All right, I'll bring this mean of the Assembly Lands Housing and Economic Development Committee to order.

Um Ms.

Hall, will you read the land acknowledgement?

Thank you.

We would like to acknowledge that the city and borough of Juneau is on Clinkett Land and wish to honor the indigenous people of this land.

For more than 10,000 years, Alaska Native people have been and continue to be integral to the well-being of our community.

We are grateful to be in this space, a part of this community and to honor the culture, traditions, and resilience of the Klinkett people.

Thank you.

Mr.

Blydorn, will you note the role?

Yes, please.

We have uh Mr.

Kelly.

Here.

Uh Ms.

Hall.

Present.

Uh Lisa Hughes Gandhi's.

Here.

And then Chair Steininger.

Here.

We also have uh Mr, who is the um liaison for the Planning Commission.

We have Mr.

Becker, who is the liaison for the Dachs and Harbors Board, and we have Ms.

Schreimer, who is the liaison for the Parks and Rec Advisory Committee.

Thank you.

Um does anyone have any changes to the agenda?

All right.

Seeing none, I'll consider that approved.

Um, we also have before us the minutes from the January 26, 2026 meeting.

Um changes to those minutes.

All right, seeing none, I'll consider those approved as well.

Um, Mr.

Blydorn on the topic number one.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

So the first item on the agenda today is going to be vertical bridges request to amend a communications tower lease at 3,000 Fish Creek Road, which is Eagle Crest.

So currently, as of 2013, uh Vertical Bridge has leased 402 square feet for a communications tower at the base of Eagle Crest.

If you're ever up there, you'll notice it it's a monopole tower uh right next to the parking lot.

And so um, due to the high demand and the continued use for uh cellular communications, they've requested to expand this lease.

Um I had conversations with uh former Eagle Crest General Manager who was uh highly in favor of this, and he spoke with their board and they're in favor of it as well.

And so the idea is to increase the square footage, but also take this as an opportunity to extend the lease out uh to the full 35 years that's allowed by city code.

And um staff are requesting that the land's housing and economic development committee provide a motion of support to amend the lease of city property located at 3,000 Fish Creek Road.

And on page 7 is the memo, and page eight is another diagram of the location of the tower, and I'll gladly answer any questions.

All right, are there any questions from the committee?

Seeing none looking for a motion from anybody.

Uh Mr.

Kelly I move that the Lands Housing Economic Development Committee support the amending the lease of CBJ property located at 3000 Fish Creek Road and ask for unanimous consent.

Is there any objection?

Seeing none, that motion is adopted.

Uh Mr.

Blydorn.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Uh, next topic on the agenda is a proposed land trade between the CBJ and the state of Alaska.

And I'll note that we have Port Director Carl Eucatel in the audience who could be available to answer any specific questions if there are any on this topic.

So on page nine of the packet, this there's a memo that begins this section.

And so I met with the port director and the state of Alaska uh in December to discuss the opportunities that the city is looking forward to enhance the um North Douglas boat launch ramp at 13020 North Douglas Highway.

And so Dawson Harbors has initiated preliminary concepts to improve the facility, which will require additional property from the state of Alaska to make needed improvements.

And so the the boat launch ramp is a high priority for Dawson Harbors and the city, and the current configuration is largely on state property.

And so the DOT and DNR are receptive of working with the CBJ for this acquisition, and that includes tide lands.

That's why the Alaska Department of Natural Resources is involved.

And uh, but DOT requested that the CBJ consider trading property located under the Juneau Douglas Bridge in return for the area that's needed for the launch ramp.

And DOT is interested in that property because right now they have air rights.

And if something were to happen structurally or otherwise to the Juneau Douglas Bridge, if the city utilized that lot to build anything on it, it would make the reconstruction of that bridge much more complicated.

It's a property they have been interested in for a long time.

And they said that if they could acquire it from the city as a part of a land trade, they would in return grant the city an easement allowing us to continue to use it, but they just don't want a building or anything else to be put on top of it or anything use that would um previously in the city's past we had a streets warehouse there that had maybe some fuels in it, which is um more and more an issue across the United States where we have fuel storage under bridges, just doesn't make sense anymore.

So they're just looking at their long-term goals of maintaining that bridge, and they thought this would be a good opportunity to try to acquire that to secure their future needs.

The city property is about an acre at 0.96 acres and is currently vacant.

And um staff are requesting that the lands housing and economic development committee provide a motion of support for land trade with the Alaska Department of Transportation.

And I'll answer any questions.

And like I said, we have the port director in the audience if there's more specific questions about the structure or the plans for the North Douglas Boat Launch Ramp.

We also have Mr.

Becker here as part of the board as well.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Are there any questions?

Mr.

Kelly.

Thank you.

Uh what do we currently use this property for?

And what would we use the easement for if we move forward with this?

Through the chair, great question.

Uh currently the property is vacant, and it's kind of like um outside of the existing whale park area.

And I think if we were able to get an easement from DOT as part of a land trade, it could be used for um any type of activity that wouldn't build a permanent structure on it, and that could be something like um a public market style event or anything that would be non-permanent, and anything that would allow the DOT to come in and utilize the property for uh reinforcing the bridge in the future.

Any other questions?

I guess I'll chime in with one just to make sure I'm understanding the property.

It's not like that area directly underneath the bridge, but more that kind of grassy area near where there's that like kind of whale tail looking bunches.

Is that correct?

Um it is.

Let's see if I had um in the packet.

If not, I can pull up.

It might be better for me to try to pull up a map.

But it is not the area directly under the bridge, it's directly adjacent to the bridge, though.

So the corner of this property is exactly yep, in the shadow of the bridge.

Thank you.

Any other questions?

Ms.

Hughes Candy's anything.

Yeah, thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Sorry, I was trying to look at that same diagram.

Um Mr.

Blydo, just confirming you just used the example of like a public market, you know, imagining tents or things like that.

So just so long as it's not would the kind of guideline be if we can break it down, you know, within a day, we could you know, stage something there.

Through the chair, yes, that's correct.

I mean, any um any easement for use would be negotiated with the DOT.

But uh one time prior to the 2016 land management plan being adopted, the assembly looked at this property to try to think about somehow doing some type of affordable housing on it.

It was very complicated because of the shape and size of the property, but I think at that time DOT took note and they were maybe against it.

And since then they've been thinking about ways to try to acquire this from the city.

So I think it's been on their mind for about 10 years since uh since we went through the public process of adopting the land management plan.

Sounds good.

Thanks.

Any other uh Mr.

Kelly.

Thank you.

Um I am not sure how important this might be or not.

Uh I was wondering if the values of the land are approximately the same, and if that matters in a government to government transaction.

Through the chair, great question.

And so um it does matter, but less so in a government to government transaction.

And based on the square footage of what we would need from the DOT, it's likely that the city property that we would be giving up as part of this land trades would have a lower value than the property that we'd be acquired from the DOT.

But since it is government to government, um, you know, we're still going to work on calculating that out and making sure that as we negotiate a land trade, it's in the city's best interest.

But something like that is something we'll look at in the future.

But I think most case most likely we'd be benefiting more than uh value for value-wise.

Thank you.

No, uh, Miss Hughes Candy's.

If you're ready for a motion, Mr.

Chair.

I'm ready.

Go ahead.

I move that the lands housing and economic development committee provide a motion of support to direct staff to begin uh negotiation of land trade with DOT.

And I ask for unanimous consent.

Any objection?

Seeing none, that motion is adopted.

Um, Mr.

Blydorn.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

So uh third item on the agenda today is a probably more meaty one than the last two, but it's a request for direction on the disposal of city property located at 155 Heritage Way City Hall, the building we're currently in.

And so in your packet on page 16, there's kind of a uh long wordy memo that talks about some options and the city processes for disposal.

So this building is just under 22,000 square feet in the total lot size is just about a quarter of an acre.

And uh staff are proposing that a competitive sealed bid process for the disposal with a minimum bid of 2.5 million uh be uh discussed this evening.

And so the value is based on a land analysis from the assessor valuing the property uh between 900,000 and 3.5 million.

The CBJ could hire an appraiser.

Uh we solicited appraisers and only one responded, and their um their cost to do an appraisal on the building was about 15,000, which seems unnecessary given the competitive nature of a sealed competitive bid process.

So sealed bid process is most commonly used process by the city and is more likely to net greater revenue uh compared to some other options of sales.

And so um and it's also a little bit faster than some of the options for sales as well.

And so the timeline to get to vacate the building is estimated to be December of 2026, which coincides with the uh moving into the new office space uh uh on that's currently called the Burns Building.

And so staff are requesting that the Lands Housing and Economic Development Committee provide a motion of support for the sealed competitive bid of the property located at 155 Heritage Way, with the minimum bid being 2.5 million, and direct the city attorney to draft an ordinance for introduction authorizing the sale.

And so and with that, I will answer questions.

Any questions?

Um Mr.

Kelly.

Thank you.

Under the current zoning of this area, what could a future owner use this property for?

That is a great question, and I don't have answers to that off the top of my head, and I wish CDD maybe uh I don't want to put Scott on the on the spot here, but that's something I can look into and get back to you as well.

Thank you.

Um Ms.

Hull Regardless of who wins the seal bid, would uh the the building go on to the property tax rules, or would it depend on through the chair?

Um seal competitive bid, depending on who purchases it, if a nonprofit acquires the building or if another government entity acquires the building, then we'd have to look at their um you know their taxabilities and things like that.

But if it if it does sell and somebody who acquires it is a private business or a private entity, then it would just be on the tax roll.

Ms.

Hughes Scandies.

Thank you, uh Mr.

Chair.

Mr.

Blydo, on you listed uh there's good materials in the memo are below the memo, uh providing um the breakdown uh description of each of the other disposal types, and those are coming from city code 5309 to 100.

I am curious if you could talk a little bit about um none of these disposal methods particularly speak to me for this property.

Can you speak to any times uh that the city has exempted a specific disposal by ordinance?

Are there examples in recent memory?

Is that enough of an a question for you?

Do you kind of know what I'm asking?

Uh through the chair, I think your question is related to options for terms and conditions.

And I think there's uh the option for the assembly to choose to do some type of um request for proposals, which would be more related to a response rather than a disposal.

So I think that would be another option.

And I briefly touched on that in my memo, but I think if the city assembly determines that they want to have some type of parameters or guidelines or a specific future use in mind, it might make sense to do uh some type of request for proposals and then determine how to move forward with the disposal from that.

I think if let me know if that answers your question.

Yeah, uh follow-up.

I think that is that is helpful.

I guess part of my question, and I know you're not the attorney, so I'm not expecting you to be, but I when I look at this, certainly a request for proposals is one of the things the city could do.

But if the city exempts this particular piece of property by ordinance, I'm thinking, is there any I I guess I'm asking, is there anything that stops the city from doing some modified version that's a combination of these where the city desires to have some control of the future use or some control that's not based solely on price, so it's not solely a disposal, but mimic some of what is good about say a sealed competitive bid.

Through the chair, yes, I think any type of disposal, if the assembly determines that certain things they want to have completed as part of this, uh, we could incorporate all those things into a into an ordinance that would authorize the disposal.

Okay.

Thanks.

And um, through the chair, sorry, I just wanted to address Mr.

Kelly's question about future uses.

This property is on mixed use, so there's a wide array of future uses that could take place here.

Um kind of down the lines of Miss Hughes Candy's question.

If we did a seal bid proposal or uh sealed bid auction um on the property, could we include parameters in there?

Say I'm thinking along the lines of you know, sometimes when the state auctions off property, you get a credit towards your bid based on certain criteria, usually it's like a veteran's preference or something along that line.

But could we structure something where we said, you know, we want to see housing preferential, but we don't want to put so many strings on this as to kind of close down the pool of bidders and say have some credit towards your bid if you intended to use property for housing or something along those lines rather than going to a full RFP, you know, kind of mixing, kind of like what Ms.

Hughes Scandis was working towards, some kind of mixed option.

Is that within the realm of possibility?

It's definitely within the realm of possibility, and there's opportunity for um development proposals to be a significant factor in the award.

And then uh, if that's the case, it would be subject to approval by the assembly.

And I think we have Mr.

Kelly, the Miss Hughes Scandes.

Thank you.

I think Miss Hugh Scandis was before me, but I can it's up to you.

We'll go, Miss Hugh Scandis and Mr.

Kelly.

Mr.

Kelly, you're so kind.

Um Mr.

Blydorn, we question we did the we only received one response for an appraisal.

I think this is kind of a crystal ball question for you.

So is it I I'm trying to phrase it in a way that's not crystal ball territory.

Is it true that more often than not when we do an appraisal, it comes in higher than our assessed value?

Would you say that's true in the up the disposals where we've done an appraisal?

Uh, through the chair, I'd say it's a complicated question to provide an answer to, especially because we don't have assessments of publicly owned property.

The assessment base is based on properties that are on the tax roll, and this building is not on the tax roll.

And so um, I talked to the assessors and they gave me uh, you know, it's hard for them to evaluate this property too, especially when you can look at it in different parameters.

And so um, if we I would say if the assembly determines that we want to do something that's more complicated than a straight sealed competitive bid sale, then maybe evaluating the price closer makes the most sense.

But the competitive nature of a sealed bid sale would be the the starting price, the 2.5 million would be the minimum bid.

And so I think um, you know, the more parameters, the more terms and conditions, the more complicated we want to make this, the more we would want to fine-tune the value of the property prior to going and looking for um requests for proposals, for example.

Okay, thank you.

That is helpful.

Um, Mr.

Kelly.

Thank you.

And I think this might follow in line with um Chair Steininger's question, um, just a slight variation on that.

Would we be able to, and maybe this is being too creative, would we be able to apply tax incentives to a future buyer if say they end up building housing or or some other use that the assembly decides that we find important?

Through the chair.

And so the building is in downtown, and we do have tax incentives in place for downtown.

So if um so outside of the sale process, say somebody acquired it from the CBJ and they've determined that their best use is to build housing, it is in the downtown area, so they can apply for the tax abatement, and then they could follow through and try to do the affordable housing fund loan program too, which uh has an extra benefit if it's downtown, so they score higher if they're downtown.

So there's opportunity to uh for new owners of this building to apply for the existing um the existing programs that the city has to help build housing.

Any other questions before I jump in with one of my own?

All right.

Um sent the the need to you know generate some revenue in order to help offset the cost of our move to the Burns building, you know, if if that weren't a factor, would it still be the recommendation to dispose of this property when we're leaving?

Like, are there other municipal uses for this land or this property that we should be considering as we think about a sale?

Oh, well, thank you for that question, Mr.

Chair.

And so I did discuss this with the city manager and a couple of department heads, and it didn't appear that there was any uh need to retain this property for a public use within the current city uh programs.

And so it does make sense.

I think uh regardless of the move, if this building was going to be put up for sale, I would still be recommending that sealed bid be the way to do it.

It provides the fastest, most efficient way to sell city property.

It allows for the most involvement from citizens as far as the opportunity to place a bid on it, and um it's just pretty straightforward and it's the most common used way to dispose of city property.

And then um, you know, the minimum bid at 2.5 million is um it's in a lot of ways less important to finalize the actual two true appraised value because the market would determine the final value of the property.

And so there has been cases.

I'll just note there has been cases when we sold vacant property out at the Lena subdivision where and at the Renegar subdivision where we didn't have any bids, and then from that point the property was put on the market as a negotiated sale, or excuse me, yeah, um, an over-the-counter sale, in which case it's just made available, put on our website, and then in all those cases, people reached out to us after uh uh you know a certain amount of time and then acquired them at that minimum bid value.

Um Ms.

Hall.

Yeah, has the city considered this site for a future city museum?

Uh we have not, and I don't know that we would want to.

I think that um, you know, we have a whole list of problems with this building, and if we were going to try to retrofit it for a museum, it would be extremely costly.

And so I think um, if that's something the assembly wanted to evaluate, um I would defer to the city manager's office, but as staff, I would recommend against that.

Has there been any consideration into you know retaining ownership of the land but entering into a long-term lease with someone so we can kind of maintain that kind of ownership footprint in downtown Juneau, or would that not be kind of viable moving forward?

Uh that's a good question.

We haven't evaluated trying to continue to own the land.

I think um it starts to get pretty complicated to own the land under a building that's you know beyond its lifespan.

And so um it could provide opportunity in the sense that it would make um you know, not owning the land would mean the future owners of whatever gets built here wouldn't necessarily be taxed on it, it could be some type of like land trust model.

Um we don't have anything like that currently, and it would be creating a new program, so it would be something we need to evaluate.

Currently, the land division consists of just myself, and so I'm the only employee in the division of lands and resources.

So starting a new program like that, I have a lot of caution just with the amount of time and energy it would take.

And then also the legal team would really need to evaluate it as well.

But it could be something we could look at if the assembly determines that's the direction they want to go.

Any other questions from the committee or liaisons?

Um I have a motion they'd like to start us off with Miss Hughes Candies.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

I think I'm gonna break this up into pieces.

Uh and I will speak to my reasoning there.

So I first I would make a motion that the city engage with the responding appraiser and get the property appraised.

And if I could speak to that, I would um I would say that the you know it's pretty um, I've already showed you my cards, but I'm not interested in doing like a disposal to the competitive sealed bid to the highest bidder.

Um and I think as Mr.

Blydorn said, if you are looking to do something else, or the more wily you're trying to get with it, perhaps the more it matters that you are getting closer to the value.

Uh and if an appraisal helps us do that, I think that cost is worth it.

Um I will use the example of the property over by the archipelago lot.

Uh, you know, I I think it was listed for 10 million.

And I know that 2.5 is just the starting or the minimum bid, but um this is this footprint, knowing the amount of traffic it gets and everything else, I think it would be helpful to get a more of an idea of what that's appraised at.

So my motion would be to uh engage with that appraiser and get the property appraised, and I would ask unanimous consent.

Um Mr.

Kelly.

Thank you.

Just objecting for the purposes of a question to the maker of the motion.

I just so I can evaluate whether or not I would support this.

You mentioned that you wanted to break this up into a couple different motions, and so it would kind of help me give some perspective as to what your next motion might be or what other idea that you might be pursuing.

Where I'm going with this, uh absolutely, Mr.

Kelly.

Um that's a good question.

I will, I should like preface everything by saying it's 9 30 on the east coast.

Um, so uh I'm already getting a little loopy.

But um, the I I'm not entirely uh a better way to say that, Mr.

Kelly, would be to say I'm gonna break this up into pieces so I can find the points that I think we might agree on.

I am not sure even.

I do not have true clarity.

I think the my next motion will probably be to direct staff to bring us back more information uh about an ordinance exempting this property by ordinance.

So I don't have a clear like let's go forward this way because I don't think we're there yet.

I appreciate staff's desire to get this started because I uh we do just have uh Mr.

Blydoor and Department of One, and it does take time to do anything at the speed of government, but I think we need more information before we choose one of these.

So I think uh my next motion would be to direct staff to bring us back um information about exempting by ordinance.

Which is why for now I say start with um appraisal.

And I'll object quickly for a question.

Um, Mr.

Blydorn, timeline wise, how long would it take?

Do you estimate it would take to come back with appraisal information?

Uh great question, Mr.

Chair.

So since the cost of the appraisal is above the $5,000 maximum, we can do by soliciting an individual entity to provide services.

We'll have to do an RFP for requesting proposals to provide appraisals for this building.

And that would probably take a couple of months and then uh I would say a couple of months to receive the appraisal from the service provider.

So I'd say uh given it's February, maybe June, we'd have results from an appraisal, June or July would be my guess.

And then from there we'll have more information.

And then maybe follow up to that question.

How long say we got the appraisal back and we chose to go the sealed bid route anyway?

How long do you think that would take before we find a buyer?

Um I estimate the sealed bid process to be about nine months.

Um Mr.

Kelly, are you maintaining your objection?

Okay, we have a motion and an objection.

Um you call the roll.

Perfect.

Ums Hall.

Could you please restate the motion?

Um I believe the motion is to uh move forward with an appraisal for the property in order to determine fair market value.

No.

Mr.

Kelly.

No.

Uh Chair Steininger.

No.

And Miss Hughes Scandies.

Yes.

Motion fails.

Motion fails.

All right.

Um, do we have any other motions?

Uh Mr.

Kelly.

I move that the land housing and economic development committee support a sealed competitive bid sale of 155 Heritage Way with a minimum bid of 2.5 million dollars and direct the city attorney to draft an ordinance for introduction authorizing the sale and ask for unanimous consent.

Thanks, Chair.

I'm gonna object to that motion.

I am totally open to hearing other ideas.

I am uh open to a lot of things.

Um I just heard the timeline that you also heard from Mr.

Blydorn.

I think it is our job and duty to balance a lot of factors, and one of those is timeline.

Yes, one of those is timeline of moving into our the burns building.

That's true.

The other piece of that is that we have the highest and best use of this municipal property, which we've been entrusted to.

And I am not convinced at this point that with all the other things we have going on in the borough right now, that with one memo, the quick decision that we're gonna make is to move forward and do a sealed competitive bid for a city hall.

That seems like a flip decision to me.

It feels ill-advised.

I don't know if ill advice is the right word, but it feels too rapidly considered, and it does not feel like we are taking the gravity of what our decision making is supposed to be with 20-year horizon, 50-year horizon, et cetera.

We do have to balance what we have to do timely, but to move forward with that motion.

I I feel strenuously would be a mistake without getting more information than you have in this memo.

So I'm gonna object to that.

Mr.

Kelly.

Thank you.

Uh, just a question for Mr.

Blydorn.

So if I were if the committee votes in favor of this motion today, this basically means that an ordinance would be introduced at a future assembly meeting, and that we would also have some time to debate it uh probably as early as April.

So we would have time to consider on this proposal.

Through the chair.

Um, yes, I think the next step would be ordinance for introduction, and that ordinance could have terms and conditions of the sale that the assembly would uh help draft and authorize.

Uh Miss Hugh Scandies, is your hand up for a comment?

No, I'm maintaining my objection, Chair.

Anyone else?

I guess we have a motion and an objection if you want to call the roll.

And Mr.

Kelly.

Oh, sorry, Miss Hall?

Yes.

Mr.

Steininger.

Yes.

Ms.

Hughes Scandes.

No.

And Mr.

Kelly.

Yes.

Motion passes three to one.

All right.

Thank you, Mr.

Blydoorn.

On to item four.

All right.

Uh, next on the agenda is amending title 69 code related to peer-to-peer vehicle sharing.

And we have Deputy City Manager Barr here to talk on this topic.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Uh, the there's a memo in your packet discussing um this draft legislation that is also in your packet.

Over the past couple of summer seasons, we have struggled um more.

Uh, I would say on an increasing trajectory with peer-to-peer car rentals.

Um, using using our public spaces uh more than they have in the past, right?

Uh specifically the parking garages on street parking in the downtown area in the proximity to cruise ships.

This um concept before you would implement an excise tax.

So uh you can think of it as similar to hotel bed tax, a tax on top of existing sales tax on peer-to-peer car rental activity to do two things um to discourage use uh and to discourage um or or you could say in encourage use outside of that half mile area, reducing congestion uh and uh allowing for that that downtown space, which is um uh quite quite full.

I can talk about parking garage uh rates if you want uh in the in the summer months uh outside of that area, or to the extent it doesn't uh encourage that use outside of the space to create a revenue source that the assembly could at their discretion use to help offset the general fund subsidy that is currently required for downtown parking management in the downtown core uh and parking garage costs that are currently not covered uh by fees um and fines associated with our parking garages and also require a general fund subsidy.

I'm happy to um take questions.

Um Mr.

Kelly.

Yeah, we have uh let's wait.

Thank you.

Uh this one, I I probably should have given you a heads up that I might ask this question, but I did not.

So if you're unprepared to answer this, that's okay.

I did receive an email from a concerned constituent, uh business owner who was mentioning that there this could create something of well she she was mentioning that they're basically a couple different markets.

There's the there's this there's this market of peer-to-peer rental, but then there's also like the rental cars that are um out at the airport.

They would probably not be subject to this excise tax.

Is there are there any other taxes and fees that rental car companies would be paying?

So we're not adding uh a disadvantage to these peer-to-peer rentals.

Thank you, Mr.

Kelly, and through the chair.

Um that that is correct.

Traditional car rental companies would not be subject to this excise tax.

Um we generally have been seeing the impacts that I was speaking to earlier from peer-to-peer um car car rental companies, uh, not from traditional car rental companies, traditional car rental companies typically, uh, I'm sure there are exceptions, but typically utilize their own their own private property, uh, their own um their own methods of of renting and not marketplace facilitators like uh peer-to-peer rental companies do.

So I would say they are they are similar but slightly different markets.

Would you say that they're I guess the part of the question I was hoping to have have answered is is there anything that would affect them in the same way as this excise tax?

So that way we're not unfairly adding or I guess discouraging users from using the rental car company versus a peer-to-peer.

Thank you, Mr.

Kelly.

I'll I'll I'll try um I think that it's um it's it's slightly different.

So it's it's typical.

I'll use the airport example.

It's typical for traditional rental car companies to operate out of a permanent fixed space at airports, um, space that they may lease or rent from an airport, space that have uh associated business costs that a peer-to-peer car rental company would not have.

It is also common in airplan airports, including our airport, to have a specific tax that only applies um to peer-to-peer car rental companies and not their traditional car rental companies, because the impacts that those two businesses impart on the on the airport in this example or um on downtown and and in mine are different.

Um other questions?

I think I'll chime in with one.

So this would apply to any peer-to-peer car rental, you know, within the red zone on the map behind you.

Would that be regardless of whether the pickup and drop-off point was on private property or public property, or is it only if it's on public property or city-owned public property, I suppose.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Um, this would apply to peer-to-peer car rental companies that operate that have an origination or an ending point anywhere in those red circles.

Um it may, if if the assembly wishes, it may, I'm not sure, be possible to create um using geotargeting and engaging very specifically with the industry to only target uh what is public versus private.

Umecdotally, what we see uh is is public use of those peer-to-peer marketplace facilitated um by software company rentals.

Uh Ms.

Wool.

Thank you, Chair Sidinger, for indulging me with a question on this one.

Um and this is a bit off the cuff, but ms Mr.

Barr, if I remember correctly, we all we recently increased parking fees significantly at our lots with if I might be missing something, but with the intent to solve a different problem, but a related problem, which was that peer-to-peer car sharing networks were using our lots.

Um and leaving cars there.

Have we seen any well am I remembering that correctly?

Have we seen any um results favorable as a result of that?

And um we I'm assuming if yes, we're we're still having a congestion problem.

People just aren't leaving the cars there for a long period of time.

Thank you, Assemblymember Wall, for that question and through the chair.

Um we we did recently increase uh parking permit uh fees as well as uh the fine structure, and I think the fine structure is what you're recalling.

Um we are seeing um uh I I would say better compliance in the garages uh due to that increased fine structure.

We nevertheless still see significant waiting lists in both of our garages downtown.

Um we are uh currently oversold um in each garage by over 45 percent.

We aim for a 30% over sell rate, and even with that over sell rate, which is standard in the industry because not every permit is being used at every period of point in time, uh, even with those over sell rates, we have waiting lists of nearly 200 uh for the marine parking garage and and and uh 87 for the downtown transportation center.

Um looking at the map behind you, I notice because of the half mile distance laid out in the ordinance, there are you know very small sliver of neighborhood in on Douglas Island that would be you know excluded.

Is that something that could be cared for in the ordinance so we don't end up with just you know a handful of households that can't operate uh peer-to-peer?

Yes, absolutely.

Um and uh follow-up also on the the regions um the way the ordinance is drafted right now, would it require amendment at such time that the HUNA totem development opens, or would it be able to just adapt itself?

Thank you.

If constructed would would simply be included um once once it is constructed and not require an amendment.

Uh Mr.

Kelly.

Thank you.

Uh should the assembly pass this ordinance as written, how would we publicize the existence of the zone so people are aware of it?

Would we have something like this on our website?

Would we have plaques in various places so that way companies would know the boundaries of the zone?

Thank you for the question, Assemblymember Kelly, and through the chair.

Um there is generally in this industry only one marketplace facilitator that is operating, and we would work directly with them uh to ensure that they um are aware of the map and aware of when they would need to apply that excise tax.

Uh the the users uh are are generally tourists.

Um we would have information on our website uh for for those um industrious tourists who who would want to kind of seek that out.

Um, but I would anticipate that most would learn about it when they saw the excise tax on their on their turrow bill.

In considering putting this together, you know, the half mile radius can make my assumption is it's based on you know how far a cruise passenger might walk to get to get to a uh a peer-to-peer rental um rather than uh that just kind of strict radius was it considered or reviewed with law whether we could just draw a boundary around certain neighborhoods to kind of make it a little less arbitrary at those kind of end areas on that circle.

We did not have that specific conversation, um, but we can any other questions.

Um yeah, great uh motion when you're ready.

Uh thank you, Mr.

Chair.

I would move that the lands committee refers this to the next regularly scheduled assembly meeting for introduction, and then also refer this ordinance and memo to both the obviously this next part relies on a chair of that committee, but to the committee of the whole uh and to the visitor industry task force, and I can speak to that if you would like.

Go ahead.

I would just say briefly.

Um, you know, I appreciate this ordinance.

I think this is a good thing.

This is uh certain topics.

I think it makes sense to put them in front of the whole assembly.

It sounds like there's maybe already a couple of amendments that we want might want to make.

So after that's um the cow might be the place to do that.

Um and then uh so that's my reason for there, and then the visitor industry task force is working through issues just such as this uh right now, and uh based on my conversation with you, just talked about downtown congestion.

So it'd make perfect sense for them to see this and weigh in on this as well.

So that's my motion, and I would ask for your unanimous consent.

Any objection, Mr.

Kelly?

Just for a question to staff.

Do we know if the visitor industry task next visitor industry task force meeting would be before or after the next committee of the whole?

I don't know.

Thank you for the question, assembly where Kelly.

I don't know the answer to that off the top of my head.

I I know when the next committee of the whole meeting is if you give me a second, I can't.

And Mr.

Kelly, just to be clear, that was a dual sending them to do different places, not one and then the other.

No, I I believe the next visitor industry task force is March 12th, and the next committee the whole is March 16th.

Thank you.

Uh Ms.

Hull.

Um, has the visitor industry task force already grappled with this in their committee, or would this be no?

Okay.

I remove my objection.

Okay.

Any other objections?

Seeing none, that motion is adopted.

Mr.

Blydorn.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

The last item on our agenda today is the affordable housing fund verbal update from Scott Chambor.

And he is in the audience coming up right now.

Um, Mr.

Blydorn, on our agendas, we have the short-term rental update as well.

I apologize.

Uh, let me stop sharing my screen for this and we'll call Mr.

Chamber up in a second.

The next item on the agenda is the short-term rentals.

And uh Assemblymember Hugh Scandies has this topic.

Ms.

Hughes Candies.

Uh, thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Thank you, Mr.

Blydorn.

Um, this evening, you have a bunch of memos from ranging pretty far back into uh relatively uh assembly history of times that the assembly has touched on this uh topic.

They are not that is not the full and complete list.

Um I have spoken in this committee prior to uh working with Mr.

Blydorn to bring something in front of this committee uh to pick up the work following uh the short-term rental task force.

Um the mayor at the beginning of the year had also requested an assembly member comments and questions that this committee uh take up that topic um and finish the work of the rental task force.

So this because that was not ripe as of this meeting.

These uh this uh packet material, these uh uh memos are simply to base you in uh so you will be ready by next meeting.

The um toolkit that staff put together for the task force is again fairly extensive, and you also have the findings and recommendation of the task force.

So I would say let that be our homework for the next one, and we will um pick this back up the next regularly scheduled lands meeting.

So just information.

All right, thank you.

Any comments or questions on that for the rest of the rest of the committee?

All right.

Thank you.

Uh Mr.

Blyder and then Mr.

Chambers, thank you.

All right, so here we are at the final agenda item, affordable housing fund verbal update from Scott Chamborn.

Thank you, Dan.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Um, so I'm here tonight as a precursor to the next meeting.

Uh so we're gonna provide uh the lands committee with the June Affordable Housing Fund annual report.

Typically we do these in April uh May, but we wanted to bump it up this year because there is some uh some budget concerns, obviously, and then also uh some questions on potential changes to the fund uh uh from from committee uh member uh Kelly uh particularly.

So I wanted to come tonight to just uh encourage uh the committee to provide uh uh some questions or some some feedback as to um what you may want to us to answer at the next meeting.

Um the Affordable Housing Fund has a long history.

Uh there's input from uh Affordable Housing Commission, Assembly members passed, staff, uh national consultants away back to 2008.

So there's a lot of background to the structure of the program.

Uh and so wanted to get some of those uh kind of questions out of the way uh if you have them uh or uh to encourage you to send it to us so that we can have it prepared for our next meeting.

Mr.

Kelly.

Thank you.

Uh and this might be something of a reminder because I did bring this to the um previous lands committee last year with the suggestion that we explore options to incentivize uh certain licensed professions like uh teachers, um medical professionals and other people who we need in this community, but we might be having trouble finding because they're having trouble finding housing.

And so what I would be interested in in seeing next week is maybe what it might look like to have the following couple of proposals.

The first one is for future applicants for the affordable housing to perhaps have a weights that would benefit additional units being provided to these professions uh to who these licensed professions and the other what it might look like to provide some sort of incentive for people for developers who might already be underway who might want to provide additional affordable units to people in these uh licensed professions.

So excellent.

Yes, so through the chair.

So this is um as you see the timeline uh behind me.

This is the perfect time for the assembly uh in the lands committee to have those sort of discussions uh because we are uh right at the point where we've in the in the process of wrapping up the last found uh round.

Uh there's a grant that's going to the assembly uh for approval uh next month.

Uh but that uh essentially ends round five.

Uh and so the timeline was created in order to uh give the assembly uh opportunity to decide what next year's round looks like based on your your fiscal schedule.

Uh so at this point, we will uh during the annual report make a look at some changes for for the program.

Um I have had conversations with Mr.

Kelly uh as well as staff, so we're clear on on what his ideas are.

Uh so in the memo, you will have a summary of that concept, you know, technically how it will work, as well as some of the pros and cons for making that change if you agree to do so.

Mayor Weldon.

Oh, Ms.

Hall.

Um Yeah, I I guess I have a little bit of concern zeroing in on a couple professions when across the board, you know, from clerks at Super Bear to construction workers, people are experiencing homelessness.

So I know search is building that new property over um by river uh river view that uh you know that's for uh professionals, and I think Bartlett has is also uh going down that road as well.

So I think it's a problem across the borough without zeroing in, but you know, so I don't know how much staff time we want to utilize just focusing unless we have some clear data as to why those two professions particularly.

Thank you.

Ms.

Hughes Scandis.

Yeah, thanks, Mr.

Chair.

I just clarifying process and uh staff somewhat along the lines of Ms.

Hall before um they get tasked with too much work.

So Mr.

Chombohr, are you saying if I understood you correctly, you're saying um now is a good time if anybody has any ideas?

Uh Mr.

Kelly has already expressed an idea um for utilizing the utilizing the housing fund differently next year.

Is it is that an accurate summation?

And would you say if people had other ideas they should they should be talking to you now?

Uh thank you, Ms.

Hughes Scanzies Food Chair.

Uh so yes, so uh the good news is that we've got five years in a row of having organized and and operated the housing fund program.

Uh so there's a pretty clear picture of what works and what doesn't, as well as pretty clear where uh the assembly's decision points are.

You know, the main decision point for the assembly is the budget.

Are you going to put money into the funds?

Uh the second major uh decision point is is what is the cap per unit uh for affordable housing developers and what is the cap per unit for private developers uh with their loan terms.

So most of those things are already in place.

So if there are minor changes or suggestions, uh it's not very difficult to analyze what those changes to the program can be.

Like I say, we've run it for five years.

Uh we're clearing, clearly making headroads uh in terms of getting loans out to multifamily workforce housing uh and our affordable housing uh uh providers who are looking to develop in the future are relying on the on the fund being available in the future.

So it's not difficult to analyze ideas that the assembly might have because we have so much experience.

Great.

Thank you for that, Mr.

Chambar.

That's right.

Reassuring.

And it feels good to hear, you know, five years.

That's great.

I just won't give a time check.

We only have three minutes until the next meeting in this room.

Um Mayor Weldon came to join us to make a comment if you'd like to chime in.

Uh thank you.

I appreciate Mr.

Kelly bringing this forward to try some of the um professions that we have a hard time recruiting for.

But as Ms.

Hall said, we have several people that are from all kinds of things.

But my question would be to the maker of the motion, how would you enforce that?

So let's just say you have nursing housing, and for whatever reason the someone is no longer a nurse, they retired, they got fired, you kick them out.

And what happens if there's a divorce?

And the uh person that you were trying to put in there is the one that left.

And so do you kick out the wife or husband that's left?

So I don't know how you would enforce that.

Any thoughts.

Mr.

Kelly.

Thank you, Matt.

Thank you, Madam Mayor.

And to be clear, I listed two professions as an example.

I wasn't specifically narrowing it down to those professions.

And also to kind of respond to to Ms.

Hall.

I um I forgot what what else I was going to say.

Um, it this would not be replacing the affordable housing that we have now would be additional additional units of affordable housing.

So it would help.

Um to I don't have answers to the mayor's questions at this moment, but um, I guess to the point she's she's asking addressing this to the maker of the motion, and I this isn't a new motion.

This is a motion that the lands that was passed out of the lands committee back in back in August.

So I I'm just kind of clarifying uh what I'm maybe previewing for the current lands committee what I'm hoping to to address, and hopefully we can discuss that the next meeting.

All right.

Thank you.

Um anything else on this topic.

Do you need a motion from the committee?

To be clear, Mr.

Chair, this is a staff item.

So a motion is inappropriate at this time.

Okay.

Thank you.

Through the chair.

Could I make two uh quick announcements on top of this?

Uh one, we do have a senior housing planner position open, so we're gonna have a recruitment and hopefully have staff on uh to use the next uh few months of discussion about the housing fund going into new new year as our our training opportunity.

And then also uh the CDD staff, about nine of us went and visited Chilcat Vistas, the new uh apartments being created uh uh by Michael and Bill Human and their project director.

We spent about 45 minutes in a unit uh talking about their travails, what's working, what their concerns are, what they think about this product coming to uh online, as well as the importance of the affordable housing fund to it.

So I would encourage if you have connections with Bill and Michael uh to take a site visit uh because it was really enlightening to uh their journey on getting uh housing built in our town.

Thank you.

Um so to finish this up, we've got almost no time left.

So any quick updates from our liaisons.

Um Becker.

Well, I had a little bit of notes there, and I get I won't need to go through them.

We don't have any time.

The thing that uh we did that was kind of notable, we voted unanimously to develop North Douglas.

There's a lot of need for that expansion.

There's quite a bit to be done, and more will be revealed later.

Thank you.

Thank you, Ms.

Shrimmer.

Okay.

We reviewed the 2627 budget, discussed the need for root solving the roof leaks and the turf at the field house and the lighting at Derek Kennedy.

We're continuing public meetings on Jackie Renninger.

All right, thank you.

And do we have a liaison on the line as well, Mr.

Blydorn?

We do.

We have Mr.

from the planning commission.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Um, just a quick, I guess, request maybe for Mr.

Bly Dorn.

Um, at our last meeting on January 27th, there was public questions and um regarding city disposals and land sales and how it goes to private users, and just maybe if we could have like an informational discussion at some point.

I don't know if it's more appropriate in this body or for the planning commission, but it would just be really helpful that way we can help answer questions.

All right.

Thank you.

Um anything else from the committee?

And we are adjourned.

Thank you.