This meeting is being held in person at City Hall and by video conference.

The public may participate in this meeting by coming to City Hall or joining the Zoom webinar.

The meeting is being broadcast live on the city's YouTube channel and Comcast Cable Channel 30 within city limits.

There will be opportunities for the public to speak during this meeting.

If you would like to address counsel, you may come to City Hall or participate via Zoom.

If you are interested in speaking, please let staff know by filling out a yellow comment card for those in City Hall or emailing OCR at Milwaukee, Oregon.gov for those on Zoom.

When it is time to take public comments, staff will monitor the comment cards, email inbox, and zoom participant list and chat.

We will take comments in the order they are received and seen.

Comments may be emailed to OCR at Milwaukee, Oregon.gov.

We ask that all Zoom participants who intend to speak label their Zoom username to show their first and last names for the record.

Spanish translation services are available upon request.

The public is asked to request translation and other meeting accessibility services at least 48 hours before the meeting.

For more information, contact the city recorder at 503-786-7502.

Servicios de Tradución en Espanol está disponible cuando se es solicitado.

Se pide el público que solicite servicios de tradución y otros servicios de accesibilidad por lo menos 48 horas antes de la reunión.

Para obtener más información, llama a El Secretario de la Ciudad 53.

Siete ocho seis cinco ceros.

Translation services are also available in other languages.

Please join me in the Pledge of Allegiance.

And to the Republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

And in just a few minutes, we will have our Indigenous People's Day proclamation.

But first, announcements and haikus.

Applications continue to be accept accepted for the city's Climate Action Committee.

Weaves together her family's story against the backdrop of Korea's tumultuous modern history with a powerful question at its heart.

Can we ever separate ourselves from our family's past?

And if the answer is yes, should we?

Volunteers are needed at monthly restoration events on Elk Rock Island.

The next is on Saturday, October 18th from 9 30 a.m.

to noon.

Volunteers volunteers remove Ivy and invasive plants and pick up litter.

Volunteers meet at Spring Park at 19th Avenue and Sparrow Street at 9 30 a.m.

And I will say that's uh the October 18th, but more immediately this Saturday, October 11th.

There's work party at 9 30 a.m.

at Minthorn Springs for anyone who wants to come out.

at Minthorn Springs for anyone who wants to come out, park near the Planet Fitness and walk across 37th Avenue and come see all the exciting stuff that's going on in Mint Thorn Springs.

Um early design work for the central segment of the Monroe Street Greenway has begun.

This segment starts at 21st Avenue, jogs to Campbell Street, then to Oak Street, and back to Monroe Street.

Starts at 21st Avenue.

Is that right?

Oh well, okay.

Yeah, it starts starts at Willard and then goes on uh 21st.

Okay.

And then down Washington.

It's kind of a rather than going on Main Street, which is what they typically done, it's going behind.

Okay.

By uh El Puente and Milwaukee Elementary.

Okay.

Uh the community is invited to attend an open house on Wednesday, October 22nd from 5 to 6:30 p.m.

to see design plans, ask questions, and give feedback.

Refreshments will be provided.

The event takes place at the public safety building at 3200 Southeast Harrison Street.

Stop by and ask the city manager questions, raise concerns, or just find out more about the city at the next city manager open door session on Friday, October 24th from 9 a.m.

to 10 a.m.

at City Hall.

Downtown businesses will open their doors for little ghosts and goblins with candy and fun surprises on Saturday, October 25th from 1 to 4 p.m.

Trick or Treat on Main Street returns with a long list of participating businesses.

And while you are downtown that day, be sure to also stop by the Letting Library for Halloween craft.

For more information about these events and others, please visit the city's homepage at Milwaukee, Oregon.gov or call 503-786755.

I also had a late breaking announcement, yes, that just came in today.

And now it's a voting phase.

It's the first of two voting phases.

Putting out a list of projects and asking people to vote to help prioritize what things people are most interested in.

I have not had time today to go look at it myself, but I will definitely be doing that over the days ahead.

And that 3D barcode there on the slide is where you can go visit.

But I think you will probably also be able to find that info popping up on uh Facebook and Instagram pages and as we try and get the word out to more people.

Um the city uh park staffer Adam Ward did send it out to people on the parks mail list.

Um, but um we just want to try and get it out as widely as possible so that people know that they can vote on their favorite projects, and there are a lot of cool projects around Milwaukee.

Um, and with that, I will go to the haiku.

Um, this was submitted by Hamid Shabata Bennett uh after he saw some damage to our pride flag, pride flag uh, which is a banner on the Cronberg uh bridge, has taken of a little bit of abuse over the past few years, and I think we are going to renew revive it in some way over this winter.

Is that right?

City manager, sorry.

The pride flag.

We're yes, we are and we're gonna revamp it.

It's been pressure washed and cleaned several times and needs uh a refresh, but we've got plans to do it.

Yeah, which is great.

Um, so Hamids uh haiku, Milwaukee Pride flag, waving steady in summer breeze, be your fab self.

And I want to also put out a give a shout out a thank you to Hamid and to Jennifer who's here in the room with us today, because they got the word out there about the need for haiku, and now I'm stocked up with haiku through March.

But if you've got a haiku, especially if you've got a seasonal type one, um, feel free to send me your haiku.

We will work you into the uh twice a month haiku reading at the city council meetings.

Um with that, uh, I will we move on to proclamations for of which we have two tonight.

And the first one is for Indigenous People's Day, and uh I will have uh ask our city recorder Scott Stoffer to introduce that one for us.

Thank you, Mayor Beatty.

Um pleasure to be here to introduce that one uh to council and the public.

Uh the city has uh celebrated and marked Indigenous People's Day uh officially by proclamation.

This is probably the fourth or fifth time the council's read it, but uh certainly the city values and and respects the relationships that this community has with the Confederated Tribes of the Grand Ronde and other uh bodies that represent the Indigenous folks, the Clackamas people who lived in this area before the arrival of European American settlers in the 1840s.

Uh, but I wanted to touch on uh a particularly cool project that the city's working on right now with the Confederated Tribes of the Grand Ronde as council remembers.

A few years uh last year uh the city signed an intergovernmental agreement with the Confederate Tribes of Grand Ronde for the first fish Herons project, which will bring three heron sculptures to Milwaukee Bay Park on a seasonal basis to coincide with the running of the salmon when the the herons uh stock the rivers and uh monitor the return of the salmon uh to the Lamet River between March and May of every year.

So that IGA was signed last year.

Uh city staff and tribal staff have been working together since then to get a contractor in place.

The city's part of that agreement is to pay for the installation of the Plints, the concrete and metal bases that these artworks will sit on.

Uh, and uh thanks to the really good work of Camilo and uh our city uh engineer Jen Garbin, we've got uh a contractor in place, and we had our first on-site meeting with uh tribal staff, uh parks district staff was there.

Uh and so we're we're underway.

We're planning the public will probably start to see some minor construction work in the park in the next two months uh with the pouring of concrete and placement of those posts.

And then um the tribal representative last year indicated that this week they would release funding to three artists for the initial artworks to be starting to be constructed and built, and with the idea they'll be placed in March.

So there will definitely be more discussion and announcements about programming around the placement of that and and uh the ceremonial aspect of having those uh sculptures in our in our park for three months of the year.

But really good news.

Super appreciate uh the partnership with the Grand Ronde.

Uh and uh with that, Mayor Beatty, I think we're ready for the proclamation.

Okay, well, thank you.

That's all good news.

Exciting to hear it going forward.

Whereas the city of Milwaukee recognizes that the indigenous peoples of the lands known as the Americas have lived on these lands since time immemorial.

And whereas the city wishes to honor the fact that the community of Milwaukee is built on the traditional homelands of the Clackamas people and are part of the Confederated Tribes of Grand Ron, which includes more than 30 tribes and bands and affirms the legal rights of the nine federally recognized tribal nations in the state of Oregon and all Indigenous peoples everywhere.

And whereas Indigenous Peoples Day was first proposed in 1977 by a delegation of Native Nations to the United Nations sponsored International Conference on Discrimination Against Indigenous Populations in the Americas.

And whereas the city, this city is committed to protecting and advocating for justice, human rights, and the dignity of all people who live, work, and visit our community, and to supporting the principles contained in the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples endorsed by the United States on December 16th, 2010.

And whereas the Declaration recognizes the right of Indigenous peoples to the dignity and diversity of their cultures, traditions, histories, and aspirations, which shall be appropriately reflected in education and public information, and places an obligation on states to take effective measures in consultation and cooperation with the indigenous peoples concerned to combat prejudice and eliminate discrimination and to promote tolerance, understanding, and good relations among Indigenous peoples and all other segments of society.

And whereas the city wishes to recognize the second Monday in October as Indigenous People's Day as an opportunity to reflect on the ongoing struggles of Indigenous peoples of this land to celebrate the thriving cultures and values of the Indigenous Peoples of our region and to stand with Indigenous peoples everywhere.

Now, therefore, I, Lisa Beatty, mayor of the City of Milwaukee, a municipal corporation in the county of Clackabas in the state of Oregon, to hereby proclaim October 13th, 2025 to be Indigenous People's Day in Milwaukee.

Thank you.

Okay, and then our second um proclamation today is uh noting the 200th and 250th anniversary of the United States Navy, and we have our very own uh retired naval officer, Councillor Robert Massey to introduce it.

We don't normally do this every year, but I thought 250 was worth our proclamation.

Before we get to that proclamation, I just want to share some background uh about uh my involvement in the Navy.

Uh I used to really enjoy uh my uncle telling me about his experience in the Navy and during the Second World War shortly after Pearl Harbor when he was 17 years old.

He got my grandparents to sign a waiver so that he could join up right away, and uh off he went.

And uh it didn't take long before uh he was at the Battle of the Coral Sea, and his ship, uh the Yorktown was heavily damaged at the Battle of uh uh the Coral Sea.

They limped back to Pearl Harbor, and uh they thought that they had a couple of months of work to be done on the ship, and Admiral Nimitz came on board and he said, We're gonna do what we can in 72 hours because you're sailing again to a little known atoll called Midway.

And so he joined the Navy when he was 17, and by the time he was 18, he would survive heavy battle damage on his ship at the Battle of the Coral Sea, and his ship was sunk at Midway.

Uh during the process, um, the task force, including the ships, the including the Yorktown, uh, basically turned the tide of the battle in the Pacific by sinking four Imperial Japanese carriers in the course of one day.

It was the most pivotal moment in the Pacific War.

And uh I was enthralled when he told those stories.

He maintained contact with the his uh fellow shipmates and their anti-aircraft gun crew throughout their lives.

They never missed a Yorktown reunion.

And what they had was what we talk about here sometimes.

They had a community, and I was always uh impressed by what they did because they were just ordinary people doing extraordinary things in trying times.

So fast forward about 35 years, and I'm a newly commissioned officer in the United States Navy, and um there's a senior non-commissioned officer who takes me under his wing.

And thank goodness, because uh I needed some guidance and some structure, and he helped me get it.

And uh senior chief peloton with the last name like that, he had to be in the Navy, right?

Uh he kept me from making bad decisions, but more importantly, he taught me how to make good decisions.

A few years after that, I came to work with a person that I worked with three times during my naval career, um, Admiral David Robinson.

When I first met uh Admiral Robinson, I could see the scars along his jawline, and I saw that he wore a ribbon on his uh dress blues that I had never seen before.

I found out it was the Navy Cross as the second highest uh medal for valor.

And uh if you read this citation, um he uh was captain of a patrol gunboat in Vietnam.

He beached the patrol gunboat um to put the patrol gunboat between the North Vietnamese and a group of Marines who were doing an amphibious landing in I Corps.

And uh he was um seriously wounded, but uh protected the Marines from that.

And uh I was impressed by that.

I went on to serve with him again when I was the executive officer of a guided missile destroyer in the Mediterranean in the height of the Cold War.

It seems like I spent a lot of my life in the Mediterranean and the Norwegian Sea tracking Soviet submarines.

And uh I drew some delight in making life miserable for those Soviet submarine crews because I always wanted the captain of those uh Soviet submarines to be thinking, does he know where I am?

Does he have contact on me?

And we did.

Not only we had contact on him, we had a firing solution on him because if the time came, I wanted at a moment's notice to put a Mark 46 torpedo in the pre-hispressure hall.

Um that was one of the reasons that one of many reasons the Soviet uh Empire fell uh during those days.

Um I went on to serve with uh Admiral Robinson again.

He uh kept moving on and up, and he became the uh surface force commander of the Pacific Fleet, and he controlled all of the assignments.

And um I was given the uh assignment given the uh uh the charge to take over a uh uh an assault uh aircraft carrier.

It was 900 feet long, it had a displacement of 42,000 tons, it was big ship, had 35 aircraft, but more importantly, it had a crew of 1200 sailors and eighteen hundred embarked marines, and uh it was an honor and pleasure to serve in that uh capacity.

Um the Navy's meant a lot to me, and I kind of wanted to give that background about how I came to serve in an institution that I love and I wanted to honor on their 250th birthday.

So I will now read the proclamation, Scott.

Yeah, thank you.

Whereas on October 13th, 1775, a resolution of the Continental Congress established what is now the United States Navy with a swift sailing ship to carry 10 carriage guns and a proportional number of swivels of 80 men and it'd be fitted with all possible dispatch for a crews of three months.

And whereas the United States of America boasts the world's finest Navy, which is guaranteed the freedom of the seas for over 80 years, and on October 13th, 2025, the nation will join the courageous men and women of the Sea Service in celebrating 250 years of advancing American foreign policy, and when necessary, defeating the foes of freedom.

And whereas on October 13th, the city of Milwaukee proudly recognizes the dedication and bravery by the sailors of the Navy who've given unselfishly of themselves in the high seas and the sacrifice and support of their families during frequent separations from their loved ones.

And whereas the residents of Milwaukee wish all active and veteran shipmates a happy 250th anniversary, and may the United States Sea Service continue to enjoy fair winds at following cities.

Mayor Beatty, you have the comment.

I have the con.

Now, therefore, I, Lisa Batty, Mayor of the City of Milwaukee, a municipal corporation in the county of Clackhamus in the state of Oregon to hereby proclaim October 13th, 2025 as United States Navy 250th anniversary day, as our sailors stand to watch around the clock on the seven seas.

Thank you, Councillor Massey.

It was lovely to hear your history.

Um that's it for proclamations this week.

Um now we have the City of Peace proposal uh being introduced by Councillor Adam Kostrabani and Council President Will Anderson with a visitor from the Rotary, I believe, or maybe two visitors from the rotary.

Uh yeah, thank you, Mayor.

Um the council liaison to Rotary.

Um, and one of the best parts about Rotary uh being the liaison is attending the meetings and seeing the great work that our Rotarians do, uh, not just on meeting days, but every day, not only around our city, but uh in our community as general and all around the world, really.

Uh Mr.

Potts, who is a member of the Milwaukee Rudy Club, um, had expressed uh interest in sharing a potential uh uh achievement for the city, really, and to be designated as a city of peace.

Um, and I think right now, uh, with things going on not only around the world but in our own backyards, um, this is something that's uh of great importance.

So without further ado, I will turn it over to Mr.

Potts.

Thank you very much, Adam.

Ms.

Mayor, esteemed city counselors, thank you so much for this opportunity to discuss the potential for the city of Milwaukee, Oregon being registered as an international city of peace.

Pardon?

Oh, okay, thank you.

I'm I'm new to this.

Okay.

Um peace building committee.

Oh, by the way, you should have a packet of information in front of each of you.

I just like to go through it real quickly here.

Um I am the uh peace building chair of the Rotary Club of Milwaukee, and our peace building committee um has proposed to our board of directors that we begin the process of designating the city of Milwaukee, Oregon as an international city of peace.

This program is supported by Rotaries Peace Clubs as well as other organizations.

The board unanimously approved the idea.

We would like the city of Milwaukee, Oregon to also approve the application to become an international city of peace.

There are nearly 450 international cities of peace spanning 70 countries and six continents to be considered an international city of peace.

The following must be provided on the registration website.

And I've given you the uh website on the uh page there.

The contact is a primary liaison between Milwaukee and the International Cities of Peace Organization would be me.

I'm volunteering for that.

General information about our community and the primary liaison between Milwaukee and the Association of Member International Cities of Peace, me will provide information about items of peace building and vocational service committees of the Rotary Club of Milwaukee have performed around the Milwaukee area and offer other members of the board an opportunity to provide their input.

The City of Milwaukee will also be able to provide input.

And on the second page, our vocational service efforts.

Participating in this vision and mission statement, with me leading the effort.

And the city of Milwaukee will also have the opportunity to help with this vision and mission statement.

Two others as signatories with emails, uh these will not be seen on our profile.

President Whitney, um, our current president of the Rotary Club of Milwaukee is volunteer to be one of the signatories.

And I obviously cannot be one.

So our immediate past president, uh Rosie will be the second signatory.

Uh we will submit one to three photos.

And if you look at the package, you'll see the two photos that I am proposing.

And if the city would like to propose a third photo that uh represents our efforts for peace in the city of Milwaukee, then we will add that one as well.

We also have an option of up to two documents, and uh they will tell if they will uh outline information about the Rotary Club of Milwaukee's current and historical contributions to the community, and we're also going to uh provide the city a chance to provide the second document that they would like to.

And I'd like to read our mission statement for the Rotary Club of Milwaukee to honor the rotary ideal of service above self, the Milwaukee Rotary Club strengthens both local and worldwide community by supporting programs that enhance the health, safety, education, self-sufficiency, success, and well-being of people.

After completing the draft of the items above, I propose submitting those proposed items to the board of the Rotary Club of Milwaukee as well as to a representative of the city council for approval for submitting the application.

There are multiple levels of the registration for the international cities of peace.

I am proposing the first level of which there is no charge to the city or anyone.

And uh also uh just to throw this out real quickly.

Uh I'm not sure if everybody has heard this, but uh we have been added to the Oregon Peace Trail, which was originally uh started at the uh end of the Oregon Trail at Oregon City, and then went all the way down I-5 and to Ashland.

And since then, it has been extended up through Milwaukee into Portland, and they're looking at actually extending it up into Washington as well as down into California.

Do you have any questions?

Um, I will uh I guess I have a couple questions.

But first, I want to say I really commend you.

I know you have been working on peace initiatives with the Rotary for a long time.

I remember being uh, I think I was still on Planning Commission, maybe when you came around for the first peace poll.

And the peace poll at that time was a new concept to me, but I have now seen them in uh Australia, uh Costa Rica.

Seen them in many places on my travels.

Um they don't always, they're not always in light, they don't always look like the ones we have here, but there's some variation on that in multiple languages.

Um I I applaud your your commitment to that cause.

Um in terms of what you're asking us for tonight.

Um, I feel like we all got a packet that we didn't get a chance to see.

I don't know if these guys got a chance to see it and want to um speak to it.

Uh or think that we need to take this back and come back at another time to discuss or how do you um I mean I I've looked at it, and if you guys want to have a second to, or not a second, but take time to look at it.

Um, it's pretty straightforward.

Um, it's nothing in there that is gonna require, you know, and uh staff lift or administrative lift, really.

Um I I think it's a it's pretty clear cut um on this.

But uh obviously, yeah, this is no information for the rest of you here if you'd like to look about making a decision or even directing staff to work with Mr.

Potts for moving this forward.

Um, I'm okay with that.

Yeah, CP so yeah, absolutely.

Um I really appreciate the commander saying all the work that you're doing.

And thank you.

We've got rotary folks in the audience here tonight.

Um I do appreciate our club is very active and support.

Thank you very much.

I guess I turn to the city manager to see if she feels like the city's had uh a chance to look through this, or do we should we take a pause and come back to it next meeting?

Thanks, Mayor.

I think from the from a city operational standpoint, I don't um have any qualms about this.

I do appreciate David reached out to me quite a while ago and I I mentioned it needs to be a council of conversation, but you know, I think we've we've uh uh clearly considered other similar types of things becoming a tree city or a B city that have a lot more uh of an ask or a lift from the city in this one.

Again, I appreciate David's really doing all of that.

So it's more if it isn't if it's the firm's in a lines with the city's values.

I don't have concerns or need to consider it longer, but I respect if you all feel you need to.

Okay, I appreciate that.

I read the uh package uh that was on the table on the dice here uh before the the uh the council meeting kicked off, and I'm I'm perfectly uh uh satisfied to move forward.

Um thanks, Mary.

Thank you, David.

Um I've been a part of putting peace um polls in in various places, and it's a really it's a really nice unifying um impact for community.

Um and I think the world could use a little bit more peace right now.

Amen.

I'm in favor.

Okay.

So do we need a motion?

I guess you want to you guys want to make a motion?

What is the motion for?

A sign on to Yeah.

Yeah.

I move for the city of Milwaukee to sign on as an international city of peace.

Uh second.

It's been moved and seconded for the city of Milwaukee to sign on as an international city of peace with the assistance of Mr.

Potts to get us there.

Uh all those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Opposed, say no.

None heard.

Passes unanimously.

Thank you for your work on this.

Thank you, Ms.

While we have our wonderful Rotarians here.

May I just remind you we have two seats left at the boots and crystals gala next Friday?

I will be there.

Three of you, four of you, I think will be there.

So don't miss out.

And she's the one with boots.

I'm gonna come in and see if I it's a rent boots.

I I don't have those either.

Okay.

Uh all right.

Um this is the part of the agenda during which council will hear community comments on city business that is not on the agenda.

Before we begin, is there follow-up from the September 16th comments, Ms.

Sager?

Thank you, Mayor.

Um, there were there's no comments from that meeting to follow up on, but we did receive two um pieces of correspondence in between that meeting and now that I'd like to briefly um address.

They were included in your packet.

Uh the first was a letter from um Diana Schaefer referring to um uh traffic conditions and a fatal crash, unfortunately on River Road, and asking sort of what is the city's response to speeding and unsafe conditions on the McLaughlin corridor.

We completely agree the crash that occurred on August 31st this year is absolutely tragic.

In this case, it was not just a matter of speeding.

The person was unfortunately high on methodamine, ran a red light during low traffic time at night.

Um, as much as I like to believe that any efforts we can take in enforcement could stop all crashes.

Sadly, I think this one was just a truly tragic event.

Um I have spoken with our police department.

99E is the corridor that we patrol the most, and um absolutely agree that it is one of our lately safe corridors.

Um upon receiving this this message, the captain, Captain Cheragino and I to discuss, and we actually increase patrols on 99E.

Um, we also are um confident and looking forward to the implementation of the red light and speed on green program that we're planning to launch next year, which would include 99E, because again, speed is um uh a significant factor of safety there.

Um, so again, we can't we can't control for every terrible incident, but we absolutely hear Ms.

Schaper's concerns and I take them seriously.

I also just want to note one of the things in that comment was about um what Ms.

Schaefer perceived as a dismissive response from a police officer.

And speaking for myself, Captain Cheragino and Chief Burdick, I just want to say that that's unacceptable by our standards.

Um we didn't, well, the letter did not name who the officer was.

Captain Cheragino uh took it upon himself immediately upon receiving it to send a letter to the entire police department reiterating his uh expectations and standards of customer service.

While yes, um it is true we can't solve every single uh challenge.

Uh we absolutely can always engage, hear the concerns of our community and take them seriously, and we're really sorry if that's not the standard that we met in this case.

Uh the second letter that we received was um from an anonymous sender uh about a variety of concerns around um uh residences and establishments along Lake Road, things about commercial buildings, uh burning in backyards, etc.

So just a few quick updates there.

Um there is no burning allowed right now at all in Clackamas County.

Um, and it's illegal in all of Oregon to burn garbage.

Um all complaints related to burning should be directed to DEQ.

But uh, upon receiving this, we will we will work to get more um information out to the public via social media and the pilot um sharing what to do if you do notice um illegal burning.

Um there were some code enforcement issues uh on Lake Road and Boss, and those have been um dealt with now by code enforcement.

We appreciate the community bringing those to our attention and we'll continue to monitor the property.

Um, and then we uh there was some concerns about loud mufflers, which we very much share.

The challenge with noise is uh it's so annoying, and it's also very tricky to enforce because unless you can really understand where that the person creating that noise lives, it's very hard to follow up on.

Um so it's a bit of a needle in a haystack, uh, but we'll continue to you know, please do continue to let us know if you have concerns, and we're always happy to look into them.

Um reminder from Captain Tiorgu, everything mentioned if you have concerns, it's always helpful to have an address when folks want to um uh provide uh code concerns to our attention that helps us address them much more quickly.

Yeah, there was a lot of of vagueness in this letter in terms of the properties in question.

There was a question I had in that, which is the thing about the mufflers, which is I mean, I remember, you know, in the 80s, like loud cars or loud cars was a thing, and then it seemed like it kind of went away, and now it seems like it's come back.

Has the law changed about um what's allowable in terms of the amount of noise generated by cars, or is it just like a lot of people who are doing self improved self uh improvements of their cars?

It's a great question.

I don't know the answer to.

I can look into it, but I I feel like I've seen the same trend.

Yeah.

Yeah, now we both have EVs that are so quiet and they're really loud mufflers.

It really does.

I mean, I have noticed it since COVID since probably the last two or three summers that the loud the loud cars seem to be a thing that they weren't 10 years ago.

So I was curious about that.

Um with that, um, so I do have two, I have three yellow cards, but one is about a later uh oh, two of them are about later items.

Okay, I wasn't actually intending to take public testimony during that, but okay.

Um so I have one for community comments.

Um those in person who wish to speak, please submit a yellow comment card found on the table.

If you are on Zoom, please choose the raise hand reaction to alert staff that you wish to speak.

And when instructed to click the microphone button to unmute yourself.

If you are calling in through Zoom and would like to make a comment, dial star nine to raise your hand.

You may also submit a comment via email to OCR at Milwaukee Oregon.gov.

Before you make your comments, please state your name and city of residence for the record.

If you would like the city to follow up with you, please submit your contact information to OCR at Milwaukee Oregon.gov.

As council has other business items on the agenda this evening, speakers will be limited to three minutes each.

Because information provided during community comments may be new.

This is not the time for discussion.

The city manager will respond at the next meeting to comments that require follow-up.

So I have one uh commenter, Deborah is it Taurus?

Okay, Deborah, please come forward and hit the little button so that the red light comes on.

Thank you.

I won't bother reading this because I know all of you got a copy of this.

And so I I'm not quite sure what you just said about giving comment, but I thought I would yield the floor.

And notice that Brent from the library is here too, and he's welcome to make comment about the situation.

Well, we did get something in writing.

We got it fairly close to meeting time, so I don't know if everyone got a chance to read it.

Um, but yeah, typically we give you the three minutes to repeat, say whatever you'd like to say, and then at the next meeting, the city manager responds.

I mean, we're not breaking with that tradition today, so I don't expect Brent or the City Manager to comment, correct?

Correct me, or I'll plan to respond at the next meeting, the October 21st meeting.

Okay.

So if you'd like to take three minutes to discuss it, you are welcome to do so, or we could just rest on the written submission, which goes in our records.

Okay.

Okay.

Thank you.

Okay.

With that, we move on to the consent agenda.

Um, tonight's consent agenda includes minutes of the city council September 2nd, 2025 work session and September 2nd, 2025 regular session, and a motion to approve an Oregon Liquor and Cannabis Commission application for Premier Cruise 11812 Stanley Avenue.

New license.

Does any council member wish to remove a consent agenda item?

Seeing none, I will entertain a motion.

Move to approve the consent agenda as presented.

Second.

Is it moved and seconded to approve the consent agenda as presented?

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Opposed say no.

Uh none heard.

The consent agenda passes unanimously.

Uh okay.

With that, we move on to our naming policy.

And uh for that, it's our equity inclusion coordinator Gabriela Santoyo Gutierrez and Parks and Green Space Development Manager Adam Moore.

Okay.

Thank you, City Council and Mayor Beatty for having us here tonight.

Adam and I are excited to share an update on our completed draft of the citywide meeting policy.

Um for tonight's update, we'll recap policy purpose.

Report who were the people involved and what did our timeline look like.

This one's possible.

This is the screen that's supposed to be.

Thank you.

All right, now that the slide is on track, back.

Okay, we'll recap um the policy purpose.

We'll report who were the people involved and what our timeline looked like.

This will follow also with a high-level overview of what the naming policy looks like and the process itself, as well as its partnered policy for memorial and donations.

Then we'll open it up for larger discussion and feedback and how we can improve the policy.

And some of those comments we've already seen beforehand, but this is a great period to do so as well.

Okay, with that, I'll transition it over to my colleague Adam Moore to provide more information about the background and the need for the naming policy itself.

Good evening, Council.

So the two policies that you see before you are community-led policies that Gabrielle and I facilitated over the last uh seven months or so.

Um the purpose of this policy is to create a systematic process for naming or renaming city facilities, uh parks and green spaces.

Uh, as we worked with the community groups, uh, which are made up of members of both the equity steering committee and the parks and rec board.

Uh we determined that we needed to expand that scope a little bit.

And so that's why instead of just writing a naming policy, we also have a memorial and donation policy to go along with it.

Um, but the key focus for our work was to inject equity into the process for naming or renaming assets and to fill in gaps from the existing 2000 policy.

Part of the motivation from this comes from work that the city has been doing where we had uh requests to name specific amenities inside parks or discussions with staff about the potential for naming rights um based upon donations, and that was a key, I think, feature inside of the 2000 policy.

And so we put those conversations on pause until we had an opportunity to uh write this new policy.

Uh a lot of the motivation for uh starting this this policy now is that we just completed building three new parks.

Uh two of them are just known by their street names, where those street names come from.

We're not exactly sure, but there's been a desire over the last few years to give L Floor and Bill Linberry Park some intentional names that fit the community and the community's values, and we didn't want to do that until we wrote this new policy.

Yeah, I think just to add, and you can attach on this a little bit too.

There was for sure some negative impact, not having had a policy or even awareness that the policy policy existed itself, the stall projects or prevented meaningful ways of honoring community members, and this extended even to the library, library foundation, parks and parks foundation.

And so uh as I mentioned, this was a community-led uh policy drafting.

Um we invited the Parks and Report and Equity Steering Committee to select their own members to join Gabriela and I for what was supposed to be just a six-month process.

Um obviously, we've uh got really into the nuts and bolts of all of this and had some really great discussions uh early on with our committee.

Um, but ultimately we wound up with Gary Klein and Max Pennick from the Parks and Rec Board and Anessa Korzinowski and uh Shana Justice working with us from the equity steering committee.

Uh these volunteers put in a tremendous amount of effort, not just uh coming to or not just going to their existing committee or board commitments, but sometimes meeting with Gabriella and I twice a month.

Um, and we really put a lot of effort into that.

The uh initial work uh was research-based, looking at uh case studies from the area and really you know having the community members scrutinize uh what we had in the past and where we were going.

Yeah, so just to add to that again, yeah, big kudos to Gary, Max, Anissa, and Shayna.

Um, as you mentioned on top of meeting with their subcommittees.

This is again volunteer work that they're doing, not only within their current committees, but also um uh that's work from their families.

That's connection to responsibilities there.

And so this this is additional meeting time, but they're very passionate about this work and uh yeah, just wanted to add that in there.

And then last but not least, there was, of course, some leadership overview.

Um, we wanted to give kudos as well to our city recorder, our climate and natural resource manager, our library director, and public works director.

And one thing I do want to mention is uh, you know, Gary Klein is uh, or at least his family is directly impacted from some of the work on these policies.

Uh, Gary and his brothers donated what is now known as Klein Point, inside of Milwaukee Bay Point to the city.

Um, that uh agreement with the city is one that the policies suggest that we are.

These two policies are about looking forward.

We're not looking to rewrite previous agreements unless we would go through a public process for renaming, uh, which we will get into further.

But but this policy really impacted Gary, and it was important for us to work with people who had uh literally stakes in the game here to make sure that we we can work to get this right.

Yeah, thanks, Adam.

I know we mentioned that as well in our staff report too.

Okay, let's see this timeline.

All right.

In terms of our working timeline, um we again we met earlier this year up in February, met once a month, sometimes twice a month.

Um we had very thoughtful conversations that included just the risks of naming after individuals themselves.

And we also recognize how naming practices have historically been exclusionary by disproportionately uh honoring wealthy individuals and particularly white men.

Um, and this led to establishing more uh intentional naming criteria when it comes to naming after individuals, and we'll touch on that as well as in a later slide.

But with research, uh we compared city policy, some of those included the city of Portland, Lake Oswego, NCPRD, and we mainly pulled from NCPRDs and Portland's policy.

Um, and they later helped us develop as well the purpose, the scope, and definitions in that first term.

Um, then in our second term, we drafted procedures, donations, and special considerations.

And a part of this why this extended over six months was this included conversations about naming after individuals who are still living or who have passed as well, and deceased, and the subcommittee as well as the full ESC and full PAR committee members ultimately decided to only name facilities and city assets after deceased individuals.

And this was a big conversation that eventually we took to our full committees to confirm.

Um from August up until now, uh we developed a separate memorial and donation policy to honor both living and deceased individuals, um, and then shared our working draft with leadership to review, which we incorporated their edits, and this led to the policy uh that we all have drafted today and were in reviewed.

Um Gabriella touched on much of this, but one thing that was very clear through all of our work with the subcommittee meetings and when we heard back from the full equity steering committee and the parks and direct board is that we wanted to uh avoid situations where it appeared that the city was selling the baby rights.

We didn't want to get into situations where we were accepting donations uh for individual amenities inside parks or facilities.

We're not going to name the drinking fountain, we're not going to name the playground.

Um, and we're not going to sell the names of our buildings or our parks or our open spaces.

Now finding a way to recognize that we don't have enough parkland.

We don't have enough money to develop those parks, right?

We are always looking for communities to work with us and get involved.

And so we had to try to find a balance, right?

And what is that balance that we're looking for?

And we looked towards uh these those other regional policies as Getriola mentioned.

So that's the city of Portland that's in CPRD.

That's uh to Walton Hills, Parks and Rectors for THPRDs are known, Lake Oswegal, Oregon City.

I think there were six or seven different policies that we looked at and ultimately pulled mostly from Portland and N CPRD on that.

Great.

There we go.

Okay.

Now we're gonna dive into the policy process itself and bear with me.

I know policy talk is everybody's favorite.

Um, so one of the first steps when it comes to uh uh naming policy and kicking those off, and it could be internal or externally driven.

Um submissions will go to the OCR uh email account or connection and determine to move forward by the mayor or mayor design.

Once decided to move forward, public notification will be sent out through the city's communication channels to be solicited for public submissions for naming or renaming the city asset.

Then a minimum of 45 days will be provided for the public submission process through this could be printed forms, this could be emailed to the city reporter's office, this could be uh online and engaged Milwaukee.

We want to create multiple avenues for submissions to be able to be submitted.

Um, and then following that and the closing deadline, city staff will collect all the submissions, prepare them for the naming subcommittee to review.

And just to clarify, once over the subcommittee members are appointed in the policy by mayor and or a designee, and a staff liaison will be appointed by the city manager to help facilitate that process.

After that, the naming sub the naming committee will review and reconvene within two months following the submission deadline to review naming proposals, along with conducting any additional research for the naming submissions or one that the group is leaning towards pretty majority-wise.

So can I just ask a clarifying question?

Is this process uh say renaming public requests?

So the city says, okay, we've you know, we think we should think about names for Valfur and Mob and Gray, because you know, why just name them after the streets?

And we put out a call, but also conversely, somebody out there doesn't feel like somebody else needs to be honored instead of some other person, Wichita or whatever.

Um is this process the same for both, whether it's initiated by the city or initiated by someone just submitting a request, or are we not taking requests, one-off requests like that?

We will take requests, you know.

So the renaming process is meant to be community driven uh unless it's initiated by a city.

So the differences in this policy would be that um a community member would email LCR, we would review that and the justifications that they are providing for the renaming, and then it would be up to under this policy the mayor of the design whether or not we are going to move forward.

If we decide to move forward, just like with the rest of the policy, we would then go through those initial steps.

Um ultimately, even though there is this you know subcommittee work, which would be then reviewed by staff, the final decisions on any naming or renaming would come to city council.

So with naming city council would be given the top recommendation from the subcommittee, and then have an opportunity to either select that name, uh reject that name and tell the committee to get back to work, or look at one of the other names on the list and choose those, or might even recommend a name to the committee.

The differences with renaming is the first decision was are we going to actually rename this?

So someone submits a uh application for rename which it's all part, they make good justification.

The mayor decides to move forward, we do our 45 days, we prepare our submissions, we have our staff review after the subcommittee works.

Council would then decide yes or no, are we gonna name rename which at all was there enough uh uh research and justification provided, and then you would decide on which name to select.

So I guess my only worry about that is if it's can all come in off one off.

Uh we could be having a committee every year, you know, I guess, as opposed to sort of doing a call that yeah, but I mean maybe that's still maybe that's all right.

I just I think it's a really good point, mayor.

I think that the re the this the power of the mayor, the mayor designee is to kind of uh throttle that too, and maybe say, like, hey, we've got this request.

I don't actually think right now is the right time, so we're gonna hold it or we're gonna wait till you know it's been a year.

We've got another one in the hopper.

Yeah.

Um so I think I think that was sort of the intent.

Okay, correct.

Okay.

Yeah, so they're very similar in processes.

I think only just additional comment was that um some reasonable reasonable efforts will be made to uh contact or connect with the party impacted, so who the name was previous for or connection there.

So there's a research piece that's also needed.

Okay, great.

Thank you.

And you know, I would say that you know, these questions and these comments, this is exactly why we're here.

You know, we were six people working together, and while we tried to consider all of the facets of it, you know, we wanted to bring it back to all of you, the experts, and to the public to to get some feedback with moving forward.

Yeah.

Okay.

Thank you.

Yeah.

Okay.

So after the subcommittee receives some of those submissions and research, um, we'll kind of uh narrow down and majority of the members who come to agreement for a naming recommendation that will then follow to staff for review.

Um, and the staff review of the leadership include city manager, city attorney, the city recorder, and that is also to mirror a little bit similar processes to a staff report.

Um, and that then after that is research and additionally move forward, then that will go to city council.

Um for the city council kind of update the staff liaison and a naming committee representative will be part of that conversation and update and proposal.

And then once that's been presented, um, this the decision uh of how the council wants to move forward has been made.

We will have reasonable communication for the name out to the community and community members to be shared.

So we'll adjust the language.

I think there was a comment about after that decision made about appeals.

I think we're gonna do the instead um request for reconsideration can be submitted.

So there's still an avenue there for communication.

And I also know that uh there were some questions about what form this name takes.

And so, yes, we think that a resolution would probably be in order uh adopting the name once it's selected.

Um, in terms of updating maps and things like that, uh all of our regional mapping data is housed by Metro.

So you can go on there and they have a public land uh shape file uh that covers all of Metro that is periodically updated.

Um, and so we would include new names in that existing update that happens, and then if we filter on through the submission, you know, if we want to uh update uh Google or Apple maps uh a little bit quicker, they do accept crowdsourced data and and also data and information from municipalities, and it's something that we actually do quite often as the city.

So we can make sure that we're communicating with everybody the proper name and getting that name out there uh in the appropriate matters.

Yeah.

I will note, I mean, in this day and age of you know online maps and not people not having the old what were those called, Thomas guides and things.

Um hopefully, yeah, things get updated more quickly.

But I will say that um it's not been that long ago that I haven't had somebody ask me for Peter Kerr Park, which is what Spring Park apparently was named at one point, or El Paca, one or the other.

Um, and I'm like your group, you know.

So I do think sometimes those old names live on way past when the community is calling it something else.

So I'm interested to learn that Metro is the keeper of that.

So I will keep that in mind.

We'll definitely also add that follow-up language, I think, into this too as needed.

All right, I think on the last note for this slide, um, we just wanted to clarify that the policy limits naming to full properties or buildings, except for internal public-facing rooms and buildings in which the city manager or city designee can oversee.

Okay.

And to dive a little bit more into the naming um process itself, but categories, I kind of decide if we're gonna name after individual.

Here's a little bit of the standard and criteria.

Um part of that is geographical, geographic or special features.

This is place name base.

This could be street, subdivision, area.

Um, Adam already gave examples of a few parks names and how those were established, uh, but still not knowing the origins.

Uh, there is historic opportunity, right?

So connections or references in the past to educate the community about historical context or connections to the land or facility.

Um, there is indigenous or cultural connections when we added language in there, can be applicable with consideration for tribal governments or um cultural communities involved.

Um, there's also native flora or fauna, and this includes uh connection to nature for native plants or animal life.

Um, and then the last other category is for naming for outstanding individuals, and this is for naming after an outstanding diseased individual where a person's significance has been accepted in the city, state's county, or nation's history, and it meets one or more of the following.

This includes the person was exceptionally dedicated or demonstrated excellence in service ways that made a significant impact to the land, community, city of Milwaukee counter state county, state, or the nation.

The person volunteered and gave extraordinary help or care.

Uh, to individuals, families, or groups, or support of the community.

The person risked their life to save or protect others, and or the person demonstrated commitment commitment to equity, inclusion, and justice.

These are some of those categories and standards.

Um, but we do want to know that in creating and uh thoughtful conversations around the naming uh criteria and categories.

We wanted to distinguish that a donation does not necessarily equate an outstanding individual, those are separate items.

And so in the policy we have written when it comes to significant donations or donators being interested in naming, they can be considered when a threshold of one of the full more of the following is met.

Um and I think we have that, yeah, at the bottom bullet point of that slide, and that is um land for 51% of the park or facility was deeded to the city by the donor, a contribution of a minimum of 60% of the capital construction costs associated with the development of the park or facility, or a provision of a minimum 20-year endowment for the continued maintenance operation and or programming of the park or facility are given.

And it's also important to know that if donors are seeking a naming asset are associated with a major donation or honoring of an individual, and must still follow the naming categories uh that apply to the naming asset.

So the recognition their recommendation can be considered by the naming committee and will follow the rest of the uh procedures listed for the naming uh process where council has the ultimate decision making.

And just to add on to that, um the what we just described um was seeing in the majority of the different policies from the region that we recognized.

We are not reinventing the wheel here.

We are pulling what we felt are the most Milwaukee pieces from those different policies that we looked at and editing to fit our community's values.

And so this was one that again going back to avoiding the perception of selling naming rights.

Um, this is something that the subcommittee felt very strongly about, including.

You may also notice in some of those other policies that exist out there, there's a waiting period after someone deceased, uh after someone dies.

Um our committee didn't feel as though a waiting period was necessary.

They felt as though those submissions could be made right away, and that the uh procedures in this policy were long enough to wait.

Go ahead.

Can I ask a clarification question?

Yeah, I'm sorry, I know I reviewed this many times, but I always think in scenarios.

So in the case of let's let's pick a fake name for a benefactor.

Uh Jim.

I was gonna go with Phil Knight, but we'll go with Jim.

Jim gives 60% uh of the capital expenses for something.

Jim then request a name of the subcommittee that meets the criteria, but it can't be Jim Park because Jim's still alive.

So it'd have to be some, you know, it could be it could be about a person, but have to fit these criteria and be someone deceased.

Would we still, for your last slide, do a public call for other submissions as well?

So you'd have Jim's idea and anything else at the public brought correct.

So if Jim wanted to recommend, okay, we're gonna name this after Jim Senior, right?

We would make that announcement that yes, we are moving forward with naming this new asset or renaming the asset.

Um, and we are proposing opening up some community to make some suggestions because it's not guaranteed that it would be Jim Senior Park.

Good question.

Counselor Anderson.

Um I guess two kind of standpoints I have with naming for outstanding individuals.

Um we say city, state, or patients history, but I'm curious why limit it, like why not allow for an else of Mendelaway or something more international as well.

Yeah.

Um this is not intentional at all to limit that, so we can definitely open that up.

Okay.

And I guess the other thing then is to me, it feels like broadening the first definition of the bullet point, naming after an outstanding deceased individual is allowed, or the person's significance has been accepted in this geographical unit's history.

I think that in calling out four separate categories that all to me are inclusive of the original category.

I I just don't see a reason to really call out these things.

To me, it is almost like it just seems overly prescriptive.

The fact that someone who gave their life is not obviously someone who has shown that they're an outstanding deceased individual.

Um it's kind of implicit in the act, and I don't think we need to call it out for any of those things.

I think the definition is broad enough, and I worry that by enumerating some things we're leaving out other things, and I think better to just leave the initial broad statement again.

Yeah, the conversations over what to define and how to do write those definitions was something that we spent a great deal of time on.

And I think where the committee landed was we would rather write a definition and present it to all of you than not have those things to find.

Um what do you what do you look can you uh identify the section that you're talking about?

Yeah, on page 34 of the regular session packet, there's bullet point naming for outstanding individuals.

Um those are summarized on the screen there with those first four bullets.

Yes.

I think the text would cover everything that's there if it just said naming after an outstanding deceased individual is allowed or the person's significance has been accepted in the city, state and/or nation, or now we're gonna say world's history, period.

And I think that by enumerating 341 on mine it says RS.

Oh, sorry, the page is 34, but it's RS31.

Thank you.

Um, thank you.

Um I just feel like inevitably we're gonna leave a sub-bullet off, and as opposed to trying to find every sub-bullet, it seems to me better policy just to say the larger principle and not have to imply that for some reason use of the only groups, or that these groups even need to be mentioned because to me it's implicit that these would be included.

Okay.

So are you saying take off one through four?

I just leave the take off two through four.

Uh key the first one.

I'm saying take off one through four and just leave the initial statement, naming for outstanding individuals, keep everything up to history and add in blow or world or whatever placeholder for the world.

And I think it's broad enough that it covers everything that saves us from we've forgotten one bullet point.

Oh, to avoid the one or more of the following.

And to your point is also that it's it's a bit repetitive in that and and it could be exclusionary in listing it out.

Okay.

Thanks for that.

And I think that's more semantic, but I don't think that changes anything about the learning policy.

Um, but I prefer when we make these statements to just do a broad statement as opposed to just before we move on to any other comments.

We we will need to make sure like we've got consensus on making any edits.

So thank you, Council President.

I would prefer to you want us to discuss that now.

I think probably it's cleanest if every idea raised, we kind of go through and see is it ready there so that we can check that off and move forward.

Okay.

Um, Counselor Massy, did you're you're not gonna goose is about something else.

Okay.

Uh anyone else who wants to talk about the suggestion of going with just I will just say I think I mean I I get the point that creating a list does have a tendency to exclude things that aren't on the list.

So I think that is a good point.

I kind of like the uh the more the description and point in number one better than the description up above.

Uh you know, dedicated and or demonstrated excellence of service in ways that made a significant impact.

Um I do think the uh number, the risk of risk of life.

You know, I think about Morgan City, which had a police officer killed in the line of duty, and I think they named their police station after their new public safety building when they did that.

Um so I mean I think that's kind of what motivates some of the some of those enumerated things.

But could you type the point that you know that can be encompassed in one statement?

Are you saying replace the naming of S any individuals with just what bullet point one says or include the include the description and then use number one as yeah, I would massage the language and make number one and the top into one thought, but I I think I like what number one says better than just stopping the word history above personally?

Um step views generally generally I enjoy editing in public and even more so by committee.

Just completely fulfilled.

I think this is a great deal of work, and I really appreciate the time that went into it and the dedication of the committee members that put in their time, and um I don't see any opposition to the friendly edits that have been proposed.

All right, okay.

Oh yeah, I just have a question on the same part here, not on the same uh bullet point, but uh at the bottom towards the bottom of RS31, it says city manager may approve temporary or minor naming decisions, which is fine because we love our city manager, but what would be the example of a temporary or minor naming decision?

So we we've had you know uh the Belford property or the property on Belfort Street, or it became known as Belfort Park, that would be considered a temporary name.

We got a new NetLand something until we come up with the the new name following this process.

Uh minor ones would be like internal buildings or internal rooms, right?

We have meeting rooms and conference rooms that only see staff reserve, right?

And so you know the city manager can can we we hope can handle uh facilitating those sorts of naming.

I don't know.

She does have like a new mascot every time we meet.

And then took some of them down.

It's the whole thing.

And took those nameplates down because we lacked this policy at the time.

Yes.

Yeah.

Um so it just okay.

I want to, I'm sorry to be pedantic, but I think I'm hearing no opposition to the friendly edits that would consolidate the definition of an outstanding individual so that it's kind of a match or a mix of what's existing there in the top sentence and bullet one, like get rid of the four sub-bullets.

And the only actual substantive thing was add international and add international.

You got it.

Going one device.

Okay.

Would you like to put your goose back up?

Counselor mask?

Okay.

Comfortable moving forward.

Oh.

Um, this is not policy related.

This is not really policy related, and and you folks have done a good job uh, you know, putting this framework together.

I gotta tell you, I the naming review committee looks clunky to me.

What I mean by clunky, it's kind of like uh we're gonna form this ad hoc group and it's gonna come from this this people and that people and that kind of thing, and they're gonna tackle this, and it just it seemed like this is just gonna take a long time.

So why wouldn't we just say, you know, one person from ES from equity steering, one person from parks, and uh and one person from some other they're the naming committee for this year because uh that's cleaner.

I think it splits things up, and you know, like if you have to have a uh uh a naming review committee for each name that comes up, and you establish this committee and they got what was it, 45 days or to convene or something like that.

And um then another name comes up.

Is that the same group?

Is there another group?

I just I just think it's cumbersome.

So the oh so just to make sure I'm I I'm understanding what you're saying, counselor, it's the appointment of a sub a naming subcommittee every time.

Could we just kind of clean up that process so it's a rep of ESC or up a barb?

I'm okay with that.

But you know, it's I I just say that we spent we're gonna spend a lot of time saying we're gonna end up with a as this thing goes on, we're gonna end up with a naming review committee for you know, for one place, and it's gonna have nine people in it because we just can't say no.

I guess question um do you want to try and work out all these edits at the size, or do you want to like have these questions raised for staff to think about it and come back again?

You're trying to avoid coming back again before adoption.

Um I think well, I think trying, I mean, always we would love to do this as expeditiously as possible, but bigger.

I just think we need to know direction.

So I I I can take taking a bunch of feedback, but not knowing if it's the opinion of one versus a consensus is hard to know if we're making those edits.

I will say I love that we're chopping up the bit to discuss.

Um, and I think you guys have all read your packet, which is great.

I assume you guys probably had a few more slides to kind of summarize the other policies.

We could get through that and then go into edits.

Okay, yeah.

Um that kind of cleans cleans things up.

Okay.

Then go ahead.

Let's let council finish this piece and then we'll get through the rest of the presentation and then take other edit.

Uh I think that that sounds like a great idea.

I think that would remove a lot of the maybe a friendly amendment would be you have three committees, ESC, library, and parks date each year after they form after boarding commission appointments, self-nominate one representative for the subcommittee, and that subcommittee stands for a year at a time.

Your library director dotted.

I think that's a great recommendation.

This was definitely a one that we were back and forth with who should be involved, who is continuous.

Yeah.

Okay.

We're gonna let you finish your slides before we start popping up more issues.

Don't worry, we have questions for you too.

Okay, I'll switch it over to Adam.

Okay, as I mentioned, uh, we we started this process focused mostly on how do we rename Bloom and Bray and Belfort Park.

And as we work through this and as we did our research, it quickly became apparent that even though we want this to we want our names moving forward to be grounded in equity and involve uh the community, we also recognize that there are often uh minor asks that are made of the city um where families want to uh create a memorial.

Um this is very commonly done uh through benches or trees or picnic tables.

Um we wanted to make sure that we created a policy that allowed people to make those donations.

It's important to note that when we're discussing this memorial and naming policy, that we would leave these up to the city manager or their uh designee um to make the decisions on um these donations and the plaque that would go with them.

Um the donation itself is not being named, right?

It's not gonna be Jim's bench or on the gym bench.

It's it's going to be a bench in a park, right?

With Jim Senior's name on that little plaque there, going back to our previous example.

Um this policy is almost entirely taken from NCPRD.

It is one that applies to our parks on our green spaces right now.

Uh, you may not notice it, but a good example would be going to like the Sarah High Tech uh Rose Garden.

There's about 40 benches in that park, and I think 38 of them have plaques on them right now.

These are plaques that NCPRD staff tracks um and follows.

Um we wanted to open that up a little bit, getting to try and find that balance.

We didn't want this just to be about memorials.

We wanted to make sure that we could also recognize donations.

And this comes from whether it's the library foundation who wants to make a donation to uh park capital in the project or outside their door, whether that's a neighborhood association who's donating money, um, which was a significant amount of money from them, um, but only a drop in the bucket towards the playground and then the larger park project at Belfort Park, finding ways that we could recognize them as well.

And we felt that the these two policies kind of fit well together.

So through an application process, uh someone would request that the city accept a donation in someone else's name, or um the city could choose on itself to recognize the donation of either a financial contribution or non-financial contribution.

We're looking for standard designs of these plaques.

Um, and again, we're not naming the area or the amenity, we're just providing the plaque to go there.

Um, the NCPRD policy recommends that these are time limited.

Uh, they use 20 years.

We copied that.

Um, and so we're only guaranteeing that that plaque is going to be there for 20 years.

There may come from time to time the need to move a bench or move a tree for other work that's going on there.

The city would do that and try to make uh reasonable uh considerations to whoever that bench or three is is named uh or is remembering.

Um again, this is not necessarily a fundraising policy, though it doesn't preclude the city from creating a sub uh fundraising policy.

And so just so I understand the sign on the and I've seen the ones at Sarah Hyde, but I don't really remember.

Do they say in memory of or are they just a name?

And and and I guess in reading the policy, I wasn't clear about what's uh on the item versus on a separate sign that's near the item, or is that just gonna vary based on the nature of what it the item is?

I think that would vary based on the nature of what the item is.

If it's a bench, then we can easily put a plaque on it.

If it's a picnic table, we can usually put a plaque on it.

Um we don't necessarily want to put a plaque on a tree.

Um, so you know, a rock next to the tree might be good.

Uh, a plaque on a rock or a plaque um near a playground.

Again, going back to that example of you know, an NDA donating to uh uh park construction project.

Um so it would be kind of handled on a case-by-case basis.

This policy leaves a lot of um decision making to the city manager or staff to do uh that in terms of what the plaque says um in the application.

The submitter would write what they would like it to say, and then they would work with city staff to make sure that it's appropriate.

Um we do have some guidelines as to what we felt was inappropriate, and again, that comes from the case studies that we've we've done looking into this.

Okay, council president?

So just for my understanding, contribution that's non-monetary.

If someone volunteers their time, their metro choice, we get a park here, thank goodness the person who volunteered their time to put that brand together things with that idea, they can celebrate it as a plaque or something like that.

Okay, thank you.

Yeah, the the subcommittee had no problem recognizing people for their contributions.

They just felt as though um, you know, a plaque in the space, um, and the public good that they're doing should be enough, not naming the entire park or naming the playground or the picnic table app or the and sorry that I don't remember this, but we we keep saying plaques.

Could this also apply to like bricks?

You know, how often if some if you're fundraising for like an amphitheater and everyone who donates a brick, you know, the name is on the brick, or is it very specific to plaque?

Uh well, we wrote this to be very specific.

Um, I think if we want to open that up, we can.

Um what you will see in this policy and uh its partner policy is uh a long line of things that these policies don't apply to, right?

And that was our work to try and narrow the focus on our work.

So you know, we said like this will not apply to public art or murals or wayfinding signage, right?

This is not a policy for how to cite a bench or a tree.

This is a policy of what to do when someone says, my grandmother died, she really liked that park.

I'd really like to donate a bench in their name near the pond that they like to go to, and this allows us to do that.

Um, and that's the purpose of that.

Um, you know, brief counselors and therapists recommend um people do these sorts of things.

So, you know, when my mom passed away, someone said, Hey, you know, you should really look into doing you know a public improvement.

And it's uh something that is pretty common.

And you know, our subcommittee felt like this is is more than appropriate uh for us for us to do.

But if we should you know, write either a fundraising policy or adapt this policy to allow for you know names on bricks as parts of fundraising campaigns, we can do that.

Yeah, so these are our examples, the memorial example and the donation example.

I think I went went through these.

Um, you know, this policy is meant to be flexible.

Um, it is not limited to the donation of a cost of a bench or the donation of a bench.

Um CPRD uh accepts donations for uh a lot of different things.

Um and so we wanted to again keep our policy flexible in it and matching those.

But um, since I've already talked about these uh examples, I don't uh think that there's any need for me to go through them.

And so where do we go from here?

Um, we're going to take your friendly edits and your feedback, and we're gonna bring it back to our subcommittee.

We're gonna meet with them and discuss it, and we're gonna massage that language and we're gonna start to think about some of the examples that were brought up here.

Um we hope to in December bring those these policies back to you to be approved by resolution, and then um tentatively, perhaps starting in January, we can work to uh create that uh whether that's a subcommittee or that small task group, um, however, wherever we land, we'd like to start that process um sooner rather than later.

Uh these parks have been open uh quite some time, and there's been a desire to rename them going back to um at least a planning process, if not before.

And so uh we would like to get that that process started once the policies are done, of course.

Okay.

Before I do uh have lay out a little bit of the questions we had, did anybody have any comments or other general feedback or response to the memorial policy?

I guess do you want us to answer these questions first, or do you want to go back to language, the other language issues?

People I'd recommend we do the language stuff.

Okay, and then because these are kind of next steps of it.

So let's do language stuff and then we'll talk engagement and streets.

Other things people had by way of language suggestions.

Oh, we were done before.

Okay.

Um I sent you some questions.

Um, but they're mostly um like, do we have master plans for all parks?

They say that in there we have to have a master plan.

And I'm sort of like, I'm not sure we have master plans for all our parks.

Um, so I think what the policy is trying to do is say if we have a master plan, we're trying to follow that master plan.

So for example, when uh the historic Milwaukee EDA came to us and said, hey, we'd really like to make a contribution to Scott Park.

Um how about we pay for a bench?

We said, yep, the plan has six benches in it.

We have two existing plaques in Scott Park that we are going to eventually transfer over to those benches.

Here are the ones that are available.

But just so you know, um, you can give us a donation if you want to, but we're not guaranteeing you're gonna get a plaque until we have a policy.

Um, in the case that we were talking about a park that doesn't have a plan, we would leave that up to a staff uh discretion.

Um that would also fall into things that like make the an uncommon donation.

Um the covered wagon that's in Milwaukee Bay Park that's visible from 99 is actually uh a donation uh that was given to NCPRD.

Um so this policy leaves a lot of discretion towards staff, uh particularly if there isn't a plan.

Um that would also probably be the case for like memorial trees, you know, uh a lot of our park plans um don't get very specific to individual tree levels.

Um and so it would be up to staff to help pick the right tree and making sure that it gets in the right spot.

Um another question I had was um I well another point I had was I just want to make sure it's not that we are using this not just for parks.

I mean, there are places we might want to put benches that are not officially parks, whether that's along the future Monroe Greenway, uh, you know.

Um so I just want to make sure it's sort of it's public lands or it's not limited.

Yeah, so I think in the definition sections of the policy we call out parks and green spaces or natural areas um or facilities, and that's that's uh city-owned assets.

Now, a lot of our trails are in the right-of-way.

Now, a lot of our trails are in the right-of-way, and so I think where we need to maybe clarify in this policy is that if you're proposing something that would be in the right-of-way, we need to follow those right-of-way standards first, and we need an approved right-away permit before we can move forward on these things.

Um, but the intention was that yes, this would be fairly general.

Um again, the the focus started kind of on parks, and then we quickly realized oh, we need to we need to grow this to expand.

Okay.

Um there's a piece in there about honorary street naming, and I wanted to sort of understand a little bit more about that, where that came from.

That's one of your questions.

You want to touch on that?

Sure, yeah.

I feel like we can both kind of add it on this, because I think there was also a uh a curiosity from the committee around the process itself for renaming and naming streets.

And with all the county and bureaucratic level pieces of this and doing some research on like maybe this is not something we include in this policy, but looked actually for an avenue of honorary street naming where it doesn't change or impact the street, but provides a historical context or connection to the street.

Um and I that was an opportunity of that was something the committee might be interested or want to propose to you all if you would like that to be captured in this.

Okay.

Just to understand what you're saying, not actually renaming the street, just having an honorary could that be covered in the plaque and memorial um policy.

It could either be in the plaque and memorial policy or it could be in the naming policy, whichever one we feel is is most fitting.

But yes, to answer your question, due to the logistics, the public safety, right?

Whether or not somebody gets their Amazon package, just general confusion, right?

Um we decided no, we're we're not going to get into renaming the streets.

However, many, many cities have the opportunity or take the opportunity to do honorary street naming on their important streets, honorary name, right?

Main Street will be main remaining main street, but maybe it's honorary fill night.

Well, I was gonna say, I mean, Portland actually has renamed, right?

With Caesar Chavez and um what's what the um Harveyville, um, MLK, a lot of cities have done that.

Um those are actually renamed, right?

That's not what you're talking about.

And I believe engineering has a separate policy around street naming and renaming, is that correct?

When I I as far as when I did the research, not necessarily engineering.

There is some with uh overlap with um county commissioner or county um planning also and consultants often do that, do that dealer tentwork when when we're doing some repairs.

So I don't want to I don't want to add that to this process, but I also don't I want to, as the council president likes to say, lay down a marker.

Um that I think we should look separately separately at our street naming.

Because I think once the dam is gone, we don't need a lake road.

I mean, that's not really a functioning lake anyway.

Why is it called Lake Road?

Um, so um I think there are, and as I raised at a prior city council meeting, we have a street named after a murderer, most likely a murderer.

So um, you know, I do think we volunteer.

Oh so um I totally agree it shouldn't be part of this, but I do want to lay down a marker on that and the uh counselor massey.

I'm a proponent of little confusion and whether we want to have honorary names, uh uh, you know, main street with a with a Coven sign and Will Anderson behind it.

Uh I think that's just confusing.

I you know, I just think it's confusing.

It's it's it's just gonna irritate people, you know, because they gotta change everything on their address, their IRS, their voter registration.

I just think it's it's I just think it's terrible, you know, idea to go around renaming things or having subscript names and everything like that.

I just I like simplicity.

I live on 28th Avenue, okay.

It doesn't sound real cool, but you don't want us to rename that.

No.

Well, I mean, we can have that discussion at a future date, but um table streets for now.

Table streets for now.

So does that mean table this also?

This honorary streets for now.

Right, the honorary.

You're not changing street sign addresses, but the you're not.

You know, I guess what we're talking about is like those poll toppers on some correct.

Yeah, most cities don't put honorary history, but the existing street sign and name still uh exist, won't have to change your address with the postal service or your social security, whatever else.

Um it would just be an honorary name to go in addition to that.

Yeah.

So if there was a street name after a murder, hopefully nothing fell.

Um, you could honor the family or some kind of context above it with an honorary street name.

You have to be like juxtaposed with your murderer for the rest of time.

Yeah.

Okay.

Uh if I'm not seeing any other questions or thank you.

If I'm not seeing any other questions or uh topics, language topics that counselors want to raise, then we'll turn to staff's questions for us.

I think one question um is and this was brought up by some staff who reviewed it, is you know, we've worked as a subcommittee trying to you know in involve the the relevant people that were appointed by council, um, you know, members of the parts and reboard and equity steering committee.

Um, but are there are there other groups that we should be reaching out to?

Are there other perspectives that we should be getting on for this?

Um, you know, there was some concern that maybe removing um or putting in those requirements for naming a space after a person and having it follow that public process might limit uh fundraising, you know, and so I you know basically the desire of council that we run this by uh our foundations that we typically work with or more fundraisers out there.

Um or do we think we have enough friendly edits to take back to the subcommittee as it is?

And I might just jump on that.

I think there's that's a great question.

I wouldn't be really interested in in specific groups, but I think there's also we could do that from targeted outreach.

We could also put these drafts up on engage Milwaukee, ask for feedback, and then ask you to you know share this with groups who you think might be particularly interested.

Yeah, um, yeah, I I'm not opposed to that, but I I also do think that sharing it with the foundations is a big thing because I I remember having a conversation with the Milwaukee Boards Foundation about this, and it's just kind of a barrier to fundraising.

Um so I wouldn't want to continue, like it would suck to do all this, and then there's still be a barrier for them.

Um so I I would be more inclined to hear more on their side too as well.

Because I mean we kind of already said our piece, but I'm interested in what they say before making the decision, and even a potential survey if uh council members are open to that a little.

Well, and I don't know if it's an actual survey, but posting it to engage Milwaukee and you know, having some way to make comments, I don't think we'll get very many, just judging from what we typically see.

Although the thing about what to do for winter holidays got a fair number of uh suggestions in the end.

Um, but I like that as opposed to putting the burden on staff.

I mean, we share the burden to just direct the parks foundation board and you know, the library foundation board and um here you go.

Have a look, please have a look and tell us what you think.

Um, rather than creating a lot of uh and the NDAs.

I mean, it can go in Jason's Friday email, and then my NDA's got notice of it.

Um, it doesn't have to be a lot of staff attending a lot of meetings and stuff.

So I I like that idea.

I was gonna suggest Jason's Friday email too, because it's not just the NDAs, but individuals can sign up to get those updates, and sometimes it's folks that don't use engage.

Um so yeah, I think that might be helpful.

And I guess that makes me think, you know, I don't know what other listservs exist, you know, with different constituencies across the city, but maybe it's worth sending out um in a staff email and just requesting that folks forward that through their networks within the community too, and try and make sure that we touch as many different inboxes or you know, at least copies or something at local businesses.

And try and make sure that we touch as many different inboxes or you know, at least copies or something at local businesses.

Yeah, we could definitely do something like that and put it in the pilot.

Just the co-pilot, which is coming soon.

That's right.

The co-pilot.

Just to clarify, this is of course before we confirm and approve the policy going forward.

This is engagement outreach before.

Okay.

So I might recommend kind of giving what I given what I've heard.

We make the friendly edits that were suggested tonight, which are making outstanding individuals, have no sub bullets, incorporating sub bullet number one, and including international people, changing the um committee element, the subcommittee, a naming subcommittee to like a standing committee, an annual appointed committee representing CARB or APAR member, ESC member, and library board member.

Um I think those were the three.

Uh, and then put to work on that with your with your subcommittee.

Get out, get it ready to pop on engage, do the outreach, get the feedback, bring it back here for final review and approval.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Okay.

Sounds like a plan.

I just really want to thank Gabriela and Adam.

I mean, this since I started the city, I remember this was kind of a it was an in an interest of council, an interest of some members of our committees.

At that point, it was we're gonna have to get a big consultant and do this big effort.

And they have just gone above and beyond, and I think done this frankly quite quickly, but in a very thoughtful and thorough way.

And I feel so um so good about the process you've led.

Nice work you guys.

Thank you.

Yeah, and I I mean, yeah, I totally second that.

And I would do want to say like some questions I had you brought up that they had discussed, like the thing about whether you should.

I know some of the policies that I've looked at from other places have the deceased person, you have to wait till three years after they are deceased or whatever.

And so it was great to know they discussed that, and they said no, we don't need to do that.

So you will have no idea how long this is just living or deceased to lose in here.

We really moved the needle back and forth.

And by the end of it, I was just like, I've actually just changed my mind completely more.

So did you consult the handbook for the recently deceased?

Or we can make sure they get our email about a major.

Um that's that's all of our slides.

Okay.

Okay.

Thank you all for having us, and we'll be back soon.

All right, thank you.

Thank you.

All right.

So next we have a discussion of our solid waste franchises presented by finance director Michael Osborne.

Good evening, council.

Um we are here to talk about and continue solid waste discussion on the franchise agreement.

Um we last discussed this in February on solid waste and the status of the current franchise agreement.

The current agreement is a rolling tenure agreement that renews the beginning of each year.

We are bringing the discussion forward again now.

And I have Chris Bell with me who is an independent expert of solid waste kind of through the region to answer any questions you have tonight.

The question that I am looking for, we are looking for an answer to is are you prepared to hold a hearing on November 18th to considering the current rolling 10-year branches agreement?

We're not here to discuss new model at this time, just to decide if on November 18th uh we want to send notice to that the rolling uh agreement will cease and that thus starting a 10-year clock on termination.

Um with that, we're prepared to answer most of your questions.

And I just wanted to acknowledge that uh both two of the solid waste haulers are here and um have submitted comments.

You can explain they have they've submitted written comments and they have oh my god, they have requests to come in here.

Um I guess we'll first take questions for Mr.

Bell or answers to I I will say I'll just start us off.

Um I went back and watched the February um hearing, and I thought we were pretty clear and pretty unanimous that we do want to terminate.

Um, but I I guess I I would open it up for any questions to Mr.

Bell about um any downside you see to that.

I mean to me it seems like this 10-year rolling franchise was written by the haulers.

It is a quintessential example of the foxes guarding headhouse.

Um I feel like yeah anyway, yeah.

Do you see a downside to us terminating?

And and a future council in five or six years figuring out what to do next.

I don't see a downside.

I you know, there's some things that that could uh I think that could be advantageous to the city looking looking ahead.

Um the issues that I brought up, uh, and I've been open with the haulers you know, the the the franchise system within the region, you know, it's been there used to be hundreds of haulers, small separate franchise or small independent contractors, family, and you know, over the last 20 years there's been a consolidation with the industry.

But if you look at the franchise map, there are there are territories all over the place.

And so one of the other issues that I've looked at is why don't we consolidate some of these franchise areas that have one hauler or two two haulers depending on the size of it and depending on the input from city council to maximize the productivity of the collection routes because you may have, you know, I'll take City Correspond, for example.

You've got haulers got two franchises on both sides of town.

You know, why you have um one territory, one continuous territory instead of having to drive back and forth.

Milwaukee's similar.

Um, you've got uh three franchise haulers, franchise haulers, one of them's got a really tiny small area.

Um but if you want to look and consolidate and have one hauler in response to the hauler, um, that's a choice that the city could make.

If you want to continue to have the same territories, that's another decision.

You can expand programs.

There's a lot of flexibility that you have when you do this.

Uh and you open it up to other if if you were to do a uh procurement later on, you open up to all the other potential haulers who would want to provide services.

So I don't see a downside um by doing this, you know, and and the incumbent haulers has just as much, or they usually typically have a little bit more of an advantage when they're uh proposing on an a franchised area uh that they already control or they already provide service.

Um and sometimes there's a bid risk, right?

Where you put it out and maybe the rates go up a little higher because they're building in some additional risk that they may lose it, or you know, because they're not gonna you know I'm not they may bid it to win it.

I mean, really low, but chances are pretty likely, unlikely that's not gonna happen.

But then again, it's 10 years down the road.

I was talking with the Dave yesterday, I said 10 years.

I said chances are that none of us are gonna be in these current capacities in 10 years.

So you know, that's not gonna be a decision that I think any of us have to worry about, but it does give future councils the ability to make those decisions.

Thank you.

I appreciate that.

Um I have noticed, I mean, I had the same feeling, like I just don't like the idea of hamstringing a council, you know, indefinitely.

And I think when listening to the tape and everybody sort of agreed with that.

Um I did want to ask, like some cities bigger than us, like Oregon City and like us, we don't have a single hauler.

Um so they put it out to bid that way.

Is that well Lake Oswegal the family that had that was Rosman?

And then they got bought out by a uh Allied waste and an Allied waste merged with Republic Services.

So it's always been kind of a family territory for for for quite a long time until it sold out to bigger companies.

Okay.

So it wasn't an actual decision by council to go for uh yeah, I would have to I would I don't know the exact history of that.

Uh Rick Winterhalter, the county would know that he would have the answers on that.

Okay.

Um but there are the other directors where they have one hauler.

Um Toronto has one hauler.

Um Wilsonville, I believe, has one and they have one of some of the lower rates too.

Yeah.

No.

Okay.

Uh questions for Mr.

Mell or Michael.

If not, I will give the haulers their three minutes and then we'll come back and answer question Michael post us, I guess.

Yeah.

Does that sound good?

Okay.

All right.

Um, so I'm gonna uh invite the uh haulers up, Chris Wright from Hoodview.

Give you guys three minutes each evening, uh Mayor Batty and members of the council and staff.

Uh my name is Chris Wright, I live in Cambu, Oregon, and I represent Hoodview disposal and recycling who provide solar waste and recycling collection services for the city of Milwaukee.

Um I've been with waste connections for 28 years in various roles and locations uh for the last four years.

I've been a site manager and now a district manager for some of our companies in the metro region, including Hoodview disposal serving Milwaukee, Clackamas, and Sandy Organ.

Tonight I would like to express my strong support for the franchise system currently in place for solid waste recycling and yard debris collection in the city of Milwaukee.

Franchise system enables long-term infrastructure investment, allowing providers like us to maintain modern fleets and facilities that reduce environmental impact and improve service reliability.

Uh solid solid waste industry standards or ten year contracts for a reason.

Uh it allows for a reasonable rate of return for the operator and keeps the cost down for the customer.

Shortening the length of the franchises will only increase the cost to the customer, only work to increase the cost of the customer.

Uh we hear your concerns regarding rates and the increased burden on your constituents.

I encourage you to continue working with us as your current haulers to avoid the possibility of unintentionally increasing that burden.

Several cities in Washington State state have recently gone through the procurement process for new contracts and experience an aggregate 39% increase in rates from the previous agreements.

Those cities all chose their incumbent haulers because they were able to offer the lowest rank.

This is largely due to having the infrastructure in place to provide the service.

We also hear you on service-related issues, and I would encourage you to look at the franchise system to provide regular contract performance reviews so that franchise users are held accountable.

I urge the council to continue supporting to continue supporting and refining services within the franchise system.

Some refinements could include a low-income assistance program modeled after Portland or Gresham.

Milwaukee also chose to add foods, food scraps to the Cribside Yargabre Collection Program, which increased the cost due to additional disposal fees.

But that would be very challenging since taking away a service is usually difficult.

In closing, uh franchises are proven systems that balance public service, sustainability, and economic efficiency.

And it's one that benefits our entire community.

Again, I urge the council to support and refine this model.

I would also like to extend an offer to all of you to do a ride along with one of our drivers to experience the challenges they face uh every day out there on the streets.

Um I appreciate your time tonight, and uh happy asking answering questions.

Yeah, you mentioned that 39% increase.

Um that was due to the what what happened there?

What was it?

They removed the 10-year system or what what was the catalyst for that?

It was just it was put out to bid.

Um the incumbent haulers made the lowest bids, but it was still a tremendous increase in cost to the city and the constituents of the city, um, just based on current market conditions.

So it's does that we keep our rates low.

You guys monitor that and and manage that, but you know uh our rates are our margins are very managed and within uh the specific operating range.

So how does the 10-year, like if it went from 10 to 5 or something, for example, and uh you know, I'm not an expert in this, but how how does that impact what does that do to you guys?

How does that create a uh that large of an increase?

It just it limits our ability to depreciate the the you know carts, containers and trucks that we're purchasing.

A truck costs 550,000 today.

Um cart is 50 to 55 dollars each.

So without being able to have that guaranteed revenue for 10 years, um it just really hampers and hinders the ability to make those capital investments.

Are you saying those wash are you saying those Washington new contracts were a shorter term?

They were short term, they weren't a 10-year term.

I don't I don't believe they were, but I can't I'm I'm not 100% sure, so I can't answer that indefinitely other questions.

Thank you again.

Okay.

Good evening, Mayor Beatty and Milwaukee City Councilors.

My name is Dave Huber.

I'm the senior public sector manager for WM.

Thank you for your time this evening.

I'm here to express support of the continuation of the current solid waste uh franchise agreement.

WM provides waste collection services for the city of Milwaukee servicing almost 4,500 residential customers, 450 commercial customers, and over 60 industrial customers here in the city.

Earlier today, all of you should have received a letter from me explaining the benefits of our current franchise agreement, which include providing fair and equitable rates, safe and efficient service, and the benefits of regular regulatory oversight.

It is important to note that the city oversees the rates, and you review these annually to allow for any necessary adjustments.

The franchise system also provides safe and efficient services where the haulers have designated areas, helping maintain a safer environment for the community that we work and live in.

What does regulator regulatory oversight mean?

To put it simply, it is the opportunity for us to have a strong partnership and relationship with you and the city staff.

Uh to uh to ensure that we are achieving the goals and priorities, priorities of the city.

The city sets the standard and we collaborate with you to meet those standards.

Some of the other benefits to the existing agreement include security to this to the city.

Having the current system in place allows franchisees to be immediately responsive to requests from the city, whether it's adopting innovative programs or enhancing our current services, such as bulky waste cleanups that we have here in Milwaukee.

Also, the assets needed to provide these services, which include trucks, carts, and containers can be depreciated over the existing terms of the agreement, lowering the monthly impact cost to the customers.

And just about two hours ago, another mayor beatty, the city of Beaverton and the city council in Beavers had approved the full 10-year franchise agreement uh for five collection solid waste collection providers in the city of Beaverton, and we're one of them.

That's a 10-year fixed term, not a rolling term, correct?

That is correct.

Yeah.

And we can go, you know, if you have questions on what those differences are, but it is a 10-year term with a three-year renewal every three years that goes back to a full 10-year 10-year term.

And I think about a time, but if I can finish, uh, for many decades decades, the haulers have demonstrated a strong commitment to providing excellent service to the residents of Milwaukee while also producing sustainable results, results, and consistent operational safety.

We look forward to partner partnering with the city in the future, and we appreciate the opportunity to serve Milwaukee.

And I'm happy to answer any questions.

Any questions for Mr.

Haber?

Okay.

So uh if uh WM bought a new truck on January 1st and uh put it into service until January 2nd, how long would you take to depreciate its value?

Uh currently, I believe the the way it's set up here in the city of Milwaukee is we depreciate that over uh seven years.

Seven.

Seven years.

Thank you.

I I just wanted more clarification on Pivot.

Uh you mentioned it's it's a 10-year deal, but it's not a rolling tent.

So can you explain how that how that works a little bit with the three years?

I just that kind of went over.

Yeah, no, certainly uh counselor.

So uh the city of Everton, uh the way it's set up is where it's every three years we go through a renewal process with the city, and we just went through that uh a few months ago.

We we all uh went through that renewal phase uh where the city you know asks all the all the service providers, there's five of us, uh which there's advantages to having multiple haulers to in the cities.

Um but then uh we submit our our renewal paperwork, all the questions that the city has, and then if approved, uh which it was this evening, then it brings that term those terms up to uh the full ten year terms.

Yeah, and then and then we do this again uh in three years.

Oh so if it had not been approved tonight, you would still have seven more years.

That is correct.

Thank you.

Council Savenshore, didn't you look like you might have a question?

No.

Okay.

Okay.

Uh okay.

Thank you.

Thank you.

And I got one more yellow card while we were sitting here.

So Beth Argus Duncan.

Good evening, Mayor Member Council.

I'm Beth Burgess, and I'm the regional director.

Thank you.

Good evening, Mayor, members of the city council.

I'm Beth Vargas Duncan.

I'm the regional director of work of Oregon Refuge and Recycling Association for the Metro area here.

And in that capacity, I represent um the haulers through the various areas, including the ones serving you in the city of Milwaukee.

And uh I'm from Salem, just so we for the record.

So I wanted to, I signed up last minute so that I could share a little bit more.

And I think I'm in a unique position as a person in that I used to be a regulator and worked for the city of Salem and regulated all the franchises we had at the city of Salem as their franchise and revenue administrator.

And so just a quick reminder that hasn't come up in a little while, but when I was at Salem, the franchise revenue was the second largest revenue into the city behind uh property taxes.

And the city also created that position that I had because the city, even a city the size of Salem, can get distracted and busy.

And when I took that position, some of the franchises had expired.

So there can be very good reasons to have rolling franchises to keep the revenue flowing and to keep the security and public safety um of one of your utilities, the solid waste um utility or service.

So I appreciate the comments I've heard and the concerns about you know finding future council or um feeling like you haven't had as much uh control in the franchise and the language itself.

And the franchise system is actually designed for the city council and the community to be very enabled and to highly regulate your haulers.

And so we set rates and we're work with you, you set the rates, you set the services, and you say jump and we say how high.

So that's generally the the way um we're accustomed to having it work.

And um I just wanted to also add um we've been a we've had a busy evening, and the city of Gresham also just did their franchise renewal um tonight, and it passed about an hour after Peter Tins did, and it's very similar where it has the longer term with uh the city of Portland calls it an opener where they look and do a check-in and review and see how the hillers are doing, have a conversation, and um then make a decision as to renew or not.

And that can also help with that feeling of you're you know not wanting to bind a future council.

So um I'm happy to answer questions.

I've worked in this business a long time, and I have 18 years of government business, and I've just switched to work for the haulers because I'm proud to do so.

Thank you.

Um Gresham, as far as I seem to recall, theirs is only seven years.

You know, I work in so many jurisdictions.

I don't want to be held uh to that, but I would be happy to come back with uh you know looking at all the jurisdictions and finding out a lot more detail on before now.

We're late to be.

Um I think that's correct.

And then uh Portland, I'm because it usually is we asked to have it renewed to the full term.

So it's usually between seven and ten years.

So it's a modification of a rolling franchise.

Thank you.

Any questions for Ms.

Barris Duncan?

Okay, thank you.

Thank you.

All right.

Um Mr.

Bell, is there anything about the way a future council might in seven or eight years decide to go that um should I mean that runs the risk of the kind of 39% increase that we just heard about the 39%?

Uh 39% increase, I'm assuming is the city of Kirkwell, Washington is you know, maybe alluding to.

Um, there was a lot of circumstances surrounding that, and the city came out with a list of additional plans and programs and things that they wanted the hauler to do that the city didn't want to do.

And then the other piece too related to that increase was that the haulers took a significant risk and a uh significant hit during the downturn recycling.

Uh and the cities in the King County didn't they chose not to, they chose to let the haulers take the risk and the uh the the financial loss.

So that comprised with all those other things were the was the reason for the the significant increase.

And that happened in a couple other jurisdictions within King County.

So it's it's rather you unique and King County has a different model where they do the contract and they they every 10 years they put it out to bid.

And so there's been three haulers that have been primarily bidding on those contracts over the last 15 years.

Um here it's it's interesting because if you stop the franchise, you know, the renewal, that doesn't mean that later on you can't start it up again.

Doesn't mean that you can't change it.

Uh it's just giving you uh the elected body the ability to make decisions.

Uh and and you and it opens up your capacity to to to not be injured.

So you could still want a seven-year con franchise, and that's why I was asking person at Gresham uh what the franchise length is at Gresham, because I believe it's seven years, and it's it correlates with the depreciation of equipment.

Um, you could go a couple years down the road and look at going back to the rolling franchise.

There's there's a lot of flexibility that you have, and that you know, it's not to say that these same haulers wouldn't bid on they you know, they're in like I said, they're in a good good position to retain the work that they're currently doing right now, but it does give the the elected body the ability to make decisions based on the future intent of the council.

Okay, thank you.

Uh council president, you had your goose up first.

Um Chris, my problem is not with necessarily the 10-year period or even the fact that it is a rolling um franchise agreement.

My biggest problem is that it's a one-year rolling um franchise agreement.

That term seems far too short.

Um there's no way to amend the franchise agreement without ending it um or signaling that we're going to end it over the next 10 years.

So in order to amend it in any way, we have to take the step that we're on.

Council Coast Babani.

Yeah, I guess my question, hopefully it's simple.

But um who stands to benefit more by not having a 10-year rolling, the ratepayers or the haulers.

I think there's equal risk.

I think there's equal risk.

Um but it but from from from from from your point of view, it gives gives the the city council uh uh it expands your capacity to consider.

Like council and it's one year it is, but but it's one year on you know in advance and tending.

Thank you.

Other questions?

Okay.

Uh so how do folks want to proceed?

But we will have to have a hearing to consider a termination or sending the letter to the hallers terminate.

So we've we can sell that in seeking your direction tonight on if you would like to have a hearing and it would be November eighteenth.

So thank you.

All right, we are back on the air, everyone.

And we are to the council reports part of the agenda.

There's far too much frivolity over here.

We have two letters to discuss.

People may have other council reports.

I um I did just want to say quickly that there is a I think I reported previously that the um that representative Sosa in the House is convening a working group to discuss the problems with the Oregon governmental ethics council commission, whatever they're called.

Uh their um procedures and their their interpretation of the law around the Serial Meetings Act.

Um there is some kind of meeting um scheduled for next week and through the Metro Mayor's Consortium, they sent out a call for us to provide any feedback of particular problems.

We are and this also actually this working group is also addressing the food policy one as well.

Um so just say if anyone has specific specific challenges, they think that this interpretation is faced that that are worth raising to the reps on the who are going to these meetings.

Um I guess to avoid violating the serial meetings law, send those to Emma.

And um, and I will collect anything anyone has and it's needed by uh first thing.

So just over the next day or two if you think of anything that you think would be uh illuminating for Mayor Rosner of Sherwood, who's our rep on this work group uh or the work group itself.

Um two letters.

So who wants to go first?

So the the letter that you're looking at says the thraft letter for council consideration on restoration project team.

So um after the revelation that uh project team was expecting the city to pay for the uh the sewer pump and relocate the sewer line.

Um there was some concerns there, but that was quite breaking.

Um not on our radar.

And so uh we had a meeting since this is not really an intersection for parks in green space affordability.

Um Adam and I uh along with uh some of the such that I've got together to discuss this.

And uh we feel like um we want the project team to come we're getting all of our information, you know, through the uh the city staff representations to the project team.

And we think that there needs to be a more formal uh communication between the leaders of the project team, specifically outside of the city staff, you know.

Um I keep calling them American Rivers, but I'm sure they're I can't remember their current name, and uh and uh the watershed council.

So right, and we're asking them to come and talk to us.

So if you you uh and I'll get to this in a minute.

This is in the in the uh toward the end of the letter, uh asking them to come forward in November 18 and address a number of the questions we have.

But we kind of roll this into you know our our rationale for asking for this information, and because we made a uh uh you know a connection between each one of the three city goals uh and what they want to do.

Um, and you know, we we have this um we have this um I'll call it a synergetic potential between Kellogg and Milwaukee Bay Park, if in fact uh you know the the path, the underground path is built.

Uh but you know as things are uh developing here, that that that path has called been called into question about whether that's gonna be built or not.

And I think that that's really important from our perspective, really important, and we don't think that that's something that can be negotiated away.

Um on the economic development front, you know, we see both Kellogg and Milwaukee Bay Park having that synergistic effect, but then uh you know, where people go from a more passive uh recreation environment to more active recreation environment, but that would bring people into both of those environments but also have the knock-on effect of bringing them into the downtown area and frequent the the uh you know the restaurants, bars and shops and that kind of thing.

And you know, obviously the you know the affordability issue is that you know it's this thing is gonna cost like four plus uh million.

Uh and I I'm a little bit concerned that that the team is sort of saying, well, you can it's never really not going to cost you anything, and we don't think that that's true.

Um, because uh you know we're gonna incur, you know, even if uh you even if Phil Knight gave us four million bucks, we can talk about Phil Knight's uh, you know, we would still have long-term operational costs that post the rest of the city, and you know, this is a capital improvement program.

We just can't, we we go through a very deliberative process on the budget and the CIP, and we can't really make this uh kind of on the fly here in uh October and November.

It has to be you know rolled into the our dedicated process of prioritization of the CIPs of the budget.

Um those are our goals.

So we've asked them to come to the meeting on November 8th, 18th, 18th, yeah.

Sorry, uh, to answer the following questions.

What's the overall project funding strategy and outlook at this point?

Because you know, one of the things you know, the worst case scenario is that we we sunk you know four million bucks in this thing, and then all of the uh funding for the broughter project falls through, and we've signed four million dollars in it for no reason because we think that the existing infrastructure has 20 years life left, okay.

And uh, you know, is the revised timeline warranted given the new federal you know realities and you know uh and basically has every option on the sewer line been fully explored to include the channel orientation of it, you know, to eliminate the need for a sewer pipe relocation.

Um is there still an option for the uh sewer relocation to be folded into the bigger project and funded by the you know the larger project, which was you know, the which is the original statement, right?

Uh and so then we start to ask about you know some of the other uh money that's set aside.

We had one million dollars in urban renewal.

Well, where exactly is that money going to be spent?

Can that be put toward the the pump station?

Uh and uh you know how to how do they envision using the 10 million dollar metro program?

Each one of these uh team members kind of has a piece of this thing, and I I'm concerned that they all think they're gonna get you know a piece of the one million to ten million, and uh they all can't have it, you know.

Um, and so uh uh you know asked for considerations of the shared path as I've talked about before.

Um and you know I I'm a little bit concerned that uh I think we have a very dedicated and uh and smart team, but you know, just does I don't I don't know that the project actually has a charter or a decision making process that's uh that we can put our finger on because these things are kind of happening in a sort of a fluid manner, so that's why we've asked them to come.

So that's why we've asked them to come.

But it's not we don't want them to come and then feel like we're trying to sabotage this thing.

We're just trying to make sure that it's on solid footing and everyone's roles and responsibilities and the allocation of resources are well defined as we move forward because we're all behind this, and we I don't really want quite frankly, you know, they were here before uh I I think we we kind of get a dog and play show.

It's uh you know, history of the project.

I know history of project.

We all know the history of project.

We don't need to hear about the history of the project.

We need to focus on the things that need to get done.

And uh so um uh I hope it's more of a discussion rather than a uh a presentation.

And you know, despite the fact we have a letter here, you know, I'm gonna talk to the to the you know the Neil and others about a real conversation about these kinds of things.

Yeah, the council agrees with the with the premise of this letter.

I think also you know, it's worth maybe pointing out, and maybe it's uh I don't know.

I I mean the last two times we've met has been a work session, and so they haven't really been able, I mean, they did some commenting from the sidelines, but they haven't really been at the table.

So I think we should acknowledge acknowledge that we want to put this on a you know thing where they are at the table with us.

It's not all on them that we've scheduled a work sessions, and it's awkward to have your input, right?

So um your co-author of this did you want to say questions?

Yeah, I just wanted to uh thank uh counselor massing for for putting this letter together.

I I think you did a great job of putting everything that we talked about in that meeting.

And I agree 100%.

Um nobody's saying that we're against this thing where we're trying to key it, but I mean there's some serious questions and concerns that we have on all levels.

So um again, I just wanted to appreciate the the content of this letter because I think it's very clear uh and lets me know exactly what what we're trying to do here.

Council president, um yeah, I'll just second that.

I think it's a great letter.

I appreciate you all putting this forward because I think it will help our conversation on the 18th.

Um I have two small friendly amendments on the fifth bullet point down.

We have budgeted one million dollars from the URA funds.

Um I had a question of what question you actually trying to get answered here, and you said your um talking point you want to address where we're supposed to use this.

And I might just add that there so their project can give us that clarity of what we're asking there.

Um the other small thing was with each of the goals, we start with kind of an introduction about what the goal is and kind of some nature of the goals.

I think we're kind of fine, like that whether or not the city can influence the cost of living to me feels immaterial to this.

There were some small edits that I sent to Scott that could just rework those bullets to say the direct access to Kellogg Park.

Um day Calog Park.

Um, but uh I think if we made those tweaks and we're just focusing on those parts.

I don't think that's essential.

Uh do you have you so you have all these things that you mentioned?

Uh not uh fifth one.

Uh not one that I described with URA.

Yeah.

So what would you recommend we change?

That one I might just add a sentence at the end that says um we love clarity on where you can use this or something to that.

I think you said it all I would just um offer that I don't think you want to give your budget authority over to non-city agencies, so I wouldn't call I wouldn't phrase it as how would you like us to spend this or sort of um does the project team have an expectation as to where these city funds would be applied?

Um because you retain the ability to program that much.

That's not the choice.

Yeah, Scott.

Good thing we take these though.

Okay, and that was in the fifth bullet on the second page.

So and then the last sentence uh other comments, questions?

Well, uh I got a goose.

Um just uh there's been some conversation with regard to economic development with downtown businesses and the downtown alliance around creating a gateway from uh downtown to Milwaukee Bay Park.

Um and so I realize that the intent here, at least as it's laid out in your letter, is to connect the park's natural area through the walking path or the shared use path.

But I think that with regard to economic development, there's a secondary um uh there's a there's a secondary project that the downtown businesses would be interested in some attention to, which is creating some type of a gateway.

Um and I don't think it's the shared shared use path.

I think it's in addition to that.

So that's for us.

Yeah, that's is that really well I guess I'm bringing it up because the goals are highlighted here and the connection from the goal to this project is highlighted for the leadership team.

Um but I think that the downtown businesses, if I might attempt to speak on their behalf, would like to see some note to um you know, maybe it's uh I'm trying to find some some creative words that I can add to this.

You might have already seen this, but in that uh doc and all the problems there's a concession between this and a parking reach by school or if you like the graphic replacement shops and restaurants still think that that's ever um we can certainly add something else.

I mean, I guess I guess I'm a little puzzled as to I mean, I get the idea of another of another gate more direct gateway, more direct connection, and I mean it's something we talked about with South Downtown, overpass, different, you know, Harrison Maine, overpass.

Um so I don't know what exactly dam is you know might be wanting to propose.

Um all ears, I think it's great, but is it's not something that would fall within the scope of the dam removal.

I think what I would suggest is the second sentence um would say that um it is it's important for the city council to um support um ease of access and clarity of or like and we're gonna get cars that's in the in the all the kids watching have already been to bed, right?

I'm sure that's what they're paying attention to in the world.

Um I understand what you're saying, Mayor.

I I think that it's just calling out that it's not only the um footpath, but that the um the city is entertaining multiple points of you know defined access to Milwaukee Bay Park Devil's Habitate.

Does that does that put any risk then of them saying, oh, the underpass isn't that important?

If you've got other ideas of how to do that connection, um, I don't think so.

Yeah, because you've already made the point under parks and natural areas.

If the intention in this letter is to make a connection to the project and each of the three goals, you have that connection um that you've made under parks and natural areas, you're doubling down on it through economic development.

And I understand that you know it maybe what we decided to do is just settle on the underline, but I want to just be on the record currently for my expletive, and also um that there is interest in creating um defined gateways plural to Milwaukee Bay Park.

And I'm fine if we leave it out of this letter.

I just want to make sure that that folks know that that conversation is happening in the community.

Yeah, I'm um I'm happy to hear that that conversation is happening in the community.

But I do have no worry Emma has that they already want to not do that and actually just looking at this language, nothing here, and I realize it's not really the goal, but nothing here says anything about safe and safe crossing of open um, which is you know the whole reason for the underpass, right?

Is to get people from away from having to cross at grade on 9090.

Um, could you just say in that second sentence, could you just say building an environment that is safe and easy to access would that give you at your point, Mary?

Is that important?

We're talking about it, uh the second setup so I don't know.

Yeah, um, actually third sentence, sorry.

The first element is retention.

The second element and then the second element includes building an environment that is safe and easy to access with both natural areas of commercial and payment and shopping options.

The second element includes building an environment that is safe and easy to access with both natural areas and commercial entertainment and shopping options.

And I will um retract my previous comment about adding something else complicating to this sentence.

That was pretty simple.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Natural here is in what all of that remains the same.

The only word, the only two words is safe and safe and before easy.

Easy.

That's it.

Okay.

Cool.

Cool.

All right.

Yeah, no, I'm glad to hear that is thinking in those terms.

And I know the arts committee has their Milwaukee there.

Thinking about where we can put too.

Um, so anything else.

Do we uh is everyone good with signing on this was drafted with the idea of all this signing?

Yeah.

So everyone's good with being signed on to this.

Okay.

I will format it and put these edits in and then share it with Councillor Massey.

Okay.

One last question.

Mayor, I I heard your point that some of the previous work sessions have been staff at the table, so it's not been a very conducive for a conversation.

Just to confirm the time we are holding for this on November 18th is the entire work session, but I think we were envisioning it more as a work session between them and you with staff kind of on the side.

Yeah.

Um, is that okay?

Or do you want a regular session?

I mean, and we do have work sessions where we have the other, you know, like today we had, you know, Dr.

Blurry at the table.

Um, we just haven't formulated the last ones that way with them at the table.

So yeah, yeah.

Um president, you have a letter.

Um okay.

My letter.

Uh we um the limit week today this morning reported that uh Milwaukee resident Frank Miranda was um one of the first people in order who was legally detained by ice.

Um and I read that article, and I think I've already been pretty baseline upset uh about what we're seeing in Portland, what we're seeing across the nation the way that um this agency that I think has had challenges that I kind of detailed in the letter for years on end is now being weaponized in an extreme way um to really impress violence upon our community.

Um I um I was fine to write a letter with just two words in it and sign it off and send it out.

Um but I wanted to enumerate a little bit more.

Did I already say one of those words?

Um Adam definitely said one of those words.

Um but uh I thought I might enumerate that a little bit more and put down in writing some of the frustrations that I think I'm not unique in feeling.

I think a lot of our residents are feeling as well right now.

Um so I wrote this letter as an attempt to put into writing um those sentiments, and I think really importantly to um this is something a story that's been rolled out this morning, and I've already heard from a lot of folks about what's happening as Milwaukee.

And I think it's important to show like in your values-based response about this type of action hacking our community and where the city stands.

So I'd love to put it forward to you all if you all would like to sign on as well.

I wrote it in the framing that it can be all of council.

Um I'd love to get you all to sign on and um would love to be able to make this statement all together.

It's a great letter.

Uh I really enjoyed reading it.

Uh, and I will sign on twice.

Uh I guess I might know.

I mean why a letter to Christino, who, you know, that's not gonna go anywhere, versus a kind of kind of statement that we did like earlier this year, uh, or some kind of a just a gener, yeah, just a general statement of uh.

Yeah.

In the article, it has a letter that Frank is using in a lawsuit against Christy Gnome that's directed to Christy Gnome.

And I think I wrote this original letter, kind of throwing support behind the tort claim that he's making.

And I realize that's not really our place as a city.

Um, but I think in some ways writing to the secretary in kind of concert with Frank, or like supporting the statements that Frank is making and the experience that Frank is um going through, I think validates the claims that he's making and throws our way behind that.

I think it's kind of I'm fine with the semantic difference in who we address it to.

Um, but that was, I guess, my thought to her as opposed to the director of the ICE facility in Portland or a generic statement.

Um you know, we can send it to more than one person too.

I have no problem sending it to as many people as it needs to be sent to.

Um I ask a question.

When you got together with the other mayors past week, was it was there a written document or was it just a statement?

There were both.

Um, there was there was a written letter.

It kind of read like a uh I think I sent it to you guys, yeah.

Kind of read like a resolution with a bunch of whereases, and then you know, called on them to honor the uh standards of you know, like not wear masks and sort of all these things honor the standards that Oregon law enforcement agencies have to meet.

Um my question is haven't we done this to a certain degree already?

Well, I mean, that was more I mean, there was certainly part of that was about ice, but that was really more focused on the military intervention as opposed to ice.

I I mean I'm a little surprised to hear council president say that this is the first time it's happened in Portland because I actually suspect it's I mean, we've just there have been so many accounts like this from other parts of the country.

I can't imagine it's actually the first one in Portland, unfortunately.

Um the other side of things, I will say that you know, having spent my career in the immigration field, I know that first stories are not always completely true.

And I would I can't, I I did look at the Oregonian, I did look for other news sources today that were picking up this story, and I haven't seen it anywhere else yet.

Um I mean that could still happen, obviously.

It's early.

It just came out this morning.

Um I'm supportive of setting out some kind of statement of indignation about ICE.

Uh you know, mistreatment of people.

Um, and I guess first off, there's some legal issues in this letter, but setting those aside, um, I guess I just don't know that I feel like this is the right one, the right way to go about it.

I think I can speak to a little bit.

I grappled with that question.

This is one report of a case.

How do we then write a letter about this that kind of acknowledges the inevitable kind of this is an allegation, it's not clear and defined that.

Um, and I think that's why I tried to touch on uh in an edit to the letter.

We change the language to this um what this agency is alleged to have done.

So I think trying to remove any implication that the agency is guaranteed to have done this, what this is directed that is guaranteed to have come from the secretary herself.

I think I want to try and step back from that.

I think what I try and capture later on in the letter is outside of just the specific action.

I think that there's a history of the way that this agency is just operated that I feel like is moral outside of the laws that we set forth in our nation to like constrain the way that government acts onto people.

And I think that that is a really troubling history.

Um, and that these actions just feel like an extension of that troubled history to me.

And I think that it is escalation far outside what I would have expected.

Um but I I tried to write this letter in a way that isn't just grounded in what happened to Frank.

That I think is access for this and why it's so important to write this now.

Um, but I think it's also calling out that like through this agency, the federal government is trying to exert power on our community and on other communities across the United States.

And I think that that is unacceptable.

That's larger than just Frank story.

Frank story is an important component of that.

Um, but I really want to be able to track against that.

I will say that at the mayor's tables.

Um, I mean, I do think some cities have written some sort of um, you know, have released statements.

I mean we did the one earlier this year, but maybe this summer as well as things kind of escalated, uh, have written statements in some ways.

There is definitely a concern uh among the mayors about you know um putting a target RBAX and impact on you know federal funding and lots of things that should we have sailed with the recent um, you know, with the statement by the mayors and with the you know, sort of recent escalation of things in Portland with the administration, but I just want to put that out there that that is a concern I hear from uh a lot of mayors.

Um, there were a couple who signed on to the uh statement and participated that I was a little surprised because they had been much more reticent before um about you know the impact on their federal funding.

Um I guess um I don't know because I'd like to hear from other people.

Um but I mean I do have I do think there are some things in the letter that are legally incorrect.

Uh although citations don't stand for what you cite them for.

Um so um, yeah, I would I would love to take some time and maybe rework this letter with you and bring it back the next meeting.

Um, but uh if you um give some thought to whether it's just gnome or whether it's a whether it's a just a statement or public press release public statement or something.

I mean, I guess together that's your intent it's that this letters goes out that you follow it with the press sending it to the press or somehow getting it out there, yeah.

Um yeah, other thoughts?

Oh, sorry, so uh since Mary, I'm I'm trying to put some edits in here.

Um I was equally just I read when I read the article this morning.

Um I think that um I think it brings up a lot.

I think it brings up um feelings of um some of the things that we're seeing across the whole country.

Um I um I would love the opportunity for the council to reach out to Mr.

Miranda before um before using his name and his experience in a letter.

Um, I think that that would be most respectful.

Um but I I worry about taking too much time um and massaging the the language too much so that we lose the um the urgency and the intensity of how it feels when something like this impacts one of our residents.

Miranda is a US citizen but we're seeing this impact citizens and non-citizens alike and non-citizens who are here legally but happen to be you know black or brown um all of these things are unacceptable and we we have an opportunity to make a statement about all of these things but I I don't want to leave too much time um between this particular instance and the statement that we make especially since she's just arriving in Portland like w within hours um oh is that your plan you're gonna go meet her and deliver your letter facility I'm worried yeah I doubt I mean I was this way I don't care um so I would I'd be in favor of um moving forward with the approval to spend a little bit of time editing this letter send edits to Scott we've done this before with letters where we'll send edits to Scott um with the intent that you know the final product would be something that we can all either all sign off on or we have the ability to pull our name from um and then the timeline for that be that this would be released tomorrow.

I I'd like to propose that and I'm happy to put in some time to edit do you guys think that works I mean as a legal matter think you would have to call some kind of special meeting in order to review the collected edits correct Scott unless they unless everyone was willing to authorize the using their signature having not collectively reviewed the edits.

Yeah that's how it's worked before when the council signs off and it's just some tweaking uh I don't know if that's the case here I don't know how serious the tweets are uh there is a council retreat next week that you guys are gathering oh I'm sorry no your question yeah um that that could that delay might also permit some additional reporting and also some contact with Mr Miranda do we know if he's actually a Milwaukee resident or is he unincorporated yeah uh he lives in Oakfield.

So I flip this in a specific way so we could say um community member not necessarily Milwaukee resident um but I think the point is he's a member of the Milwaukee community sees Milwaukee on his output yeah I wasn't trying to imply anything otherwise I was just curious you know how intimate would it be if we brought him in or so you reached out to him was my only thought so if you know that you've been in contact with the lawyer or something.

Nope I just found this online so I have his contact people online that we can jump to um if we'd like to um and I think trying to find idea that the brainstorming together look like the best strong and for way we'd reach out to him is um because I don't want to reach out to him I don't want to make this more difficult um I do think it's important to reach out to direct it and say just we stand with them and that we're um yeah I as long as we move water um I understand the the risks we take with the with federal I I don't want to govern it computer period and the other thing is is if I I have I have family members that are directly impacted by this directly impacted by what's what ICE is doing.

And I feel like it's my duty to fight for them regardless of what that looks like um you know I I'm not gonna count him to this administration in any way and I'm not saying anybody here is either but I do feel like we have an obligation to meet the moment right now um in that if if if a letter like this is is is step one then so be it but I I'm not interested in in watering it down um out of fear of retribution.

That is not how I I want to meet yeah I mean I think I ultimately agree with that.

I just wanted to make sure everybody knew that was you know a concern raised in um mayoral circles I think I agree we do I I I wouldn't want to not issue the statement or you know engage in some way.

We do I I wouldn't want to not issue the statement or you know, engage in some way.

Um I I mean I think you know irrespective of Mr.

Miranda, um, we may want it uh statement.

I mean, if we talk to his lawyer or talk to him and find out they don't want the added attention.

I will say I was at uh the ice building yesterday.

I was nearby, I drove past that I was nearby because I'm actually uh I'm sponsoring, I helped I helped write a letter of sponsorship for by this Venezuelan woman who was released um from custody last week, allowed to pursue her asylum um her asylum case.

So I mean, I've I've uh I've been in I've been over there a fair uh amount lately and I've seen it.

So um yeah, I don't yeah, anyway.

Um there's uh yeah.

Um counselor massey, you haven't been heard from much.

I guess I'm um inclined to go with the public statement uh rather than the letter to the no because I think it just uh might get more coverage, I guess.

Um I I just kind of want us to not want to spend a lot of time on it like the others have said, but at the same time, I just don't want to make any you know enforced factual errors either.

Um I have a diverging path we can choose to take.

I do agree with Counselor Seven's point, though I would love to get this finished tonight to get something out tomorrow.

I think that there's this urgency here um for our community to see really a quick response to this.

Um and I think we can release future statements if we need, we can follow up as needed in um speaker directly.

I think that working somebody out here tonight is a good course of action.

The diverging paths, if we want to continue to include reference to Frank specifically, we can leave the letter as is.

If we think it's more appropriate to remove reference to Frank after we've contacted him, we could remove his name, the first paragraph, and just say unlawfully detained US citizen member of our community and then delete the second paragraph that specifically references um his case.

So it's then referencing in more vague terms, um Frank's case, and then talking more about just the nature of how ICP organized against certain committees.

Um I think that's one option.

I still think it's I think I'm fine to be wrong here.

Um I think it's okay to say we support Frank after what we've seen to put out a statement that directly kind of affirms the story um that we've read double annot we um and then follow up with Frank.

Um but if people feel like it's better not to reference him directly.

Um I think I'd be okay cutting the portion and just moving more bigly to his story.

Um, but I think there's power in saying his name and talking about what happened.

Well, given that his lawyer released that letter, presumably to uh leak.

Um maybe they want uh attention to the story, but I guess it would feel better to have that conversation with his lawyer.

That's what I was gonna say.

I know we'd want to see done tonight, get it out tomorrow.

But if it's gonna be more powerful, I mean what we could do this too is we can hold off on the letter, come up with a statement, and then once we have more facts around Mr.

Miranda and then send that letter within a day or two.

Yeah, maybe what we could do is we finish the letter tonight.

We contact Mr.

Miranda's lawyer tomorrow.

Um and just get confirmation from his lawyer that they're okay with us sending out the statement.

And I think we can totally we don't have to change the substance of the letter at all to delete the first um dear secretary now.

I have some edits.

Yeah, are you open to reading the letter?

Okay.

Um so we're just gonna read through it um without noting the pieces that have removed.

I'm just gonna read through it and see if there's anything that gives you pause.

Um as the elected city council of Milwaukee, Oregon, we add our voices to the national condemnation in the strongest possible terms, the actions of the federal immigration and customs enforcement agents.

Um today we read reports of a Milwaukee area resident, a US citizen who was abducted unlawfully and unlawfully detained.

What we are seeing across the country is not an isolated mistake, these are abuses of power, violations of the constitution, and acts of state-sanctioned violence.

Details of this case will continue to develop, but the facts remain that across our nation, plain clothed and masked ICE agents are confronting and seizing our neighbors without cause, detaining them for hours without answers to questions, and even after they've proved or provided proof of U.S.

citizenship.

This is not law enforcement, it is unlawful kidnapping, harassment, and abuse carried out carried out by federal officers acting outside their legal authority.

ISIS actions in this case fits squarely within a long and shameful pattern of unconstitutional behavior by the agency from the retaliatory targeting of those who speak out against the agency's abuses, the warrantless detentions to the separations of children from their families at the border.

ICE has repeatedly violated civil rights of law-abiding people and intentionally ignored the limits of its own authority.

These are not one-off incidents.

They're some symptoms of an agency that has been empowered to abandon accountability and sees itself above the law.

These behaviors pattern of unlawful activity is not just unconstitutional, it is unimoral.

It represents an affront to the basic values of our nation and to this community, dignity of the individual, compassion for our neighbors, fairness under the law, and respect for human life.

For years, ICE's actions have inflicted fear and suffering on families and communities, undermining the for moral fabric of the country is supposed to serve.

And let us be clear, this conduct is unacceptable.

Your agency must face institutional accountability for its repeated violations of the constitution until ICE can demonstrate adherence to the constitution, transparency in its operations, and respect for the people it serves.

It has no moral or legal legitimacy to operate in our communities.

I think that is really good.

You are able to take the case that we saw and not necessarily reference Frank's name.

I think we can follow up and do that after we contact him.

I think it's still really powerful.

There are two parts.

Yes, it goes.

I don't know how to cover it.

When I read it, um I felt like it was unnecessarily small because this is I mean, certainly I don't mean to diminish the experience of this community member.

Um, but also we're seeing patterns of this across the entire country.

And I think the power of um the words of elected officials needed to um add weight to the words of resistance across the country and not just be limited to their own jurisdiction.

So I'm open, I'm open to edits on that, but I think it should be more than just Milwaukee.

Well, I agree with that general point, and I guess I was able to follow you in the beginning, and I liked definitely the way you began it.

Not sure I was able to follow it all um all the way through.

So I'll look forward to getting it in the writing.

Um the one legal question I'll tell you that is um the reference to warrant was detentions.

So actually, I still sent me a warrant to detain people.

Um that case that's cited there, and and it hasn't for decades.

If they if they have suspicion of persons, not the legal resident, they don't get a warrant.

Not even to enter person's form.

Uh to enter those.

No, it's detention.

It's the enter their dwelling, you you have to have their permission, or you have to have their role school to get right.

I'm just saying as a legal matter, using the word or that's that opinion that's cited there is an opinion about whether states uh law enforcement officers have to detain people for ice, and that's a very different question.

So I would just strike for it was detentions because getting into what that means and what the legality of it is, you know, that's um, and yeah, I mean that there are other problems.

I mean, these cases don't really stand for what they're signed for, so I would drop all the citations, but I think if you drop the warrantless detention, um and you drop the the citations, I think you know the rest of Catholics is abuse or illegal.

Yeah, I'm trying to drop warrantless detention and the citations I included just to think I was making bold statements.

Um but right people can dig into that if they'd like um and um yeah that's my drop those.

Um so if we took the citations out but changed unwarranted to unsubstantive, is that a word it's too late.

I think it's I think it's important to say that people are being detained without the without the um without using the wrongfully and without the context that is um that is culturally expected in you know not culturally.

Well, I think if you just say wrongfully detained, wrong kind of detentions, that's okay because that's I mean that's that catches things that you know.

So I think I've I think I've gathered all of this.

Um what I'd like to do is send the copy of the edits to the council president and to Scott and see if I mean, or do you want me to send it to all of us tonight?

I know that we're coming up on a deadline here.

I think that the correct me if I'm wrong, Scott and Justin.

I mean, I think if you don't want to wait until another scheduled meeting, you would need to say today you're you're comfortable putting your signature on it because there will not be another time for us to have a conversation, even you were replying to an email and saying I'm good with it, is a violation of the public meeting law.

So um, I think you have a couple options.

I think um you could vote to extend this meeting because you're only thinking about in seven minutes.

Um counselor staff and George could send it to Scott, you could pull it up here, and we could guess get get it done.

Or you can say generally I'm okay, um, put my signature on, Scott format it in the morning and send it off.

Um or decide that you're gonna discuss it again next Tuesday.

And there is nothing to stop any of you from ever making individual statements in your position as counselors, um, ever.

So I really don't think there's anything that would change scientifically on this letter that would make me take my name off it, period.

So I'm fine.

Well, I'd like to see the latest draft, so we need the stuff when we want to extend the meeting.

I'll move to extend the meeting.

I second all those second because all those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Opposed say no.

Okay.

Quick point of order.

There's typically a until until tomorrow.

Let's go ahead and do that.

All those in favor say I closed.

Okay.

Well, then let's take a ten minutes for people to have a look at that.

Come back at five time.

Are you recessing your design?

But then we'll be out of public meeting.

But we can't take a reason.

We can, but then you lose your ability to talk to each other about the elevator.

So you're your we're in recess.

Oh, the entire on air, Mary.

We're on air.

I'm seeing my RPG's version of it.

I said I love plural.

On the dials on committee.

Exclusives on the air, and dots, you've got together.

No, all your friends.

I think if we're gonna start to do really small then the national condemnation in the strongest possible terms of the actions.

Do we need to add of there?

As we add in the add our national condemnation of, yeah.

The first second line.

Um the actions.

Second line.

Strongest possible terms.

Of the actions.

Oh, sorry.

So not of the strongest possible terms.

Yeah.

In the strongest possible terms, of the actions.

Yep.

I would say of as opposed to reports of a Milwaukee area resident.

I think we can say of a member of our community.

And then it's still because the nuance of like that makes sense.

What is unincorporated?

We cannot kind of dodge with that.

I'd say keep I'd keep US citizen.

I would just say we read reports of a member of our community in US citizen.

Yeah.

That's good.

And then in the second paragraph, we need to also put periods after US.

Yeah.

Yep.

With periods.

Well, uh the cities.

We're writing style.

It's not.

We oh we I guess we lost it here.

So what I would suggest is if this is the first place we say US.

Oh, it's up here.

So actually maybe we spell it out.

And then it's just we don't use periods afterwards.

Well that means there are a lot of really strong things about that mode.

But we don't use the periods after.

I would tell you in immigration parlance.

It's always got the period.

So smart.

Your council, you can tell me to do what you want to do.

I have one periods in there.

Well can we add that to the uh retreat agenda?

I want to I want it noted why I broke the branding.

And I add I have council directed me to do that.

Yeah.

In the first in the last line of the first paragraph, the other edit I was suggesting that is over there in that comment bubble is adding more systematic.

These are systematic uses of power.

These are systemic systematic systematic systematic.

Um it's a different um active voice.

I would add and before detaining in the second paragraph.

I think it makes it read a little bit clearer.

Um details of this case will continue to develop with the facts remained across the nation, playing clothes and masculine ice agents, um, or confronting seizing our neighbors without cause and detaining them for hours without answers to questions and after it provided US citizenship.

Okay.

And then my other one was at the end.

Yeah.

Yeah, I really like that ending sentence.

I mean, that's just sentence.

I just don't think that institutional accountability sentence adds anything.

And I kind of like stopping it because comment is unacceptable.

Period.

Yeah.

And then still I skipped straight.

Yeah.

So that's just yeah.

Awesome.

All right.

There's oh, there's one last comment that I don't know where I would put this in the works too.

I think it's a small thing.

Removing the citations.

Yeah.

Um change that I had that I'm fine if we don't do this at the start.

I think it's reads a little bit cleaner.

If we just say as elected council, we can dem in the strongest principle terms.

Or like join others in condemning in the strongest possible terms.

But we can keep it.

I think he's wanting the acting verb of condemn.

We condemn.

Yeah, we condemn.

We condemn as opposed to condemnation.

Okay.

Is that what I'm here?

I think that's it, yeah.

So what we can.

Oh, so we can do that.

Um, I think on the second to last paragraph.

When we say we say these pattern, these behaviors and pattern of unlawful activity.

I think um I think it's stronger if we say this is not just unconstitutional is immoral, but I'm fine to do I think that's just a stylistic choice.

And I'm going to do this.

I'm sorry, I didn't follow that.

Uh to say right now these behaviors and pattern of unlawful activity is not just unconstitutional.

It is immoral.

I think it's more powerful to say this is not just unconstitutional, it is immoral.

Uh oh.

You're saying inserting the word just.

Uh change.

No, deleting the oh, I see.

Oh, yeah.

That's strong.

That's stronger.

And then yeah, I think this is a good spot.

For next steps, we make these edits.

I think it I do like how it's still addressed to Secretary Nelm.

I like that we send this out.

Um we can follow up with Frank's attorney and see if we can provide them this statement and say we're open to starting a dialogue to see how we can support you, or there are other things that we should say um Frank and attorney.

Uh I would say that, sure.

I mean um, I mean, there are you know.

I think so, yeah.

Now that we've removed reference to Frank specifically, I think it's okay to send out tomorrow morning, um, but still as a next step to contact Frank.

Um and see just starting that dialogue.

Oh, two adds asking.

Yeah, I guess mask that seems like the right course of action, I think by the way we want to find out the yeah.

I would like to contact there is a lawyer.

I wouldn't try to contact him directly.

Yeah, I agree.

Yeah.

And his lawyer looks like he's easy to find.

He's got just website as underdog underdog law.

He's also with a firm.

I looked him up.

So he's with the firm when he does risk management for a firm when then he does his underdog law.

So we got yeah.

Um thanks for taking the initiative to put this together.

Yeah, thank you all for your editing.

Appreciations to everybody for staying a little bit later to get this out.

Just to confirm, so you'd like Scott to send this to Secretary Gnome's office.

Yep, that's the transmitter plan.

Do we want any CCs?

Do we want a C C Yeah?

I mean we can see I liked your radio, we could see C to a limit.

We we could C C your delegation.

You can see a little Biden verk.

Yeah.

Uh I like Robert says the Oregonian.

We could C C other outlets as well.

We could C C.

Did you say the entire congressional delegation or just our representative?

I think it's Murphy, Whitey, and Biden.

Is that yeah?

Okay.

Great.

Okay, that's that one.

Any other council reports.

I would just ask that I sent out the um agenda for next week's retreat as well as a very, very short, it shouldn't take you 30 seconds.

Uh pre-survey.

They'll look really similar because you took it last year too.

We're gonna see how things have changed, but please take that.

Um I will bug you a lot now.

Um, I did want to bring up one other, I have a bunch of LOC notes, but I think I will put them in writing um as opposed to um doing them on the dais.

Um I did want to bring up the um Emma mentioned the Rotary Dinner uh coming up the night before the Rotary dinner, I believe, is the street trust dinner honoring Rev Gamba.

Um hopefully he's I assume people heard that he's had some medical setbacks lately, but um hopefully he's gonna be able to participate.

Yeah, he broke his hip.

He was he was hit by a car as he biked back from the ice protester.

Oh, was he hit by a car?

He was hit by a car.

So wow, I didn't know that part of it.

For those who say we don't need to see it for streets.

Wow.

Um anyway, um I'm planning to go and I thought I would just mention it for others who might be inclined to go.

Um the 16th.

16th.

Or the UC Crystal, and you are now all attended.

Oh, are we all attending?

Yeah, yeah.

Okay.

Uh anything else by way of council reports.

All right.

Uh then I will entertain a motion to adjourn.

So we moved a second to adjourn.

All those in favor say aye.

Opposed say no.

We are adjourned.