we're not going to pay it right now.

I'm open for anybody's.

I'd like to include that there is a $25,000 claim in there, which is part of the facility, which is in there and is being approved.

So there's no question on the $25,000 a month or $300,000 a year that the city pays them per the contract, just so we have priority placement for the for the on the average of six animals a day that we bring there.

So we pay them $300,000 a year to have priority placement for approximately six animals a day.

That's $2200 divided by $365.

That is in there.

There's no question on that payment.

It's just the animal portion.

And my hopes was when I and I sent the email a week over a week ago to city staff so that we can begin to have this conversation until we have the conversation.

So I just want to stop it and we can fix it as soon as we can have this conversation.

I'm assuming that Patrick Brown was part of that discussion, so I would just ask him when there's a dispute, or maybe even the attorney, when there's dispute in amount, what's the proper channel to address that when we're talking about payment of claims?

So in this case, um PD actually hand handles all of the um receipts, and so it's matching up what uh humane society sends to the police department because in the sheets that we have, there's actually um numbers that are generated from our spillment system tied to an animal.

So it's going back and reviewing that and making sure that are these legitimate charges.

If we approve it, the amendment as is, then this review process will take place with the engagement of the Humane Society to confirm those funds then, correct?

The charges?

That is correct.

Okay.

So we uh we have a way to get them to the table and let's take a look at the 7900 to confirm.

Okay.

And I'm okay with that.

Just so there's a mechanism here that we just don't say no, we're just not gonna pay it, because I don't think we should.

Um I'm okay with that.

I can support the amendment now that I understand that it is an amendment.

Mr.

Shear.

Thank you.

I guess I have a question on this as well.

Um Chuck brings up some things that I guess I didn't ever catch.

What is the next step to talk with them about not I want to take what Chuck's saying, you know.

I appreciate him looking into it, but I want to have the conversation to know how we avoid having this happen next month and the month after to make sure I like Mitch said, I uh if they're expecting this $7,93.28 cents this time, they're probably gonna expect it next time.

How do we have the conversation or what's the mechanism to look into what Chuck's talking about and make sure that doesn't happen again?

Or explain why it did happen.

I don't know the answer to that last question.

So here's in Chuck's email and what I found out.

We have four different sets of eyes on this invoice.

Okay.

So it goes to P D.

I believe it goes to Cindy Wampple.

She looks at it.

She does some stuff.

It goes to uh Jason Wood, I believe, in uh code enforcement, and to double check are these the animals that they actually didn't bring in doing that review, and then once it goes, it comes to city hall, and is uh uh we've also instituted it now before it comes to city hall that legal actually reviews uh the invoice to make sure is this to the contract, and then thirdly, we have an accounts payable person looking at it as well, or fourthly.

So this is the process we're gonna go through.

It just we just need to be a little bit more detailed and making sure that we're following the contract.

I will tell you at the beginning of the contract, it it was very hectic and and we missed stuff, and so it's an ongoing process.

Uh it's open dialogue.

I think the dialogue's good from the police department to humane society.

So I don't foresee any issues going forward, but there will be more attention put to it.

Thank you.

I uh you know, I know when we did this contract, we spent time talking about three nights.

Is that three nights?

Is that they come in at noon?

And I mean we we spent time on that.

And to have you know what Chuck's talking about, some of them go longer and what does that look like?

So I you know I don't want to dismiss that much money continually.

So is there something we need to be brought to the table on, or do you think it's gonna be handled through your checks and balances that you're instituting?

It'll be handled through our checks and balances.

There's no doubt about it.

Okay.

Could we get some sort of report out next month on what happened with this?

I guess we need to come back and pay that 79 if it was actually supposed to be paid.

Will there be an update to us?

We could do a reconciliation on that particular invoice to make sure and match it up and see you know, is this right or is this wrong?

So, yes, we can do that.

Is there's a chance that some of what is on there is actually legit and some of it might not be absolutely so we want to make sure they're not getting cut and anything in the contract, but as Chuck said, paying more is probably not what we want as well.

So totally agree.

All right, appreciate all the extra work and investigation on that.

Mrs.

Fisk.

Mayor Sid's vote in if the council were to vote to approve this amended claim, it would functionally serve as a denial of that claim when that claim is brought, assuming that claim is brought back at the next meeting, too.

That would also be an opportunity to readdress that uh claim approval process either as part of next month's large schedule of claims, or it could be brought back at council's request as a separate claim for approval unbundled from the main claims list if that's easier for you to address separately.

Mr.

O'Neill.

So just to simplify this a little bit easier, Pat.

So realistically, you could probably go through and determine everything between now the next meeting and whatever we owe them, could just be approved at the next meeting.

Absolutely.

That that's the plan.

Yeah, just saying I think it should be that simple.

There'd be nothing else to do, and we just catch up in two weeks.

Okay.

Okay, so this will be a vote on the amendment for a total of three million nine fifty-one nine ninety-five thirty-four.

Please vote.

Doug, can you vote?

Motion adopted the public hearings.

Public hearing request from Third Street Trees LLC, doing business as third street trees 305 North Broadwell Avenue for a Class D liquor license.

Mayor, on a point of order, I think we just voted on the amendment.

We have to actually go and vote and approve the rest of claims.

I'm sorry.

And I'll let you do that.

Do you have them?

We need a motion.

We need a motion.

Mr.

Sheard.

Thank you.

I will move to approve item six C as amended.

And Mr.

Brown.

Second that motion.

Discussion.

Please vote.

Motion adopted.

So now we'll take up 7A, the request from Third Street Trees, LLC.

An application for a Class D liquor license was filed with the Lurker Control Commission and received by the city on February 4th, 2026.

A notice to the general public of date, time and place of hearing was published on February 28th, 2026.

A notice to the applicant of date, time and place of hearing was mailed on February 4th, 2026, along with Chapter 4 City Code Alcoholic Beverages.

Departmental Reports were received as required by City Code, and the recommendation is to deny this application per the recommendation of the police department in the Nebraska State Patrol.

Public hearing is now open.

Would you like to speak?

Could you speak your name?

Tell us your name.

My name is Melissa Field Grove, and I am the owner of Third Street Trees.

My store serves the community as a convenience style smoke shop.

I understand that holding a liquor license is a privilege, not a right, and I take that responsibility very seriously.

I'm committed to strict compliance with Nebraska Tobacco Laws, careful ID verification, and responsible tobacco sales.

My goal is to operate a business that serves the community with alcohol sales responsibly, according to the Nebraska state laws, and I respectively ask for your support in my application.

Thank you.

Is there anyone else that would like to speak on this item?

If not, public hearing is now closed.

Council, is there a motion on resolution 2026-56?

Mr.

Hawsey.

Thank you, Mayor.

I um make a motion to deny under resolution 2026-56.

And Mr.

Lanfear.

I'll second.

Discussion.

Please vote.

This is on to deny.

Jason and Mark, we need your votes.

Motion is denied.

Mr.

Schmitz.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

In 2007, when this was originally platted, the intent was to run the electrical on the back side of the lot.

Then it ended up running it on the front side of the lot.

So this is to get an easement to cover that, which was left off earlier.

So this is a five-foot easement on the front side.

Thank you.

Public hearing is now open.

Is there anyone that would like to speak on this item?

If not, public hearing is now closed.

Mr.

O'Neill.

I move we approve 2026-57.

And Mr.

Sheared.

Thank you.

I'll second.

Any discussion.

Please vote.

Motion adopted.

8A.

Consideration of referring a blight and substandard study for proposed CRA Area 42 to the Hall County Regional Planning Commission.

Mr.

Navity.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

Before you this evening, you have Blight, you have a Blight and Substandard Study for Area 42 in Grand Island.

This is for about 17 acres located in Northeast Grand Island, just to the east of St.

Paul Road and south of the outfall ditch, south of Capitol Avenue.

It's if you look at the picture, this is Fred Hoppe's development, the Orchard Subdivision.

This is Habitats Development that they did a number of years ago.

The property, the study has come forward from Marvin Planning Associates, and the Habitat for Humanity was the applicant for this.

They had the study done.

They are looking at purchasing this property that is currently owned by Bill Ziller, Bill and Julie Ziller.

Zeller, excuse me.

Um, and looking at doing another subdivision for Habitat for Humanity at this location.

Um if this is approved, they would move forward with that, and they will come forward with an application for tax increment financing.

I think it's safe to say that of all of the affordable housing that is built in Grand Island, Habitat probably builds the most certainly those that are the most affordable.

Um that doesn't mean that the cost to put in sewer water and streets is any less for them than it is for anybody else.

Um and this is a this is a stretch goal on their part.

Um the study does indicate that it could be declared blighted and substandard tonight.

You are just being asked to send this to planning commission for their review and recommendation.

If you do that, it will go to them on April 1st and it will come back to you on May 12th.

Lindsay Jergens, did you want to speak on this item?

Uh good evening, everybody.

Uh Zach Butts.

Um, I am sort of pitch hitting for Keith Marvin tonight.

Keith usually comes and talks about his blight studies.

He was unavailable, unfortunately.

And since I've had the uh pleasure of working with and for habitat uh in the past and currently, they asked if I could uh just jump in and give a give a brief talk since I've been in front of you on these things before a time or two.

So when we're dealing with blighted and substandard areas, we have the lawyers definition of that, and we also have the non-lawyers definition of that.

And sometimes how the lawyers view uh a blighted area and how non-lawyers view a blighted area aren't necessarily the same thing, sometimes they are, and this is one where uh any definition of the word pretty much is going to apply here.

Uh I'm not gonna just regurgitate Keith's study for you, but in reviewing it and in in preparation of tonight here, uh pretty much any legal box that we need to tick to show that something meets the standard of being blighted is there.

Age, condition, um sidewalks, their standing water.

This uh this really lends itself to the blighted designation and to giving habitat the chance to take a parcel of land and make it a lot better for the community, just superficially and all the good that they're gonna do with this.

I think we know their mission and how valuable it is to our community, and so tonight we're just asking you to refer it on.

There's not necessarily an analysis of the merits of this, but uh if if if you did analyze that, I would hope you'd come to the conclusion this is a worthwhile project.

We'd ask for uh your support in moving it forward and letting us come back to you on this one.

So happy to answer any questions that I can.

We've got some of the team from Habitat here tonight, and I know they'd be willing to speak with you as well.

There's anything else he'd like to discuss.

Thank you so much.

Max Luber, did you want to speak?

I'm okay for now unless the council has questions.

Okay, okay.

Anyone else from Habitat want to speak?

No.

Okay, thank you.

Mr.

Sheard.

Thank you.

I move that we approve 8A.

Mr.

Brown.

I second that motion.

And discussion, Mr.

Sheard.

Thank you.

Um Zach and Lindsay, it looks like you guys had a big crew here tonight.

Uh, thanks for sticking around through a very uh couple of long items.

Uh we appreciate you and your patience.

Uh no plans yet for what this would look like.

To are you that far?

I suspect there are.

I'm just coming up to the microphone.

I'm probably not the best person to discuss those plans to to be quite honest.

Like I said, I'm I'm just sort of filling in last minute.

So I've maybe present Lindsay's right there, yeah.

We should be deferential to Lindsay on the creative vision of this thing.

Creative Vision is a grand statement.

Hi, I'm Lindsay Jergens, and yes, we are in the purchase of working to purchase this land.

We have ambitious plans for it, which would create a lot of affordable housing in the community.

Uh without going into too much detail, we want to make a lot happen with this property that is currently um you know not being used.

Most of it is not being used at all.

So that is the goal.

Do you know how many lots roughly do?

Okay.

Are you allowed to say?

I'm not allowed to say right now, no.

All right.

Yes.

That's fair.

Sorry, it's a lot.

But it is for obviously for housing, right?

Is what you're saying.

Correct.

Yes.

Single family dwellings is what we're looking at.

Okay.

That's kind of my question.

All right.

Thank you.

And thanks for being here.

Thank you.

Please vote.

Motion adopted.

8B consideration of refer referring a blight and substandard study for proposed CRA Area 43 to the Hall County Regional Planning Commission.

Mr.

Nabity.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

And to address your question earlier, the I understand why she doesn't want to give a definitive answer.

The plans aren't done yet.

And you get that number out there, and everybody says, Well, I thought it was this.

So it you want to be somewhat circumspect.

But this next one is another blight study.

This was done by the tree folks.

Grant Calarose is here.

Grant owns the property where the storage units are at the very northwest corner of this at the corner of Highway 2 and North Road.

And has plans to put in some industrial flex buildings there.

He's going to start with one.

Right now he can do one without any real issue.

There's water available, there's plenty of land to put a septic system in, but there is no sewer.

So half a mile away at Capitol Avenue.

It's a long trek across that cornfield to get sewer there.

For ultimate development of this piece, sewer is absolutely necessary for a little bit of incremental development.

We also know that we have some issues with the um, yeah, with the um lift station that was approved with the subdivision, the northview subdivision up here, and getting sewer to this site would take care of the north view site.

So he's come in with the Blight study again.

Marvin Planning did the Blight study.

Keith was planning on being here until his car went into the shop today unexpectedly.

And so he's in David City, he wasn't able to make it and called me this afternoon and said I'm not gonna be able to be there.

Um Grant is here.

We did include the property to the south, which is undeveloped, because that's where the sewer line has to go.

It has to come through that property, and this makes it possible to potentially use TIFF to help develop that and extend that sewer line and bring it forward so that we can solve the issues here and the issues across the road.

Um again, all you're doing this evening is forwarding this to the planning commission.

If you forward it to the planning commission, it will go to their meeting April 1st and then come back on May 12th.

Grant, did you want to speak or just if they have questions?

We have any questions, I'll show them.

Okay.

Mr.

Hawsey.

Thank you, Mayor.

I move to approve item 8B.

And Mr.

Brown.

Second that motion.

Any discussion?

Mr.

Hawsey.

Thank you, Mayor.

Uh Chad, uh, as you know, the I think one of the main reasons to support this is to try to get the sewer up to the subdivision that has had trouble, and that this has been a kind of a block to getting any any support for them.

And so I I support whatever the development is here as long as we can extend the infrastructure so that the whole community is served.

Thank you.

Please vote.

Motion adopted 8C cross street banners on utility power poles.

Mr.

Schmidt's Mr.

Mayor.

Um, this was a conversation I had with Mr.

Brown and thought it would be best to get council's guidance on it as it involves also liability in regard to other things.

So the history is um actually I don't even know when it began, but the utilities started hanging a few nonprofit banners across second and third street off power poles uh in on Cedar Street, and it's expanded to where it's at 11 a year.

So in addition to the cost, there's also wind load.

They're about two feet wide, they vary 30 to 40 feet long.

Um it's really unknown what effect they have on the power poles.

Um then, as far as if a banner were to come untied or unconnected and across the car, that's a whole nother question.

So the question tonight is do we keep doing it?

We do it for free right now at no cost.

Do we do it and charge an hourly rate or do we quit doing it all together?

And that's it's just here for guidance.

So that's the topic.

I wanted to follow up on that.

This is just for a discussion item this evening.

Is that right?

Yes, yeah.

You want input from the council?

I see Mr.

Hossee would like to comment on this.

Thank you, Mayor.

And thank you, Ryan, for bringing it up.

Um, you know, I I really think the community benefit is there, and I you know, I I like to continue to support it.

I know we've had some on 2nd Street and others, and I don't necessarily know all of the ones that you put up, the 11, but I see that some of them have big holes drilled in them so that the wind hopefully blows through them as opposed to putting stress on.

But you know, if we did, I don't know if it's the same poles all the time, but we've got over 18,000 utility poles in Grand Island, and so I'm and I'm sure we're probably replacing one percent of them every year, so maybe 150 to 200.

Uh, if we did have some damage, it wouldn't significantly financially affect the utility department.

You know, so I I just I like the community benefit to having those, but I think uh are you the only one that put them up, or do you allow the nonprofits to have somebody else hang the banners?

Not at this time for cross-street banners, so not to be overlapped with the banners you see on the light poles, which are are different.

This these are just strictly we put those up.

Okay.

And the biggest risk, I guess, would be is if if you would actually lose a pole in a windstorm or something, um you would lose the feeder, which is about seven to eight hundred customers downtown area.

Now, has that happened?

No, it hasn't, but is it possible?

Yeah.

So I I I my support is for it to keep doing it just as we have been, because I like the community support that it brings and uh kind of the feel that everybody gets to use their local government for something.

Thank you.

Mr.

Nickerson.

I'm gonna take a little different approach here.

So you're not gonna get from two guys, you're gonna get totally different opinions, and so the other eight will have theirs somewhere.

I I think we're at a point, and I'm gonna tell you why I feel this way.

I think we're at a point where it's probably wise not to continue it.

And I'll and I'll tell you why I think that is when we take a look at at something like this, and it and I don't disagree that it it sends a nice message out.

Yes, it lets you know an event's coming, but I also think the amount of marketing that that generates is pretty limited by just the people that are driving by.

You know, that's that's a select few people when you look at a city of this size.

And I will say that when it comes to marketing, I get more information on this thing right here every day from Facebook.

I can tell you what's going on at railside, people will tell me what's going on, they'll tell me what's going on at the library, what's happening at the police department, and what's happening at the fire department.

And I'll guarantee you that the few hundred people or maybe a thousand that see that banner on any given day or week, it's gonna be getting a lot more information off of this thing here.

So Facebook, whatever those social media things are that do a good job of telling people what's happening, it's right here.

The reason I'm not crazy about continuing the banners, and it's gonna go for a couple of reasons.

And this is from lessons learned in the past from the council, and I'm gonna go back and I don't know how many were here back many years ago when we were giving city was actually funding nonprofits, a few nonprofit organizations.

And I don't know, Chuck, if you were there at the time, Mike.

We came to a point where we had a select number of nonprofits, and the city in the budget every year had a certain number of dollars that we were giving each one of these nonprofits.

Well, pretty soon somebody else would come up and say, Well, why don't we get some money?

Why don't you why don't you prone promote us and help support us?

And it got to a point where we had to decide how did these select few get up get selected?

And then we got into budget problems, and we had to make the decision that we shouldn't fund any of them.

And so we gradually, I think over four or five year period, and you guys can correct me if I'm wrong, we just kind of started defunding them at that 20 percent until after five years it was zero.

And we and we got got rid of that.

Because how do you pick the people who you're gonna fund?

How do we pick whose banners get to go up on these polls?

Now we've got 11 groups so far.

What's the criteria to pick those 11?

And what's gonna keep number 12 or 13 or 14 that may come along that's something that maybe we don't want, and I don't know what that will be.

But if you're allowing 11 people to do it, what keeps 12, 13, 14, 15 from coming in there?

I think we open ourselves up to some things that as a community we could may or may not end up in a situation.

The poll stress, I don't know.

I don't know how how big a deal that is.

That's your world, and I can understand that.

But to me it's more of the it's just more of who gets to be part of the club.

And I uh and I don't think it's it's right to start, because I don't know if we even have criteria.

I don't know.

I I see our city attorney shaking our head.

We don't we don't have any criteria based on who gets to put those up.

So if 11 people can, what keeps keeps number 12, 13 up to 20 to 25 from doing that?

I think it's better not to do it and count on the social media expertise that we have and the people that can get this out to thousands of people in a second multiple times a day.

And so all those events that we see are good, but I guarantee they're probably on Facebook and whatever other social things that are out there.

And I just think it makes it safer, as you've talked about on the equipment that you've got, the polls.

And I think we don't have to get into this club thing, who gets to be in the club.

I don't I don't think that's an area that we want to go down because we may get ourselves in some pretty messy situations.

We haven't yet, but we could.

And why why continue that?

I would say that if there's anybody that along the line that we did with the charitable contributions, if there's somebody that we've already committed to within a certain small period of time that says, you know, we we were going to do that, I I think we honor that.

But if there's no commitments, then I say let's just say enough is enough.

I mean, so there's two views, and we've got eight other people here, and uh I don't know where you land, but that's that's democracy for you.

That's Mr.

O'Neill.

I have a few questions.

Um so largely it started off with what what has changed, um, what what what has the increase been in asking to do this over the last few years of you truthfully?

Uh the reason this is coming is we had a a overhead superintendent for many years, and he I think did it just of the goodness of his heart would take them on.

And so as we've had a change over there, it kind of came to light that these have grown.

We don't know the history of how fast.

I I know at the current time they're at 11.

And then how much time does it take them to do this and what do you think our cost is roughly?

We it takes a crew, so a crew's four people, so two two, you got a bucket and a truck and and two four guys probably takes an hour to put it up, an hour to take it down at the end.

And the estimated price was in the memo.

So it was like I think 465 dollars if you include the vehicle charge.

Now the charges can be moved around or whatever, but yeah, that's so you got four guys, two hours each side.

And sometimes they do will come loose a little and the guys have to go readjust them.

And then I obviously whoever wants one has to produce their own banner, you're just hanging it for them so they they just have a little bit of production cost, or I don't know if they're recycling old ones a lot here or um one of the question too, so if the rate structure, if you're gonna do this, does everyone if you did charge a fee, everyone had would have to be charged consistently.

There's no other way you could say like nonprofits or profit businesses are charged differently or I think we could do whatever council prefers, honestly.

I don't know if Kerry has any.

If you were to formalize the program, I would probably recommend you uh use a side uh a system similar to our current license agreement, the one we use for the regular poll banners in which we look at some pretty concrete costs.

I know we've they've worked with the nonprofits to let them provide in-kind services like having a I believe the hometown heroes banner program, for example, used donated labor to install the signs.

So there are some creative solutions we could use under our existing uh programs to kind of.

And that's where it gets as far as allowing people to hang it themselves, being that it's a power poll that creates a little bit of a seems like a lot of liability there.

Yeah, it's a little different than the light polls.

Yeah, I kind of find it interesting to see if there's a hybrid thing, if there could be kind of a preferred rate for certain circumstances, but uh I almost can it between them, uh security is another thing.

I think that you kind of your question and and some of Mr.

Nickerson's comments hit on some of the other concerns that you probably just need to take into consideration.

Um truly it is a you need to be able to say yes to everybody in a certain group or no to everybody in a certain group.

Um special uh preferential treatment, of course, is never um likely to pass constitutional muster.

Um similarly, you have some of the restrictions on providing taxpayer funds for private benefit that have to be threaded carefully.

Um probably the biggest issue is uh the liability associated with this is not covered by our current insurance provider.

One of those banners uh we have switched insurance since the last time they've installed one, so we don't have past risk.

Um, but if one of those banners were to come down after we installed it onto a vehicle, we would have some liability that would be uninsured right now.

Um so if we formalize this program, uh passing off that insurance cost, the requirement of policies, some of the structures we have around our sign permits um would help us remove that risk for the city.

Um not cost-free for those nonprofits, of course, but um would be a factor for them to consider when they decide if it's worth that marketing boost or not there.

Um it's best practice that we're consistent all whatever we do.

Okay, Mr.

Shear.

Thank you.

I don't know how I would know that it was acts of kindness week without a banner over the top.

So uh as a marketing person, I will tell you that uh signage is not dead.

Uh there's a certain amount of people that do benefit from that.

And I I kind of like I know it sounds a little goofy, but I like the quaintness of the quaintness of having those hometown style banners uh over our downtown.

It just kind of fits in.

Uh whether it be the AOK ladies or harvest of harmony or whatever it might be.

But I do think we shouldn't have a cost that we're eating on that.

Uh to Ryan's point, nonprofits or not nonprofits.

Uh let's say it's a $500 charge and you have to sign up and have to be a nonprofit.

Is that legal?

To say you can only will only allow nonprofits.

We don't allow commercial advertising on our city polls already, so it inherently lends itself to a restriction like that.

We're already there.

You wouldn't have a uh there wouldn't be an ability for my business to put a banner up to say, hey, go you know, shop with Jack.

Uh so that that already doesn't exist.

So I think I don't know.

I'd be willing to open the conversation or see what you guys put together for a $500 fee uh just to cover our cost to to be able to keep doing it.

But I'd want to see that we figure out the insurance liability part of that as part of that plan.

So if that incurs more cost, we'd have to know that as well.

So that's Mitch, that's my two cents.

I don't know where everybody else stands, but I'll give you one more opinion.

Yeah, I'm I'm involved in the whole town hero's banners.

And uh just about 15,000 a year cost us to put them up and take them down.

Uh we pay a contractor that's certified with the city to do that.

So uh it's it's not a free thing for us.

We go raise the money and put the banners up and take them down every year.

But uh I would be all for the fee and some kind of liability, you know.

Well, we've got to charge them what it costs us to put it up, and we need you know, liability coverage in case something happens.

Mr.

Paul.

Thank you, Mayor.

This is one of these items that you're all gonna have to make up your minds on.

We have liability issues, we have cost issues, which will get expensive.

Chuck was here when it happened the last time when we started cutting out nonprofits, and so is Mitch.

They've got really good ideas with this.

So I think that everybody's gonna have to go home and get their pencil and pad out and figure out what they want to do.

Because it's gonna keep it's gonna keep snowballing.

We went from how many requests do we have now for nonprofits, Pat.

So nonprofits requesting what?

No quite miss.

How much money are we looking at to feed nonprofits?

Uh right now we we don't get any.

Um not necessarily.

Let me take that back.

I mean, we've had some requests for funds.

Um, I believe it's Bonner Park is one of them.

Hanging across the street, which is a big liability issue when you have a liability problem.

Most of the time the wind doesn't blow that hard, and we don't have power poles come down, but it it can happen.

We all need to take a real good look at this and decide how we want to word this.

And speak with the lawyer.

They uh they know how to handle this better than we do.

Thank you.

Thank you.

That was a good that we are uh Mr.

Brown, you're down for a motion, but there's no motion on this.

We're just going to try to distill the advice we received this evening and probably bring this back later.

But this was a good discussion with a lot of uh valuable insights exchanged.

Thank thank you, everybody for your input.

Appreciate it.

So we'll move on to ordinance 10A, approving changes to Chapter 15 of City Code involving electric utility commercial deposits.

This one's on me.

Well, first of all, I need to ask if there's a motion to suspend the statutory rules and Mr.

Landfair.

The statutory rules concerning ordinances.

And Mr.

O'Neill.

I second the motion.

Any discussion.

Please vote.

Motion adopted.

Sorry to interrupt Mr.

Schmitz, please proceed.

Sorry.

This one's on me.

So the presentation last time was what everybody voted on was the presentation.

What was intended with edits made from feedback from the first round.

Unfortunately, what got attached in the council uh packet, which wasn't caught by myself until this last week or last couple weeks, was that the red line version of the city code edits reflected the first reading and not the second council reading on what was presented that night.

So this reflects what everybody was presented to the second night.

And so we're just trying to bring it back through to correct the code to match what was voted on.

Okay.

House clean housekeeping matter.

Mr.

O'Neill.

I move that we approve uh 10,063.

Mr.

Hawsey.

I'll second the motion.

Any discussion.

Please vote.

Motion adopted.

And B consideration of vacation of a portion of easement in Northwest Gateway 2nd Subdivision 3019 and 3023 Colorado Avenue.

Mr.

Kurtz.

Oh, again, motion to suspend the statutory rules.

Mr.

Lanfair.

I move.

We uh suspend the statutory rules concerning ordinances.

Mr.

O'Neill.

I second the motion.

Any discussion.

Please vote.

Motion adopted.

Please proceed, Mr.

Kurtz.

Public Works received a request from the property owner here as described in your packet to vacate and access easement, which is kind of shown here as highlighted.

This was routed through all the departments.

The easements below it wouldn't be retained.

So they are only looking for vacation of the access easement at this time.

Thank you.

Mr.

Brown.

Move we approve 10,064.

And Mr.

O'Neill.

I second the motion.

Any discussion.

Please vote.

Motion adopted.

11A executive session to discuss strategy regarding purchase, sale, and contract negotiations of real estate.

Mr.

Sheard.

Thank you.

I move that we move into executive session.

Mr.

Lanfair.

Any discussion.

Please vote.

Motion adopted.

You're going into authorities tell you to go.

Hurry up and do so.

Get to safe ground.

Go as high as you can.

Do what you need to do, but don't put yourself in harm's way.

Just inches of water can sweep you away.

Once the water is gone, move carefully.

Be on the lookout for dangers you can't see.

Be on the lookout for dangers you can't see, animals, debris, and electricity.

Do not go home until you hear the all clear.

Now, when you get home, be aware.

Not everything is as safe as it may appear.

So before the clouds form, the rain pours, and water is all around.

Get prepared.

Make a plan and keep yourself dry.

Get started today.

Go to ready.gov slash prepare.