All right, good evening, everyone.

I will call this uh City Council and Local Contract Review Board to order.

And before we begin tonight's meeting, I want to make a moment, uh, take a moment to acknowledge that many people in our community are feeling anxious and unsettled about by what we are seeing and hearing about federal immigration enforcement activities, both here in our region and across the country.

Um, regardless of where people may fall on national immigration policy, Tiger is home to families, workers, business owners, students, and neighbors from many, many backgrounds.

Everyone deserves to feel safe going about their daily lives, sending their kids to school, going to work, and participating in community life.

The City of Tiger does not set federal immigration policy, and therefore tonight's meeting is not the place to debate those policies.

But it is appropriate for us as your local government to recognize the concern many residents are experiencing and to affirm our commitment to treating everyone who interacts with the city with professionalism, respect, and dignity.

For those who wish to express their views, our country has a long tradition of exercising First Amendment rights, peaceful expression, civics engagement, and respectful dialogue are essential to a healthy democracy.

And we encourage people to do so lawfully and safely.

At the state and federal level, there are upcoming opportunities as well.

This Friday, Senator Jeff Merkley is holding a town hall in Beaverton, just across the street from Tiger.

State Representative Sue Ricky Smith is also holding a town hall this Saturday.

Information about these events will be shared through city's uh social media channels, and you can contact their office directly for details.

In conclusion, if you are feeling worried or uncertain, please know that city leadership and staff remain focused on delivering essential services, maintaining public safety, and supporting a community where people look out for one another.

With that, we'll proceed with tonight's agenda.

Councillor Anderson.

Here.

Councillor Gaducy.

Use Councillor Halleck.

Here.

Mayor who?

Here.

Councillor Robbins?

Councilor Schlack.

Here.

Councillor Shaw?

Here.

Council President Wolf.

Here.

Here.

Would you please stand on and for pledge of allegiance?

Council member and city staff, do you have any non-agenda items?

None from us, Mayor.

Seeing none, let's move on to public comments.

While public comments now dialogue, uh either I or staff will follow up to address the issue brought forward in this comment.

Thank you.

The calling number is 503-966-4101.

And those wishing to comment should call now to get into the queue.

Anyone present wanting to comment should sign up on the public comment form at the front of the room.

So we receive no comment, uh written public comments by Monday noon deadlines.

And for in-person, I don't see anybody signing up.

So anybody here?

None.

So let's move on to phone and video comment.

Uh, Mr.

Vann, are there any callers in the queue for phone or video testimony?

No callers, Mayor.

Thank you.

Uh so let's move on to city manager report.

Uh acting city manager Trish will give a brief report.

Good evening.

Good evening.

Thanks very much, Mayor.

Council.

If I could have the slide, please.

Thanks, Robert.

I'm pleased to share an important announcement for the benefit of the community.

The Tiger Public Library Services will be moving to a temporary location here at Tiger City Hall, starting Friday, February 6th, ahead after the uh library's building temporarily closes for construction beginning on February 1st.

This is to install the new HVAC or the air processing units on top of the library.

It's part of how we are updating that facility.

I'd like to let community know that Express Library Services will be available at Tiger City Hall during this closure from 10 a.m.

till 6 p.m.

Friday through Sunday and include story times at 10 15 in the morning, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, as well as a selection of library events, small browsing collection of items for checkout, access to Wi-Fi, computers, and limited printing, technology help, and assistance with library accounts.

In addition, our library teammates will be available on the phone every day, 10 a.m.

to 6 p.m.

at their usual number, which is 503 684 6537.

And you can also get information online if you go to Tigered-Or.gov slash library.

If you have questions leading up to that event, you can stop by our library anytime or ask anyone in the city, and we'll be happy to point you in the right direction.

Patrons can also visit any of the Washington County Library branches.

And we look forward to reopening the library for services on or before May 1st.

That's my report.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Acting City Manager Trish.

Counselor, do you have any question or comments?

Seeing none, let's move on to the next item on our agenda, which is consent agenda.

The consent agenda is used for routine items.

Information on each item is available on the city's website in the packet for this meeting.

These items may be enacted in one motion without separate discussion.

Council members may request that an item be removed from by motion for discussion and separate action.

Tonight we have three consent items.

All our contract, one for on call engineerslash architecture slash related services, one for on call water system engineer slash hydro hydrogeologist of record, and one contract amendment for bond council services.

Mayor, I move to approve the consent agenda as presented.

Is there a second?

Is there any discussion?

Mayor who this is Council President Wolf.

And I know on item A, it covers a tremendous uh broad spectrum, but I was just hoping um to have a just to even a range to give us a sense of the scale of um the approval of the five year, and that's all I was asking for, but I don't want to poll it.

Thank you.

Okay, so we have um our engineer project team online, I believe, to answer those questions.

Good evening, Mayor and City Council.

Uh the range for these projects are typically up to 250,000 per task order.

However, that is not a limit to the contract.

So there can be multiple task orders issued against each contract.

Um past practice, they've ranged from $2,000 up to 250,000.

And it's all budgeted through our capital improvement plan budgets.

Um they are for up to five years, that is with multiple extensions that can be granted to get to that five years.

Uh so I can go into more details if you have more specifics you would like us to share.

But that is the range.

It's up to 250,000 per project or per task order.

Um thank you, Joe.

And and I think it's fine.

I think it's just the scale and then recognizing it goes through the capital uh budget process.

So I'm fine, and thank you, Mayor, for asking for allowing me to ask the question.

So thank you, Joe.

Thank you, Joe and Council President Wolf.

And uh before we uh vote on it, I have a short disclosure as well.

So before we proceed to the vote on the bond council selection, I want to make a brief disclosure for transparency.

Earlier in my career, I work at the same law firm as several of the bank attorneys at the firm under consideration.

However, I do not have any current relationship with the firm, and I also have no personal financial interest in this matter.

And this prior professional connection does not does not affect my ability to participate impartially in discussion.

I'm just sharing this solely in the interest of transparency.

So we have a motion to approve the consent agenda and a second.

Um is there any further discussion?

Seeing none, no those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Those opposed.

The consent agenda is adopted by a unanimous vote of the council.

So let's move on to the next uh item agenda item, which is presentation of external financial audit by Baker Tilly, formerly Moss Adams and assistant uh finance director at McCluck and uh engagement review and principal Keith Simonvik from Baker Tilly will give the report.

Good evening.

Good evening, Mayor Who, City Councilors.

Uh nice to be here.

Thank you.

Um Mr.

Simovic should be here shortly.

Um yeah, I've got a little bit of an update for you beforehand.

Um so while we're waiting for um Keith, um I'm here tonight to assist in presenting the 2025 audit results for the city.

Um before we get started, um, I wanted to point out that, like last year, this audit was completed timely and we filed with the state prior to the 1231 deadline.

So again, we're still uh very, very compliant with that in that respect.

Um we were able to do this um while implementing the utility billing module and also the new GASBY 101 related to compensated absences.

Um, if you remember, there were two best practice recommendations suggested by Baker Tilly last year.

Just want to remind everyone that we don't really forget about those and take them very seriously.

Um, one of those being to establish an allowance for doubtful accounts related to utility billing.

Um that is a best practice.

And so this year we identified uh certain accounts that we deemed uncollectible and have actually disclosed and recognized that in the financial statements.

So that is an ongoing process.

We will revisit that every year based on the health of our aging and uh continue to identify accounts that um you know we deem uncollectible.

Um the second being an IT recommendation to review access for ERP users to make sure that their access level is appropriate to that position.

Um I'm happy to report that the sim city implemented both of these recommendations prior to June 30th, 2025.

We employ under both of those recommendations prior to June 30th, 2025.

Uh these successes and improvements are made possible by several staff members that you don't see here.

Um all of finance plays a role, but if I could point out the financial operations group led by Amy Lawson.

Um Amy and her team do most of the heavy lifting and are absolutely key in delivering a quality audit.

Um I'd also like to point out that the city received the GFOA's Triple Crown Award.

Um that is recognition for the city's budget document, the city's ACVR, and also the city's PAFR, which is the um I call it the People's Annual Financial Report.

Um, but it's basically a smaller version of the ACFER designed to invite more reading and provide a little bit higher level results to the financial statements.

Um to give you an idea, Tiger is one of only 300 nationwide to receive this, and there are 90,000 municipalities.

So we are one of 300, that is 0.3% of that population.

Um we take it um very seriously and uh are proud of that award.

Um I say that because we are applying again for 2025 based on uh the work we've done so far.

So we also applied for those awards with the ACFAR and the PAFR.

So similar to last year, there are new uh best practice recommendations that you're gonna hear from Mr.

Simovic.

Um all three relate to the utility billing and the implementation of the module this year.

Um I'm happy to report that the city started taking steps to rectify once these were brought to our attention this fall during the audit.

Um so we don't wait until December or January when we're talking with you to make those changes.

So for the finance department, best practice adherence is paramount to improvement.

And we take the recommendations very seriously and committed to committed to improving year over year.

With that, I would like to introduce you once again to Keith Simovic, principal at Baker Tilly, the city's external auditor.

Like Amy on the finance team, Keith's team is very integral to a successful audit.

And it's very much a team team approach.

And I'm very proud to have Keith next to me here.

So thank you for having me here.

I'm very excited to be here, Mr.

Mayor, members of City Council to present the results of from the 2025 financial statement audit for the city, which we finalized just before the holiday, right in time for the end of the year, and of course, for the city to file with the Secretary of State Audits Division, which you have to do within six months of your fiscal year end.

So you've been able to achieve that, get it done timely, and file it with the state like you have to each and every year as well.

So the goal tonight is to kind of go through those results in a little more detail.

We did get a chance to sit with the audit committee for the city right before we were able to finalize the audit as well and go into these results in a little more detail than we'll go through tonight.

But happy to pause, answer any questions as we go along as well.

Go ahead and advance the slide.

No.

No.

Okay.

We can probably advance one more as well.

Perfect.

Just a quick recap of our team because it's not just me.

You see me and hear me tonight.

I get to present the results and some of the good news here, but there's a full team, and it's not just the folks that you see on the on the screen here as well.

This is kind of the core kind of managerial group that we have serving the city of Tiger.

So in addition to myself, we have Kevin Muller Liley that serves as our kind of concurrent, what we call our concurring reviewer, really a QC role, Harvey Wang that served as the audit manager on this engagement for a number of years with me.

And then Tyler Kalamanis is our IT audit manager.

So as part of this audit, we look at the internal controls related to the city's uh Tyler system as well.

And so we've brought in kind of specialized expertise on the audit over these last few years as the city has brought this new system online and continues to bring new modules online.

So we brought Tyler and his team of specialists into this engagement to really look at the uh conversion over to the Tyler system, how we're bringing these new modules online, how we're setting things up from a security and access standpoint, a change management standpoint, and making sure the internal controls there are very sound.

Go ahead and advance the slide.

Lots of words on this page.

Uh we'll have to change this up for future years.

Um this is kind of to give you an idea of the different reports and services that we provide as as part of this audit process each and every year.

So when you hire an independent uh auditing firm to come in and do a financial statement audit for a uh local government in Oregon, these are the different reports that that you'd expect to receive and the different services you'd expect to receive.

Um boxes one and two are related, but it has to do with the ultimate deliverable of our report over the fairness and accuracy of the city's financial statements.

Uh so that's through all the the detailed testing that we do back to contracts agreements and invoices and different pieces of substantive evidence to be able to support what the city has captured, recorded, and ultimately reflected in that act for that annual comprehensive financial report at the end of the year.

So we want to make sure there's evidence supporting the information that is reflected in that in that document.

Uh, we also do kind of a technical review of that document, making sure it's set up in the format and includes all the disclosures and different pieces that the governmental accounting standards board that the city has to follow that that it incorporates all those different pieces as well as the different uh additional items that the government finance officers association, the GFOA for that additional award that Keith mentioned that the city is receiving each and every year.

So we want to make sure that you're able to continue uh to put yourself in a position to receive that award each and every year as you apply for it.

So that's something that we do to do that technical review and make sure that you can continue to receive that award.

Box three is a separate audit report that uh that we have to provide because we do the audit in accordance with government auditing standards.

That is required whenever you have a certain amount of federal funding that you expend in a given year.

Uh and the the federal government requires that we're doing the audit in accordance with government auditing standards, which just adds a little bit of a layer in terms of um additional reporting that we have to do.

So this is an additional report where we would note if we had any instances of material weaknesses or uh significant deficiencies in internal controls.

Those are kind of the red flag uh items that you want to be on the lookout for.

Spoiler alert, we did not have any that rose to that level, but this is a report that you would you would see those things.

You don't see those types of things in normal corporate audits that are not done in accordance with government auditing standards.

Box four is an additional report that we have to uh put out there and note any instances of non-compliance with certain uh organ minimum standards.

So the state of Oregon says, hey, you auditor, if you are out doing an audit of a local government in the state of Oregon, we want you to look at uh certain compliance requirements, certain uh state statutes, and see if that local government is following those and and go out, do testing and find evidence if if they're um uh following those or not.

So there's an additional report in your ACFR in accordance with the organ minimum standards where we note the different items that we look at each and every year.

I'd say the areas where we spend the bulk of our time is going to be state statutes uh surrounding following local budget law, as well as uh the the public procurement standards as well is kind of where we're spending the bulk of our time.

There's a number of other things that we're looking at there, um, but that's the report we'll where you'll see if we note any instances of noncompliance.

Uh, because of the level of federal uh expenditures in the current year, there's an additional report that we have to issue that'll be separate from your ACFER that will be finalized at a at a later date for your uh compliance with those underlying grant agreements.

What are those requirements in those grant agreements, and did the city follow those when spending those funds?

So that's something that we're currently working on wrapping up right now.

A little bit of a delay there because of uh the information from the federal government that gets put out each and every year that tells independent auditors here's the things that the federal agencies want you to look at for all these grant programs.

That came out very delayed this year.

The government shut down, kind of uh delayed that a little bit further as that was not getting worked on, so that didn't come out until um very very late in the year.

So we are kind of finalizing all those audits now.

No audits kind of across the country were able to get finalized as that was outstanding.

And then item number six is a separate letter.

It's called the communication to those charged with governance.

That is a letter that gives you a little more information into the audit process and how it went.

So not just did we get a clean audit or not or a clean opinion or not, all those things are very important.

But this is a letter intended for you as the governing body of the organization to tell you more things about how did it go?

Did we run into issues along the way?

Did we find uh errors along the way?

Maybe they were corrected at the end of the day, but do we find errors?

Do we see any uh internal control deficiencies, best practices?

That's the intention of that letter.

That is separate again from your ACFA report.

Go ahead and advance the slide.

Number of different things that we look at each and every year within your financial statements.

These are kind of just a bullet point list of the of the areas where we spend most of our time.

Uh so of course the additional um modules that came on um uh online this year with utility billings and the permitting and licensing.

So again, we had those additional IT folks that helped us out there.

Uh capital assets and and that process of uh identifying projects and getting those closed out and and capitalized timely.

Uh the utility billings process with the new system coming online, and of course, all the internal controls that have to be in place there to make sure at the end of the day, when a bill gets to a customer, it's for the right amount at the right consumption, the right rates, those types of things.

Uh you had a new accounting standard you had to adopt in the current year.

Your team had to adopt GASBY statement 101, which all local governments did.

Uh, this really impacted how you account for compensated absences and really kind of added to the liability there because you had to uh account for the idea of sick pay uh being accrued for where is in the past under the old guidance, you didn't have to do that.

So that's impacting local governments kind of across the country right now.

Uh the compliance with the organ minimum standards, the additional testing we do there, that's always a focus.

Uh, and then we always have to be aware of the potential for the management uh override of internal controls.

This is not something that's specific to the city.

This is an area that we have to look at on every audit that we do and list as a critical audit area because of folks that in a management position and the influence they can have, the access they can have within a system.

We have to uh design procedures each and every year to be on the lookout for the potential for management override of internal controls.

Go ahead and advance the slide.

All right, so at the end of the day, the different uh kind of uh deliverables that I talked about before.

What are you gonna see in those when you look at the ACFR?

Our report over the fairness and accuracy of the financial statements.

It's a clean audit opinion, exactly what you're looking for.

Any third party, of course, the state, uh, debt holders, um, general public, anyone that takes a look at this, they want to know did you get a audit done by a qualified CPA firm that's licensed to do this work?

Of course, we are.

Uh did you get the audit done in a timely manner, which you were done within uh the time frame to file with the state, and did you get a clean audit opinion?

Uh that's exactly what you're looking for there.

So very good news.

As I mentioned, we didn't have any material weakness or significant deficiencies to note in the government auditing standards report.

Also very clean and good news.

We did have a compliance finding noted in our organ minimum standards report.

I'd say this is probably the most common compliance finding that we see within this report.

It has to do with when there are budget over expenditures.

So this is something that where we have to note, and it doesn't matter if it's a thousand dollars, a hundred thousand dollars, or one dollar.

If you've overexpended on a budget appropriation in a given year, uh we have to note that within the report.

So there are three instances of that that are that are noted, both within our report and the city has disclosed that in the footnotes to the ACFAR as well.

And then the single audit report, that's the one that has to do with the uh spending of the federal funds.

We are close on that.

We do not have any findings, we don't expect any findings.

We expect to wrap that up with the next few weeks, uh, but we do not have that issue quite yet.

Go ahead and advance the slides.

Within the communication to those charged with governance, you're gonna see a number of different paragraphs in there.

The the bullet points you'll see on there kind of correspond to each of those paragraphs.

I'm not gonna go through each one of these, but some of the highlights that you'll see on there, you'll see a discussion of the adoption of the new accounting standard that I mentioned, um, mainly with the impact being from GASB 101 and the additional liability there for the for the sick leave piece of that.

Uh, we also discuss are there any audit adjustments?

This would be anything as we're going through our testing if there are any uh errors noted in the testing that we're we're doing, right?

Where we're pulling uh evidence underlying a certain transaction, we say, hey, we pulled this this invoice and this invoice is for you know ten thousand dollars, but you it's recorded in the system for a hundred thousand dollars.

You know, that's that's one small example of just saying, hey, the evidence doesn't support what's in the system, or maybe it's recorded in the wrong period in the wrong year.

Maybe it's recorded in the wrong account, maybe it doesn't follow the governmental accounting standards rules.

Those are the things that can drive uh an audit adjustment if it's a material amount as we're going through.

We did not have any material audit adjustments noted as we were going through.

Meaning the information that we're looking at uh is very clean and materially accurate, meaning your team has good internal controls that they're going through and vetting the transactions before they get captured in the system before we start the audit process, so that you have a materially accurate set of financial statements.

Uh and then finally, in terms of audit observations and recommendations that you'll see within this letter.

Uh, again, no material weaknesses, good news, but we do have a few best practices that we discussed both with the management team and that they've taken some action on already, as you heard, and then also with the audit committee, we discussed in detail all of those.

And you'll see those kind of detailed on, I think the next slide.

Go ahead and advance the slide.

And as you heard before, these are primarily related to all related to utility billings.

Uh and some of these are new things that we hadn't noted in previous years, but with kind of the new module coming online with Tyler and everything.

You've got some uh setup work and different things to kind of uh get the internal control uh structure set under the new system.

So there's a few, and again, we're we're uh kind of uh classifying these as best practices.

We're not kind of raising the flag on these or saying there's any significant concern here, but some things to kind of think about uh going forward.

Uh one having to do with our a review of any adjustments made to uh customer bills by a second person other than the person preparing those, one related to retaining evidence of certain uh calculated charges uh for utility billings, and another one having to do with uh reviewing kind of the new rates that are set in place by the city and implemented into the system and making sure that those are at the right amount that are consistent with the uh council approved rates as well.

Go ahead and advance the slides.

Oh, and I think I missed on the last one, but we did have a recommendation last year that we discussed with the audit committee where the city had not recorded historically an allowance for doubtful accounts for its utility billing uh receivables.

This is something we had recommended as a best practice in the past.

We didn't think it was gonna be a material amount.

It wasn't.

Um, but we recommended that that that be considered, evaluated by management and considered for recording in the future.

Uh the finance team did that in the current year.

They have recorded an allowance for doubtful accounts that is disclosed in the financial statements now.

So things like that that we've noted in the past, definitely good to see that track record of the management team and the finance team taking a look at that, taking that to heart, and making those changes going forward.

So we definitely uh saw that in the current year, we're able to validate that.

Um I'm not gonna spend too much time on new accounting pronouncements.

Again, we went through this in a little more detail with the audit committee, uh, but just to note there are a few new standards coming out.

We always like to bring these to the attention of the governing bodies, letting you know, hey, what's what's gonna change our look and feel of financial statements in the future?

Um and the good news I'd say overall, uh, and for your finance team as well, uh, feeling a little bit better about things just because we've had so many changes in the accounting rules over the last 10, 15 years, and so many additional disclosures and extra work that it's had to be done by all the finance teams at any local governments to comply with these new rules.

The new standards you see up here are really disclosure only, they're really only impacting uh your footnotes and kind of the look and feel of of some of those and the things that you're having to disclose, but doesn't really change the underlying accounting for specific transactions or or driving a lot of new analysis that your team's gonna have to do to implement these.

So, really disclosure only, and we do not anticipate our clients having to uh spend as much time kind of evaluating these and adopting these as some of the the standards that they've adopted over the last 10 years, even kind of the GASB 101 related compensated absences that just got adopted last year.

So good good news there.

Go ahead and advance the slide.

Other than that, just a big thank you to everyone involved in this process.

Finance does the heavy lifting.

We really appreciate all the work that they do to kind of uh foster this along and make sure we can kind of get this to the point where we're able to work collaboratively and get this to the finish line on time.

Uh but lots of folks outside of finance play a part in this as well.

We're talking to folks in in all different departments, whether it's on the public work side, we're we're talking to IT, we're talking to uh payroll and HR.

Uh so a lot of different folks uh that we're talking to each and every year to kind of get to this point.

We appreciate all their help uh and assistance in this process.

And I think that's everything we had.

Go ahead and advance the slide.

Yes, just our contact information.

So I'll pause there.

If there's any questions, uh happy to entertain those.

Thank you.

Uh for your presentation for everybody who uh who are involved in uh um in the project.

So counselors, counselor shaw?

Maybe mayor not a question, but highlighting the crown triple award.

That seems like something we should highlight on the website.

Uh sounds like it was sound physical accountability, good stewardship, and one out of 300.

That's laudable.

So congratulations.

I see our director of finance is here, but to both the team, but also to all the staff that worked on that.

So just want to highlight that, and perhaps we can highlight it on the website and maybe even a newsletter.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Councilman Shalak.

Two questions and then um uh a request.

So the first one, we we talked about um the designation of um utility building accounts that are not collectible.

I'm just wondering uh after this sort of first pass of that designation about how many you know percentage-wise are are actually falling into that category.

So we bill about 22,000 accounts.

Um I think this is right around 140.

Okay.

Um and it's just under 600,000.

Okay.

Which from a percentage basis from our total aging is is a pretty good percentage.

Yeah.

Um it doesn't mean we won't get the money because we we turn it over to collections.

Uh, but obviously it'll be heavily discounted after that.

But for our perspective, we're moving forward.

Yeah, cool.

Just trying to understand the the scale of it.

Um I'd love to hear a little bit more about the audit committee's involvement with this particular audit process.

I know I haven't served as liaison to the audit committee, so I just love to hear a little bit more about um sort of their involvement and what maybe some of their feedback was as community members.

Yeah, so just a little background.

Um we meet twice a year, um, and we have a a counselor as a liaison.

And so um it's a very open process.

Um all of these critical areas are discussed um with the committee.

Um, and it's brought forth by Keith and Harvey in terms of where they're going to focus, what the current trends are in the environment and where those hot topics are, where people really want to see them diving in.

Um again, very open process.

Um the audit committee meets separately or with just Keith as well with staff out of the room.

So it's a very transparent process, and we expect both parties, audit committee and Keith's team to uh be very upfront and um yeah, we adhere to kind of that directive and the tone.

Um but very involved um and very open, I would say.

I was just gonna add one thing.

I mean, I would say uh of my client base, um probably less than 50 percent have an audit committee.

And I feel like it's a very good, important thing.

The audit seems to go better when that's in place.

Uh definitely a good piece from a a governance standpoint, obviously.

Um but the the committee is very engaged, ask good questions.

Um, you know, when when we have findings in different things, they they ask management, okay.

What's what's the plan?

Are we how are we addressing this going forward?

What's our timeline?

Uh and then they'll the next meeting they'll ask again, okay.

Did we did we do those things?

Did we follow up?

Where are we at now?

Um so I feel like it's a very very good, healthy, important process to have in place.

And I think it's a very good thing that the that the city has an audit committee.

Awesome.

Thank you so much.

And then as far as my um one request, which I think is more towards the um acting city manager.

I know we have a tentative agenda item coming up to talk about the parks and recreation fee.

So I saw that come up as part of the audit, so I just wanted to flag that recalculation just to make sure it gets covered then.

Thank you.

Thank you, Council President Wolf.

Yeah, I um it was actually more I serve as a liaison for the audit committee.

Counselor Robbins has done that um as a volunteer.

Um but a lot of the committee members, I don't really have much to add uh beyond the keys except to say that a lot of the members are technical experts that have accounting or CPAs as their background.

And um, and as Keith alluded to, um we do have staff step outside, we ask those questions, have a really thoughtful conversation, and um I think it's a uh great opportunity to serve as a counselor and an important component and really proud that we have that oversight committee actively engaged.

So thank you, Mayor.

Thank you.

Anyone council Robbins?

Just thank you very briefly.

You want to say hello?

And yes, I got my um start here volunteering in the city on the audit committee.

And um I just want to highlight the the note that we got in the audit about how professional and prompt staff was with all of the documents that they turned in.

It's a lot of work to to participate in the audit, and I'm really proud of the city and what they've done.

Um, just one more thing as far as the audit committee goes.

Um we also participated in the RFP process when we needed to renew and find and you know, see who we were gonna go with and uh myself and the uh Fiona, the chair of the committee, participated in that process, did the interviews and scored that.

So the committee is actively involved throughout the process, and I learned a lot that I had no idea accountants did.

Thank you for that insight.

Um seeing no other question, I just would like to thank you again for your presentation and for your work.

Thank you.

Yeah.

All right, so let's move on to our next uh item on the agenda, which is uh council liaison assignment.

So uh this is the beginning of a new year's, and this council has expressed desire to revis a council liaison assignment, I believe, annually.

And we have also have a new uh council members, so it's a perfect time for doing that.

So last Wednesday I share my proposed uh assignments with all the counselors, and you should all have a copy in front of you.

Um I dropped this assignment based on the preferences and feedback you all provided.

And I also try to balance the overall time commitment so that the workflow is as fair as even as possible across council.

I did my best.

So but this is only intended as a starting point for discussion, and I welcome your feedback.

So with that, I'm happy to open it up for council discussion.

Any compliment?

Oh, Councillor Shah.

I just want to thank you, Mayor, for making this process uh incredibly easy, simple, and um moving the request forward uh that had not been the case in the previous year.

So thank you very much.

And with that, I have no changes to my assignments and happy to serve the city of Tiger on these different uh liaison assignments.

Thank you.

Thank you, Councilman Shaw, for the kind words.

Um not hearing anything, I assume everybody's happy.

Counselor Schlack.

Just gonna say ditto to uh counselor Shah's perspective.

Um really appreciate the um continuity on the the regional side, but also um sort of uh giving everybody a turn at some other um city related stuff, which was um one of the the key changes we had in our ground rules to make sure we all get exposure to different areas of city boards.

So I'm very excited with my assignments.

Thank you.

Oh, thank you.

So okay, so everybody's happy.

Oh, thank you for making my job easy too.

So all right.

So we will just uh uh adopt uh council liaison assignment as it is, and um I'll ask uh our uh city team to make sure the transition is as smooth as possible.

So you know, so all the council members will get their calendar invite and whatnot.

So thank you so much.

All right.

So that's move on to the next uh item on our agenda, which is transit lodging tax TLT framework.

Oh, sorry.

Oh, I'm sorry.

I'm sorry, Danielle.

I skip sorry.

Just I skip one.

Sorry.

So next one's uh physical 20 uh 7.

FY27 Mayor and Council budget development discussion.

So assistance to city manager Hendrix will give the staff report.

So welcome, Nicole.

Thank you so much.

Good evening, Mayor and Council.

It's good to see you, Nicole Hendrix, assistant to the city manager.

So I'm here tonight to see your guidance on possible reductions for the fiscal year 2027 mayor council budget, with the staff recommendation being a 5.1% reduction of the current fiscal year's uh mayor and council budget.

Next slide, please.

Um also included in the staff report, but not on this slide.

We're looking uh to get your guidance on if the council also wants to consider a five thousand dollar contingency fund to respond to community needs.

So this is suggested based on the council's action in November to support food security by donating donating to PAC with Pride uh in response to the SNAP benefit reduction.

Next slide, please.

So as you are already aware, the city the city is entering uh the upcoming budget side of cycle during a time of economic uncertainty and with about a six million dollar deficit.

Our departments are preparing the budgets considering a 10% reduction in general fund utilization.

When developing this current fiscal year 2026 budget, the mayor and council had discussed reductions options of three to ten percent in council meetings back in March and in April of 2025.

So using those discussions, the city team is presenting some recommendations for the fiscal year 27 reductions.

Next slide, please.

So the following recommendations would save about 26,220 or 5.1% of the total mayor council budget.

That list includes uh reducing the Tiger Youth Advisory Council travel costs for the National League of Cities Congressional Cities Conference by 2,500.

So this would accommodate the shift that the league had made to have a separate youth focused pre-conference.

So that would send them to this conference rather than the conference, the pre-conference and the full conference.

It's a lot of conference days last year.

So similarly, in a few lines below, you'll see the reduction for the youth city councilor as well.

So they would still attend the pre-conference there.

The other recommendations are around training budgets.

So counselor training budgets uh reducing it by a total of 12,000, so that's $2,000 per counselor.

So that would lower the individual counselor training budget from $9,000 to $7,000 each.

Uh also the mayor's training budget, so by $6,600, which would reduce to a $10,000 budget.

Um we also included in the staff report the spend history, so you just get a sense of how much has been spent in the past for training costs.

I believe it's around a 30 to 55% utilization each year.

Um so there is kind of under traditional underspending for that um those those areas.

The last two we suggested are reducing state of our city spending from 6,000 to 3,000.

We believe we can cut some food costs uh on that front, and then uh eliminating the move with the mayor uh program, which is the reduction of 1,250.

So also in the staff report, we attached a list of all of the kind of discretionary items in the budget just to give you a sense of what other things that could be considered.

And uh just again looking, next slide, please, looking for your guidance um on the reductions, the recommendations, if you have other ideas that we're open to discussing, and then also thoughts on the contingency fund if you're interested in in doing something like that as well.

So I will hand the hand it back over to you, Mayor.

Thank you so much.

Counselor open for discussion, councillor Caducy.

Um question and a comment in terms of comments for the move with the mayor.

It looks like for that specifically, one of the reasons why so much is move with the mayor is actually trademark, so you have to pay something towards that group.

Is that correct?

Can you say that again, trade for move with the mayor?

Is some of the fund going to the national move with the mayor?

No, I I don't believe we're paying the national, it's more of just programming costs, um advertising publicity, that kind of perfect our costs.

No, no, no.

For the state of the city, where would the what would we lose in losing about half of the funding there?

For move the state of the city funding?

State of the city food.

Food primarily.

Yeah.

We have we have a lot of food at that event.

So I think we could scale it back and we wouldn't notice too much.

Yeah, there's a lot of left over.

Yeah.

My only concern with that is I don't know if we are paying for child care or things like that.

We're still going to be able to do that.

We still we would do that.

Great.

Thank you.

Counselor Schlack.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um yeah, I support the proposed 5.1% cut that's that's presented.

Uh I'm personally um not supportive of the five thousand dollar contingency.

Um just because I'm not really interested in in creating sort of that open-ended funding considering the the tight fiscal situation that we're in.

I want to make sure that our our dollars are intentionally going to to specific um destinations, if you will.

And then uh this was a point I raised when we had our discussions last year when we were facing a three to five percent cut and I advocated for matching what we were asking of our departments at five percent.

While I'm supportive of the proposed reduction of five point one percent, if we're asking all other departments for a 10 percent general fund cut, I just feel um it's important as a council to match that ourselves.

That way we're not we're we're walking the walk, so to speak.

I don't have specific line item proposals if that's what you know the conversation that that we're about to have, we could have if other people want to do that.

But that's just um my position.

If we could bump that up to 10 percent to match what we're asking of everyone else, that would be my preference.

But I support what's already proposed.

Thank you.

Counselor Robins.

Thank you.

Um I do have a question.

Um it was my if I remember I didn't look this up, so forgive me for that.

But looking at the budget and the the reductions, we're starting the counselor's training budget.

So the six counselors started out this year, or we reduced from 10,000 to 9,000, which is a 10 percent reduction.

Um and that shows that nine times six is fifty-four thousand, and then the uh pro and the proposed budget spreadsheet.

Um so you take out twelve thousand, which is two thousand per fine, it goes down to forty-two thousand.

But then the mayor's training budget for conferences and meetings, it's starting 2026 as 16,600.

But I thought the mayor also had a reduction in our last discussion.

Nope.

We didn't know.

I think it was all right mentioned, but that was not where it landed.

Okay, then perhaps this year well, I guess that's taking it down to 10,000, so that seems okay, fine.

Um could you just talk a little bit slower about the changes to the uh TIEC conference?

Sure.

Yeah.

So last year was the first year the conference put on an earlier session before the full conference started, and it was specifically for youth.

And that was feedback they got um from prior years from youth saying, uh this doesn't really feel like it applies to me, or there's not focused conversations.

And so this revision would essentially just send the youth to the pre-conference only, not the pre-conference and the full.

And did we get feedback from the youth counselors last year stating that the full part was not as useful as the pre- Yes, and we actually had a couple um youth leave early because it was such a long trip.

Okay.

Yeah.

Okay.

I I am in agreement with that.

Um I agree.

If we can um if we can find more to cut, that's fine.

I know we had emailed back and forth about um one of the mayor groups that we had budgeted, it was a little bit, it was actually higher than what it was for our designated city size.

So hopefully we can find more savings.

Okay.

Thank you.

Yeah.

So uh to counselor Robinson Schlack's would you like to see a 10 5% version and 10% version?

Or would you just want to see a 10% version?

That wasn't clear.

On what you were asking.

Well, I mean my individual request doesn't necessarily represent a majority viewpoint to to ask of staff, which is why I phrased it the way I did.

But I would if we're asking all other departments to expect a 10 percent general cut uh fund cut, I would like to match that as a council, just because I think it's important when we're facing budget cuts that we lead by example.

Um and that's you know, something I raised uh a year ago when we were looking at just a five percent cut.

Um and that's just my that's my personal preference.

But I don't necessarily believe that there's four people up here who who are in agreement with that.

Um, counselor Robin, would you like to see 10 percent or are you okay with a five percent?

Or would you like to see if possible we would try 10 percent?

I think we'd have to see what the other reductions would be before I said jump to 10 percent.

Um I mean, one thing that isn't it it's kind of on here is like the mayor's innovation project, and it hasn't parentheses reduced by 7500, and we kind of don't get credit for that reduction because it says 2500 when last year we did budget 10,000, but it turns out it's the cost is really only 2500.

So I feel like that should we should get extra credit.

Getting that in because it is, you know, that's the more accurate thing.

The other thing is since last year we voted to not do that anymore.

Do we want to be?

You know, I looked at it and it looks like an interesting thing, but if we're not gonna take advantage of it, maybe we get rid of that.

Okay.

I don't know.

It's okay.

And what's your view on the $5,000 contingency fund?

Would you like it?

Or no?

I would rather not.

No, okay.

Youth counselor, do you have any input?

I just had a clarifying question I wanted to ask.

Because you have the youth counselor and the youth tiec as the those were two, there's two separate things there.

The send two TIEAC members and one tiger team chaperone.

That's the part where it's just skipping out on the general conference, right?

Yes, and that would be for the youth council position as well.

Yeah.

And then that is also the same for the youth city counselor training.

Okay.

They're just two separate things because they're yeah, two different lines.

Thank you.

Just wanted to clarify.

Well, counselor president Wolf.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um so my question, Nicole, is I um I apologize for being remote this evening, but I'm looking at the spreadsheet um in my hand.

And if I round up 26 to 200, and then I see a reduction of 26, that's over 10 percent.

So if we do everything, we've more than met that.

Am I missing something?

Yeah, so the the total mayor council but budget is not listed here.

These are only the discretionary items listed.

So it's not the the full picture because it doesn't include, for example, the the staff member that's paid the mayor council assistant or other items.

So these are just more of that discretionary choices.

So that the total mayor council budget is five hundred and twelve thousand um roughly.

So it would be ten percent of that.

So it would be fifty-one thousand would be a ten percent reduction of a total budget.

Okay, yeah.

Thank you for asking.

Well, and that's where I don't have all my pieces in front of me.

Um so there might be additional opportunities to look at that.

And that's what gets tricky about our budget, not to say we shouldn't be mindful and trim, but we're kind of a unique group um as well.

So I I support whatever works to make a fiscally responsible um budget, and I support all these uh issues.

The contingency, I kind of wonder if there should be a reserve held on the social services grants.

Um I appreciate counselor slack's concern in doing that because we just don't know what's coming ahead of us.

Um but I I'm sure all the nonprofits applying are gonna be in tremendous need of uh funding in the coming year.

So um so I support going forward and maybe looking more broadly across the whole budget, and maybe that's a conversation with counselor who, but um anyway, neither nevertheless I support the changes.

And uh about the contingency, um, can you be more clear?

I wasn't sure.

Do you support a convention?

I quite frankly, um I really appreciate the 10,000, and that was matched to 20.

Um five um would serve I'm sure individuals um but it's a it's a smaller amount.

So I guess if we are moving forward trying to distribute all with social services and not hold back a greater amount, then I think we just um I I'm fine not withholding it.

If that helps us get to a bottom line that people feel better about, and then it goes with social services, and then we don't have money, you know, to disperse in the year.

So um I don't know.

I I'm clear as mud, I know.

Um so I I'm fine either way.

I think that at the end of the day, I feel like five thousand um is a great number, but it's not gonna make a material impact on the needs that we'll likely see in the coming year.

I think that's what I'm trying to say.

Got it.

Thank you.

Counselor Shaw.

Uh thank you, Mayor, and just want to recognize uh counselor Robbins.

I agree that there have been some additional reductions with that.

I support the 5.1% and no more.

I don't think we have a very large budget to begin with.

Uh so I think we've we are very judicious with our dollars.

And also um I do not support the 5,000 contingency.

Okay.

Counselor Anderson.

Just a question.

Um, the counselor's training budget is about 7,000 per counselor.

Historically, do the counselors use all that?

No.

So it's attached in the staff report.

It shows uh almost all I think it's not to the level of individual counselor breakdown, but overall, none of the counselors meet their seven or even ten thousand dollars that they currently.

Right, right.

So if we don't use it, it just goes back into the fund.

Yeah.

So it could be actually higher.

The percentage.

Yeah.

Yeah, I'm fine with the 5.1.

I think you did a great job.

Thanks.

And $5,000 contingency fund.

No.

Yes.

I don't know.

In the past we've had it.

We've had it, we had a $10,000 slush fund type of thing.

But uh I think $5,000 we could always find.

You know, if something came up that uh we don't necessarily need it.

Okay.

So the 5,000 gain A?

I would like to keep the 5,000 contingency.

Um I also would actually support the move with the mayor if that was something that you're interested in.

Uh any sort of health initiatives that we could do with the city, some that I'm gonna try to support.

But if there are other ways that we could do that, that's not necessarily moving with the mayor because I'm not gonna make you move.

What do you mean?

I move quite a bit.

Um yeah, I I I appreciate it.

And I I think maybe we can find other ways to promote healthy movements without spending money.

That's my favorite, but I appreciate it.

So I think the consensus is 5.1 is fine, but if we can look for more, that would be even better.

And then I think we the majority council does now want the $5,000 contingency.

So then uh just to be clear, so is there consensus on the five or ten percent?

Because I heard a little bit of a mix there, so I just want to be really sure.

Sound like there was consensus for 5.1%.

Yeah.

That was what I've not.

Yeah, okay.

Yeah, 5.1 is as a floor with some general interest and in finding.

Okay.

So I'll I can do another review, and if there are some things, I can always come back and suggest a little bit more.

But go ahead, Emily.

Sorry.

Thank you very much, Mayor.

I appreciate this conversation, and I also want to appreciate this council for demonstrating leadership in uh looking at at your own budget uh to to lead by example as we're asking all of our departments to look at cuts.

Um I recognize it's uh never an easy conversation to have, and uh as we uh uh pursue a zero-based budgeting, we we do try to uh make sure that we uh uh spend the resources that we are setting aside.

Um I wanted to acknowledge that as uh our departments are looking at reductions.

Uh we are looking at uh possibly removing vacant positions uh as a uh potential cost-saving measure.

Uh salaries and benefits are among the the higher costs that we carry year over year.

Um I I wanted to mention that uh to you today because I did hear some discussion about five or ten percent uh that we're uh happy to take your direction uh with the staff recommendation is at 5.1 percent.

Um just acknowledging this is a challenging year and perhaps the first of a few more down the road.

So um again, I appreciate your thoughtful discussion uh on this budget and we'll move forward.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you so much.

All right, thank you, counselors.

All right, so this time for real.

We are moving down on to translodging tax TLT framework adoption discussion now economic development manager Holler and Eco Northwest Project Director Mag Craig will give the report.

And there's this slide presentation.

Good evening.

Good evening, Mayor and Council staff.

Thank you for having me back.

Uh I know it seems like I've been here a lot lately, but with two projects going on, we uh did feel it was important to keep them separate.

Um tonight we're here to talk about transient lodging tax.

We are last here in early December with our draft vision and expenditure categories, which you had approved with minor changes uh and offered us to move forward with the uh drafting of the final framework, which is what we're here tonight to talk about uh and look for your final approval.

Next slide.

Tonight our ask of you is to confirm alignment with the TLT vision, validate the expenditure categories, and uh there is a resolution in front of you tonight for adoption of the final framework.

Next slide project purpose was to establish framework for the use of TLT transient lodging tax funding across the city.

Um we have since the last time we were here, the final vision and um funding categories.

What we want to talk about tonight is implement implementation and next steps.

So I'll really be emphasizing what's been added to the framework since the last time we talked, and then leave time for a QA.

Next slide.

The establishment of a strategic framework, again, the framework being the emphasis, not a final plan.

The framework is to give us the tools to move forward with more intentional and strategic use of transient lodging tax year over year across various opportunities across the city.

Next slide.

Reminder that we are governed by the post-2003 transient lodging tax rules as guided by the state of Oregon.

So at least 70% must be reinvested into tourism promotion or tourism-related facilities.

That's the portion that we're talking about under the use of the TLT framework.

There's no recommendation or anticipation of changing the 30% allotted that goes directly to city services.

There's no mention or request to change that 30%.

We're just talking about the 70% directed at tourism promotion or tourism-related facilities.

Next slide.

Next slide.

The expenditure priorities.

Again, these are the broad categories and prioritization of investment that the both the work group and council commented on in December.

The first priority for evaluation would be promotion and marketing.

So any investments that either are city-led or partner efforts to attract visitors by sharing Tiger's story, developing the city's brand, promoting events, amenities, experiences that draw people to Tigered.

Second priority is destination improvements that includes enhancements to visitors serving places, amenities that support access navigation, and the experience of exploring Tiger, including including improvements to infrastructure, wayfinding, recreation connections, and other features that help visitors find and enjoy what Tigrid has to offer.

Our third priority has been identified as events and entertainment, including support for programming and activities offered throughout the year by the city and its partners to attract visitors and create that regional draw for Tiger.

Next slide.

So now we're into the part that's new, the implementation of how we get there.

One of the things identified in the framework is the recommended establishment of a committee.

And we feel like it's important to create a TLT administrative committee because we want to make sure that not only are we using this money strategically and intentionally with council's guidance, but that we're doing it in a manner that doesn't get anybody in the hot seat for use of money.

Obviously, we'll have our city attorney on the committee, but looking across departments to make sure that there's no single use or single decision point in the identification and allocation of transient lodging tax funds.

We'll talk a little bit more about the committee makeup on the next slide.

But also we wanted to be sure that we had this in place ahead of the 2026-2027 budget cycle, and that this year would be the pilot year for the administrative committee, and we would be using the newly formed preliminary TLT allocation tool.

And we do intentionally call it a T a preliminary tool because we anticipate, as with frameworks due, we'll be able to adjust over time and use this year as what works and what do we need to do ahead of next funding cycle.

Next slide.

This is identified preliminary in the January-February time frame because right now is when we're in the budget cycle space to be navigating and negotiating funds for the next fiscal year.

And then additionally it's the in alignment with the city's grant community grant process so that we can help identify eligible grant applications or eligible opportunities for use of TLT funds, which could also turn around and save or be able to support additional general funds committee or grant requests by being able to transition some if there's eligible grant requests, they could be transitioned to TLT funds.

And then we also recommend either quarterly or ad hoc based on if there's additional cyclical allocations or requests for use of TLT funds.

Next slide.

So we want to be very clear that this is not a go no go hard stop.

This could be a tell me more.

This could be a partial, but let's articulate it better.

Let's make sure that the proposals and requests are in alignment with the guidance and rules so that we can even move on to the next phases, which would be uh the next evaluation criteria would be does the proposal for use of TLT funds meet the vision statement.

Are we hitting those categories broadly of what we uh see the use of TLT funds returning on the investment for the city?

And then looking at the priority expenditure alignment again with that promotion and marketing being our top priority as stated in the framework, destination improvements as the second, events and entertainment as the third.

This would help give us uh a little bit of funding priority if we get to the space where uh the requests exceed the requested uh amount by council if it exceeds our expected revenues, if there's a situation where we would be dipping into the reserves versus using the current year's anticipated revenues, etc.

And then the fourth would be that real uh evaluation against strategic use of resources.

How well leveraged is a request, what's the impact?

Um, does it hamper our availability or opportunity to fund else with our transient lodging tax fund?

What is the community benefit?

Is it going to be as equally impactful as the investment?

And then are we looking at one of the things that was identified in the vision statement as and as a priority of the work group was leveraging partnerships and leveraging resources throughout the city to really uh expand the impact of the these investments, and so are we doing what we need to do with partnerships to make sure that this is community use of the funds and leveraging the partnerships that we have invested in going forward.

Next slide.

So, what we're looking for tonight is um again that uh confirmation with the updated modified TLT vision validation of those three expenditure categories, and then uh look to a firm approval of the framework with the resolution in front of me tonight.

And with that, I'd like to open to any questions.

Thank you.

Counselors and wolf.

Next slide, please.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um can we go back to the slide for the committee?

Um I just want to make sure I understand how those decisions are getting made on funding.

Yes, so go back four slides, I believe.

Keep going.

Keep going.

Too far.

Too far.

Let's go to slide nine, please.

There we go.

Yes.

So the identification of the staff positions, making sure that finance director uh right now has uh control of the the transient lodging tax funds and has traditionally been used in alignment with the grants committee.

That's how most of the expenditures of TLT funds under our historically conservative approach have been allocated.

We are offering the importance of bringing in the community development director and the economic development manager because of the importance on connecting with that investment in tourism related facilities and tourism-related activities.

Those are both areas that fall under the day job of your community development director and your economic development manager.

We do want someone.

Oh, go ahead.

Yeah, so my to be clear on my question.

So it seems what I'm trying to understand is if director Kang, you know, through our social services grant day or other programs we have in place that engage our community members or outside groups.

I feel like this has shifted to a complete internal group, and my misunderstanding that that's kind of what my question was in terms of the funding distribution.

Because some of the events were part of the social services.

So I guess maybe more plainly has the engagement of community members or outside groups now shifted under this model.

Does that make sense?

I I believe I I'm understanding your question to say does this change the request for what the actual activity is that is being requested for funding.

And my recommendation and our uh what we envision here is that that doesn't change, right?

So the community event that would want to use TLT funding as their way forward, they would still go through whoever they're working with, whatever they're doing now to create the event.

What we're recommending as a change and as a collective kind of check and balance is it still goes before councils if it's if it's a fundable activity, if it's something that wants to be invested in.

This committee as an administrative committee would make that determination if it can be used for transient lodging tax fund can be used, or if it needs to be identified as general fund, or if there's a mix of that, right?

So we're not recommending uh displacing any other decision making processes or bodies that go towards funding activities, events, community focused, social services, anything.

We're looking to make sure that there's actually an added layer to keep us all in the above board of identification and um allocation of just the funding source of transient lodging tax as part of those things going forward, uh, which is why one of the things one of the proposed members is somebody from the grants committee because that is historically again where we've seen the funding requests or the the typically uh eligible items come through.

We also understand that there's uh at least an appetite for more strategic investment and use of transient lodging tax money.

Um and this is in that navigation in between the spaces of economic development, strategic plan, and transient lodging tax framework in that universal across the board acknowledgement that the city of Tiger doesn't necessarily have uh a ready on hand agreed upon brand that we can take and go market.

We can't that we don't have a plug-and-play anything that we could engage um regional tourism partner and create an ad campaign and go invest in the attraction of additional visitor nights to reinvest in that uh the engine of the TLT and and get more nights.

So we acknowledge that with our top priority being promotion and marketing, transient lodging tax is an eligible approved and very valid funding source to go do that work.

And we anticipate seeing that same intention mirrored on the economic development strategic plan side as we continue to work through the last few phases of that project as well.

Saying brand identity in a marketing sense is very important for as an investment strategy for the city moving forward.

And we expect that partnership to rise to the eligibility level of using TLT funds.

But again, we don't want to make that decision unilaterally.

We don't want to make that in any sort of bubble.

Those are all funding decisions that an administrative committee with different perspectives that could bring in even the eligibility of it, and then the framework intentionally leaves space to apply direction from council as council goals change year over, well, every two years as the climate changes as community focus changes as we navigate economic challenges, right?

All of the things that change year over year can still be applied to TLT framework in a manner that leaves those directions and decisions with council as well.

Council Robins.

Thank you.

Okay.

How this worked last year, which was my first time here, my first time doing a budget, and also my first time on the special events and community grants.

And I see finance director Kang is there because he was here.

He taught us we get a long list of people or groups asking for money.

Some are social services, some are special events.

And so then for the special events, we pick out which of these qualifies for TLT.

And that is something that actually the individual groups or entities say, yes, we qualify for TLT.

You know, yes, we have people from more than a 50 miles away or 100 miles away coming, blah, blah, blah.

We think we meet that criteria is what the group say.

And then we have a budget of a certain amount of funds from the general general fund, I think, for social services, some's from the marijuana tax, some's from TLT, and we get to divvy that money up.

That's what we're asking is do we still get to divvy that money up for those events?

Understanding that we also have the priorities of marketing and then uh facility improvements and then fund events or or I'm not wording it quite right, but those three things.

And so this sounds like this committee sounds like it's gonna take away that divvying the money up away from the committee.

Or is it that we still get to divvy up our little allocation and the rest of the TLT funds that previously were going into the bank to save up for whatever big thing we're gonna spend on, that gets divvied up with advertising.

Counselor uh Council President Wolf, was that your question?

Because that's what I heard it to be.

Sorry.

Sorry, shouldn't I put her on the spot?

No, it's alright.

Uh I think uh finance director King has please go ahead.

Good evening, Mayor and Council.

Uh, for the record, Finance Director Eric Gang.

Uh so I just wanted to provide some insight into what's being proposed tonight.

Uh so ultimately, uh, one thing to keep in mind is that the authority of budget appropriation lies with the budget committee and council.

So, all and not at the end of the day, it is still within council and the budget committee's authority to say what the budget levels are.

So, what this framework is really getting to is how we allocate of the total TLT 70% will be allocated towards the grant process.

So the way I would envision it is that you know, if say we have a uh 70% allocation, maybe you know, 100,000 of that will be allocated towards the grant, then the grant committee will still continue forward to make that decision how how those funds get allocated to the different organizations.

Uh but this establishes um a framework in which also how we can weigh and um to a uh an agreed upon consensus whether or not a activity meets the requirements of a uh TLT eligible activity.

So when we're looking at um a questionable grant applicant, uh there's a way for us to kind of have a consensus and that yes, this this does make sense and that they uh meet meet the criteria being a TLT eligible activity.

Uh does that help answer your questions?

So does that mean so just to go back to we get our list of people and before it was like yes, TLT, yes, yes, yes.

Will this committee kind of prevet that list and say these these ones all do meet the criteria?

The intention of the committee would be to prevet anybody who's asking for TLT funds.

And it's also important to recognize that the grant committee is not the only way that TLT funds get invested or allocated across the city.

So there would be an additional step for any grant applic application uh members to review to make sure that it does go through basically the legal review process to say yes, these are eligible for the grant committee to consider using TLT funds for, or say no, these are not eligible for TLT funds, please treat this as a general fund request grant application.

It would not change the grant committees option and opportunity to identify and allocate those awards.

We would just take that legal burden of justification and eligibility as a preliminary step before it even gets to the grant committee.

The other thing is it would be using the exact same process for internal requests, for additional partner requests, for any expenditures that would be asking for TLT.

Um again, it's not the the community grant process is not the only way that TLT gets invested.

Um we also have partners who are pretty heavily funded out of the TLT, making sure that all of those go through the same betting process every single year.

Okay, thank you.

I do have one more question.

I'm sorry.

Um just thinking of the fact that we're we're in a budget constraint and people are gonna be doing more work with less.

Um have we had um any issues where we funded something with TLT funds that it turned out it wasn't actually eligible because um just because a lot of these people who are named on this committee already have an awful lot to do.

And so is this you know, in concept, I I'm not opposed to this, but I'm wondering if it's truly necessary to then add an additional duty onto the finance director, community development drug.

These people are very busy people, and so do we need to add this on, or is it just a kind of nice to have?

Thank you.

First of all, thank you for the acknowledgement and recognition that we are all very busy, especially this time of year.

Um, it is true, we are the time that it takes to review applications for funding is significantly less time than it takes to undo an incorrect allocation.

We are in a litigious time, and cities can be sued over incorrect use of TLT allocation.

It is not something to be taken lightly.

It's not something to look at and go, oops, oh well, it is something that we need to be very mindful of going forward, the putting a process in place that keeps us on an above-board equal framework to be able to clearly articulate our intention and our investment.

Our investment in with use of TLT historically has been very conservative because we've only been looking at those things that clearly rise to the eligibility.

Our intention and what we understand is direction from council moving forward is to be more uh forward-looking and investment looking as we create opportunities to offset some of these budget reductions, offset some of the other impacts to fiscal restraints by identifying more opportunities to invest in transient lodging tax.

We have historically not had expenditures that meet our revenues, and we're not saying we want to, right?

We don't want to exceed it, but we also do want to take the opportunity to say we have this income source that we have fought for, we've said is important to us, and it is our fiscal responsibility to reinvest that back into the system of tourism and tourism-related activities.

Um or we need to identify a reason why we're holding it.

So one or one of those two.

But it it creates that layer for us to be able to have that equity lens, that eligibility lens.

And it also saves work ahead of time because if a project goes all the way through, or an event or an activity goes all the way through the creation and the and the support process and we're ready to go, and it is found out about after the fact of by the way, this isn't eligible.

There could have been different decisions along the way.

There could have been different um efforts along the way that could have been saved had we had that early identification of even something that yes, we can pursue a conversation or please select a different pathway.

All right.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um I was just gonna say um as far as the the grants topic goes, if something's not TLT eligible, that doesn't mean we still can't fund it.

It would just come from the general fund side of the bucket as well.

So I mean my concern with TLT has been we're levying this tax and we're collecting it, and 70% of it we don't have a clear path to spend beyond issuing a few tens of thousands of grants, a dollars worth of grants every year.

And that's why I really like this framework and this initiative that came out of the council goals in order to make sure we can fully leverage those dollars and unlock them to the benefit of our of our community, because otherwise the question becomes why are we still levying this tax?

I understand the benefit to the general fund with that 30 percent, that's not nothing.

But the question is why are we why do we have that tax burden?

Um so I really love the framework.

I love the vision statement.

I love the administrative committee in terms of having cross-functional perspectives on how we can invest these dollars in areas outside of grants, which is would be outside that that subcommittee process.

And I do enjoy, uh I do like having the grant committee representative as well.

So there is a touch of having um a community member who's involved who's not necessarily part of council.

And at the end of the day, um, you know, we'll see how this framework uh works out over time, it'll get refined.

Uh we have final say over the budget process.

So I really I really appreciate all the work that you and all of our stakeholders did um as part of this workshop process.

Thank you so much.

Thank you.

If I may add just one thing.

Uh so I just wanted to remind council uh you know and the community, the impetus for this is also because um, you know, there when we first established the TLT funds, there was some direction uh many years ago uh to invest in the into a regional sporting field.

Um, and that is not feasible anymore.

And so we are now going down the path of finding a different um uh project or investment opportunity for these funds.

And so that is the impetus of why why we're doing this.

Thank you.

Councilman Shaw.

Great, thank you.

And I too want to thank the committee that put the framework together.

Um couple things.

One from the administrative committee, it really is can they can we legally do this or can we not?

It's not you're making the funding decisions.

Is that correct?

Correct, because again, the budgetary uh authority still lies with council no matter what.

Terrific.

Just want to make sure I was clear on that.

I too appreciate the cross-functional perspective.

What I do think is missing is the voice of the community partners, whether it's the Tiger Chamber of Commerce, Washington Square, explore Twalton Valley.

So I'm not sure where that fits in here, if that's part of the administrative committee, if it's like a subset, if it's a separate.

So I'd like to see that in place too, just so we have the experts around our region who will speak to potentially those dollars.

So we we do offer caution on uh involving partners who are potential recipients of the funds.

And so when we talk about involving our tourism partners, they're also the partners that we anticipate being eligible to receive totally understand that partnerships does the expenditure amplify valued community partnership.

Yes.

So I just want to make sure we're ensuring that that's happening and it's with those cat that those strategic plans and those voices in mind.

Yes.

Absolutely.

Thank you.

I just want to follow up on counselor Shah's line of questioning.

So when I saw the committee member uh, and based on your explanation, these are the people who are in charge of determining what is TLT eligible.

So I thought my understanding, maybe I was not reading this correctly before is so this there will be no additional party or person in charge of attracting like events or or or things like that, potential event to Tiger.

Is that is that correct?

So this plan doesn't involve attracting events.

So this no no nobody's in charge of doing that under this plan.

So uh again, we want to be very clear.

This is a framework for the identification of eligible investments.

Okay, got it.

This is not uh an actionable plan that says we're going to go forward and do these things.

Thank you for that's all.

So and and again, the the committee member, the administrative committee members have been identified because everybody on that list has a day job responsible for eligible activities.

Yep.

So it's still my job, but it's the one over here.

I understand.

So that it's great to have this in place.

But my concern is that if we are concerned about not spend not enough places or people to spend this money on, are we is it in the plan to have that kind of attracting events to our tiger place?

Is that part in the future plan or it wouldn't be under the framework of TLT?

All right.

That falls under the work plan and uh priorities of economic development.

Got it.

So it's two separate things.

Two separate things.

Okay, great.

Yeah, go ahead.

Thank you, Mayor.

And just um so I'm clear.

So we're gonna and I hear you about the um ensuring that there isn't uh particular organizations that are going to be benefit inappropriately.

However, we can use them as educational resources given their expertise, and we do plan on doing that.

Absolutely.

Thank you.

And following up on that, when we bounce off each other.

So uh so going back to this committee, I heard you you said you know when they come, you will tell them this is not eligible for TLT, you have to use general fund.

Uh can you foresee scenario where you will say, but if you do this, you will be qualified for TLT.

Is that something that's on the table as well, or are you strictly no?

What you propose is not eligible.

Go some do use use general fund only.

So it's our intention to be able to guide as many activities, events, applications, uh, investments towards TLT as possible.

One of the commitments we have is to work to get people to a yes.

However, the conversation on partial funding is where that would come in.

Got it.

Or being able to say, if you change these things, it meets the threshold, it meets the requirement.

As is, it's not eligible.

But if we tell a different story, if we change something to truly make this a regional draw, if we make this activity event investment rise to the threshold of saying this is unique enough compared to surrounding cities that do something similar.

This is unique enough in Oregon that would be able to realistically justify and consistently justify that this is a regional draw that has the potential of attracting visitors from over 50 miles away that has the potential of creating those hotel night stays, which is that reinvestment in the system of generating more transient lodging tax nights.

And so it's it's being able to articulate the eligibility, and it's our intention to help get applicants and requested users of TLT funds to that.

And we also understand the burden will be heavy the first couple of years because it's gonna be an education opportunity across the board.

We're not just talking about the grants committee or community um partners or organizations that want to use the money.

It'll be conversations with our chamber of commerce on what activities are eligible and what activities are not.

It's gonna be conversations with um explore to Alton Valley on what activities meet the threshold and what investment strategies and partnership opportunities there are.

But it's also gonna be a really big learning curve for um our own staff and for people who put on events for people who do community-facing activities because we we have to meet the threshold of the requirements of the funding.

Yeah, I understand, and I'm not criticizing this.

This is great.

I'm just concerned that in the long term, if we don't have the other piece where we have this you know determination threshold in place, but there's no the you know, uh people going out to actively recruiting events.

I know that's staff's constraint and stuff like that.

Um this by itself, you know, it's a gatekeeper say we're waiting for you to come and we'll approve we without active recruitment in the long term, but that's that's conversation from another day.

So thank you.

Any other um we have about five minutes, so any other comments or uh we can we need to uh have a motion to Mayor, I move to approve resolution number 26-02, a resolution adopting a strategic framework to guide the use of transit lodging tax revenue in the city of Tiger.

I second.

Okay, so we have a motion to approve resolution number 26-02 and second.

Seeing none, will the youth counselor give an advisory vote?

Aye.

Thank you.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Those opposed.

So resolution number 26-02 is adopted by a unanimous vote of the council.

So thank you so much for your presentation and your work on this.

Thank you.

Thank you.

So next uh uh agenda item is resolution of necessity related to right-of-way and easement acquisition for the Tiger Street Fannel Creek Bridge Replacement Project.

And our senior project engineer Morris will give the staff report.

Good evening.

Council Mayor, can you see and hear me okay?

Yes.

Okay.

Um senior project engineer uh with the engineering division of public works, and the item being brought before you is a resolution of necessity to acquire easements and right-of-way for the Tiger Street Bridge over Fannel Creek replacement project.

It's uh CIP 95060.

Thank all of you except Councilor one of you have heard about the project at various times this past year during our land use approval and a contract uh amendment.

So I won't get into too much of the background, but we're nearing final design on the project.

Uh we're getting our final permits, and we're gearing up to start the property acquisition phase in preparation to go actually perform construction.

And so the resolution is pretty standard for this type of project.

It establishes project needs, saying that the project is per our plans and system plans, and that it was designed for the greatest public good and with not excessive detriment to any of the individual property owners.

And then in the event we are at an impasse with any property owner, be it they're not responsive or we just can't come to an agreement, we would be in position to pursue eminent domain or condemn for the property rights.

That's always a touchy term or subject.

The project team has no plan at this moment to do that.

Um we've had pretty good relationships with the property owners.

Um there are only four private properties, and there's a variety of different easement needs.

All four of them we need temporary construction easements.

Some of them we need permanent easements for things like slopes, drainage, and utilities, and then there's one junk on one property.

We need to expand the public right away to encompass the bridge itself.

Um this item is seeking your approval and available to try to answer any questions you may have related to it.

Thank you, Zach, for the presentation.

Uh council members, do you have any questions for Zach?

Uh Councilor Kuducy.

Thank you, Mayor.

For the permanent easements, have any of the landowners had any objections that you know of.

No.

The three property owners that have, or I guess just the two that have permanent easements we've been talking to.

Um has bid pretty limited, that's on the northeast corner of the bridge.

They said as long as their tenant was happy.

I'm getting a little bit of echo.

Is it okay on your guys' end?

Yes.

Okay.

Um and so the tenant seemed happy with our plans, and then the other one where we've been talking to very closely.

You never know what these things till the papers are signed, but we've done a lot of lay work with all the property owners up one, which has a very small impact, and we have ahead of need to interact with much to date.

So as best as we can, we feel pretty good about going into the the process.

Okay, any other questions?

Uh do we have uh can anybody want to make a motion?

You have don't have questions.

Should I do it?

Okay.

Go ahead, Councilor Ross.

Mayor, I move to approve resolution number 26-03.

A resolution declaring the need to acquire property for the Tiger Street, Fannel Creek Bridge replacement project and authorizing eminent domain and immediate possession if necessary.

Sir second.

Second.

Thank you, Councilor Schlack.

So uh Councilor Robin move to approve resolution number 2603, and and there's a second.

Is there any further discussion?

Seeing none, will the youth counselor give an advisory vote?

Aye.

Thank you.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Those opposed?

Seeing none, resolution number 260 26-03 is adopted by a unanimous unanimous vote of the council.

Thank you, Zach.

Thank you.

So we don't have any non-agenda item, and we don't have any on executive session, so there being no additional items.

This meeting is adjourned.

Good night, Tiger.