All right, good evening, everyone.

I'd like to call this regular city council meeting Tuesday, February third to order.

Oh, today we have Reverend Andrew Moore for the invitation.

Sir, if you lead us in prayer, please.

Good evening.

Let us pause for a moment in silence as we gather our thoughts.

Gracious God, source of wisdom and justice and compassion.

We pause at the beginning of this meeting to seek guidance beyond ourselves.

Bless, we pray this city of surprise, its neighborhoods and homes.

Here.

Councilman Haney.

Here.

Councilman Duffy.

Here.

Councilman Melton.

Present.

Councilman Hastings.

Here.

Councilman Judd.

Here.

Thank you, Mayor.

We have forum.

All right, thank you.

So tonight we have a special group to lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance.

We have the Dysart High School, Skills USA and Broadcasting Team here.

Oh, in the back.

Okay.

So if you could help lead us in the pledge, I would appreciate it.

So we have a proclamation too.

So you go ahead.

Then we'll do the proclamation.

Good evening, Mayor Sarder and Council.

My name is Grace Brennan, and I am a senior at DIS Art High School and the president of our Skills USA chapter.

Skills USA is a career and technical student organization that empowers its members to become world-class leaders, workers, and responsible citizens.

We are also part of the DISART Student Broadcasting Program, a program that is student-led, student driven, and student produced.

We broadcast academic and sporting events live to our school's YouTube channel for any and all to join us.

Throughout the 2025-2026 school year, DISAR and Film, Dys Art Film and TV gave back to our community in ways I could have never imagined we'd achieve.

As a two-time, hopefully going on three gold chapter of distinction, we are proud to share some of our accomplishments over the last year.

Working in DISE Art Student Broadcasting, we have worked closely with Surprise TV to cover events such as the Veterans Day Parade, the Sci Tech Festival, and with other events like Partnership Day coming up.

We have participated in multiple street cleanups for Adopter Street in Glendale and have collected over 160 pounds of trash, and we are still counting.

Additionally, we held our second annual Toys for Touch Drive, raising nearly 240 toys for children in need.

In just a few weeks, 38 of our members will be headed to the Glendale Community College to compete in the annual Region 5 Leadership in Skills Conference.

Thank you for giving us the opportunity to share more about our accomplishments and contributions to the city of El Mirage Glendale and Surprise.

Thank you.

All right, so proclamation from the Office of the Mayor, whereas February 2nd through February 6, 2026 has been designated by the Skills USA National Association as Skills USA Week.

And whereas career and technical education provides students with a school to career connection and is the backbone of a strong and educated workforce that fosters productivity and business and industry and contributes to the leadership and the national and global economies.

And whereas career and technical education and Skills USA gives high school students empowering experiences in the meaningful application of skills such as reading, writing, mathematics, as well as the development of Skill USA framework skills, including personal skills, workplace skills, and technical skills granted in academics, thus improving the quality of their education, providing increased motivation to learn, and giving all students leadership opportunities in their career fields, schools, and communities.

And whereas career and technical education offers students opportunity to learn skills and have career experiences that may lead to further education or meaningful employment.

And whereas the cooperative efforts of career and technical educators working with business and industry stimulates the vitality of our nation's economy by preparing graduates for careers, forecasts to experience the large largest growth within the next decade.

And whereas Skills USA is the number one workforce development organization for students preparing middle school, high school, and college post-secondary students and technical skills and career programs to be high performing workers.

Now, therefore, I, Kevin Sarder, mayor of the city of Surprise, to hereby proclaim February 6th and February 2nd through February 6th, 2026 as Skills USA Week, and urge all citizens to acquaint themselves with the mission of Skills USA and to give support to the members who are working hard to achieve the goals that will make them outstanding skilled workers in our community.

Okay.

Yes, please.

Council, you want to join us?

I don't want to be out there.

I know.

All right.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Hey, way to represent skills, you guys.

Good job.

Good job, guys.

Thank you.

Appreciate it.

Thank you so much.

Good job.

Thank you.

Yes.

May you just sharing a few words about the proximity.

Oh, perfect.

It is with great honor to accept this on behalf of my personal chapter as well as Skills USA adds a whole.

As a student leader, I always question how can I empower my fellow peers?

How can I convince them that they too can be a leader?

I'm sure many of you are curious as to what Skills USA is, and I'm here to explain how this program alone is the answer to my two previous questions.

Skills USA is a number one youth workforce development organization with over 444,000 members nationally.

As mentioned, the purpose of this organization is to ensure students are prepared for careers in trade, technical, and skill service operations.

Their mission is to quote, empower students to become skilled professionals, career ready leaders, and responsible community members, unquote.

If I told you that a year ago, I refused to use my voice, and I wouldn't dare speak up for the good of my school.

Would it be hard to believe me?

To help you all understand, I'd like to begin by recognizing the previously mentioned achievements of my film and TV program within this past year.

Personally, I understood what my sole purpose was as senior chapter president.

I knew I needed to give back to my compute community that has invested so much into us.

And I knew I was going to utilize every opportunity that came across me, not just for me, but for my advisor, my beloved peers, and the school in which I spend more time at than my own home.

Now I stand here before you overwhelmed with pride for what we have accomplished.

I would like to ask again, would you believe me if I told you that I would dare not speak up for the good of my school a year prior to now?

I'm sure at this moment, most, if not all of you are asking yourself, what was my turning point?

My change only truly began once I took part in Skills USA.

This organization has taught me that I too can be a leader and take that next step.

And that any voice, no matter how proudly spoken or nervously whispered, is a voice that is deserved to be heard.

Finally, as I end here, I would like to express the dire importance of teamwork, diversity, and involvement within not only a career and technical education program such as ours, but within everything practice in our lives, within our schools, cities, and communities.

Skills you say in CTE allows every student from any background to become a leader.

Thank you.

Well, young lady, I was gonna give you one of my coins because you did such a great job.

I owe you one.

I don't have one of my my coins, but great job presenting.

Oh, wait, Karina has one.

You gotta appreciate that.

Okay.

One sec.

Okay, here we go.

So you can advise right now.

Can we um find a real point?

It's a challenge coin.

And give them out for various reasons, but yeah, the way you presented tonight in front of the council in front of all these people is amazing.

Yes.

Certainly for says these are not words.

It's something that I live by.

Instead of talking about it, you're being about it.

That's how you are in school, it's leadership.

Congratulations.

Uh thank you, Mayor Council members.

No reports tonight.

Uh the item that is agendized will be rescheduled for the February 17th meeting.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you.

There are three items on the consent agenda.

Would any of the council members like to pull one for clarification?

Hearing none, I will entertain a motion to approve the consent agenda.

Motion to approve consent agenda.

It's been moved and seconded.

Please cast your vote.

That's unanimous.

Pass vote, Mayor.

Thank you.

Please read item four.

Item four, Arizona Corporation, Commission update.

Good evening, Mayor and Council.

Today I have with me Arizona Corporation Commissioner, Kevin Thompson, who's gonna provide an update of what the ACC does, how they approach Ray cases, some of their recent wins over the last year, because they've had several that a lot of people don't know about.

So I'm gonna pull up this presentation and call him down and have him share the good news with all of you.

And Jody, thank you for coordinating this.

Yeah, you're welcome.

This is something that we haven't done in the past, but thanks to you.

Um everyone will have the same update now.

Thank you.

Just uh just run the good evening, sir.

How are you?

We broke it.

You gotta wing it.

Oh wait, go ahead.

Okay.

Okay.

Good evening, Mayor and Council.

Uh, thank you for inviting me to come and speak about the Arizona Corporation Commission.

The Arizona Corporation Commission is one of those entities that was founded, was founded at statehood constitutionally.

Uh so we don't report to the governor.

We don't report to the legislature or the attorney general.

We report to the citizens that elect us uh statewide to represent them.

The main uh focus of the Arizona Corporation Commission is um really to regulate the non-municipal utilities across Arizona.

Uh our primary function is is that that's about 98% of what we do.

APS, TEP, Unisource Energy, Southwest Gas, and about 220 or so private water, wastewater uh companies across Arizona.

We also have a securities department where we investigate securities fraud.

Um, we also have pipeline and railroad safety uh division, so we inspect every inch of rail line uh across the entire state of Arizona.

We're responsible for all of the crossings at grade crossings to make sure that the lights are flashing, that the arms come down when the trains coming and so forth.

And then we also have uh in corporations division.

So if you're an entrepreneur, you want to start your business, we will help uh you uh fill out your paperwork to become an LLC.

We don't regulate business, uh we're only the filing uh agency for that.

So the Corporation Commission, our mission is to power Arizona's future.

It's simple as that.

Uh we we try to protect uh ratepayers uh during rate uh when when the utilities come in for a rate cases, that's our primary responsibility is to ensure A that we have a reliable grid, and the grid is both water, gas, and electric at the lowest uh possible price.

And we do uh we take uh our job very, very seriously at the commission to ensure that we're keeping our our prices as low as possible.

Um, Arizona right now is ranked nationally seventh in reliability in the U.S.

compared to other states.

Um the uh the energy uh information administration.gov is the one that they're a big uh government entity in DC that uh is kind of like the watchdog and they uh look at all the states and compare states.

And Arizona, as I said, was uh ranked seventh nationally.

Um over the last three years.

We have had uh no major outages other than well, we've had six major outages, uh, which is well below the uh national average.

California, for example, had 145 major outages, Texas had 210, and Nevada had six.

And so uh nationally we're doing very, very good.

The nationwide average for retail residential prices rose uh nationally from uh roughly six point uh or increased by six point five percent nationally.

Uh in Arizona, our rates over that same period only increased by 1.7 percent.

So we're doing our job to put the utilities back in their lane, ensuring that um that we're holding our utilities accountable and we're not letting them uh spend frivolously on projects.

Their job is to produce power, put the power in the in the transmission and distribution lines, and serve the the ratepayers, and that's what we're trying to get the utilities back to doing.

Arizona ranks seventh for population growth from from prior years, and the state's population is projected to increase by 102% between 2000 and 2030.

Our infrastructure is aging, and so uh with aging infrastructure, as you know, with your water and sewer lines, you have to start replacing aging infrastructure.

Um our rates uh uh previously were outdated.

They didn't really reflect the actual cost of providing service.

And so uh we're working with our utilities to make sure that they're updating their utility grid, they're updating water uh lines.

We have private water companies in Arizona, some that have never been in for a rate cre for rate case, which tells us that they're not investing in their utility.

We have some water companies that haven't been in for a rate case in over 30 years.

So they're not really investing in their in their utility to provide potable, safe drinking water.

Primarily natural gas that fuels most of our electricity across Arizona with roughly 46%.

Nuclear power is out at Palo Verde.

That's about 27%.

Solar is about 10 to 13%, along with coal, which is seven to eight percent, and renewable hydro wind, which is around 5%.

It's worth noting that both SRP and Tucson Electric Power, as well as APS plan on converting some of their existing coal plants.

There's three left in the in Arizona.

They're looking to convert those coal plants to natural gas so that we can keep those plants open and functional for another 25 years.

We're also supportive of all of the above.

We believe that every electron that we can put into the grid is what's going to help us keep the lights on in Arizona.

During our summers, and very few people know this last summer in Arizona, all of our utilities, all three of our utilities, SRP, TEP, and APS, hit back to back to back record days with the heat.

So they uh when it was 120 degrees here in the valley, every single day the utility was breaking new records.

And our lights never flickered, our power never went out, and we were able to keep the air conditioning on across Arizona.

This past year we did repeal the rest rules.

Those are the renewable energy standards and tariffs.

Those are rules that were put in put in place around 15 years ago that have cost our ratepayers to this point in time over 3.2 billion dollars.

Those were the mandates that said the utilities had to produce a certain percentage of their power using renewables.

What's happened over time is that our commission has forgotten about baseload generation and relied on renewables, and the renewables have not uh kept up uh with that baseload generation.

And so you're seeing our utilities now to back back off a lot of their commitments on renewables, and they're starting to reinvest in natural gas generation to help keep the lights on.

We also are supporting our uh uh supporting consolidation of the water companies.

As I said, we have some companies that haven't been in for 30 years to renew their or for a rate case, which it which means they aren't investing in their utility.

Their leakage is 30 plus percent leakage, and that's water that the that the ratepayers have paid for that's going right back into the ground.

And so uh we're very supportive of supportive of consolidation where you have a larger utility that will come in and purchase the smaller utilities and they're reinvesting in those utilities, bringing them up to the standard for the day.

We've also eliminated a lot of the special interest incentives and rate payer subsidies.

Again, we believe that ratepayers that if you want rooftop solar, you can have rooftop solar.

Don't make me pay for your rooftop solar.

And so uh so we're eliminating a lot of the mandates and a lot of the subsidies that have cost our ratepayers hundreds of thousands, if not millions of dollars, and uh letting those utilities stand on the on their own merits.

Data centers and large load customers have become the topic of the day, and it's no different for us at the commission.

We strive every day to make sure that our lights stay on amongst all of this high load uh factors that are coming in.

Um we don't discriminate against projects.

So whenever we're looking at contracts, for example, we approved the project blue, which was down in uh Tucson in the Mirana area.

We approved that project not too long ago.

That project was a data center.

We did not look at the data center, the project itself.

That's your job as the local government to deal with the ordinances and the land use issues.

All we look at is the electric piece, whether it's a generation tie or whether it's a contract, and uh what we do is we verify and make sure that the contracts that the utilities are putting in place aren't going to impact our residential consumers.

And so we take our that job very, very seriously.

We don't want to interfere with what your job is as local government because you are the government that's closest to the people, and our job is to really manage the the power grid to keep an eye on that.

Renewables, um the commission uh it's it's something to note that a lot of people think that the commission has authority over renewables.

The only authority that we have is on the generation tie itself.

The um Arizona revised statute, Title 40 gives us authority, uh authority as well as title or uh Arizona Constitution, uh section 15.

Our authority uh stops at thermal in hydro.

Uh we do not have any uh authority over over non-thermal.

So all of renewables, wind solar, we have zero authority over that other than the generation tie itself, where it ties into the transmission lines coming into the valley.

A lot of people feel that or think that we have that authority that we can stop projects and we simply cannot.

That's again, it goes back to local jurisdictions and your ability uh to manage your projects and uh manage your ordinances in your city.

Um so with that, if you have any questions, I'd be happy to answer.

Thank you.

Council, do you have any questions?

Councilman Hastings.

Thank you, Mayor.

Well, thanks for coming out.

Appreciate you.

I mean, you got your start on was it the Mesa City Council or something?

Spent eight years on the Mason City Council.

I never heard a statewide elected official say that, you know, you guys are the local government and you should be making decisions.

I think that's the first time.

But thank you for all you're doing.

I think that um sometimes like we overlook, you know, the utilities, and it's supposed to be the offensive linemen in a sense.

Like you never know just when they're doing a good job, you only kind of see them on the news if something happens, and maybe that's kind of like it for all elected officials.

But appreciate your work and thanks so much for coming out here and especially talking about the data center piece, because I think that is new.

So is that considered, is data considered a utility now, like in your umbrella of that like what she regulated or no where is that at?

It's not, uh, mayor council, uh Councilmember Hastings, it's not.

Um, again, we we don't look at the project itself.

Um, we try to do our best to manage, you know, we we've said from the dais that development has to pay for itself.

So we're not going to put um the cost to serve a data center onto the backs of our residential uh ratepayers.

We've made that commitment and we're working hard to live up to that, but we don't manage AI, we don't manage data centers.

Um I know there's a lot of legislation that's being ran this this uh this cycle uh or uh or this session where they are trying to put regulations in place to manage AI.

Um somebody out there needs to, um, but it's not the corporation commission.

Absolutely.

Well, you sure know how to grind to draw a crowd too, as well.

We're all here for you.

So hey, you have you have a good night.

Thank you, sir.

Thank you.

Yeah, no jokes throw there.

Vice Mayor, you were serious now, councilman.

Uh uh Councilman Melton.

Thank you, Mayor.

Uh Commissioner Thompson, thanks for thanks for coming out to see us.

Um you're obviously your job is the commission has a has a tough has a tough role.

As you as you pointed out, Arizona is doing everything we can to keep up with our demand curves.

And it's uh and you have to balance all of these things.

And I will tell you that having uh being observer of the ACC all these years, uh, I'm very impressed with what you guys are doing.

I I know that you're doing every tool you have to keep up with that demand curve, to be respectful to the ratepayers, but uh having watched you know promoting securitization, promoting permoting reform, repealing these uh mandates, uh like the rules, rest rules, um, you know, doing what you can for NG conversion.

Uh I I really appreciate I know it is you know, and city council, we're doing everything we can just to keep up with infrastructure.

Every tool we have, we we are trying to we're trying to use, and you guys are kind of similar to using every tool you have at your disposal to keep up with our demand curves.

And I really appreciate it, everything you guys do at the ACC, and I really appreciate you guys coming down and and briefing the community.

So thank you.

Absolutely.

Thank you, uh, Mayor and Council.

Thank you, uh, Councilmember Melton.

It it hasn't been easy.

Um it uh it was um you know when we first got into office in January 23, the commission was in disarray.

And um we were dead last in the nation for regulatory stability.

That showed up in our rates because our utilities, uh, if you think about uh regulatory stability and the ability for our utilities to uh to go out and get capital for these capital-intensive programs, replacing poles, replacing wires and so forth and equipment, transformers, pipelines, all of that takes capital.

And because our credit ratings were in the gutters, um, our utilities were paying uh higher interest rates.

So it's no different than a consumer.

If you have bad credit, you're going to pay a higher interest rate.

Our utilities were paying higher higher interest rates.

A lot of people say, so what?

Well, that interest rate is a pass-through cost onto our consumers.

And so while you're paying 7% interest on uh on several hundreds of millions of dollars, um that interest is compounding, and our utilities, our ratepayers are paying that by stabilizing our regulatory environment in Arizona.

We've actually opened up access to capital.

So now our utilities have access to cheaper capital where they're only paying two to three percent interest on on the on those hundreds of millions of dollars of capital, which means it helps reduce our cost as ratepayers.

And at the end of the day, I'm a rate payer, just like you're a ratepayer.

So I don't want my rates to go up.

My wife don't want my rates, our rates to go up.

Um, she makes sure she reminds me of that all the time.

And so uh again, we're working hard.

We've cut uh since we uh were sworn into office in January 23.

We've cut over a billion dollars of waste out of our utilities.

That's a big deal that a lot of people don't talk about, but a billion dollars in waste that our utilities have been spending.

Um, we've cut that out, and hopefully that's going to show up as our in our rates uh in the future.

Again, um we use the test year in Arizona, so the money that we're the rates that are set today is money that the utility spent two years ago, and they're just now starting to recover that.

We can minimize these stranded assets that might be possible.

Yeah, yeah, exactly.

So um, so again, thank you all for allowing me to be here tonight.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Madam Clerk, please read item number five.

Thank you.

Item five presentation and discussion pertaining to the FY2027 budget kickoff.

Good evening, Mayor and Council.

Good evening, Miss Simmons.

How are you?

Good.

You guys are stuck with me for free presentations.

I apologize.

Oh, all right.

It's important stuff though, the budget.

So we're looking forward to it.

All right.

So we are here for our annual budget kickoff.

So, what is the city budget?

This is where we take limited resources and allocate them to maintain our service levels.

We consider the budget to be all four of these items: financial plan, communications device, operating guide, and a policy document.

Everyone here at the city participates in the budget process in one way or another through the strategic plan that you guys help initiate all the way through our staff.

Um asking for their needs and and expressing those needs.

And developing the budget, we utilize council strategic plan to ensure we are maintaining service levels, but also to ensure that we are able to expand or create new programs and services as needed.

We are constantly evaluating operational demands and reviewing and prioritizing needs versus wants to ensure that we are in line with council goals and meeting safety, compliance, and contractual obligations.

While prioritizing, we recognize that everything we want to do is important while accepting that we have to allocate limited resources to those needs and wants.

Something that we must be able to do is keep up with growth.

But what does that mean?

Increased population doesn't just equate to increased revenue, it also equates to an increase in demand on services, which in turn means an increase to our expenses, which isn't always one-to-one.

Our top priority is to maintain our current service levels.

So everything I just told you has to fit in within our state requirements.

We have to follow Arizona revised statute title 42 to ensure that we meet specific deadlines by posting forms and publishing documents accordingly.

The state form is one of the most important forms that is utilized in communicating and publishing our tentative and final budgets.

And here, this is just a quick outline of some of the rules we have to follow.

We also have very strict rules when it comes to publishing the truth in taxation notice for property tax.

This is a quick picture of what that posting looks like.

Um again, with some rules that we have to adhere to.

Following state requirements, we have to ensure that we are creating a balanced budget that is structurally balanced with our sources and our uses.

We do this by identifying what are one-time versus ongoing, or in other words, consistent versus inconsistent.

For example, we know we will always have personnel costs and local sales tax to pay for them.

While construction sales tax can be volatile, our capital projects are considered one-time in nature.

Here is a high-level look at how we start and proceed through our budget process.

We do, we start with continuous monitoring, our budget versus actuals, and we continue that through every cycle of the process.

So now that I have explained the what, the why, and the how, I want to remind everyone how the FY26 budget is laid out.

Here is a summary of what is in our budget book, pages 26 through 29, our total 986 million in uses.

For the purpose of this slide, we focus on the operating of 395 million.

And you can see those can be broken out by category and fund type accordingly.

We also have capital debt contingency and transfers out that we monitor and maintain.

Taking the numbers a step further to include capital and debt funding types.

This is how each set of funds are budgeted for a total of 788 million, not including contingency and transfers.

You can see that our enterprise funds are 160.5 million.

Those include our water, our wastewater, our stormwater, and our sanitation.

Our special revenue funds grants, municipal courts, streetlight improvement districts, highway user revenue funds, donations, sports, entertainment, and culture, those all are in our special revenue funds, among others.

Our internal service funds are our employee health care, work comp and risk management.

And our capital project funds include transportation, public safety, and asset replacement, to name a few.

This includes incorporating the support service functions of HR, finance, IT, communications, et cetera, into each one of these functional areas.

They're pretty well evenly spaced out with community and economic development at 7%, community services at 15%, so forth so on.

What revenues support our citywide functions?

Almost 300 million are from taxes, local, state, and property, and almost 200 million are from licenses, fees, and charges for services.

The citywide charges for services category does include our enterprise funds, along with our permitting engineering, parks, programs, etc.

Our next set of slides will break down the general fund revenue and expenses.

That is since all the other funds are restricted for a specific use.

Of the 231 million of general fund expenditures, we are investing almost 60% into public safety, and the remaining 40% is divided pretty equally across our other functional areas.

Again, this depicts our internal support services of HR, IT, communications, finance, et cetera.

Again, how are the general fund items funded?

The majority of them are funded by taxes.

And in order for us to offer many of our community services, we also have charges for services.

So you can see our local sales tax, our state shared sales tax, income tax, and other intergovernmental, and our property tax.

Those are the taxes.

And then our charges for services make up a good chunk of that.

The charges for services category help offset a lot of the costs to have those programs.

The fees charged and the number of customers, participants are the main drivers for this revenue category.

An economic outlook.

There are approximately 500 bills that may have an impact to cities that are actively being looked at by our staff.

We are patiently waiting for further updates from the state and legislation at this time.

We have tonight, our budget kickoff on April 7th, we will be back for our department and operating capital overview, kind of our recommended budget.

And May 5th will be our tentative adopted budget.

Any questions or comments?

Okay.

Thank you for your presentation, Council.

Councilman Haney.

Thank you, Mayor.

Uh Sandy, thank you for your presentation.

I I know we're gonna have you out in some of my community meetings just because I think, especially in Northwest Surprise, we deal with a lot with roads, and uh we severely underestimate just how much it costs for certain things.

And I and I was one of those folks where I thought a road was a lot cheaper than it was, a traffic signal, everything has a cost.

And so having um the opportunity to break down the budget for folks to see where where is the city spending your money.

I believe that we exist as a service organization, but those services cost money, and I really appreciated you kind of making the point of a lot of folks say, hey, we're we're growing at a rapid rate, which if you go in my district, you can see that, but that doesn't necessarily mean that all of that growth is just paying for itself service wise.

And so I always tell folks that although we are growing and you think you know the city is just hey, let's have the growth.

We're responsible for writing services for those residents, and those services cost money.

Public safety is very expensive, but it's critical to keeping our community safe.

And so I I appreciate I know we're just starting this whole kickoff, but my hope is that we continue to have presentations like this that'll give easily digestible information for our folks so they can see exactly where their money is going, what are we prioritizing as a city, and how does our budget reflect that?

So I know it's a lot of information, so I appreciate you um condensing it down in a way that that folks can understand it, and I look forward to our future conversations.

Thanks, Mayor.

Well said, thank you.

So any other comments or questions.

Thank you.

Okay.

Madam Clerk, please read item number six.

Item six presentation and discussion pertaining to proposed updates to the comprehensive citywide fee schedule.

All right.

Moving on to the next pack.

Okay.

Our citywide fee schedule is something that we look at annually.

The purpose of our fee schedule is to recover the costs associated with city programs and services.

We need these fees to help offset operating costs with a balance of affordability versus sustainability.

They are examined and updated annually.

We adhere to statutes and policies to get us there.

I want to mention that our fees cover the entire city and that the majority of them are cost recovery for our time and services.

For example, charges for services are based on community versus individual benefit.

High individual benefit equals low general fund subsidy to offset programs.

Parks and rec, but not all parks and rec is supported by fees.

It is also subsidized by our taxes.

Not all programs are 100% cost recovery.

And Holly will be up here joining me for our next presentation to go over our park programs.

Development services, growth pays for growth, fees are a direct correlation of our cost for service.

In compliance with state statute, we have to issue a public notice for any new or increased fees.

A public notice is not required for lowering or eliminating a fee or any text changes to that fee.

There are fees that are exempt that won't be on our fee schedule.

Tonight, I am here to go over some of the updates that we will be issuing the public notice for tomorrow, actually.

Um CD has three new fees and amending seven, fire medical, amending two, uh, human services community vitality has 16 new and amending four, parks, 12 new, 12 removed, amending two, and our water resource management are removing 10, but they're just going to the rate schedule, um, which is posted on their website.

I'm going to highlight what some of these updates are on the next few slides.

One of the new fees for community development is to allow applicants to request an expedited plan review if they have a history of compliance.

This fee is to recover administrative and operational costs that are associated with that expedited review.

This fee is being brought forth to align with Arizona House Bill 2447.

Human services and community vitality is implementing a new program fee for the planned outings and trips for senior center members and non-members.

One of parks updates to their fees is increasing tennis court rentals to both residents and non residents.

Parks is removing fees associated with group tennis court rentals after 4 p.m., sticking with a single rate per court regardless of time of day.

And community development is also making updates to the name of two of their fees to better align with their operations.

With that, the timeline tomorrow we will post a public notice with the new and updated fees.

And I will be back on April 7th for you guys to take action on the updates of the fee schedule.

Any questions or comments?

Council.

Councilman Hastings.

Baby Mayor.

Could you go back to the slide with the uh chart on it?

I think it was towards the beginning.

Awesome.

Thank you.

So I know, like when I first started in this role, you know, we would do this kind of every year.

And you know, obviously, fees, you know, go up, and that's not exciting, but um, at the end of the day, someone has to pay for it, right?

So if if the person isn't paying for the service, right, then we're subsidizing it.

And so especially when someone's paying for something like club swim, which is beyond the recreation swim or beyond swim lessons, it's just different program.

But you know, I I you know, a few years ago, I know last year we took a look, it's like, okay, if we're gonna raise some, can we at least you know go through and eliminate some too?

And so I think we eliminated nine last year, and this year's is 22.

And that's awesome because even though on here you see three for community development, those are fees for developers.

And then as far as you know, eight, if you're wondering what HSC the Human Services Community Vitality Department, we have a new resource center.

So that's just a brand new building that doesn't have any fee schedule at all.

So we're kind of implementing that for the first time.

And then yeah, you know, Parks Interac is has 12, but they're getting rid of 12, and then you know, waters, you know, a little different.

So I'm really glad the city is you know trying to work, you know, so we're trying to, you know, make life more affordable for residents, obviously, but we've been going on.

And so thank you for your guys's work on this.

I know I've you know, with fees, I've I make a few calls and ask questions, but it really seems like you guys have you guys have done your due diligence and um and people are kind of getting what they're paying for.

So thank you.

Thank you.

All right, thank you.

Well said.

Thanks.

Okay, Madam Clerk, put please read item number seven.

Item seven, presentation and discussion pertaining to parks and recreation programs.

Do you want to see what do you want to do?

You need to stand the whole time?

Okay, it's awful.

I'm gonna sit.

Please do.

Sandy has a brief 45 slide presentation on parks and rec.

Sorry, good evening, Mayor and Council.

Good evening, Mrs.

Osborne.

How are you?

I'm wonderful.

Good.

Good.

And so just before you start, what one of the things I talked to the city manager about, uh, Mrs.

Davis is that you know we have these programs and and we implement things, and I don't think there was ever, and I know the staff does the review, but it never really came to council as far as is this program effective?

Are we gonna continue it?

And I think for me or but I'm not gonna speak for the council, but it's important that we review these programs to make sure that we're putting the money where you know the where the residents want us to put money and where the programs that they need based on usage, all those different things.

So uh Ms.

Osborne, I appreciate you being the first one to present, but it's important that we are residents know that we do review all of our programs every year through the budget process and um make cuts where we have to.

Yes, well, that doesn't mean I'm the first department to get cut, it just means I'm the first department to reset.

I just wanted to make sure that was clear.

Um but we're gonna go in just to talk about our budget and go over our revenues, our expenses, and what we allocate those expenses for and um to Councilman Hastings' point is how do we come up with our fees and what is our balance?

So we'll go through that.

I'll be as fast as possible.

But also get my point across.

Okay, here we go.

I'm gonna start off with the budget.

So FY26 general fund expense budget for parks and recreation is 17 million dollars.

That budget is um broken out, as you can see.

Uh, park maintenance is our biggest portion, 32%.

There is very little cost recovery there, if at all.

Um, and then we have our aquatics and our recreation programs as such.

And Holly will go into more detail on each one of these programs.

Um this is how the budget is broken out.

And then charges for services budget is three and a half million.

So going back, you see 17 million, and we budgeted for three and a half million cost recovery for them this year.

And uh of that three and a half million, 60% of that is within their recreation programs.

And with that, I'm going to pass it over to Holly.

So, what does that mean for parks and recreation?

We will never be able to move out of our parents' basement.

We will always rely on the general fund for funding unless we start charging for each one of these different amenities.

And we'll go through and kind of talk about that.

But how we end up doing our charges for services, we notice them because if we're charging a service, the city government is charging, it's essentially a tax, right?

Um so we try to use our general fund subsidies to benefit the greatest amount of people.

But then as we shriek into more of those special interests, like we had talked about club swimming, then we go into okay, now you have to pay for 100% of those direct costs.

So case in point, a city park, we get zero percent recovery on the scale of the 3.5.

But adult sports, you don't have to play adult sports.

It is a niche.

Um, so they pay 100%.

And I do say direct costs, so they don't pay the indirectives far as like the staffing and that, but they do pay all of the direct costs.

And we do go through our budgets every year and we true them up.

Um, we try to bring if we can bring in more money, that's good for us because then we can expend more money.

Um, we try to be as self-sufficient as possible, but again, we never will.

Aquatics is another one where we call we do bring in some money more than our park services, but open swim is something that with especially with our new pool, our numbers are 85,000 people go to our pools.

But our swim teams, we have like 400.

Our swim lessons, we just try to cover our staff costs.

We'll try to get 30 to 50%.

So we do have a cost recovery model based on that.

So parks is 0%.

Then you have the greater good, like our adaptive, we try to make some, our swim lessons just to cover a little bit, uh, but it's never gonna be 100% recoverable.

And we could make it that, but your fees are gonna be a lot.

Um, but then you go into youth sports, which is 50 to 75%, but then you go into adults and rentals, and that's 100% recoverable.

So does that make sense?

Why we'll always look at it.

Real quick while we're on this slide, um, the park maintenance of 5% revenue here.

That is um for the maintenance of Marley Park.

So it is just it's like less than 300,000.

It's 211,000, and it's the OM for the Marley Park CFD.

Yes.

So we can only spend on maintenance, and we can't spend it on staff.

So it's only for supplies and services.

Very fun facts.

So speaking of park maintenance, um, we support over 700 field rentals a year.

These are just little fun facts.

You know how I love fun facts.

Um, our parks do playground maintenance, remadas, we do our lake quality, we take care of um fish animals, stock the lake with fish, we have dark park maintenance, all of the turf maintenance, the mowing, um field repairs of all sorts.

So um of our parks, these are a snippet of all of them.

Our newest baby is Mick Micken.

It used to be Oasis, but um, we we gave you this one.

Um, but kind of going into how we allocate these and what this looks like.

This may be my favorite slide that I put in here.

Uh, we wouldn't have been able to get this data without our Placer AI software.

So we're pretty new into this, but you can see that surprise community park gets over a million visitors a year.

Like I had said, it's one of the top 10 most popular parks in Arizona, and that is up there with the Grand Canyon.

So we're doing something right there.

Um, so 40%, pretty close to the Grand Canyon.

Um Marley Park, Heritage Park is um second.

Then we have Dick McComb, then fields at countryside, that's our newest one, and then Asante.

It's very popular park, and then Oasis Swim Center, our newest one.

And this is based on 25 data from Placer.

There's some things that um to councilman's judge looking at me.

I wanted to talk about McMicon just for a nanosecond.

Um, with getting the Placer AI because the area mass is so big because you did such a wonderful job of securing 3,500 acres for the city and its residents.

We haven't narrowed down those parameters of the heat maps.

Um, so we're getting permission from those.

So I do have an asterisk just to know that it is low, but it's not that low.

That's just a certain percentage that we could get the geofencing around, but that should increase.

So we'll we'll get that one.

But I did want to put it on there because it is one of our newest facilities.

Um, but this kind of goes to show of all of this, two almost three million visitors a year.

They're not unique.

These could be they go to the pool and then they go to the park and then they go to the tennis center, but this is just total based on our placer AI and our heat map.

So um, just kind of give you a snippet of our 165,000 residents that we have here.

They do enjoy our parks, and it's evident in this that we don't charge money for.

So another thing that we have very low to minimal cost is our special events that are also very highly attended.

Um, Backyard Bash is our newest one.

That is our 90s throwback this Friday.

It's gonna be 80 degrees, and we're gonna add the other 10 degrees in coolness.

That's a weather joke for you.

Um because I have a tendency to rain out events.

No, it's just a shameless.

I know.

Oh, I have just one question.

I have a debate at my house.

Is it 90s like fluorescent 90s or 90s like alternative 90s?

We're trying to figure out which it could be 90s hip hop.

Like it depends on or grunge.

Like who were you in the 90s?

There's no not 90s country, probably the best era of country ever.

I think people agree with me back here.

Um it's a variety.

We're gonna, that's why we did a DJ instead of a band.

So we can get four non-blondes and Tim McGraw playing in the same four hours.

I appreciate it.

Which you can't get that in a band.

So same.

Okay, back to Fourth of July.

And America's 250th birthday, Fourth of July is one of our heavily attended events.

This year we have bigger, better fireworks, something really special.

If I can pull it off, um, which I hope I can or I might lose my job.

But Fiesta Grande is our fall fest with about 9,000 Veterans Day, 8,000 surprise party, um, 14,000 per day, which is Friday, Saturday.

So almost 30,000 collectively over that two-day weekend, and then sparkling surprise the month of December, not including the surprise party weekend.

We had over 32,000 visitors at the community park.

So again, we don't charge a lot of revenue for those, but those would things that would be easily cut.

Should you look at a budget, but looking at the numbers, that's how we try to the cost benefit.

So this Osborne comes on the Hastings has a question.

No, absolutely.

I remember when Donna came up here, I think when I first got on the council, I think she may have showed us that.

You know, how do you measure recovery?

And we all say like we like to run government like a business, but there are certain things that are a service, right?

We're not in the you know, trash business to to make money or to take money from residents.

We're trying to offer that service.

And so the way it was described to me then, and I think what you're saying is, you know, obviously there's certain things, like Councilman Haney has done a great job with helping kids get swim lessons, right?

It's a huge benefit to the community that we do try to, you know, I guess you could say subsidize, make cheaper because it's a it's a safety thing, you know, or um, you know, surprise party, sparkling surprise, that the benefit there is just so much that that's kind of where it's measured.

Now, obviously, if you get back on the other side, like we talked about club swim or this is sports and tourism, but VIP seats at the concert, which is like you know, regular ones, that is less benefit of the community, less benefit to the community, maybe more to the individual.

And so you would require for that a higher cost recovery.

And so I know I've I've seen that in the past, and so um we we appreciate the work you do.

And you know, if if we were making money at the public pool, um, we'd probably be charging a lot more.

So definitely a lot of it.

But yeah, people can use the pool, but you know, you want to rent a room for you know a birthday rental, something like that.

That's a little bit different, right?

Right, absolutely awesome.

And for those of you guys who haven't been to Sparkling Surprise or Surprise Party, next holiday season, you guys should definitely come check it out.

It is.

I always say my favorite child, but I say that about so many things that my team laughs at me all the time.

But that one's my favorite, but the pools are my favorite, but the Christmas is my favorite.

Puppies are my favorite.

Um, I could go on.

I have lots of favorites.

Um, so speaking of favorites, youth and adult sports.

I would say that this is a community favorite.

We have 16 different youth sports programs, which go into that's two seasons of baseball, two seasons of softball, two seasons of basketball.

But in all those seasons combined, we have over 15,000 kids that are in our youth sports program.

Um, where we talk about trying to maximize our facilities.

We our team does an amazing job of trying to make sure we can get as many kids in for as little fees as possible.

So to uh Councilman's Hastings point, when you get into the club level, you're spending a lot of money.

Now, so our volleyball program is $80 for eight weeks.

I'm not gonna tell you what I spend on my kids' club volleyball.

And mayor, I'm not gonna ask you what you spend on your daughter's club volleyball, but it's a lot more than that.

But when you're paying for the coaches and you're paying for the fields and you're paying for that, the travel, that's where your fees go in.

Our job in recreation is the city is exposure to give kids the ability to learn new skills, to make new friends, to learn teamwork, to get along.

Um, those are social skills that they don't always get in school and to find their niche and find their sport.

So um our youth sports is huge, and our staff does amazing.

We used to have a council member that was a wonderful red shirt, is what we call them back in the day.

So um our youth camps and clinics are growing in popularity.

So summertime is good.

We have clinics on getting ready for school sports or tryouts, um, refreshers, skills developments.

Then we have team tournaments, which are growing.

We have a wiffle ball tournament coming up.

We started doing a beach volleyball tournament for teens, which is sold out.

Um, and then our adult sports.

So you can see we have 5,000, 5,000 people compared to 15,000 people.

You can see the difference of um where we're putting our finances.

So we subsidize more for the youth, but not for the adults.

I'll try to go faster.

Um, racket sports.

We have over 800 total programs of our tennis and classes.

So we racquetball is pickleball, racket, and then we also have pickleball tournaments and tennis tournaments.

So it's a little bit interesting because sports and tourism does some of the tournaments, and then we do the classes.

Um, we're probably gonna change that model if I haven't talked to you.

We can talk after class or maybe tomorrow.

Um, but we have 17 pickleball tournaments a year at our tennis facility where we have 25 courts.

So pickleball is all the rage, it's huge, but tennis is still thriving and racquetball, those courts are full all the time, too.

Um, then our other side is youth teen and adaptive.

So we have our summer camp break camp.

Those programs are 100% recoverable, preschool program, 100% recoverable.

Special interclass is the same.

Um, special programs are not teen programs we subsidize and adaptive programs we subsidize.

So um going into that aquatics, and then that's another one of my favorite children.

Um swim, I was a lifeguard when I was 16, so I have to caveat it's my home.

My right, we have this.

So swim lessons, we have almost 4,000 kids in our swim lessons, which is a very big deal.

And thank you to Mayor and Council for making that happen.

We were at 1,500 with almost 3,000 on the wait list before we opened our new pool.

So um, we definitely have made an impact on that.

We have over 500 participants in swim team, 8500 people coming to our pools, our three pools that we have.

Um, and then our special interest class is 350.

So special interest class is something that's 100% recoverable.

Open swim is subsidized.

You can see the difference.

85.

What did I say?

Million?

I said 85.

I meant 85 million, trillion.

Get that one.

Okay.

Questions.

That was fast.

I talked fast.

Did I do okay?

85 million.

85 million people are here in surprise every day.

Or a thousand, whichever zeros are hard.

Holly, I'm gonna start.

I just want to say thank you.

Uh to you, your entire team.

What you provide for the city is just an incredible thing for our residents.

I hear nothing but good things from all the events, all of it.

And it's just uh it's a treat to have it here in the city, and it's because of your effort and your team's effort.

And and I am grateful for that.

So thank you.

Thank you.

Councilman Haney.

Thank you, Mayor.

Holly, I did have a question and have a comment.

So my question is, and and I apologize if I missed it.

Um, are we still getting a pretty decent amount of attendance in those special interest classes that we used to offer?

Are we still offering?

We're holding steady.

Yeah, those ones are 100% recoverable for the direct cost.

Yeah, and yeah, what did I where are we at?

It's on there somewhere.

I I skimmed past it.

Oh, there it is.

700 programs and 5,000.

So similar to adult sports, but we have more classes.

So we'll have like a dance class.

It only has like 12 kids because you can only handle so many three and four-year-olds at a time.

So um, and can you give us like a just a few examples of special interest classes?

I know you said dance, but there's a wide variety, right?

Anything you can think of that's not involving a ball, really.

We have skateboards, we have dance classes, we have tumbling is a huge one, um, cheer, martial arts, keep going.

Aquaerobics, they're just gonna throw some.

Zumba dance.

We have I think we have a 90s or some new like 40-year-old women that are awesome.

Dance class that like we can go back into the 90s hip hop and without our kids around making fun of us and like really jam out like we used to.

So that's gating and popularity too.

Gotcha.

The 90s are back.

That would have been good to know a few weeks ago.

I would have taken that.

Yeah.

Um, thank you.

Thank you for your presentation.

I, you know, we're a multi-generational city, and I think it's so important that we're investing in these programs.

Obviously, aquatics, you know, Jack and I got our start in aquatics as you did.

And um, but it's something that's super, super important.

We talk public safety, but we also have to talk about making sure that we're keeping our kids safe.

And I don't want to get on my soapbox about drowning and drowning prevention, but a lot of the work that you guys do helps helps with that.

And I'm so appreciative.

I mean, just every time I hear that number, I just I watch the video over and over and over again because I still can't believe you guys were able to accomplish that.

Um, and I did have to add too, if I had to cast someone for a parks and recreation director, I don't think you could find any better than Holly Osborne here.

I mean, it's it's reflective on not only how hard your team works to put on all these events, but we're really kind of the tip of the spear on some of these major events where we're getting folks from all across the state to come to our city and experience um just what what we all love about it.

It's the reason why so many of us call it home.

And so thank you for your work.

Thanks for your passion that you inject into these programs because it wouldn't be the same without you.

So we appreciate you.

And she was my old boss, so I had to get that in there.

So I'm not anymore, though, but he did have to say that.

Vice Mayor Greenberg.

Oh, thank you, Mayor.

I only have one thing.

Thank you for taking advantage of AI to give us better data.

It is the better data we have, the better decisions we can make.

And that's that's all I gotta say.

Thank you.

Councilman Judd.

Thank you, Mayor.

Thank you, Holly.

This is great.

So I love the parties.

I love the events that you put on, and I love that we have nearly three million people visiting our parks.

I mean, this really is this is all about quality of life.

And I think you're doing a great job of subsidizing the ones that need subsidized for the little guys running around, and then making the adults that still want to throw a ball around, you know, pay their way.

Um, as this is a budget meeting, and we're working towards what we're gonna do next year with our budget money.

What do you have planned for McMickin?

Do you have budget money in there?

What kind of things can we look?

I mean, one of the reasons the number is so small is we've it's a space that needs to be activated.

So what's our plan?

That that's a hard um, thank you, Councilman Judd.

I'm stalling to give Sandy some time to think of a better answer and me not to throw under the bus.

We have a lot of things planned, but it depends on how financially we end up.

So we have we have money to start the design process.

As you know, we're going through our parks and recreation master plan right now that does encompass McMick and Dam once we figure out we have a couple of geographical locations where we're looking at budget permitting.

We want to start at least a 30% design to get us to the point of where we could do a programmable park and then also know the the geo, what is the top topography?

Is that the word?

The topography of the land while we're doing our master plan to figure out the most advantageous and where we can actually do programmable parks within that.

So that would be the design phase.

Um with McMacon Dam, we have a lot of it as our park rangers coming up.

We would like to eventually start more of an outdoor program, but right now we currently are in the enforcement um and education as opposed to the luxury side of things.

Yeah, and I think the idea, I mean, we I expect it to be a long time before we can actually afford to build a build up a proper programmable park out there.

They're not cheap, they're hard to do, and we're gonna want a lot of community input before we do that.

Um, but it is a nice conservation area.

I would like to see some great outdoor uh skills type things out there, hopefully an archery range on the outside of town over there, so we don't have to go the way to ban Avery for that stuff.

Um, but really just some outdoor focused nature type things would be great.

And again, it's the main goal of this is a conservation area.

So just giving people a chance to get outdoors right next to the white tanks and maybe even join up for the white tanks there through Andy's property.

Yes, that is our plan.

Thank you.

Timing and money.

Okay.

Any other council members?

Hearing none.

I appreciate thank you very much.

And thanks everyone for showing up for a parks presentation.

So we're gonna move on to the call to the public uh portion of this meeting.

I have a uh a brief statement I want I want to read.

Um that game here we go.

So before I open the call to the public, I just want to thank everyone for being here.

I know many of you signed up to speak, and I want you to know that this council is here to listen to you.

Um hearing from residents is what really our our job is.

Listen, hear you.

It's what makes our community incredibly strong.

If you haven't filled out a request to speak, there's one in the back.

Um, I encourage you to do so and then just give that to our city clerk.

That way we can put you on the list to speak.

Um we want everybody to feel heard and respected.

And I ask that we remain kind and courteous to everybody and follow the rules of decorum in this chamber throughout the entire process.

I understand that many of you are here this evening to talk about the recent purchase of the building of in surprise by the Department of Homeland Security.

And because there are limitations on the council's ability to respond during the public comment, I want to share some information just to have some clarity on our stance.

So the city was not aware of the that the efforts were underway to purchase the building that was secured by the Department of Homeland Security.

I was not notified of the transaction by any of the parties involved.

It's important to note that federal projects are not subject to local regulation, such as zoning.

Although the city cannot regulate the Homeland Securities purchase or the use of the building, the council is genuinely committed to hearing your thoughts and your concerns.

And so we're going to hear from people on both sides of this.

And I I ask you that you respect one another.

And I think we just need to lower the temperature and respect each other in this chamber.

And I appreciate that of you.

And we're here to listen and I appreciate you.

Madam Clerk.

Thank you, Mayor.

To make this go as smoothly as possible, I am going to read out five names at a time.

So if I call your name and you're in this room, if you would make your way to the center aisle in the order that I call you, and the same for the other room, um, they will send those speakers forward.

So we'll just have to be a little bit patient.

The first five are Brent Peak, Sarah Helgison, Catherine Saber Hagen, Alex, Chris, and Stephen Cobet.

So if you could make your way to the center when you get to the podium, please state your name and cross streets for the record.

Good evening, sir.

Mayor and Council members, thank you for the opportunity to speak.

My name is Brent Peake.

I'm co-chair of Northwest Valley Indivisible.

I am not a resident of Surprise.

But our organization includes many surprise residents.

And over the past year, we have held many peaceful protests and other events here in town.

Tonight I want to be very clear about who we are and how we show up.

Northwest Valley Indivisible is made up entirely of unpaid volunteers, including myself.

No one is paid to attend our events, organize our actions, or speak on our behalf.

We show up on our own time at our own expense because we care about the Northwest Valley and the issues that affect it.

I share this paraphrased sentiment with one Minnesota protester who recently said, I gotta get up in the morning, just like everybody else.

I'm just here to stand up for community.

Northwest Valley Indivisible is firmly committed to peaceful, nonviolent, weapons-free protest.

That commitment is rooted in the National Indivisible Movement's nonviolence policy, and it is non-negotiable for us.

We plan with de-escalation in mind.

We set clear expectations for participants, and we do not tolerate intimidation, threats, or weapons from our participants at our events.

Tonight I want to clarify why we oppose the proposed ICE facility here in surprise.

We support holding people accountable for their crimes, whether they are citizens or immigrants.

We do not want to excuse or allow criminal behavior.

Our concern is that ICE cannot be trusted to exercise their authority responsibly, whether on the streets or in a detention center.

We do not trust ICE to distinguish between criminals and non-criminals, between a violent offense or a misdemeanor.

We do not trust them to reliably uphold the constitutional rights of citizens, much less immigrants, documented or not.

And we do not trust ICE to respond to peaceful protests like ours with the professionalism and respect that we have consistently experienced from the surprise police department.

Based on ICE's recent conduct, we believe that allowing this facility and surprise risks introducing chaos and cruelty into a community that has worked hard to maintain peace and safety for its residents.

But please know this.

As Northwest Valley Indivisible responds to this situation, we will continue to hold to our standards of peaceful, nonviolent, weapons-free protest.

Interest in this facility is tremendous.

And outside groups are already here to take action.

If any plan to do so, if any of those plan to do so in coordination with us, they will be expected to follow the same principles we do.

Peaceful protest, nonviolence, no weapons.

And if they are unwilling to do that, we will not partner with them.

We value our relationship with the city of Surprise and the Surprise Police Department.

We will continue to coordinate the surprise with Surprise PD in advance.

We will communicate clearly, and we will express our appreciation for the department's consistent focus on safety and professionalism as residents exercise their First Amendment rights.

Thank you, sir.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um Mayor, Vice Mayor, uh Council members, thank you so much for allowing us to come here.

Um I appreciate this council of how you guys always hear what we have to say, and I appreciate my fellow surprise and those from uh neighboring um uh communities as well that have come out, taking their time to come out here and express our passion to you as well.

Mayor, I'm here to support our fellow law enforcement who daily put on the uniform, whether it's our police, our medical, our fire, our nurses, our doctors, and yes, even custom and immigration force.

I support them.

They do a hard job, and I am not going to impede on that job.

A well funded, a well-trained and a well-supported law enforcement is an essential part of our republic, whether it's our nation, our state, or even right here in surprise.

And I've gotten to know the chiefs of both, and they are professional and they are great.

And I appreciate the hard work that these men and women who wake up every day, take up these shifts, and say, I will protect you.

And my prayer for them is that they go safely and return safely back to their families, that I can support them as well.

I want to thank everyone that come has come out here from what we've seen on YouTube and different um news media.

This isn't anything like that.

They have been very respectful from both sides.

They have been here and saying, I will support whether this cause or that cause in a very respectful manner, and I hope that this is going to be the way it should be for all communities.

Mayor, vice mayor, council members.

This is a great republic, and I hope that we can continue another 250 years.

Thank you very much.

Thank you, sir.

Before you start, I'm gonna read the next five.

The next five are Lisa Everett, Michael Chester, Kelly vote.

Savani Akani, I hope I said that right.

Ricky Hatara.

Okay, you can begin.

Thank you.

Good evening, Mr.

Mayor, men and women of the council, and any distinguished quests who I've left out.

Thank you for the time to talk about this controversial topic, the ICE warehouse.

I support the police and ICE.

These men and women have a job to do to protect us.

They, like all of us, want to go home and see their families after work.

In the last four months, here's an example of a few states and the number of illegal aliens who were deported.

Texas, 17,000, Louisiana, 7,000, California, 6,000, Florida, 4,000, Georgia, 4,000, West Virginia, 650, and Maine, 200.

I bring these numbers up because while they're all substantial, all are without incident.

Because people living there and the local police worked with ICE, and ICE went in, arrested them, and left.

In surprise, and I hope we would work with ICE and with our local police so they can do their job.

To my knowledge, we do not know yet if this facility is to store their equipment or to temporarily house or a temporarily house illegals before deportation.

But either way, why are some people against it?

I can't answer that question.

We can one second, sir.

Um, I asked at the beginning of this that we're gonna respect each other.

I know that we are we have passion about it.

Um I know we got some claps, but we need to really respect, give this man his time, like we're gonna get you your time, and we're gonna respect each other in the way that we approach this.

So I appreciate your candor and letting everybody speak their peace and and letting everybody say what they need to say.

So, sir, I'm gonna give you well, go ahead and continue.

We pause the time.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

Oh, it's actually a great location.

It's not interrupting our daily lives, it's not in the middle of our city.

I fear that the reason for this anti-ICE sentiment is because many protesters have the attitude, these people are our neighbors.

But are they?

The minute they come across the border and step foot in our country, they're illegal.

In fact, the current administration has offered them to leave now voluntarily, and they have a chance to return.

In closing, I am a God fearing man.

I will pray for the mayor and for the council members to do the right thing for our community.

I will also pray for ICE to get their job done and go home safely so we can all go back to our lives here in Arizona.

God bless you all.

Thank you.

Good evening.

Mayor, council.

Thank you for giving me the opportunity to speak tonight.

I appreciate the time you've set aside for residents to voice their concerns about the proposed 1,500 bed ice detention facility planned near nine schools.

I understand and want to acknowledge this project is not under your jurisdiction.

But this is still something.

Is this an appropriate place for us for it?

Is it a place that we want to put a detention center?

This is not a Democrat or Republican issue.

It is an issue about human dignity.

Dignity does not depend on someone's legal status, political affiliation, or where they were born.

It is either value that we hold consistently, or it is not a value at all.

Immigration and ICE enforcement have become deeply polarizing topics.

The media often pushes people towards the most extreme positions, as if there are only two sides.

Most people are in the middle.

Two things can be true at the same time.

Let them know that you are not okay with this.

The dignity act is in committee right now.

And if that were to be passed, this would be a moot point.

We want our country to return to being that shining city on the hill, one that enforces laws, protects communities, and never forgets the dignity of every human life.

Thank you, ma'am.

The next five speakers, Samantha Cooley, Shannon Rayburn, Sonia Ramirez, Lynn Peters.

Christopher Grams.

Do we know if they're coming from the overflow room?

I'm checking.

I'll read the next five, and if they come in, we'll go there.

Colleen Pullman.

Diane Eden Giordano.

Alexandria Moen.

Stephanie Bowham.

We might have two coming.

Okay.

And if you have somebody sitting next to you that stepped out for whatever reason and they come back, we can put them in line as well.

If they call their name.

Can we keep reading some names?

I'm gonna continue.

Karen.

I'm sorry.

Is there someone?

Please state your name when you get to the podium, okay?

Christopher Graham's good evening, sir.

Mayor, Councilman, Mayor.

Good beer tonight.

I come to you to speak about the current and concerned situation regarding the 70 million dollar purchase of a facility done by DHS and ICE.

As American citizens, whether you were born here or come here, does that matter?

As citizens of the USA, we have to demand and expect complete transparency from our elected officials.

We deserve to know what plans are for this facility, how it will affect not just surprise, but all of Arizona.

I urge you to work in the best interest of everyone, and not just here, but also the rest of the United States.

Our neighbors' communities and friends who come here and hope to come and deserve a better life in the United States that is welcoming to all and for everyone.

I will like to end with this quote from the Constitution.

We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal to next five names.

Karen Jones, Alexandra Sullivan, Lawrence Julian, Christina Denham, Alexa Poulter.

Please state your name when you get to the podium.

Good evening.

Good evening.

My name is Alexandria Moen, and I'm here to speak about the new ICE detention center on Dizard in Sweetwater.

Purchased from the Rockefeller group for 70 million dollars in cash on January 23rd.

The new center is a warehouse facility being turned into a center with 1,500 beds, just a second's drive from Dysart High School, my alma mater.

And a minute's drive from right here.

The City of Surprise said they were unaware of a new facility being built in our city.

And meanwhile, DHS says they expect it to be up and running by April.

Two months to convert a warehouse with no infrastructure to a death camp.

A camp I believe will have at least double the 1,500 beds we were informed of based on the pictures of facilities across the nation.

How will they manage to convert a building meant for laborers to a building housing over a thousand?

That is a major difference in sewage lighting and especially air conditioning in these upcoming summer months.

Not only does this new facility pose a moral dilemma for some of the citizens here who have watched our brothers, sisters, friends, and neighbors be stolen away, but it causes a multitude of issues for those who live close.

One resident said when interviewed by 12 news, they dread the crowds of protesters.

I imagine they would also dread the sounds of trucks in and out, day and night, and the sounds of detainees screaming for help, like we've seen in so many detention centers, including in Ila, Arizona.

I'm terrified that the detention center will begin to target the 60% Hispanic population at Dysart High School.

Once again, my alma mater.

And the children are terrified as well.

Last week, over 40 schools in the valley stood up to show their solidarity for those abused and kidnapped by ICE, not only here but across the nation.

These children are smart, fiery, and our duty to protect.

We can protect them from increased pro profiling, increased police presence, and heartache by stopping this when we have the chance.

Does the council not wish to have known of this camp before it was purchased?

Does the council not wish to know of the plans for their land?

Please show the community your strength and solidarity and stop this.

Thank you.

Again, I'm on asked I need to ask you to not clap or cheer or boo or whatever it may be.

I know that you want to, but I don't want anybody to feel intimidated, regardless of the side of the issue that you're on.

Everybody needs a chance to be heard without fear of intimidation.

Ma'am, good evening.

Uh good evening, Mayor and Council members.

My name is Alexa Quilter, and I've been a resident of Surprise for the past 26 years.

I currently live near Grand Avenue and Reims Road.

I'm here tonight to speak about my grave concern for our community as immigration and customs enforcement recently purchased their massive warehouse space last week near the intersection of Dysar and Cactus Roads.

According to its recent statement, the City of Surprise was not aware that there were efforts underway to purchase this building.

And given the current context of other cities such as Portland, LA, Chicago, or Minneapolis, it is wildly irresponsible that the city failed to work either on its own or in coordination with other nearby governmental agencies to strategically plan for our community's needs given the current agenda of this presidential administration.

ICE is above the rule of law.

Vice President Vance has publicly stated that ICE agents have federal immunity, meaning their actions go without consequence.

There is documentation of ICE aggressively and violently approaching people in every area of their communities, cars, home schools, and businesses.

There is also documented evidence of retaliatory violence against Americans who are peacefully protesting and organizing in their communities to protect vulnerable populations.

And this is not political conjecture, inflammatory platforming, or alarmist rhetoric.

There is qualitative data from the federal government that affirm these realities.

Federal judge Patrick Schultz wrote in a January ruling that ICE had violated conservatively 96 court orders in January alone regarding the release of detainees.

Federal judge Fred Beerie wrote in a January order that in his specific case, observing human behavior confirmed that for some of us, perfidious lust for unbridled power and the imposition of cruelty in this quest knew no bounds and are bereft of human decency and the rule of law be damned.

And yet, despite this evidence of authoritarian power, it is possible for even the most local forms of government to take a stand in the name of the people.

In January, the Kansas City City Council passed an ordinance banning non-municipal detention centers for five years to protect their city from this exact situation.

Our city found its best course of action was to have no course at all to simply fold its hands and say, how could we have known?

But it was your job to know, and it was your job to plan.

Our community will forever be altered by this course.

I currently have no call to action or recommendation to the council.

It did feel vitally important though, in an America and a surprise that are very clearly for some and not all, that I use my privilege to hold this council accountable for this failure.

Each of you ran for public office to serve every human being in your jurisdiction.

As public servants, you do not get to selectively choose who to serve depending on your personal politics or platforms.

You have a moral and ethical obligation to defend every life in our city.

And the reality is that people under your care are now incredibly scared and incredibly unsafe.

For people who are most vulnerable to the actions of ICE, I want to be sure they know there are people in their community who will use their privileges to advocate for their lives and the dignity and compassion they deserve as human beings.

As a group of people with a great amount of power and privilege, as leaders of this city, I implore you to catch up and do the same.

The lives of people in our city will literally now depend upon it.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Please state your name when you get to the podium.

When the community reports that they've seen ICE activity, I go out and I try and videotape and record and report what's happening.

It's upsetting.

It's awful.

They treat people horribly.

One of my own family members was detained by ICE.

He was here on a visa and also had a permit to travel anywhere in the United States.

ICE took him and detained him for three days.

He was taken to the field office.

It was supposed to be a 12-hour hold.

And instead of using the field office as that 12-hour hold, they kept him for three days.

They knew he had a visa.

They fed him occasionally a bean burrito, maybe twice, sometimes three times a day.

They are deplorable conditions that no one should have to live in.

They're keeping people in these temporary holding facilities for up to 43 days with no showers, no brushing their teeth, no beds.

And the fact that they're want to build a 1,500 bed property here, it's disgusting.

I am helping a family right now who the father was taken on Christmas Day.

I met the daughter at the field office when she was looking for her father.

She's 16 years old.

He's HIV positive, and he takes medication that he has to take every day.

ICE is held his medication for seven-day periods.

And when we finally are able to get him his medication, they'll give it to him for 30 days and then they withhold it again.

This man has no signs of HIV, yet when they don't let him take his medication, he gets signs of the symptoms.

I also am working with the family of Yari who has leukemia.

ICE has given her advils instead of giving her the chemotherapy treatment she needs.

And I would hope the city is surprised, does not want to have this kind of blood on their hands, and would actually say no to this and figure out a way to stop this facility from being built.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Madam Kirk, can you call a few more names, please?

I'm gonna call five more.

Kendall Strobel, Vince Maniule, Jennifer Wood, Donna Bronsky, John Manella.

Go ahead, sir.

State your name, please.

I'm John Manella.

Uh I live 15 minutes south of here, right down Dyser.

Uh, mayor and city council, thank you for having public comment tonight.

Appreciate that.

Um, DHS says that ICE is going after the worst of the worst.

This is their words, right?

The worst of the worst, pedophiles, murderers, gangbangers, psychopaths, the absolute worst of the worst.

So I ask you, why are you allowing them to house these worst of the worst right next to Dysert High School?

There's a building right uh bordering this facility that has a cheerleading studio where little girls go to learn how to do cheerleading and tumbling.

You're allowing the so-called worst of the worst to be housed right there.

I do say allow because other cities are successfully fighting back against these facilities.

So I ask you either they really are the worst of the worst, and you are doing a disservice to the children of surprise by allowing them to be right next to them, or DHS is lying.

And either way, we shouldn't have a jail right here.

Not in my backyard.

No, certainly not.

Uh, I think you need to do something.

There's plenty of things that you can try, such as getting an environmental review.

You can petition our representative, you can go to our senators, ask them for an inquiry.

Uh, you can fight back.

Uh, you can do something instead of just sitting here and saying no.

I imagine if this was a homeless shelter or a mental health center, you would find a way to stop it.

You would pull out all the stops, you would go to the tomes of English common law, dust them off, and try to find some appendix in there to make sure that you didn't have to build this building.

Well, just pretend that it's that and put a stop to it.

Thank you very much.

Good evening, ma'am.

Good evening, Mayor and Council members.

My name is Jackie Cosales.

I'm a proud Latino American, a parent, and a longtime resident of Surprise, Arizona.

I believe in our community.

And I'm here tonight to respectfully ask that the city of Surprise not allow an ICE detention center to be built or operated in our community.

My family and I choose surprise because it's a place that values safety, family, and opportunity.

It's where we're raising our children, building our lives and investing in our future.

As a parent, I think deeply about the kind of community my kids are growing up in.

And one of the main reasons we live in this city and chose it.

Not just what it looks like today, but what it stands for.

An ICE detention center does not reflect the values that brought many of us here.

These facilities are not just buildings.

They are impact, they impact real people and real families.

Across the country, detention centers have raised serious concerns about conditions, medical care, prolonged detention of individuals without clear timelines.

Regardless of political views, because this is not about politics.

Human dignity should always come first.

As a Latino American, immigration is personal for me.

But as a parent and a resident, this affects everyone.

Facilities like these create fear and communities, fear that keeps parents from attending school events, neighbors from reporting crimes, and families from fully participating in civic life.

That park in surprise that we spend so much money and that you guys just talked about how much money is spent there, will no longer be full.

None of us will feel safe.

None of our children feel safe here.

That fear does not make surprise safer.

It weakens the trust that strong communities depend on.

And many of us choose surprise because of the sense of community that we feel as we walk through the streets with our children and play in the playgrounds.

What are we teaching them if we normalize the detention of families as an acceptable form of development?

Surprise should be a city that invests in projects that bring people together, strengthen our economy, and reflect compassion and responsibility.

I urge you to not only listen to me tonight, but everybody that has signed up to speak and all the people that are peacefully protesting outside.

I urge you not only to listen to that, but also you need to deeply care about the generations to come in this city.

Please choose development that aligns with our shared values, our safety, our unity, and respect for all families who call surprise home.

I want to thank you for your time and thank you for listening.

But most of all, we are begging you to hear us to not allow this to happen to the city that we are all so proud to live in.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Just one moment, ma'am, before you start, I'm gonna call a couple of more names.

Okay.

Just one moment.

Randy Carnett, Sylvia Lazano, Lisa Brinkman, Nancy Stevens, Matthew Reaster.

Okay, please state your name.

Um, good evening, Mayor and Council.

Jennifer Woods, I live at uh Resident Cactus in Reims.

Um, I want to be very clear.

I'm not a paid protester.

I'm not a show.

I'm a daughter, mother, wife, and neighbor, a small business owner here in surprise, and a disabled veteran.

My family and I first moved to Surprise in 2005.

We followed my sister who moved here in 2000 because it was a beautiful city.

City had a lot to offer, it was up and coming.

They enticed us with families.

Families move here.

It was booming full of promise.

Bring training tickets were still $5 for grass seeds.

And like many of us, we were sold on the vision of Prasada even back then.

The vision faded for a while, but we stayed and we stayed and stayed.

We built a life here, multiple goodwills, burger kings, and family Prasada.

And I do have a bone to pick eventually with somebody who planned the parking lot that isn't there.

Mayor, I met you and your wife at home goods right before the election.

We even had a sign in our yard for you.

You looked me in the eye at that time, and you said you would listen to all sides, both sides, didn't matter which side anybody came from.

That you would make informed decisions and you would do what's right.

You would do what's right for the city.

You said you would be out and about in the community talking to people and hearing everything that we had to say, regardless of what side we were on.

And here we all are.

We are here coming to you.

The building of cactus and dice art is an inhumane operation.

It's about to put surprise on the map and not for spring training, not for the beautiful year-round weather for this, for this blemish on our city.

And who's standing up here for Dice Art?

I'm sorry, for El Mirage.

Because this is just as much in their backyard as it is in ours.

Our kids are scared, our neighbors are scared, and our community is divided even more now than before.

This will be the history that our grandchildren learn.

Your names will be attached to it.

Mayor Schaeffer, she would be absolutely appalled.

She worked tirelessly, so families will feel safe here through community projects, diversity, inclusion, and connection, not fear and not division.

You may think this moment will pass quietly, but it won't.

Mayor Schaeffer has been gone for many years, and I still stand here speaking on behalf of her name with absolute respect because she was a true community leader.

People remember her, and they will always remember this.

We have fallen as a nation when we allow this to happen in our cities in our own backyards.

We have neighbors who complain about the HOAs, but yet they're welcoming ICE with open arms.

Not me, and I refuse to look away.

With the rest of my time, I would like to honor the men and women who have lost their life, their lives to ice, people killed over power trips, rage, and unchecked authority.

I will be watching.

And I like to think surprise is a pretty good place to raise families and live.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Good evening, council members, city staff, and neighbors.

My name is Kendall Strobel.

I'm in the fourth district.

Before I begin, I want to be honest about something.

I am terrified of public speaking.

I don't seek out microphones or podiums, but standing here tonight is far outside my comfort zone.

This issue is too important, too urgent for me to let my own discomfort get in the way.

I am here because this proposal is not just another line item.

It is a direct threat to the well-being of our families, our neighbors, and the future of surprise.

The plan to build an ICE detention center on West Sweetwater is something I cannot and will not stay silent about.

Not as a resident, not as a mother, and not as someone who's seen firsthand the cost of human detention centers.

I do not want to raise my children 10 minutes away from a facility that brings trauma, fear, and heartbreak into the communities around it.

I refuse to normalize the idea that suffering is something our kids should grow up watching from their backyards.

That is not the world I want for my family, and that is not the world this city should be building.

And the concerns here are not hypothetical.

They are documented, they are measurable, and they are real.

National data shows detention centers bring increased traffic, increased enforcement activity, and increased strain on emergency services, often without compensation that matches the burden placed on the local systems.

Studies also have shown that property values within a one mile radius between have dropped between six and 10%.

That affects our local homeowners, families, and the long-term economic health of our city.

Detention centers do not make communities safer.

There is no evidence that placing a detention facility near neighborhoods reduces crime because the people detained are not local offenders.

Many are asylum seekers or individuals awaiting hearings.

So the question becomes why should surprise absorb the risk, the cost, and the consequences of a facility that offers us nothing in return.

I grew up in a diverse community shaped by incredible immigrant families.

When we moved to from a small town in Washington to Surprise, Arizona, it was because I wanted my children to grow up with the same richness, surrounded by people from different backgrounds, cultures, and stories.

And I know the human reality behind these centers.

My uncle is an immigration lawyer.

I watched him spent years fighting for people seeking asylum.

People working tirelessly for a better life for their children.

These were not criminals, these were family parents who would give anything to protect their children.

So when I hear that a detention center is being proposed in the heart of our community, near homes, schools, small businesses.

Look around this room.

We are here because we care.

We are here because we see what's at stake.

We are here because this is our city, and we will not let the federal detention facility redefine who we are.

Thank you, ma'am.

Okay.

Good evening.

Good evening, Mayor and Council.

My name is Donna Brodsky, and I live near the intersection of Bell and Rheims.

First, I want to thank you for accommodating all the speakers tonight.

It's a long night for everyone, but everybody needs a chance to be able to be heard.

Tonight I'm here because I'd like to.

I'd like to urge you to oppose the proposed facility.

And because I believe we shared the same goal to protect the character and safety of surprise.

This facility is planned within two miles of at least six public and private schools, and maybe more, because you you get different information when you Google it.

This isn't just a federal policy issue.

It's a land use and public safety issue that directly impacts our students and our neighborhoods.

For example, a few possible tools might be lead with transparency.

Use your platform to demand that the ICE provide a full operational plan so our residents aren't left in the dark.

Two, strict oversight.

Require rigorous environmental traffic infrastructure, impact reviews, anything that would help us know what they're going to do.

That's a that was designed as a warehouse, not as a housing facility.

Our roads and public safety resources belong to this community, and we must know how this facility will train them, will strain them.

And principled partnership.

Commit to not using any city contracts or local tax dollars to subsidize the facility and the operation of this detention center.

Lastly, we are not alone in this.

Other jurisdictions around the country country are investigating ways to reject the ICE facilities in their jurisdictions.

According to the El Paso Herald post on February 2nd, the city of Orlando, the state of New Mexico, Kansas City, and Oklahoma City are all researching and/or attempting various actions to bypass the supremacy clause and to stop potential ICE detention facilities.

Perhaps surprise could collaborate with some of these jurisdictions.

But you have the power to pull up a chair right now.

Let's work together to ensure that the safety of our schools and the integrity of our neighborhoods remain your top priority.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Before you begin, I'm gonna call it.

Hold on one second, ma'am.

Um, can you get with Karina in the back?

I'd like to meet with you, please after in a day or two.

That is okay.

Okay, okay.

Thank you.

The next five names are Linda Landry, Gail Manahan, and Natalie Artista, Cassandra Harbin, Casey Jones.

Thank you, please state your name.

My name's Yolanda Landeros.

I'm from Pacay, but I shop here and surprise.

Good evening, ma'am.

Please don't normalize the hate and violence against innocent human beings.

Don't put detention centers in our community.

What we are witnessing today is not law and order.

It is a violation of it.

Over 40 innocent people have been killed by ICE agents across our nation.

Kidnapping and detaining innocent human beings from their homes, cars, cars, schools, and workplaces based only on how they look, is illegal.

It violates existing federal and state laws, and it violates the United States Constitution.

Racial profiling has no place in a nation that claims to value justice.

Immigration laws were created during the era of chattel slavery when only free white persons were allowed to become U.S.

citizens.

For more than 200 years, immigration policy has been shaped by racism designed to endanger, exploit, criminalize, and exclude non-white innocent human beings.

The Constitution is clear.

Mass deportation is not about safety.

The most dangerous criminals in our society are the extreme wealthy and powerful, the Epstein class of multi-billionaires who exploit people with near total impunity.

Their power allows them to influence legislation, manipulate the judicial system, and dominate the news media and social media.

They shape public narratives while avoiding responsibility for immense harm.

Justice cannot exist when the Epstein class of the most powerful billionaires are in control.

Some laws are unjust, and justice demands not blind obedience to them, but the courage to change them in pursuit of a better future.

Abolish ICE.

Yeah.

Madam Clerk, we're gonna take a recess after the last gentleman for about 10 minutes.

Okay.

Um before you call more names up.

You got it.

Please state your answer.

Yes, sir.

Good evening.

My name is Matthew Reyster.

I appreciate your time here tonight.

We're not talking about normal law enforcement.

Normal law enforcement follows the rules of the United States, the Constitution, and is accountable.

We're talking about the creation of a police force similar to what Nazi Germany had in the 1930s, where there's total disregard to the citizens of the country that they're supposedly protecting.

Surprise is about to become an experience the biggest public safety crisis in its history.

You're going to become the epicenter across the Southwest and further of huge protests.

Thousands of people opposed to the violence that ICE is using against people and the disregard for the constitutional rights of all people living in this country, both citizens and non-citizens.

It will likely spark violent clashes.

Trying just to exercise their constitutional rights.

While it may be the case, possibly that there is nothing that you can do to hold off federal agency wanting to come in.

What you can do, and there must be something you could do to slow down the process and put some impediments in the pathway.

At the very least, what you can also do is to pass a resolution stating on record that you all oppose this facility that is proposed for the town as surprise.

What I lastly do want to say though, this detention prison center does not belong in anybody's backyard, any place in the United States.

I should be disbanded, and anything this board does in support of ICE or not doing anything to impede ICE is supporting them by your silence.

Thank you.

Thank you, sir.

Mayor and members of the council, I'm Eugene Hunt.

I'm a uh resident of Surprise.

I live in uh Sun Village, Bell, and Sun Village.

Uh I'm an architect and a planner.

I have an active practice and I have a past experience in correctional facilities.

And my uh wanted to address you tonight because I think this is an inappropriate location for this type facility.

They're talking about one of the busiest intersections in the city of Surprise.

It's also a building that wasn't designed for this purpose.

It's an industrial warehouse building.

I think if they were going to locate here, they should have done some planning rather than just buy a first building on the street.

It's an inappropriate location.

I think it's going to be a disaster for those that are going to be incarcerated there.

So I would ask your favor in not approving this location.

Thank you.

Thank you, sir.

Good evening, good evening.

Mayor, counsel, Mrs.

Davis.

My name is William Conium.

I have lived near Lichfield in Waddell for 17 years.

I'm here today to voice my strong opposition to the federal purchase of the Warehouse and Sweetwater Avenue.

That approach it from a slightly different approach than than many others here, but but similar to uh the gentleman architect.

While I understand the legal complexities regarding federal authority, it's deeply disappointing to see the federal government abandon the good neighbor policies that have traditionally defined these relations.

Historically, even when federal agencies had the legal right to bypass local zoning, they work closely with cities to ensure a project wouldn't overwhelm local infrastructure.

This property was marketed as a Class A distribution facility, premium asset designed to attract high-quality corporate tenants and jobs to surprise.

Its original design included less than 2,500 square feet of office space with plumbing intended for a standard warehouse staff.

Retrofitting the same shell to house 1500 people creates an immediate unplanned for load on our city's water and sewer lines.

By bypassing our planning department, the federal government is forcing a massive utility burden onto our local system without a single public impact study.

Furthermore, we must consider the long-term scars this leaves on our industrial corridor.

By installing specialized plumbing and high security reinforcements, they're effectively ruining the building's future resale value.

No CEO is going to move their company into a facility that requires millions of dollars to remediate just to strip out detention cells and hundreds of floor drains.

They will simply move those jobs to a clean site in a neighboring city.

Finally, we must look at the exit strategy.

When this site is eventually vacated, federal law under Title V of the McKenney Vento Act.

I'll put you guys writing this down, requires that surplus federal property be offered to regional homeless shelter providers at no cost before it can be sold to a private developer.

Because this building will have already have the massive plumbing and bed capacity for 1500 people, it will be flagged as a perfect candidate for a permanent, large-scale regional homeless shelter.

By allowing this build out now, we are essentially letting the federal government pre-package a prime industrial site into a permanent, non-tax generating shelter hub.

I urge this council to use every utility and legal lever available to protect our city's vision.

Surprise deserves a future built on economic growth, not a permanent zombie building forced on us by federal overreach.

We deserve development that contributes to our local economy and aligns with the long-term vision of the people who actually live here.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Mr.

Murray.

Mr.

Murray, can you sir?

You're speaking out of turn.

Thank you.

Mr.

Murray, can you do research on the McKinney Bento back, please?

And brief us.

Hi, my name is Lisa Brinkman, and I live over at Cotton Lane and Waddell Road, and I've lived in surprise for about 10 years now.

I'm also not a professional public speaker.

My interest is in the humane treatment of people that would potentially be at this facility because we all know that that facility is going to be targeted as a detention center.

It's very personal to me.

My husband is from Guatemala, and he works for the US United States Postal Service, and he's in our neighborhoods all the time.

I make him carry his U.S.

passport card with him because I'm scared to death they're gonna grab him off the street, and I'm not gonna know when or where he's going.

But what I'd like to talk to you about, which I think that it would be more interesting for you is how you can fight back.

Um, Leavenworth, Kansas.

Um, their situation is a little bit different.

They have a private um uh profit prison system that's coming in to try to reactivate a shutdown prison in their community as a detention center.

And so they are using land use rights to fight back against ICE taking over that facility for that purpose.

And the way they're doing that is they're um pushing for let's see, sorry, I wrote it down.

Oh, they're um requiring a public review process, um, which is required for a special use permit.

So because that facility wasn't intended for that purpose, um, in their jurisdiction, it requires a special use permit, which then opens up that process for public review.

So it's put forward in front of the residents.

That way the residents get to decide whether or not that facility is going forward.

And it's currently in the legal process with the U.S.

Department of Justice, who is trying to back that private prison and the use of that prison as a detention center.

So that's also an avenue for us.

The ACLU is supporting their efforts in that um legal process with the Department of Justice, um, providing support with documentation of the inhumane treatment of people, the safety issues, understaffing, management problems in these facilities, and the fact that the warehouse here is also not zoned for residential use.

You can use that to stop them from taking over that facility.

So, as the woman before me said, we do have options available for us to fight back against the federal government, and I implore you to please use every means you can to do so for our community, for our residents, anybody that's affected in our community, it affects everyone.

And I please, please urge you to take care of all of us.

Thank you so much.

Thank you.

Good evening.

Good evening, Mayor and Council members.

My name's Natalie Bautista.

I'm a registered nurse.

I'm a volunteer community outreach specialist, and for over a decade I've been a resident of the city of Surprise, specifically Greedway Road and Cotton Lane.

I'm here to speak about the building purchase last month by ICE and why the city of Surprise should not allow them to set up operations in our community.

I've heard the argument that this facility would make our community safer from an immigration standpoint.

I want to respectfully but firmly challenge that claim because it does not reflect what actually ends up happening on ground.

I've seen with my own eyes what it looks like when ICE expands its operations into a community, such as in Portland, where I've been doing what I can to help.

What follows is not increased safety, it is fear.

Families, both immigrant and U.S.

citizens, become afraid to leave their homes.

Parents stop taking children to school, stop taking them to their activities, and even to doctor appointments.

Victims stop calling the police because trust is lost when they witness local law enforcement working with ICE.

Communities go into hiding.

Local businesses suffer.

That is not public safety.

That is destabilization.

Facilities like this bring increased surveillance, militarized activity, and trauma into surrounding neighborhoods.

They disproportionately impact people of color, mixed status families, and U.S.

citizens who are mistakenly detained.

The ripple effects harm the entire community, not just immigrants.

Surprise is a city that prides itself on being family-oriented, welcoming, and safe.

Approving this facility will move us in the opposite direction.

It would tie our city's name and resources to uh a system agencies that have documented of constitutional rights violations, a lack of accountability, and violence towards both immigrants and US citizens.

Uh look at and listen to the lived experiences of the communities that have already been through this, such as Portland, Los Angeles, Chicago, Minneapolis, and so many more.

Look at what inviting ICE into the community has done to those communities.

Do not allow ICE or any of these federal agencies to set up operations in our beautiful city of surprise.

Thank you.

I worked at Palo Verde for 25 years.

And uh that came to surprise because it's a nice community.

Lots of changes have occurred in this uh community, uh a lot of growth, and I've seen a lot of it.

And I like the surprise, and I don't want it to be uh uh place that has a uh uh facility that is not appropriate.

I object to the DHS and ICE creating the 1500 bed detention facilities.

A few things I want you to uh um consider, and then I have some background in utility, so one of the things is where is the power coming from?

We have a limited amount of power, it's not uh unlimited.

And we have to create it.

It has to be created somewhere.

And Palo Verde produces quite a bit of power, but not all of it.

Uh, another thing is huge water requirements.

Where is our water coming from?

You know, uh do you are responsible for making sure that your residents have plenty of water?

There's drinking water, cooking, showers, toilets, sewage, another thing.

Sewage increase.

We have a limited capacity.

Buckeye has a huge facility for our sewer, but it's not lit unlimited.

Uh these are impacts that I hope that you consider.

And these impacts are important because we don't want to run out of water or power or sewage, and fire and rescue is another thing.

Do we have a plan and evacuation plans for getting these people out in an event of an a huge fire?

If they're detained and locked up, we could have a huge disaster.

Do we want that in our community?

I don't think so.

Medical impacts.

What about uh fire of uh people rescuing in hospitals?

If that's 1,500 people, they have to go somewhere if in the event that there's an outbreak of disease, uh medical impact, summer heat.

Uh a warehouse is not designed for summer heat.

It is insulation is not adequate, and it's air conditioning uh facilities are not adequate.

So they they can't take care of people, create a lot of heat.

And you have a lot of people in a small area, and all of a sudden you have too much heat.

Deaths could occur.

Do we want that to happen in surprise?

I don't think so.

I just want to make sure that you uh consider these impacts on the city of surprise.

They're not alone in that in that detention center.

They're not by they're not an island.

They have to have all of these infrastructures in place, and you are all responsible for uh them having those uh facilities available to them.

Thank you for your your considerations.

Thank you.

Honorable mayor, honorable deputy mayor, and honorable members of the city council.

Thank you for the opportunity to come and speak about the ICE detention facility.

My name's Casey Jones.

I live in District One in Arizona traditions.

I'd like to make four points about uh the ICE detention facility.

First, ICE is recklessly and incompetently pursuing its mission.

One example you may not know about, but you'll recall from the news.

This last spring, 252 Venezuelans were forcibly deported to San Salvador, El Salvador, and they were incarcerated into the Cat Detention Center.

Now there's a group called Human Rights Watch, a private nonprofit organization, and they had access to ICE data.

And they found the following.

Half of those people that were deported had no record whatsoever in the United States for a criminal conviction or conviction of any kind.

There were another one fourth of those people who had pending charges, but undecided charges.

So there were no convictions among those people.

They were in the process of being adjudicated.

There were only a third, and pardon me, a three percent of the people had been convicted of a previous violent crime or a crime that could be violent.

And the rest of the people had minor convictions for really misdemeanor type things.

Very minor kinds of things.

So a great proportion of those people, contrary to what was publicized, were not criminals.

We're not the worst.

So it counterpoints the argument that ICE is going after the most serious criminals.

The other thing is Minneapolis, and that speaks for itself.

I'm not going to repeat all the horror we've seen there.

My second main point is that that warehouse where this is intended to be was never designed to be a housing for human beings.

And I do know this.

So that was put into place before anybody knew that ICE was coming.

Better hurry and wrap this up.

I would commend you to have your permit, your inspectors inspect that facility to make sure that it is decently habitable for human beings.

Another point is that's very close to schools, as people have mentioned, but also to the Dysart Community Center.

Urge ICE to leave that community alone.

It serves a large Hispanic community.

And finally, I would commend you to pass a five-year moratorium like the City of St.

Louis did.

I have a copy of the ordinance right here, and it was attached to my request to speak.

Thank you.

Thank you, sir.

Good evening.

Good evening.

My name is Claudia Nolasco.

I'm an American citizen, born and raised in Arizona, and I stand before you tonight asking respectfully and urgently that you listen to the voices of our community.

For many of us, having Mexican heritage in this moment feels incredibly heavy.

The constant way of fear, fear of leaving our homes, taking our children to school, or fear of going to work.

And fear of carrying out the most basic task.

This is not a way.

This is not any way a family should have to live.

And I, and yet I live in fear every day.

If this is my reality, I cannot express the pain and anxiety experienced by those who are here on who are here legally under DACA, permanent residency, or any kind of work visa.

The issue is far greater than political differences.

It's about humanity, compassion, and it's about dignity.

Our Mexican and Latino communities are not outsiders.

They're workers, parents, caregivers, business owners, and our neighbors.

No child should ever have to carry that fear.

At their age, they should be focused on learning, dreaming, and growing, not worried about family separation.

Our children should be happy and proud to be Hispanic.

Not taught to fear it.

With that in mind, I respectfully urge you to reconsider the establishment of the ICE facility.

No person should ever be detained, targeted, or locked away simply for being Hispanic.

Our identities are not a crime.

Our culture is not a threat.

And our existence deserves dignity and protection, not punishment.

Thank you for your time, and I ask you to use compassion, courage, and humanity in your decision.

Oh yeah, I'm not sure.

City Council meeting.

Madam Clerk, can you please call additional public speakers?

Yes, sir.

Uh next five is Maureen Miller.

Greg German.

Ian Henderson.

Christy Nielsen.

Marnie Caldwell.

Yeah, well.

I'm gonna go ahead and call five more.

You just keep it.

Go ahead and come on up, sir.

If you could say your name and crossroads for the record, please.

My name is Greg Gaerman.

I live in Vier Monte area, so yes, I'm a resident of district where he's he's the he's not here right now.

We're six.

No, it's district six.

It's somewhere else.

Okay.

I'm uh have been here for five and a half years.

I'm a uh was a former science instructor for 45 years.

So I'm used to uh doing practice on hands-on research, so I deal with facts.

So that's my my lines are things like you if from the research it says that if you're gonna increase ice presence at all, you're going to increase the number of uh convicted uh felons and criminals in this neighborhood.

So that's what we're inviting.

If you're in if you're inviting ice at all.

Uh fact two has already been mentioned, property values are gonna drop.

I heard someone said something before, but I've come anywhere from one to twenty percent.

So here our property values are gonna go down.

Of course, there goes taxes.

Uh the safety of schools already been mentioned.

We already know that uh ice has been known to use uh pick up kids and use them as bait to bring people out.

Which again, the safety of this committee is going into the dumpster in that particular case.

Another fact, you're gonna have more people carrying guns.

And the more guns that are carried, the more likelihood that someone's going to have an accident.

So there's, you know, the fear factors of that all the way around.

Um the economy is going to be suffering.

Therefore, the taxes are going to be going up.

You may some people think it's a great idea to have well more people come in.

Well, the caliber, the quality of the types of people that you're going to be attracting are a different story.

Uh having 1,500, uh 1500 bed facility means you're probably gonna have somewhere between, in fact, 1,500 to 3,000 ice agents coming into the facility area besides.

All the uh utilities that you're talking about, you just looked at your budget and said something to the effect of, well, we need to think work on our roads, noise that roads are costing more than before.

How are you gonna be able to support the facility with that?

With the the lack of road to the infrastructure area.

Um sad fact that I think you should all realize is that the United States has more people in detention facilities and in criminal facilities than any other country per percentage than any other country in the world.

When is that gonna turn around?

When we stop spending money on criminal facilities and put it towards more social activities.

And love my community.

But we do not want an ICE detention center in surprise.

Here are neighborhoods, schools, shops, and businesses.

It is a warehouse, meant to be for merchandise, not humans.

ICE does not follow due process.

And that's something under the Constitution, we're all supposed to be granted.

And so they're arrested.

They don't have to have a warrant to go into people's houses and take parents away from their children.

ICE did not seek out the proper permits from our city for this.

We especially do not want masked ICE agents having rounded up victims in and out of our city, frightening our residents, and especially our children.

And that's all I have to say.

Thank you.

Thank you, ma'am.

Madam Clerk, can you call a few more speakers, please?

Yes, Mayor.

The next five.

Canet Jimenez.

David Klingon Smith.

Nicholas McApolis.

I'm sorry if I butchered that.

Cynthia Fox.

One more.

Angelina Torres.

Good evening, ma'am.

Hello.

My name is Maureen Miller, and I live in Desert Oasis.

Boy, I have a lot to say.

As I was leading up to this event, I was thinking to myself, I have so much that I want to say, so much that I need to say, and three minutes isn't enough time.

The other thing that I'd like to say, so many of my friends here tonight have been so eloquent on what they want to say, and I can't possibly compete with them.

But I in good faith cannot sit back and not say my two cents.

First thing I want to let you know is that I've recently retired, and I did not expect that I would need to spend so much time standing up for common decency.

I am fortunate to have extra time moving forward to continue to do so against hateful policies.

I was so disappointed when I learned about the recent DHS building purchase in surprise.

Over the last couple of days, I learned of other communities who are pushing back and passing ordinances in order to reject ICE facilities.

Not yet.

Portions of our history are ugly, and we cannot rewrite it.

But we can show that we learned from it and continue to learn.

Building an ICE concentration camp is in no way in no way uh will protect us, our friends, neighbors, and fellow humans.

No ice and no ice camps.

If we do not stand up, we lose bragging rights on what a great city this is.

The last thing that I wanted to point out that I found kind of ironic is the name of this building in question is the Surprise Point Commerce Center.

If we take this on, we are in the commerce of having illegal facilities.

Thank you.

Thank you, ma'am.

Good evening, sir.

Hello, my name is Ian Henderson.

I'm here to speak about the warehouse recently purchased by DHS to be turned into a concentration camp.

As far as I understood prior to this evening, which you one of you confirmed, um, the city has no ability to stop such a purchase by the federal government.

And even if you did have the ability, I don't believe you would do anything if you could.

So I'm here to tell people what they can do, and I'm sure everybody who's listening and would agree.

Uh, you guys all love jury duty, right?

Um, but did you know that as a member of a trial jury, you are not required to give a guilty verdict, even if prosecutors have proven without a reason within a reasonable doubt that a person is guilty.

This is called a jury nullification.

We have the power to render a not guilty verdict in defiance.

Here's a hypothetical to help everybody understand.

If a hypothetical warehouse were to be hypothetically burned down in order to stop a hypothetical concentration camp from being built, hypothetically, um, and the alleged person was hypothetically caught, the arsonist.

A jury nullification, we as the we as a jury and a criminal child can declare the hypothetical alleged arsonist innocent, regardless of evidence.

There would be sent free, nobody could be recharged again due to double jeopardy laws, and jurors cannot be punished for this.

We have a responsibility to defend any hypothetical person in this way, because why would anybody allow a concentration camp to be built?

And why would anybody allow a hypothetical hero to be punished for this?

People are being violated with their first, fourth, and fifth amendment rights.

Ice guards are murdering detainees.

There have been tens of thousands of reported rapes at the hands of ICE guards, let alone the unreported.

And the concentration camp in Pennsylvania just recently argued in court last month that their guards are not liable for the rapes they commit.

This cannot be allowed.

I do have some time left.

We're all perfected in Palestine.

Police, ICE, they were all trained with the terrorist genocidal ethnocolony known as Israel.

And all of these tactics and technologies are coming back to be used on us in what is called the imperial boomerang.

This is why a free Palestine is intrinsically linked to our struggles here today, because unless we stop the atrocities the US Empire is committing in Palestine, we uh well, we also need to end the US bipartisan policy of not a violent colonial imperialism.

Um because no one will be set free until Palatine is free, until the Congo is free, until Sudan is free, power to the working class, fuck ICE and fuck fuck Israel.

Before you start, ma'am, I'm gonna call five mornings.

Thank you, sir.

Um good evening, Council.

I speak today as a proud daughter of hardworking immigrants and as an ashamed member of this community.

It is disheartening that the first time our small town makes national news, it is not for who we are, but for something that threatens the dignity and safety of our own people.

Immigrants are not numbers to tally.

We are human beings with histories, families, and dreams.

We contribute, we work relentlessly, and we belong.

With the approval for a new ICE detention center in Surprise, what we have seen unfold across the country, what once felt distant has now knocked on the door of the city I call home.

The dehumanizing treatment of immigrants, detention without due process, discrimination based solely on the color of one's skin is coming to a neighborhood near you.

Surprise is the only home I have ever known.

It is where I learned the meaning of community, of peace, of belonging.

It is where my family planted roots.

And now families are being asked to wonder will this city still feel safe for people who look like me?

A detention center does not just change a building, it changes the soul of a city.

It alters the rhythm of neighborhoods, the laughter in playgrounds, the confidence of children walking to school.

It turns familiarity into fear, neighbors into strangers, safety into uncertainty.

Our community deserves more than statements that protect the city's liability.

We deserve action.

We deserve accountability.

What concrete steps will be taken to ensure that residents are not profiled, targeted, or made to feel unsafe in their own homes?

Transparency after the fact is not enough.

Silence is not enough.

We need real commitments, commitments that protect the dignity and safety of the people who call surprise home.

Our neighbors, our friends, our families, the heart of the city is in its people.

We cannot let silence and blind compliance decide who belongs.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Ma'am, before you start, I'm gonna call a few more names, okay?

Next five, Tina Malica.

Milton Morrow.

Christina Anta.

Rosalind Melling Dorocher.

Alyssa Fio.

Good evening, ma'am.

Good evening, Mayor and Council members.

I don't have my glasses, so I'm gonna have to hold this up.

Yours.

I can loan you, so thank you.

My name's Cynthia Fox, and I'm a resident of surprise.

I stand here tonight speaking from a place of deep moral alarm.

We understand that this council cannot overrule ICE's federal authority.

We're not asking you to do what you legally cannot do.

But what you can do, and what you must do, is refuse silence, refuse complicity, and refuse to look away.

The Department of Homeland Security quiet quietly purchased property in our city to build the 1,500-person detention center, and neither the council nor the people who live here knew about it just over a week ago.

That should stop every one of us cold.

Because this is not just another development project.

This is not a warehouse.

This is not housing.

This is a place where human beings will be confined.

We've all seen the reports coming out of Florida.

People held in overcrowded, degrading conditions, people denied basic medical care, including the uh current outbreak of measles, families torn apart, arrests carried out with brutality that shocks the conscience.

These are not abstract policy debate.

These are real human experiences, and they're happening right now.

And now our community is being asked without warning, without consent, to host the next chapter of that story.

Whether someone supports strict immigration enforcement or not, there must be a line.

There must be a point where we say this violates our shared humanity.

Human dignity is not partisan.

Decency is not radical, and morality does not stop at jurisdictional boundaries.

If our city becomes home to a facility like this, then our city's name becomes attached to what happens inside it.

We cannot say it's not our responsibility.

You may not control ICE, but you do control whether this city stands up and says, not without scrutiny, not without accountability.

Our voices being heard.

We are asking you to speak publicly and clearly against inhumane detention practices.

Demand transparency from ICE and federal partners, use every lawful tool available to slow review and challenge this project.

And most importantly, just stand on the side of human dignity.

Thank you, ma'am.

Good evening.

Hello.

Hello, my name is David Klingensmith.

I've lived here in Surprise for uh five years now.

And I'm here to express my serious concerns as well about the this Department of Homeland Security occupying a this massive warehouse facility down on Sweetwater Avenue.

Surprise prides itself on being a desirable residential community built around families and schools and churches and small businesses and long-term neighborhood investment.

And a large DHS operational presence, especially one housed in a warehouse like this, is fundamentally incompatible with the character, the planning priorities, and the expectations of this community.

Um DHS in the whole purchase of this building.

And uh I agree with the other speakers that uh I would encourage you to do everything possible to have as much oversight of this facility as is possible.

Um I share the concerns about um safety and traffic and infrastructure issues that many other folks have mentioned.

Um I think that ICE has proved in many ways that it is an out-of-control organization.

And I think a DHS facility of this scale, in addition to bringing things like vehicle traffic, um has also concerns of things like um security perimeters, surveillance activity, um, and all kinds of other operational risks that were never meant to be part of a zoning uh intent for that particular area.

Um I think that as other speakers have mentioned that our roads and utilities and emergency services were not designed to support a facility like this.

Um I'm gonna kind of just say that I agree with many of the other speakers, and I want to add, though, at the end here, that uh I'm also a uh Christian clergy person, uh minister in the United Church of Christ denomination.

And I would remind all who claim to be followers of Jesus that the actions taken by ICE are incompatible with Jesus' teachings, that we are to love our neighbor and the immigrant is our neighbor.

And scripture tells us to treat the immigrant as one of our own.

And um I'm one of those people that also believes that that uh unless you're a Native American here, we're all immigrants.

So I will just end with that.

Thank you.

Thank you, sir.

I'm gonna call a few more names.

Elaine Darkbaum, Zach M.

No Laughing.

Zane Gordon.

Sophie Barowski.

Thank you.

Good evening, ma'am.

Good evening, Mayor, Councilman.

My name is Tina Malica.

I'm a 25-year resident of surprise.

My husband and I have raised two children in this city.

One a Dysert graduate, one still in school.

I live in Marley Park.

I've lived there for nine years.

Mr.

Judge, you are my councilman.

Hello.

My home is 2.8 miles from this warehouse.

There are many parks where children live, and nine schools within three miles of this warehouse.

A high school, a middle school, and five elementary schools.

All of them are Title I schools who serve our minority and low-income communities.

This location is not a coincidence.

ICE agents have been kidnapping children, families, even off-duty police officers.

I'm holding one of them in front of you right now, a five-year-old boy, Liam Ramos.

This facility puts our citizens, our children at risk of violence.

It will put a strain on our police department and emergency response teams, lower our property values, and strain our water and sewage systems.

Experience shows that they are not arresting violent criminals.

But as someone else mentioned, even if they were, why would we want that here?

This community deserves transparency and action.

Other communities like Salt Lake City, Oklahoma City, San Antonio, Kansas City were able to stop such sales to DHS.

Somehow, no one in this city knew anything was happening.

What is the plan now to protect our neighborhoods and our schools when ice come because they're coming and we've seen what they do.

We've seen them take children and parents from pickup lines.

I've already signed up to get training so that I can watch and record when they start taking our children.

Because as my sign says, without due process, it's kidnapping.

Councilman Judd, I'm going to implore you that leaders do not say our hands are tied.

Leaders work with their community members, the businesses, their police, their school districts, the people in this room.

We work together and we find something to do to protect our children and our community members.

The government cannot force municipal t municipalities, excuse me, to build roads and utilities.

Construction permits will be required for toilets, showers, dining facilities.

So what you can do is refuse to partner with or fund private detention operators through city contracts.

You can demand environmental traffic, public safety, and infrastructure impact reviews.

You can require transparency about how this facility will operate and affect our community.

To you and to everyone in the room, I ask that we do not let this end tonight.

Contact our senators, our representatives, our attorney general, whoever we need.

And we are asking for you to do it with us.

Thanks, ma'am.

Good evening.

Good evening, Mayor Council.

Good evening, Mayor and Council.

My name is Alyssa Maria Esteville, and I was born here in Arizona and raised in Surprise.

I grew up in the original town site.

I've been here for 36 years, and my family has deep roots here, not only in Surprise, but also in El Mirage, where my grandparents have lived in both cities for over 60 years.

I am a true local.

I and I'm proud to say I'm a native of surprise from before Surprise even became a city.

I am a third generation resident whose family has grown here, worked here, and invested in this community for decades.

Both my father and my stepmother, Christy, who some of you know well, dedicated over 20 years of service to the city of surprise and retired after a lifetime of public service.

I also worked for the City of Surprise as a resource specialist and a case manager, supporting vulnerable individuals and families within our community.

I know well what this city stands for, and this city is known for its diversity.

Growing up, I remember surprised when it was full of fields, orchards, and farmland.

I remember driving by and seeing Hispanic families and immigrants working hard in those fields, helping put food on our tables, supporting the economy, and contributing to the culture of this area.

The Hispanic community has always been a huge part of surprise in El Mirage.

And it is impossible to separate the success of this region from the contributions of immigrants.

This is where we went to school.

This is where we played sports.

This is where we were raised, and where we are now raising our children.

Today, Surprise is no longer a small town.

It's a growing city.

But with the decision to bring a detention center into our community, right in our backyard on the borderline of El Mirage, many families who live here are now living in fear.

There are children who go to school with my children who are scared to attend class because they don't know if their parents will still be home at the end of the day.

Parents are afraid to go to work.

Families are afraid to shop for groceries, attend church, or even take their kids to sports and city parks.

This is not what a safe community looks like.

I truly believe bringing a detention center into our city will not bring peace or stability.

It will bring chaos, fear, division, and trauma.

It increases the risk of harassment, discrimination, and racial profiling.

It will create tension in neighborhoods and could impact public safety, not improve it.

I do not want to live in a city where residents are forced to watch ice activity near our homes, schools, parks, or everyday public spaces.

I don't want families to be afraid to exist in the same place they call home for years.

That is not the city of surprise I grew up in.

And it is not the future I want for my children.

Citizens and immigrants in this community are not a political stunt.

These are real human beings, mothers, fathers, workers, grandparents, and children who are here to build better lives and race families who will grow up and contribute to this community.

Right now, this attention center is already causing harm, not just through fear, but online as well.

There are hundreds, if not thousands of people discussing this facility, and the comments are filled with hate, ignorance, and cruelty.

That should be deeply concerning to all of us because the tone of a community matters.

The message we send matters, and bringing a detention facility here sends a message that surprises becoming a national political stage instead of the family-centered community we claim to be.

I am asking our city leaders to make the right decision and take action immediately to stop the detention center from operating in surprise.

This is not what residents want.

It does not represent the value of our city.

We should be a community built on safety, dignity, and humanity, not fear.

Thank you for your time.

I'm going to call a couple of things.

Okay, five more names.

Michael Olski, Candace Beach, Steven Kramer, Daniel Quigley, Alan Klein.

Thank you.

Thanks.

Good evening, ma'am.

Hi.

My name is Rosalind Melling DeRosher.

I've lived at Cactus in Reims and Rancho Gabriela for 22 years.

My home is three miles from both a proposed ICE detention center and a data center power plant.

My kids are now 21, 16, and 15.

When they were little, we rode our bikes through the fields where these facilities are being proposed.

Beautiful flowers and cotton grew all around here.

I've loved being a tiny part of the growth and progress in this town.

Normally I'm good with background organizing and holding signs.

I've stood on street corners to get school bonds and overrides passed.

I volunteered as the vice president for the Marley Park PTA for many years before my kids moved up to high school.

I have a small community pantry at my house where friends can drop off and pick up food to reduce waste and grocery costs.

I do little things because I feel a responsibility to my community and my neighbors.

I don't know what to do now.

Mayor, council members, neighbors, I need your help.

These proposed facilities cannot be allowed to operate in our community.

The drain on our resources, the additional congestion on our streets, the negative press about our town.

I mean, do you want to buy a house next door to Alligator Alcatraz right now?

Nobody will want to live in surprise.

Those are selfish reasons for surprise residents to oppose these facilities, but they are valid.

Sound pollution in residential neighborhoods, interference with Luke Air Force Base and more.

The ICE facilities that were documented on 60 minutes showed that laws are being broken, human rights trampled, and people are getting hurt and killed in these places.

We cannot live next door to that.

The people of surprise, this community, and specifically this suburban mom need you to represent us and do whatever you can do to stop the data center and detention center from moving forward.

Please refuse to partner with or fund detention center operations through any city contracts.

Also, we need you to demand environmental traffic and public safety impact reviews immediately.

These proposed facilities are within two miles of each other.

Slow them down before there is irreversible damage done here.

Thank you.

Thank you, ma'am.

Good evening.

Good evening.

Thank you for your time.

My name is Zach Miller.

I just recently moved to Surprise.

But we need to call this ICE facility out for what it truly is going to be a for-profit concentration warehouse.

Will surprise local officials have access to make sure the conditions of the facility are humane and sanitary?

Will you all have DHS provide a full environmental impact statement?

We have seen with our very own eyes what these call of duty cosplaying white supremacists, ICE terrorists will do in broad daylight with cameras filming them, such as executing U.S.

citizens.

So what do we think they are going to do in that concentration warehouse behind brick walls with the public not watching?

Some of these ICE terrorists have been trained by the IDF.

We see what kind of morals they put on display.

And ICE have pedophile enablers and puppy killers as some of their leaders.

Such as Christy Gnome, who is staying at the Arizona Grand Resort right now.

Even if they were getting the so-called worst of the worst, do we as Surprise really want that to be a part of our backyard?

Will these so-called ICE agents be held accountable and arrested if they violate the laws of surprise?

I love that the city talks about being proactive.

But this is truly the time to walk the walk and to decide if you will stand on the side of the people and if you will stand with the good and stand up to the evil.

And come up with a proactive plan to keep the people in the community safe from these federal domestic terrorists.

Immigration enforcement is important, but the way this current form of ICE is going about it is pure evil and needs to be abolished.

This concentration warehouse most certainly will leave a blood stain on the city of surprise forever if something's not done about it.

Thank you.

Thank you, sir.

Go ahead.

One sec.

Madam Clerk, can you call a few more names, please?

Yes, sir.

I have more.

Carol Gonto, Terry Perez, Timothy Woolard, Claudio Carrillo, Nancy Martin.

Good evening.

I'm Dr.

Stephen Kramer.

I'm a resident of Sun Village for 14 years.

And I thank uh uh in Johnny's district.

And I thank the uh mayor and the city council for my allowing me the opportunity to raise the issue of grave concern about the DHS decision to cite a detention center here in the city of surprise, but especially at the Sweetwater Avenue location.

That location is less than a mile from Dysert High School and less than 2,000 feet from the nearest children's playground.

This poses the greatest threat to the children and residents of Dysert's cactus community based on the planned detention of the worst of the worst, brutal criminals and rapists they plan to house in an insecure warehouse there.

I thank the city for making us aware uh that federal jurisdiction takes precedence over local regulations.

However, states' rights do take precedence over federal uh federal uh federal uh unless expressly permitted by law.

It is a state's rights right and obligation to ensure the safety and security of its citizens, citizens.

Therefore, your honors, I ask what has the council and the mayor done to take steps to what steps have you taken to make Governor Hobbs and A.

G.

Hayes aware of this critical safety and security risk this detention center poses to our community and the need to prevent the potential disaster for for our community.

Finally, what will be the impact of the unplanned major increase in demand for potable water and sewers in the detention center on surprise and its planned expansion of working and taxpaying families housing that can be and you that you can refuse to grant this request to increase for that facility.

I thank you for your time and look forward to your response.

Thank you, sir.

Good evening.

Good evening, Mayor Sartor, members of the city council and city attorney Laura.

My name is Alan Klein.

I've been a resident of Surprise for well over 20 years.

I've called Surprise Home.

I've got this prepared speech, and I'm gonna go through that because a few other things came up while I was in the audience.

So yeah, we've we've gone through all the buying the warehouse and the federal agency and breakdown and intergovernmental transparency and all that in the warehouse of people, the concentration camp, uh, the lousy location, the tax to our infrastructure.

And I hope I implore you, I hope you'll study all that and slow this thing down as much as you can and do what you can.

Uh, all the studies and all that, and you know, I'm gonna go off my prepared speech because I'm speaking from the heart.

Because I spoke with some of the people in the audience, and they told me they have to carry their passport because they're in fear, and they're American citizens.

This is not America.

And I I saw what happened to Renee Good.

I have family and friends in Minneapolis, and we hear it's worse than what you see in the news.

And I woke up one morning, and I'm an avid cyclist to go mountain biking, and I saw Alex Predi's picture on a mountain bike.

And I went to a protest this week, and I've gone to multiple protests, and I did a memorial bike ride for Alex Pready.

This is not America.

Surprise Arizona.

All of you, you have an opportunity to show the rest of the country and the rest of the world how to stand up to the federal government.

And I'm gonna ask you a question.

I wanna know what are you going to do?

And I wanna see it.

I want there was no transparency in what the federal government did when they acquired that property.

I want, I'm asking you for transparency.

I wanna know what you're gonna do, and I wanna hear what you're gonna do publicly.

I wanna see it.

So I I implore you, I hope you will do that, and don't let this facility ruin surprise Arizona.

Thank you.

Good evening.

Kirill Gonko, Grandon Reims.

I was deeply disappointed by the statement of the City of Surprise released on January 30th.

It essentially told residents that there is nothing you can do.

And from where we sit, you're not even gonna try.

That's unacceptable.

If you truly don't know how to push back, then look to those cities whose leaders are standing up for the residents and pushing back and stopping it.

Hanover City, Virginia, Durant, Oklahoma, San Antonio, Texas, Merrimack, New Hampshire, Social Circle, Georgia, Roxbury, New Jersey, Kansas City, Missouri, to name a few.

These communities don't hide behind federal language.

They use every tool available to make it clear that detention centers are not welcome here.

Right now, surprise is doing the opposite by staying quiet.

If you allow this to move forward without resistance, our city will be remembered for one thing.

Standing by while detention center was ushered in.

We'll be known as a city that is complicit, a city that signaled it was friendly to a system that harms children, tears families apart, and detains people who are here legally.

We expect you to act, and we expect you to fight.

We expect you to show the same courage that other leaders in other cities have shown.

Thank you.

Good evening.

Hello.

My name is Claudio Cerrillo.

I live in Tempe, but I grew up right here and went to school in Surprise and El Mirage.

Um my family lives on Dysard and Cactus, just a stone's throw from where this facility is and where it was sold under the people's noses here.

Uh, since the news broke, I've truly never felt more ashamed to call this place home.

Um, I really I can't accept the fact that if this goes through while we shop, while we go to school, while we spend time with our family less than a mile away, there will be men, women, children kept in cages.

Um it's a it will be a failing of the city to allow this kind of violence to take root here.

Um we all we know all about the similar facilities across the United States.

Um, like Alligator Alcatraz, we know so little of what is actually going on in there, but what does come out is truly horrifying.

Um we see daily violations of human rights, and including disappearances of way too many.

Um that's the future that awaits surprise.

Unless this is fully halted in its tracks, this facility will be a stain on us that will never fade.

Um I want to be clear that what's needed in this moment is not a push for more oversight of the facility or more training for those that will staff it.

Um this building cannot be allowed to be operational in any capacity.

To the council members, it is up to you to do the utmost to prevent this.

Um this building will require municipal utilities, it will require frequent contact with public safety workers, uh police.

Um, all of this, if it's allowed to happen, it's nothing more than collaboration with what is a fascist enterprise.

Um use your imagination if if that fails.

I'm sure the people of surprise can vote in someone with more creativity and backbone.

To the people, we cannot let the results of this room dictate the course of action going forward.

Our collective imagination needs to stretch beyond the four walls of this room.

Um this facility cannot become operational.

There is a moral imperative to prevent this by any means necessary.

Thank you.

I'm gonna call a few more names before you start.

Oh uh Sir, one second, please.

I'm gonna call a few more names before you start.

Mary Bank, Stephanie Madrano, Alexis Young, Sarah Hartman, Susan Anderson.

Thank you, sir.

Thank you.

Good evening, sir.

Uh, my name's Tim Willard, and I live at uh Reims in a coma area.

Um 69 years old, never spoke before.

More than about 10 people in one place at any time.

Uh never been an activist and until about 10 months ago, I was never a protester.

Um, so kind of nervous.

Um I I just want just to know that I object to the lack of transparency that um our current federal government.

Um they gave us no prior notice.

They gave you no prior notice as I understand it.

Um closed in total secrecy.

Um I object to the inhumane separation of families.

Um, often without due process, without reason, other than what?

Uh color of skin, they don't look American, they don't speak American, they don't sound American.

Um suspected of possible fraud, said the fraudster in chief.

Even Native Americans have been caught up in this.

Um I object on the grounds that our community infrastructure, our water, our sewer, our emergency services will likely be strained.

Uh let's for a moment imagine that uh what the so-called president and the so-called officials and and cabinet people and his other bureaucrats are telling this is true.

Uh that the worst of the worst is going to be put in this facility.

Um does it make any sense to house them right in a highly populated neighborhood in our community.

I think not, and I object.

And I hope and pray that you all object also.

I urge you each and individually to make your views known on this matter because it's important to know what side of history you are on.

I also urge and demand that each and together, you move uh to take any action possible to slow down impede this facility from opening in our community.

Um I love surprise.

I love Arizona.

I love the USA.

And in closing, no kings, no tyrants, no fashion just USA.

Thank you very much.

Good evening, ma'am.

Hi, Mayor, Council.

Um just keep this very simple.

I've been a resident of uh surprise since 2009, live in Sun City Grand.

And I just I beg you to try to do something to stop this DHS detention center.

Um, the planned concentration camp of Paris would disrupt learning at the Dysart schools, and and it would terrorize the neighborhoods nearby and even either beyond in surprise and put fear in surprise.

We should not have to live in fear.

I heard I sat through this home meeting and heard that your biggest budget is um is safety in this community.

Please show that that is the case, and please try to do something to stop this detention center.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Ma'am, can I have your name, please?

Ma'am.

Can I have your name, please?

For the record.

Sorry.

Nancy Martin.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Good evening, ma'am.

Hello.

Hear me.

Okay.

Good evening, Mayor and Council members.

My name is Stephanie Madrano.

I am a lifelong Arizona resident, a former elementary school teacher, and the daughter of a first generation migrant farm worker.

I'm here tonight because this decision is not just about a warehouse.

It's about who we choose to be as a city and as human beings.

My father worked in the fields of Arizona so that others could eat.

As a child, he attended a school in Tolison that was legally segregated until the federal court ruling of Gonzalez versile forced Arizona to confront its discrimination against the Mexican American children.

He grew up in a system that taught him through law and policy his life and his future would be of less significance, but he proved them wrong by becoming an educator.

That history matters today because what's being proposed here is not new.

It's the same injustice repackaged.

Today, instead of segregated schools, they're building detention centers instead of open discriminatory laws.

They hide behind dehumanizing terms like illegal aliens and domestic terrorists, which has saturated the media by this current administration.

But the outcome is the same.

The communities of color are criminalized, families are separated, and suffering is turned into profit.

The Rockefeller group made 70 million dollars in taxpayers' money, our money, by facilitating immigrant detention.

This isn't economic development.

It's profiting from human pain.

Any corporation that profits from ice detention is complicit in the harm.

And any city that allows it shares that responsibility.

Children deserve safety, stability, and freedom to learn, not a constant 24-hour ice presence in the neighborhoods.

No child should fear carry fear into the classroom.

We know what ice detention brings.

Wrongful arrests, abuse, death, and total lack of accountability.

A permanent ice presence does not make our community safer, and no one is safe with this ice and surprise.

If this facility does move forward, it will place an unfair and dangerous burden on our local fire, police, and EMS departments.

These are civil servants who chose to serve this community, our neighbors, children, and elders, not to support a federal detention operation designed for profit.

A 24-7 detention center will require emergency responses that pull resources away from surprise residents in crisis and put lives at risk.

It also places civil servants in a compromising position, forcing them to choose between their duty to their community and involvement in a system that causes harm.

Thank you, ma'am.

I'm gonna call a few more names before you begin.

Jonathan, Sarah Hartman, Walter Thorndike, Rich Manales.

Thank you.

Hello, my name is Alexis Cotton and Greenway.

I've talked to you guys a couple weeks ago.

I'm here to state clearly and for the public record.

This community does not consent to an ICE concentration camp in the city of surprise.

We've all seen the atrocities being carried out by ICE, the senseless violent violence, inhumane practices, and complete disregard for due process.

These preventable tragedies are happening before our eyes, and many more are doubtlessly being carried out behind fences and locked doors.

Federal funding does not erase local responsibility.

The trust broken will be immediate and lasting.

Residents will be fearful to call for help, report crimes, attend schools, and participate in local events.

That fear undermines public safety for everyone, but let's be very clear who this harms most people of color and immigrants.

Immigrant families are a beautiful and essential part of our community.

They are our friends, our neighbors, our classmates, our co-workers, our small business owners, our caregivers, our faith leaders.

They bring resilience, culture, food, music, labor, and love to surprise.

They strengthen our schools, our economy, and our everyday lives.

A concentration camp sends a message that these families are a threat instead of a gift.

And that message is both false and deeply damaging.

A city that claims to value families cannot knowingly introduce a facility that makes families feel unsafe in their own homes.

We are demanding that this council uses its authority to block this project by any means at your disposal and place the opposition of residents clearly and unmistakably on the public record.

No ice concentration camps in surprise.

Let me be clear.

All power to the people, abolish ice.

Hey, my name is Jonathan Cook.

I live off of Grand and Deer Valley.

Just recently purchased my home, not next to an ICE warehouse.

And it's very disappointing to find that that is the future plans for surprise.

And uh my neighborhood is a new up and coming neighborhood they're building.

And uh I often wake up in the morning to see people building houses next to me.

And you know, they're not uh like most of us here are up there sitting on there uh on the chairs.

Uh we're white skinned.

Um we don't have to worry about getting picked up just because we look a little bit different, but you know, when I look outside my window every morning and seven days a week and see who's building my community, it's often people who have different colored skin.

And to think that our city is gonna be the hot spot for a warehouse to store them all in or whatever the plan is for it.

It's very upsetting to know that that is the future of my community.

Um the street I live on has all families of all colors, all backgrounds, and we all get along just fine.

Um I am very um against the the warehouse being used for that, and I hope that all of you that have a voice that can use it to speak up, just like the community that is coming here tonight to tell you their concerns, that you can take your voices to um voice your concerns and make something happen, whether it slows it down.

Um we need to think about the future of surprise and where we're gonna head.

What's our what's the goal?

Um thank you for your time.

I'd like to call a few more names.

Adriana Garcia, Andrea Cervantes, Rebecca Murray, Connie Adams, William Murphy.

Thank you.

Good evening, sir.

Good evening, Walter Thorndike.

Uh Mr.

Mayor, Counsel, uh I'm a resident of Phoenix, and as your neighbor, I'd like to share a story uh from a local paper in Coldwater, Michigan, dated to the 9th of April 1945.

It tells how the US Army under General Patton, the U.S.

Third Army came onto what you might call a detention center just outside the village of Ordorf, Germany.

The U.S.

Army brought the leading citizens of Ordruff to tour the facility.

Which turned out to be part of the Book and Wall network of concentration camps.

A U.S.

Army colonel told the German civilians who viewed the scenes without muttering a word that they were to blame.

One of the Germans replied that what happened in the camp was, quote, done by a few people, and you cannot blame us all.

And the American, who could have been any one of our grandfathers, said done by those that the German people chose to lead them and all are responsible.

The morning after the tour, the mayor of Ordorf killed himself.

And maybe he did not know the full extent of the outrages that were committed in his community, but he knew enough.

And we don't know exactly how ICE will use this warehouse, but we know enough.

Maybe he felt like a victim.

Maybe he would have said this site was not subject to local zoning.

What could I do?

But I think when he reflected on the suffering that occurred at this camp just outside of town, that those words would have sounded hollow even to him.

Because in his heart, he knew as we do, that we are all responsible for what happens in our community.

And I urge the council to take action to stop or stall, or at the barest minimum, to think creatively about how to exercise oversight over this proposed ICE facility.

Thank you.

Good evening, sir.

Good evening.

Uh mayor and council members.

My name is Rich Manellus.

I live near the intersection of Grand and Sunrise.

And I'm here to talk briefly about my concerns about this ICE facility and to do my best to increase your motivation to do whatever is necessary, as many uh my previous speakers have said, to find a way to get rid of this uh construction.

It's uh immoral.

Unamerican.

ICE since uh Trump too has focused its methods uh by disrespecting the rule of law, and uh which is terrible, and even more terrible, they treat humans uh with no compassion, no humanity, even if they're no matter if they're members of uh of our of our citizenry or immigrants.

This is this is uh unacceptable.

It's un-American.

And so uh you know, all I could say to you is that do your best, go beyond what you think you could do, find a way to uh decrease the probability or eliminate the building of this other institution.

Uh you know, a comment I learned later on in early life.

Where there's a will, there's a way.

I hope you have the will.

Find the way.

Uh, and even citizens could help you.

Form committees if necessary, you gather evidence.

We gotta we've got to get rid of this.

Thank you very much for your time.

I'd like to call a few more names before we start again.

Tammy Hall.

Dana Strickland.

Mary Hendrick, Sarah Cleland, Jason Wentz.

Thank you.

Hello, Mayor, Council, and city staff.

My name is Adriana Garcia, and I'm a longtime resident of the West Valley and a member of Organized Power and Numbers.

I watched in horror, like many of us.

The constant violence that ICE has inflicted on communities and on people, regardless of their immigration status.

The recent murder of Alex Predi, an ICU nurse, is a clear result of ICE escalating violence.

Let's be clear.

The only ones who win by having this concentration camp in our community are mega corporations that the administration has given sweetheart deals to, like the Rockefeller Group.

They received 70 million dollars, 70 million of our taxpayer dollars with no transparency.

The federal government is telling the residents of Surprise and this governing body that they don't care what this community actually needs.

The federal government did not consult with you nor give you notice of its plans.

The mayor and council should know and have a say on what happens in the city.

That is what you were elected to do.

You know better than Washington what's happening here and what's good for your city.

Bringing a detention to the detention center to the doorstep doorstep of students and residents is a danger to this community.

I doubt that the young people, like the ones who presented today in the nearby high schools, want a detention center that might hold their friends or family members in it.

Mayor, council, and city manager, you all have a moral responsibility and a fiduciary duty to not allow this detention center in your city.

The federal government's property will be tax exempt, will be costly to your city through the infrastructure changes needed, and will be a drain on resources, including fire and police.

Cities across the country, both Republican and Democrat-led, are recognizing the danger of these detention facilities and barring them from opening up and denying permitting and utilities.

Surprise can take action too, like other folks here have said.

Thank you for your time.

Good evening.

Hello, mayor council and city staff.

My name is Andrea Luna, and I'm a member with organized power and numbers.

I'm here tonight with working people who keep our cities running.

People from different backgrounds are gathered here in the city of Surprise to deliver one clear message.

This facility must never be used as a detention center.

And to add insult to injury, it's our own taxpayer hands that are funding this human suffering.

If this detention center is built, that would mean 1,500 people who live, work, worship, and raise families in Arizona could be held here out of sight, behind walls, under an agency with a record of abuse, neglect, and wrongful detention.

When corporations proffer from ICE's violence, they are complicit in what follows.

Shame on you, Rockefeller Group, for putting people in danger just to make money off our backs.

And let's talk about what happens for surprises.

What does this mean for us?

This warehouse is close to Daizar High School and nearby elementary schools.

Having ICE presence will create fear and disrupt living and really draw back, you know, the usage of those parks and events you all just shared.

It will also strain city resources when we should be investing in our community.

No one is safer because the detention center moves next door.

And this is a question of local governance.

If the federal government can override surprise laws, what does that mean for local control?

You're gonna let the federal government just do that to you.

It is not enough for you to say that this is out of your control.

Your residents deserve a clear position from this council.

Your responsibility is to the people of surprise.

You must publicly denounce the use of this facility for immigrant detention.

Working people built this city.

We weren't allowed to become a site of detention and trauma for someone else's profit.

We must put people over profit, workers over billionaires.

Thank you.

Good evening, sir.

Good evening, Mayor City Council.

May begin by saying my name is William Murphy.

I reside with my wife at 15626, North 159th Lane, Surprise Arizona.

That is in Congressional District 9.

Legislative District 29.

City of Surprise District, Council 5.

Not the biggest, just the best, Jack.

So came here tonight to say mayor like you.

I took an oath of office many, many years ago.

You see by this global anchor that I have on my hat.

Nobody has removed me from that oath of office.

In my lifetime, I have dealt with most or been around and introduced to most police agencies across the country, including Secret Service.

What I have never had to deal with.

Well, let me just pause for a moment and say when I came to the city hall tonight, surprised police department was on the front door.

How did I know that?

They had their badges, big smiles, blue uniforms.

Come on in.

Welcome to democracy in action.

But what I have never had to deal with was a black SUV pulling up beside me.

Somebody in something that looked like that was a Halloween outfit.

Jump out and say, I'm a law enforcement officer.

I say, oh yeah, well, where's your badge?

He doesn't have one.

The city of surprise does not need nor want ice in this community.

We don't need them.

We have a fine police department.

We have federal partners.

I'm really disappointed at the lack of transparency for my federal partners.

I live in, as I told you, Condest Congressional District 9.

I have contacted my representative and got no answer.

Frustration, frustration, frustration.

And it just appalling to have honorable Purple Heart, discharged veterans, Purple Heart recipients, honorable DD 214, snatched up and deported.

That don't bother me.

You know, I'm at they won't do that to me.

But this last incident that happened in Minnesota, and I'll be brief, Mr.

Mayor.

Uh caused me to pause and say, what would I do if I saw something like that happen?

I've been known to get involved.

Would I get involved again?

So I have a quick question.

I'll sit down.

You guys, all you folks on that panel and the city staff know your job.

I don't have to tell you what it is.

My question to you is what can we do to help?

What can we do to help to make sure the word goes out of this place tonight?

Not here, not now, not ever.

Ice, no IS detention, no gestapo, none of that BS in the city of surprise.

I'd like to call a few more names before you start.

Hold on one second, Chrissy.

Thank you for your service, sir.

Sir.

Thank you for your service.

Thank you, Mayor.

Thank each and everyone to serve.

Thank you.

She's already some names.

Go ahead.

Ronald Beldner.

Tony Rosenberger.

Shelly Smith.

Sebastian Deportillo.

Evelyn Castillo.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Good evening, Mayor and Council members.

My name's Rebecca Murray.

I do not live in Surprise, but I am very close to the border, so I feel that this directly impacts me as well.

Additionally, I am a Arizona local.

I've lived here for all 41 years of my life in the Phoenix metro area.

And I take great pride in that.

Excuse me, I'm so sorry.

Now is a perfect time to take a stand and show communities you support that you truly support their best interests and safety, that you won't idly stand by as fascism digs its claws deeper into our society, and that you will do everything in your power to protect the people who have entrusted you with this power.

If nothing else moves you, remember the economic hit that Arizona took after 10 B SB 1070, this will be much worse.

Thank you for your time.

Good evening, ma'am.

Uh good evening, mayor, council members, and fellow residents.

Um, my name is Cammy Hall, and my cross streets are grand and reams.

I've lived in our community for about seven years.

I'm here tonight because I care deeply about the future of our city and the quality of life for everyone who calls it home.

I am here to address the proposed ICE detention center.

My family and I do not want a detention facility in surprise.

Everyday families and children navigate these areas, and without proper safety measures, we're putting them at unnecessary risk.

I am concerned about the lack of water and sewer cap capacity to transform a warehouse into a detention site.

We need to require transparency about how this facility will operate and affect our community.

This city has been growing beautifully.

I have been proud to live here and proud to invite others to enjoy and experience what this community has to offer.

I det a detention center is not a business that will stay and help our community.

It will not bring people to help our community grow and better itself.

This type of business will only bring us down with negative views and policies that breed violence and tear families apart.

This is not a business with a positive future.

The type of business, this type of business has a terrible track record.

The ACLU, American Civil Liberties Union, report that detained immigrants detail physical abuse, sexual abuse, medical neglect, and intimidation to self-deport.

Deaths are reported at these facilities.

Can we support a business?

And yes, it is a big business.

Literally caged in our backyard.

Cages.

Can we refine require uh adequate adequate food, adequate water, adequate medical care, mental health care.

They should be allowed religious counsel.

We should require citizen representatives to have access to the detainees to assure their needs are met as humans.

Detainees should be allowed access to lawyers and family.

They should be allowed phone calls at the time of detention and of release.

They just dump people out on the street.

Could be 120.

They should be allowed phone calls.

They should be allowed work release if they're in for more than 72 hours.

No call, no show.

You get fired.

Your family doesn't have an income.

They need to be accounted for, no disappearances.

I believe our local government has a responsibility to act in every way.

They have available authority.

According to the national news reports, members of communities are being erroneously detained.

People with citizenship and thank you very much.

I believe we can do better.

Ma'am, can I have your name, please?

Ma'am, can I have your name, please?

Cammy Hall.

Thank you.

Good evening, ma'am.

Evening.

Good evening.

Good evening, Mayor and Council members.

My name's Mary Hendricks.

I've lived in surprise for eight years.

This is hard.

I don't know what to do with this.

This makes me terrified every day.

And I listening to everybody else speak so eloquently.

Very good points.

And please listen to them.

Do anything and everything you can to not bring this to our community.

Sorry, excuse me.

It is absolutely terrifying.

Even going to work seeing a dark vehicle.

Blacked out.

I work in areas where there's high populations of all kinds of immigrants.

They all make this country beautiful.

I'm just terrified.

And I don't know what to do anymore.

Please do anything and everything you can to not bring this to our community.

We won't survive it.

It's not good for us.

Thank you.

I'd like to call a few more names.

Paula and Clara with Gary Allison.

Anthony Robinson.

Nancy Blazing Game, Jacqueline Jimenez.

Thank you.

Good evening, ma'am.

Thank you.

Mr.

Mayor and Council members, thank you for your time.

My name is Shelley Smith.

I'm a 10-year resident of Grand near Sunrise and Bell.

I'm here tonight due to the recent purchase by DHS of the Warehouse and Dysert, of course.

While I understand that our corrupt federal government chose not to communicate with local government about this purchase, and that the supremacy clause in the Constitution may apply, I also believe that now is not the time to rapidly raise our hands in the air and surrender.

And that's kind of how I took your statement from the city as a big surrender.

We can't stand by and let the ice thuggery into our community.

So the city must take all actions that are within its power.

They can't operate a facility without sewer.

What about environmental impacts?

Has a study been completed?

It's time to be creative and to be leaders.

Does the city have leverage over vendor contracts for private agencies that may be contracted to run the facility?

You all know better than I do what your areas of leverage are, and I ask you to use those.

The bottom line, please stand behind your citizens.

We don't want this in our community.

And as a city council, if you don't do everything in your power to stop it, you're all complicit in supporting the Trump regime's violent deportation processes.

They are not just detaining violent criminals.

They are detaining many hardworking citizens who live and work amongst us and have no criminal records.

A felon president is behind the violence and murder of U.S.

citizens by ICE agents.

And this facility puts us all in danger, including the students in the nearby schools.

So I have just a moment more, and I just want to thank the local um surprise police department for helping us stay safe during the protests on Saturdays.

Thank you very much.

Good evening, sir.

Um good evening, uh, mayor and council.

Um thank you for allowing this space to happen on here from your constituents.

My name is uh Sebastian del Portillo.

Uh, I'm an organizer with organized power and numbers.

We have members all over the valley, including a lot of members here in surprise.

Members who are appalled that this warehouse will be used as uh an actual concentration camp for working families who are being scapegoated and targeted by this fascist administration.

This council right here has the responsibility to do everything in its power so that this concentration camp does not open.

Working class immigrant families are being kidnapped, brutalized, and they're being killed.

Also that companies can profit from the system.

The billionaire class is the real beneficiary from these state-sanctioned killings, these abductions, um, these assaults all over the country.

That's why there were over a thousand people here today protesting outside, really enraged, and they're speaking to you, and they're speaking out right now.

The seller of this warehouse, Rockefeller Group, they sold it for a whopping 70 million dollars.

They got a cash payment from DHS.

That was our money.

Our money is being used.

Let's really think about this to imprison innocent working people.

Not to mention all the tons of millions of dollars that are gonna go to the contractors to run this this concentration camp.

There is no public process, no public input, no consideration with the residents, obviously, um, on this project.

It's gonna be a huge cost to the city and its resources, and it's gonna allow and allowing this to move forward will just put residents at risk, not only because it's gonna suck up resources, increase wait times for first responders and emergencies, but also all the shit that ICE is gonna create in the community.

It's only a matter of time until ICE residents here are brutalized by ICE.

All of us here have had to bear witness to all of the murders online, which have been horrible for all of us to watch.

This agency should be nowhere near our communities, nowhere near our youth and our children.

And in fact, it shouldn't exist at all.

So the demands are pretty clear.

You need to publicly denounce the use of this concentration camp.

The city of surprise and its attorney must outline their position regarding whether the federal government has the authority to override city zoning laws.

And while you may not have all been involved in the purchase, not doing anything about this will make you complicit in fit in facilitating this unimaginable cruelty that's gonna go on there.

So, in the most literal way right now, doing something to stop the to stop this is up to you.

Thank you.

Good evening.

Good evening, Mayor and City Council members.

My name is Evelyn Castile.

I'm also an organizer with organized power numbers.

Uh we have many members who are rooted in this community, and they, along with their neighbors, are deeply alarmed and outraged by what is happening here in surprise.

The sale of this warehouse to ICE for immigrant detention is not a neutral business decision.

It is an immoral one.

And it sends a clear message that profit is being placed above human dignity and above the well-being of this community.

Like you've heard numerous times, this facility is dangerously close to a local high school and nearby elementary schools.

Children should be thinking about their dreams and future, not growing up in the shadow of a detention center.

A permanent ICE presence threatens student safety, disrupts learning, and exposes children to the traumatic and potentially violent ICE encounters.

That alone should make this development unacceptable.

Community members are already struggling.

They are worried about the lack of housing, rising rents, inaccessible health care, and the daily reality of economic hardship.

Adding an ICE detention center does nothing to address these needs and problems.

It deepens them.

It diverts public attention and resources towards incarceration, while our communities' real needs go unmet.

If you allow this to proceed, you are choosing complicity.

We demand that this council publicly denounce immigrant detention and that you stand with the people of surprise, not corporations, not ICE.

I'm sure we're all exhausted and tired, but it doesn't matter.

Because if nothing is done, uh, we will be back, and we will continue to show up.

So choose people over profit and the billionaires.

Good evening, sir.

Thank you for this opportunity and your attention.

My name is Tony Rosenberger.

I've enjoyed retiring in Surprise.

Uh close to the cross streets, uh, North Stadium Way and Bell.

What Putin does with despotism, Trump does with corruption.

We don't want his corrupt ice.

We don't want his detention gulag.

Surprise.

I retired to pickball courts, swimming pools, and a gulag.

Thanks.

Good evening, ma'am.

Good evening.

My name is Dana Strickland.

I've lived in Surprise since 2009.

I'm a disabled veteran, a mental health professional, and a two small business.

I'm speaking today with an urgency and conviction that all of you oppose the proposed ICE concentration camp because that's what it is.

Not just because of the proximity to schools, parks, children's activities, and all of the things that define community and that we enjoy with our families.

But because across the country, ICE facilities, very loose air quotes and enforcement actions have not been isolated policy decisions.

They've produced documented deaths, agregious human rights violations and trauma to the people in custody and the families that they're being torn away from.

In 2025, more than 30 people that we know of, and I attached a PDF with their names and the circumstances of their deaths in my request to speak.

So you have it.

So more than 30 people that we know of died in these camps.

And that doesn't include the people who were kidnapped and taken to Alligator Alcatraz because we don't have that information.

So these are the known deaths just in 2025.

It was the deadliest year for ice on record in at least a decade.

These deaths are tied to systemic racism, abuse and neglect, inadequate medical care, poor inhumane conditions, and lack of transparency.

These are not accidents in any way, shape, or form.

In multiple cities, ice operations, including a raise and raids and enforcement near schools and homes have fractured the sense of safety that education playing communities should provide.

Schools are supposed to be safe havens.

These policies and just the outright fascist actions of the government are upending our communities.

And they shouldn't have to be.

Educators and mental health professionals have reported that immigration enforcement centers near the schools creates anxiety, depression, disrupted learning for students whose families live in fear of detention and separation.

Communities that have lived in detention centers nearby describe a chilling psychological effect with constant reminders of families being ripped apart, fears of being killed in the streets.

And it should not happen.

I have more, but what I will say is that not just for the sake of our children, our communities, and our families, but for the moral integrity of this city in this state.

I am strongly urging you to outright reject this proposal to stop it from happening and to use every bit of your power and privilege to do it.

Know that we're paying attention and that ultimately you will all be held accountable for what side of history you choose to be on.

Before you start, ma'am, I'm gonna call some more names.

Okay.

Thank you for your service as well, ma'am.

Elena Thomas, Jeffrey Smith, Brittany Burbach, Janita Hawley, Roxana Catlett.

Thank you.

Good evening.

I know you must be tired, and I appreciate you listening to the mayor, the vice mayor, and the city council members.

I just recently retired from teaching.

And my husband and I, he taught high school English and speech and debate, and I taught kindergarten.

And in June, we moved away from Bullhead City in the Mojave Desert to live where we believed we could experience a beautiful garden city.

We crawled out of the dust and the scorching wind, hot moon to live in paradise.

And now we have this Trump army concentration camp built in our paradise.

It reminds me of a cattle slaughterhouse that was being considered in Junction City, Kansas, another beautiful garden city.

And the people fought against it because they knew if they didn't, they would reek like the cattle yards of Fort Worth and Dodge City.

And it reminds me of Auschwitz, quite frankly.

We are all very kind people.

We're all very considerate.

We help our communities, we love each other.

We've been listening to people after people, express their love for each other and for this community.

And the people of this tiny Polish city called I can't pronounce it, O S W I E C I M, they loved their parks and recreation too.

And in 1939, it was annexed by the Nazi Germany, and it was name was changed to Auschwitz.

Those people, although they were aware of the network of concentration camps being built close by and in their town, and they saw the smoke every single day.

They choose to look away.

And after seven million Jews and others deemed unwanted, material marginalized and different were confined and disappeared.

The people of that beautiful garden city were forced to look at what they had ignored.

I have a very good friend named Eva Schloss who survived Birkinell, and she was the stepsister of Anne Frank, and she spent her life warning the world that this could happen again, and it's happening again.

I will not ignore this detention center and this camp that is going to sit in our garden city and kill it.

The city council gave doesn't have to give them water.

You don't have to give them electricity or air conditioning or sewage.

Just make it a hot box that no one can work in, and they'll go away.

If the current administation administration, excuse me, needs a large building to contain people and separate them from their loved ones, they've got a huge 400 million dollar ballroom to put them in.

They bought, they bought this Trunch Trump concentration camp, not for 70 million dollars, but for 30 pieces of silver.

Thank you, ma'am.

Thank you.

Ma'am, can I have your name, please?

Ma'am.

Ma'am, can I have your name, please?

Okay, thank you.

Sure, K-A-N-C-L-E-R-O-W Ice.

All right.

Good evening, sir.

Good evening, uh, mayor and and uh city council members.

Uh I've I've been watching uh these speakers, and uh so far I've noticed that there were only two that were for this facility.

So that should tell you something.

Um this warehouse was purchased by the Department of Homeland Security on January 23rd for 17, 70 million dollars at the expense of taxpayers without informing the city of this transaction.

This lawless federal government made this purchase in secret in order to avoid public scrutiny.

This is a prison like processing center with schools and parks nearby, placed in residential area.

No public hearing until now, after the purchase has already been made.

If this goes through, it will reduce property values, local businesses will suffer, and children will stay home from school for fear of them and their parents being arrested and separated and detained or deported.

We have all been seeing the lawlessness and arrest with no due process in other states by these masked wearing thugs, smashing windows and pulling innocent American civil civilians out of their cars with impunity, terrorizing cities with rubber bullets and tear gas.

If not already, we are becoming a county under siege and authoritarian rule.

Especially right now in Minnesota for the past three months.

My heart goes out to the families and friends of Renee Good and Alex Pritty, who are gunned down by ICE agents who somehow think they have special immunity.

This is what we're up against.

This year, this year, three 3,800 children have been abducted across the country and detained.

No more funds for DHS impeach Christy No.

These are excerpts from a speech by Chase Iron Eyes, an attorney of the Lakota tribe speaking during a hearing.

Uh the impact at the impact of ice on Minnesota.

What was described by Senator Dibble was a declar declaration of war on American people, American families.

What we are facing is an attempt overthrow of constitutional order.

The integrity and sanctity of the United States Constitution is being overrun outside the scope of the law, outside the scope of constant constitutional authority.

The good people of Minnesota and the whole country deserve better.

This is this is the gravity of the weight and the magnitude of a very live controversy.

A constitutional crisis that is disturbing the peace of all Minnesotans.

Right now, this is no small matter.

Thank you, sir.

This is a seizure of constitutional order.

Can I have your name, please?

Okay.

Can you say your name, please?

Can you say your name, please?

I'm sorry.

Have your name, please.

Gary Allison.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you.

Good evening.

Good evening.

My name is Jacqueline Jimenez.

I live in District 5.

Um, first of all, I want to thank you all for your time and your attentiveness and engagement.

This issue is critical for my community.

My statement will echo the sentiment of the room, but I need to add my voice.

My parents moved this to surprise over 20 years ago because they believed that this was the best place to raise a family.

Since then, my siblings and I have started our own families here, too.

We own property and we're small business owners where we work as a family.

Probably serving our communities for the past 15 years.

We have deep roots here.

Surprise has changed so much in the last 20 years with expansion of retail and housing, replacing so many of the crop fields which immigrants picked, which, if you still drive by, you can still see them today.

Today, our small city has the spotlight for wrong reasons, and all the eyes are on you.

You can tell us you weren't consulted or notified about the ICE facility, but now you know.

Now we all know, and it's time for action.

You can't just say that there is nothing you can do.

It's your duty to protect our community and use any and all means necessary available to you to fight for our rights and for the peace of our community.

Many great suggestions were offered tonight.

The impact this will have will be devastating, and our community will forever be changed.

No federal agency should be allowed to operate in secrecy, especially not in our backyards.

You can't just say that there is nothing you can do.

We will all be looking to you for deeds, not words from everyone.

What I do take comfort is seeing the turnout today.

Thank you.

Madam Kirk, are there any more names to read?

Yes, let me read a few more, please.

Alexia Isaiah, Dania Duran, Thomas Skipper, Vince Mendez, Amanda Kaminskis, Yavet Servin.

Thank you.

Good evening, ma'am.

Go ahead.

Good evening.

Hello, Mayor and Council.

My name's Brittany Burbach.

I'm a lifelong Arizonian West Valley resident.

I'm live in Peoria.

Um, but my children attend Woodlands Elite Cheer Gym.

That's directly within 500 feet of this concentration camp.

And I'm here with a lot of other moms to not only voice my opposition for this facility in general, but to also bring your attention to the severe and foreseeable risk that this facility poses to our children.

Um, not to mention the schools that are all directly around there, but again, we are within 500 feet.

We walk out our door, and there's the building right there.

And we know that that based on the rest of the nation, ICE tactics.

We know that they deploy tear gas and pepper spray and long-range acoustic devices that can permanently damage hearing.

Though our children are directly within, we are not in a safe zone.

So if I gets into a scrap with somebody with a protester with whomever they deem unsafe, our children are directly.

This is a direct and foreseeable risk that the city has an obligation to protect against.

You should be ashamed of yourselves to not be able to provide answers to us today, to your constituents as to what this facility is being used for.

The we don't know what it's going to be used for is unacceptable.

Tell me that the mayor of surprise cannot get someone from DHS on the phone to say what this facility is going to be used for and to issue an appropriate statement.

Citizens, immigrants alike.

And this is unacceptable and despicable.

And history will remember where you stood, what you did and what you didn't do.

This isn't about politics.

This isn't about this is about basic human decency, morals, and especially we listened to a prayer at the beginning of this council meeting.

That to me, to sit up here and say that you know you're gonna follow Christ's teachings or you're a Christian, and this is how we're gonna treat people.

I don't care where you're from, I don't care how you came here, I don't care.

Any of that is deplorable.

And it is your duty, you swore an oath when you took office to the constitution to uphold the constitution.

And we know that ICE is actively violating the constitution.

They said the constitution, the fourth amendment doesn't apply.

So everybody in Arizona in general, the Fourth Amendment wouldn't apply to over half of the citizens here because they look like they might be here illegally.

I'm asking you to take a stand.

Thank you.

Good evening, ma'am.

Good evening, Mayor and members of the city council.

My name is Janessa Holly Roebuck.

I'm here as an indigenous American from Minnesota and a proud member of the White Earth Nation of Ojibwe.

I'm a parent, a new resident of Surprise, and someone who chose the city very intentionally.

As an Indigenous American, I do have to say I find it rich that we just sat and listened to budgets and the AAC telling us about our aging energy infrastructure for a city that is now set to allow a facility to operate here where we treat people without human dignity and further strain that infrastructure in the process.

My mother still lives in St.

Paul, Minnesota, and she's now staying with me indefinitely because her home now feels too unsafe thanks to ICE agents.

My family recently moved here because Surprise has a reputation for being safe, family focused, and transparent.

We chose this community specifically because it felt like a place where children can grow up without fear, where parents feel confident dropping their kids off at a school and sports, like my child's cheer gym right next door, Woodlands Elite.

That's why the recent purchase by ICE of this large warehouse is so alarming.

This facility is located close to homes, schools, and youth spaces.

And yet residents were not informed, consulted, or given the opportunity before this to voice our concerns before the purchase was made.

A decision of this magnitude should never happen without community input.

For families like mine, this isn't abstract.

This is about the daily sense of safety we feel, driving our kids to practice, walking our neighborhoods, and putting down our roots here.

Introducing a large federal detention operation so close to children's spaces fundamentally changes how the area feels, and that matters.

So tonight I'm asking for action.

I respectfully urge this council to formally request full transparency from ICE regarding the intended use of this facility.

Further, immediately stop the implementation of whatever it is that they have planned, because I can tell you right now, our community does not have room for the fear, hate, and division that this concentration camp will undoubtedly bring.

Leadership means standing up for the families who trusted this city to protect their quality of life.

I moved here because I believe surprise put safety first.

I'm asking you tonight to prove that trust was well placed by standing with residents, with parents, and with our children.

Please stand on the right side of history.

Thank you.

I'd like to call a few more names before you start.

Michael Owe.

Diane Bernick.

Or Venric, I apologize.

Nathalie Mendez Hernandez.

Mark Camarena.

William Oye.

Thank you.

Good evening.

Hello.

My name is Alexia Isais.

I am a history teacher, a proud Mexican American, and a member of the Party for Socialism Liberation.

I'm standing here today in pride in my identity in the face of concentration camps being built in our backyards.

And I want to point out something that this meeting for the first hour was run as business as usual.

And this is not a business as usual kind of meeting.

So it was not the right thing to do.

It's like what I tell my students, time and place, or read the room.

As we speak, more than 400 protesters were outside of these chambers chanting against ICE in the proposed facility.

And we already know by now how many millions were spent on this facility and to make it run is going to cost even more.

What about building schools?

What about making sure that my students have pens and pencils and the things that they need to be able to actually go about their day?

They don't have those things.

Why was my last school shut down?

Why are we trying to build ICE facilities in the face of our crumbling infrastructure, in the face of crumbling education, and every other thing that we have that people need to survive in this community?

This body should be concerned with those types of things.

It should be standing with its constituents, fighting back against this parasitic regime that is violating our rights and against billionaires who are dividing us with lies that immigrants are why grocery prices are high, why hospitals are shutting down, why schools are shutting down.

When that's not the case, it's these rich people who are making those decisions.

These are our neighbors.

Some of my own family fears going to grocery stores.

And if we get any say in it, the mothers, the fathers, the students, the stakeholders of this community in this room, we will not allow our community or any community to be turned into this warped reality of terror, death, destruction, and chaos in our streets.

We have to fight back against ICE and the Trump administration.

There shouldn't even be consideration to allow people to be dragged through the streets, shot in the face, not on our dime, and not without a fight.

Just a few days ago, tens of thousands of Phoenix residents marched through the streets of the Arizona State Capitol.

There were so many people.

It was hard to keep track of just how many were coming through.

We chanted ice off our streets.

We chanted on and on and on.

There was a diversity of people.

I've seen a diversity of people here today.

Young, old, people who are teachers, people who have different uh, you know, who are in different professions.

That is something that is that I look at as a uh as hope and optimistic as an optimistic point.

And if you imagine a facility built here, expect the chance of those tens of thousands to be echoing through the walls of these very council chambers, to be hundreds, to be thousands, because if you don't stand up to ice, we will.

The energy is here and is one that I fear uh has to be talked about and has to be uh expressed.

So before I go, I just want to chant real quick with the rest of the audience.

Thank you, ma'am.

We want justice, we want peace.

We want peace.

We want ice off our streets.

Thank you, man.

We want ice off our free.

Good evening.

Hello, everyone.

My name is Dania.

I'm also a member of the party for socialism and liberation.

I hikey forgot what I was gonna say, so I'm just gonna speak from the heart.

Um, I was out here with the the 500 people that were outside and chanting over and over and over and over again ice off our streets, ice out of Arizona.

The people here today are here for one reason alone to say this.