Rayford.

Here.

Shayner.

Here.

Scott?

Here.

Fairenstein?

Here.

Bertran.

Stand for a moment of silent prayer, followed by the pledge of allegiance, please.

Touch allegiance to the flood of the United States of America.

And to the Republic for which it stands.

One nation undergoing.

Sam out there.

Yeah.

Sam Wagner and Kelly, you got something to do here today, please.

Come forward.

Come on a regular, Sam.

Hey, I told you I'll be back.

So here we go.

Uh, this time as a duly designated representative of Mid-American Energy, uh, here to present a check in the amount of five thousand dollars as a grant through our treats please program.

So uh make my remarks brief.

And that is that's pretty much it.

So thank you again.

Uh thanks uh to Kelly and the Parks Department for uh putting in the application and giving me a reason to come before the city council uh without being in trouble.

So thank you.

We always like it when you come with checks, Sam.

All right, thanks, Sam.

I have a proclamation that just says public works.

Okay, everybody.

Whereas the public works professionals provide essential services to protect the health, safety, and quality of life, allowing for a sustainable and resilient communities as well being and the well-being of the people of the city of Sioux City.

Whereas these services could not be provided without dedicated efforts of public works professionals who are employees at all levels across our six divisions who are responsible for rebuilding, improving, and protecting our infrastructure and transportation network, wastewater treatment, stormwater treatment, solid waste operations, fleet management, and renewable energy essential for our citizens.

And where it is the public interest for the citizens in Sioux City to gain knowledge of and to maintain a progressive interest and understanding of the importance of public works and public works programs in their respective communities.

Whereas the year 2026 marks the 66th annual National Public Works Week sponsored by the American Public Works Association.

Now therefore I Robert E.

Scott, mayor of the city of Sioux City, Iowa, on behalf of the City Council, do hereby proclaim May 17th to the 23rd as National Public Works Week.

I urge all citizens to join with representatives of the American Public Works Association and government agencies and activities, events, and ceremonies designed to pay tribute to our public works professionals, engineers, managers, and employees, and to recognize the substantial contributions they make to protecting our national health safety and quality of life.

I'll let you guys present this to me and tell us all those activities that we need to take part in.

Thank you, Mayor.

Mayor, Council, and members of this community, thank you for recognizing the National Public Works Week and your continued support for the public works team.

Public works impacts the daily lives of our residents in many ways, from maintaining infrastructure and protecting public health to responding to emergencies and supporting community growth.

I especially want to thank our dedicated employees for their hard work, professionalism, and commitment to serving Sioux City each and every single day.

Thank you.

Thank you.

All right, we'll go to the consent agenda items two through 13b.

You can consider these items passed unanimously unless a separate roll call votes called for by a council member.

Anyone wanting to speak on an agenda item may come up the podium at the time the item is being discussed?

Anyone wishing to speak on an item not on the agenda may do so at the end of the regular meeting during citizen concerns, fill out a citizen concern card found.

Well, you don't have to do that.

Not this late.

I'll move the consent agenda.

Second.

Two is a reading of the city council minutes of May 11, 2026.

One item.

Heidi, can you on the council concerns of those minutes?

I had asked the question about how each city department is going to manage its fuel costs in light of the increased fuel in cost increases.

Um in the minutes simply show that I was asking about the airport, but I was asking about all city departments.

You want us to amend or are you just making a clarifying?

Please.

We need to vote.

I'll move that amendment.

Second.

Shanner.

Hi.

Scott?

Fairenstein.

Furtrand.

Rayford.

Three is a resolution approving the annual action plan for the Sioux City Consortium in the conjunction with the community development block grant program and the home investment partnership program.

Four is a resolution accepting the work of Knife River Midwest for the Hamilton Boulevard resurfacing project.

I just have a question on this.

On the funding of this project, it notes that there's in sale sales in transfer in transit.

Why is a sales tax supporting a public works project?

60 percent of it has to go to public work project or 40 percent.

It's it's in the bond.

It's in the resolution that was passed back in the eight nineties when I was here, that so much has to go for infrastructure improvements.

Is that what this the sales tax generated would have to be?

Yes.

Yeah.

So much.

Yep.

Yes, so a portion of it it was um passed um when we increase the sales tax for that one percent that we actually get back.

So a portion of that has to go to infrastructure.

So it's not necessarily always this project, but we put it towards an infrastructure project in the CIP.

Okay, thank you.

Yep.

Five is the resolution amending rev resolution number 2026-40440 by extending food truck Fridays events dates through August 28, 2026.

Question.

On the food trucks, what do we pay in now for a food truck fee per year?

When was the last time it was raised?

Um, Rick, are you talking about Food Truck Friday specifically or the food truck?

Just in general, isn't it count?

Is it the same permit, isn't it?

Is it a different no, they have to have a city permit.

I'm not sure if Angel could address that.

The food truck Fridays is $300 a trial for the season.

For the season.

Yep, sorry, Reagan Cody.

That's a Sioux land health permit, not the city, the Sioux City permit for those guys.

Fire inspects now, yes.

Do they?

Yes.

So Food Truck Fridays is separate from Parks and Recreation overseas for food trucks.

So they pay $300 to park for the year.

They pay $300 for the season for Food Truck Friday specifically.

But just that group you mean.

Just that group, correct.

Right.

And then they go through the Sioux Land District Health Department and the um fire department department.

So that that lets them park like in the Morningside Library parking lot and all that too, or is that a separate permit?

That would be a question for Joe.

Joe Rodriguez with the fire department is usually the one who goes out to to inspect those.

But I just no, I'm just curious.

Is that like I said before, is you know, Julie, you owned a restaurant too, and you know, those guys don't pay a lot of property taxes and a lot of cash business and stuff.

I'm just kind of curious and what are they kicking into the kitty if we're giving up I like food truck Friday like everybody else, but you know what?

I mean, it'd be it's kind of hard when you're trying to do lunch five days a week and one day gets taken away from you.

I know it's the old scenario, I'm not trying to be the Debbie Downer.

What's can you get back to me on what the at the library the dollars are permits if you're there's no fee at the library morning site because that's public property?

No.

Okay.

That doesn't mean they can park there for free necessarily.

That's what I'm asking.

I thought there was always like a $2500 or something like that for the year.

Other communities do that where they come in and that includes the inspection and everything.

We'll follow up.

We follow up?

Yep.

Not trying to poke the bear, but I wouldn't mind seeing a little revenue out of that.

And there's a resolution authorizing the neighborhood services division to submit a grant application to the Federal Home Lank Loan Bank for affordable housing program funds for the Midtown Terrace Project.

Stevens resolution inviting proposals for the sale of land in the Teeton Urban Renewal Area, announcing the intent to accept the proposal of Outer Bank's apartments and scheduling a hearing property at 4203 Denise Court.

Quick question on this.

Who's here on this item?

I think this is a great Clayton, great project.

I know that there's a waiver of 50 percent of the property taxes as it relates to city funding.

Do they seek a city a similar county or school district waiver as well?

Clayton Bankford Economic Development Specialist.

I'm not sure that they do right now.

We can look into that.

I I'm just curious about the total receipt of taxes.

I know that we're waiving a portion.

It's a great project.

I'm just curious about the total total finances.

So this is specifically just to um sell then the land.

Right.

Um I know the development agreement is still in works, so we can talk about that as I get closer.

The school district is exempt from that, right?

Teresa Fitch, um assistant city manager.

So when you're talking about um tax uh when they do tax rebates, we actually we as the city um manage 100 percent of the TIFF.

So you collect it for all three.

Correct.

Okay.

And then we we would rebate it back.

Um if we this agreement would go to council before January 1st, we would have the ability to do 100 percent.

But as Julie said, and with new legislation that um that school um levy, foundation levy is removed, so we'll need to re-look at what we can do.

That will put us at between 75-80 percent.

We need to look at what that looks like compared to what our um taxing is there.

So we'll move forward to notice the sale.

It will come back whether we receive other bids or not.

We'll approve the sale, but we're we'll revisit the components of the development agreement based upon the ta the tax in the middle of the year.

So there will be another development.

Okay, very good.

The development agreement as it's currently being noticed will come back in the 30 days at the same time as the brain correctly on this one.

Thank you.

Yes.

Are actions relating to capital loan notes?

A is a resolution directing the sale of general obligation capital loan notes of series 2026 A.

B is a resolution directing the sale of taxable general obligation capital loan notes series 2026 B.

I need to show us abstaining on the taxable loan general taxable obligation bonds, please.

Nine are actions relating to agreements and contracts.

A is a resolution approving a post-construction storm water management plan maintenance agreement, an easement with JD tire services for the detention basin and accepting a permanent easement property at 4059 Southgate Drive.

Can I just back up?

Um Councilman Bernstein, are you at standing due to a conflict of confidence?

I don't need uh yes, I'm staying due to a conflict related to Security National Bank.

Okay.

Just for purposes of the record, if a conflict isn't noted, conflict of interest, it counts as a no vote.

So we just need to clarify that it's a neutral extension.

It's a new, yeah, okay.

Okay.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Is that the bonds we sold today?

Yes.

What does that have to do with security bank?

Security bank is a participant with UMB on the taxable portion of the general obligation bonds, so I need to abstain.

So if you own stock and security bank, you can't do that.

That's why I'm abstaining.

I better I better abstain myself if that's the case.

Due to a conflict of interest.

Well, I guess so.

If I'm a shareholder, I suppose I do.

I didn't see that part.

I saw the UMB, but okay.

B is a resolution approving an agreement with the Eagle View for Aerial Photography Services.

Can I ask you?

I'm sorry.

Uh Nicole, did you have a chance to look at this agreement?

Or did somebody in your department have a chance to look at the agreement?

Refresh my memory.

This is on the aerial and it in particular, I'm concerned about the On the Eagle View Pictometry.

I have looked at it many times with many revisions back and forth.

Okay, you're comfortable with the agreement.

Well, this is where we ended up, um, and we had no more room to move on.

Okay.

I have concerns about the warranty language and the limitation of liability language, but you've done everything you can.

Yes, Gordon South there.

We have been back and forth many times related to this.

Unfortunately, this is where we ended up.

All right, thank you.

C is resolution awarding and approving a contract to Barkley asphalt for the Lorraine Avenue Resurfacing Project.

D is a resolution awarding and approving a contract to Mark Albinicious for the Larson Park Road Flood Repair Project.

E is a resolution approving a non-Aresia advisory services agreement with creative planning.

F is a resolution approving an attorney fee contract, 10 or actions authorizing payments.

A is a resolution amending resolution 2026-0323, which authorized payment to fruit of gifts and water works for the annual fee associated with the Neptune 360 water meeting reading software.

B is a resolution approving change order number one and authorizing payment to mark albonius for the Lorraine Avenue Emergency Sanitary Sewer Repair Project.

So is is the reason there was such a significant change order on this is because it was an emergency repair, and they can't fully understand the scope of the project.

And that so as part of the emergency they wouldn't have evaluated that as part of the project because you needed to get them in sooner.

Yes without bidding the project?

That's correct.

Thanks.

C is a resolution authorizing payment to mark albonius for the removal of the temporary access roads off of South Lynn Street.

D is a resolution authorizing payment to mark albonius for the Floyd Golf Course Storm Sewer Repair Project.

Eleven's purchasing A is a resolution awarding a purchase order to Krausk Recreation for the purchase of the Cone Park Outdoor Furniture.

B is a resolution awarding a purchase order to Sioux Land Bobcat for a T4 Bobcat's Git Steer Loader.

C is resolution awarding a purchase approving a purchase order, agreement and purchase order with Connor Sports Flooring for the Tyson Event Center, basketball flooring.

Did the what are we doing with the old basketball floor?

Did we get that sold?

Jessica Johnson City Manager's Office.

I'm not sure if we haven't put it up for sale yet by any means, but we can look into doing that through CMG.

I'm not sure what we'll get out of it.

Somebody was interested in it, I know that.

We we have we can certainly look into it.

Okay.

Well, sometimes those things disappear around here, and I want to make sure they don't just disappear.

So thank you very much.

12 or applications for cigarette tobacco, nicotine vapor product permits, 13 are applications for alcohol license.

Anyone to be heard on any of those items?

Um Heidi, can you go back and show me substaining on 1282 on the liquor on the tobacco license for the Sus City Country Club, please?

Yes.

That's also due to a conflict of it.

I had a crown in diet up there the other day.

They didn't have any liquor in it, so I wouldn't renew their license.

I wouldn't remove that 23 in the block bounded by Fifth Avenue, Glenn Avenue, South Endery Street, and South Clinton Street.

The petitioners clear Clarence Zoe Gordon at the P and Z recommends denial.

I'll move that.

Second.

Public hearing is now open.

Clarence Gordon, 2310 South Clinton.

Uh you guys said last time I was here that you would uh decide on the vacation of that then.

So that's I think that's why it's in front of us again.

We did get an email today from someone that said they were unable to be here today, but had some concerns.

Okay.

So this will be continued then.

I don't know.

I I'm just raising the the gentleman said that he worked until 5, wasn't able to be here.

I can pull it up.

It was someone who utilizes the alley that's considering building a garage and she felt like it would block her access.

To me, it seemed like she wanted to get paid.

That's what it seemed like to me.

There is nobody beyond where I'm wanting to vacate the app.

Seemed like she's wanting to get paid.

Gibriel Folio City Planning.

During the Festival at the PNZ, he summited like at Quan Senho Position to the vacation and it would deny go to kind of night and also sent an email this morning that he's still no position to it.

Oh yeah.

So this will be continued then, right?

Or we can still not necessarily.

And if I'm not, I mean, if I'm correct, the beyond Mr.

Gordon's area, it dead ends.

It is because of the topography.

Right.

Yeah.

But it's also because of the retailing water you built, because we look at the area view, and in 2010-2014, there wasn't any retailing wall.

Oh, but the retaining wall.

So he put it in, yep.

It's been there since that property was there.

I rebuilt it when my neighbor knocked it down, redoing their retaining wall about 10 years ago.

So it's not something new that I just put up.

It was already there.

And the retaining wall that's in the alleyway.

It's that tall.

Right, but you can't drive over it.

If you knock that down, you still cannot drive over here.

It's it's impossible.

I mean without going out and looking at it.

I I gave you guys pictures last time.

Nobody's been in that alley for years.

For years, right.

So what's the vote?

What's the vote?

To vacate.

To vacate.

To overrule.

P and Z recommended denial.

We're being asked.

So the vote is to either support the denial, which is a yes vote.

Or no.

No, a no vote as well.

That's why I asked.

So he's applying for vacation.

A yes is a support his request.

We we can vote yes.

Correct.

Yes.

Okay.

So yes, it vacates.

Yes.

So is there any reason based upon the communication we received today, either with regard to broadened development that that person wants to do or Rick's point to be compensated for impacting the value of their property that affects our vote today?

It depends on the council, but because like in the initium, the request that went to PNZ, engineering recommended denial of that because going to create a dead alley.

They denied it every time they've had it.

The alleys already did.

Yes.

Yep.

But if you look at the area, the area for the views that we are looking at in 2010, 2014, 2017, it looks accessible.

But because I've been telling what else built, if you look at it when it rings, it blocks the sign, and that's why that's caused IQ a little bit.

But it also serves as the they use that one to like take out trees when they fall down and also fall like uh well I took out the trees today that fell down back there.

I've done all the maintenance in that since I've lived there for almost 27 years.

You guys don't maintain it.

I know that's fine.

Right.

I don't think I'm asking for anything unreasonable.

I'm gonna put around the corner.

Yeah, and if we vacate the neighbor still has a chance to buy a couple of that alley.

Everybody that has the other half of where I'm at, she's sick today, so she couldn't come with me.

She has no problem with it.

Just saying it and none of my other neighbors are.

Can't go down it.

It makes no I know you couldn't get down there if you fire truck to get down there.

Let's vote it.

Let's get it out of here.

We can vote it, but the consequence of voting and vacating it is the neighbors have the opportunity to buy half of the alley.

The neighbor across the alley.

Right.

Just so we can't.

That's what she has she would have been here with me today, but she had the flu.

Right, even though she's not here, she's still running.

Yeah, this is like your third time here.

Let's get him out of here.

Okay.

Okay.

Just I just want you to know that.

Anyone else?

Hearing is closed.

An I vote goes vacate, a no vote affirms the action of the planning and zoning.

Passes five zero will hold on the statutory so the other person if they want to come, can.

Boom.

Hearing in resolution number 15, approving plans and specs for the Nebraska Street Water Main Replacement Project.

I'll move that.

Second.

Hearings now open, anyone to be heard.

Seeing none, the hearing is closed.

Passes 50.

16 hearing resolution adopting a regional hazardous mitigation plan.

I'll move that.

Second.

Public hearings now open, anyone to be heard.

Seeing none, the hearing is closed.

Is this plan?

I know it's for a five-county region.

Other communities they reviewed and approved the plan as proposed.

Wait, shall city planning.

Uh they are in the process.

Uh Simcoe sent it back to us here probably about three weeks ago.

And so I think everybody's in the process of approving it, so it's in the it's on the works.

Just keep us posted if there's any concerns raised by any of the communities.

Yep.

Thanks.

Did that come up and I missed it?

No, just right now.

Okay.

50.

17 to hearing and resolution approving a proposal to sell that vacated part of 8th Street adjacent to 702 St.

Mary Street and the vacated North South Alleys in Block 3 and 6 adjacent to 702 St.

Mary Street, the Patricia Zammy and Damien Pierce.

I'll move that.

Second.

Public hearings now open.

Anyone to be heard?

Seeing none, the hearing is closed.

An ordinance and repealing ordinance number 2026-046 for an amending chapter 12.30 stormwater program to modify the stormwater collection fees.

First consideration was approved on May 11th, 2022, 2026.

I'll move second reading.

Second.

Anyone to be heard.

Oh.

I'll move third of you.

You got to wait, move the wave the rules.

I'll second that Scott.

Barenstein?

Aye.

Bertran.

Aye.

Rayford.

Aye.

I'll move third.

Barenstein?

Aye.

Bertran?

Aye.

Rayford.

Aye.

Shayner.

Scott.

19 is a resolution inviting proposals for the sale of land in the combined central Sioux City CBD urban renewal area announcing the intent to accept the proposal of Bishop Heal and Catholic Schools and scheduling a hearing of the property at 1100 Douglas Street.

I'll move that.

Good afternoon.

I'm John Flannery, president of the Bishop Elian Catholic Schools.

I'm here on behalf of our Cathedral of the Epiphany, the Cathedral Dual Language Academy, Bishop Ellen Catholic Schools, Students Administration staff, our school board, all of which are represented here throughout the audience today.

This falls into our strategic planning of maintaining a continuous campus that includes not only Bishop Healen but the Cathedral of the Epiphany.

Our strategic plan includes campus expansion.

We're landlocked to the west due to Perry Creek.

South and North have additional challenges, and East is our most efficient with the least amount of barriers.

We're in the process of purchasing Marion Hall at 1122 Grandview for new teacher apartment living.

We're leasing it this year from the diocese and have an offer to purchase it this summer.

The land currently acts as a pass-through alleyway and has parking for our CYO building along with a large grass area.

The main points of our needs stem from a safety and security standpoint.

Acquiring this parcel of land from the city will provide a significant benefit to our schools by enhancing the overall safety, security, and long-term protection of our campus.

Ownership of the adjacent property would allow the school to create a physical barrier between the campus and surrounding traffic or public access areas, helping to better control entry points and improve student security during the school day and school-related events.

Investing in this property is an investment in our long-term stability, safety, and well-being of our entire school community.

If this were to become a public paved street, our campus would be severed.

If this area were developed into a public street, it would effectively divide our campus and create a direct passageway through the heart of school property, severely compromising the integrity and security of our campus.

Such a roadway would render our CYO facility functionally unstable, excuse me, unusable for its intended purpose as it would no longer provide a safe environment for students, staff, families, and visitors.

The increased traffic flow, unrestricted public access, and separation of a key campus area would create substantial safety concerns.

School zones are part of the active transportation and safe routes to school portion of the long-term comprehensive plan for Sioux City.

If this block were to become a paved street, it would go against those plans and increase the risk to pedestrian safety for our school on the cathedral campus.

Additionally, the right of way to reconstruct a school street would encroach onto the CYO parcel and the cathedral parcel.

Currently, our CYO building houses.

One, a preschool classroom for our Cathedral Dual Language Academy, which has 20 students registered for next year.

Two, a kindergarten classroom for our cathedral dual language program, which has 22 students registered for next year.

So 44 students ages four to six years old.

Our preschool and kindergarten students use the playground just to the north of this property every day, every school day, weather permitting.

Their main building is about a block away at the Epiphany Center where the first three eighth graders reside, and those students do use the playground at the boys and girls club.

Unfortunately, that building, uh the Epiphany building was erected in 1959, and our preschool classroom cannot move over to that building due to codes for preschool through the Iowa Preschool Initiative.

Hence the current situation to leave these two classrooms in the CYO because we don't have another option in the Epiphany Center.

Our exercise science classroom at Bishop Heel is also in the CYO this year.

We have 230, 230 of our 515 high school students take exercise science four days a week, and those students walk from the main building to the CYO Center.

Our wrestling room is also housed in the CYO building, so we have about 25 wrestlers that are there.

Due to major renovations over the last few years, our CYO building hosts about 20 freshmen and JV basketball games annually.

These games not only have Bishop Healen students and families that attend, but other MRAC teams like the Sioux City Public Schools and Council Bluffs teams and their fans.

Or we are Healing Youth Athletics also use this facility on nights and weekends for practices and scrimmages.

We've invested about 1.5 million into our CYO building in the last eight years.

The building has heavy daily usage all year long, even in the summer months when our athletic teams lift weights.

Putting a street there would not only be a huge safety concern for these uh four to six year olds and the 230 high school students, but also the neighborhood in general has major safety issues.

I truly appreciate the city council as looking into ways to address our roaming populations in that area.

Bishop Healen is right in the middle of those concerns.

Two recent and obvious examples I can personally provide.

Last Tuesday night at 7 30, I was walking along the Prairie Creek Trail and our campus, and I counted nine people either on our campus or within just a few steps of it.

A few were on the trail, two were cutting through our main campus, and three were sitting on the retaining wall right out in front of our CYO building.

Yesterday morning I walked from the CYO to Mass at the cathedral at 9 30 a.m.

And a homeless person was sleeping right behind our old sign, which is on this 1100 Douglas Street property.

His position was seven paces to our preschool and kindergarten classroom.

At 1120 a.m., nearly two hours later, I returned by the same route, and the homeless man was still lying there.

Additionally, a shirtless man was 20 feet behind me walking down this property.

Um, and he was on his speaker on his cell phone shouting a profanity-laced tirade on person in person uh to the person on his phone.

These are real examples every day.

If Bishop Healen were to purchase this property, we could finish the fence that we've currently started at the back of the rectory of the cathedral and comes up towards our preschool and kindergarten playground.

This would cut off the transient traffic we experience every day.

John, I don't want to interrupt you, but the fencing that you're talking about would be on the east side.

Yes, not along the west side.

You wouldn't even have a gate or something to get in from Douglas.

Yes.

Yes, correct.

Thank you.

Um, Jessica Felix, Bishop Healing Catholic Schools Boards of Education Representative.

Um, I wanted to speak on behalf of Cathedral of the Epiphany.

Right now, they're represented here today by their rector, Father David Escalano, Carla Cramper, and Dan Creener.

The Cathedral's home is the home church of our Diocese of Sioux City, which covers 24 counties in Northwest Iowa.

The Cathedral is currently the largest Catholic church in our diocese with over 3,000 families registered, not people, families.

Which would make them one of the largest churches of any denomination in our area.

The cathedral has a minimum of four weekend masses and two daily masses, and open and to open this street next to them would be a huge concern for the parish safety.

The cathedral uses the block for our religious processions in the current configuration and ensure safety our parishioners and visitors as they do not have to deal with traffic.

Most of the parcels surrounding the cathedral are owned by the diocese, the cathedral church, andor Bishop Healing Catholic Schools.

This acquisition will allow us to continue with our synergy of services for the community, school, and diocese.

The Cathedral and Bishop Healen Catholic Schools recently partnered on the new parking lot to the north of the church.

As the abutting property owners to this parcel, it would be nice to have the ability to purchase 1100 Douglas Street and the 11th Street parcels to ensure our institutional block for the Diocee of Sioux City and Bishop Healing Catholic Schools.

This is in compliance with the City of Sioux City long-term comprehensive plan for this area and is an appropriate land use for the zoning of the area, inconsistent with other school campuses throughout Sioux City.

The public schools in Sioux City do not have a public street through their campuses.

They have a security fence and they have a buffer for off-street parking.

Bishop Healen and the cathedral host many events that have individuals attend from outside Sioux City.

Our campus and institutional block are a great extension of this city.

We want a safe, secure, beautiful campus that is not only a reflection on our mission, but on the greater community of Sioux City.

I have a question.

Correct, sir.

You look at an aerial map, you look at a 2012 agreement that they signed, not me.

Well, I think I signed it too.

But it says that we're gonna put a street through there.

Now there's a mystery of how this all of a sudden became a street project when in reality, if you look, it takes you all the hot way to Highway 75.

We have one block that's not done.

We made that clear in 2012.

But now all of a sudden we're supposed to not do those plans that have been in our system for quite some time.

So to address the paving of the street to provide that east-west connection of 11th Street, there's other issues along that corridor that need to be addressed prior to this one block, including over a half mile of residential zoning with stop signs, the cargo operations on either side of the road with two railroad crossings, the 11th Street bridge load posting and lane reduction, and the BNSFL BNS BNSF railroad crossing near Lewis Boulevard.

The Hooven Valley study of the early 2000s indicated that other potential options for east-west can connectivity are 6th Street and 18th Street.

The 16th Street East-West connection could be achieved by eliminating the one-way traffic on 6th Street in the downtown area.

Also, the state is investing in the ground.

I did not sign it personally.

Well, why did they sign the agreement?

You're speaking for them.

Why did they sign it?

That's what I don't get.

Why did the mystery today?

We re we revisit revisit agreements all the time, Mayor.

And you also agreed at that time to do a lot of campus improvements and a parking lot was not one of them.

Look, go back to the agreement.

We're gonna have a little chapel, we're gonna have like a gazebo, we're gonna have a we are working on our faith walk.

Unfortunately, Mayor, that that agreement, uh there was no agreement.

Uh because the land was owned by Bishop Healing Catholic Schools and transferred to the diocese.

But now you're here as one group.

And you were here as well, I was here.

Sure.

You were here as one group then when you told us what you were gonna do, and you didn't do it.

You didn't.

Uh I I don't believe that to be accurate.

Well, back up.

They all they also invested 30 million dollars in a blighted neighborhood, Bob.

Things change in in in 1012, 13 years.

And I agree, I understand that there if was there handshake agreements back then, and I I get the bird in your saddle, I do.

But the reality of it is is that uh Healing is in an expansion mode.

They don't want it, they want the the city isn't dying for this one block of of connectivity that they think is gonna happen.

And at the end of the day, it's the expansion street for crying out loud.

Why did we connect here?

What is it?

What does it matter?

What did it change?

You wanted that road by your campus at that time, too, to get your kids to school faster.

Can you go back, Jessica?

Or you John, you you talked about acquiring properties a little bit further to the north on 11th Street.

What would you acquire those properties for?

Blighted area demolition improvements.

We've uh we close at the end of this month on the pink house that you might be familiar with.

Uh we're working on the greenhouse that's also uh there just on our campus as well.

We just we're looking to for safety and security reasons, we're looking to push our buffer out just a little bit further for our students.

Every day we have we have people through our campus through our neighborhood.

You're you're all aware of that because I know that's high on your on your list of of things you're looking at.

Craig, in addition, as John had mentioned, we are looking at purchasing from the Diocee Marion Hall, which we currently currently rent.

Um we're seeing that as a retention and recruiting for our teachers in order to bring those salaries into and those people into Bishop Healing Catholic schools.

You'll also notice we're doing some work near Memorial Field.

We've cleaned up the trees there, we're working on a grading project, and we broke up an enham homeless encampment there as well.

We're trying to be a good neighbor.

We bring in solo ensemble.

We host a show choir.

We host um lots of events regarding athletics and academics.

And so we end up being that front face to Sioux City because our school is the closest proximity to downtown.

Listen, I'm I got kids in the school.

It's not that I'm anti-Healand.

No, no.

My wife's memorial fund went to you.

But I agree.

It's it to me that we put that street in because we wanted a street that went from the east side to the west side.

I I just don't get why this is such a mystery all of a sudden.

Hey John, obviously um, you know, this is very impactful for for everybody.

Um you talked about the CYO.

Uh you know, what happens?

I mean, you guys are growing.

What happens if you grow, you outgrow that, and and then what happens, especially we're giving.

You're trying to get me on record to say what we're gonna do next.

We don't know what we're gonna do next, but we are looking at several expansion projects.

We're looking at uh renovations at Memorial Field, we're looking at some renovations additions possibly to the current high school, as as Rick said.

You know, we uh we're pushing 40 million dollar investment in downtown Sioux City when you fit factor what we've done at the CYOM and everything we've done in our area there.

So um we will be doing some expanding in the next few years.

We're just you know we gotta raise some money and and see what that looks like.

But I think I already see Sneaky's chicken, you know, park or sneaky's chicken.

Closer, Craig.

There you go.

Um I know a couple of years ago there was some dialogue about a developer that was looking at apartment complexes in the area.

Is there any more is there an opportunity for Marty and Renee to continue to work with developers for sites in that proper uh in that in the vicinity?

So right now, if you look at your law at the Sioux City long-term comp plan, um the break line is technically 14th Street.

And so, would you in order like we've mentioned, we are landlocked.

Ideally, we would preserve our campus all the way over to Douglas Street and all the way up through 13th Street.

Um that allows that institutional block of our Bishop Healing, the cathedral, and the diocese.

Um I understand it can get kind of murky there, but we have a synergy.

We are you know independent entities, but we have a synergy by maintaining that institutional block.

I would say that it's no different than you know, your your north high school, north middle school, or even like a hospital campus that has multiple buildings.

Um that's what we're looking at is to try to potentially expand to that east where the Douglas Street is a boundary, 13th Street is the boundary, and then as we push down towards the cathedral.

Well, we also had a synergy for development in that area for 80 percent housing.

80 percent of market rate.

And that was not looked upon favorably because someone who was speaking on Healens behalf, whether you asked them to or not, reached out to our developer and spoke against it, and he wanted to be a good neighbor of Sioux City, and so he stepped away because he didn't want the conflict.

And that was a 45 million dollar apartment complexity.

But in fairness, Julie, respectfully, in fairness.

That that guy never stood on the property, he never understood the proximity to the high school.

I talked to him.

He never stood on the property, he never he saw multiple sites, and as soon as he understood it was within that close to a uh high school, he backed away.

So again, I don't I agree with you that probably it the way it was presented by that individual shouldn't have happened, but I don't think it would have been a viable site just because healing would have then made their intentions known right away to where they were at.

So well, they're they're housing teachers now.

So I think that they needed those apartments for your own employees for perhaps a student that didn't go away to college, perhaps a student's family, perhaps somebody who cooks at your school.

We don't offer a rent at market rate.

It wasn't market rate, it was 80 percent market rate, Jessica.

Three years later it had been a 40-year HUD project.

That's what he does.

No, three years later, he would have converted it to a HUD project.

Is that what he did with the that's what it's that's what those projects do?

That's what that's what those projects are designed to do.

80 percent of them three years later, they turn into a 40-year refi HUD.

I disagree.

It's okay.

I I think that the diocese and I think that the Healing school system need to be commended for what you've done in that area.

Um I I I understand what you're saying, Jessica, as far as whether there were agreements or understandings 15 years ago.

Um things do change, and I think we want to respect and understand where the scope of your development is.

Um I know we can continue to work with John and others on your board and and try and make progress in the air and beautify the area.

I know there's a there's growth and expansion to the east that's currently under discussion as well.

So um regardless of how this vote goes, I look forward to further discussions.

Yeah, and I would I would say that uh Healen is is now approaching a hundred um lots in the area and over 80 houses that they have demolished in that area.

So to your point, you know, I I wonder what the neighborhood would look like if Bishop Healen, my predecessor, Father Patrick Walsh, if Father Walsh would have said Healens gonna pick up and move to Whispering Creek or pick up and move to the north side or pick up and move somewhere else.

I wonder what the downtown area would look like if Bishop Healen and Father Patrick Walsh hadn't said we're gonna stay right here in downtown because we have um clean the neighborhood up a lot and we want to continue to be good partners.

Anyone else passes three to two.

I would hope that the three that voted for this would demand some kind of reasonable expectation of what this property will look like.

That healing will agree to because we've had it in the past.

You can tell me we didn't.

We had it in the past, it didn't happen.

I don't think it's unreasonable to ask what their campus plans should be.

Well, I think that's the expectation moving forward.

I know what the next question is gonna be the lots to the north, Mr.

Scott, and I think that that was a burround on your saddle there, too.

And you got both you guys, but I think what they're gonna have to present next time is their actual physical plans for expansion.

This just kind of frees the way.

And to be honest with you, it it's a safety thing.

So, but I think it's fairly it's very reasonable what you're asking there.

So I go to that CYO many times.

I never feel unsafe.

Well, my daughter, three times they come, they knock on the doors, they not they come and they beg on the doors, and and what's it gonna take?

It's gonna take some little girl to get boogered in a parking lot, and then it's gonna be why why weren't we allowed to put the fence up?

That's what it's gonna come down to.

So good vote today.

That was a winner.

And and Mayor, to your point, that's exactly why I made the last comment to John and Jessica and to the rest of the of the team that's here.

Is that I look forward to working with you?

Yeah, I'm obviously there's some concerns of not opening up the street, but you know, in visiting with our engineering department, and as I evaluated the positives and the negatives on both sides, I simply found that the safety concern and the impact to your campus and the growth of your campus was more important than maybe developing of a full west to east connection because of other issues that I think impact that flow.

So I look forward to working with you and and continuing the the development.

And I think if there are opportunities with private developers, I hope you'll be open-minded with that in that regard as well.

Thank you.

Stacey O'Rendorf, Recies for this purpose.

Um I know you're gonna talk about fog or have a fog presentation here in a minute, but I didn't know if I'd have the opportunity to speak.

So just wanted to uh let you know about the experience that I had last week and the week before, and a little bit concerned about how it was handled, how we were approached.

Um I think it's very disruptive.

We had a surprise inspection, never had met with them before, had never been reached out to, no kind of contact through email or phone or anything.

I just happened to be there, which is not usual.

I don't have set hours, and so we're very caught off guard and approached um about compliance and violation and all these words were being thrown at me in the middle, you know, as a small business.

We're dealing with customers and employees and those kinds of things.

So having that kind of disruption out of nowhere is a little bit stressful.

Was there a particular reason for the inspection?

Did something occur or was just a general inspection?

It's a random inspection.

What time of day was it?

Oh gosh, I don't remember.

I want to say 10, maybe in the morning.

Yeah.

Um, and so um I let them know where the grease trap was, the best I knew.

The building that we rent from, they're actually responsible for it.

Um, you know, they put it in and all of that.

We weren't even around when that all happened when we signed the lease.

We were told everything was in compliance and all of that.

Um we were, you know, our hands were slapped and we were told we were doing all these things wrong, we were given paperwork.

Um I couldn't stick around, so I know they told our employees some things, they were not sure, they were confused about some things, and then we received a follow-up email, and we were given two days to pump out our grease trap, which wow, that's that's a quick turnaround in a small business to have somebody come in that fast, but um thankfully we were able to make that happen, and our neighbor Crum also had the same situation, so we were able to pool our resources and do that at the same time.

Um so we got that done, and then a week later, they came back.

I happen to be there again, and um not a great not a great interaction at that time either.

And um, the building owner, one of the building owners, Amy was there at the time too, and so she was able to witness the conversation and and our kind of what we went away from the conversation is who does she have something against.

One of us is doing something that we felt a little bit um attacked, or just you know, um I don't know.

It just seemed like we were we were being targeted.

Um she assured us we weren't, and I did bring up to I think as Clayton that was was with her, you know, the surprise, the initial surprise inspection.

I just don't understand why that wouldn't be an appointment, why there wouldn't be some kind of notification so that we could set aside time if the uh purpose is education and for us to understand.

And I think that's where I'm I'm concerned.

I I wish it was an education-led experience and not a compliance-led experience, especially for small businesses who have never dealt with this kind of thing.

Our um contribution to the grease trap is very minimal.

Um Sarah would disagree, but um, I think compared to apartments and franchises and hospitals and schools, our small little coffee shop, um, is probably not the biggest concern.

And um, so I guess my proposal to Sarah and Clayton was to make an initial appointment for the first inspection.

Um they said that they tried that in the beginning, and they had owners not show up, people not there, they get there, and employees wouldn't know anything about it.

Um to me, it's the owner's prerogative if they want to show up to the meeting, but at least they have the option.

I would like to have the option to know ahead of time.

Um, and then they also said that um, well, if we do that also, then the owners all of a sudden pump their grass grease traps out, and so it's done.

Which my response is isn't that a good thing?

Isn't that what you want?

Is compliance that you want the grease trap cleaned out?

So why is that a bad thing if you call and let them know then so um to me that said this is more of a wanting to catch people doing something wrong versus educate what the system should be.

Thank you.

Thanks, Stacey.

Anyone else under citizen concerns?

Hello, Lee Tonga.

Aliha.

Kyle Stewart.

Um, I know that some of you guys wanted to have some questions for Kyle, so he took some time to travel from Montana today with his wife.

And uh want to just give an update on where we're at with the project.

So, first of all, I'd like to express appreciation for the quick turnaround getting the redlined drawings back to us so we can get started on that.

Um that was nice to get those quickly, and uh we went ahead and got the engineering updates made, and uh Lee Hyde uh recently emailed those in, and the architectural portion of the updates will be completed uh this week.

Our engineer has committed to, and we will be providing those.

And as we look forward to hopefully being able to proceed with this project.

Um we also want to point out that we're aware of the um of the need to keep the building secure um and to make sure that there's no issues in the meantime, and uh we've implemented daily security checks, you know, physically checking every board, physically checking the locks with on on-site maintenance, and we are taking every measure to ensure there's no problems in the meantime, and we are open to any concerns or any recommendations on what you'd like us to be doing in the meantime to ensure that um the situation uh does not bring up any concerns as we work this out.

We I can't see behind you, but is Daryl behind you?

Cyril's oh there is Daryl would appreciate your comments as well while the gentleman are speaking.

Um just having some clarity on what you're getting, what you're reviewing, what their expectations are, and what as I told Lehigh, and thank you for being here tonight.

We appreciate but as I've shared with Lehigh throughout the process, as long as the property is safe and he's working with you and you're comfortable with the progress uh that's being made, then that to me that's the status updates that we need.

Did we accept the plans?

No, I didn't think so.

We still haven't.

Sunday the evening there was another set sent in, very vague still.

There was no specific details on things.

Several issues were brought to light.

Um items like mechanical will be brought to code.

How condensing units set in an area that wouldn't have enough airflow.

If an engineer designed it, I'd already like to know what the calculations they use because they're running right away.

There was no breathing room, so to speak, between them.

Um second bedrooms don't even meet the requirements for width.

I mean, the list goes on.

How much time do we spend staff wise reviewing incomplete sets?

They came in without engineer stamps, so if the engineer is designing them, why didn't he stamp what he approved?

I thought that was an issue two weeks ago, and I thought it represented that the engineer stamps would be provided immediately.

That wasn't provided.

No, it was provided.

Not on a complete set.

I I think we're having a little bit of miscommunication here.

That the first set of drawings was provided, um, and it was just accidentally.

Um, we provided a version without the stamps.

That was went out.

We provided that with the stamps, and then there were some changes requested, and we were provided a red line document identifying the changes needed.

And we are working on providing that.

Um, and the timeline that we presented when that was initially given to us was to provide the completed stamped revision this week.

We provided a working version um yesterday to show progress being made.

That was not intended as a complete version.

I apologize if it was seen that way.

It was intended to to show progress on the engineering side.

But the architectural side should be completed this week, and then we will be submitting um stamp drawings.

And I'm not an engineer, so I I can't speak to specific details, but um my understanding was that the red line issues were addressed.

If there's any deficiencies there, we are happy to address those and um and and get any corrections that are still needed on the engineering side.

We're um can I ask you a question?

Um the drawings that were provided yesterday were the ones that had the deficiencies in the engineering.

Okay.

So I I'm not aware of um what deficiencies these might be, but we Can I ask you who the who your design professional is?

Uh yeah, he's uh architect who works uh I mean an engineer who works freelance, his name is Neemat Said.

Is this the gentleman that's gonna be stamping these drawings?

Uh yeah, he's so I I guess I'm asking is in the being doing this for as many years as I've done this.

I've never seen an engineer design something and not stamp his drawings.

Um my understanding was that he did not stamp the drawings that we provided yesterday because he was just showing us his work in progress and he didn't want to stamp them until the architectural.

Those corrections are not even close.

They're not accurate.

You don't even have a mechanical room, you've got water lines going into a bedroom.

Designed to go into a bedroom.

I don't know what more I can say.

I mean, these are the kind of situations that are on there, and there's nothing specific.

It doesn't say how you're going to do your ventilation system, it says we're just going to comply.

How do we know what you're going to comply with?

We don't have any specifics.

The type of devices that are being used, none of that is included.

There's no detail whatsoever.

I don't know how you prove it.

I'm sorry, Jason.

I'm just wondering how it's getting past the two of you with these details, water lines going into bedrooms and condensers not having enough space.

I mean, well, when the in reference to the condensers not having enough space, we're we're not we're not HVAC professionals.

So we do, of course, hope that the people that were using are doing those things properly.

It's not our number one expertise.

Right, right.

Nor is it mine, but I'm gonna hire somebody who I don't hope gets it right.

I'm gonna hire someone who does get it right.

And that would be correct.

Right, and our staff is spending hours and hours and hours reviewing plans that your professional is submitting, and our professionals are saying this is not correct.

It's almost like it's an AI design.

It's going back and forth and back and forth.

That that is so have you lost confidence.

It's not typical.

Have you lost confidence in your architect yet?

I mean, how many times is it going to go back?

How many times is it?

Is it going to be a work and project?

Julie, it's the first revision.

No, it's not.

Is this not the first revision?

We got we've received one red line.

That was the one last week.

We received you did receive one red line.

That isn't accurate.

Red line, but there have been there was another one before that one which first came up, and then a more detailed one came in that we actually redlined.

I'm just concerned about it.

I'm just really concerned about this work and these designs not being close.

I would love to get with you, Darrell.

I mean, I'm more than happy to say with you guys to do that.

So Kyle, you flew in.

And go through it.

You're right.

So first thanks for uh looking at Sioux City to spend a bunch of money.

Right.

I'd love you to come back and spend more and more and keep spending it here.

And I don't want to discourage you, one IOTA, but there's a lot of concerns around this property.

Okay.

You know, I think you see the sensitivity, I'm sure you've been watching it online.

A lot of sensitivity around it, the area.

Um there's just the the problem here is a little bit of the validity issue is it where you run into in the in this the councils before us did wouldn't take action there or starting to take action.

This council wants to take action.

It's a blighted area.

So my question to you is as you're as you're spending money on these engineering plans and everything.

Uh the the budget that was shared with us was about 900,000, which ends up being about 52 bucks a square foot.

You know, and and I I'm trying to figure out I'm I'm being positive here, but my fear is is that we've got an out-of-state developer who out of state developers have really kind of roughed this city up in the past.

And we've got a local guy who is completely bought in and is giving us guts.

Is we get a year into this thing and we realize this is a probably a three million dollar project.

Or do you do you can you provide us like I mean, would you have any of the projects that you have experience with that those types?

I mean, I'm not quite I'm not challenging your your your validity, and I'm just I'm asking is it can you can you put this council at ease on letters of credit, your banking institution, everything seems to have a little bit of a fog on it when it's presented to us.

So give us some clarity, give us some confidence.

Well, like you say, this is a difficult project.

Um there are a lot of uphill challenges, and so it is financed through a private lender um rather than a uh conventional loan at a bank.

And so I think any concern with the letter is just that a private lender just generally is not going to write the same a letter that looks exactly the same as a conventional uh mortgage letter would look like from a bank.

But um we we're happy to provide any um updated documentation, any specific documentation um desired for the for the lending.

I mean the lending is fully secured, and um can you can you go back to the letter of credit though?

Because I I respect what you're saying in terms of this may not be a conventional bank borrowing transaction, sure.

But any lender can indicate a letter of credit.

A letter of credit is not an indication of borrowed funds, letter of credit is to indicate that you've got the funds to support funds that will be borrowed, correct?

Correct.

And so and in the letter that Daryl showed me, this has got to be two months ago, was a letter.

It was not a letter of credit, there was no authority, there was no resolution, there was no indication that there that the funds were available to support either a transaction or a commitment to the city of Sioux City.

So I'm I'm still struggling a little bit with understanding where your financial support is.

Yeah, it's with this this lender.

This lender has agreed to fund the project completely based on the equity and the rest of the buildings.

And um that letter that they provided, I I agree that looking at it in isolation, it can look a little bit vague without being in the context of the greater loan agreement, and I can request for them to provide a more clear, a more clearly stated letter to to show that those funds are specifically for this property.

They actually did already provide a revision that we have tonight that's that's specifies the funds are for this building.

Um I the original letter was worded in a way that you could read it and think, oh, this might be a lot of different things.

Look like it was for maybe potential a number of transactions or a number of properties.

Right.

And that was just unintentional language in the letter, and they did provide a version of the letter that corrected that language.

But um they would provide uh I I can ask for a more formal letter if one is desired.

Um to you know, to completely specify that the funds have already been approved and decided to be.

So, how did you come up with the $900,000 budget?

And again, I'm not trying to get if somebody tried to get in my business, I'd be telling me to pound sand right now.

But the problem is this is the the area of this project, and it's been there for so long, and it's that we have to ask these questions, you know what I mean.

Of course.

So, how did you come up with the $900,000 budget?

I mean, I mean, I I kind of asked for kind of a performa a little bit.

I mean, it's what are you gonna I mean I'm just I'm concerned that that just isn't gonna get it done.

So I I calculated the the the budget.

We go through an extensive estimating platform.

Um we so my line of work, we work in the restoration business.

Um when dealing with insurance carriers, we get down to every single line item specifically.

So when we write our estimates, even in this case, we we treat it the same way.

So we we did provide the city with an estimate, it outlines all of the line items necessary for the project when it comes to all of the MEP items.

We went directly to the contractor and had them provide theirs and then included that into the estimate as well.

Um, and then we removed all of the costs that would be associated with a uh contractor to to do the work directly, right?

So it would be basically this is the cost that it would take to actually get the project done without paying someone an oversight fee as a general contractor.

To also add there, there is the hundred um thousand dollars bond that we could replace um uh with the ten thousand dollar fee, we could have a private company um uh fund that when the project is further along, and so that's an additional hundred thousand in funding that is available or ninety thousand in funding that's available for this project.

Kyle uh and Leah, thank you.

Thank you for being here.

Thank you for coming out.

Uh you know, I I have supported you guys in and and in this project.

And I I think the big big issue in question, um, you know, and and maybe Rick maybe kind of alluded to it.

You know, if you get the plans, uh you you know, I mean, you know, what can we do to make sure that we get the plans submitted so that they're submitted and then you can get to work.

I mean, and we're looking, you know.

I don't know how long do you think the project would take.

You know, let's say plans are you know uh approved Friday, you know.

What timeline are we looking at?

Six to nine months to have the entire thing completed.

I've already reached out to the subcontractors that would be able to start on the project right away and let them know kind of where we're at with with in regard to the city, and uh just said, hey, we we have the financing ready ready and available.

So a little bit with that is that we've already started with the financing, so they've already provided us with funds.

Um that's what we use for the demo in the beginning of the project, and what we use for the the plan.

So they've already started funding it.

Um, you mean the draw that they're talking about in the letter you've already drawn off of the 900K?

Correct.

Correct.

So is there a loan agreement in place?

Yes.

And you've mortgaged the property to uh Barker Financial?

Yes.

Yes, they hold they hold a first position lien on the property, and that's and that's the lien supporting the financing.

And I don't I don't know if if you guys are super familiar, and uh maybe you are, so I apologize if I'm just saying this, but that property is actually one parcel.

So that's it.

Including the four properties to the to the behind and to the west.

Correct.

So that apartment in the front, it's it's it's technically all of those are one parcel.

So technically they all got to be up to code before any dollar nothing.

Uh you can't limp in.

The the the 14plex is the uninhabited red type building, and then the other four buildings uh uh have rental permits now.

Right, right.

And um and are operated right now as rental properties.

So just going back to the plans, uh you know, what's the what's the plan to get those?

I'd be I'd be more than happy to go uh I can go and come in tomorrow if if I mean I know you guys are busy, so I get that outcome whenever you guys have time.

Be more than happy to sit down and go through all of those things.

We we can't design it for you.

Totally understand that.

So and a licensed engineer should be able to.

This is a lot of times you'll have a design professional like an architect that does all the grunt work, all the detail work.

So you know you're you know, the cost here's the I'm I'm not looking to say that this person is not giving you the product you're paying for.

I'm just saying that how does your contractors even give you a solid estimate when they don't even know the equipment that's going in it?

There's no equipment that's been submitted for approval, any types or anything.

This might be uh they might be get you know thinking they're gonna put an $8,000 unit in and it's 16,000.

I mean, I don't know these numbers, we don't know these numbers at this point.

There's been zero plan to show you where your mechanical room is gonna be.

Your mechanical room's got to be somewhere, it's not on the plans.

So you're gonna lose at least part of it apart, but not a complete apartment just for your mechanicals.

So I I this is helps.

I want I don't want you up over your head and backwards in this thing before you get done.

No details, I can't give you a permit.

Somebody needs to design this that knows what they're doing.

They can't just put down we're gonna design it to code, or you're gonna put it into code.

Somebody in New York City designing something for Iowa.

I'm sorry, he does have a license in the state of Iowa.

But does he know how to design it?

Does he know what the codes actually state?

I don't know that.

The evidence that I've gotten so far on the plans that we've gotten shows us there's a lot of inconsistencies, and I'm not sure you're getting the product you're paying for.

Do we know if we have original plans for that?

I'm sorry, what not do we have original plans for that for that property?

From what, 1920 is nothing that's today's code.

So that's probably part of the problem, right?

We we don't have anything original, so now we're creating from practically new, right?

Well, I I want some understanding.

Not, I mean, not yes and no.

I mean, the the only thing that the original set of plans is going to do is give you the shell portion of it, you know, and we're not talking about the shell itself here.

We're talking, you know, Lee has expressed, you know, there's a roof situation that's got to get fixed.

We're not talking about that, not in this design right now.

We're designing the interior of it for people to dwell in.

Okay.

Gotcha.

So there's there's things, and I don't know, and I you know, I haven't gone out and throw a tape measure on it, but just things like your path of egress out the front is so it's gotta be path of eager has got to be 36 inches.

It's just the way it is.

It's been that way for a long, long time.

And I think it's like at 33 shown on the plans.

Now they've been there forever, those stairs.

I don't know.

Did anybody really measure that?

Do we even know the accuracy of it?

Because man, I don't want to put on their plans, you got to tear your front stairs out and start over again.

When that may not be true, it's all those little details that we lack to be able to give a good presentation.

I mean, if it was as simple as just saying, yep, I'm gonna do it to code no matter what, you know, you get in there and the guys get going and say, Whoa, stop, wait a minute, tear it all out, they're gonna start over again because it's not right.

And so the issue that we have, and and I sympathize with with with what Daryl is saying, you know, the issue is that obviously 10 years ago we didn't get those things.

And and 10 years I'm sorry, 10 years ago.

10 years when this first hit, right?

Yeah, we did nothing.

We had nothing on this until last August, I believe it was when we brought it back to council.

We had nothing at that point.

It's been tagged for 10 years.

Right.

Yes.

And and I guess that's my point, and and and where my frustrations come is because now we're punishing someone who wants to do something, and it's it's almost like it's you know, and and I get it.

I mean, the respectfully, I don't consider code a punishment.

I think it's a matter of safety and health for their community.

Well, and and I think with all due respect, I don't I don't get the sense that it's punishment either, because I think we've been trying to work with Lehigh, giving you lots of latitude, but what Daryl's not seeing is the formality, the the legal nature of what would of what have otherwise been provided by other developers.

And I think that's where his frustration lies.

Because he's but they didn't do that though, they didn't do that before though.

I mean but even but when we've talked to Lehigh and I recognize And Daryl, you told me that you you had when you asked for the bond.

This is the only one that's ever given a bond.

That's incorrect.

Okay.

We had one in the first three years that it was that it was red tagged, actually.

I think it was the first year that it was red tagged.

Um we had an actual ten thousand dollar bond because council at that time only didn't understand the requirements of having to do it as based on the cost estimation of demolition.

So then how do we get here?

If we have the bond then, why did why didn't it proceed then?

Because council at that time directed me to hold off because there were several people that had come forward looking to do repairs to it, and then they never developed, and then I'd start again, and then it council would stop me, and then I would develop again.

Yeah.

It's been three different orders.

Right, yeah, quite frankly.

It's been and that's candidly, that's why I think we're trying to give you.

Lee has done a great job of representing the property's interest.

He really has.

He's been very credible, um, very passionate about the opportunity.

What we're struggling with is not the passion that you've shared, but the formality that is continuing to not be demonstrated.

And if it's that your engineers aren't doing the work, if they're not fully familiar with being licensed in Iowa, if they were doing preliminary drawings and they should have been stamped and sent to Daryl, we're st it just it's just one thing after another where the the informality is causing Daryl to say, I just don't see credibility in this project.

We are trying to give you the latitude to to work this project out.

I see value in updating the property where it's located.

I think it would do a really nice job of improving that area.

We I've got other ideas for a little bit further north and east and west and south.

Um that's why I think we're trying to give you that latitude.

We're just not seeing the formality.

And I think that's the struggle that Darrell's had that it's one thing after the other.

I think that it's I think that it's the biggest regard is getting the plans done.

Right.

Right.

Which is the only unfortunate thing that we cannot do.

Once the project starts, and once the project starts and we have full autonomy to get it done, that's where that's where if something were going wrong, I would totally understand.

So I'm not saying that we're not responsible because we we absolutely are responsible.

Right.

Um it's just it does take a little bit of time.

It's not as easy as a developer coming in and building something new.

If we are coming in and building something new, that no offense, it is way easier.

You get to create the plans, it's a hundred percent what you put in there, and then you just plug and play and go and do it.

When we're renovating, we have to take the existing, we have to try to make sure that it follows the updated code.

If it doesn't, then the engineer has to figure out what's the least path of resistance here to not do a crazy amount of work that would cause right.

Like you would, it wouldn't make sense.

Like if you have to move the entire structure six inches, it doesn't make sense.

But it's not as easy as just developing something.

You're right, but your expert should be the expert in retrofitting all of these things.

We understand that you're not, I'm not an engineer, but I have competent staff, we all do that manages that process.

So you the person you have relied on is you.

They're representing you, they're your voice, they're your expert.

I would hope I'm not sure.

So you've you've got to get with them.

Completely respectful, but I would hope that you've never made a mistake in your life.

Because what you're saying is is that we're responsible 100%, and that if someone else makes a mistake that we can't control, that we are 100% responsible for that.

But those words just come out of my mouth.

But Leh, I don't think that's what you because I agree.

Let me just finish.

Let me just finish this.

No, no.

I think what Julie said is exactly correct, and that is we don't expect the two of you to be experts in designing and providing stamped engineer plans.

That's why you're going to the engineer.

Right.

You're looking to an expert, no different than if you were going to a medical doctor or an attorney, an engineer, an architect.

You are your developers.

You're looking for somebody to be able to provide what is required under code to our planning team.

And that's the frustration that we've got is that every time we ask a question, there's still something missing.

Whether it's the financial aspects, which I looked at that letter, that still doesn't look adequate to me.

Understanding that the plans that you're trying to get from your engineer, that they don't seem to be adequately detailed.

They're not stamped.

That's where Daryl's frustration is lying.

We understand that there's a hundred thousand dollar bond to support the demolition.

We hope to not have to trigger the use of that bond.

We want to try and save this property, but it's just one thing after another.

And that's why I think Julie's comment, it's not to expect the two of you to do everything a hundred percent accurate.

It's not that to expect the two of you to not make a mistake, but it is to expect your engineer to do everything 100% correctly and understand everything 100% correctly.

And I and I think it goes back a little bit to Lehigh when you had mentioned too before about the architects being so expensive and so costly.

And I think you see the product, the you know, the product difference here in finding somebody that actually fit the needs that you were expecting versus a design professional architect that was going to charge you, I'm gonna say, quite a bit more, extensively more.

They're gonna have that detail in there that we're looking for.

I'd like to add just three really quick points.

Um, one, uh the the cost was a factor in selecting the architect, but also the timeline.

Um, we called every single architect that we could find looked at in Iowa, Nebraska, and South Dakota, and many of them at the beginning of this year, when we were going back after having trouble with earlier architects and engineers, we're talking about finishing in the fall.

So it's it's just a it's an industry where there's a very long timeline, and so we were we were we wanted to be quick and um prompt after we were given the grace to proceed.

And um, and that that that was also one of the constraints.

And we do appreciate that, as you mentioned, um, that you've worked with us.

We we very much appreciate that.

We don't want to come across as saying that we don't appreciate that.

We don't want to come across as saying that we don't understand that it is our responsibility to provide adequate drawings for this property.

That's what we intend to do.

We will do whatever we can to get those drawings submitted for from our perspective.

They should be okay for this.

That's what the license is for.

When I go to a doctor, they have medical license.

I don't really look much past that.

We also checked references and he had good references.

To be honest, I'm frustrated too with this situation, and I don't understand um why there is such a great disconnect between expectations and what has been delivered.

And it is and we are willing to do everything that is in our power to do to research what is happening here and what is causing this disconnect and involving whatever professionals we need to involve in order to resolve that disconnect.

You think that possible to get your architect on site?

I will ask.

I mean, that might go a long way.

Yeah, but anyways, um we're gonna let you follow the advice of Daryl.

We're gonna move along.

We've been on this topic for over 30 minutes.

Um we have a couple of other presentations coming, so we appreciate you showing up.

Daryl, I'll defer to you.

Um what next steps are for them.

Go back to the art or your design professional.

Oh, they need detailed drawings and specs on what they're actually doing.

Um, I mean, if council wants staff to could do a complete review, you know, review of this what was submitted Sunday night instead of just a cursory one.

I mean, we can.

Um we're talking several more staff hours doing that.

Obviously, though, they need to resubmit.

So let's get I mean they need details.

Yeah, let's get those details.

Uh is uh does the city do something where we pay like we pay that portion?

Just curious, you know.

Portion we have to do.

I think they're saying that it would be an additional.

Oh, cost per no, we we don't do design.

Good question.

No, no, I'm not gonna.

I don't think you're you're saying the design, but I'm just saying would you're saying could we pay for the additional cost to the city?

You're wondering if you can be responsible for that.

That's nice of you to say that.

I I don't think we have a system set into place to do that.

Okay, we we can't approve what we designed.

Thank you.

Right, right.

Definitely come.

So I I'm wondering if part of the disconnect is and I know I'm anticipating what your response is going to be, but would it help if you or someone on your team, Darrell, did a walkthrough with Lehigh and actually was pointing to the things that were of concern.

Really nothing left in the building.

But you can go but it's an example.

You're talking about that the entry has to be 36 inches and it's you you're seeing it as 33.

Walking through and explaining those things.

Would that be helpful?

If it wouldn't be helpful, I respect that.

But if it would be helpful, it's just not his job.

But you said an architect, it is architect on the code.

Yeah, we know that.

And again, it may be the architect.

It may just be a disconnect from not being on site, the art the design professional, making those calculations, designs.

It might be just fine.

I I have not gone up there to put a tape measure on it, but I'm not the contractor, I'm not the architect, I'm not the engineer on the project.

Correct.

And it's not for Kyle because you came in town.

Last question.

I just broke, I keep going back to the money thing.

I just can't get because I live in the rural world too, and I just don't understand how you're gonna get this done for 900 grand.

Well, the the major uh one of the major contributing factors is that you know I'm partnered with Lehigh, who as part of our partnership is absorbing, you know, the part of the cost that would usually go the labor part of it, all the labor.

Well, no the the general contractor labor, so like the the labor in arranging with contractors, applying the relationship she already has to get to get a competitive bits and all such things.

And you know, we're still talking about $52 a foot, which is you know that's a substantial amount of money to put into a project.

Oh I mean, I just like trying to figure out how you're gonna get that done.

I mean, on a remodel, normally it's even more it's you know, new construction if you could squeeze, I mean I mean, 90 bucks right now, I'd you know, on anything, I think you I'd laugh.

I mean, new construction, that's even easier on a remodel.

I just can't imagine.

I mean, just the infrastructure on the utilities and stuff.

I I just I that's gonna be a huge bite.

And again, I'm all about you spending money in this town, man.

I really am.

You bring it if you bring in a clean set of stamped engineered plans.

I'm the first guy to say, Henry, it's stamped, review it, get it out the door.

But the problem we keep getting, and I and trust me, these Ike is going to bat for you.

And I think the only reason you're still standing here is because Ike is really, really doing the work.

He is is because I'm in we're in demo mode right now.

So but the thing there is just is you're not providing a set of plans that we can just sit there and go get it out the door.

And so that's my advice is get the plans and and you know, we'll see you in a week, I guess.

I don't know.

We need those plans, guys.

We we need them.

Okay, thank you.

Try to get him on site.

Yeah, so he has an understanding of the scope of this thing.

A good demo site and start new.

Please don't.

Be a good spot.

Thank you.

All right.

Any more concerns?

Yes, sir.

On up, sir.

My name is Melvin Carter.

I'm sorry, could you say that again?

Melton Carter.

I'm kind of found out what's going on with Donatall Park.

I haven't heard none yet.

Well, I would tell you there is a stay right now.

We're taking a step back.

Um our parks and rec department is.

I've been in communication with them.

I'm considering having a little neighborhood meeting there to see who shows up and what you guys' thoughts are, who's planning on using it, etc.

So I emailed our parks and rec director.

He said he's open to doing that, but for now we've taken a step back to reevaluate, we're sending another letter out to the neighborhood to connect with people again to say, hey, what do you think about this?

Are you using it?

Would you rather it be gone or would you rather you open to having a home put here?

So nothing's happening to it right now.

I can assure you that.

Okay.

Okay.

Okay, thanks.

All right.

Thank you for coming in.

Thank you.

All right.

Presentations.

Oh, we got it.

Okay.

Presentations.

Fog program.

FOG Fats, Oils and Grease.

Good evening, assistant Public Works Director Vicky Baker.

Cameron Bill, uh pre-treatment manager.

I uh I will start with the history of the program because I originally developed the code.

Um, but Cameron oversees day-to-day operations and knows all of the updated things we do from day to day.

All right, well, just quick agenda, we'll tell you what's fog is the the concerns, history, and then program overview.

What is fog?

So fog does stand for fats, oil is in greases, but we are also worried about the solids coming out of the kitchens from the kitchen prep.

So um these units not only capture solids and grease, just everything coming from the kitchen.

They're attached to the kitchen, so they're capturing all things that are coming out of the kitchen, so not just fats, oils, and grease.

It was the best name we could come up with.

I don't know what it we've tried.

Just add the S.

But that's something we hear a lot is I don't I don't have fryers, I don't have grease, but it's it's all kitchen waste.

Yeah.

And there's a lot of milk solids and things like that, dairy, other food things.

Dairy products are loaded.

They're the worst.

Um because I know that from Mars.

Yep.

And this is a manhole that's supposed to have a trough.

These pictures are from our collections.

This is what they're supposed to look like.

Um, this is totally greased over.

Um, so there's a negative effect.

All right.

So why is fog a program?

Um causes sewer backups, and then once the sewer backs up, the sewer has nowhere else to go but out, so it goes out into the street, which gets us to the storm drain or basement backups or any other environmental concerns you can think of.

Um can interfere with our pumping and equipment throughout the collection system and our lift stations, which also increase maintenance costs with our UFO department and the wastewater department, and then of course, odors and corrosion, as you can imagine.

Um the environmental health risks, same thing I just mentioned.

It goes on streets, sidewalks, basements, storm drains, rivers, left untreated.

It can harm aquatic life.

Um citizens' health concerns, damage to personal property, and uh violates all of the Clean Water Act regulations.

So, history of the program.

We had a couple of repeated EPA audits back prior to 2015, where we had a whole bunch of SSOs, which uh SSO is a sanitary sewer overflow.

That's basically something happened in their in our sewer collection system that caused the sewer to get out of it.

A lot of them were due to Greece and so the EPA had verbally uh told us, you know, next time we come back, you guys need to have taken care of this, otherwise it's most likely going to be an enforcement, possibly a consent order.

Um so we took it on on our own part to create the the program due to that mandate.

Umyself and a uh the previous pre-treatment manager research for about a year.

We looked at programs across the country, um, looked up regulations, and we developed the code based on what we felt in our professional opinion was the best thing to do at the time.

Um we went very strict with our original code.

Um we did pump outs, we did uh fog concentration, we did uh 25% rule.

Um we did a whole bunch of regulations thinking once we get everybody in the program educated, then we could dial it back.

What is the 25% rule?

So we have like a uh think like a a slare tube that we can put in and like take a core sample, and it shows us the different layers that are in there.

So the layer on top is your fat soils and greases, and then the middle layer, which is like a gray water, is what goes to the sewer, and then everything at the bottom is the solids.

So those two layers together can't be more than 25 percent of that total because once you hit 25 percent, then those as those layers get closer, more of that layer more of that is going out, it's not doing its job.

Correct.

So when you said that you uh to get everybody on board, who who would be everybody who's who's required?

So all at the time we just went with um food service establishments, but in the code, it's everybody that produces food that can be consumed by the public.

So and also uh maintenance garages with oil water separators.

So at the time we just hit the hit the food service establishments, and then we went churches, schools, daycares.

Um the only thing we don't have jurisdiction to is the domestic population.

The only thing we can do with them is flyers, education, social media, things like that.

Um and then food trucks, we do have all the food trucks registered, um, and sister cities.

So sister cities, due to their 28E agreements, have to either mimic or be more strict to our fog code.

So prior to them having a fog code, we were also in the sister cities doing all of the inspections, and if there was any enforcement or anything, we would just work with them and notify them and things like that.

We do not at the time of the um code development council council knew that some so I'm getting ahead of myself, but everybody at that time, April 1st of 2015 was grandfathered in.

Whether they had a grease trap, whether they were up to code, anything, they were grandfathered in.

If something happened, whether they caused an SSO, whether they um added to their menu, like not just a sandwich or something, but like another if they only serve breakfast and now they serve breakfast and lunch, like an expansion of their menu, or if they did like a big remodel of their kitchen where they expanded their waste, then they had to come up to code.

So 10% since 2015, these units are not designed to last forever, especially even if they're maintained well, um, but they they will eventually have a life.

Um, but 10% of those FEC FSCs are still in that grandfather clause since 2015, which is pretty remarkable.

But what was the average replacement cost?

What's what's the average replacement cost?

It depends on the size.

Some of them, if they're smaller, I think they're like a thousand bucks for the unit.

For the under the sink just under the sink.

Oh, those uh honestly, those can even be four or five, six hundred bucks, right?

Um but if you're talking like to to be sized to where you're going out, you might have to tear up the floor.

I mean, I've seen quotes of 75,000, 100,000.

Big place.

Yeah, if it's a current, if it's like they're already established.

That's why we tried it.

We are on the DRC.

We try to catch everybody that comes in and make sure we do have a sizing proposal, um, which we have changed recently due to uh the public's desire for us to do that.

Um so we try to catch everybody coming in and try to get them sized so that way it's not after the fact because that's what that's a big battle that we were facing for a while.

But all right, so that's me.

Kick it over to Cameron.

I could jump into how the program works.

Well, first say I have seen quotes from ranging from 200,000 all the way down to 25,000 for the same project property, same project, same install.

So what the cost is, it's hard to say.

We've seen varied quotes across the board.

Um how the program works, um, one of the main things we try to focus on is education.

Um you know, we're we obviously we do do on-site trainings and things like that.

Um but working with um city manager's office and like doing social media posts, we've had a few of those go out and they've worked really well.

Um then in terms of like grease trap maintenance, interceptor maintenance, um, we'll do on site checks.

Um you know, the restaurants are there, they they should be keeping logs and things like that of to kind of prove compliance over time.

Um so we've got a new software, which I'll talk a little bit more about later, but there's this option now where they can record this stuff online in a database, um, and that's helpful.

It helps prove continued compliance.

Um so the inspections, the frequencies in code is at least once every three years.

Um we kind of go in, that's why we we usually ask for three years' worth of records because we may not have been there for three years.

We went there three years ago and it was good, we don't come back unless there's a problem.

Um so then there's follow-up inspection sometimes if there was something that that needed to be addressed, we would come back and kind of do a follow-up.

Um so the basic requirements, um, I've sort of talked about them, but install, maintain, operate a properly sized grease interceptor.

Um obviously there's a grandfather status on the clause or uh grandfather status on the original installs, um, they didn't have to be changed right away, but they still have to operate maintain that unit.

Um so keeping records I've talked about dry wiping dishes is huge.

Um scraping the food off, throwing it away.

There's there's a lot of best management practices in code.

Um I won't necessarily go through all of them today, but um a lot of these things really help prevent what ends up in the interceptor, and trying to throw food away instead of letting it go down the drain.

Um some of the common problems we've already talked about through questions and things, um, but overdue pumping, you know, we show up in the maybe the interceptor is not in compliance.

Um a lot of staff training is an issue.

There's um kind of a younger crowd than a lot of restaurants, and they tend to turn over, and that becomes an issue for the management staff, the supervisors, those types of things to train and make sure their employees know how to you know wash dishes correctly.

Um sometimes we see lack of pumping records and startup owners are maybe not necessarily aware of their requirements, but like Vicky said, we've had good collaboration with um getting on to like DRC and other things like that to make sure we get ahead of the problem versus um brand new building needing to install a new interceptor after it's already built.

So this is kind of a slide about the benefits of the program.

This is not just um on the city side, this is public.

This is um this is for the restaurant owners, not just on the city side.

Um we'll see you'll see following this program, you'll see fewer plumbing backups, um, reduced maintenance, fewer emergency maintenance calls, and environmental protection and compliance.

There's go ahead, finish your set.

I got a question for you.

Yeah, just the you know, I've I've heard people say there's plenty of um bills and things like that on the restaurant side for emergency backups and um things like that, and so a lot of the things that's in the code can help limit you know those sort of things on the restaurant owners.

So a lot of times it's it is beneficial to for them, aside from just compliance.

So how do you decide like size of the interceptor?

Uh so do we have a size and proposal and that they would be um completed, there's several factors on there.

I've got a slide or two that I can show you that you can sort of look at and see it, but does does like hours, uh uh you know uh operations, does that matter the size of location matter?

Or are you just saying that this is the interceptor that that a person needs?

So it does take into consideration the hours.

Um we have a grease factor in there now that even considers um what kind of operations the restaurant might be doing.

Um say like a pizza joint, maybe isn't the same as a coffee shop, not the same as a concession stand or a steakhouse.

Um it kind of yeah, it kind of takes into account the different um grease factors that that have been published in other documents, um and we utilize that to incorporate that into our signing proposals with hours with uh number of meals per day, or there's several factors in there.

And and and obviously, you know, as as Stacey mentioned earlier, um Brecki's had this this inspection, but Crum, who is next door, and and he gave me permission to actually you know bring it up.

But you know, uh he said he's only open nine hours a week, right?

He's only got three tables, most people don't even come in.

So, you know, what you're saying is that regardless of those uh hours or whatever, he's still got to have the same size as say McDonald's.

But no, no, no.

I'm I'm just asking, I'm no, it's we have like three different factors over the original, it's square footage hours or um uh what's the last number of sales, number of customers.

Yeah.

And then later on in the sizing proposal is where you get your category.

So when do you guys ask that though?

When did you sizing proposal?

Well, when do you ask, like how you know your your your hours are not ours, but but you would say revenue.

That's on your honor.

Yeah, and you we have a license, we ask that a licensed plumber fills it out, and then if we get any plans back that they're stamped plans.

So it's all on you to fill it out, like Julie said, on your honor, and then we get all those numbers back.

We just check the calculation, and then if there's anything in there, we'll call that person back because there's a contact on there, and just work through it if there's anything missing, and then we get that final number.

And and see, I guess the the issue that I would have was that you know the person who did our inspection actually said that we weren't in compliance based on the previous business.

So I mean it it never, you know.

I we never was asked that, but you know, I I apologize.

I'll look we're gonna follow up, but I don't know why that would have been said.

Because it it goes it once you once that business closes and you open, um, then we like nothing against the old business goes.

Two different businesses though.

Well, yeah, I know that, but but we were treated as as if you know uh it was the same business.

We'll reiterate with staff.

I apologize.

I don't I guess what I think may have been happening was the grandfather status issue with the changed interceptor, and just wanted to make sure the size was appropriate because it got changed.

Um but we can look into it.

We'll definitely get back to you.

Um I do have the sizing proposal up there, you know.

If you wanted to look at it, and it kind of shows the different factors, dishwasher, um garbage disposals, how many meals per day, um, all those sort of things are taken into consideration here.

So, like number one there, you don't have to fill out all three.

You can just fill out one.

So if you know your average meals, you can use that.

If you know your seating capacity, you can use that.

If you if you know you're uh you're coming into town, you're not sure what you're gonna do with this building, but you know the square footage, you can use that.

Um, and then it just goes to the next thing, storage factor, waste flow rate, and then your that big chart on the side there, that's where you would look to see the number that you plug in.

That's how it's different.

You can see how it says high, medium, low.

That's how that's rating those.

So I can't consider how much of your food hours to go.

I'm so sorry, you'll need to come to the microphone.

That's all part of your that's what you would put in your average meals per day.

It has to be recorded.

If that percentage is taken into consideration, provide your name one more time.

Stacy Orndorf Breckeys.

Thank you.

That would be part of that number one that you would put average meals per day.

This was revised last year.

So that it wasn't a one-size-fits-all or all restaurants, all sizes, all types.

Before it was just average meals per day.

Right.

Or no, seating capacity.

I'm sorry, seating capacity.

Right.

That's all it was before.

And then we didn't have that chart before.

Right.

Okay.

Yes.

I yeah, oh yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

This was recommended.

This was recommended by the citizens and the FECs to for us to look at it and review it, and that's what we come up with.

So there was a lot of work meetings with a lot of stakeholder.

We did look at location for the butt for compliance tracking.

Um we recently began a partnership with Fog BMP, and this is the online database I was telling you about.

There's uh online tracking of pumping records, um, haulers and the restaurants submit records online, and we can see them as soon as they're put in.

Um there's also an efficient tracking of inspections.

So, you know, instead of having paper records, we can have electronic records.

Um, we can send send an email that the same day as soon as we get done with inspection, send them a report of you know everything that we found, good or bad, and they can see that so it takes a lot of labor out on our end, and kind of helps us with tracking.

Um so it takes a lot of labor out on our end, and kind of helps us with tracking.

And also, you know, the FSE can see what was deficient, you know, the restaurant, they can see what was deficient and submit a corrective um plan, you know, within a few weeks or whatever the timeline might be, and to kind of show that they are compliant, that there are no issues going forward, and that they're taking care of things that were problems.

So this is uh you know takes a lot of strain off, it's been beneficial.

We're trying it's early stages, we're trying to get some buy-in, um, but this is showing a lot of promise.

So I guess last question I'd have on the on the restaurant side of it is when you guys go in there on a new construction or on a remodel.

Um, one of the biggest complaints we the I think this community, not just your department in general, is the lack of finding solutions versus just telling us.

I mean, I mean, since this new council has come aboard, I would hope that maybe as we're addressing, you know, we're we're solution-based, you know.

That that that so if if the feedback that we want to get is that yeah, it sucks, but you guys are trying to find cheap solutions.

Right.

That would be hopefully the new attitude.

That's always been the what they have a little bit.

I know it always has been, but let's just you know, let's just let's re rekindle and it's new refocus.

This new program did do that, Rick.

Yeah, um, talk to Heather at Buffalo Apple.

Yeah about this that they found for her.

Yeah, how excited are you over there?

I don't have a problem with okay, just want to make sure.

It's the implementation.

Yeah, Vicky, do you want us to respond to the scheduling of the oh?

So originally we did.

I I was actually uh originally an inspector.

We would we would spend a lot of time waiting for the person to show up.

Um especially places that were open, not within our normal city business hours.

We would schedule a time like at a 10 o'clock or something.

We sat we would sit for half an hour to an hour.

Um then not then we try to call, we try to call and ask where they were and things like that.

So it was just a lot of inefficient labor, um, and then rescheduling, and then we've rescheduled and then we sit there again.

Um so we've just went to not scheduling, um, but we do work.

Uh we've worked with um the community long enough that we know a lot of the owners and managers that know that want to know either they want to be there or hey, just keep me in the loop, or we've told them you know, if if we ask, is it okay if we inspect?

Um, because sometimes you know it's during their lunch rush or something, and we don't want to um stop them from doing any of that.

So we try to schedule it before and after that.

Um, but that's kind of why we went to unannounced.

It was nothing to do with catching anybody or anything like that.

It was simply staff time was just a lot of staff time was wasted.

So and it seemed it from what I've known, it it's worked well.

So I would love to talk to you and get your feedback.

I was just gonna say, in my 12 years of owning SOHO, the only time I had anything scheduled was when I very first opened my initial opening and I was grandfathered in.

But otherwise, you guys would just show up every other year or whatever it was back then.

So yeah, like I said, we first started that way and it just didn't work out.

So cool.

Be part of the solution.

Yep, yep.

Any other questions?

Very mild okay.

Thanks, Vicky.

Thanks, Cameron.

All right, building permits.

Oh no, sorry, Big Sioux River Levy Expansion Project, guys.

Sorry, I start getting out of here, Daryl.

Sorry.

Sorry.

Freaking me out there.

Yeah.

Good afternoon.

Good afternoon.

Evening.

Oh, evening.

We uh wanted to go over our big Sioux levee extension project.

Uh, if you don't know about this project, we're going to it's over on River Drive along the big Sue.

We're going to extend this the uh levee.

Uh about 1300 square uh 1300 linear feet, 1400 linear feet.

Orden, could you state your name for the record?

Oh, yeah, Gordon Fair City Engineer, and I have with me Kevin Cruz with uh JEO, he's our consultant for this project.

Uh so we're gonna just go through the whole thing.

Hopefully, this will answer a lot of the questions.

I'm gonna do the first part, then Kevin will start.

Uh we're gonna give you the project background, the status up to date, and four alternatives, and then our next steps on this.

Fair to say that we're not gonna in the materials that we reviewed to prepare for today, there were no financials.

We're not gonna see financials today again.

Is that correct?

No, not as well.

I mean, cost of each proposal.

Yes, for the alternatives, you'll see some of those.

But it's not, there's no decision making at this point.

Um if you see something you're we're we've already we're on track to do alternative A, so to speak.

And if you're you you guys decide no, we want to hear more, we want to vote on the others, then we'll bring it back at a later date, and then you can vote on those alternatives and we'll go from there.

Great, thank you.

So uh Big Sioux River uh levee was constructed in the mid-70s, just an earthen embankment, and on top of a lot of it, we have the trail.

It's about three to four feet tall, and our original design, like said we're gonna do about 1400 feet.

And uh to do in preparation of that, we acquired three properties la last year, and this was after the 24 flood, they were damaged, all three of those properties were damaged.

We bought them out at uh fair market value, relocated them, and then we demoed the buildings.

So that's to put the levy there.

Uh that was in spring of 25.

We acquired the properties, and we received in the fall of 25 a $866,000 grant uh from the uh levy improvement fund grant.

So that's to go towards construction.

No.

How do you get that?

Okay.

Uh acquisition uh construction's right around about that price, 860-ish.

Um at the current rate.

So, and it is a 80-20, it is an 80-20 grant.

Okay.

Uh right now we're in the design phase.

Uh we've got four alternatives, like I discussed.

We've already started our discussions with the core.

We have to meet with the core for both our side and North South Dakota side, as they are doing the same thing with us because they're doing levy improvements on their side as well.

And we're doing the uh flood floodplain permit, and uh they're working on the hydraulic evaluation of the river currently.

So phase uh alternative A basically is or actually all the alternatives at this point shows that levee being extended from the southwest of this map, southwest of this map, all the way up to the uh where that red cloud is.

It's all the same for all four alternatives.

Okay, it's basically just a four-foot uh embankment with an access road put on it and a little turn lane, a turn pocket up there, so we can uh uh vehicles can turn around and go back down the on top of the embankment.

So this is alternative A.

We thought at the very beginning that we could do this whole embankment without having to buy this last piece of property, the one that's shown here on the right.

It's actually two properties, but we just it's the same owner.

We'll just say one.

Uh we thought that the elevation would bottom out right about there, but we were incorrect at the beginning of this project.

It was soon evident right after we started looking at it, but we wanted to come up with these alternatives.

And this first alternative is to bring the temporary embankment out into the street during flood events, kind of like we do now.

But right now we do it for 1,600 feet, is it?

Close to it, yeah.

Close to 1600 feet, and that's bringing out those uh we call them HESCOs, that's a brand name.

It's a four-foot by four foot by four foot uh pallet, so to speak, that's interlocked with a bunch of them, and then the maintenance crews will then scoop up sand and dump it in, and that becomes one giant sandbag.

So we had to use those for that flood in 24, and thankfully we did.

So rather than doing sandbags, you've got those units that you place and then fill them with sand.

Right.

That is correct.

So we were hoping to get away from all of the temporary stuff, but we we will not be able to without purchasing this property.

So I miss anything.

Oh, yeah, there we go.

The pros and cons on this, uh it's got a reduced temporary closure.

So it's not as big as the last one or what it is currently.

Uh we don't have to take any additional property.

It's the least cost.

And we can still extend this in the future if we decide to.

Uh the next phase, alternative B, is similar to that, but this is doing one of those bulkheads in front of the house in front of the property, like a retaining wall, small retaining wall, right on the edge of the property, and putting bulkhead boards along the driveways or in front of the driveways during a flood event.

You've you may have seen these elsewhere around.

Uh do we have pictures?

And I've got some pictures on the next one here, too.

See, similar to this.

They can be the two on the right are actually from downtown Des Moines on a project we did.

That that's kind of a very simple basic gray concrete wall.

The ones on the left give you some ideas of some other things that could be done with those a little more decorative.

Um the one on the top left also gives you some perspective of what that looks like when the gates are in place and installed.

Um that be in the right-of-way, or would that be on the proper right on the property line?

Behind the sidewalk.

And that it does kind of get into one of the cons of that is that in order to build that in order for operation and maintenance, there would need to be some easement.

Even though the wall itself would be on the city side of the property line, it's going to be right there close.

So, in order to maintain it long term, a permanent easement would be recommended.

Um it's also maybe one of the cons.

I don't want to cut you off quite a bit.

Uh, a big piece of of that that I really want to highlight is that it's important to note that the wall is there not to protect that home, but actually to protect the neighborhood from the river.

So it's a little bit of a juxtaposition, and normally the home is on the right side of the levee.

In this situation, the home is actually on the wrong side of the river.

Kind of keeping the water in that.

So that that's I don't want that to get glossed over, is that the wall is protecting the neighborhood from the river, not the other way around.

Well, there's benefit to the property, is a greater benefit to the broader scope of the neighborhood.

So impacting property owner and needing an easement from them has real value.

Well, it's a detriment to the property because I mean, that's what I'm saying.

That's why requiring the easement, there is value to them.

Um again, we're um we're not endorsing these, we're just gonna make sure you show we're showing you the options.

Right now, we're the first one with the sandbags, that's our alternative that we're going with at this point, unless you decide you want us to choose, and then we'll bring that back at a later date.

And those have worked well on the past.

Yes, they have.

Right.

And we have staff to deploy it.

Yes, we do.

Much warning do you need in order to get everything out?

Uh last time we did it in what 18 hours?

That was it was Sunday morning.

I got called out.

They hadn't I thought it was even less than that, but Kelly would know.

I think it was the next morning that's when I well.

Let's see.

My day started at 2 a.m.

that day.

I think I called you about six.

Kelly.

We had staff state your name.

Kelly Bacham, the park superintendent.

Um I believe we had staff working by 7.30 or 8, and we were done at four, both with this levy and protection of the riverside collector.

Well, we ringed that whole thing.

So tally that up.

What's that?

Alley that up.

How many hours was it then?

We were looking at about eight hours with full staff.

Yes.

Very good.

That's two different locations, too.

Right.

Right.

Right.

This one would we went with this.

One long line.

A lot less.

Alternate A ends up being about a third of the length of what you currently do that do right now today.

So thank you.

Yeah, so alternate C is another one we just wanted to make sure that that you were all aware that we did look at it.

I will point out it does have some really big physical challenges to it.

Um, so when you do see the cost, you'll see there's a pretty big window or a range of what those are.

So rather than an alternate B where we were taking the flood wall or the line of protection in front of the homes or the home that's there, this would be sliding a combined earthen embankment and flood wall behind those homes, like between the homes and the river.

Um we really just wanted to see is could something feasible fit, feasibly fit, what impacts would there be?

Uh the real drawbacks of this one as you see on your uh screen up there is that the top of the levee, whether it's a earthen embankment or flood wall, it does impact several outbuildings on that property.

Um the big bigger red rectangular area is actually a swimming pool.

Um and however you cut it, uh, with whether you use a wall or a earthen embankment, you get extremely close to that pool.

Um and I think you would start to run the risk of some damage to that pool.

As you start to get close to the river bank itself, which is the green line, it's a little hard to kind of depending on the resolution of screens.

That's actually the top of bank of the river.

The soils get very uh problematic as you get a little closer to the river.

It's not in in itself an insurmountable thing, but it has an implication on cost if you were to go down that route.

Um so there again would need to be some easements for not only construction but operation and maintenance if that's the route you you choose.

Um, but it does it would get the line of protection on the river side of that property.

Um, but it does have it is the most costly option as well.

Um and as I mentioned, there still are a number of uh big uh engineering challenges to get across, and you would be yes protecting the home, but the swimming pool would be impacted, those two outbuildings would be impacted, and it would probably have a a negative impact for those folks as well.

The homeowner probably won't look like it anyway.

No.

Um alternate D.

Go ahead.

Alternate D is is more of a future type of scenario.

It would be um extending what you saw in alternate A, the R preferred alternative, would be extending it all the way to Beck Street.

Um now the the big point about this is it does go through though that property that we were talking about of not acquiring now.

So that's probably the biggest downside or drawback of alternate D.

Uh the one nice thing about alternate D is it like I said, it could be a future expansion if and when those properties ever do come up sale, the same way you acquired the properties you have now.

That could be a five-year, ten year, twenty-five year vision to completely eliminate the uh temporary flood controls of this area.

Um but it would go all the way to Beck Street, which is the high ground that we would need to tie into for complete flood protection at this time.

So turns out another thousand or thirteen hundred feet linear feet.

Yeah, so basically the the total length of flood uh temporary flood protection is right around 1,500 feet right now.

That would completely remove all of that temporary and go back with an earthen embankment the entire way.

So you could spend the city forces elsewhere where they're needed when it comes time to prepare for those floods.

So then it kind of gets into the the where the rubber meets the road, I guess, is actually the opinion of cost.

Um as Gordon mentioned, we are in roughly a 50% design stage right now.

That's why there is a range here.

We kind of need to decision point about which alternate we want to go down.

Um these are all standalone items.

So you don't we don't add if you want alternate B, you need to add all it's not don't make oh don't overcomplicate it.

It's either A or B or C or D.

That's where you can get to.

Um so generally speaking, alternate A is between 850 and 850,000 and 1 million, and then it goes up from there as you start getting into uh flood walls, which were extremely expensive.

The biggest cost of the flood wall is the foundational elements.

The portion you see is really only about half of the wall.

There's that twice as much down below the ground in order to make sure it uh it all stands up because the we can't count on the soils when it's they're all saturated because of the flood condition.

So yeah, the most expensive options are alternate B and alternate D.

Those are the ones that have the longest stretches of flood wall.

And again, beans.

Excuse me, alternate B and C.

Alternate D is that future expansion or future work if you would so choose if you wanted to do that all now.

And keep in mind that is not 15 1.5 million more correct than the for each their own price.

Yeah, yeah.

So the cost difference, if we were to do it now, question.

So on D.

Well, first of all, on the liability on A.

I mean, you're putting a wall behind a guy's house.

So you obviously they're gonna get wet, right?

Yeah, in front of the well, on the street side, yes.

But when the flood comes, they're gonna get wet.

Yep.

So we're creating a barrier.

What's our liability on that deal?

I'd be happy to provide an opinion to the council if you would like that.

That's not been discussed.

I I have not been involved in discussing the honesty.

You build a wall behind my place and then you block you could block my driveway and then my house floods, I'm gonna sue you.

I mean, that's never been discussed.

Oh well, at this point, it's no matter what happens.

If we're if we're a flood happens tomorrow, we're putting those um sandbags out there all across the front, and he's got floods.

I have to ask.

That's my first because I you know it might I keep going back to D, which is uh I mean you're saying to acquire the properties and everything and then extend it permanently where you don't have to dick d uh mess around with the temporary stuff and everything, you can get it done for one seven and acquire that's that's also acquiring the property.

Yes.

Why wouldn't we do that?

Well we can.

I mean, this is where we're at.

I mean, I mean, I'm I mean, we could do it for we can limp in at a million bucks.

And then we still gotta buy, maintain, and staff and scramble, right?

Yep.

At a flood.

Yes, we do.

And then we leave it to the next guy down the road, maybe buy the property, not buy property, or you go in at 15, 17 or beat up the people that are hungry right now.

And you're saying you can acquire the properties up to Beck Street.

You think they're acquirable?

They weren't when we were buying these other ones.

Well, we we didn't have we didn't off um ask for them at that point.

At this point, we just these three were damaged.

This one was not.

Yeah, and we were pretty sure that those three was all we needed.

Until you did the topo.

And then we did the like, uh oh.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I mean, call me crazy, but I mean I I mean it means free kick it down the road to the next guy for the next 20 years.

I mean, you're talking the solution done, slam the door, don't need a consultant 15 years from now.

You invest the one five to one seven and you fix that problem.

Okay, boy.

Finding the funding is another.

Well, again, I go back to you.

My guess is if you put a wall behind a guy's house and it gets flooded out, you're gonna buy in the house anyway.

You are.

No, no, you're totally are not.

I know I'm right.

Good question.

I'm right.

Yeah.

The one thing I will say is that that the temporary flood wall in front with the Hesco baskets, that's what is in the current core of engineers design.

Okay, that might give us a little bit of immunity.

Yeah, I'd like to see an opinion, Nicole.

Anyway, I just think it's you know what, I think it's a great presentation.

I think it's a great discussion for the council to have is from an investment standpoint.

At what point, you know, we always talk about this community kicks things down the road, and it's like, why didn't they do it this way?

Well, you know what?

This council might step up and say if we just hear this problem be done with it and be done with it.

So let's figure it out.

Well, that's what we were doing on this extension on the levy until we just found out that long enough.

Cool.

How we got here.

We were stepping up and not kicking the can.

Julie, I know you were.

We're good.

So this is something you want us to bring back so to be voted on.

I would love to hear Nicole's opinion.

So whatever.

We'll take that as a yes, then.

A indeed.

We'll see you at our next meeting.

Yep.

This meeting.

No.

The team meeting.

Correct.

Put it on the agenda.

We'll gather some information before then.

Perfect.

Thank you both.

Well, we still have to.

Oh, okay.

Yeah, I think the only other thing was that the next steps as it's really up there.

And then um we're we provided a like a 50% design to Gordon and Britney.

We kind of need some decisions on what the direction is, and then we can wrap things up.

Gordon didn't mention that any of this has to go and be approved by the Corps of Engineers.

I was just gonna ask that.

Because from what we already have, we're gonna have to go back to the core.

We're gonna have another six to nine months.

We haven't officially submitted to the core, we've been meeting with them though.

Oh, okay.

And generally speaking, we're gonna have to go to the core with any of those options.

Yes, I thought that that may I'd be done already.

Uh they aren't gonna tip their hand one way or another, but generally speaking, it's that they want to know what your final design is before get involved with it.

Uming and being through a lot of 408 process, I think any of those we've talked about are permittable.

It's really what do you want long-term that's where it boils down to.

What kind of timeline are you on?

I'm I see the next spring next year we'd like to construct a year from now.

So I will say that the core reviews are caught up in the kind of ongoing federal budget thing.

I know there was a lot of them in Omaha that sat on somebody's desk for about six months before they ever got any kind of feedback whatsoever.

So this is the spring of 27 is when we would like to be doing it, but that we're gonna need to be submitting to the core roughly around you know, Thanksgiving give or take.

Well, probably yesterday.

Yeah.

All right, understood.

Thank you.

Thank you.

When's the next meeting?

Oh I'm sorry.

Put it on.

You're gone.

Yeah.

Well Brittany.

Okay.

Permit.

Thank you guys.

Darabolock inspection services manager.

We've got the uh reports we're sent out on each Friday.

Uh they can speak there.

We do have an awful lot of them coming in recently, especially on the residential side.

Um Brian is on vacation this week, so we're kind of pulling away from the commercial side as well as my own time to try to get as many of those out as fast as we can.

Um so if you have any questions on that, otherwise Marty's got an update on our program.

Yeah, Marty Dorty, economic and community development.

I remembered.

Thank you.

Um ours is so much easier than these other ones you've been looking at.

We're it's all good.

Um anyway, um, yeah, we are continuing with the um project to implement new software to make the process easier for building in Sioux City.

Uh last week we had our first three-hour plan review committee um business process review that they have consultant.

So it was three hours.

It was long.

It went well.

We're we're going through the what the configuration will look like, what the what the public-facing um uh software uh will look like.

And um we have in that committee people from IT, finance, planning, engineering, inspections, economic development, and fire.

So a lot of folks involved in this process.

Is the is the philosophy in the room less is more after the three hours, yes, it was.

I mean, I mean from the you guys, I'm assuming you're developing the footprint.

Yes.

Exactly.

That's the same thing.

Everybody wants to put in their 40 things.

I mean, are we?

Yeah.

You know, all in a nutshell.

I mean, it's going to be the fact that everything will be there to be able to plug in play and move forward as quickly as they have their information available for them to move that forward through that.

Right now, the focus this last time was on more on planning and zoning portion of it, but engineering every course was there as well as as fire.

FIRE is going to join our part of this group as well to help make that even smoother transition, if you will, um, for the permitting process, which we'll be starting that next week, hopefully.

Right.

So the second, hold on, did you find out during this process though, Darrell?

That's funny you bring up fire and stuff like that.

Did you are you guys figuring out during this process what's really code and what's just kind of always has been?

Is it is it's is it giving you guys some clarity on this?

Because a lot of, you know, I mean, from uh oh, this is the way we always do it versus now you're plugging in what really just the minnow has to happen.

Is it a good exercise?

Oh, it's always good exercise when you have to review processes.

I mean, we're doing that right now with graffiti, if you will, because we'll be taking over in the inspections department graffiti.

And there was a lot of disconnect there, and I think without making that transition to go back and look and see how we're doing things, we would not get better.

We would just status quo and it would just keep moving forward the way it was for, you know, uh and we've got a lot of exciting things coming up as far as that program is concerned as well.

And again, that goes back to ease of reporting is gonna be an essential part of that as well uh on the graffiti part.

It makes it a lot simpler for the citizen to make a complaint and get it taken care of for quickly.

July 1st.

That's when it changed on the graffiti.

Yep.

So again, the business process review uh started last week, it's continuing this week.

It's divided into two sections, planning and engineering in the first one, and then the second part is the building permits.

So we'll start that next week.

Yeah.

There will be two two additional the the three-hour sessions will continue to go with planning and zoning, but then you'll have three three-hour meetings as well for planning or for permitting services as well, with other departments chiming in on that permitting as well, like the fire department before for uh fire alarm permits, for uh fire work stand permits, for sprinkler system permits, all those kind of things.

That way it can be all found in one location and serve the citizens a little better.

Glad to hear that the IT department is a part of that because we got some sharp guys down there that they have to be, yeah.

We need them.

But it sort of is them.

They have to put it in.

We have to figure out what it should do.

All the inputs come from everybody.

Yeah, right.

All the user is down this thing down, yeah.

It was gonna be my question, but when you said it, so you know, a lot of things, just even user simplicity.

You know, there's a lot of acronyms that are thrown out there that you know, one department understands every single one of those.

Um, but the next department doesn't, you know, they might have a whole different meeting for that, quite frankly, for the same, you know, acronyms.

So this helps simplify that to make it very much more user-friendly in that respect.

Yeah, and we're we're we're doing something that hasn't been done in a long time, which we're talking to each other about why do we do it this way.

You know, maybe maybe there's a better way to do it.

And um I think that's healthy.

It is.

Keep getting it to the field.

You guys are doing a good job, get it to the field, get it to the field.

Good progress.

Get it to the field, get it to the field.

Yeah.

Thank you, gentlemen.

Thanks.

Thank you.

All right, moving on.

HART Homeless Assistance Response Team.

Rex Mueller Police Department.

Um, your last memo to council, or at least information to council last week would have had the latest statistics.

I think uh the team is still doing what we expect them to do.

I see regular emails from the officers uh involved in that.

Uh they're constantly out there problem solving.

We've thrown a lot of uh new locations, projects, concerns, and uh both officers along with the other city partners get right on the issues and provide a response.

So uh I think they're continuing the excellent work that uh that this council endorsed.

And if you have any questions about the uh the last report out, just let me know.

I want to thank uh, you know, uh Captain Bertrand sent out a QR code and everything.

I think that's such a great piece uh to get especially into the public so that people can have that readily available to to reach out and so I've heard some great comments, had a conversation with a local business owner downtown.

Yeah, and that's a direct connection to not only the Hart officers but community resources.

So uh they researched that, we talked about that, we thought uh, you know, at a glance, what could we do?

Um everybody has phones, and that QR code is a nice link to some of this uh the resources that the community provides.

So, Chief, I think we're making really good progress.

Um I think we continue to have the dialogue that you are seeing with your team and the stakeholders that are involved with Hart.

I know that we're all having continual dialogue.

I met with Jessica last week, I've talked to Joe a number of times, I've talked to Sheila a number of times, and I also had a chance to visit with Wendy Jackson last week.

And I think everybody is moving in the right direction.

Everybody is uh is trying to get our arms around the scope of the issue and trying to know the best way to manage it.

I think we continue to make good progress.

I want to thank you and your team, and I want to thank the other the other corporate citizens that we're working with to identify all of the issues, all the stakeholders and coming to a resolution.

Absolutely.

I think a lot of conversations were happening that uh a year ago were not happening.

Right.

And uh the familiarity that the team approach, it's outstanding.

I think I think in the long run, we're gonna be an example to other communities that are wrestling with the same issues.

Well, and to that point, um I was gonna raise this point during council concerns, but Mike and I are actually working um to reach out to a variety of communities that have dealt with the same issue.

Jessica mentioned to me last week that the city of Milwaukee had a similar issue and was addressing it.

Two weeks ago, I was watching a debate on television, and the mayor of San Jose was identifying how they were trying to manage the issue.

Mike and I have a call with the mayor's office of San Jose on Thursday.

So we're continuing outreach, we're continuing to try and get our arms around all of the issues, identifying the issues, and coming up with a solution.

We had uh council bluffs uh chief was in town last week, and he and I had a sit down about that too.

They have got a different approach.

Now there's no one size fits all, obviously, suits your unique community.

So when we tailor our response, it's with our unique needs and our geography and uh our resources involved, and I think we've done a good job of of making constant tweaks to HART and the response based on the needs that we find, based on the barriers that we've uh encountered, and I think uh the team is doing a very good job addressing things.

Do you know, or Mike, do you know?

My understanding is that SHIP is in possession of a study that was done in the last year or so on the homelessness.

Uh point in time count, I assume, or the point in time count?

No, what it would have been beyond a point in time count.

It was a broader scoped.

Can you reach out to SHIP, please?

Ask Matt if they've got something.

And if not.

Mike, if you want, I can do that.

I uh shout out to Mike.

Okay.

Or excuse me, shout out to Matt.

Yeah, Matt Ollman.

Chief, do we know um, I mean, I know that Hart has spent a lot of time downtown.

Do we know what the approach is as it relates to the whole city?

Um they have obviously they have uh a lot of it's call-driven, but they have not limited their work to the downtown area.

Um I have seen the emails from the Hart group.

Uh we've gone to the east side, obviously, with some of the concerns brought up about Gordon Drive and the reconstruction.

They've got properties over uh on the east side uh that they're watching, locations that they're checking uh where a concern was addressed, it was related to homelessness.

So they are not limiting their activity to the downtown area.

They're going wherever in town we need them to.

Uh and uh uh, you know, uh I I don't see any boundaries as to uh where the heart team is working.

So when it comes to uh feedback, um I've been sharing with my fellow council members uh emails receiving from local businesses that are very appreciative of what's going on, and they kind of feel like they're getting uh maybe the the shackles taken off them a little bit to be able to express themselves on uh uh without feeling retaliation, saying this is happening, what you guys are you guys are over the target type thing.

We have a lot of work to do yet.

Um so where my mind is shifting now is um to the enforcement side of it, and I think that's why you've been great about supplying the data that you've been I've been asking for data, even just like the things with the mini-bikes and stuff like that.

And it seems like that when we ask for data, um you guys tweak or sharpen your your skills on or sharpen a little bit on the enforcement side of it.

Um we asked for the mini-bank data for a year the last year.

I think it's kind of an eye-opener how much we, you know, the tickets that weren't written, all of a sudden now we see that this an issue now.

You guys have really I saw the story the other night on the KTIV that have really heightened your awareness on the mini-bike issue.

So going back to the homeless side of it, you know, we can we can feel really good about ourselves, and I think we are identifying the um uh the the players, let's put it that way.

But there's still that 20 percent that I really want to continue to to focus our resources being the badges on enforcement.

Are they on drugs?

Are they intoxicated?

Are they trespassing?

And if they are, you know, we've talked now to the judges, we want to continue to hammer home the in the in the infractions that they're getting prosecuted, that 20 percent.

They need to feel that they're not that they are uh um endangering or they're not or they're breaking the law.

So I just want to compliment me on that.

I know that that's part of the focus, but um it really this thing is now transitioned in my mind to law enforcement on that 20 percent.

That's the only way we're gonna get that 20 percent to realize that uh they can't keep doing what they're doing.

We haven't we haven't the panhandling is down, I mean it's down now.

There's not seven of them standing in the in the median, there's just one or two here and there.

So it's it's we're we're making headways and I appreciate that.

Um Rick, the 20 percent, can you please clarify again who they are?

Yeah, it's the people who don't want help.

We we've done we have historic um reach out.

Oh, we have historic reach out right now.

And that's why I tell people and it's uh this is a 20 to one issue for every one comment that I get um saying, you know, you're being kind of maybe a little compassionate.

Uh there's 20 people saying that, you know, this this has to happen downtown with what the investment we have done there.

They are and they're good emails, and the the people are sincere about it.

Um the other thing is uh people like to reach out and talk about, you know, hey, what if we built this, or what if the city builds this?

I'm just gonna be transparent, like I've said before.

My mission is very simple.

It's it's it's not my mission to house the homeless.

It's not the city's mission to home the house.

Our mission is to protect the downtown, to protect the downtown businesses, and that patrons and citizens that live down there or shop down there or do business down there feel safe and and they want to be down there.

So that's that's my mission.

And the rest of the city.

You know, that's what that's the mission.

So again, I think that you're over the target.

We're focused.

Uh, and I think with the ambassadors coming on with Reagan, it's great.

Um and uh we'll just see how the summer plays out.

But back to the encampments, I think you're doing a good job there.

I'm also meeting on Wednesday with uh um Ottawa Falls, the head of the uh BNN railroad back there, that big encampment back there.

Um I toured that facility with the county.

I know they got a lot of property back there.

It was back there with the county boys.

Um we're gonna try to put a plan together to get that dozed and just get that camp cleaned up.

We're gonna bring in the railroad, the adjacent property owners that are there and say uh this is just it's just a big landfill back there.

And it's there's so much so it'll be collectively all the property on the process.

Yeah, we're gonna if they don't clean up their property, we're gonna clean up for them and we're gonna assess them.

And I think that uh the railroad is extremely receptive to this conversation.

Um I meet with them on Wednesday with the county again, and uh uh uh the public will notice when we go in there.

My my goal is to doze that, put a frontage road in there that can be can be patrolled, can be um uh it's not really.

It's not I mean I said I walked it.

I w we walked it the whole way, and it's how about putting in a trail.

Yeah, put in a trail, really, yeah.

But but yeah, be a good idea if we're gonna spend the money.

But but the uh uh that that's another one I think that that when that one finally we get that one cleaned up, it's gonna be very symbolic for the city um uh as it's called progress.

Um so we'll just keep doing what we're doing.

I want to keep that front and center in front of the public that we're working on it.

So I think I've been clear.

I mean, even the last report out to this council that we are still a law enforcement agency and we're just one aspect.

Yep.

At the end of the day, that's what we are going to do, and we're gonna provide a criminal justice response.

Our partners in the Heart Task Force are there to provide the other resources.

So we're not gonna shy away from arrest when it's necessary, and our officers understand that.

That's what they do.

Yeah.

Uh but when you ask, you know, for a report out, I think we're reporting out on a lot of our partners within the task force to try to give this council an understanding of what's being accomplished.

But at the end of the day, uh we're police officers.

So enforcement is the best tool that we have.

Uh in many cases.

Um better result than enforcement, but in many other cases, enforcement is the best option.

And we're not going to stop doing that.

That's what we do.

So we won't step back and avoid arrest when an arrest needs to be made.

And the officers understand that.

And the hard officers aren't the only ones working on the problem.

And I like the way you're highlighting.

I mean, just like said, just like the simple thing with the minibikes.

It's going to be curious to see now that the focus has been refocused on that, how many tickets are actually issued versus I think there was like six over last year.

It'll be fun to watch that explode.

And and I had another guy, I had a guy that's been in my neighborhood driving without a license plate for a year, and all of a sudden now he's getting pulled over.

It makes me feel good.

I mean, it's like you know, there's it's called compliance.

I mean, they're going out there and they're, you know, it's the lawlessness in South City.

Not saying there was, but that the graffiti, the the lawlessness stops.

And I think you're starting to see that, and I appreciate what you guys are doing.

Well, dealing with the mini-bikes, that part of that is that's a new ordinance, relatively new ordinance.

And the first thing we should always do is public education.

And that's what we've been trying to do with our social media.

I think there's a lot of parents, grandparents, whoever buying those for their kids with no idea where they could be operated, which is why we've done interviews.

We put it on our social media, and and voluntary compliance is always the best result of anything.

And so trying to publicize that, uh, trying to let our citizens know what they can and can't do with those devices.

And I think the messaging has been really effective.

I looked at uh some of the things that we generated on our social media, and kudos to our community policing team for getting the message out in a succinct manner so that uh citizens don't have to read through the city ordinance to figure out what is and isn't legal.

We're putting it right out there, very simply for them to understand, and that's to me is always the first step.

I think Iowa and then our ordinances did not catch up with those, a lot of those electric advices because they're kind of a new thing.

And now we're we're seeing what's happening with them, and now we're responding with an ordinance last year, and uh with public education and then enforcement is always going to be part of that.

Give them a chance to learn about it.

And I I don't think that some of the grandparents and parents, like you're stating, understand that just because it's sold, I mean, you can buy these little mini-bikes at bomb guards and all kinds of different places that doesn't make it legal to drive them anywhere that they choose to.

So the education is gonna be really key.

Yeah, and the new their new devices, relatively new devices, and I think state law and and local ordinances are playing catch-up.

So we're responding to something that came out on the market that municipalities and states weren't necessarily prepared for, and now we got to deal with it with law uh common sense laws.

And I think the city's ordinance that was authored by uh one of our great uh city attorneys, uh very common sense.

I think it addresses the concerns and it uh you know it outlines where those should and shouldn't be used.

And I think uh for pedestrian safety, and those are essential pedicles for pedestrian safety.

I think that the rider safety, uh we don't want to have any vehicle versus you know kids riding an electrified motorbike.

We want to make sure that the law facilitates uh their safety.

Thank you.

Appreciate it.

Thanks, Chief.

All right.

Council concerns, Mr.

Bertrand.

Quickly.

Uh quickly.

The uh met with uh on the grading permit.

You guys can thank me later for that three hours of my life.

I'll never get back.

Daryl and with uh uh Gordon and all of them.

We are getting through the grading permit upgrades, and uh Steven is rewriting it now in legal department.

I'm really excited about it.

We've kind of simplified it, dumbed it down.

I think the uh the development team is gonna be really happy with it, the bill along with along with the dirt guys.

It's needed, you know what I'm talking about.

I'll give you my two cents.

She did, he did, yeah.

Yeah, noted, yep.

Okay.

And it's it was a good process, and we've been working on it, so I'm looking forward to the the legalese catching up with it and implementing that new uh grading permit process.

Um we talked about the bomb guards building behind there this week.

Uh Mike, you're gonna get the variance that's coming June 1st, right?

Yep on that.

Um TV vote, is it coming?

We've probably 10 hours into drafting new version of the ordinance, so we're working on it.

Um those are calls I get.

Um we got an update on the spec building at an ED, which I'm excited about that.

But uh somebody want to tap Salazar.

I had two complaints on Bacon Creek this week.

Not not big complaints, but just needs a little cleanliness and they got a report.

Yeah, and they had some crackhead walking around there too, and they couldn't get him out of there fast enough.

So maybe just a little bit more of attention in the Bacon Creek area.

It's very well used, and it's an it's a nice resource for the public, especially the east side.

Um and then Mike, I talked to you again.

I'm I want to continue.

We're gonna I do want to formally pursue uh the nuisance um uh on uh the Nebraska property.

I want I'm not taking my foot off the gas there.

I do want that to come to council um for us to debate and vote.

Uh other than that, it's gonna be uh a great week.

My my daughter just graduated.

I want to say congratulations to her.

She heads to state uh track uh Thursday.

She is a 10-time conference champion and uh a first team all stater, and this is her senior year, her final race in a healing uniform, and I love her and I'm so proud of her.

Congratulations on her everything she's accomplished.

Greg.

Uh, in addition to the comments they had made earlier with regard to Milwaukee, San Jose, the homeless study.

Um, very quickly, Mike and I had a chance to meet last Friday with uh community health, uh Mark and with Brendan had a really productive meeting to understand the full scope of what community health is able to do, the services that they provide, and how they really are a separate health care system in our community ancillary to what Unity Point does, and uh I can look forward to continuing to work with them and support what community health does.

And then also to Rick's point about Bacon Creek.

My family was at the riverfront yesterday, and it's a wonderful facility from from start to finish.

Um great opportunity.

He was getting really good use, but it just didn't seem like maybe the maintenance had been done for the spring.

Can you find out from Matt what he's got planned for both maintenance cleanup?

Um what he's got planned for multi-thing specific.

Uh the mulch had not been replaced, maybe it just needed to be um raked and revised.

There was quite a bit of dead in a number of the planters.

Some of them looked great, um, and there was quite a bit of trash.

Thank you.

That's it.

Absolutely.

Thanks.

Uh I was very happy to see the uh recycle bands next to control.

Right.

Uh they have seemed like they were out of just uh out of control, but I was happy to see at least some of those uh additional ones being placed uh for folks.

Uh also had the opportunity to uh participate in the Morning Side Days Parade with Legend there.

Uh it was it was kind of fun, so which brings that I'm actually excited uh for the you know I I won't steal it from you, Joe.

I know you're going after this.

I know, so I'll I'll let you I won't say it exactly.

I I'll I'll leave that for you.

But also, you know, and Craig had mentioned this earlier, but uh great to meet with Jessica and Christy Vermulum.

We're looking at beautification uh and and looking at all the areas to to beautify our city, and I'm excited uh for that work that we're trying to do in partner uh with uh the chamber as well as uh Iowa, you know, and those things.

So that's it.

I am gonna announce um because I did not want our 250th anniversary of the United States of America to pass Su City by without our effort.

So we will be having a 250th anniversary slash 4th of July parade.

It will be held on the riverfront at 6 p.m.

on July 3rd.

It's gonna be fun.

Whoever's interested in having a float, if it's your business, um, you want to enter in, if it's a group, if it's a 501c3, if it's a dance troupe, whatever it is, please go online, look at the city's website, you'll see the information, how you sign up for it.

Let's make it big.

We're not gonna have this occasion again.

I'm haven't told Mike this, but I'm gonna ask that the city also construct our own float.

It can be simple at no cost, just on things we have hanging around, because I have a commitment from the county that they're going to do the same.

So maybe we have a little competition there.

Um it's just such an important part of Sioux City's history, the country's history, that we mark this down, and that when we reach that time, July 3rd, we look at our city, our community, our neighbors, our friends, our relatives, and ask ourselves, are we proud?

This is our place, right?

This is where we live.

This is where we exist, and I know I keep hammering these things, but I can remember back when I first ran for my first council seat, 2019.

I was campaigning, and at one of the forums, I was asked, and at more than one, but my first forum, I was asked, um, do you have plans to grow this city?

Do we need to expand this city?

We need to grow it.

What are you gonna do?

And I just said, well, the reason I'm getting on this, trying to get on this council is to improve our city.

And first of all, we need to improve it.

I said we need to grow up first before we grow out.

So if that makes sense, we need to take care of what we have.

We need to love what we have, we need to respect what we have.

We need to get off of the negative campaigning about where we live.

This is where we've live.

It's what we should love.

And if you can't love it, you better at least like it because it's a part of all of us.

I didn't grow up in Sioux City, I didn't live in Sioux City until 2015.

But let me tell you, I fell in love with it very quickly because it's the smallest little hometown city ever, but it's also the fourth largest city in Iowa, and we need to really respect that, and we need to get our place, and we need to stand up straight and proud and prove that this is our community, we're gonna keep it clean, we're gonna respect it, and that will through osmosis bring us employers in more economic development by having a place that their employees that they may bring would want to live.

So we're on our way.

We just need to get over this hump and continue.

And we are all committed to it here, and I just I want our community to just lock arms and let's do this.

I drove on Singing Hills Boulevard the other day, and I saw an adopted street.

It was Singing Hills down by Culver's, and a single Sioux City resident's name was on the sign that he had adopted the street.

It wasn't a big business, it wasn't a 501c3, it was no big team, it was Mr.

Jake Jungers.

Guess what?

We have many hundreds.

Patrick, how many streets do we have?

Thousands or hundreds?

Hundreds of streets.

So if hundreds of us each just went and adopted a street or part of a street, imagine what that could do for our litter pickup every week.

And it would make our community look so much better.

So give it some thought.

I might start a campaign for that, even though we have an adopt a street, I might start a different one.

So with that said, the last thing I want to mention is per the mayor's request, and I do support this, we're gonna cut the presentations down to just two a week.

So it doesn't matter which two they are, whatever you guys want them to be is fine.

But with citizen concerns and you know, not being able to control that length.

Um, he would like to do that, and I'll support that.

So we still have the presentations, we'll just do limit it to two a week.

Okay.

All right, with that, I move we adjourn.

Second.

Bertram?

Hi.

Jayner, I'm team.

Hi.

Thanks, everybody.

Thank you, everyone.