Well you just need my trees.

What is it?

Oh, you do this.

Alright, perfect.

So if you want to help us change the passwords, that's more fun, so I think that's what we're gonna do.

But it was real cool.

Good evening.

Welcome to the regular meeting of the Olatha City Council for Tuesday, August 19th, 2025.

The first item on our agenda is the Pledge of Allegiance.

Would you please stand with me for the pledge?

Liberty and Justice for all.

Most of you are probably aware that my son passed away recently.

And I just want to, on the behalf of my family, thank everybody, the whole community for your support.

Meals, encouraging words, text messages, phone calls, thoughts and prayers.

And it helps us get through this difficult time.

So thank you so much.

Yes, Mayor, I move to approve resolution number twenty-five dash ten one.

Reappointing members to be citizen, uh to be on the Citizens Police Advisory Council.

Second.

Yes.

Motion passes seven zero.

With us tonight to introduce our reappointed members is Board Chair Kyle Neal.

Um for the opportunity to um to be here tonight and thank you once again for your continued support of CPAC and its mission.

With that, the Citizens Police Advisory Council mission statement reads to serve as an advisory board to the City Council, City Manager, and the Chief of Police, and to improve the understanding and communication between the police and Olatha community.

on the first Wednesday of every month at the Olatha Police Department.

Um while the the council is diverse in their various backgrounds and how they came to be members of the council, we share a common goal to support the collaboration between the city council, the community, and the police department.

We have two members being reappointed this evening.

Eric Arazo.

And Cameron Cadir.

One once again, thank you for the opportunity to recognize some of our members' continued service.

Thank you.

So I want to thank each of you for being here tonight and for your volunteer services.

Appreciate that.

We'll now move to item B.

Item B is presentation of the Cup.

Uh each year we present the Mayor's Cup in recognition of the Olatha Company who performed best at the Kansas City Corporate Challenge.

For the fourth year in a row, Garmin not only won this trophy, but also their division.

So Garmin Associate Peyton is here to accept the trophy, Pete.

And I just heard that this is 11 out of 16 years.

Fantastic.

So if you come next year, it will be five in a row.

Um this is a great time uh in the spring to just have our employees who work so hard at uh Garmin to be able to have a little fun and play some sports.

Um so we want to thank you, Mayor, and then the City of Olatha for recognizing us.

Congratulations.

One of our goals in Olatha is to keep our citizens healthy and happy, and you're a great example of that.

We appreciate your hard work.

It's not easy, I know.

We'll now uh move to the consent agenda.

The items listed below are considered to be routine by the city council, may be approved in one motion.

These may include items that have been reviewed by the city council in a prior planning session.

Uh there will be no separate discussion unless a council member requests that an item be removed from the consent agenda and considered separately.

Councilmember Bacchus.

Um Mayor, I'd like to pull item L.

Councilmember Felter.

Thank you, Mayor.

I would like to pull F and G.

Okay.

So I guess a motion.

Any others?

Motion be in order to approve the consent.

So with the exceptions of F G and L.

Now you're right, move the approval of consent agenda excluding items F, G, and L as presented.

Jericho second.

We have a motion and second with the city clerk, please call the roll.

Dr.

Felter.

Yes.

Mr.

Vacas.

Yes.

Miss Essex.

Yes.

Mr.

Bacon.

Yes.

Ms.

Vote.

Yes.

Mr.

Gilmore.

Yes.

Mr.

Schoonover.

Yes.

Motion passes.

7-0.

Item F is consideration of proposals as an award of contract to Waste Management Inc.

for recycled materials processing for the Solid Waste Division of Infrastructure.

Councilmember Felter.

Thank you, Mayor.

F and G kind of go together, and I gave our team a heads up.

This mainly was to draw awareness to the great work going on.

Thank you for being here, Darren.

Would you like to take it from here and give the good news to everyone?

Well, good evening, Mayor, Council members.

Darren Gilbert, Infrastructure Sol Waste Manager.

Thank you, Councilmember Fitzgerald for recognizing the work on the two agreements.

That journey started in March, so we're certainly ready to get across the finish line.

To summarize the transfer station agreement, uh, if approved, it will go into effect October 1st.

Uh using the uh annual tonnage assumptions for 26.

We anticipate a disposal cost savings of 195,000.

With those lower disposal costs, uh we also anticipate an increased revenue of approximately 130,000.

That would come from our outside tonnage, and that would be uh contractors, other haulers, just people using the disposal facility.

So combine those two, it certainly has a financial benefit.

That's great news.

So that was F that you're talking about, right?

So far, any other questions on item F.

I would I would just say that um it's nice to have some competition out there where we can compare and have some options because it does keep everybody honest.

And so we appreciate you doing the work to find us the best deal.

Everything from A to Z is increased, and uh it's certainly uh uh our pleasure to stand in front of you and have something that's decreasing.

So uh as far as the recycling agreement, uh we only received one proposal.

If approved, that will go in effect December 15th.

Uh the recycling proposal, we will have a slight increase in our per ton processing fee, or that could be viewed as a slight decrease in the revenue the city would receive from the recycling material.

Uh it's nearly impossible to predict the recycling market, but I will tell you historically, uh year in and year out, the city receives at the end of the year, we're on the plus side of of recycling revenue.

With these agreements we've had with waste management.

We work with waste management dating back to 2015.

Uh I will tell you that Olatha is very fortunate that their facility is in close proximity to Olatha and it plays a large role as far as the success of our recycling program.

Also want to acknowledge John McConnell's here from Waste Management.

Thank you, John, for being here, and we're excited to work with them.

Uh but probably more importantly, uh as far as recycling of the nearly 9,000 tons that we collect annually, and I want to emphasize that's a lot of recycling, because recycling is lightweight.

Uh we're diverting that from a landfill, we're reusing it, we're repurposing it, and we're not paying those higher disposal cost through the transfer station.

So we certainly appreciate your support.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Any questions?

My attention was the disposal cost of what we divert through recycling was almost 200,000.

Just the savings of what it would have cost to correct.

If you took that 9,000 tons and ran it to the transfer station, it would probably be somewhere around $350,000.

Right.

That's unbelievable.

So it's good for the environment and good for our wallets.

So that was great news.

I appreciate it also that it's a five-year term with the three-year extension option.

And um wait for up to three additional five-year terms.

The transfer station is three, the recycling is two.

Okay, got this.

Renewable five-year-old.

Fantastic.

So well done.

And Don, thank you for being here, and thank you for the work you do.

Thank you so much.

Thank you, Mayor.

Councilmember vote.

Thank you.

Quick question.

I know in the past, uh recycling of plastic and plastic bottles have been a problem.

Where are we at with that now with the market?

Uh plastic is probably one of the tougher markets.

Uh it still is.

The plastics, typically in our recycling stream, it's it's plastic we call plastic one and two.

Uh honestly, I'd have to just get back to you on that as far as what it's a blended value as far as how they split that revenue share up.

And I I can't tell you off the top of my head what we're receiving for plastic.

But you answered that it's still a challenge of it is a challenge.

So we all need to get rid of our plastic bottles and bring our little containers, I guess, uh, to help it out.

Um the other question I would have has to do with uh, of course, the mixed uh recycling that we collect door to door.

Um much contamination do we experience and how does that impact our recycling?

So what happens waste management will perform an audit typically twice a year.

Our contamination rate uh historically has been under 10 percent.

Awesome.

If you compare that to other communities, they're typically in a 20 percentile, so our residents do a phenomenal job.

Awesome.

Well, thank you very much for all the work you all do.

Thank you.

Thank you, sir.

Councilmember Vacus.

Uh thank you, Mayor.

So, Darren, again, congratulations are in order.

Um, I was at the uh Mid-American Regional Council of Governments today on a total transportation policy committee meeting.

But but while I was there, I spent about an hour and a half with their solid waste experts just to talk about things from a regional standpoint.

And I want to emphasize to everyone here and everyone who might be live streaming that hands down, Olatha is the best in the entire Kansas City Metro.

We set the standard, and it's so high that uh the um there is an admission in mark that nobody can catch us, you know, for what it's worth.

That's how good we are.

We just do everything right.

And so we have so much to be proud of, and certainly the uh the negotiation of contracts and how we come out with this cost savings is an indicator of your ongoing continuing quality of work.

Now, Darius, I understand that too, the solid waste and the recycle recycling process.

You know, again, uh some of this is an estimate because we don't know the actual cost or return on recycles next year, but should I be thinking of about collectively about a $300,000 annual savings?

As far as revenue?

Yeah.

For the transfer station agreement?

For both.

Well we're that is that is a conservative.

Yeah, conservatives, so it could be more.

So over the course of five years, it's to me and five plus, which is nice.

I mean, that's real money, there's no doubt about it.

Having said that, we we just approved the rate increase in our last budget workshop.

Was that six and a half percent?

That's right, Deputy Director, and it's five percent.

Okay.

And um, as Darren said, we started this process in March.

So we had an idea in May, and we factored that into the recommended rate increase.

Okay.

Good.

So, yeah, and I'm not suggesting we should revise the rates.

I mean, that's it.

We have approved that, and I think that's great.

And the, you know, the uh I don't know how much better we can get.

We have assistance system.

I'm so glad WMI is here today.

But but 5 percent annual rate increases are still tough to stomach.

You know, we have a program in place for low-income people, which is wonderful, but the majority of Olathans aren't low income.

They're somewhere in the middle.

And they aren't seeing those kind of pay raises necessarily.

So I would just offer to everyone and to you, because you are a guy that can handle this, it's the idea that we we think even deeper on how we can somehow lower cost of operations going forward.

Maybe that is uh a deeper discussion with WMI about how do we capture methane and in turn use the methane to compress it in power vehicles?

Certainly the dump in Shawnee is going to fill up sometime over the next to 15 years.

What are the plans on how we get around that?

Is incineration an option?

You know, we know that we don't um we don't require everybody within Olatha to use our services, uh unlike Lawrence, um, who does.

And there's a good and a bad to that, maybe, but maybe selectively broadening our customer base is one way to capture more revenue without having to work too much harder.

I I don't know.

I don't know the answers, but at some stage next year when we have time, it would be great if we could sit down with public works and with WMI to just kind of think through what the future could look like over the next decade.

Is that a reasonable?

So that's my one comment.

Congratulations, and thank you both very much.

Thank you, Mayor.

Thank you.

Um Darren, you said 10 percent contaminate contaminants in the recycling.

What's the number one culprit culprit?

Is it glass or pizza boxes?

Probably thank yeah, I mean that's just a combination of plastic bags.

Thank you, Beth.

Uh our plastic bag recycling initiative is taken off quite well.

Uh you know, somebody might put like uh rigid plastic in like a broken piece of lawn furniture or something like that.

But no, we should be very proud that our contamination rate is less than 10 percent.

So that's pretty low.

That's a very good question.

Okay.

Thank you.

Thank you, sir.

Uh any more questions on item F motion be in order on item F.

Um, Mr.

Mayor, I would move to accept the proposal and award the contract to waste management incorporated for recycled materials processing for the solid waste division of infrastructure.

Second.

Motion and second with the city clerk, please call the roll.

Ms.

Essex.

Yes.

Mr.

Rakin.

Yes.

Ms.

Boone?

Yes.

Mr.

Gilmore.

Yes.

Mr.

Scanover.

Yes.

Dr.

Felter?

Yes.

Mr.

Vacus.

Yes.

Motion passes 7-0.

Item G is consideration of proposals and ward of contract to waste management for transfer station operation hauling and disposal services for the solid waste division of infrastructure, and that was Councilmember Felter as well.

I think any other questions on that item?

This is the one we had the three proposals on and not the other.

You know, it's interesting that uh does everybody use waste management for the recycling in the metro, or we just just there's one other one?

Or we couldn't have to do that.

We just received one proposal for recycling.

Three proposals for the operation of the transfer station.

And we reached out to folks that provide it and we didn't get any bites.

I think given the location of the recycling facility, I want to say it's in Harrisonville.

Obviously, the distance would factor into that.

Thank you.

Any other questions on item G a motion be in order?

Uh Mr.

Mayor, I move to accept the proposal and award the contract to waste management incorporated for transfer station operation hauling and disposal services for the Solemn Waste Division of Infrastructure.

Second of a motion and a second with the City Clerk please call the roll.

Mr.

Bacon?

Yes.

Ms.

Vote?

Yes.

Mr.

Gilmore.

Yes.

Mr.

Schoonover.

Yes.

Dr.

Felter.

Yes.

Mr.

Vacas?

Yes.

Ms.

Essex.

Yes.

Motion passes.

7-0.

Item L is consideration of resolution number 25-1073 allowing the hunting of deer with bow and arrow for the 2025-2026 season as defined by the Olathe Urban Deer Management Program.

Councilmember Vaucus.

Thank you, Mayor.

So Paul, this is a long-established program.

Could you just talk through us so we understand what we're approving?

I'm sure.

This is Paul Kruger Parks Park Services with City of Olatha.

So this ordinance has been long established, 20 plus years probably.

And the intent of the program is to identify and kind of address conservation issue, outlining some concerns from people regarding the regarding overpopulation of deer, um, damage to property, um potential for car deer accident collisions, and also disease prevention that comes from overpopulation.

That's the intent of the program.

We do recognize that it's been kind of lightly participated in over the last several years.

The parameters of ordinance 9.14.110 have been established.

There's 27 requirements requiring hunters to meet to be able to participate and this is a resolution allowing the hunting on the one property that was submitted for uh approval to this year for this deer this year's deer season.

So is it just one property?

Just one property, yes.

And where is that property?

It's located um south end of town by the quick trip off of 169 highway, and it kind of situated between 169 highway and I-35.

It in about how many acres is that?

Um I have it here.

Uh let me see.

95?

95 acres.

Um sixty-five of the acres occurs within the city limits of Olatha.

Okay.

And could could, you know, under the provisions of this program, could other people apply for this?

Yes.

Yeah, other uh property owners could apply for it.

Other private property owners.

Private property owners, yes.

But we don't do this on any of our city parkland, do we?

That's correct.

No, we do not we do not need this on any city park land.

Sure.

And for the bow hunter, is it long bow and crossbow?

Uh it it um.

It yeah, it's it's bow and arrow.

Okay.

So I believe.

That's as specific as we get.

Yeah.

They have to comply with all Kansas re laws and tagging requirements and everything.

So yes, bow and arrow is what how it is specified.

So we've got, and I I appreciate the purpose of the program, I sincerely do.

You know, on one on one level you are revolted at the idea, but on the other hand, I mean that's that's uh nature and it's uh part of life, you know, quite frankly.

But we have certainly a deer population within the city of Olatha.

Uh do we do anything else to manage the deer population, cull the deer population over the course of the year as a parks and rec department?

As a parks and rec group department, no, we do not.

This is the main management tool, I I suppose.

Okay.

Yes.

Okay.

Good.

Good.

Any issues with the program?

Uh since my involvement, we have had no complaints that I've been aware of.

And for those that are able to participate on this private land, what whatever deer they may harvest, they're able to keep the remains, keep the meat?

Yes, they are.

Okay.

Yep.

Okay.

And the the goal is to address overpopulation.

So we do require more antlerless deer to be taken.

Do you?

Okay.

Over antlered deer.

That has to be.

That has to be they can't have more antlered deer taken off of the property than antless deer.

Okay.

Got it.

Good.

Thank you.

I appreciate that.

Mayor, that was the extent of my questions.

Councilmember Voe.

Hey, thank you.

I was going to pull this one.

You beat me.

I pull it every year.

Everybody knows that.

I when did parks and take over this?

Police department used to do this.

Right.

When there is a little bit of a reshuffling of organization from the 2040 plan, animal care and control came under the quality lack.

So who does the inspection?

Our animal care and control team.

They're here tonight.

Okay.

James Brackett is the one that would go out and inspect and make sure that it's safe.

And that the stands are in place in the shooting room.

This, of course, is a lot further than some of the ones we've seen in the past.

They were adjacent to trails in my ward.

So, you know, to me it made no sense to be bow hunting in the middle of the city.

Looking at the numbers, you know, the locations have gone down, and it looks like in 2024, only one deer was harvested.

You look at 19, 2019, 2020, 2021, zero.

I have a feeling people are saying maybe this isn't what they want to do in the city of Olatha.

Though I think, you know, are there other ways?

Because then, of course, I look at the number of deer and the impact on city traffic.

And that seems to continue to increase.

And the dead deer calls a recovery.

So I don't know if there's some other methods.

You know, we keep building and we keep moving about and uh that's all the comments I have.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Any other questions?

On this items.

Seeing that a motion be in order.

Mayor I move to approve resolution number 25-1073 as presented.

Second.

I have a motion and a second.

Would the city clerk please call the roll?

Mr.

Gilmore.

Yes.

Mr.

Schoonover?

Yes.

Dr.

Felter?

Yes.

Mr.

Vaucus?

Yes.

Ms.

Essex?

Yes.

Mr.

Bacon.

Yes.

Miss Vote?

No.

Motion passes.

61.

We'll now move to new business.

Item A is consideration of ordinance number 25-26, which is RZ25-0005.

Requesting approval of a rezoning from the CTYRUI County Rural District to M2 General Industrial District with a preliminary development plan for Hedge Industrial Park on approximately 98.09 acres, located southeast of West 167th Street and Hedge Lane.

Planning Commission recommends approval 8 to 0.

This proposal is for hedge industrial parks, which would include warehouse and a distribution building.

Thank you.

Council members.

Good evening.

Nathan Jury, senior planner.

Before you tonight is a request to rezone property as stated from the county rural district to the M2 Industrial District with a preliminary development plan for the Hedge Industrial Park.

This property is 98 acres in size, located southeast of 167th Street and Hedge Lane is highlighted in yellow on your screen.

It's east of the new Coca-Cola bottling facility and south of FedEx's distribution center.

There is a stream that runs uh kind of along that northern boundary of the site as well.

The site was annexed in 2021 and has retained that county rural zoning district since then.

It's mostly surrounded by existing two district zoning.

The applicant is requesting the rezone from the county rules to the M2, which does match all of the existing properties or all the existing properties with city zoning in the area.

There are some county rules that are waiting to be rezoned as well.

Staff does recommend approval of this with a handful of land uses restricted to ensure this development is consistent with nearby industrial developments.

These uses are generally more intense in nature.

And they do uh some of them do also rely significantly on outdoor storage as well.

Now the site is designated an industrial area on the future land use map with a secondary secondary greenway.

Um the M2 district directly aligns with this industrial area designation.

Um also the uh greenways will be preserved on site uh with stream corridor requirements.

Uh this site uh it also additionally uh the development achieved several policies of plan Aletha, including consistency with the comp plan, promoting targeted industries, encouraging new businesses by building on our existing strengths with transportation.

The proposal is for six speculative warehouse and distribution buildings with a total building area of just over a million square feet.

Um access is proposed off of hedge lane at three locations as shown red on your screen.

And the uh required right turn will be installed at each access point as outlined in the traffic study.

The loading docks are located to the rear of the buildings away from public streets and view.

Phase one uh does include the building in the southwest corner and future phases will be developed as market demands.

Uh existing stream corridors and woodland areas will be preserved.

About 29 acres of stream corridor and wet detention is proposed.

Um almost a third of the site and woodland uh areas are preserved exceeding UDO requirements as well.

The proposed building is a high qual proposed buildings, I should say are high quality and comply with all industrial building design standards.

Um a consistent architectural theme will be used throughout this development, and uh the buildings do exceed class one and two material requirements with their uh tilt-up concrete panels with decorative form liner reveals.

Overall, in terms of public correspondence, uh notifications were requirements were met.

Neighborhood notice was sent to all the non-residential property owners in the area.

Um there are no residents in the area.

Uh in addition, uh staff did not receive any correspondence on this, and planning commission held the public hearing, which no one spoke at, and they recommended unanimous approval.

Um so before you tonight, the application does meet the golden criteria as outlined by city staff and the staff report.

And staff does recommend approval with the proposed land use restrictions mentioned previously.

Um we also recommend approval of the preliminary site development plan with just three stipulations.

Uh the first one just being landscape terms along hedge, making sure those are completed with final development plans.

Uh there's some existing sewer infrastructure that needs to be upgraded, and uh uh the traffic study will be updated as this area develops.

So with that, uh the applicant uh Vic Burks with Tesseray Architecture representing um Aspen Land and Development is here for any questions, and I will also stand for any questions.

Council any questions for staff?

Council, did you have one?

Councilmember Schoonover?

Thank you.

Thank you, Nathan.

Can you do we have anything in the CIP now?

Can somebody remind me for for hedge lane in that area?

I I know from the presentation it said that that traffic improvements will be made kind of as needed, but is there any is there anything long-term in in the CIP at least when it comes to hedge lane in that area?

I believe Beth Wright is here for answering this question.

Beth Wright, WD Director.

Um Hedge Line Lane was recently improved through a benefit district, um 267th Street, along with to support the Coca-Cola development.

Okay.

So hedge lane is approved.

Thank you.

Beth, don't go too far.

I've got a quick question.

So there the road on 167th Street to the west, before you get over the interstate, that's all c it's been closed for some time.

Is it is still closed and what's going on there?

So the intent is to improve that to the new police firing range.

So that's what that work is involved in.

I'd have to get the same.

Does that include some asphalt on that gravel?

Yes.

Awesome.

That's great.

Back to you about when that will be done.

But yes.

I think that's important as we get more and more truck traffic in the area.

Any other questions on this item?

Seeing none, thank the developer for being here tonight.

Uh motion be in order.

Uh Mr.

Mayor, I move to approve ordinance number 25-26.

RZ25-05.

Second.

We have a motion and a second with the city clerk.

Please call roll.

Dr.

Felter.

Yes.

Mr.

Vacus.

Yes.

Ms.

Essex.

Yes.

Mr.

Racon.

Yes.

Ms.

Vogue.

Yes.

Mr.

Gilmore.

Yes.

Mr.

Scunover.

Yes.

Motion passed 70.

We'll now move to item B.

Item B is consideration of ordinance number 25-27, which is RZ25-0006, requesting approval of a rezoning from the CP2 planned general business district to R4 residential medium density multifamily district for the Salvation Army Family Lodge Expansion on approximately 0.21 acres located northeast, Santa Fe Street and North Woodland Road.

Planning Commission recommended approval 8 to 0.

This item and the next one relate to the proposal to expand the family lodging at the Salvation Army downtown.

This homeless already has 14 units, and this would add an additional four.

Nathan is back for a presentation.

Welcome, Nathan.

Thank you, Mayor and Council members.

Good evening, Nathan Drew, Senior Planner again.

Before you tonight is the request to rezone property from the CP2 district to the R4 medium density multifamily district.

Also is to approve the special use for the Salvation Army Family Lodge expansion.

I will make one presentation, but there are two actions before you tonight.

One for the proposed ordinance and the other motion for the resolution on the special use.

Subject property, just a couple blocks to the east of us, is generally located northeast of Santa Fe and Woodland Road.

The property is part of the Salvation Army's main campus as outlined in orange.

Salvation Army is requesting to rezone just a small portion of their site from the CP2 district to the R4 is what's proposed to allow them to pursue their special use approval for expanding the family lodge.

This area was rezoned to the CP2 district back in 2010 as part of the Salvation Army's chapel project edition.

And this request will just revert only that small portion of the campus back to residential purposes before when the before the uh single family homes on the site were removed.

Proposed R4 district is consistent with the zoning of the existing family lodge RP4 district to the north.

Um did receive approval back in 2012 where they were approved for a 14-unit residential shelter that provides both emergency and transitional housing for families in need.

Uh photo of that existing shelter is on the top right of your screen.

Uh Salvation Army also provides critical wraparound services out of their main church building on the property.

So the proposal will expand uh the lodge from 14 units to 18, so an additional four uh units and from 0.8 acres to just over one acre in size.

Uh the Salvation Army will continue to manage and operate this family shelter as they have for over a decade now.

The site is designated as an urban center downtown area on the Plan Olatha Future Landes map.

Uh Plan Olatha envisions the downtown area as a mixed-use area with commercial, civic, and residential uses that support and complement each other.

Uh the R4 district does allow for civic and residential uses, and the Salvation Army family lodge aligns with that vision.

Additionally, uh the rezoning and special use both achieve several policies of Plan Olatha to encourage housing near services, supporting original town neighborhoods, and promoting affordable housing.

The expansion will add four uh dwelling units in the orange box on your screen is where the building will go.

Um and it does comply with all requirements of the R4 district and all site and development requirements of the UDO.

Uh the new building does match the design and materials of the existing building and existing street trees and landscaping will be preserved throughout construction.

All public notice requirements were met.

Uh neighborhood meeting was held back in July.

Uh three residents were in attendance.

Uh and generally questions um were about the operations of the facility and all those registered at that meeting regarding security management resident management processes.

So overall, staff did correspond one resident throughout this process, no concerns from them, and they actually were supportive of this use as well.

At the public hearing in July, no one spoke.

And Planning Commission again recommended approval unanimously unanimously on the rezoning and special use requests.

Overall staff does recommend approval of the special of the rezoning to the R 4 district with no stipulations, ordinances before you tonight on this request.

And also recommend approval of the special use with just two stipulations, including one stipulation on the 15-year time limit as requested by the applicant.

So with that, I will stand for any questions.

And again, Lieutenant Nate Woodard is here with Salvation Army if you have any questions for him.

Thank you, Nathan.

Councilmember vote.

Thank you.

Thank you for the presentation.

Major Wooden.

He's okay.

Right here.

If you'll come on up, I just have this is more to highlight what you all do.

You do a wonderful job.

And this is I think what most of us at the council would like to see when we're providing shelter for the homeless.

And we are the only family-centered homeless shelter in the area.

And the housing is housing with dignity.

And the fact that you provide the wraparound services, so important for them to get off their, you know, to get that oomph to be able to move into society and not have to worry about housing and paying the bills and all of that.

Tell us a little bit about the wraparound services you provide and give me an idea of what's the typical time that a family might spend in transitional housing with you all.

Yeah, thank you so much for the kind words.

Families with minor children in their care move in.

These transitional units, our transitional program is six months to one year.

And really it's molded to each and every family's specific needs.

Really, no two families are alike.

Everyone moves in with their own strengths, abilities, and gifts, and also their own challenges, be that the past, be that just decisions or life happening.

And so the wraparound services that we include is you you have a case manager who is uh who works with each and every family.

It's a strength-based case management model.

Um, so we try to work hard to get to um our clients to get to know our residents and to uh help them uh take the next step and accomplish goals.

Um this program in particular um also has access to our food pantry, which is on site.

Um we also stock um the rooms with partnerships across uh Johnson County with uh fresh linens, brand new when they move in, brand new towels, uh a full pantry, um, a crock pot, toaster oven, all of these things uh that they also move out with.

So it helps them furnish their home uh when they leave.

Um in addition to that, in the past few years we have uh started a before and after school care program.

Um we work closely with uh Johnson County Parks and Rec and we work closely with Olatha Public Schools to provide transportation to school and from school helps these families extend their work availability and to give these uh children a safe place uh to be and to dream.

Um we are starting this school year.

Um we have free music lessons on Tuesday, we're teaching pianos, uh free piano lessons for Olatha and Johnson County students in addition to these shelter families, um, guitar lessons on Thursdays and uh brass band if they're interested on um uh Wednesdays.

So we're trying hard to develop and build character um in in the students as well.

So well, I think you all do a tremendous job.

And the fact that in the 10 years that you have had the shelters, I have never heard anything at first.

And the fact that people are supportive in the neighborhood speaks for itself, but you all are truly the epitome of what we would like to see for shelters, for homeless shelters.

It's the only way you're gonna break that cycle of homelessness.

So I want to thank you in the Salvation Army for the very valuable service that you provide our community.

Thank you.

Councilmember Fachis.

Thank you, Mayron.

Thank you very much for this project.

So is this funded entirely by county dollars?

I'm sorry.

Is this funded by county dollars?

Is that where the money came from?

The whole project?

Yeah.

This is a 50-50 partnership between loc or privately raised funds and we did uh write for a grant with the SLFRF funds from Johnson County.

Okay.

So it's a it's uh it's a collaborative partnership.

Good funding.

And so you did get county dollars.

We did.

How much did they give you?

467,000.

Okay.

That's it.

We expected more from them.

Uh we were uh we asked for um just a partnership.

They said the same.

They said the same.

Why didn't you ask for more is what their question was.

Uh and our answer to that is um we really feel uh like we just wanted a partnership and uh we're not we're not going anywhere and we love to be here long term, so there will be plenty of opportunity for more, hopefully in the future.

And so yeah, and along that line uh with sincerity, if if you had the money and the space, would you like more family shelters?

Um yes.

I think the point in time count numbers that we see um and just the need that we have calling and walking through the door every day, uh more uh would be would be better.

Would be better.

And is this the only family shelters, homeless shelters in Johnson County?

Well, beyond family, this is the Soviet Army Johnson County Family Lodge is uh the only freestanding shelter uh in Johnson County, and we have by the if when we hopefully finish this project, we will have over 90 percent of the beds that are available to the houseless in Johnson County right here on our campus.

Okay.

Good.

Good.

Thanks very much.

I'm glad we're the center of it.

Yeah, thank you.

Yeah, thank you.

Thank you, Mayor.

Councilmember Gilmore.

Thank you, Mayor.

Nate, just wanted to say thank you for your ministry in our community.

And I know you've only been here a few years, but you've already made a great impact, and thank you for that.

I was gonna ask a question similar to Councilman Vaucus about uh and this has no bearing on my vote for this, by the way, but have you if your fundraising completed?

Are you still in the process of that?

Or how where are you in that journey?

Uh that fundraising is completed.

We're no longer uh raising funds, so all the all the funds that we need are are in the in the bank, and we're just we're ready to move forward pending your approval.

And I think um to uh echo your sentiment, I've been here just a few years.

Um, but you we stand on the shoulders of giants who raised their hand.

I think it was the mid-90s in that motel who said we would love to purchase this and uh and make this a shelter, and so we have done that with um the support of the city um in collaboration with several other agencies and people who just try to say yes um to meeting needs.

So thanks for bringing that up.

Thank you.

Councilmember Felter.

Thank you, Mayor.

Lieutenant Woodard, thank you for your work here in OA that and the impact you're making.

Something that I wanted to point out that is also unique to your program is something that stuck with me from a tour that Councilman Gilmore and I went on three years ago, maybe, um, that ninety-seven percent at the time of the folks that go through your program never experience homelessness again.

Is that still true?

Yeah.

Uh actually I just had an interesting meeting uh about that uh today.

We are seeing longer stays.

People are moving in with housing barrier debts that are um tens of thousands.

Um what that's causing us to do is work with families a little bit longer, but it causes us to ask um ourselves a question is once we once a family uh moves in, um, are we interested in in uh completing our program within six months to a year, or are we interested in that family's particular uh ability to be sustainably housed?

And our answer to that question um is that once we partner with a family and begin walking with them, um we stick with them.

But these families are amazingly successful.

This past year we had uh a mom pay off over $15,000 in four months of rental arrears, and is uh I happy to say successfully and sustainably housed um with her children.

So uh yeah.

I love that love hearing that.

I think it's more than an attainable or affordable housing issue.

There's a great article in the Wall Street Journal.

I think it was today.

It's talking about everybody's kind of frozen in place.

Nobody's buying new homes, nobody's switching jobs.

America's mobility has stopped.

America's mobility has stopped and I a lot of it's interest rates, a lot of it's other things.

So maybe perhaps read that article and look at the solutions through that lens because it's going to take a multiprong approach to fix this problem.

And you're right.

I mean I know you do emergency shelters for 60 to 90 days but you do up to 365 days and God help us if we get to where we need longer than that but perhaps we will and if we do how can you you have 14 units now you're adding four and more thank you for that but as it you know for Johnson County is it enough and no.

So thank you for lifting the portion of the heavy load that you are and we will do our part as we can and it's up to us to study these complex problems and thank you for recognizing that it it's changing a bit.

So thank you very much.

Thank you.

Councilmember Essex Thank you.

Thanks for being here Nate I just wanted to share with you also my congratulations because this is so important.

Your model is recommended all over the state, all over the nation because it's been so successful.

And I also wanted to make sure everybody heard that last we talked it was 96 percent don't return homelessness.

That's kind of the target.

Is that correct?

That is correct.

All right I think that's fantastic what you're doing and um just want to know have you got to that vacation yet?

I just got an email a couple weeks ago.

You got 14 days to take by the end of the year.

Yeah.

Councilmember Schoonover Thank you, Mayor and Nate thank you so much.

You know I I I share the sentiments of everybody up here.

We're just so proud uh to to have you in our community and for the work that you do.

To follow up on a on a question that that Kevin asked you had mentioned that uh your fundraising was was complete I assume it's just for this project that you're speaking of correct that's if people if people still wanted to donate to the Salvation Army how could they go about doing that?

Is it is it time?

Is it money?

Is it material?

What is it that we can do to support you in those efforts to make things easier in our community.

Yeah.

Can we say all of those things?

We will uh in a couple of months here we're already talking about it.

We'll start uh standing out in front of your stores and ringing a bell uh just to remind uh the need I and this gives me an opportunity to just say thank you so much for the support.

I always say the Salvation Army is just a great middleman between people who have a desire to serve and to give and um the people that are in in the most need.

We cannot do it on our own and so we're thankful to all the donors that that we have but we have ways to to give of time uh of talent of resources each and every day day in and day out and uh you can go to our website um uh Olatha at salvationarmy dot Use dot salvationarmy dot org um and uh you can find ways to get involved um otherwise just stop on by if you haven't had a tour of the uh of the facility um we'd love to we're always about connecting people to our our uh programs and our resources to help them thrive in all areas of their life and so um all of the money that's raised here in those red kettles uh over the Christmas time that's really our main fundraising season that stays right here in Johnson County 90% of that stays right here uh the 10% that leaves just helps us do things like HR and accounting and and all those things and we share those costs across the state of Kansas in western Missouri and so that that money that's raised here doesn't go off to some uh place in Washington DC that stays right here in the community to allow us to uh continue to serve the most vulnerable right here so amazing thank you so much yeah thank you um Nate I didn't have any questions for staff but I did want to tell you that um we appreciate the work that you do in our community um I had a gentlemanly friend tell me a few years back he says don't he was a volunteer Bell Ray said never go past one of those red pills without putting money in so I've never done that since I always put whatever I had uh available in the I encourage everybody else to do the same you you do really important work hard work and uh it's difficult sometimes and so uh we appreciate what you do for our community.

Thanks for being here.

Yeah if I could just say that we have a great team.

We have tremendous uh staff who who have dedicated their lives um to this and we have very competent uh compassionate loving staff who is there to meet people each and every day and so I stand here representing um people who who give of their entire lives to this mission and I'm proud to wear uh this uniform and what it represents here in Olatha um the many people that the Salvation Army has been able to partner with represent and to serve um it's a real honor um to be standing where I am and representing the people that I am so thank you for giving me the opportunity to share um and thank you for collaboration and partnership in the future.

I'm proud to wear uh this uniform and what it represents here in Olatha the many people that the Salvation Army has been able to partner with, represent, and to serve um it's a real honor um to be standing where I am and representing the people that I am.

So thank you for giving me the opportunity to share and thank you for collaboration and partnership in the future.

When we when we toured the facility I don't know a couple of years ago I was touring it there were a couple of units that needed some renovation and I don't know if you were that's part of this ongoing uh donations to renovate units as they wear and tear.

I'm sure it's when people move in and out.

Yeah it's all important.

Our families do a great job.

They're really thankful to have the space and so they take care of it.

But you know when you build uh 14 units at the same time things start to wear out and go out at the same at the same time and so replacing those PTAC units it really is like a motel setup.

Everyone gets their own unit it's a really dignified way to serve it is a great model.

But that means that everyone controls their own AC and everyone uh and so all those units going out.

So there is a lot of uh routine uh maintenance um and program costs so um if you have a new blanket or a new comforter or a new towel or new toothbrushes toothbrushes are uh one of the one of the favorite things of families moving in um and uh or a pillow or you know we even have people that donate KU gear or K State gear to hopefully inspire people in the future and so um those donations are always welcome to help us continue um to serve those families with dignity thank you for being here thank you any other questions of staff motion be an order on item B Mr Mayor I move to approve ordinance number 25-27 RZ 25-06 approving the rezoning from CP2 district to R4 district for the Salvation Army Family Lodge expansion on approximately 0.21 acres.

Second we have a motion and a second one the city clerk please call roll.

Mr Schoonover Absolutely yes Dr.

Felter Yes Mr Vacchus Ms Essex Yes Mr.

Bacon Yes Ms Vote?

Yes Mr Gilmore Yes Motion passes 70 Item C is related is consideration of resolution number 25-1074 which is SU 25-000 two requesting approval of a special use permit for a homeless shelter with a preliminary site development plan for the Salvation Army family large lodge expansion on approximately 1.01 acres located northeast of East Santa Fe Street and Northwoodland Road.

Planning commission recommends approval 8 to zero any questions on this motion motion be in order.

Mr Rio move to approve resolution number 25-1074 SU 25-000 two.

Second we have a motion and second with the city club please call the role.

Ms.

Yes.

Mr Gilmore Yes Mr Schoonover Dr.

Felter Yes Mr Yes Ms Essex Yes.

Mr Bacon motion passes 70 Item D is consideration of an annexation agreement with the fire district detachment petition submitted by 167th Street properties LLC pertaining to the annexation and detachment of approximately 37.56 plus or minus acres at the southwest corner of 167th Street and Lone Elm Road.

This item and the next one were a report at the August 5th City Council meeting the petitioner is requesting annexation so they can rezone and develop the property for commercial use.

Do we have any need for presentation or questions on this item tonight?

Seeing none appus I just had a question just an explanation of the fire district detachment.

Okay.

What does that entail Councilmember Vaucus uh members of the council Ron Shaver, City Attorney I appreciate you raising this uh point it's uh thanks to Councilmember State Representative Essex um who helped carry the bill that got this legislation fixed this allows us to proceed with getting uh voluntary petitioner-driven petition to remove the property from the county fire district uh to petition the Board of Commissioners uh to do that.

Uh it used to be that we had to get the board's approval the fire district's board's approval now the Board of Commissioners uh is the Board of Fire District 2.

So this is in fire district two's boundary.

Uh it used to be uh much more difficult to do that and we all we had to negotiate with the the district board itself but since this is under that particular enabling legislation we're able to do that.

And this is the first one you've seen where we'd be able to kind of simultaneously bring them to you.

We have batches of ones that we have put together kind of in the mix of the old statute and the new statute, and we're working on gathering them.

The county likes to get them in a bundle together so that we don't just do one of these detachments every month or so.

So we're in the process of gathering several of these to present to the Board of County Commissioners.

This would be in that next batch.

We haven't done one, a detachment for a couple of years now.

So thanks very much, Ron.

I appreciate that.

Sure.

Yep.

Bottom line, Ryan, Ron, does this it just keeps people from having to pay taxes to vote fire protection?

Well, what happens, Mayor, is the county will there's tax um various tax classifications.

So it can be a tax classification if you're in the city of Olatha No Fire plus Fire District 2.

So you're paying higher taxes because the Fire District 2 levy is higher than the city fire, city with fire levy.

It's only another one and a half mils to add the city uh fire city with fire levy.

So it's a tax savings uh ultimately to the owner and uh before and after annexation, it's often just a m a matter of a few dollars here and there difference um from the time before they are annexed.

So it's usually a great benefit for these owners and uh can also help them with their insurance.

Thank you.

A motion would be in order.

Mr.

Mayor, I move to approve the annexation agreement with and fire district detachment petition submitted by 167th Street Properties LLC pertaining to the annexation and detachment of approximately 37.56 plus or minus acres at the southwest corner of 167th Street and Lone Elm Road.

Second.

We have a motion and second with the city clerk, please call roll.

Mr.

Bacchus.

Yes.

Ms.

Essex.

Yes.

Mr.

Bacon.

Yes.

Ms.

Vote.

Yes.

Mr.

Gilmore.

Yes.

Mr.

Schoonover.

Yes.

Dr.

Felter.

Yes.

Motion passes.

70.

Item E, as we said, is related.

It is consideration of ordinance number 25-28, annexing approximately 37.56, plus or minus acres at the southwest corner of 167th Street and Lone Elm Road.

Any questions?

Motion be in order.

Mr.

Mayor, I move to approve ordinance number 25-28, which is annexation 25-0003.

Second.

We have a motion and second with the city clerk, please call roll.

Mr.

Gilmore.

Yes.

Miss Vote?

Yes.

Mr.

Bacon.

Yes.

Ms.

Essex?

Yes.

Mr.

Bacchus.

Yes.

Dr.

Felter.

Yes.

Mr.

Scunover.

Yes.

Motion passes 70.

We'll now move to item F.

Item F is consideration of ordinance number 25-29, amending Title 13 of the Olathe Municipal Code pertaining to water and sewer fees and charges.

This item was a report at our last meeting, August 5th.

Any need for presentation or questions?

Seeing none.

Motion be in order.

Mr.

Mayor, I move to approve ordinance number 25-29, amending title 2 of the Olatha Municipal Code pertaining to water and sewer fees and charges.

Second.

We have a motion and second with the city court, please call roll.

Ms.

Essex.

Yes.

Mr.

Bacon.

Yes.

Ms.

Spot.

Yes.

Mr.

Gilmore.

Yes.

Mr.

Schoonover.

Yes.

Dr.

Felter.

Yes.

Mr.

Vacas.

Yes.

Motion passes 7-0.

Okay.

We'll now move to general issues and concerns of citizens.

We have one individual that is signed up to speak.

So would the City Clerk please read the guidelines and call up our speaker?

The Council has extended this privilege to allow people who live and work in Olatha address concerns to the City Council.

Speakers must only address the council.

Council members are not required to respond.

Please treat others with kindness and respect.

The council has allocated up to three minutes for speakers.

Welcome.

Hello.

I am Dr.

Heather McCain and I live at 11830, South Pine Street in Olatha, Kansas.

And I wanted to give you an update on the traffic that is going through my neighborhood because of the woodland road construction.

It is far worse than it was previously.

Now there is two-way traffic going through the neighborhood day and night.

This is a neighborhood with no street lights and no sidewalks.

So now people drive through with their brights on at night.

We have people who like to walk.

You can't walk anymore because now there's traffic going both directions.

There are absolutely no detour signs on Iowa Street saying that traffic should go west on 119th Street to Loneown Road as the detour.

So what they're doing is they're turning and going through the road closed signs that are on 119th Street.

Two different sets of signs that say road closed, coming up Pine Street, going across to 117th Terrace and back on woodland.

So last time I was here, the police came out and put up a speed, like a speed recorder sign for a couple of weeks.

I think people just tried to see how fast they could go past the sign versus slowing down and paying attention.

Since the meeting I was in last time, we have had one mailbox and we have brick mailboxes in our neighborhood, one mailbox damaged, and one totally destroyed in a hit and run.

While my grandkids who are out in my yard, they hit it and took off.

So it is much worse, and something needs to be done to show that the detour should go west and not come east through the neighborhoods that are Mill Creek Grande and the Milk Creek neighborhoods over in that area.

Because it's getting it's really dangerous now because now we have children who are standing out there waiting for the bus, and there were dump trucks coming through this morning, went right behind a bus.

So not good for our kids.

So I'd appreciate if somebody would put detour signs at Iowa and maintain the fact that people should not be cutting through these neighborhoods.

They should be going on the preferred detour route that was established months ago.

Thank you.

Thank you.

We'll now move on to report of our planning session tonight.

Report item A, or one is uh regarding proposed amendments to Title VIII and Title IX of the length of municipal code pertaining to animals.

Any questions about that report?

Then we'll move to discussion items.

I'm sorry, hold on.

I just wanted to take a minute to thank staff for making those changes that over and above what was required for the you know amendments.

So thank you very much.

I think it explains exactly what we do in our shelter.

We'll move now to discussion items.

We have tonight our general overview of the proposed 2026 recreation, park sales tax, street maintenance, sales tax fund, um budgets, and then the 2026 to 2030 capital improvement plan, CIP and fees.

So uh Clara Bernar Bernhauer is here.

Welcome.

Good evening.

And then you'll hand it off to the United States.

That's right, yes.

Good evening, Mayor and City Council Clara Burnour, interim budget manager.

Uh tonight is the last of our three budget workshops for the 2026 budget process.

Uh tonight we'll be discussing the city's recreation fund and fee changes, our two dedicated sales tax funds for parks and street maintenance and their capital improvement plans.

And then we will touch on the tourism and development fund before handing it off to our partners at the chamber.

First, the recreation fund.

Uh, this fund accounts for user fees from the many excellent parks and recreation programs the city offers, as well as the Letha Community Center.

We present this as a single fund, but administratively we do examine uh how these two elements operate individually, and you'll you'll see that uh in our upcoming slides.

So this fund has faced budget pressures, which we outlined here.

Uh but overall revenues have been outpaced by expenditures.

So we currently anticipate up to a 1.5 million dollar transfer from the jobs fund in 2026.

Uh to any extent that revenues can increase and costs can decrease.

Uh, that will only help reduce this transfer amount.

We will only transfer what is needed.

So on the expenditure side of the equation, one of the largest groupings of expenses for the community center is custodial service contracts.

Nearly a fifth of the contractual services budget for the whole fund goes toward facilities maintenance.

Uh so if we've seen those costs increase, that's definitely an upward pressure on the fund.

Uh then, as we've highlighted for other funds, the city is supporting increased personnel costs.

This fund has a large mixture of staffing, including seasonal staff with pay structures that need to stay competitive in order to operate well.

Next, on the revenue side of the equation, 2024 saw a new software implementation.

Overall, a great step forward for managing recreation, but a byproduct of this migration was a loss in OCC membership from a lack of billing information, which we've discussed before.

And then really already OC memberships as a revenue source are somewhat constrained.

Staff have found that our community center fees are at the top of the range that we can charge and still remain competitive.

So although we look for opportunities for additional revenue generation and value ads, and we will show proposed fee changes later, we are mindful of that downward pressure.

As I just mentioned, staff diligently looks at opportunities for cost savings and new initiatives for revenue generation for this fund and its programming.

So to help with formalizing these efforts, we've entered into two evaluations to get recommendations on programming cost recovery and how to optimize the community center.

Customer service and custodial service staffing have also been realigned at the OCC.

Efficiencies were identified in duties such as front desk assignments, and that's a change starting this year.

Should result in savings.

Staff is also reviewing various other contracts that we have.

As an example of an agency that pays us, the Olatha Girls Softball Association had a negotiated contract for exclusive use of our fields.

And so we're revisiting that aging contract since it's older now to see if it can reach a more mutually beneficial deal there.

For an initiative new this year, we've enhanced rental space park options for birthdays at Black Bob Bay in Lake Olatha.

This programming has been a good revenue generator, so staff's excited about that.

Finally, the OCC Kids Club was renovated.

This is now a great space for child care.

This has an increased proceed value for membership at the OCC and allows and can allow double the participation of the current.

So this isn't an exhaustive list of everything, but it does touch on some of the meaningful ways we were addressing the budget pressures we're experiencing in this fund.

So then taking those pressures and solutions together brings us to this slide on cost recovery.

Is our goal in Aletha to keep the recreation fund as close to 100% cost recovery as we can?

But in 2026, we are proposing a recreation fund budget with 79% cost recovery, which you can see here is consistent for other comparable communities recreation funds.

This bar chart shows the total revenues, expenditures, and ending fund balance for this fund since 2019.

The revenue bars in 25 and 26, the projected and 2026 proposed, include uh the general fund transfers with a rise, as you can see, uh a rising trend of expenditures.

This slide here illustrates the breakout of the community center and recreation operating revenues.

So that's excluding the general fund transfer that we just saw, and just showing charges for services.

This demonstrates that recreation revenues, apart from some minor fluctuations associated with seasonality, uh, have recovered and stabilized in 2022 through 2025 so far.

And uh, we project just a slight increase in 26 over 25 projection then.

Um that contrasts then in the orange with the community center revenues, which has had uh which have had some recovery but saw the decrease in membership loss in 2024.

We forecast revenues to hover right around 2.1, 2.2 million 2025 and 2026, which is similar to what we saw in 2024.

These bar charts then are uh the breakout of the operating costs and revenues of the community centers looking at the community and um just the operating piece of the community center.

In 2025, uh projected and 2026 proposed, it also illustrates how the general fund transfer works to bridge the gap between the community center revenues and expenditures.

So two pie charts here to show the proportions of the types of revenues and expenditures in recreation fund.

On the revenues, 80% comes from charges for services.

So hopefully seeing that OCC Kids Club increase here along with the facilities rentals that we mentioned previously.

Additionally, then the general fund transfer.

On the right are expenditures for 2026, personnel is the largest cost at 72%, followed by contractual services, and that's where you'll see the custodial services chargebacks reflected from the budget pressure slide previously.

This table shows that 2026 proposed budget for recreation is just under 7.7 million dollars.

This is a very slight increase over the adopted 2025 budget.

Uh recreation, so then we divide it out between recreation and the community center.

Recreation is seeing a standard increase of 4.2%, and you can attribute that to personnel costs.

You can attribute that to personnel costs.

OCC there then has a 4.5 decrease.

Identified deficiencies in savings and categories like custodial services are the reason we propose this decrease in 2026.

Reserves then on that bottom line stay about the same for 25 budget.

Here are the proposed recreation fee changes in 2026.

As I mentioned before, staff's always looking at opportunities where it's appropriate to increase fees for programming.

Updates in the first portion are uh include raised minimums for ranges, some alignment for consistency facilities, and some increases for pools, child care, and like Lake Olatha daily fees to recover costs for what are really great services.

This year we also have some new fees highlighted.

Uh they include a three in one summer pass, summer one pass, um, which will provide affordable access to families uh for Mahaffey, City Pools, Black Bob Bay, Lake Oletha, and the community center.

Uh then there are three new ads for OCC membership.

First, the social services group, uh, and that will provide an inclusive membership to the OCC.

Uh second, a one-month membership for individuals and families, and and that'll hopefully attract new segments of members.

And then third, the kids club membership to provide child care option to members uh along with that great renovated space that we have.

Council member vote.

Explain the social service groups membership.

Yeah, I'd be happy to have actually do we want Mike to We can get you like some additional written information on that.

It's I it's new, so we've got it's evolving.

Okay, I'll look forward to receiving it.

Councilmember Gilmore.

Thank you.

Could you go back a few slides to the bar chart on the revenue operating of the So we have uh we've obviously don't have any year where we had revenue that met our expenses here?

This is expensive transfers, right?

And it excludes transfers, yes.

Okay, for the first poll.

Um can you remind us when the community center was built?

How was that funded?

Is that capital outlay money that we went and put long-term bonds on?

I'm not remembering.

Somebody can help me.

Yeah, it was yeah, yeah, obligation bonds.

Um, so the part that's missing from here is the service of that debt as well.

There's no money coming out of here to service the debt that's on the property.

That's that's correct.

That's I just wanted to clarify my understanding on that.

Thank you.

Yeah, absolutely.

Councilmember Vacus.

Uh thank you, Mira.

And thanks, Clara.

So I didn't realize we could ask questions as we go along.

So I've got a couple of questions on earlier slides, but we don't need to flip back.

Okay.

You showed a slide that showed a peer comparison in terms of our fees.

Oh, okay.

I'll flip back, Brady.

Sorry.

Have we tried to compare ourselves to Johnson County parts and recognition?

I don't think we have.

So it's yeah, we're trying to get apples to apples with uh communities that are offering like somewhat similar programs.

So I think, yeah.

That's that's what let's do that.

So we've explored them deliberately.

Okay.

The um the uh Olatha Live.

This is part of the money that we use to fund Olatha Live and our other concerts.

You can it's the Mike Sorry, directory of life.

Um yeah, that's some of the Olathe Live concerts come from the general fund.

They aren't out of the recreation fund.

Okay.

So the the various activities that we have, are those all out of general funds?

No, it's it's a variety of programs come out of the recreation fund, and then some like Olathe Live come from the general fund.

Okay.

So I you know, I don't know if a couple of general comments.

First of all, you know, look, the realistically, I think it's unrealistic to think that this would ever be self-supporting.

I mean, I think that's the reality of the nature of our business.

But I would also ask as many events as we fund wherever the source of money comes from, to include the chamber events.

Have we ever thought that maybe we're doing a little too much?

Uh we could look at the number of events we have.

They're always popular and and well attended.

So uh I mean I don't want to be the scrooge that says dial it back.

But I mean, should we give thought to that?

I think one thing you'll see is in the downtown events.

We we really ramped those up over the last couple of years to bring some attention to downtown, and that over time those will ramp back down.

Now, not saying chamber and forth Fridays, but um some of the events that we're having down there.

You know, I know they're they're all extraordinarily popular, and Olaythe Live in particular, which is fantastic, you know.

And and I I don't uh even like the idea of bringing up the idea that maybe we're trying to be too much.

But maybe it's part of the consideration of how do we tighten our belt a bit.

Maybe it's something we we could think about, should think about change, but at least think about it.

So I'm sorry.

Yeah.

We one we are looking at a number of things.

So we do look at what do we include and say uh um in some of the events that we have in the other things we are looking at are sponsorships, for instance, for some of the even for the community center or even naming rights potentially.

Sure.

So there we have a lot of things that we're we're going through all the time to try to close that gap as much as we can.

Okay.

Hey, thanks very much.

Thank you, Mayor.

Councilmember Scudover.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um looking at it at uh a couple of the slides here, both slide nine and then slide slide seven.

Uh I guess I should have said seven and nine, uh, both of these slides seem to track um a decrease in expenditures from 2023 to 2024.

I mean, they also track them from 2019 into 2020 and and the COVID years and all of that type of stuff.

Um but do we know what caused the decrease in expenditures from 2023 to 2024?

And follow-up question, is that something that we can replicate moving forward?

Yes.

So um 2024 that year um it had less in revenues, um, and so it had a resulting small like a smaller budget authority essentially.

So what we had to do in 2024 was move facilities costs out of the out of the community center fund, out of the rec fund, and put it toward general funds.

So it the final fund financials show a reduced 2024 expenditures, but that is because of lower revenues that happened.

So that's the reason for the dip in 2024.

So if we look at it slide seven here, the difference primarily between the expenditures that we saw in 2023 and then in 2024 is those the facility funding is no longer accounted for.

Yeah, and it was a way uh essentially, so in 25 and 26 we have that general fund transfer in 2024, not quite enough to support the funds.

I mean, Jamie can kind of if she wants us to come speak a little bit more about that, but um, yeah, you got it.

Okay.

Hi, Jamie Roboshot Economy Director.

Um so when the council adopts you're you're adopting the budget to zero, which includes reserves.

Usually we will have plenty of budget authority because we include reserves in the spending authority of the fund.

There are no reserves really in the rec fund because the revenues have been so much out.

The expenditure have been outpacing the revenue growth.

And so in order to, we did not have enough budget authority under the state statute in the recreation fund in 2024.

And so what we did in that instance is we took what were the overhead operating costs, and we moved those to the general fund rather than the general fund transferring it back just because of the adopted budget authority.

And so we can give you the exact cost, like we track them both.

And so what we're really trying to fix in 2026 is make sure we have enough authority in this fund because it really does mess up our data.

So we have to track it two different ways.

And so what I would tell you to do on these charts, the 2024 looks funny.

Follow the trend line because the 2024 is actually probably slightly above that six million dollar line.

But in the QA, we'll show you exactly what those expenses were and what we moved out to the general fund because we track them both.

If if thank you very much for that explanation.

I if we can just What's the point of having a separate REC fund then if if we can just transfer money from the general fund or or transfer an obligation that would be paid out of the rec fund over to be paid from the general fund?

Why have multiple funds covering this stuff to begin with?

It's a really great question and uh uh policy we've debated the past few years.

Um one, I think it's been important historically to the council to know how what our cost recovery is on our rec program, so that's one reason why.

We did explore if we're gonna keep transferring from the general fund, why don't we just move all of this to the general fund?

We could still track it by cost center or what have you.

The problem with doing that is you create when you're when you need to do a 1.5 million dollar transfer, if you're keeping it in the general fund to maintain your 30 percent reserve balance, you suddenly have to hold back 30 percent of those annual revenues, so you make the problem worse.

So that's why we have not recommended that.

That's a good answer.

One last thing, and and I know uh earlier today there was announced, and I'm sorry if I'm stealing anybody's thunder if they were going to announce uh uh uh mention this earlier, but the city of Olatha now has a partnership with MNU for some of our programming uh through through parks and rec.

Is that gonna have any impact on this this fund moving forward?

Uh most likely a positive impact where they'll help uh sponsor some of the team.

So maybe it's t-shirts and and uh maybe ball fields and stuff, right?

Yep.

Yeah, minor impact but impact.

Excellent.

Thank you.

Councilmember vote.

Uh quick questions.

Um membership losses you mentioned were related to that rack track software system change.

So what have we done to change to bring them back to make this work?

Yep.

User friendly.

One of one of the things that when we say membership loss, we have as many memberships, but they've changed in nature from family to single.

And um and and changing over to the software, you know, it's just like that having too many TV subscriptions.

You're gonna you're gonna get rid of one of them, right?

So uh we did run into that.

We have a slew.

We've already had and we will continue to have marketing campaigns through the rest of the year where we're trying to get people back.

We also think that by expanding the kids' club at the community center, we add that value back to the membership so that um that's one more reason to bring families back to to come and work out and have somewhere safe for their kid to be while they're doing that.

Super.

And in regard to scholarships, are we still providing and what's that dollar amount that is included in the budget?

I think we're at $20,000 that we go through for scholarships through the course of the year if someone applies them.

And there's also a couple that the the um the parks board gives out a couple of thousand dollar a year scholarships for uh students who want to go on into the recreation field.

Great.

Um you mentioned your evaluating program cost recovery and OCC optimization.

When will we get a report on that?

Uh looked at a draft report today, and so we didn't wait for the report to be out to make some of the changes.

So we've made some changes in the last um over the last several months where we've changed the staffing model, we've changed the the model with facilities on um our custodial services, and we already project that we'll see some the the positive turnaround through the the remainder of this year and into next year.

So I think uh but we will have the final report very soon.

It was um nothing nothing terribly new and things we didn't know to take after, but there are a handful of things that was very helpful to find out.

Great.

I think all of us would enjoy being able to look at that.

On the peer comparison cost recovery.

In not just these municipalities, what is typical?

If you look at the numbers, and you might have um different numbers, it it's very hard to say what um what things that a community offers and then be able to compare them together.

So that's why we see 50s up to you know uh into the 80s.

And so we have a lot of venues and we have a lot of sports fields and pools, and I think um finding a comparable city is a is a challenge.

So we look at the cities that just around us.

Did we ever get a hundred percent like we initially that first year?

I don't know.

Could have been the first couple of years overall or just on specific facilities, yeah.

Probably.

We had probably seven on some.

And it was a pretty high expectation, I think.

And I think, yeah, I think our taxpayers do just like what the scholarships expect um or parks and and some of the events that we have, they are free.

And that is what builds our community.

So I am very supportive of that though.

I think getting sponsorships is always you know ideal to help us out with that.

Um I think that's all I've got.

Thank you so much.

Councilmember Felter.

Thank you, Mayor.

Thank you guys for the presentation.

Thank you specifically for Black Bob Park.

It's so amazing.

You wouldn't believe the well, you would, the amount of positive comments that the residents make about it, they just love it.

It's a home run.

And then I noticed in here enhancing birthday park um options at Black Bob Bay.

Um I also received a lot of questions about it's so hot, why are our pools not open?

Can you speak to that?

I can.

What happens to us is that we hire a lot of kids that they end up going back to school and we don't have staff to keep the pools open.

So we we stretched this year we stretched one more weekend out of uh Lake Olatha, and then we keep the pool at Black Bob open uh through Labor Day.

But that's about as far as we can get with the staff we have.

We're looking at what can we do next year to set the expectation that we have people longer in the year because it is a very short season and we'd like to extend that as well.

Yeah.

I figured that was it.

But it's nice to hear it from the expert.

So thank you very much.

One of the complaints that I had, uh I think it was this last year, I can't remember.

Was did we eliminate a family season pass or something like that?

And was it in by doing so did we accomplish what we set out to accomplish.

Yeah, I think we we maybe um we make changes every year in the types of passes that we have, and I think that maybe wasn't one of our better moves in in the last few years, and we've we have replaced that with another pass that is more comprehensive and affordable.

Expensive maybe.

Maybe we can make money on it.

I don't know.

Cool.

At some point we we get right, we get to that level where we can't continue to raise the prices.

And that's what where when we took that family pass away.

It was I think it was families over five, is where we got into trouble, and that's where um people really got into it was a it was became a money issue at that point.

And everybody was family.

Maybe exactly.

All right.

I think that's it for this section.

We'll move on.

Thanks, Claire.

All right.

All right.

So that pretty much that that covered the uh the fees too for there.

All right.

So um next, before we jump into the dedicated sales tax funds and all the great work that they're supporting, uh, we did want to cover the current sales tax trends and forecast.

So for context, uh the street maintenance sales tax or SMST for short is a dedicated three eighth cent sales tax and a latha for all things street maintenance, repairs, rehab, improvements of streets.

It was first approved in 2013 by voters, and the renewal uh for another 10 years was approved in April 2023 with 79% support.

Um sales tax is a dedicated one eighth cent sales tax latha for park improvements.

This was also improved in 2023 with 77 percent.

And uh that was the fourth time being approved since 1999.

So as you might gather uh from the history of pretty steep blue lines on both of these charts, and especially in recent years, uh we've been fortunate to be able to accomplish a significant amount of work in both parks and streets uh with these funds, especially with the exponential growth in recent years.

It's uh much more than what the budget office would have foreseen when the taxes were originally put to vote.

Uh that said, the current sales tax outlook in the dashed blue lines uh has slowed, and the proposed 2026 operational budget and five-year capital improvement plans are adjusted down from what was uh previously planned.

Um we can handle the slowdown for now, uh and we don't want to overcommit on projects given where we see revenues right now.

Uh staff is very mindful that voters place trust in take care of the streets and parks with these funds, so that guides all the decisions.

So with that, foundation laid with the sales tax, the park sales tax fund and CIP up next.

Um the park sales tax proposed 2026 budget is just under $8 million.

This is a decrease from 2025 projection, largely due to the smaller transfer and intentional spend down in reserves.

Uh the transfer to projects from this fund is the largest expense, and it largely depends on timing of projects and fluctuate some because of that.

Um the reserves being spent down here are still meeting target fund balance.

That's just 20% of annual expenditures.

Uh and as you just saw with the sales tax trends, we did have some very strong years and we're able to put together a parks plan utilizing those funds, uh, which of course will result in getting those uh fund balances down to target levels.

So we'll continue to evaluate and following budgets based on sales tax and what happens, but this is currently based on the current projections.

So what these park charts really highlight uh are the in the supported fund transfers to the CIP are 87% of expenditures uh for the 2026 operating budget.

14% of expenditures are tied to personnel.

So eight employees are funded here, including parks craftspeople and parks maintenance workers, and they're uh part of the teams who help move the needle on parks maintenance perceptions for the city.

Um but really though the transfers at 87% are a large majority.

So here's where the transfers go.

Um we started showing this slide to demonstrate how the park's capital improvement plan aligns with the parks master plan.

So on the left are the projects as they fall under each priority in list format, and on the right is a pie chart showing the funding by those priorities for the five-year CIP.

Uh you'll see enhancing community and regional parks is uh where 48% of funding goes.

Uh but revitalization of neighborhood parks and trails are also around a quarter each for the five years.

Um this is significant because the in the parks master plan, 94% of those surveys supported improving existing parks in general as the highest need.

So we really are adhering to that intention with the parks CIP.

This chart just represents a slightly different view of the parks projects, basically just taking off that dimension of neighborhood parks and community parks to put to focus in on improvements versus renovations.

Uh here we'd consider renovations to include maintenance and updates to existing park features, like replacing a playground, for instance, uh while improvements would be new ads, like adding a restroom facility.

Um when we look at it this way, renovations are 20% of the five-year funding.

Um so while the last slide was showing a one-to-one uh with uh the parks master plan, this chart's kind of also tying into the alignment with 2040 in our direction finder survey.

Um it's a goal to have highs in citizen satisfaction with parks and trails, and we succeed there because of these investments that we're making.

Um parks maintenance is 92% satisfaction 2024, and walking and biking trails had an 89% citizen satisfaction in 2024.

So just in general, um the generally speaking, the major categories that city services that should receive the most emphasis over the next two years.

Um that question.

Parks and records get into the top five pretty regularly.

So just just trying to maintain what we have through innovations.

So uh this table, this is another large table of the CIP.

It's also in more detail in your binders, uh, shows the full five-year plan.

Um the park CIP is totaling 33.7 million dollars over the five years.

This last table here is to illustrate the three different funding sources for the park system CIP, general fund, park sales tax, and special parks.

Uh park sales tax is 78% of that five-year total for funding sources.

Street maintenance sales tax fund and its CIP.

The proposed 2026 budget for street main sales tax is around $16 million.

And the decrease that you see between projected 2025 and 2026 proposed budget is due to the slowing of sales tax.

And is the goal of this fund to transfer all revenues out, leaving zero dollar uh balance so that everything can go to annual programming.

And here is a map of the 2025 street preservation uh and reconstruction projects, uh that annual programming.

Uh you can see projects in every ward uh evenly distributed through the city.

Uh so this is just kind of showing what we have.

Um at the start of 2025, Oletha had 1,401 lane miles of streets estimated at over 1.8 million dollars in value.

Uh so this shows how we're investing in taking care of what we have.

All right.

Uh this table shows the five-year plan for street preservation.

Um, again, highly dependent on sales tax forecasting, but the current outlook we're planning for just under 98 million dollars going to the street preservation program in the next five years.

Claire, I have a question.

Any other questions?

So I I was kind of messing up.

I was trying to figure out what the projection was for the park sales tax collection each year.

Oh.

And I didn't know if it if that was the 5.6 million dollars.

The yes.

So on chart or slide 21, what happened in 2028, and maybe we're explaining that while I was looking around.

In 2021 here.

Oh, yeah, 2028.

That's so that's just it it's the timing of the project.

So really what's happening is just not the revenue then.

This is not the revenue.

Yeah, this is the projection of the revenue collected each year for this fund.

We can provide more in a full table for that.

Absolutely.

I mean the sales, yeah.

You can see the it's it's not in table format, but this is that dotted line showing is showing the 2030 projection.

So but we can get that exact numbers.

Yeah, absolutely.

Thank you.

Any other questions?

Okay, we're ready.

Move on.

All right.

Wait a minute.

Council Member Scoon over.

Thank you.

Uh on slide 18.

Um we talk about enhancing and upgrading community and regional parks.

What is the difference between a community and a regional park when that is a good nuance.

Um Beth might be able to speak a little bit more of the new ones on that.

But that's right, Deputy Director.

Uh the regional parks are the larger parks.

So think of Lake Olatha and Low Num Park.

And then the community parks are slightly smaller, so that would be similar to Frontier Park, Prairie Center Park, to Trails Park, and then you have the smaller neighboring parks that are somewhere between three and six acres.

Okay.

Thank you.

I appreciate that clarification.

I don't see any other.

Okay, now I think we're ready.

So that brings us that brings us a tourism and development fund.

Um the tourism and development fund accounts for revenues gener generated from the city's transient guest tax, uh, which you see on the left and the revenues.

Um we're highlighting this fund in part because we're taking it up for the chamber tonight, um, but also because earlier this summer the transient guest tax rate was approved to be raised from 6 percent to 9 percent effective January 1, 2026.

Uh that brought Aletha closer in line cities like Overland Park and Mission.

Um the right side here on the pie charts, you see the expenditures for the fund.

It's 100 percent contractual services.

Uh but that does that includes the Aletha uh chamber uh contribution, roughly 2 million dollars, as well as downtown grants.

So this table shows how we anticipate significant growth due to the proposed 3 percent increase in the TGG rate.

Uh and that's after some good performance in 23 and 24.

So the additional 3% of revenues planned for 2026 is being set aside for uh one year to support citywide events related to the 2026 uh FIFA World Cup and increased collaboration with the chamber.

So asterisk on the one-year change, what does that refer to?

Um year change.

Right on that chart in the top right corner.

Oh well, that's a good question.

I I would uh I would delete the I could do it again.

Yeah.

Okay.

Okay.

I think that.

Yeah.

So yeah, I think really just the 2025 adopted uh to propose.

So we're just trying to I think that's just trying to call it the one year changes uh 25 adopted budget to 26 proposed budget.

We didn't specify the one year.

All right.

Um so that that's that's that fund.

Um uh but before I hand us over to Tim, so we can highlight uh the great work the chamber is doing.

I just wanted to wrap up the budget portion um of this discussion.

So next steps are the public hearings, uh next council meeting, September 2nd, and then we conclude with a vote for budget adoption on September 16th.

Um as always here are the ways to engage.

Um that concludes the budget portion of the discussion.

I'll hand uh this over to Tim and we'll both be available for questions after.

Thank you, Clara.

Welcome, Tim.

Welcome.

Thank you.

Uh Tim McKeah, um CEO of Latha Chamber of Commerce.

Um I will be very brief.

Um our budget is um pretty simple for 2020 um uh six.

Um we are only uh it's very similar to the year before.

We are only looking at a uh 3.5 percent increase um for 26.

The vast majority of the money that will be raised will be set aside for uh World Cup um for 2026.

Um so each division we're looking at about um 30,000 per um EDC and CVB.

Our biggest expenditures, as you can imagine, are people and um our uh our lease which increases about two percent um a year um contractually, and then our our health insurance, which we're estimating um should be about a 10 percent increase.

Um but we're trying to keep that um all within about three and a half percent is all we are looking at for um 2026.

Um, and we'll be back to talk about that.

Um you know, we're looking at some a number of things, including downtown sports, other things related to that in 27.

So with that, unless there's any questions, I was just gonna hit some highlights of um you know this year and and um what we anticipate next year.

Um we had a really good year in regard to economic development even so far, um highlighted by uh Heartland Coca-Cola um plan opening the Walmart beep prop uh processing facility.

Those two alone are close to a billion dollars and about um seven, eight hundred employees new to all new to Olatha.

So um and then the other big highlight that's um really getting started and just beginning is our downtown redevelopment and Pizza 51 opening.

And so next year, um, you know, obviously we're gonna see more of those restaurants that have taken years um to develop.

I think you know, knock on wood that we'll see all of them open um this time next year.

Um and then uh you know, we have the RFP for out for our redevelopment of our post office project that has definitely been um uh a labor of love um for the last three or four years um trying to to relocate um them and working with uh uh U.S.

Post Office, and then um hopefully get started on Halo Ridge, which is 119th in renter, um, which also has taken probably about 10 years um that we have been working on that project.

So I think a lot of those things that um you know you put in put in the time and and we'll see a lot of that happen in 26.

Um on the CVB side, a lot about sports.

Um we've done Kelly and his team have done a really good job on some, you know, getting sporting events to come.

Um USU Soccer Regional Championship, actually we were that is the largest sporting event in Johnson County history.

And we've worked with Overland Park and even KCK on that, I believe.

Um this is the second year that we've done it.

Obviously, next year with World Cup, we won't be able to host that, but um, you know, just a great event.

Those other events that you've seen there, um, and I was just talking to Kelly about this.

Um each one of those, this is the either their second or third year.

Once we get them here, um they really like um being here.

Um, you know, the Australian rules football championship, uh regional event, definitely a national event, and we were able to entice them here.

They liked it, um, wanted to come back.

And that was every other year um we were talking about.

Um but they were back this year.

Um so next year we'll you know really focus on the World Cup.

Um this is uh goal Olatha is um kind of a branding process.

And all of this is working with city staff.

Kelly and and your team have been wonderful working with them on how do we take advantage of what we're gonna see next year.

And um so we're really excited about that.

Part of that is focusing on an enhanced or our portion of um, you know, we're looking at multiple events um, but the one that we're controlling, which is our downtown watch party, which you know will be really fun in that Kansas City hosts an event on Thursday, I believe, the day before.

Our fourth Friday is in between, and then there will be a s uh uh Saturday game here in Kansas City as well, too.

So what we're looking at is kind of an all-day event that um people can come to it and kind of a watch party because there will be other games going on in other cities.

So really ramping that up.

I know that Jason has also been doing a lot of um uh working with the um FIFA in regard to how do our businesses take advantage of of this while we're here, while they're here as well, too.

So um you'll you'll start to see a lot of of that really ramping up.

Um so with that I'm here for questions.

Tried to be brief.

Um they were joking on how long it was gonna take me to go through this.

So I'm trying to be brief.

Um yes.

I have one really important question.

Yeah.

Halo Ridge.

Yes.

Where does that come from?

I don't know.

That was the developer who came up with that name.

Um, but I I'm not quite sure how they they developed that name.

Yeah.

Thank you.

Councilmember skin over.

Uh just a note to say thanks for for you and your team, everything you guys are doing.

I think this is money well spent.

It's an investment in a lathe, and I think I think we get much more in return.

So thanks to you all for all the hard work you do.

And and one thing I didn't say, we try to enhance these dollars that you give us with private dollars as well, too.

I mean, our Fourth Fridays event.

I know we were talking about um, you know, events in our downtown and and others, and we definitely try and get sponsorships and and cover that through um other means as well, too.

So but thank you.

Uh this partnership that we've had, it's it's definitely um you know uh unique, I would say.

Um talking to my peers across the country, it doesn't always happen like this.

And we don't take it for granted.

Do you like your landlord?

I do like early.

Yes, it's great.

Actually, it's great being back downtown.

Yeah.

So have you back downtown.

And appreciate all the work you do.

Uh Councilmember.

What if you didn't like your land?

What would you do?

I don't know.

So any any uh Austin's will be working hard next year, but probably won't be open until 27.

Um no, I think I you know, I think they were trying to get done at the end of twenty-six as well too about you know this time.

Maybe add them.

Yeah, that'd be awesome.

And and Char, I've had com conversations with them as well too.

Right about now that I'm they'd like to, although well they'd like to take advantage of World Cup as well too if they could.

But that may be pushing it a little bit.

Thanks to the report.

Yeah.

That's uh Claire, did you have any final comments here?

That's it for budget.

Okay.

Okay, thank you.

That's the end of our workshops.

So we could add another one if we thought was necessary.

But I'm guessing we're all good.

We're ready to move forward with the public hearing.

Okay, that's the plan.

Uh we'll now move to executive session on our agenda.

Um we have two reasons to go into executive session tonight.

We'll do them one at a time.

We'll come back up and go back in for the second one.

Um staff would recommend how many minutes for the first ten minutes on the first item.

I'll make a motion.

On item A, I move that the city council recess into an executive session for preliminary discussion of the acquisition of real property in downtown Olatha pursuant to the exception provided in KSA 75-4319 be six for ten minutes.

Second.

We have a motion and second would the city clerk please call the role.

Mr.

Bacon.

Yes.

Yes.

Mr.

Gilmore.

Yes.

Mr.

Scoonover.

Yes.

Dr.

Felt.

Yes.

Mr.

Vacus.

Yes.

Miss Essex.

Yes.

Motion passes.

I said, is this how you got it?

We said no, but it makes sense.

I like it.

But that's called the Mark.

Shut up.

Um here right as you have to do.

And then we can say, oh, look at all these hard.

Oh, yeah, we're going to like a lot of that.

Right here by the stock.

No.

Yes, we will.

We can we can do it right now.

We will.

Second.

We have a motion and second with the city clerk, please take Mr.

Yes.

Miss Vote.

Yes.

Dr.

Felter.

Yes.

Mr.

Vacus.

Yes.

Mr.

Schoonover.

Yes.

Miss Essex.

Yes.

Mr.

Gilmore.

Yes.

Mr.

Brain.

Yes.

Motion passes seven zero.

A motion to recess back into executive session for item B would it be in order?

Yeah.

Second.

Mr.

Gilmore.

Yes.

Mr.

Schoonover.

Yes.

Dr.

Felter.

Yes.

Mr.

Vacus.

Yes.

Miss Essex.

Yes.

Mr.

Bacon.

Yes.

Miss Vote.

Yes.

Motion passes.

Seven zero.

I have a motion second.

All in favor say aye.

Any opposed?

Okay, we are reconvening from executive session.

A motion would be in order.

Item B, I moved to authorized staff to proceed with the strategies discussed with and directed by the governing body.

Second.

Yes.

Mr.

Bacon.

Yes.

Miss Essex.

Yes.

Mr.

Markus.

Yes.

Dr.

Felter.

Yes.

Mr.

Scanover.

Yes.

Mr.

Gilmore.

Yes.

Motion passes.

Seven zero.

Okay, now we're on additional items.

I'll start on my right, Councilmember Bachettes.

I um I know Saturday night, there was an issue at Woodland.

The railroad arms were down, the lights were flashing for forty-five minutes, but there was no train.

And so there are people then going into and out of the neighborhood, driving around, because that was the only way in and out.

It's not clear which way you should go for a detour.

So it's very easy to just get in that neighborhood and just drive around, you know.

So I wanted to talk to public works later this week, but I mean, maybe this is good enough.

We just need to take a hard look on the ground with what's going on.

I mean, they are suffering.

There's no doubt about it.

So I I would like just for my sake, a clarification of the construction timelines.

So we know when we'll be through this pain.

I think that'd be helpful.

And I, you know, I'm I have half a mind, only half of mine.

To walk the neighborhood and knock on some doors and say, hey, just share with your feedback just so they get a sense that somebody out there is thinking about above and beyond what public works already does.

But I think this is an opportunity for us to rise a little bit above and beyond what we we've been doing.

So that's my only additional comment here.

Okay.

Um yeah, we were just talking about it.

Um they're gonna Beth is gonna have our folks look at it again, and uh we'll have something sent out to you guys on what if anything we we can do.

I mean, part of the problem is we do have it signed.

Well, and to your question, we think Woodland will be back open about the end of October.

So we gotta still a little bit more pain, but that'll help significantly when we do think we have it signed.

Uh part of the problem is if you're using Google Maps or something like that, it takes you on the shortest route, which happens to go through that subdivision.

But but we're gonna take a look at it and we'll send you guys something out.

So and we'll we'll talk back with her.

If we can get it open by Halloween, that'd be helpful.

So the sign today says no through traffic on 119th uh Iowa.

Uh, going around the blockade.

So, you know, one thing you could do is on Pine, you could close one of those, either the east entrance or the south.

And just but it'd be have all the neighborhood would only have one way in and out, but that would stop the through traffic if they couldn't get out.

And people would not be able to use it as a detour anymore.

But I don't know, maybe somebody needs to call Google Maps.

Maybe they're routing them through there.

Okay.

Often it's we try not to close roads that we don't have to close.

But I can understand the concerns, so we can, you know, certainly look for all alternatives.

Um and we'll take a look at that suggestion.

Um it is it does say road closed to through traffic.

Okay.

Um they're going past the signs, and but there are connecting public roads that allow you to turn left, go through the public roads and get around to woodland.

So we can certainly take a look at it.

Okay.

Councilmember Felter.

Anything else?

Thank you.

Thank you.

I wanted to brag on Chief Jeff DeGrafenreed, who recently completed the Center for Homeland Security program as the Naval Postgraduate School's Executive Leaders Program.

The program participants gain knowledge from nationally recognized experts and each other by discussing complex problems and strategies to enhance their agency's homeland security security mission.

Graduates of the program emerge with a deeper understanding of the nation's security issues and a broadened network of homeland security leaders.

And wow, what an asset you are for our community and beyond.

I know Johnson County appreciates you and beyond that too.

So we are very proud of you.

Kudos to you for completing that.

Super grateful for that.

And another gold star or Jewel in your crown is that this month the Olatha Fire Department and the entire Johnson County Fire and EMS system was notified that they had been recognized by the American Heart Association with a 2025 Mission Lifeline EMS Gold Achievement Award.

The M EMS system was also recognized with two additional awards, including Mission Lifeline System of Care Target Target Heart Attack Award and the American Heart Association's Target Stroke SM Honor Roll Award.

These awards highlight the collaboration and contributions of both pre-hospital and hospital providers.

And our family experienced firsthand, the great uh uh uh care and life-saving efforts that the first responders do and uh all in coordination with our police, EMS and fire departments.

So I had to give you a shout out tonight and thank you for that.

And thanks to our team for all that you're doing during this time of change and uncertainty.

You are in good hands with this council.

We all love Olatha.

We all want the best and brightest future for you.

And we will do right by you in the future of Olay that we've had a great leader at the helm and Michael Wilkes, and we will have another great leader going forward.

I know you feel uncertain, but just know these are fantastic leaders up here that have been elected to represent your community.

And we love and respect you and will work hard to fill that seat with the right person.

Thank you.

Councilmember Vell.

Nothing is even Councilmember Gilmore.

Councilmember Essex.

I just want to add that service was beautiful.

And what wonderful memories, what a wonderful man.

And we're all here for you.

Thank you so much.

Councilmember Scott.

John back.

Certainly hope that you and Melanie are finding peace in the days ahead.

I I wanted to uh take take a moment just to uh thank Chief uh But for sitting down with me last Friday.

Um we had the opportunity to sit down and talk about a lot of the uh great things that the Olatha Police Department is doing, particularly when it comes to uh responding to calls that are involving mental health crises or involving drugs and alcohol.

And I uh you know, certainly we see a lot of different things in the news all across the country uh about um issues involving policing and and certainly they do not have an easy job.

And um, you know, I I appreciate you, Chief, and your team uh for for all you uh all you do and and trying to approach every single call uh really to help and and to be that community partner.

So thank you for all you guys do.

City Manager Michael I've got a few items real quickly.

It was mentioned that the pools will be closing right after Labor Day, so you have a couple more weeks for that for swimming in our pools.

Um however, the spray ground at Lake Olatha will stay open until October 1st.

So you'll still have that cool off if we get some warm days in later in September and October.

Tickets are on sale for separ uh the cemetery tours at Olatha Cemetery September 25th through the 27th, and you can buy your tickets at uh mahaffee.org for those tours.

And then I did want to remind everyone watching that the City of Olathe will be closed Labor Day September 1st.

Um one last thing, I guess I'll mention this.

Um Chief Gottad brought a proposal of maybe uh licensing e-bikes and things like that a while back.

It was about six months or maybe a year ago.

Um I didn't really see the need, but I've I've watched the news in some other cities, uh municipalities that have had some issues with some of these bikes that are more like motorcycles that are really fast, they're they can go up to 60 mile an hour.

And um they don't have pedals.

So there are some city ordinances that are tailoring specifically to that problem.

And these bikes are sometimes used in um some kind of a criminal act potentially or whatever, and they have easy getaways without any licensing recognition or anything like that.

So I don't know, I was just gonna throw that out there and see if maybe somebody might be interested in in tailoring just to those particular e-bikes if we have an issue.

And I've seen several um it seems like the uh e-bike population is growing in our community, which is not necessarily a bad thing, but um maybe there might be a need for looking at some of that.

So I'd be willing to if other people would be interested in maybe looking at something.

Okay.

That's all I have for tonight.

Thanks for joining us and have a good night.