Yeah, in the red side where sending on link so I just want to go to work.

Yeah, yeah, I think we have to come down here on the wrong one.

I know what's wrong with that.

Yeah, but it's it's not just a layer of the right.

So we'll want you very much out of the time.

So I was not sure which is very difficult.

Okay, so I'm gonna have to run the corresponding property.

I know.

I think maybe we have a lot of things.

We'll see how it's a high note.

Oh to the right thing.

I don't see it.

I appreciate that.

I meant to bring off the email from your device.

Is that what's the one?

Or maybe it's like a problem.

Yeah, why don't we log in all that?

You have to put the right password in the does not probably have.

Yeah, that's my trade out, but uh just like just pointing everything.

Good morning, Wichita, and good morning, staff.

Can you please roll the video?

Thank you for attending today's City Council meeting.

Please take a moment to silence your mobile device.

If you wish to speak on an agenda item after the mayor invites public comment, proceed to the podium, state your name and address, and you will be given five minutes to speak.

A timer can be viewed on the podium screen.

You may speak one time per agenda item.

Please refrain from clapping after other speakers.

Thank you again for joining us today.

Let's pause a moment for our television audience to join us!

Welcome to this week's city council meeting.

Heavenly Father, we come to you today with gratitude for the opportunity to gather in service to this community.

We thank you for the city of Wichita for its people, its neighborhoods, and its shared hopes for a better better future.

Grant wisdom to these council members and who all serve in leadership.

Help them to seek what is just to act with integrity and to listen with humility.

May their decisions reflect fairness, compassion, and a commitment to the common good.

Bless this meeting today.

Thank you, Pastor Moore.

Before we move on from our meeting, I just wanted to recognize that assistant city manager Troy Anderson was promoted outside of our city, and so this will be his last meeting.

And so I just wanted to recognize him for his service.

Madam Clerk, can you please call the first item?

Approve the minutes of the regular meeting, March 24th, 2026.

Council members, any items to be edited from the minutes.

I see none.

I move to approve the minutes for the regular meeting, March 24th, 2026.

Second.

Motion second discussion.

See none.

Madam Clerk, please open the roll.

Motion passes seven zero.

Madam Clerk, please call the next item.

Awards and proclamations.

Today's proclamations are donate life month, fraud prevention month, and leadership and health care summit day.

May I please ask the representatives from Midwest Transplant Network to come forward at this time.

The proclamation reads, the City of Wichita, Kansas founded in 1870, whereas organ donation is a selfless gift that saves lives in Wichita and across our country.

Whereas the mission of Midwest Transplant is to save lives by honoring the gift of organ and tissue donation with dignity and compassion.

Whereas the number of people on the organ transplant waiting list continues to far exceed the number of registered donors.

Whereas April is national donate life month, a time when local, regional, and national focuses on encouraging organ donor registration.

Now, therefore, be it resolved that the Wichita City Council does hereby proclaim April 2026 as Donate Life Month.

Mayor and Council, thank you very much for this recognition.

Nicole Asquith and the community engagement specialist for Midwest Transplant.

And the importance of this month is beyond just what today is.

It's the lives that are saved every day through somebody who said yes and gave that gift.

Today, as I walked in, I looked up the numbers.

It's a hundred and eight thousand people waiting nationally for the life-saving gift of organ, eye, and transplant, solid organ specifically.

I am a tissue uh recipient wife.

I am honored to work alongside donors and recipients every day, and it is with great gratitude we thank you for recognizing this and for helping us continue the education that is so important in the lives that we have the opportunity to save every single day.

I'm joined by a long recipient, and I will let Nancy give just a couple of words.

Good morning, and thank you, Mayor and Council.

The people standing up here, some work for the network.

There are people whose family members tragically died, and they honored their memory and their wishes through tragedy by letting them become donors.

The rest of us are standing here because of the generosity of a stranger.

Thank you.

May I please ask the supporters of AARP Kansas to come forward at this time.

The proclamation reads the City of Wichita, Kansas founded in 1870, whereas Americans lose billions of dollars each year to fraud, with older adults disproportionately affected, making prevention, education, strong consumer protections more important than ever.

And the Federal Trade Commission estimates fraud losses in 2024 were as high as 196 billion dollars nationwide, with up to 81.5 billion stolen from older adults.

Whereas older adults who experience fraud have a life-changing amount of money stolen from them, roughly 83,000, four times that of the average across all ages.

Whereas our communities, which include nonprofit organizations, law enforcement, and public officials are working to strengthen consumer protections, provide victim support, and advocate for stronger measures to prevent and prosecute fraud at the local, state, and federal levels.

Whereas preventing fraud is a shared responsibility, and increasing awareness during fraud prevention month empowers all Wichitans, especially older adults, to protect themselves, their families, and their financial security.

Now, therefore, be it resolved that the Wichita City Council does hereby proclaim April 2026 as fraud prevention month.

Good morning, everyone, Madam Mayor and members of the council.

Thank you so much for this opportunity to share with you today.

I'm Glenda Du Bois, and I'm the State Director for AARP, Kansas.

Joining me are volunteers and staff from AARP, Kansas.

We are very honored to be able to share with you our stats and all of the information regarding fraud prevention, with April being fraud prevention month, AARP nationwide is doing an amazing amount of events virtual and in person to provide resources and tools for those who are able to provide uh assistance when you have you might encounter fraud.

At the state level, we have uh House Bill 2591 that sets on the governor's desk now to be signed.

So hopefully that will put some guardrails around some of the opportunities that are being taken to make fraudulent acts.

So again, we thank you very much for this opportunity.

A proclamation of the city of Wichita, Kansas, founded in 1870, whereas the healthcare industry is a vital pillar of the Wichita community, directly impacting the health, well-being, and economic stability of its residents.

And whereas healthcare organizations are currently facing unprecedented challenges, including workforce shortages, evolving patient care demands, and the need for rapid innovation in service delivery.

And whereas strong adaptive leadership is essential to address these challenges and ensure sustainable, high-quality health care systems for the future.

And whereas WSU Tech is a partner in partnership with the Kansas Leadership Center, is hosting the leadership and health care summit, bringing together health care leaders, educators, practitioners, and community partners from across the region, equipping participants with the tools needed to lead effectively in a rapidly evolving environment.

Therefore, now, therefore, be it resolved that the Wichita City Council does hereby proclaim April 7th, 2026 as leadership and health care summit day.

Congratulations.

I want to say thank you to Becky, the mayor, and the city council for recognizing this huge need that we have in the community, that those of us in the healthcare space through administration, through teachers, through faculty are trying to solve the problems.

My name is Lynn Loveland, and I am the Dean of Health Sciences at WSU Tech, and I work every day to try to educate our students to be able to go out and provide the health care that you all need, and also to make sure we do it in an effective, cost-effective manner.

So thank you so much for this.

We will continue to work on this issue as it does affect everyone here, not only in this room, but across the city and the state.

So thank you very much.

Councilmember Ballard.

Thank you, Mayor.

I just want to take a point of privilege and um recognize Vanessa.

She's one of our students from Friends, and she is just here to uh tour uh City Hall and check out what public service is all about.

So, Anna, thank you so much for for giving her the tour, and Vanessa, thank you for being here.

Madam Clerk, please call the next item.

Public agenda.

We now come to public agenda.

The public agenda allows for up to five speakers to have five minutes each to address the council.

Please bear in mind that this is not a period of dialogue with council or question and answer period.

This is your opportunity to address the city council with your concerns.

I ask that you address your remarks to the city council as a body and not any not to any individual council member.

No action will be taken relative to items on public agenda other than referral to the city manager for information as necessary.

Speakers will please speak into the microphone.

Please state their name and address for the record.

A time clock will display the speakers' remaining time to speak.

Order and rules of decorum will be observed.

The first speaker today is Harold Schlechtwig, which calls hot weather and the tree canopy.

Is Harold present today?

Harold Schlechtweg, 351 North Fern Street.

Can you hear me?

351 North Fern Street, Wichita, Kansas.

I'm a member on the board of ICT Trees.

Wichita is trending hotter.

Steadily rising temperatures and extreme heat events threaten the health and safety of citizens.

During the past year, Wichita witnessed its warmest Christmas on record.

This is part of a decades-long trend.

Evidence of this trend includes increasing average annual temperatures, increasing average summer temperatures, increasing summer nighttime temperatures, which inhibit cooling down from high daytime temperatures, and a lengthening of the freeze-free season.

There is variation from year to year, but the overall trend is clear.

Wichita is trending hotter.

And this trend is projected to continue through mid-century.

Moreover, this trend poses a serious threat to the health and safety of those who live and work in our city.

In July 2024, the Wichita Eagle reported that more than 115 people were treated for heat-related illness at the McConnell Air Show.

During a seven-day period at the end of June 2024, KWCH TV News reported that at least 11 people were treated at Ascension via Christie for heat-related issues ranging from severe sunburn to heat exhaustion.

Some of our citizens are more at risk than others.

In 2022, the City of Wichita partnered with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration to learn how increasing outdoor temperatures might affect city neighborhoods.

The NASA study found that some neighborhoods are more at risk than others due to an urban heat island effect that amplifies summer temperatures within Wichita.

The urban heat island effect occurs when a high concentration of impervious surfaces, for example, concrete and asphalt, and a scarcity of shade caused heat to be absorbed and re-emitted.

Wichita's heat islands result in neighborhoods significantly hotter than outlying areas and natural landscapes.

The increase in average summertime temperatures in Wichita is a product not only of climate change, but of our local built environment.

The impact of heat islands is not felt equally by all Wichita neighborhoods.

Some neighborhoods suffer more.

In general, heat exposure diminishes as one moves outward from the city core.

Trees are a necessary feature in combating the urban heat island effect because they significantly reduce air and surface temperatures of buildings and streets.

Shade reduces the surface temperature of roads, sidewalks, buildings, by shading them from direct sunlight.

Trees are also a source of natural air conditioning called evapotranspiration.

This is an example of the sweating effect.

If you work outside, you sweat, and as the sweat dries, the moisture is absorbed into the air, creating a cooling effect on your skin.

Trees do something similar.

Neighborhoods with mature tree canopies can have ambient air temperatures as much as 12 degrees cooler than neighborhoods without them.

Trees help in other important ways.

When planted in the right place, trees significantly lower the cost of heating and cooling buildings and homes.

The best and most effective way to address trending otter is to protect the trees we have and plant many more.

We can do something about this.

There is a problem.

Trees are the answer.

Thank you.

Thank you, Harold.

There you go, Harold.

Madam Clerk, please call the next individual.

Andrew Kramer, funding for WPD equipment.

I reside at 3626 North Ridgeport Street.

Good morning, Mayor Wu and members of the council.

Good to see you again, Councilmember Johnston.

My name is Drew Cranmer, and I am a taxpayer residing in Wichita's 5th district.

I am here today not to relitigate the privacy debate around license plate readers.

I am here to ask a straightforward fiscal accountability question, one that every taxpayer in the city deserves an answer to.

Six days ago at midnight on March 31st, 2026, a 1.6 million dollar DOJ grant expired.

It was the primary federal vehicle underwriting Wichita surveillance technology expansion.

There was no press release, no agenda item, and no public vote.

According to the city's own transparency portal, 191 cameras are still running, and as of April 1st, nobody has publicly explained who is paying for them.

These are not free, they never were.

That means the city entered April 1st, 2026 with no federal grant, no sales tax backstop, and as far as any public record shows, no council vote authorizing where these costs now land in the general fund.

I am aware the city manager has stated that Wichita maintains healthy reserves and a triple A bond rating.

I am not alleging insolvency.

What I am alleging is a process failure.

The absence of public deliberation, about a half million dollar annual commitment, now apparently being absorbed without explicit counsel authorization.

I've submitted a written summary to the city clerk for official record, which documents these figures and formally requests a written response from the city manager.

That brings me to my two direct questions for this council.

First, as of April 1st, 2026, which specific line item in the general fund or which alternative fund is now paying the annual subscription cost for these 191 flock cameras.

Second, at what point will this transition from federal dollars to city dollars be brought before this council for a formal vote and public comment period?

I am asking this council to direct the city manager to provide a written accounting within 30 days of the current funding source for the flock ALPR program, the total annual obligation, and the plan for ongoing authorization through the normal budget process.

The public deserves answers about what this program costs, who authorized it, and what comes next.

That conversation cannot wait any longer.

Thank you for your time.

Thank you, Andrew.

Madam Clerk, please call the next individual.

George Theo Harris policing.

Police have my ire.

Hello, mayor, vice mayor, city council, the honorable city manager, and city legal.

The mayor wants me to bring just one issue, but as the neighborhood president of three neighborhoods and 6,000 citizens, I would need to talk every week and not have to wait 30 days between.

So here we go with my five minutes.

Back on October 15th, my wife and I were coming back from the neighborhood meeting, and my neighbor, five doors to my north, came up behind us at a high rate of speed with no lights on and was attempting to ram us.

This scared my wife, and subsequently I called 911, and the police didn't respond until much later.

Then a month later, the same neighbor came by my house five separate times in a little over an hour on November 13th.

I've come and talked to this city council, and the police were supposed to go do something.

Well, what I've learned, if you rob a bank and don't answer the door, then there's nothing they'll do because they won't went to the neighbor's house twice while he was home because his vehicle was out there and he didn't answer the door.

So they closed out the call.

When questioned by me, the lieutenant said it was like apples and oranges.

My comment about the bank robbery, not answering the door, and at this point, I have to know which is the apple and which is the orange.

We were almost physically harmed by this guy, regardless of what his deal was, and a bank is just money.

Now on to a second situation.

Well, newsletters.

Well, on Sunday afternoon, March 8th, I put a flyer in a person's screen door like I have thousands of times and started to go to the next house.

And the guy that lives there came out screaming at me and told me not to open his door, and I was being passive in backpedaling, just trying to tell him I was trying to save him some money on his trash bill, and he didn't want to hear that.

And he started walking towards me and doing his fists, a rock em sock and robot.

And I still was backpedaling, and I've since talked with the police.

They told me this is assault.

And yet our city legal says it's a he said, he said, well, this he said, is willing to take a lie detector test.

Will that other he said take a lie detector test?

I know they're not admissible.

But I have nothing to lie about.

And this needs to be resolved.

Is the last people who delivered newsletters for us were church members?

Can't happen while I'm the president of the neighborhood.

Number three at the animal shelter, which I've asked for years to have an audit done, and yet we haven't never got around to it.

I'm on the animal advisory board, and they told us one month there was a 92% of calls were closed.

And I know myself, I've called them five or six times and didn't get any closure.

So what does that really mean that 92% close, right?

So it they I asked, and they're closing calls if they don't get to them.

Well, I don't see how you can do that.

I was the chairperson on the licensing subcommittee.

And after asking Jan Jarman and Emily where our numbers on licensing are, they told me to get a CORA request or call licensing, which I might add, have been directed not to talk to me.

Our last police chief actually married my wife and I on May 20th, 1999.

Yet this chief won't even talk to me.

Chief Ramsey said I make police accountable and better.

I want to build up our police department, not tear it down.

And in closing, uh my wife's mom died last Monday, and Janet's afraid to come to Wichita anymore, which is sad because that's where I have my house.

But I want to say, City manager, people on next door have said your salary is too high.

Well, George Theo Harris says they should double it if you have to deal with this city council.

8218 ring a bell.

Thank you.

Thank you, George.

Councilmember Hoheisel.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um, just to the previous speaker, Andrew.

I just wonder if we can make sure to get him a response.

Thank you.

Madam Clerk, can you please call the fourth individual?

Uh Madam Mayor, we do not have a fourth individual.

This means that there are two spots available for anyone who would like to address the council.

Whoops.

Good morning.

Celeste Reset District 5, 2239, North Tea Time Court.

Wasn't planning to speak on the public agenda, but I notice there's parking now where you have to pay for parking to come to a city council meeting.

I think, in order to be open and listen to your constituents, and some of you have called for public meetings.

Anyone who wants to come to a city council meeting should not have to pay for parking.

And so I'm slightly offended.

I understand why we need security because I support all of you to be free from threats or physical violence.

But still, we should be able to park and come in and speak.

So I don't know whose idea that was, but I strongly discourage you from charging parking for people to speak.

Thank you.

Thank you, Celeste.

We have one more spot available.

I see none.

It is now time for council members to ask the city manager uh direct questions.

Council uh city manager, I do have a couple of questions regarding uh our speakers today.

Uh, first and foremost, I wanted to make sure uh that it is public knowledge that the city of Wichita is planting trees, um, but make it more obvious.

I'm looking at the park and recreation uh website right now, and the very first portion of the website doesn't even show um the dashboard, and I think the dashboard should actually be on there.

The dashboard shows illegal dumping, uh it shows homeless encampment cleanups, um, and I think that should be more prominent on the page.

Um, so that's one what from speaker number one.

For speaker number two, um, I would like Mr.

Andrew Kramer to get a response.

Um, so I would like to know how we are paying for those subscriptions regarding flop cameras.

Uh for speaker number three, uh, Mr.

Theo Harris.

Um, there were multiple items, and I know that council member Hoheisel speaks uh to his constituent, uh, Mr.

Theo Harris often.

And for speaker number four, Celeste, um, we had a whole conversation regarding parking two weeks ago during the workshop.

Um, but I'd like to get an update on how we are managing paid parking at City Hall.

Uh paid parking at City Hall is not new, however, there's a new system, and I want it to be clear for individuals that do come to City Council because I do want more people attending our council meetings, that they are welcome, that they we want your voices to be heard, and so we have a validation process uh from the past.

However, the new validation process may need to be communicated better to residents.

Uh so I'd like to see that also on the city of Wichita's page.

I see no other council members addressing the public agenda with council member shepherd.

I just want to clarify um city manager, particularly the concern from I believe majority of those from the bench in reference to the speaker who spoke about parking is that victims who are coming in to interview with Wichita Police Department would not be charged.

Can you confirm whether or not that is true?

And to the mayor's point, can you please expand on the workshop that we had that addressed city parking?

Thank you.

Thank you, Mayor and Council.

A couple of things related to parking is that yes, we have had parking at city hall, so it is not new.

We do have new equipment and a new way to do that through the pay station and through license plate versus the actual coin meters.

Um there is a validation option.

Um but Mr.

Shepherd, to your question.

Um we don't have the data on tracking victims who have come in here.

So some of them could have paid, but we do have in the past, we've had a validation system if their victims come into court.

So they have had that option and they will have that option going forward.

We just don't track them individually to tell you how many folks came through and did or did not pay.

Um so it is a new system, so thank you for those who are working through this with us.

We do have paid parking um throughout downtown now, and so City Hall is part of that, and so we are just implementing a new system, not new paid parking.

The rates are actually a little bit lower for the long term in the city hall than what they used to be.

Um but we do not have the 30 minutes free that we used to have here at City Hall, but we do have the validation option, and so we do have to communicate um since it's through technology in a lot of cases to get the validation.

Mayor with the follow-up, please, Mr.

Marstall.

Where would we get that data from?

And I'm sure WPD has that data.

So is there a way that we can collect that data?

I would like to know.

Data You said that we don't collect data on victims.

If they're coming to court, if they're speaking in court, so surely we can get that data.

No, so well, meaning if the court office, a court administrator gives out validations that day.

We don't know if the validations are for victims or for other folks, and so we don't have it broken out.

But we can see how many validations we're getting out that we can do.

Correct.

Yeah.

And we who's responsible for the validations per department, who pays that cost?

The departmental budget absorbs those validation costs.

So that's concerning given budgets.

Um, so take that for what it is.

Um and who made the decision on parking, Mr.

Marstall.

City Council.

Okay, thank you.

Councilmember Hoheisel.

Thanks, Mayor.

Uh, just want to reiterate my belief that um we should not be charging parking at city hall to people who are coming to petition their government.

Um, just my thoughts it makes sense on the weekends where people who use the parking lot maybe to go downtown or anything like that, but during operations of city council and city hall, I really do have issues with that.

Thank you.

Councilmember Vice Mayor Glascock.

I'll join into the chorus.

Uh, I've had opposition for uh charging parking at City Hall.

I think there's a majority of council based on my colleagues, and so I'd be interested in that being brought back up uh to a vote of the council um because of the concerns, especially.

I know we're trying to look at it as an enterprise account, and I think there's some merit with that.

Um, but to some points regarding parking at City Hall, if you're expressing your first amendment right to air your grievances of government, I think it should be easy to be able to do that because we should hear um grievances.

Uh in addition, I also have concerns to council member Shepherd's points about um when we have victims of uh potential crimes that have come up here.

I don't want an additional burden of them having to figure out how to validate their sys or how validate their parking when they're already probably at the uh one of the most difficult points of their life as well.

So I think I hear from a general consensus of my colleagues that we would probably be interested in addressing that for a further vote of the council to codify council member Shepherd.

Councilmember Johnston.

Thank you, Mayor.

I will also concur with majority of the council.

I don't think you should have to pay to come to city council meeting.

Uh anybody with domestic violence.

I also think that people who come to pay a water bill.

Um I think that's why we have the 30 minutes free.

Um they can probably at least afford to pay the even though it's only a dollar.

They obviously couldn't pay their water bill and they have fees to pay.

So I I really think we should consider that.

Um also question is the rounds importer, is that paid parking or not?

As of now it is available for staff and other business, but it is not charged.

The rounds reporter is not charged, so it's a little further walk, but not too bad.

Okay.

Thank you.

I see no further comments from the council.

We will now move.

Madam Clerk, can you please call the next item?

Consent agenda items one through 31.

Council members, are there items to be pulled?

Councilmember Johnston.

Thank you, Mayor.

I'd like to pull item 3A.

Item 3A is the approval of a purchase and sale agreement for a parking garage and subsequent lease agreement with WBD LLC in district number four.

Any other items, council members?

I see none.

With that, I move to approve consent agenda items without consent agenda item three A.

Second.

Motion second discussion.

See none.

Madam Clerk, please open the roll.

Motion passes 70.

Councilmember Johnston.

Thank you, Mayor.

Uh C Manager and Troy do have some questions about this item.

Um how do how did we come to the amount uh per parking space?

How is that amount determined?

It's just a cost or estimate of cost.

Yeah, so uh Troy Anderson assistant city manager.

Uh you'll recall back in the original development agreement that was approved by city council.

Uh the cost was based on a mutually agreeable term and condition of $32,000 a stall.

Um that's based on general consensus around what it would cost to have a a structure like this built.

Um and so uh when when we ultimately negotiated that original development agreement with city council, uh that was determined condition that was agreed upon by both parties.

Okay.

There's some question whether that hotel is actually gonna be built or not.

I know we're all hopeful that it will be built.

Um what if it's not built?

What will effect have this on this agreement?

So if the hotel is not built, um, or or either of the projects for that matter, um, then the other party would be in default of the development agreement, and uh the city uh would have to enter into most likely litigation uh with the other party to uh to acquire the land back if if the defaulting party did not uh deliver what they uh promised that they would.

Yeah.

So if that was the case, would this agreement help us in that court proceedings?

Uh yeah, so I should probably make sure that we're not mixing messages here.

The two documents that you all are approving today are simply exhibits to the development agreement that has already been approved by city council.

In the development agreement, the city council already approved, city council already agreed to a uh a purchase of the parking garage upon substantial completion, and subsequently council previously approved leasing a percentage of the parking stall back to residents of the multifamily residential apartments, uh patrons of the hotel.

These are simply those sort of final form documents.

Nothing in these two documents that you all are approving today.

Changes anything that you all have already committed to in regards to again purchasing the parking garage for those mutually agreeable terms and conditions, as well as leasing the uh a percentage of the parking stalls back to those individuals.

Okay, so this this just sets the financial these are purely just form documents.

Yep, they're financial agreement with both parties.

The development agreement's already been approved.

Okay, okay, thank you.

Vice Mayor Glasscock.

Thank you.

A few additional questions, um, concerns that the only thing if there's default is litigation because it's seemingly we haven't had a good track record when it comes to public private partnerships regarding parking.

I can think of four right now that I'm concerned with off the top of my head.

Um so one of my questions would be right now, we've extended the vertical construction milestone to July of 2026 to make sure that completion can happen.

Why couldn't this come back once vertical completion has begun or at least um vertical construction begins in July of 2026?

What would be the detriment of waiting to make sure that the buildings actually go in vertical to figure out whether they're in default of the agreement before we uh codified this?

I'm gonna probably I'm gonna play junior attorney here for just a second, um, no one understanding that we do have legal counsel in the room that can uh tell me I'm wrong, but a development agreement's already been approved, right?

This is when the development agreement was originally approved by city council back in 2024, 2023.

You may recall we were we were changing from an office use previously.

The original development agreement prior to even this amended uh agreement where we separated out WRLP from EPC, there was an office project.

Well, we know post-COVID and really over the last decade, offices um have been incredibly hard to backfill, right?

But we knew and understood back in 2023 that residential was uh a more desirable use, particularly downtown, and so back in 2023 when city council approved this agreement.

We left out exhibits J and K until such time as the project could be redesigned to account for that residential versus the office.

We didn't know how many residential units there were gonna be, how much square footage it was in redesign back in 2023.

So we intentionally left off exhibits J and K to that development agreement so that the development partner could go back redesign, knowing that we would ultimately bring back exhibits J and K to that development agreement.

That's what you all are approving today, are those exhibits J and K to the original development agreement.

So the follow-up question to that would be could we bring this up once vertical construction has begun?

Because at that point, the applicator the partner could be in default the agreement if vertical construction doesn't begin.

Is there a detriment of waiting until that day to be able to bring this forward?

So uh we actually have uh the the development partner, we have Austin Bradley from EPC available online.

Um I would defer to him to answer that question.

My guess is is that um much like any sort of real estate transaction, their underwriting is gonna want to see these documents as part of the underwriting for the project, and that probably they won't be able to commence construction unless and until these documents are part of those closing documents or part of that transactional documentation.

But uh I don't know if we maybe to legal, could this agreement be modified contingent on a vertical construction be giving the date that's been passed by council?

Thanks, Mayor.

I think I would need to look at the development agreement to see what our obligation is.

I'm just not prepared to say what that development agreement requires.

I don't know if I would feel comfortable being today without that.

Um I would probably be interested in maybe delaying that.

One more question that I have for Troy regarding this as well.

What is different about this argument than pending maybe litigation with current uh parking situations as well, which I don't want to get us in trouble for.

What is different about this agreement opposed to I would say failed or uh difficult parking agreements that we currently have in place and other public-private partnerships.

So I would say that um these parking negotiations are uh exponentially more favorable to the city, right?

In the context that none of this is binding to your point unless and until the development partner begins to achieve those project milestones and ultimately delivers a project.

There's no commitment by this the way that we have structured this deal, right?

You'll you'll uh recall I've often kind of went back to making sure that our incentive packages are performance-based, right?

Um, and that we're not burdening the taxpayer, right?

In this case, that that's that's true, right?

We will not acquire the parking structure unless and until it's built upon substantial completion.

So it's gonna take 18 months, right, to build this parking structure.

It's not going to the city's not going to be obligated to purchase the parking structure, and then subsequently lease parking back to those tenants unless and until it's built.

So in perhaps maybe some of those other circumstances, um, and again, there were a lot of those agreements that were floated around, so I'll try to just generalize.

Um there were overcommitments, I think, made by the city uh to sort of stand up and support some of those other projects in advance.

Uh, in addition uh to that, I think we may have uh uh overextended our commitments to deliver and tie up parking that otherwise uh other folks could have used.

In this case, we have terms and conditions that mitigate sort of use it or lose it type of provisions as well as uh exponentially, like I said, more beneficial to the city, uh, but really to both parties.

I I think these the between the purchase sale agreement upon substantial completion and the subsequent lease back, I I think we've positioned ourselves much better than we have in the past.

Well, I'm hopeful development happens, and I guess we'll find out in July as well.

Um I I might have more questions, but I see my colleagues are on the board, so I'll let them answer.

Councilmember Hullheisel.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um thanks, Troy.

Appreciate your work.

Um I have a couple of questions here.

Up to 85% of this is available for EPC or the hotel or the office base to lease.

Is there a floor on that?

Is there a certain amount that they have to lease at least in order to make sure that this project is viable and we actually receive some of the income that we're planning on here?

Um, there's not a floor.

I can tell you, I can speak, and again, I don't want to put words in uh our development partner's mouth, but I can assure you they actually wanted to lease more than what uh we have agreed to, right?

We want to make sure that it is uh under that this is a public parking garage, right?

That the folks who are parking in this public parking garage are residents of an apartment complex that is next door, citizens to the city.

That the people who are parking in this parking garage are patrons and visitors who are staying in the hotel, or that might be frequenting a ball game, or may just be coming downtown to shop in the Delano shopping district, right?

That this is a public parking garage.

We want to make sure that we preserve that integrity first and foremost.

Um I'm I have no doubt in my mind that this parking garage will have the utmost demand given its location and proximity to uses within the area.

Have they indicated what the split is that they would want for the apartments to the hotel?

So no, but if you can imagine there are um several hundred apartment complexes, and um I don't remember the exact well hold on just a second.

So there are there's a hundred and fifty-five room hotel, and uh there is at least a hundred and fifty unit apartment complex.

In fact, I think it's north of 200 apartments now.

You can imagine pretty quickly, even if it's just sort of a one-for-one in that case, uh, there could be 300 of 300 spaces within this parking structure that are occupied at maybe any given point in time.

Appreciate that.

Uh, do we have a schedule for when this would be would essentially pay for itself or pay it off the the debt that we're gonna take on for um this project?

So the recommendation and uh Mark is here, so uh just to back me up again.

I'll play junior finance director here for a minute.

Um so our intention, our recommendation is upon substantial completion, once it's built, uh, that the city would issue bonds.

Uh those would be 20-year bonds that over the life of those 20-year bonds and the schedule associated with those 20-year bonds, that the parking fund would backstop, right?

Uh, or would be the first line of payment towards those bond payments, which is why we've been working uh sort of diligently over the last several years to stand up a very successful parking management system to assure that as the city starts to step into these business ventures, right?

That again we're not burdening taxpayers.

This is a user-based fee structure and uh uh special revenue fund that is ultimately paying for the death service on more of these assets.

So yeah, I'm I mean I'm just curious when essentially again when it'll pay for itself, when we'll get the uh nearly 10 million dollars that we're putting into this paid back through this parking garage.

So the bonds will be most likely a 20-year bond structure.

So you have to um again, this is very similar to a a real estate portfolio, right?

Um you can't look at individual parking structures in a vacuum, so to speak, right?

You'll almost never charge enough in rents within a uh uh any one individual parking structure, right, uh, to recover the death service on it.

That's why it's part of a system, right?

Uh, much like any real estate portfolio, you're gonna have some projects that um ultimately make more money than they um than they originally intended to, right?

Uh once the debts retired, for example, we have a number of assets downtown uh parking structures that no longer have any debt on them, right?

And so the revenue that is being generated from those parking structures within the system are also going to pay for the death service on these new parking garages.

It's not just a kind of in a vacuum of the revenue for this garage, it's part of an ecosystem and it's part of that network of parking structures and the revenue that the city is receiving off those other assets that will also go to pay for the death service on these new assets.

So will that prioritize paying back the debt on this above the maintenance that we want to see in the other parking garages and parking lots and whatnot?

The the beauty of the system that we're we're standing up is it's not either or, it's both, right?

That uh in fact uh you'll see a presentation from uh staff later this year here in the next couple of months on a routine uh maintenance uh strategy around all of our parking assets downtown.

How are we uh uh continuing to invest and maintain a clean and safe environment?

Um we look back at deferred maintenance in a lot of our assets over the last several years, right?

Over the last several decades, right?

And so now as the system is getting stood up, again the revenues that are being generated as a result of the system and the usage are now going back to pay for the maintenance and the death service on these assets.

So it's not either or it's actually both.

Okay, yeah.

I I share some of the same concerns as council member Glasscock, and um I wouldn't be against the delay as well until we see vertical.

So just my thoughts.

Thank you.

Um assistant city manager, I have a several questions actually regarding this item.

First and foremost, the green sheet is inaccurate.

Um I'm looking at the minutes for the October 17th, 2023 meeting because there was no October 16th, 2023 meeting, and this actually says it was a resolution setting a public hearing regarding this project plan.

So I'd like to make sure that the green sheet is actually reflective of the actual meeting and the real document.

So can we get clarification?

Is this what was being referred to?

I'm sorry, can you I'm I have about how a hard time.

I'm looking at the minutes for October 17, 2023.

The green sheet says October 16, 2023.

Number one, there was no such meeting unless the minutes are incorrect.

I I want to make sure that green sheets are accurate because they become a historical record, and if they're incorrect, this council, again, a majority of this council was not there on October 16, 2023.

So I want to make sure that A, was it October 16, 2023, or was it October 17th, 2023?

The inaccuracies of this green sheet caused me pause about moving further in the discussion.

Um, in addition, um, I want to make sure that again, if this is reflective of what had happened in the past, and you've been mentioning multiple times.

Um council voted this.

Well, again, a majority of this council was not there.

Um I want to have clarity.

I do recall that on October 21st, 2025, it was a unanimous vote by this council minus council member Shepard to um make an amendment to this development plan, which did include that garage.

And I do recall having the conversation regarding this garage.

However, um I've been always asking questions regarding parking garages and how much they cost per space.

So right now, this new parking garage would cost 32,000 per space.

I'd like to know in comparison across the street from this baseball stadium, the city of Wichita is building a new transit hub.

How much per space is that?

Yes, so um, regarding the dates in the green sheet, I will go back and verify uh actual dates on the green sheet.

Regarding the $32,000 install number that is has been negotiated.

The $32,000 a stall number is the number that the city is willing to buy the parking garage for, right?

It may actually cost more than $32,000 a stall to build the parking garage.

Anything above and beyond the $32,000 a stall is absorbed and is on the developer to bear those costs, right?

The city is only willing to buy the garage for $32,000 a stall.

If it costs more than that, then that's on the development partner to absorb those costs.

But before he does, I want to make sure that we're we're differentiating too.

When we talk about costs per stall, that's a that's a measure, right?

That we use to at least begin to frame the conversation of how much these garages cost and what the city is getting as a real result of it.

For example, um, if we were gonna spend eight million dollars on a parking garage, eight million dollars to buy one space is wildly different than spending eight million dollars to get eight thousand spaces, right?

So now you start to kind of begin to provide context around how many spaces that you're actually purchasing, because ultimately at the end of the day, in an operational model, we're leasing up individual spaces.

So now we can kind of start to compare apples to apples of the revenue that we're receiving per space versus what it actually cost to get built.

That's why we use that that number in the per stall.

So there's a number of different factors that lead into the cost.

There's acquisition costs of land and real estate, there's the hard costs of actually physically building the parking structure, there's the soft costs, those are the costs associated with the design of the parking structure.

And then ultimately there are kind of carrying costs, development costs, right?

Those are it's the developer fees and the and the carrying costs again on the interest of the loans that are associated with these, right?

So there's a number of different factors.

So, for example, you're gonna hear from uh city engineer here in just a minute.

In that scenario, we may have acquired the land for a whole lot less than perhaps where we might acquire land elsewhere.

That changes that variable on that dynamic.

Uh same with types of construction.

So the cost of construction in a port in place post-tension concrete parking structure has different costs than that which is a pre-cast concrete structure, right?

So changes in construction type can also uh impact the overall construction cost.

But with that being said, I'm gonna defer to um city engineer Paul Gunsman.

Thank you, Troy.

Good morning, Mayor City Council members.

Uh regarding the hub, the uh the bid on the project was just under 20 million dollars.

It was 19,738,580 for construction.

And that also included the transit office spaces as well.

So I have broken out those costs for the parking garage itself, is just under 17 million dollars.

16,921,743.

And if there's there is 425 spaces within that garage, so that equates to approximately 40,000 dollars per space.

Now, if we add the soft cost, as Troy mentioned, land acquisition design, construction administration, special inspections, etc.

And prorate that, or you know, um the transit office for construction was approximately 14% of the total cost.

So if I take 86% of the soft cost and add it to the parking garage construction costs, then that equates to approximately 45,725 per space.

Now that is a as Troy mentioned, that is a cast in place post-tension garage, so which is a bit more than what the precast would be.

And this EPC garage is what type of garage again originally it was contemplated that this was a uh cast in place post-tension parking structure.

I I'd have to go back to uh the development partner and let them specify exactly what type of parking structure construction type this was going to be.

Um the EPC garage is a cast in place post-tension, and the hub is also a cast in place post-tension.

Is that accurate?

So we are kind of comparing apples to apples now.

So the hub, which is on the west side of the stadium, is roughly 40,000 per space, or if you add in soft costs, 45,700 per space.

So between 40,000 to 46,000 per space for the parking spaces at the hub on the west side of the stadium.

What we're talking about right now is the EPC garage and the parking spaces at that garage, which would be very similar in in construction, cast in place post-tension, and they're asking for 32,000, but we don't know if it would be higher or even lower.

Is that accurate to say?

Because we're the city is only willing to buy it at 32,000 per stall.

However, if it costs more, we would not buy them at that cost.

Is that accurate?

That's correct.

The agreed well, I'm gonna let me back up.

I'm gonna I'm gonna defer to the development partner who's building it to identify basically uh what construction type the the parking garage that is being contemplated today is going to be built as I don't want to misrepresent and misspeak.

Yes, we have representatives available online.

The second part is yes, regardless of how much it costs, the city has agreed to pay for uh or purchase the parking garage at a not to exceed price of $32,000 a stall.

So my follow-up then, just for an idea of what we're talking about, because I think that we have individuals who are either in the audience or uh watching online.

In 2016, there was a garage that was built in district number one with 400 spots.

It was 7.2 million dollars.

So per space, it was $18,000 per stall.

And then recently in the news, uh, we have a parking garage at one of our healthcare hospitals, um, 500 spots roughly $65 million.

That's about $130,000 per stall.

Um again, I don't know their soft costs versus hard costs, but that's what we have from the news.

And then we're talking about the city of Wichita's transit hub.

Um, and that in 2024 was $26 million was the total project itself.

Is that accurate, Paul?

Can you uh differentiate between your set 20 million and the 26 million that the council approved?

Yes, so the the total budget approved by city council August 20th, 2024 was for 26,325,000 for the project.

Currently, with the bid of 19,738,000 plus the soft cost, we are at a project cost right now of 24 million three hundred thousand approximately.

Thank you, Paul.

So this really is a question for they're online right now.

Is that accurate?

EPC?

Um I'd like to know more about this parking garage that EPC will be building.

Um again, this council already voted on the amendment back last year, but I think um in comparison to these parking stalls, we all have pause because we know that there have been multiple issues regarding parking uh in downtown Wichita, and we want to be prudent that we are making the best decision given the information that is at hand in 2026.

So the question is for EPC, I think they're online right now.

Can you talk about this parking garage?

And I know that the city is willing to buy it at $32,000 per stall, but if it comes higher or if it comes lower, what will be I guess any recourse by EPC uh and tell me more about this parking garage that's being built because I think right now they're saying it's a cast in place post-tension um versus a pre-cast type of structure.

Yeah, you want to get yes.

So yeah, so it's a required person.

This is often rather than the ECR with your question, uh all the ride is was a cast in place post-garage.

Uh it is now a precast garage.

Um, and to answer your question directly, it absolutely will be higher than $32,000 installed.

Yes, and at this point is 12 and a half million dollars for this garage.

And so in terms of the mission recourse there, um, that's that's where the tip comes into play.

And so those will then be that delta between what this garage costs and what the student will be requiring it for, will then become reimbursable and uh certifiable to the cost that we can recover over the TIFF term.

So again, we expect this to cost at least three million dollars more than what it's being acquired for from the city.

That's always been our assumption within our underwriting.

Um I'd like to address some of the other comments here, but uh pause mayor, is that answered to your question relative to the garage construction stuff?

It does answer my question regarding um what type of structure this is.

Can you explain why you guys chose to do pre-cast versus the uh cast in place post tension, which was the original?

So it's a a costing uh solution, you know, keep the project within budget.

You know, we're doing 10 garages across the middle right now and say about that's not a very task, so it's very common.

Um that's what we're at right now.

And this parking garage, um, again, there's nothing there's no retail space in this garage.

Can you just tell me a little bit more about this garage?

Um, I know at some point someone had mentioned that there were other amenities that were on the garage.

This is just a plain parking garage, no retail.

I think it's what you're referencing that we do have on the south in the east side of the garage.

Um we are wrapping it with apartments uh retail and our lobby, but none of that falls on the footprint garage itself.

Thank you.

You can address the other concerns I think that you said you uh wanted to talk about.

Councilman Hospital, um, so in terms of the key program, uh, we're actually up to 16 keys on the hotel, uh, and 192 apartments for both kind of increase since we last spoke uh to choice points.

You know, we actually wanted to use uh as much of the ground as we could um on the apartment side, you know, we expect to use somewhere in the 1.2.3 stalls per apartment, and that's how we start at that.

And then in terms of the hotel use, this will be a brand driven requirement uh to have these stalls available for the hotel yes.

So I don't know what scenario that would lead to us not being able to use all these stalls and use those.

Uh so we want to give you um maybe a little bit of comfort there.

Um, and then as I mentioned a couple of times initially by councilman glass cock, um the reason the time is important is the acquisition and assessment lease in the garage is such a fundamental component of the economics of this project and also has been approved in the development agreement.

Uh so it's sure you appreciate our vendors as we're getting through the diligence right now to keep us on track.

Uh we don't have assigned purchase and sale agreement we can share with them or assigned lease.

And so until we have that, this is a major question you know for most parts in particular.

So for us to maintain a critical path again, I think step is a milestone with no cushion.

So it's aggressive when we're on track, um, it's critical that we need these documents um approved and avoiding any additional uncertainty because of is this council through these documents because without a purpose and sale agreement and especially what lease the project's not moving forward.

Um one of the main acts to have you address these questions and for control mission in this.

These documents are really uh meaningless.

Um if this project does not go or execute considering your garage to buy, first of all, there's no stalls in the least on the side.

So um if there's scenario if these documents are approved and executed and you go down to field, and this project is not staying on track, and this is milestones and never happens uh in the end of things documents would be much as that point because there's no crossing pad.

So I wanted to clarify that to be someone reiterated forwards of getting these documents done, so we can be sharing this with our capital partners and our uh particular uh you know, something bringing clarity to you know how to operate.

Councilmember Glasgow or Vice Mayor Glascock.

Thank you.

Councilman Ballard, did you have something to say first?

Yeah, there's just a couple people texting that can't quite hear the speaker online.

So I don't know if he can just talk into the mic a little bit better, but they're asking for a recap, but maybe um just a short one somehow and making sure that it's coming through so they can hear online.

Sorry to interrupt.

Thank you.

I still have quick questions that may tie into that recap.

So regarding language, I appreciate the um verbal confirmation that vertical construction is going to happen, but verbal confirmation only goes any particular way.

So regarding this agreement, if we're confident that this is needed for uh underwriters for the construction, would the applicant be amenable to language that says contingent on vertical construction, given that they have every intention, and we can have an argument whether or not this is meaningless come uh the July deadline for vertical construction, but that would be something that I would need to feel comfortable doing forward.

I also like the ver or the verbal confirmation that this would not exceed 32,000, but I also want something codified that's not verbal communication.

So looking at subpoint one B of the agreement, it says language that an amount equal to $32,000 multiplied by the number of parking stalls, even the language of up to 32,000.

Um for the number of so let's say it comes down for 30,000.

Let's say we get a really good deal.

I'm not in the business of pricing out parking garages.

Well, let's say it's 30,000.

Then just that alone, this agreement means that we'd have to pay 32,000, which means if we multiply out that by the number of spots that were um allocated in this agreement, we would be at a negative loss of 520,000, more than half a million dollars for this.

And so while yes, the construction projects likely will be higher, it could be lower.

And if that's the case, we still would be out, and the developer would be profiting 523,000 by just the words equal versus up to.

So that would be one thing that I would probably want changed.

There's also just a challenge, and I don't know how this can be addressed by this agreement, but there's no incentive to save money on the construction of this right now.

They have no incentive to not hit the 32,000.

I mean, they have an incentive not to go to 42,000 if we purchase it for 32,000, but there's no incentive for them to go to 30,000 or 28 and figure out ways to make more of a cost um conscience uh parking stall um because we don't need necessarily all the amenities in a parking garage.

So those are again some of my concerns moving this forward.

I'm still likely to um not support this as if this moves forward today uh without those changes and would want to delay, but I'm still interested.

I uh see there's probably colleagues on the bench too.

I do have follow-up questions to that.

Uh number one, Mr.

Austin, uh, would you be in favor of changing the language to say up to instead of equal to uh first of all, we will uh process that we're gonna take a lot of people.

Austin, um I think that this council um just wants to make sure that the contracts read in favor of the citizens of Wichita, and so I know that it's in semantics and it's very uh minute.

However, it is very critical for our citizens to know that they are being protected by this council.

So if it is changes of words um that will make it so that citizens of Wichita feel more secure about this investment, um I am in favor of delaying.

The other question is um the question about making sure that we're not buying an item that is not even gonna be constructed given that July 31st is the deadline, and I am confident that you will bring us an actual uh vertical construction starting July before July 31.

However, I think this council feels more comfortable if it is again codified in the language of the contract that if it doesn't commence, then this is null and void.

So it's maybe a question for legal.

How would we codify that?

Um I know with the intention that they are going to go vertical by July 31, but if they don't, I wanna make sure that the taxpayers are not uh holding uh uh you know uh a lease that doesn't even um come true.

Mayor and Troy can jump in if if he feels differently.

I believe this would require an amendment to the development agreement.

Do you disagree?

Uh no, I don't necessarily disagree.

I would agree that if we're gonna go back and amend the terms and conditions of the development agreement, um that's probably a different conversation, right?

Uh, because we to your point, we have a development agreement.

This spells out the fact that the city's willing to buy this parking garage upon substantial completion for the cost of $32,000 a stall.

Um and again, we know that as you heard from and I can testify in just in other conversations I've had in other parking garage acquisition conversations.

I can guarantee you that the cost of building a parking garage exceeds $32,000 a stall.

I mean that's almost just a fact nowadays between acquisition, hard cost, soft cost developer fees.

I have no doubt in my mind that this garage will far exceed $32,000 a stall.

In fact, the city is going to be um to your point, the fact that the city is uh has negotiated acquisition of this garage for less than the actual costs, is actually in the favor of the taxpayers and the citizens, because we're only having to acquire the garage for less than the actual cost to build.

Um but that's been part of the negotiations all along.

You're right.

If we want to go back and kind of renegotiate terms and conditions of the development agreement, that that's something that we would have to bring back as part of renegotiating the terms and conditions of the development agreement.

These two documents that you all are approving today are in alignment with the terms and conditions of the development agreement was previously approved by city council.

I I do concur.

I mean, it has like Troy said, we've already committed to to making these agreements as part of the development agreement.

They could have been exhibits at the time, they weren't.

Um but they are the cities agreed to do this already in in the development agreement.

Um it does not address when the purchase sale agreement must be signed, um, but it is to be entered into upon substantial completion of the apartments in the garage.

Council uh Vice Mayor Glascock.

I'm reviewing the language in both the documents we have right now, and given that the development agreement isn't before us in this agenda packet, but there is nothing that I have found in this packet that says that they are contingent on vertical construction by July of 2026 and substantial completion.

That's correct.

I mean, nothing in this in these documents would say that.

So I when looking at one of the items in resolution number one today, it specifically says that the governing body may make such alterations, changes, or additions as we approved before by the city manager and the city attorney.

And so why couldn't we make any suggestions to the purchase and sale agreement that's listed, especially regarding language on item one B again changing equal to up to I mean, if this is just formality, we can't change any language that's in this document or the purchasing and sale agreement, but the purchasing and sale agreement would be different than the development agreement, correct?

I just need to look at that.

Okay.

I just would need to read them together.

I think that's a it sounds like a proper pragmatic idea.

Sorry for that, but I do think the purpose of the other agreement was attached as an inside two of the development agreement.

Councilman Glasgow from the outset.

Anything in here exhibits J and K were not part of the development agreement.

Not necessarily.

I'm gonna pull up the development agreement.

But I think there's still a lot of questions.

So I'd be open to moving a public comment, and then I'm ready with a motion.

Actually, I have one more question for Austin.

The idea is that we want vertical construction to begin before July 31, 2026.

I think that's what we even though this council was not around back in 2019 when this original idea came about.

We want to make sure that this idea comes to fruition.

And part of that coming to fruition is apartments, hotel, I know it was office in the past, but that did not happen.

So we don't want an empty piece of land.

We want something to be developed.

So Austin, my my question really to you is by July 31, 2026, not just a verbal agreement.

We already have talked about this in the amendment back last year.

Will we actually see a hotel and an apartment complex with a public garage?

Yes, we're on track of that, but I do think otherwise they can documents because right now our break is no binding, chilling.

And then they're waiting on this document.

Will delay of a week Austin will delay of a week also delay a deadline of July 2026 while we work on getting these answers.

You should just relative to while we work on getting answers from legal will delay of one week jeopardize the project further.

Is that what you're arguing?

I'm just being candid that this is a side timeline and any delay will create additional challenges.

I'm not saying it's getting protected.

I just want to be clear that it is critical to the back in the world in a position that's acceptable to the city.

So we're saying that we're high out of the case.

But it needs to wrap up quickly.

If I might I pulled up the development agreement, right?

And so I'm just gonna read right from the development agreement.

So this is section 4.02 of the development agreement, and it reads upon substantial completion of the multifamily residential apartment and parking garage.

So I'm gonna pause there for just a minute.

If substantial completion never occurs, then there's nothing to actually purchase.

So substantial completion, that's the condition that upon substantial completion of the multifamily residential apartments and parking garage, the city shall purchase the parking garage from developer in the amount of $32,000 per parking stall, which shall include all hard costs, architectural costs, engineering costs, cost of inspections, government and permitting fees, consulting fees, punch list costs, legal costs, real estate taxes, insurance costs, construction loan interest and financing fees, and development and construction management fees, and any other costs incurred to develop and construct the parking garage.

That's why we say the 32,000 inclusive of those things such as acquisition, hard cost, soft cost, carrying costs located within the parking garage, pursuant to the parking garage purchase and sale agreement in substantially the form of exhibit J, provided, however, that any amount expended by the developer in development and construction of the parking garage, which exceeds the amount of $32,000 per parking stall located within the parking garage, shall be reimbursable to the developer through tax increment funds pursuant to the terms of Article 6 herein.

The city shall finance the purchase of the parking garage via lease purchase revenue or redevelopment bonds at the city's sole discretion.

The parties acknowledge that the city is self-insured for purposes of any insurance obligations related to the ownership of the parking garage.

So in summary, then upon substantial completion, will the city buy this.

If there is no substantial completion, the city will not buy this, even if we were to approve today's parking garage uh purchase.

Is that accurate?

Yes, that is accurate.

Councilmember Ballard.

Thank you, Mayor.

Troy, quick question, and I'm really sorry if you already addressed this.

In the green sheet, it says the 260 parking spaces and the below then the paragraph below it says 300 parking spaces.

So it's 60 space difference, which would be about 1.2 million dollars.

So which one is it?

So the language that you see in the first paragraph is what was part of the original agreement.

I mean, we're talking the original agreement way back when, right?

And then as that project has evolved, right?

The baseline is that the development partner must construct at a minimum that size of a multifamily residential project, that size of a hotel.

As you've heard, the actual project has gotten larger, which is great for everybody involved, right?

And subsequently, yes, the parking garage got larger, and that has been taken into consideration in our proformas around the parking fund, but that $32,000 per stall has always maintained consistency as we've navigated through this.

So the actual project size is a 300 give or take, 300.

I'll I'll let Austin ref uh respond, but right now the project size is a 300 space garage, not the minimum 260 space parking garage that was originally required.

Okay.

Austin, is that accurate?

300 spaces.

Correct.

Yeah, and again, that's a total point I mean that the program has grown, which obviously benefits everybody.

And so the department garage is wrong, you know, committer with that additional square footage to ensure we can park the developments.

Thank you.

Councilmember Hoheisel.

Thank you, Mayor.

Uh, what's substantial completion in this scenario look like?

A temporary certificate of occupancy, even though you don't generally get a temporary certificate of occupancy on a parking garage, you get a certificate of completion.

So upon substantial completion, i.e., you're passing a final inspection that upon final inspection, and that passes final uh inspection that we would begin to start coordinating closing.

Is that tied to substantial completion of the hotel and apartments as well?

No, that's just substantial.

Well, it's all especially on this side of the street, it's all part of the same building, right?

Um in essence, the city is buying call it a condominium unit, right?

The the the multifamily residential, the retail, and all of these amenities that it's part of one building.

So uh I'd be remiss to think that they would build just the garage and not the entire development.

Um but I'll I'll let Austin speak to kind of the integration of the parking garage into the overall concept of the the project.

Yeah, no, that's right, I mean it's the garage and it's us are one of the same RSN structure and also not an amazing question, the suspension is associated with that request and play.

Thank you.

Vice Mayor Glascock.

Thank you again.

I'm not saying that that isn't going to happen, but it could happen that they just build the parking garage and then the city have to acquire it given this language.

Is that correct?

Uh I would argue that no, because the project deliverables that are in the development agreement include not just the parking garage, but include multifamily.

I agree.

It is also upon substantial completion of the apartments and the garage.

Thank you.

I need I needed that confirmation.

Thank you.

Council members, any further questions?

Um, Austin, thank you for answering some questions.

However, I have one more for you.

Um I feel like again, our community wants to make sure that number one, this project actually comes to fruition given that this promise was many years ago.

Um, but not more but but more importantly, that there is actual progress.

And so I've been getting multiple questions about what is happening uh by the baseball stadium, and I think that um a quarterly update or every other month update would be appropriate.

Would would you be able to provide an EPC update so that then the council knows and can share with community what are the next milestones?

I know that the big milestone is not until July 31st of this year, but there's a lot of time between uh then.

Would you be able to provide maybe an every other month update that then could be shared with the entire public about this project?

Yeah.

Right right now, uh which will be subtract projects.

Um mayor has to be.

Thank you.

I think our community would appreciate that communication.

Um, and again, your EPC's project is supposed to commence by July 31 when it comes to vertical construction, and it's supposed to be completed or reached substantial completion by July 31st of 2028.

Thank you very much for uh answering those questions.

We will now open it up for public comment.

Good morning, Mayor Woo, and City Council members.

Thank you, City Council member Mr.

Johnston.

I appreciate you pulled this from the consent agenda because it needs discussion.

So I thank you that we can now discuss this.

I will say right from the get-go, I am disappointed in the staff report, particularly from Troy Anderson.

I didn't hear any dates for development agreements, amendments to various development agreements.

There were a lot of questions from you all that indicated I don't know how this got on the consent agenda in the first place.

This should have been public discussions, staff discussion, and I'm still at a loss, don't even know what the plans look like, have no conception of the apartments of the parking garage, of there was gonna be a pool at one time on the top.

So this is like an a perfect example of why the proposed sales tax referendum failed, 82 to 18 percent, because this is frankly a mess.

So here's a direct quote from a city council member when this contract between the city of Wichita and Wichita Riverfront LP, the original developer, was signed.

First, he said, we're gonna maximize our return, we're gonna get the best bang for the taxpayer dollar with clawbacks and contingencies.

We are lowering our risks, and yet today we're being held hostage to whatever the developer demands in order to see construction start.

And we have amended this numerous times in the past.

This city council member went on to say we're building something sustainable with mixed-use development with our risk being mitigated because of that additional development, and yet today we're being held hostage to get that additional development going forward.

This council member went on to say projections were gonna be open and transparent with sharing as much of our analysis as possible so that financing is clear.

It is not easy to find.

I searched on the transparency portal for CID and Starbond debt on the ball stadium, which we're currently paying on, and I couldn't find anything, didn't find this, didn't find the CID debt that we're paying on, and I saw this outdated Gantt chart that doesn't even show all the various hands that this development agreement has changed with, starting with Wichita Riverfront, then it became EPC, then EPC split it out, and it became WBD-H for the hotel and WBD for the rest of the development.

So this is completely outdated and no helpful guide to taxpayers at all.

Let's see.

City council promised all revenue on this development around the ball stadium would pay off debt first.

And yet, what are we doing?

We're giving money to the developers.

So we broke our promise, and there's a city council member who's currently serving on this council that was here from the get-go and made that promise, and that was the first promise broken when we created a TIFF to pay now EPC back as a pay as you go TIFF instead of towards the debt.

The ball stadium development agreement was first discussed six years ago.

There were blank exhibits for this agreement, and there are still blank agre exhibits as we heard today on this agreement six years later.

That just stuns me.

This was the first time I started speaking in front of you, January 7th, 2020, and I told former Mayor Longwell, parking is gonna be a big problem.

And he said to me, and I quote we have a parking plan.

And he reassured me six years ago, parking would not be a problem.

And it's interesting because in the initial discussions about this ball stadium development, the parking garage wasn't even part of this discussion.

The retail space was, in fact, I'm gonna quote from one of these documents that says future development assumes that the following will be added through 2028.

A hotel, 15 restaurants, bars, and clubs, and 20 small retail stores.

And it said nothing, this was in 2019 about a parking garage.

In fact, this is uh a uh document from the March 19th, 2019 meeting, where again it talked about this multi-entertainment center, uh multi-sports stadium development.

They called it an entertainment venue.

Again, no mention of a parking garage that came later.

I'm not sure when it came later, but um this should have been part of the presentation, this mutation of these developers.

And I I heard limited discussion from Troy Anderson, who I believe his last day is Friday.

So you better move quick to try to figure this out or delay it.

That was a great suggestion.

Delay this a week, there's just too many holes in everything.

Um let's see, I'm out of time.

I had more to say about this.

Here's my questions real briefly.

Where why is property tax revenue not part of this cost model?

Because we're gonna lose that when we buy the garage.

Why is depreciation not part of this cost model?

Where are the financial statements for the parking fund, which is a backstop for this?

I didn't see anything regarding the parking fund.

Where's the debt service agreement for the 10 million bond debt?

Why is there no minimum lease stall requirement?

Uh again.

Celeste, can you send me a list of the questions that you have?

Sure.

I apologize for going over time, but thank you for pulling this for discussion.

Thank you for your good comments.

I heard some good comments.

You've absolutely got to nail this down, including what does substantial completion mean and get it in the contract finally detailed.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Councilmember Shepard.

Thank you, Mayor.

I I want to hit the pause button just for a second.

First of all, thank you to the previous speaker who came and spoke and reached out to the council members uh in advance to have this item pulled.

I think healthy discussion is always important, and I also just want to take a moment to lower the temperature in the room to get to a place of learning and engagement and purpose.

Um, I think many times when we are talking about um moments in in our history or our time that have happened that have caused some distrust, can tend to get spirited.

And I think there were just a few comments that I always want to be mindful, especially as someone fairly new up here, that uh we we take a step back, and so a couple things.

Um I know that perhaps maybe from the public perception that um it's easy to look at some of the council members up here and and maybe blame us for some of the decisions that we've made, and conversely perhaps look at our staff who I believe you will not find a harder working staff anywhere else.

I don't always agree, even in my three months here.

Um, but they're dedicated, and uh there's shared accountability to this.

Uh it was it's not just the staff that have the opportunity to peel back the layers of the the onion, but as you all know, every Friday we have agenda review, and it is on all of us to take the time to review our packets and to ask those questions in advance, so that way we're not doing this what we see today.

And sometimes it's healthy for us to do this today.

So, shared accountability, um, and that includes me.

It's not just on our assistant city manager.

Please hold me accountable too.

I could have could have raised this question in advance.

Uh there were some comments about folks who were on the council uh long before my time.

And I've said before, and I'll say it again.

I'm not responsible for what happened then, but I'm responsible for how we move forward now.

And I believe that all of my colleagues here again don't always agree with them.

But I truly do believe we are doing the best that we can in the moments that we have and where we fall short, because we do fall short, we do fall short, that it is up to us to use that as a learning moment and how to move forward better.

You've held us accountable today.

Many speakers have, and it is on us to receive that information and do better moving forward.

I just want you to know I hear you, but I also want to take a moment to uh just provide some perspective from the other side.

Uh, that's not always considered.

So thank you for being here.

I appreciate our staff, and I also want shared accountability that this is not just on them, this is on us too.

We'll continue with public comment.

Good morning, Mayor, City Council.

I want to backtrack to Joseph's comments.

To my knowledge, there are only three people in this room who've been involved in this discussion since the beginning.

Doesn't mean that all of you weren't in our community of our community and seeing this from a distance, but you weren't involved in the discussions.

And again, Joseph, that is not on you.

Those decisions are not on you at all.

I know that Jennifer was with us at the time.

I know the Paul Gunsman's been a very valuable part of this.

And at that time, 2018, actually 2017, I sat on the community, Vince Hancock, Delano District.

You guys knew that.

We were working on a 20-year revitalization of the Delano Neighborhood Plan.

We had that sucker knocked out, everybody had wonderful visions for the future.

And then in late 2018, Troy's predecessor came up to us and said, wait, wait, wait, time out.

We'd like to come up with a ballpark addendum to the pretty much wrapped up tie a bow on it neighborhood plan.

And so we humored him and we listened to him and he said, This was the first time anybody had really heard about the stadium being moved, a whopping 200 yards to the west.

And we looked at it and we said, This makes sense.

To Celeste's point, there was a mayor at the time and a city council member that said, Oh, there's no need to add parking to this.

Everybody's just gonna walk and take bicycles to it.

And the rest of us said, Do you realize how many community events considering that I saw most of you at the St.

Patrick's Day Parade?

That St.

Patrick's Day Parade used to start its staging in the parking lot of the old Lawrence Dumont Stadium.

It can't do that now because the parking lot was essentially sacrificed down to one fifth of its space to make room for other things.

So I'm glad that we're giving ourselves a little bit of flexibility in saying we are gonna need some parking for this, otherwise, there's not gonna be a way to get people in there to enjoy these amenities.

I do want to reiterate for your benefit.

We had an issue years ago called the Minnesota Boys.

Our community learned that words are great, contracts are better.

So I'm completely supportive of all of you saying trust but verify.

I want to make sure that everything necessary is in writing because how do you tell dishonest developers from honest developers?

You don't until you look at your bank account at the end of the deal.

So we have to make sure that the paperwork is in place so that we're protected, that our tax dollars are protected every single time.

That said, uh, we have had a previous project, which I was also involved with, with EPC.

They have gone above and beyond every single time I've seen business with them.

That was their first project in this town because they knew uh they live just down the road from us in Kansas City, and they wanted to be more part of our community, and we've seen that so far.

So I still believe they should be held to trust but verify.

But so far I've been very impressed and appreciate them so much.

I do think we've got opportunities down the road to get some more documentation going on this parking garage.

We've been talking about public parking for some time now.

What are our expected annual maintenance costs over five years, over 10 years?

It's called TCO, total cost of ownership.

Let's do that math.

Depreciation.

In 30 years, our arena is going to be a pile of dust.

Nobody at county has ever planned for depreciation on that arena.

And lastly, and this is part of our parking discussion, revenue.

We know how much it costs the city per space, but over the lifespan of this parking garage, will that revenue close to offset?

Maybe not offset, maybe it's the amenities, maybe it's the tourism aspect of it that's helping us cost justify this.

But I think those are numbers that we should look at.

And I'll stand for any comments, questions.

Thank you for your time.

Thank you.

We'll continue with public comment.

I see none.

We'll bring it back to the bench.

Um before we go into council member comments.

I have one more question for Austin.

Um, if this was to be delayed by a week, which would be next Tuesday, um, so that staff can give us all the answers we've been asking for, a corrected green sheet that has accurate dates.

Um please explain how this would affect um your any of the current deadlines you have with the project.

Yeah, no, that's a very question there.

Uh a little bit of crystal balls to be honest, but yeah, I'm not sure everybody knows, right?

And then we you know you're right, it's not able to underwrite the entire project.

So this is a big there, but uh cost.

Thank you, Austin.

Um, as you can see, it's more internal uh discussions that we need answers to versus really with you and EPC.

Um, and so because we need to clean house and have the correct information out to the community.

Um, I'm gonna ask the city manager to uh direct staff to provide a website, uh uh a page that provides the EPC timeline and all the documents that we've been talking about, because I feel like we keep saying it was years ago.

Well, what's years ago?

Years ago could be 30 years, it could be three years ago.

Um, if there's a timeline that it's easy for community to go and check these documents, it will help with the conversation.

Um, but I do believe that I'm feeling a sense that this council would like to at least delay it for next week on Tuesday and bring this back up with all the answers to our questions, plus a green sheet that's reflective of all of the historical data that we need.

Um City Manager, would that be possible within the next few days to have a website uh link with all of the timeline history?

Um, and and then we are able to have the true discussion just pertaining to the purchase of a parking garage.

That is if EPC uh is there at their substantial completion.

So the city is not on the hook on this parking garage until it actually is uh substantially completed.

So we're not paying 9.6 million to an unknown garage, but rather when it is actually fully completed.

Uh mayor, to answer your question, yes, we can have information on the website.

Again, we'll work with you and council.

I want to make sure as we look forward that we're not confusing the issue from other developments that were associated with this, so I just make sure you're right.

We have the pertinent information so people can understand what you all are looking at right now.

So, yeah, we can do that on a way web page.

Um I'll talk with our um communications folks, but we can see about having that done by the end of the week.

Um, but I want to be clear that council, what questions remain in terms of if you're talking about timeline, the July 31st, 26 or 28.

Um those that is in the development agreement.

So that's in there.

If there is something else that you're looking for in a document, I want to make sure we're separating out the development agreement that has some of the information where you just talked about how we document 32,000 per stall.

That is in the development agreement that's already been reviewed.

If there's some changes you want to the resolution today or the documents today, let's make sure that we are clear on that.

But I think the answers you're looking for are existing in the development agreement that Troy read to you.

You've heard what was said, but I think it was also documented to verify is in the development agreement.

So I want to be clear if you're looking for other information to finalize this decision.

I want to be clear what that is.

And I think we have it already in the development agreement.

What we're talking about today, as we said, are these two exhibits.

So there's any amendments that you want to the resolution today or the amendments today, I would suggest that we can do those, and we'll defer to legal here.

Grab a question.

If you wanted to make amendments to the packet in front of you, I think that would be helpful.

I have a couple of uh detailed questions.

So October 21st, 2025 was was was when this council approved the first amendment to the development agreement extending the vertical construction milestone to July of 2026.

That specific verbiage, this council was very cognizant.

We wanted to see vertical construction as soon as possible, but more importantly, an actual date.

So that was codified.

And again, I want to make sure that agreement, because that was not attached to what was given to us, is easily available for not just the council to see, but for the community to see this agreement.

And I think Austin asked a question in that amendment, there were some exhibits, and those exhibits were uh regarding the parking, so they were JK, and according to his copy of his development agreement, there were exhibits there, but according to what city assistant city manager says, J and K were not there.

So I'd like clarity.

Was there or was there not an exhibit J and K because it seems like the developer has some, but we don't.

So they need to be matching, and it should be public knowledge.

And so that's why I think that it's important back to the communication of this project.

It has received a lot of scrutiny because people are confused about the various different agreements, and I understand this is a portion of the bigger agreement, one that was already passed unanimously last year.

But these agreements again need to be communicated well to the community.

Um, and so I would like to see that in addition on that website, because I actually emailed asking about the finances to this project, and I think they have been uh public knowledge in conversations amongst the council uh meetings, but I got an email.

I would rather I would like to see this information also available to the community, which is the geobond funding, the star bond funding, uh, the TIF funding, all of that again, all in one space, so that people can see transparently what has been happening because I know that it has been discussed amongst um the council in public, but it hasn't been all packaged into one location.

So I would like to see that happen again before Tuesday.

Council member Ballard.

Thank you, Mayor.

Troy, I have one more question.

So I've been getting some questions about the um the years, the amount of years in the lease.

Can you explain whether it's 20 years?

I know it says there's an option to extend the month to month renewal.

Can you explain that?

I'm sorry.

I think it's the second paragraph under analysis on the green sheet.

Yes, so and foremost, um this is month to month.

Renews automatically as long as all parties are um in compliance with all the terms and commissions of the agreement, and so there's an underlying base sort of month-to-month lease agreement, right?

In addition to that, that next layer is that the base term for that continuation of that month to month is for 30 years, um, unless otherwise terminated in accordance with the lease agreement with two tenure extensions, unless otherwise terminated.

So it starts at the very fundamental step of sort of month to month, as long as all parties are in compliance with all the terms and conditions of the agreement, and that allows us to that flexibility too, right?

And increasing the number of lease spaces if necessary, decreasing the number of lease spaces if they're not being utilized, having that month to month continues to assure that the we're being responsive to uh occupancy and demand, first and foremost.

But then yes, so long as that continues month to month, everybody's in compliance, first 30-year term, but two tenure extensions or about 50 years.

Would the um would that information come back to the council?

I mean, obviously I won't be here, but I know there's been some auto renewals in the past that just seem to have kept on getting renewed, and maybe there should have been some questions asked along the way.

So I'm just curious.

Like I said, I know I won't be here, but I'd like to make sure that we learned from those mistakes in the past, and just that the council's brought alongside to make sure that we're checking all the boxes as well.

Yeah, absolutely.

And again, that's why that's why we always start these conversations, or at least now, you know, prior to me joining the city a couple years ago, first and foremost.

I appreciate the commentary from council member Shepherd, right?

About um that there were things that were in existence before we got here, right?

Um, and so there were there were development plans and terms and conditions that were negotiated long before any of us were standing here in front of you.

So we're simply trying to do the best with what we have available to us and work within the confines of those terms and conditions that have been put before us.

We I believe I'd like to believe we have been incredibly successful over the last several years.

Um working with both WRLP, working with both EPC to continue to advance favorable conditions for the city and taxpayers.

Um I think we've achieved that and kind of where we're going and what we're presenting here today.

So I appreciate the ongoing continued patience.

Unfortunately, we couldn't start from a bit blank slate, right?

What we're working within the confines of of the boundaries that have been put in front of us, so I appreciate that commentary.

I agree.

We're gonna take accountability and responsible for where we are today, though, right?

And so in that in your so I'm gonna read from uh the lease agreement in the documents provided to you here today, that uh the option to extend that term, right?

Provided there is no existing uncured event of default, the basic term of the agreement shall automatically renew month to month for two 10 year terms commencing on the first day following the expiration of the basic term and any successive extension term.

So, no, any extension won't necessarily come back to you.

But remember, we have baked into these agreements.

We're gonna come back to these are first and foremost month to month, and as long as both parties continue to be compliance with all of the terms and conditions of the agreement, then we're achieving all the goals and objectives of this public private partnership, right?

And so, if at any point in time during that term or any extension thereof, if there is an event of default, we can begin to start to respond to are you able to cure that default, or do we need to start advancing towards termination of the agreement, and then we're having a wildly different conversation.

But as long as all parties are compliant and consistent with the terms and conditions of the agreement, then this just continues on, and that gives everybody involved some assurances, right?

That gives the residents who are in the apartment complexes assurances that they'll continue to be uh that there will be parking options made available to them.

There are underwriters, there are investors who will continue to be made assured that their investments are being respected, and the parties that are involved are agreeing to their mutually agreeable terms and conditions.

So this will continue sort of automatically, unless and until there's an event of default, and then we tangent and we have a wildly different conversation.

Thank you.

Councilmember Shepherd.

Thank you, Mayor.

I move to close debate.

Would you like a motion?

I would like to motion to delay the approval of the lease agreement until April 17th, 2026.

14th 14th.

See, it even happens to us with the dates getting mixed up.

Human error.

Second.

Motion, second discussion, council member Tottle.

Thank you.

Uh and Troy, I want to thank you for answering all of our questions.

I know you've got some work to do before the end of the week.

I do want to recommend too that we take a look.

I I was trying to do some quick quick stuff here.

Um, and and this will give us a chance to look even more.

But I do believe the October 16th date is correct.

Um, that's the date that we went into the agreement with the development agreement, and on October 17th, which is a Tuesday, is the day that we made it, we made the motion for the public hearing.

So if maybe you know, we can we can double check that.

I know there are some questions that the green sheet isn't accurate, which then um kind of erodes the trust in the work that's been done on this initiative.

But if that's something we could just verify for next week as well, that would be great.

Thank you.

And for clarity, thank you, Councilmember Tuttle.

Um anything that is actually agreed upon must be voted on.

Is that accurate first or agreed upon, then just becomes the date.

You want to talk.

There's a history that Troy can explain on that one.

I can confirm this, trust but verify.

That October 16th date is the date that the agreement was signed.

So based on the language in the agreement, the effective date is when both parties signed the agreement.

That's the effective date of the development agreement.

You're right.

The other everything in the green sheet is true.

There's nothing sort of errant in the green sheet.

The information in the green sheet is true and accurate.

Council approved it on a certain date, but the effective date of the agreement is when both parties actually signed the agreement.

That's when the effective date versus council approved the date.

Once both parties sign the contract, that's when the effective date of the contract.

Okay, I'll go back on the case.

That is that is correct.

I believe it was voted on prior to that.

And maybe as early as 23.

It wasn't until October 16th when both parties ultimately did signed a couple of days thereafter, and then it was remitted to uh to the other parties, they have it in their possession, and then they ultimately signed it.

So the information in the green sheet is true and accurate, and maybe not necessarily reflective of the council date that council approved it, but that's when the actual effective date, that's when we entered into that agreement because that's the effective date of the agreement.

Thank you.

And again, that's the reason why, even more so, why that website is so critical.

A timeline of how all of this has um come to fruition is transparency.

And while we talk about things amongst a council meeting, unless it's codified in like a timeline, people don't know where to find those documents.

And so if it was approved by the council, because it must be approved by the council before it can be signed.

Um I can't sign things unless this council votes at least for.

Um, so that date should have been on this green sheet, because again, it does provide clarity uh on this process that we don't just sign things without the approval and without public comment.

And so I think it's uh disingenuous to provide a date that doesn't include the date that this count this council, whoever was sitting in these seats at that time, voted on.

So I really would like again that timeline.

I think it would be helpful for community to understand how we got to this point in time because as I was looking, and again, thank you very much, assistant city manager Troy.

You were not here when this initial idea came about.

You came to the city of Wichita in August of 2022.

This was before you, and so and this was before a lot of us, and so we are trying to do what's best moving forward, given that decisions from the past we still have consequences too, and so we have to move forward, and so that's why I appreciate this delay.

And again, Austin, it is not um you were not the initial 2018-2019 individuals that uh came before the city uh staff.

So I'm not I want us to move forward, but it needs to be open, transparent, and clear.

And so I appreciate a weak delay.

Thank you very much, Councilmember Shepard.

Councilmember Hoheisel.

Thank you, Mayor.

Just a quick remark.

Um, I do appreciate all your work, Troy.

Um, we do have to learn from um some of the mistakes of the past, and this process can sometimes be a little choppy.

Um, so I think this is kind of what we're seeing here.

So I I do appreciate your work and all my fellow council members' work to try and again improve the process, and that way we are responsive to the expectations of the voters moving forward.

So I do appreciate that.

With that, we have a motion and a second to delay this item until next week, Tuesday.

No further mayor, may I ask is there some information that you want us to bring back to you next Tuesday?

Just being clear.

I made a few uh questions during my remarks.

So if I need to reiterate those, let me know.

But yeah, because if we need to codify something in the again, I one of the concerns I have is item one B versus up to versus equal.

And again, I imagine that cost will probably exceed 42,000, but I would or th the 32,000, but I would not feel comfortable.

Let's say the cost comes at 315, then we're paying more than the cost of construction is on that.

And so for me, that's a concern that may not be this could still more move forward.

It might just be a concern of mine.

Um, and then um specifying in the green sheet the language about contingent on the uh substantial completion versus the uh just vertical completion and making sure that's included in here as well as part of the development agreement, maybe uh link outs to where that is in the original agreement because these are amendments to the original agreement, so let's make sure we have the original agreement as part of the present agenda packet for the public to be able to verify.

So those are the things that I mentioned during my remarks.

And my additional comment is the website must be up before Tuesday so that again the community can see this timeline as well as this council and easily accessible to these documents that we're referring to from 2018 to 2026.

Thank you.

With that, um, I see no further discussion.

Madam Clerk, please open the roll.

Motion to delay passes 70.

Madam Clerk, please call the next item.

Board of bids and contracts stated April 6, 2026.

Morning, Mayor, City Council, Josh Slobber, Department of Finance.

Uh the Board of Bids and Contracts convened yesterday, April 6th, 2026 for the following items.

For engineering, we have the Wichita Valley Center Flood Control Project Pump Station Number 2, 11 and Old Lawrence Road Flatgate Repairs for Wildcat Construction Company Incorporated for $66,500.

We have the midtown lighting, install street lights on Maine and Fairfeu between 9th Street and 11th Street for Phillips Southern Electric Company Incorporated for amount of 277,700.

For purchasing, we have the main and gutter brooms for street sweepers for Barrie Tractor and Equipment Company for an estimated annual usage of $70,270.

We have pool chemicals for the firms listed, United Industries Inc., Chemright, MidAmerica Chemical and Waterwise Enterprises for the groups listed.

We have high pressure sewer cleaner truck for Elliott Equipment Company for an aggregate bid total of 402,992.

We have 13,000 gross vehicle weight restriction cab and chassis truck for group one, Don Hatton Chevrolet Incorporated for 237,5500.

And we have NAP Chevrolet Incorporated for group two in the amount of 93,566 and Knapp Chevrolet Incorporated for group three in the amount of eighty-eight thousand six hundred and eleven dollars.

Group one is for four total at $59,375,000 each.40 cents.

We have the roll call annual licensure support maintenance renewal for VersaTerm Public Safety US Incorporated for $58,942.

We have the newspapers.com subscription renewal for ProQuest LP for three-year aggregate total of $72,747.24 cents.

Staff are requesting the addition of an eight-panel drug test, Kratom test, and Delta 8 test.

Thank you, Josh.

Questions for staff, beginning with council member Johnston.

Thank you, Mayor.

Josh, thank you.

We've had discussion before.

Can you go back to slide number 10?

Yes, sir.

Where is Knapp Chevrolet located?

Houston, Texas.

Houston, Texas.

How far I'd like to have a conversation among the council of local versus Houston, Texas.

Um how far up was the bid from probably Don Hatton and Rusty Eck from those other from that 93,000 and 88,000.

Thank you for the question, Councilmember Johnston.

Specifically, uh Rusty Eck Ford Incorporated did not bid on groups two and three.

Um groups two and three, Don Hatton had a bid of 106,717 and 100,000 394 dollars respectively.

So approximately 25,000 more okay.

I I hear that they all pay the same cost.

So are they able to bid that much lower?

I guess I guess you probably won't know that, but you just get the bids.

I'll tell you what I know, and then we'll we'll work on the rest.

I think um the challenge for this specifically is we don't know what we don't know, so we rely on the process to give us the final price.

The second part of it is is that within this industry specifically, high volume retailers from my experience can engage additional manufacture discounts that others can't.

That's why you may see Kansas City and Missouri as a logistics hub for vehicle sales versus smaller communities because they're having higher volume of output in sales.

Um I can't speak to this firm specifically, but um that was what led us to the low bid for them.

Okay, are they responsible for getting it to which talk Kansas and delivering?

Yes, sir, good question.

Freight on board Wichita, Kansas is our shipping stipulations.

Okay, I would still like to have the conversation among council at some point in time.

Um I know other cities have a 50 mile radius or thereabout, maybe 100.

I don't know what that is, but I'd I'd like to have a conversation because I what I would like to keep it uh more local.

I do think we have enough competition here.

So maybe that's a discussion for another day, but uh thank you.

Vice Mayor Glasscom.

Thank you.

I actually sent you an email about that this week.

So I echo uh Councilman Johnston's comments and again, not necessarily supportive of a complete by-local ordinance, but let's have a conversation.

I think it'd be a great workshop conversation of how do we weigh local companies versus out of state companies, especially keeping the money in our community.

So I'd be very interested in that discussion.

Can you also move forward?

I think it like we squip or quickly moved through it.

Has to do with uh Delta 8 testing as well.

Change contract change order.

Okay.

Have we continually or always tested for Delta 8 versus that that just seemed new to me on conversation, so I want to know what the city's policy is regarding that.

I'm gonna work in tandem with our court administrator.

Yeah.

Uh Nathan, I'm recorded administrator.

Uh so what this is uh really about is uh we're we contracted with GEO to have a specific panel.

We're seeing uh different drugs come into our community and need different tests to cover those drugs.

Uh a big one, um, you know, obviously Delta is something that's growing.

A big one that also wasn't included in our previous uh panel was fentanyl, and so that's getting ordered by our judges to our cost, and so this contract actually lowers our cost for those drug tests that the judges want to see.

So we've kind of been watching what the judges are ordering uh specifically.

So we've got our standard test, and then the judge will say, I want you drug tested, and I specifically want this drug tested.

Well, if it's not in the panel, we then pay more to have that one drug tested.

We've seen it consist consistently happening, so we've kind of arrived at an agreement where we capture those drugs that are now getting frequently tested.

It increases the cost moderately, but reduces the cost uh it increases the cost of our standard panel while reducing our overall cost because we're seeing so many of the kind of one-off drugs getting getting out.

Great explanation.

I have two questions, maybe one for you and then one for someone else.

I don't know.

Um question for you what is the state's policy regarding Delta 8 currently?

State law.

I can't speak to the actual state law, so um I don't know if there's no okay.

That that doesn't have to be answered for this question, but I'd be interested uh to make sure that we're in line with that.

And then second off, this isn't internal to our employees.

This is court cost.

So this is regarding court drug testing.

That's just not listed on here when we're talking about drug testing services.

My assumption was for employees, so this is separate than from employees versus people that are in our court system or defendants and cases, correct?

Yeah, this is court specific.

This is ordered by a judge.

Uh it is not related to internal employee testing.

Okay.

Thank you.

Uh Vice Mayor Glasscock, thank you for the question clarification.

We have multiple contracts with differing commodities and services, and specifically the employee services is employee physical and testing services.

So this would just like coordinate your study.

And when does that come before us?

I mean, it might change, but sorry, that's putting you way on the spot.

No, no, no.

I I vaguely remember with our working with our buyer a couple months ago to establish a new contract.

So we've got at least a year with four one year options from memory, but I can confirm that.

Okay.

Before that comes up, I would love to have a conversation with somebody on uh staff about our internal policies regarding it too.

Uh we work with our requesting department human resources, um, who's kind of our subject matter expert gatekeeper, and then all the requesting departments pay for us.

So we'll we can be happy to coordinate that.

Councilmember Shepard.

Thank you, Mayor.

And I don't Nathan, I hate to um and I'm not a judge or an attorney here, so I'm gonna lean on the experts, but I'm I'm curious why or how would we be allowed to test for a substance that is not banned and or illegal.

I know that Congress is discussing banning Delta 8 through the farm bill, but it currently is not banned in the state of Kansas, and there is no local ordinance in reference to that.

So how are we able to enforce something that is not on the books?

Yeah, so that's a great question.

Uh a corollary is why would we test for alcohol?

You know, we do test for alcohol, and the judge will say no, or will order that an individual not use, you know, substances.

Those substances may be legal substances, and so the the reason we've got that kind of on our plate of options is that's something someone who has an addiction problem may go to instead of other things.

Well, going to that doesn't really help their journey to sobriety or to pass the issues that brought them to court.

And so, yes, we do test for some legal substances, alcohol included, uh, that they're prohibited based on the orders of the judge from consuming.

Perfect.

I would love to learn more outside of this time of then if that's the case.

What steps are we taking for a restorative justice approach and ensuring that we are not placing them in jail or putting a strain on um you know the county jail and or our law enforcement officers, but we are putting them in a pathway to get them the help that they need.

So I appreciate you explaining that.

Absolutely.

Thanks, Mayor Glascock.

Thank you.

And I think Councilman Um Shepherd hit on what I was trying to hit on specifically if something's legal regarding the difference and what we're testing our employees for versus people involved in maybe the criminal justice system.

I think is a conversation warranted.

So I'd love to maybe tag team that conversation with Joseph.

Councilman Shepherd.

Councilmember Hoheisel.

Thank you, Mayor.

Uh, just to put my two cents in.

I also would like to look at possibly doing mouth swabs instead of UAs as something that's a little more um recent as far as what a person would have in their system.

So like if there's an accident, um you could still have pot in your system from three or four weeks ago, whereas something like cocaine or something like crack is out of your system in two days.

So kind of focusing on the the more immediate effects that somebody has on the system.

I just think it goes a long way towards showing again restorative justice and also making sure we're cracking down on the things that actually impact the job.

So just putting the two cents out there.

Thank you, Josh.

I see no further questions from this council.

This does not get public comment.

So I move to approve the Board of Bids and Contracts dated April 6, 2026.

Second.

Motion second discussion.

See none.

Madam Clerk, please open the roll.

Motion passes 7-0.

Madam Clerk, please call the next item.

Petitions for public improvements.

Good morning, Mayor, City Council members, Paul Gunselman, public works and utilities for the record.

This morning, I have a few petitions for your consideration.

Signatures on the petitions represent 100% of the improvement districts.

And the petitions are valid per Kansas statute.

New petitions, Eastside Community Church, third edition, located in District 2.

The project will provide water, stormwater drain and sanitary sewer improvements required for new commercial development.

The project will provide water, stormwater drain, sanitary sewer and paving improvements required for new residential development.

Trinity Point, second edition, located in District 4.

The project will provide water and paving improvements required for new residential development.

And these will provide paving and water for the internal streets of the subdivision.

And then we have another revised petition for Trinity Point, second edition on April 13th, 2021.

City Council approved paving improvements required for new residential development.

The developer has submitted a revised petition with a revised budget to reflect current market conditions.

And I believe this is for the paving of 47th Street.

And with that, I would uh recommend that the city council approve the new and revised petitions and budgets, adopt the new and amending resolutions and authorize necessary signatures.

Thank you, Paul.

Questions for staff.

I do have just one.

Um this is all paid for by specials.

Is that accurate?

That is correct.

Yes.

Um and I know that last week on Tuesday we had a discussion because uh there's currently a bill in front of the uh governor regarding um some of our bond uh financing, and a lot of these projects or all of these projects are paid for through specials.

How would this affect um public improvements if it gets signed by the governor?

On a I'll take that uh on a surface level, and we'll see what the governor's action is in relation to the bill, and we'll give you a full write-up about the proposal as we understand it as it stands.

When you factor in assessed value and bond capacity, the fact that we are bonding this infrastructure for these developments, it can quote unquote work against us in terms of how much money we have already expended in bond capacity, and so it's a little bit more complicated, certainly, and we'll work with Mark to give you a write-up.

But yes, there is um I'll call it a penalty that would be levied in terms of how we can do our assessed value and taxation based upon our bond amount.

So, since we have high bond amount because we do these infrastructure projects, that could actually be a liability for us going forward, and we'll outline that for you all, depending upon what the governor's um reaction is to the legislation.

Thank you, City Manager.

Thank you, Paul.

With that, again, this does not get public comment.

I move that we approve the board uh petitions for public improvements.

Second motion second discussion, see none.

Madam Clerk, please open the roll.

Motion passes 70.

Madam Clerk, please call the first new agenda item or unfinished business item.

Public agenda or sorry, public hearing and request for Prairie Glenn MFLC for approval of a letter of intent to issue multifamily residential revenue bonds.

Honorable mayor, members of council, Troy Anderson, Assistant City Manager.

Uh so you may recall this was a request by Prairie Glenn LLC.

You'll hear me refer to them as Prairie Glenn throughout.

Uh, a request uh as part of the construction of a 44 uh unit, two-story townhouse uh development.

Uh each of these units, including either three bedrooms, two and a half bath with an attached garage, um, constructed on unimproved vacant land, corner of Bailey and Greenwich.

Uh the total issuance is about seven million dollars in revenue bonds to finance the project.

Uh the project, based on our current economic development guidelines, qualifies for a 50% property tax abatement based on capital investments between five and ten million dollars.

Uh, the estimated 50% property tax abandonment for the first full year is about a hundred and eight thousand dollars a year.

Projects also eligible for sales tax exemption.

Uh the estimated sales tax exemption is about two hundred and forty-six thousand dollars.

Cost benefit analysis was performed.

I won't read through all of those numbers, those are in your green sheet.

Here's my standard disclaimer revenue bonds are a mechanism for achieving a sales tax exemption and or property tax abatement in a revenue bond transaction, city's not lending any money.

There's no risk.

The owner developer is required to achieve all of their own financing and no taxpayer dollars are at risk.

Uh Purdy Glenn has agreed to pay all costs of issuing the bonds and agrees to pay the annual origination fees, bonds will be purchased by Purity Glenn or a related entity.

All the bond documents required for the actual issuance uh will be prepared by outside bond council, but ultimately cities of law department will review and approve the final form.

It's recommended city council close the public hearing, adopt the resolution authorizing necessary signatures, and again, we have representatives from the applicant here today to answer any questions you may have.

That concludes staff's report.

Thank you, Troy.

We'll begin with Council Member Hoheisel.

Thank you, Mayor.

Uh, quick question, not so much related to the project, just IRBs in general.

Um, what percentage is there a percentage that is open for affordable housing?

How does that figure in?

Um to any projects that come before us utilizing IRB, like is that a 10% possible property tax deduction?

I want to see if I understand your quote your question correctly.

What percentage of IRBs go towards Yeah, if a project comes up and they have affordable housing, does that help qualify them for any additional tax um incentives?

So uh for whatever it's worth, we we almost inevitably always uh include uh these types of bonds associated with uh projects that are awarded low-income housing tax credits because of the sales tax exemption and the property tax abatement, and so it's almost uniquely sort of all those associated with those projects.

Um not entirely, but it it's a significant percentage of projects that are are awarded those light tech projects that also are coupled with this.

There's a requirement under those those guidelines.

I mean we have our housing community service director here that could probably give you uh greater clarity on that.

Um but no, there's nothing in our current guidelines.

Again, remember our current guidelines don't really address housing, right?

That's that was the direction we were trying to move in uh amendments to our economic development guidelines was we know and understand housing and a housing affordability uh in our community is is a need, and so we were migrating towards including there's actually nothing in the guidelines right now that talk about housing affordable or not as an additional incentive.

Um, primarily we're basing our recommendations on at this point, they're capital investment.

But if you want to know about kind of the correlation between sort of LITEC awards and these types of bond issuances, we have folks here that can answer those questions.

Okay, no, I I just want maybe a discussion for council.

I know we're taking a look at um maybe doing some different things as far as some of these incentives go, and I definitely think that should be central to some of the discussions that we have.

Just again, giving options as far as any um projects that do have affordable housing attached to it, whether it's 10% or or whatnot, just um just for the council discussion later.

So I appreciate it.

Thank you.

Councilmember Shepard.

Thank you, Mayor.

I will just echo those sentiments and reinforce.

We had a district advisory board last night.

Housing gave a phenomenal presentation.

That was also one of the questions that came up from the board is what are we doing in regards to incentives and how are we tying it back to meeting significant needs and gaps in our community?

And so I do hope that we can have that conversation at a workshop.

I know that we spoke about it at a city council retreat, so I'd like to see that um up for workshop.

Thank you.

I have a couple of questions uh regarding this project.

Uh, first and foremost, uh can I ask what are the current property taxes for this area?

I'll defer.

Good morning.

I can answer that question for you.

I'm Bo Hudson, one of the developers.

The current tax for this parcel where this project would actually be built is six dollars.

The full taxes, we were asking for a 50% over 10 years, so we'll pay $33,000 a year up until year 10, and then it'll go, these are projected to $66,000 a year, but today $6.

Thank you.

And that is because it's agricultural land.

Is that accurate?

Correct.

So we had the opportunity, I think many of the council members had the opportunity to meet uh with you and uh your partner, and it looks like you do these townhouses across the city of Wichita, and this council is very much in favor of housing of all types.

Uh, can you address how um you guys look at townhouses and where else you've um built them?

And and this is uh what you consider workforce housing.

Is that accurate?

True, yes, or missing middle.

Um, it's a dollar fourteen a foot rent, so sixteen hundred dollars on a fourteen hundred square foot um residence uh with the two-car garage.

But yes, we've done similar projects.

We tweak them as we learn things and we tweak them to fit the districts they might be in, but we've done these projects in two or three other districts aside from this district and plan to continue doing so.

Thank you.

And then uh just addressing one more time.

This is to assist with the shortage of housing that we have, uh, not just in this city, but across other cities in the nation.

Can you address how you're addressing the missing middle from what I can tell you and depending on where you're looking at statistics?

The one thing that we're kind of focused on is average rent across the country is at 1,850 bucks a foot based on what I've looked at.

And a starter home mortgage is often almost twice that.

So we feel like I mean, there's a reason that these developments fill up.

We feel like the numbers that we're hitting are something that's needed.

Um, and that I mean, we've built several of these and they lease up within nine months.

I mean, to us, the market speaks to what people want and need.

Thank you, Bo.

I see no further questions from this council.

We will now open it up for public comment.

I see no one from the public.

We will close public comment and bring it back to the bench.

This resides in council member Tuttle's display.

Thank you.

Um, I just want to say thank you to staff who have worked on this, appreciate it from the economic development team.

Um, thank you to Troy and Troy again.

It has been a pleasure to work with and learn from you.

So thank you so much, and I wish you nothing but best in the future.

I know you have a few more agenda items, but I might not get to comment, so I just wanted to make sure that I said that.

Come visit us often.

Um, thank you to Bo and thank you to Prairie Glenn.

Appreciate your time.

Appreciate you meeting with all of us.

It's really helpful whenever a landowner can do that, just so that we can get more information.

Um, I know there's lots of discussion always consistently from this bench about affordable housing, but I say consistently, we need all types of housing, right?

We need every type of housing that we can get in our community.

So this is just one more opportunity to expand upon our housing stock so that we can be more competitive in the economic development world.

So thank you for your investment in Wichita.

We we truly appreciate it.

With that, I will move that the Wichita City Council close the public hearing, adopt the resolution, and authorize the necessary signatures.

Second.

Motion, second discussion.

See none.

Madam Clerk, please open the roll.

Motion passes 7-0.

Madam Clerk, please call the next item.

Police robotic dog.

Morning, mayor, city council.

Jason Cooley, Captain Wichita Police Department.

Uh a little bit of background uh on this is the Wichita Police Department used a variety of equipment to protect staff and community during emergency situations.

Uh this does include uh some of our pre-existing robotics.

Uh WPD relies on specialized equipment, including robotic systems to effectively respond to emergencies at any time and at our all environmental conditions.

These robotic assets must be maintained at a high level of reliability to ensure the safety of both the personnel and the community.

Uh like Wichita robotic capabilities are essential to de-escalate and mitigate critical incidents.

The absence of this technology diminishes operational effectiveness and increases the risk to both the public and the responding personnel during these high-risk events.

Robots serve as a valuable tool for de-escalation, significantly increasing the likelihood of an incident concluding safely and peacefully.

Based on the our look into some more advanced robotics, uh, we did participate in a manufactural trial uh testing the usage of different robotics.

Uh, we participated in vendor trials uh with robotics.

Uh we consulted peer agencies and we evaluated some case studies.

Uh spot, who we've uh talked about once before at this council and in other workshops, uh was identified as the leading robotic.

Um it was developed uh with the purpose of reducing health and safety risk for workers.

It has been operational operational for 34 years and been in the law enforcement environment for just over six.

Currently, there are over 70 agencies operating SPOT.

I listed some of them.

Those are just a few.

Comes with two-way communication.

It gives us the ability to deliver food and water, deliver equipment.

Are you able to play any of the videos at all?

This October.

This October, Wichita, welcome to the world.

T Back Summit America 2025 brought more than 130 traps.

Spot walking over terrain, spot opening doors, holding the door open with its uh foot to be able to walk through it, uh, walking up and down stairs.

Um there was a video of Spot going up to a suspicious package, analyzing it and removing that device.

Um in one of the videos uh where Spot was walking up the stairs, uh, it accomplishes that mission in probably 30 seconds.

That is anywhere from a 15 to 30 minute task with our current robot, and that's all done by manipulation from the actual operator.

The operator takes the arm of the robot, places it on the stairs, which applies force, which lifts the front of the robot up, drives the track up, uh, it falls back onto the wheelie bars of the robot, and then it's on that operator to navigate that robot up the stairs without tipping it over, moving both the left and right wheels at the exact same time, gets to a platform, it's got to then turn by the operator and repeat that same process.

Um, on one of the videos where Spot uh goes and evaluates a backpack to pick it up, uh all that is done by the push of a button.

Uh which these videos would play so you could see it.

Um basically the operator on spot tells Spot what the package is.

Spot goes up and analyzes it with already built-in uh LRAD and processes that with data already built into SPOT on our current robots.

All of that is done by an operator on those robots.

So the amount of pressure, the angle you go in to pick up an explosive device is all done at the manipulation of an off of an officer.

Um I can tell you that we have those robots on our bomb team and our SWAT team.

We have two of those robots as they operate different tasks.

And for an example, on a swap call, when we use that robot to go open a door, all of that is gauged on what the operator can see through the lens inside of the arm on the robot.

So a lot of times what you'll see is us banging into the door because we just can't get the door hander quite into spots, or I'm sorry, into our robot's claw to open it.

Um those robots, even if we can get it open, it can't go through it.

It just literally holds it open.

Uh, spot doesn't work that way in one of the videos.

They actually show you uh the screen that the operator is working.

Uh you literally click on the door, you tell Spot what kind of door it is.

Does it swing open?

Does it swing out?

Is it a pull door, a push door?

Is it have a handle?

And then you stop touching the control, and spot does the rest for you.

It'll use its legs to hold the door open if needed.

And it's a large scene, it's a homicide suicide scene at the same time, and Spock clears that entire house and structure in six minutes, allowing operators to go in once they already know what they've seen.

So just to be clear, all the other so some of these other slides are not, are they deleted from the PowerPoint?

Well, there's other slides in here that aren't appearing either.

So some of the other slides that were in here is our case studies.

I wanted to present you the actual case studies that we did.

One of the case studies, I'm reading from, so I printed out the actual PowerPoint, so I'm just reading from the slides that were on the PowerPoint.

That one of those case studies is from Houston PD.

They had a uh barricaded subject.

They've been operating SPOT for a long time.

They received a call of a suicidal man.

Uh spot goes up, navigates the stairs of this motel where this guy's waving a knife at it at patriots in this motel.

He actually grabs Spot and pulls them in.

They deploy their second spot and through the negotiations with the second spot, uh, it ends peacefully.

Uh the second case study I wanted to bring to you was actually from uh sorry.

Captain Cooley, I want to make sure that these videos are being played.

Can we defer this item to the next?

Just switch order so that they can work on technology really quickly to get the videos up.

I don't have a problem with that.

Do we have the capability of putting okay?

Okay.

So we just move on to the next agenda.

Could we maybe move to the next agenda item and come back to you guys to make sure that everything is working appropriately?

Uh sure.

Can I move uh item one to be discussed now and delay this current item, which is unfinished business two to after that?

Second.

Motion second.

All those uh Madam Clerk, please open the roll.

Motion passes 7-0.

So we'll now go to new business item number one so that technology can uh work for this item.

Madam Clerk, please call new business item number one.

Public hearing and request for an amendment of the project lease and payment in lieu of taxes agreement for web industrial LLC.

I think it's uh assistant city manager Anderson will provide this one.

Honorable mayor, members of council, thank you for uh the reminder.

I was distracted.

I apologize.

Um and I'd like to before I begin, take just a brief opportunity and say what a privilege uh and honor it has been to serve uh not only this governing body and each and every one of you, but also this organization in this great city.

Uh I truly have enjoyed my time here and am incredibly grateful, so thank you so much.

But before I get too emotional, um, so this request is a little unique.

Uh we have not done this before, but um we're gonna try to work through this.

So this is a request based on um our speculative building program.

Our speculative building program.

Um there's some criteria around the size and scope of a project as a result of our speculative building program.

Projects are generally offered and take advantage of uh what we call a 9550, a 95% property tax abatement for the first five years, and then a 50% property tax abatement in year six through ten order for uh the owner developer to to build up a building uh and then have building inventory uh in stock so that uh we can respond to businesses that are growing, expanding, relocating, that we have existing inventory that is available for folks to move into.

Um the spec warehouse program, I can tell you has been wildly successful.

Continue to recommend that this city foster and embolden the spec warehouse program because it has been critical to the success in keeping and retaining businesses in our community.

With that being said, a little bit more specifically as it relates to this project.

Back on April 5th, 2022, City Council approved a letter of intent for Web Industrial.

You'll hear me refer to them as Web Throughout for the construction of a speculative building located at the intersection of 40th Street North and Webb Road.

So that building exists today.

So between 2022, April of 22 and December of 22, the building is built, right?

And then on December 13, 2022, City Council approves the issuance of the industrial revenue bonds, in this case in an amount not to exceed $8.4 million.

I highlight that in the context that when the original LOI came before us, that was a slightly different number.

I'll highlight that here in just a second.

But once the building gets built and we know what the actual construction costs were, we can then certify that, and that's the uh amount of the bond issuance that we actually issue.

So in December of 2022, the bonds that were actually issued were 8.4 based on that capital investment.

Again, the 95% advalaire property tax payment commenced on January 1, 2023, and is slated to be reduced to 50% on January 1, 2028.

Webb is requesting the continuation of that 95% advalarum property tax abatement based on the tenant that they have attracted to this particular building and this particular site.

More specifically, Webb has executed a lease with Prime Craftsman Homes.

PCH, you'll hear me refer to them, which is a startup modular home manufacturer focused on providing quality affordable housing for the city of Wichita, surrounding communities in the state of Kansas.

PCH will have significant inventory racking systems, automated wood cutting facilities, and six different manufacturing line production lines producing different size homes with various bedroom bathroom counts.

PCH intends to partner with Wichita State University Tech for its initial and ongoing training for its employees and is anticipating committing to creating 75 net new jobs by December 31st, 2027 for our January 1, sort of Q1 2028 review.

So I'm gonna highlight a little bit this here.

The slide might look a little funny.

Uh just for accuracy purposes.

So you'll see me highlighting that here today.

I will kind of walk through a little bit of that, but we've never done this before.

We we took the approach of had we known then what we know now, what would that cost benefit analysis have looked like if we had known that there was going to be a capital investment made in sort of year one, and then in an out year additional tenant improvement and acquisition and installation of furniture fixture and equipment were going to be installed in out years, and then subsequently employment was going to be made in years four, five and beyond, right?

So we had to go back and remodel the cost-benefit analysis from back in 2022.

Otherwise, it got funny in trying to model just the remaining term of the revenue bonds and the tax exemption.

So I'll read this first one.

When the speculative building project was originally approved, the estimated value of the capital investment was 14.5 million.

Again, we know that ultimately that was just the letter of intent.

We know that the actual capital investment was that 8.4 number that I referred to on the previous slide, which is why there's a little bit of difference in maybe some of the original numbers that showed up in a green sheet versus maybe more uh consistent actual numbers based on the capital investment that we knew was actually made.

So the first full year was estimated at 323,000 dollars.

Um it was our fault.

We did not that number is accurate in the green sheet originally in one of the green sheets for Back of 22 is like a 400,000 dollar number, so we more accurately reflected what that capital investment uh and the exemption was going to look like.

Unfortunately, we did not update the city county state or two five nine numbers, and so we have reflected that here in this slide in front of you.

This is consistent with the cost benefit analysis that was done in 2022.

Back when this was originally done, I can admit I don't know where the numbers in the green sheet derive from.

We tried to do research, we tried to go figure out kind of where those numbers came from.

We don't know if they were remnants from other projects, but we went back, we found the original cost benefit analysis that was conducted back in 2022, and based on that original cost benefit analysis back in 2022.

We started pulling these numbers, the 323, and then you see all of the taxing jurisdictions numbers.

So I just wanted to daylight that so that you have those numbers in front of you as a comparison.

Troy, just one quick question.

So is the county and state number accurate, not transposed?

Uh the city-county, state, and 259 numbers that you see there in blue are the numbers based on that cost benefit analysis.

The numbers that are in red were in your green sheet, those have been stricken.

So now you see how all of those add up to that 323,000 number.

Because it's usually city-county are your highest amounts when it comes to this.

Okay, thank you.

And that's where the evolution of the cost-benefit analyses that have been conducted over the years and the iterations.

We wanted something to go back to that was tangible that was defensible that said these were the numbers in the original cost benefit analysis.

Again, the CBA has evolved over time, so it's we just wanted to correct the record that these are the numbers that should have been reflected in the green sheet.

More specifically, what you're looking at today, though, is we now know it wasn't an initial 14.5 million dollar capital investment.

It was only an 8.4, not only, but it was an 8.4 million dollar capital investment.

And then based on knowing and understanding that the tenant is now going to make an additional three million dollar capital investment in tenant improvements and acquisition of furniture fixtures and equipment.

Again, we kind of went back and modeled that knowing now, or had we known now what we knew then, vice versa.

This is what the cost benefit analysis would have said, right?

That in year one, not year five, the abatement would have actually only been 199,000, not the 323 that you see there on the screen, and then again, respective uh taxing jurisdiction numbers.

Okay.

Additionally, we kind of looked at what would the city be giving up by continuing the 95% abatement, and really not necessarily just the city, but all taxing jurisdictions, right?

So originally in year six through 10, the estimated value of that 50% advalarum property tax abatement was gonna be about 1.1 million dollars.

By continuing the 95% advalarin property tax abatement, that value increases to about 1.5 million or about a 408,000 dollar difference.

We just wanted to give folks context on sort of what all the taxing jurisdictions would be giving up over year six through ten.

But again, cost benefit analyses far exceed the one to one, so we're not necessarily concerned about that.

Again, here's those numbers.

Um, also in the green sheet, won't belabor those.

So with that being said, Webb agrees to continue all uh paying all costs of issuing the bonds, agrees to pay the annual origination fee.

City's law departments reviewed and approved the documents as to form.

Therefore, staff recommends the city council uh hold a public hearing, but then close a public hearing, adopt the amended resolution uh and authorize the necessary signatures.

We do have representatives from the applicant here that can answer questions for you today.

Otherwise, I will stamp a question.

Thank you, Troy.

Councilmember Hoheisel.

Thank you, Mayor.

So this is essentially restarting the clock on the 95%, and then after five years, it'll be 50% again.

No, we're not restarting the clock.

Um basically we're going back and remodeling it.

The the abatement that exists today will continue, and in fact, um the five-year review that we conduct as a result of after the five-year review wasn't slated to be completed until you know Q1 January of 2028.

So in January, February, March of 2028, we were gonna do a five-year review anyway.

Under the spec program, there wasn't gonna be really much to certify because it's just a spec program.

Although we would have had to have probably gone back and looked, did you find a tenant and those kind of things, right?

There are some uh criteria.

So we we're gonna do that in January of 2028, regardless.

That's that five year review period.

This adds the additional um criteria of did you also make that we knew you made the initial investment in the building.

Did you also make that initial investment in uh the tenant improvements and the FFE?

And did you also create the 75 jobs that you committed to in order to arrive at these cost benefit uh numbers, right?

Those cost benefit ratios.

So we're not starting the clock over, we're continuing the clock.

We're introducing new conditions that they will have to satisfy in order for the additional five years to be continued, but rather than being continued at 50%, they'll be continued at 95%.

Okay.

Okay, I appreciate that.

Thank you for the clarification.

Vice Mayor Glascock.

Seeing there wasn't any I well, Councilman Johnson may have a question before.

I was gonna ask Mr.

Filmeyer to come up and talk about his plans and what his intentions are with the program.

Mayor, city councilman, thanks for having me today.

You know, the benefits calculations are very theoretical, but I'll just give you a few facts as I know them.

We plan to build two to three hundred homes a year, and we're seeing the demand, you know, not only in the city and the county, but throughout the state.

I've been in a number of city council meetings already.

And and I'll get this one to give you an example of one.

I was in Harper, Kansas, where they had an IHID district, and they built two homes.

They were really more attainable homes, not affordable homes, but they were three bedroom, two bath, where the land was was free, there's no specials because all the entitlements are gonna be paid for by the AHID.

Yet they are listing these how these two houses they built for 275,000, and they're 1200 square feet.

And and they're asking me why there's no takers, and and the answers are obvious, and we don't need to get into that.

But what I what I explained to them is we could have built for them a house for 175,000 that nearly matches what they did, and that's the benefit of the economies of scale and the technologies that you're aware of that we get with modular manufacturing.

It just took you know a group of people that had the desire to want to go work in this area, you know, and that's our mindset is to do this in a way where we're not we're not really profit-seeking, we're trying to bend the cost curve here so that we can go into neighborhoods around the community and and instead of listing a house for 300,000, which is like what the average median new price price is for a two to three bedroom home, we can we can put out their 200,000.

Now that's ambitious.

I'm gonna run the surprises, we won't always be able to do that.

Depends on development costs as well as the cost that we incur inside of our plant, but we're developing capability to try to knock all those things down.

So I appreciate your support here today.

We know we're fully invested in making this happen.

We have a great team of people that we're talking to that we already started to hire that is passionate about the same things.

And I know that at one point the city had said they want this to be the year of affordable housing, and and and for me it's it's it's affordable housing for sure.

We're gonna tack that segment as vigorously as you know we've talked about with NFL and just one lot at a time, but also attainable housing, which is just as big of a problem here and across the country.

As for the cost benefit analysis, I'd also just say that the benefits are simple.

If we're doing that kind of volume, you know, we should be remitting a million dollars of sales tax to the state.

We should be generating a property tax base out of these two or three hundred homes that would be times whatever number you want to put against that.

I would tell you it's hundreds of thousands of dollars, and a property and a payroll tax base, excuse me, from the new employees that we will have in that district.

Thank you, Mr.

Kellmeyer.

Uh, can I just ask you really quickly?

I know that this is supposed to create 75 new jobs in a field that is one that this council is very much interested in, which is housing and manufacturing of housing.

Can you uh just share uh what you plan to do at that manufacturing plant one more time and why housing has become your passion?

It's just become a passion because as I studied the area starting to acquire and and repurpose homes that are vacated and and boarded up, which we've now have about 75 of those underway.

That's a separate initiative altogether.

But I just saw how huge the need was and and how glaring the prospects were or the lack of prospects were to meet that supply gap, and just knowing how affordability levels continue to be more and more constrained.

Rents are not rents are far outpacing mortgage levels as you heard earlier, far outpacing people's incomes and their ability to buy homes, not and not only rent homes, but rent or buy.

And and so that was really the passion and realizing that modular had advantages that you cannot get when you're stick building, just that simple.

Um we can get economies to scale to reduce waste to improve productivity, not to improve the by by not paying the proper wage, we're gonna pay $25 an hour in this plan.

And we hope to employ a number of second chance workers.

We found that at least our experience is when you take somebody who's coming out of the justice system that's ready for it.

Not everybody's ready, but when they're ready, and somebody takes a chance on them and trains them new skills so that they have an occupation that they can be proud of and they can work with it for the rest of their life, they're loyal.

And so the turnover levels far outpace um what we hope to experience in our plant because of that kind of approach we had to take with second chance employees.

Okay, thank you again.

Vice Mayor Glasscock.

Thank you.

Question for Troy, but it may be a question for MAPC, which I don't know if Scott's here, so I might have to ask this question later because this wouldn't affect this application today.

Uh, regarding that there are modular homes, zoning concerns in particular parts of the community.

Well, will there be prohibitions where these could be located at some point?

And are we looking at proactively addressing some of maybe those zoning um restrictions maybe certain areas?

Let me see if I can separate the distinction from the manufacturing facility.

Correct.

Is a manufacturing facility, what they manufacture.

Yeah, separate from today's separate from today's ask in terms of how do we make yes right.

So the product um in essence is from a zoning perspective, a single family residence.

So in any zoning district that permits a single family residence, this type of product would be permissible under zoning guidelines.

Good from a building code perspective, right?

And this is something that uh um Mr.

Villmeyer and I have discussed, right?

Uh, so long as these uh the this product that these buildings are built and inspected and certified in accordance with the international residential code standards, then yes, that should not be an issue with the building code either.

And so clearing the way for both zoning compliance and building compliance, uh, the product that comes off this assembly line should be permissible in any zoning district to permit single family residential.

Okay, great.

I just wanted to make sure that wasn't a hurdle for the future.

Thank you.

And I would also tag along with that question that there's no redundancy.

They're already gonna inspect said item at a manufacturing plant.

Does it have to be re-inspected when it just gets moved to the final location?

Yes and no.

No, in the context of the things that so, for example, things like mechanical electrical plumbing, those things that are inside the wall captive.

No, they've already been inspected.

There will probably be some, a few tiny minor kind of was it secured to the footing and foundations and those kind of things.

There will be some inspections that will have to occur on site, but two point not nearly the volume, other inspections that are typically uh associated with what they call stick built or site-built uh residences.

Vice Mayor Glascock.

Withdrawal request, Councilmember Shepherd.

Thank you, Mayor, and to the mayor's point, Troy.

Is there a cost associated with that inspection then there is, but one of the things that we are working on, and again, no commitments, no promises.

Uh, but are there opportunities for uh the building division, um metropolitan area building construction department to wave or significantly reduce building permit fee costs and inspection costs.

Yes, we're having those conversations.

Perfect.

Thank you so much.

I I would be very interested in that.

Um in looking at the process that's done in the warehouse in comparison to the process that uh MABCD does to ensure like there's there's not a significant gap, but in the case that there is major overlap in what is being done in the warehouse versus what we do, I do think it is reasonable to to look at reducing those costs.

Agreed.

I see no further questions.

Thank you.

We will now open it up for public comment.

I see no further questions thank you we will now open it up for public comment I see no one from the public who would like to speak we'll bring it back to the bench this resides in council member Tuttle's district.

Thank you for that and I appreciate it and I certainly want to give my um thanks and kudos to Webb and Gesture LLC but unfortunately due to a conflict of interest I will have to abstain from this vote.

Mayor with a motion I would move that the city council close a public hearing adopt the resolution and authorize the necessary signatures.

Second motion second any discussion see none Madam oh sorry council member shepherd thank you mayor I I snuck that one in on last minute um but I just want to share that I know that we're as Assistant City Manager Anderson mentioned we're talking about the the warehouse and then there's the actual product but I am really grateful to have seen the impact of the product in district one.

And I know that often um I'm a major advocate for undesigning the red line and making sure that there are major investments in the parts of our community that have not seen that investment before.

And Mr.

Philmeyer I just want to take the opportunity to say thank you for seeing value in a community that is oftentimes overlooked.

But if you are to ever go out in the community and particularly on a scale you will see what happens when people invest in a community that is often overlooked.

I had the opportunity to go to some of the open houses and across the street and spoke to the neighbor and I said how how do you feel about this and with the biggest smile on his face he said I'm happy somebody is finally investing in our block and seeing the power of that also quoted the impact of this and it and one of the tenants said it means a lot to have our own home to be able to say we have a home that is ours the project is building quality affordable homes we talk about that a lot but it's also creating jobs and I'm very passionate about giving those who are reintegrating back into our society a second chance I'm a younger brother to a brother who needed a second chance and so I know firsthand the impact it has when folks like you Mr.

Philmeyer and your team say you have potential you have value dignity and you deserve an opportunity to be paid a livable wage and learn the skills that you need.

And so I hope that our community is looking at this as a model that we can continue to celebrate and invest in and I hope that it gives other developers hope to look in communities like 67214 to know that investing in our community is not a risk.

It's an opportunity to bring hope and help so thank you for that.

With that Madam Clerk please open the roll I was the second motion passes 6-0 with one abstention mayor if I may if I may um encourage uh maybe a potential option to take a motion to recess for a few minutes we do have some lunch option for you back there but it'll give us the opportunity to get the presentation up for the robotics presentation.

So if you would uh entertain maybe a 10 to 15 minute a 15 minute would be appropriate I will um I don't think we need a vote for that just declare a recess I will declare a recess until 1230 p.m.

Thank you

Alright, so we'll pick up uh at the videos.

Um these are all very short.

Even the um Lieutenant from Miami Dade that speaks, it's just a two-minute video, so they're all very short in the presentation.

So this is the uh general spot, but over those gravel walking up the stairs.

Um all that has to be done in our tracks.

The rocks get stuck in our tracks.

It's not impossible, it is highly difficult.

This uh we're moving into the closer of the impossible realm here with our current robots, and as you can see, this is why they develop spot like a dog is to be able to walk uh up that terrain.

Um these stairs, this is the 15 to 30 minute thing.

The robot has to be navigated by the operator 100%.

Uh the arm reaches out and lifts the robot up so he can walk uh up the stairs and then has to turn him.

That takes a long time.

Uh currently our robotics do not offer this capability at all.

It cannot get up once it's over.

Um, we've even seen that on uh one of our uh hostage situations, it fell down the stairs.

Uh robotics were eliminated uh from that rescue.

Uh we also have zero capability to do this, those pile of right there ends all robotics that we have.

Uh Spot walks over efforts effortlessly.

Uh one of the clothes gets stuck on his foot, and he actually shakes it off.

Um we have zero capability to get over this couch, these clothes, this bedding, uh, to navigate any of that terrain.

Uh in fact, uh we had um a call, a swap call out on Easter Sunday, a bomb call out on Easter Sunday, and then another swap call last night, and we did get stuck on clothing during the swap call yesterday.

Uh we had to yesterday actually send operators in uh to deliver a handheld uh robot that has to be placed and maneuvered to a certain location because our robot came across clothing inside of the residence.

Uh this is an example of uh the uh explosive uh detection uh robot.

Uh right now the operator is uh simply clicking on this backpack spot, opens its mouth, there's a camera in its mouth, uh, and it is using pre-uh loaded uh information to evaluate how much pressure and where to grab this backpack.

It is gonna grab it away from the explosive, pick it up and remove it away from uh the subway system.

All this is done by uh a couple presses of the button.

This is an example of how here it is.

The operator is simply clicking on the object.

This is how LA has done it twice so far that I know of with a firearm laying next to an individual.

They go up, they click on the firearm.

Spot is evaluating it himself right now, and it will pick it up with the right amount of pressure and take it away from the individual.

Our robots can't do that, and even if we attempted, it is a hundred percent manipulation by uh the robot operator.

Uh this capability, SWAT is assessing the uh pull-down door uh to push it open.

As you notice at the bottom, there's also stairs that's navigating at the same time.

Our robots cannot do that.

If we open the door with our robot, it's done.

Uh if the door is open, we can navigate up that uh stair, but then it's done.

Uh this is a door to go in.

Um it will turn it and open it.

Uh, if you will watch its uh left front foot there, uh this is an impossible door for our current situations.

Um we cannot open it like this and walk through it.

So SWAT has been, or I'm sorry, SPOT has been told to pull it open, it will use its leg and its arm to navigate the door and pull it open, and it will enter the structure.

We do not have this capability right now.

I would have to put an operator at that door in harm's way to do that.

Um on this one, it's a push door, but you'll see the door actually hit uh the robot and it will correct itself and continue to walk down the stairs.

Uh here's the case studies I was briefly uh talking about.

Um this is the Houston uh PD where they uh send it up to the individual with a knife threatening patrons.

He pulls it inside, they send their second robot up, and through the uh communication system inside a spot, uh they were able to uh in this uh standoff and barricade peacefully.

Um FDNY actually has their own uh spot.

They actually had a garage collapse.

Uh it does have search and rescue capabilities.

Uh, they were able to send it in uh and do two things uh before sending in personnel.

They one they were able to check for injured, and two, they were able to check for the uh uh structure to see if the structure was going to cave in on the firefighters before they went in.

Uh, this is probably one of the original spots here.

That's why it's kind of uh older looking and beat up.

Um this is the Massachusetts State Police, it typically operates around the Boston area.

Um, but you can see they used it to uh uh they got called to this uh crate here with these devices on it, and they were able to pick up these devices and uh go take them back to.

I'm sure they have a TCV uh total containment capsule just like we do, or we can put explosives and get them away from the community.

This is the uh use for uh what's what we refer to as uh C burn.

Uh it will detect uh chemical, biological radiation, uh nuclear and explosives.

Um you can see they're using it at uh race events, uh the ND500, the Boston Marathon, which we all know was bombed.

Um they'll use it during Super Bowl.

Um we have similar events.

We've got Riverfest, we've got our Fourth of July parade, we've got uh St.

Paddy's Day parades, we've got the drone show at Exploration Place, um, multiple things up in Northeast Wichita of different uh fireworks and events.

Uh this capability will allow us to also walk this robot around and test the air for dangerous substances before we open the event to the community.

Uh this is the Massachusetts State Police.

It was the first uh spot robot to get shot.

It took multiple rounds uh while they were firing at this robot prior to sending in their uh SWAT personnel.

Uh it was disabled and uh it was able to be replaced.

It was a double homicide suicide.

This was one of those incidents that it was it was an apartment.

Yeah, and when the decision was basically made after negotiation, we weren't getting a response at the time.

Nobody actually knew that the subject had already taken a hill life, but basically in this situation, once the decision was made to actually you know get eyes into the structure and see what was going on.

This was one of those that the feedback that I got from the IMT personnel that were there that were actually operating spotted spot cleared that structure in less than six minutes.

Went into every room, was able to see everything, traversed all the obstacles that were present.

It was able to identify the deceased in the structure, and basically utilizing that information, you know, the student was made that let's send them to SWAT team, finish up, clear the structure once we knew that the subject was no longer.

One of the problems with a lot of the uh ground robotics that exist on the market today is especially the ones that have arms, is they have difficulty trying to climb stairs.

Some of them cannot climb stairs.

And the ones that do climb stairs, a lot of them don't have an arm to manipulate opening doors.

That's one of the things that just having spot has basically been a piece of mind and then at ease for us, knowing that it can actually go a pumb.

There is a great reduction in fatigue utilizing a robot like spot.

Simply because of how fast spot can operate and clear a structure.

So you can imagine historically if you're you know waiting for the robot to clear a house and it takes upwards of an hour.

That's an hour for all the SWAT personnel that are on the perimeter.

You could be baking in the sun, it just adds to the amount of fatigue wearing your best, holding point, spot makes things a lot faster.

Um I think we all are familiar with uh you know the city, but I just wanted to provide um some data here to um as we reflect on internally uh what services and how many services we're providing here uh to residents.

So I would just wanted to include some uh Wichita statistics here from 1880.

You can see that currently, I mean we've we've continued to just grow, and uh we are projected to continue to grow.

Um when I compared the population to uh the next uh five other uh most populated uh cities in Kansas.

You can see that we're almost approaching just almost double uh the next closest sized city uh in the state of Kansas, and our 2035 projection puts us at almost 430,000 residents.

Uh households, when I compared that of how many households we're serving, um, we are almost again double the next largest sized city in the state of Kansas, and we're serving just over or just under 160,000 households.

Internally, when we are training our officers on how many people you're gonna have to deal with and how many weapons and what objects are involved, um, we do use these statistics, and you know, we we train them to know that hey, the average city in or I'm sorry, the average household in the city that there are 2.46 people inside of that house.

So it's pretty safe to say that if that's the average that you can expect on these calls, whether it's SWAT or bomb, we're gonna encounter three, four people, maybe one, maybe two.

Um but we are averaging about four and a half people living at each house.

Um, and we're covering 162 square miles.

I know some of that is still undeveloped, and we heard from some of those developers today still wanting to expand in the growth of the city here.

Uh the analysis also showed that uh we're responding to 17 plus hospitals.

We've got almost a 16,000 square or uh seat arena, uh, over 10,000 seat ballpark stadium, and uh according to Visit Wichita, over 7 million annual visitors.

There are 83 public schools, Wichita comprises of just over 50 percent of the schools in the entire county, and we are servicing over 3,000 teachers, over 45,000 students, 12 colleges, and over 16,000 college students.

Um, when we were evaluating uh what else uh spot can provide, and we came across uh the New York Fire Department.

I guess it made me think of what disasters we've had.

We've had 37 confirmed tornadoes.

I know there's the the storms get dark, and there's probably more tornadoes than what can be confirmed, but we're averaging uh one every two years.

We've had eight floods, and in 24, there were 586 mass shootings, 24 of those were active shooters, and in 25 there were 408 mass shootings in the U.S.

Uh, they have not compiled the active shooter uh count for 2025 yet to release that.

Uh this year, well, some historical data on uh I broke it down to two columns.

Uh the SWOT activations in 24 were 40 SWOT activations and 25 were 43.

Uh as of when I did this on the 5th, we had eight SWOT activations.

That number is now nine.

We had one uh last night.

Uh this was uh this included the uh SWOT activation we had on Easter and then uh we had one yesterday we were working a SWAT call yesterday as well, so we're actually at nine uh for the year, and yesterday was the example that I gave you of uh where our robot was rendered useless uh when we came across the clothing uh for the bomb uh squat activation, their numbers are on par with SWATs 43 and 24.

Uh that increased to 61 in 25.

Uh we recovered 37 explosives here just in the city.

Wichita, I know there are regional teams, but these are our Wichita numbers, these are not regional numbers, so just in the city, these are our numbers, and in 30 or I'm sorry, in uh 26, we've had 25 activations with 14 explosives.

Uh, also was just updated while SWAT was working.

Theirs on Easter bomb was working one at uh St.

Joe Hospital where we had a device inside of that hospital that bomb was working at the same time.

Uh for financial considerations, uh protecting officers and obtaining a more agile robotic equipment has been identified in the 27 capital improvement program by the Wichita Police Department.

Uh, this request is being presented now versus in 27 given the current limitations of existing robotics, but more so given the number of incidents that these new robotic dogs could have been deployed on.

Sufficient bonding capacity exists within the fiscal year of 26 CIP to accommodate purchasing these robotics now versus waiting at a higher or potentially higher cost next year.

The cost of purchasing two robotic dogs has been negotiated with uh Radico for a discounted rate of $629,647.56.

If we purchase these separately, WPD would purchase spot from RADICO for the bomb squad for $330,000, $84.68 in April of 2026.

The adopted 26 to 25 capital improvement program includes 650 in general obligation bonds for two robotic dogs, and staff recommends initiating the project funding.

So any remaining funds would be for ancillary cost or revert back to the debt service fund if not utilized.

The recommendations is to approve the initiated funding, purchase spot the robotic dogs from Radico, approve the bonding resolution and authorize the necessary signatures.

And with that, I'd be happy to stand for questions.

Thank you, Captain Cooley.

Questions for staff, beginning with Council Member Hoheisel.

Thank you, Mayor, and thank you, Captain.

I appreciate the presentation.

Do you know how many of the departments that have one dog have two dogs?

Yeah, so I asked that question when I was negotiating the price.

On how many have two dogs, but they told me that 20 agencies are already in the work to come back and get their second one because they're realizing one just isn't enough.

And when I was negotiating that, that was the reason for the original ask for two.

Um, was it was very clear from those departments that they were finding one wasn't enough, whether they were having Houston scenario or operating one at bomb or SWAT or whatever their scenarios were, they were finding one wasn't sufficient.

Okay, so most of those apartments were were they balancing it between bomb squad and SWAT?

I I don't know how they were doing it.

I can tell you our current robots that we have that have the limitations.

We have one on bomb and we have one on SWOT, just because they're doing two complete operations, maybe simultaneously, just like we had on Easter.

Um those were operating, you know, the same.

Um so I can't give you an answer on how many are currently operating two, but I can tell you that there was uh 16 to 20 that are coming back for their second one right now.

Okay.

Um how old are the current robots that we have?

So we have a robot that is from 23.

Um we have a robot from 17, we have a robot from 21, and we have a robot from 24.

The 21 and the 24 are the robots that I'm that I speak of the most that are the exactly the same robot with the tracks and everything.

Um, and those robots were we purchased those through a different funding source through the region, which we've talked about that funding source last time.

Um, and those were roughly 270,000.

So we're not out of the ballpark of those same robots that don't have this capability.

So would those robots be used for the kind of the region-wide drills that we have, or would it still be spot kind of covering all bases there?

Yeah, so the those robots were purchased by the region, so we don't have a choice but to offer them to the region.

Like we mentioned last time, that's at the chief's discretion of do we respond to a call in the region or not.

We do participate in mutual aid just like we expect mutual aid when we had our three-day SWAT incident at 4141 South Seneca.

We used agencies from all over the state to help us to relieve our fatigued SWOT officers.

So we do participate mutual aid, uh, same with fire.

We go out on fire calls, um, whether it's blocking traffic or whatever.

So we do participate mutual aid.

Uh our goal for SWAT or SPOT is uh that is a uh Wichita asset to be available for Wichita incidents.

I'm not saying it couldn't happen, but I don't want to speak on behalf of the chief of whatever scenario he gets to either approve or don't approve that.

Okay, could you give a little background on any warranties or maintenance costs that come with this?

Yeah, so there's not a lot of maintenance cost.

The maintenance costs that they are seeing over uh the six years from law enforcement aspect.

I can't speak on you know the warehouses that are running six and ten of these things at one time, um, but they are seeing just small pins in the arm, just various things that you would think of would break over time as the usual maintenance costs that costs $30 or something to get a new pin.

Um large maintenance costs, they're not seeing that unless a structure falls on it or it gets shot or something like that.

Uh, it does come with a one-year warranty for that, um, which is they we basically overnight them spot and they fix it and send it back.

Uh after the one year, uh, it's just under 28,000 if you want to continue that warranty.

Um that does cover any replacement, any cost of any damaged things, and does get you the overnight, you know.

Um, if we don't continue after the one year, whatever issues are with it, we just have to pay to ship it, and then it's a fixing it just like we would a vehicle or whatever else is out of warranty.

Okay, do we plan on writing that in the budget?

The 28,000 so I am looking in our uh software budget um to see if we can absorb that warranty.

Um I have not had that discussion in the budget hearings or for that ask because I'm still looking for it.

So I don't want to get my skis out ahead of me on answering that one.

Um based on what I'm seeing from other agencies, it's one of those where there's not a lot of them getting it, but some of them are.

There's not a lot of repair cost.

Um course we'd be happy to entertain continuing it if the budget could support it.

Um, but that's a cost first reward type question there.

And that's per dog.

2000 okay.

Um, last question on the SWOT kind of the SWAT operations.

If the door is locked, does it have any ability to get through a door that is locked?

Nope, it doesn't, and that's by design.

It's the same reason this dog cannot be weaponized.

It is prohibited from being weaponized, it is prohibited from applying enough force to crush a doorknob or to force a door open.

That is not what they're designed to do.

Um, they are designed for you know the items that uh we showed you in there to get in to get eyes on, um, to remove an object to detect uh explosive devices.

Uh it is not meant to be a force maximum.

Um, so it is not used to breach an entry.

Okay, thank you.

Councilmember Shepard.

Thank you, Mayor.

Had a couple of questions from a constituent, and I believe you answered three out of the four of them already.

And um I'm curious if maybe you can clarify whether any alternative solutions or shared regional resources were evaluated prior to coming forward with the request of a purchasing new ones for the department.

Yep, so we've evaluated all the grants.

The grants are slowly.

I know I kind of touched on some of the police grants last time.

Um we are seeing some of those slowly come in.

Uh, they are more in the wellness aspect uh than equipment aspect.

Um we did receive word that our um the regional funds were going to be uh unlocked, I guess, for a lack of better term.

Um that we're roughly thinking is about 217,000.

Um we use the bulk of the regional funds to fund the bomb team to buy items for the bomb team, their suits, their x-rays, um, the radiation meters or gas meters, uh, their vehicles.

So 200,000 doesn't go very far in the bomb world of equipment.

Um, you know, one of their trucks needs replace, which we talked about last time, that's a half million dollars.

I think we'll probably put the 200 towards that to offset the 50 percent, you know, of that.

Um, it just we're not seeing the funding that we're used to.

Councilmember Johnston.

Thank you, Mayor.

Captain Gully, thank you.

I appreciate the information.

In the last year, how many of the events would spot take care of that your robots now cannot take care of events as in like Riverfest events?

No, no, no, no.

Call outs in the last year that you used your robots on.

How many of them failed?

The test and and spot could have accomplished that goal.

Yeah, uh, we don't keep a statistic that you know says a robot failed, or we our breaching tool failed, or um I can tell you yesterday our robots failed for the exact same thing that we're asking for spot to do.

Um what happened yesterday?

So uh yesterday um we had a wanted individual that was wanted for a shooting, shot someone multiple times.

Uh we had information that uh they were inside of a residence, uh got obtained legal grounds to get inside the residence.

Um we did the normal de-escalation protocols we do.

Um at some point it was decided to we had to send robotics inside.

Um the operators uh went up in front of the door, put themselves in harmway to open the door for the big robot.

And when I say big, it's big, it's not like spot.

I mean it's big, it's got wheel, it's got tracks.

Um it went in and the house was cluttered enough.

Uh there was objects on the couch and the floor, couldn't get over it.

We can't get over any of those clothes.

Um, so we had to fly the drone in after that.

Um the drone could only go so far it was having uh issues with all the clutter in there.

Uh so eventually we had to systematically put operators, I'm sorry, swap personnel, uh, into the residence with a handheld robot and slowly keep walking it forward threat after threat after threat because our big robot was as soon as there was clothes or boxes or whatever, um we can't use them.

How did that end up getting resolved?

Uh it ended up the SWOT operators ended up having to pull the robots back out and then go back to what we're trained to do and just systematically clear the residents room by room by room.

Um he wasn't in there, we just they're just putting out a media brief now that we located him this morning.

Okay, okay.

Uh last question is you talked about your software budget.

Is that in the police budget?

Or is that in the IT budget?

Police budget.

Police budget.

Okay.

Thank you.

Captain Cooley.

Um, I had a couple of questions.

Can you go back to maybe one of the slides uh that shows the different capabilities of just an actual example?

I was just curious if there would be any opportunity for this robot to be multi-purposed.

So I know that you mentioned the CBRNE threat detection.

Is that the sphere looking there?

That works.

Is that that sphere?

Um so on the top right photo.

Um what you're looking at is the arm has been removed because they're just walking around an event, they're not there to perform any operation.

Um so the front, the dome sphere that you're looking at is the uh communication and the thermal camera, so the operators can see.

On the rear of it, they have uh placed their C burn on the back of that with the antenna for the communication coming off of it.

So on the back of it is what you're seeing is the uh chemical biological nuclear detection on there.

Does that mean that the arm can be removed and then placed back on to the robot?

Correct.

Yeah, we can take the arm off and put the needed sensors that are needed for whatever the event is.

So I I don't know.

Uh that looks like probably the ND500, so I don't know exactly what they bought, what their purpose of their robot is.

Um, but my speculation is like the bottom right one there, they probably took off the arm, move the camera up front, and put their C burn on the back, knowing they were there to just scan this ND500.

So my question then would be are there opportunities to make it multi-purposed, both for SWAT and for bomb?

Yeah, it can be multi-purpose.

Um you can remove different pieces from it and put them on.

They they're all kind of attached by different railing.

Um where that becomes problematic from what other agencies are seeing is it is an internal operation problem.

That if, for example, on Easter, they're at St.

Joe working a device inside the hospital.

That dog is not available for the SWAT call, so going on right now.

So some agencies are working one, I think is probably the root of your question.

They are working one and they are changing them at all, you know, um, which is how we wound up with Rady Co.

Um, they are a vendor of these and they uplift these robots to do what we're asking them to do.

Um, I don't know if I showed a picture, probably one of them walking up the stairs.

That's like if you bought it from Boston Dynamics, nothing on it, you just get an arm.

Um Radico uplifts it to do what we're asking these things to do.

Um so I think that was probably the same thought of a lot of jurisdictions is let's get one, move pieces around.

Umperationally, I think is where they're finding the challenge, and which is where we discussed that when we were asking for two.

I think we'll have the same operational challenge.

Where do we keep one dog?

Do we keep it at our bomb room?

Do we keep it at our SWAT room?

Who has to go get it?

Can we get it?

Is it on another call?

Who brings it?

What operator needs to operate it?

Um that was part of the discount that was negotiated too is training those number of people.

Um we received a discount to train both teams all on their specific robot for one visit.

A follow-up question to that.

I know that uh there will be training costs with uh this robot.

I know that if it was only one robot, can you still train all users that will be using this robot?

Uh that would be a probably a company or a question for RATICO.

I would I would have to ask them.

Um if we purchase the bomb robot and it came with all the needed stuff, which is in the 330.

I guess technically SWAT could operate those devices that come as long as bomb removed the sensors from the dog, if that makes sense.

Thank you, Captain Cooley.

Uh, Councilmember Hoheisel.

Thank you, Mayor.

Uh Captain, what would the plans be for some of the previous robots we've purchased?

Um, are they available to sell to other jurisdictions?

Um regionally and doing some of the regional stuff as well.

What would the plans be for any of those extra previously purchased robots?

Uh so our plan would be to keep them.

We have one that is um like the original, it's it's big.

Um we can't even bring it out, it stays at the bomb room, and we use that one to take the explosives downrange, so it kind of fits its purpose.

I don't have to ask one of my uh operators to actually carry the explosive downrange.

We can use that large robot that we can't get to scenes to take it downrange, um, which is how we lost our last uh bomb lieutenant was he was downrange with explosives.

Um, so we utilize that old big robot to do that now.

Um some of the other robots we have are more handheld throw robots.

Um there was a video I didn't put in here, but uh there's an individual in a crawl space under a house, and you're you're not getting a robot in there, you're not getting spot in there.

But they did put the robot, the throw robot in Spot's mouth, walk it up to the crawl space and tell Spot to drop it, and then they could drive it in the crawl space without sending any human being up there.

Um, so we still have needs for those, whether it's an attic or crawl space, or um, we throw it in a window, or you know, there's multiple possibilities with the smaller ones.

The two big ones, that's probably the root of your question that I keep referring to.

Uh, we plan on keeping those because there are still operational needs for those.

Um, if we had an active shooter at a school, um it's it does have a camera on it.

Um, and I want to get too many tactical terms here, but when we're down a hallway in that fatal funnel, we do need to keep eyes down that hallway or behind us on the wing of what we've already cleared as well.

So there are operational needs to have it.

Um same with the bombs uh robot.

Um that is a regional asset.

So for example, when we went to Augusta on a large device, um we had to detonate that in place.

Um we used that robot to systematically move those that large device into a hole we dug to detonate that.

We we could not bring that back into the city to take care of it.

So we still have operational needs for those robots.

Um, plus we still are a regional team with regional responsibilities.

Um, we want to keep them in-house, keep using them, and if we have to provide mutual aid or the operational needs for them, we still want to have that capability.

Okay, thank you.

Captain Cooley, can you go back to the number of incidents that um have been responded to?

Yeah, let me think it was before these.

Uh we look here.

Uh, you're talking about locally?

Yes.

Okay.

Oops, sorry.

Thank you.

Um I would be curious.

Um, I know that the council is still talking about um the number of uh robots, uh, but I would be actually uh curious about the data and tracking that data.

If this council was to approve not two but one of these technology items, I'd like to see more data regarding the usage of them, when they were used by SWAT versus BOM, when there was a conflict, that there were you would have wanted that robot to be at this location, but it was being occupied by another eight uh unit.

I think that data would be helpful to understand how highly utilized they are.

I appreciate this information, and first and foremost, I want to say thank you to the SWAT members and the bomb members because again uh they're in very high risk situations, and that's why uh they're a specialized unit.

Um, their safety along with the safety of residents is paramount.

And so I would like to always see data to see when there are conflicts, and and you mentioned that it can be multi-purpose, which I really appreciate.

I think that multi-purposing uh this robot would be appropriate since there are two units that could utilize it, um, but it requires internal operations, logistics, uh you know, working that out.

And I think that um I I know I have confidence in the police department being able to do internal ops and figuring this out, but I would be very much interested in more data if uh the dogs get purchased because again, I I want to make sure that safety of officers is number one, and safety of residents is equally number one.

Um so I appreciate that there's technology now that um does not put a human life at risk first, uh, and is able to really gather enough information, and then uh humans can then make the decision of what to do as the next step.

So I appreciate technology being utilized in the city of Wichita, which is the largest city in the state of Kansas, and um because we are so spread out.

Um I want to make sure that these uh types of equipment are utilized to their uh best potential.

And then hearing you say um the fire department in New York has utilized this for um just assessing uh the safety.

I can see that kind of like our drones being able to be utilized amongst um various different um departments as well.

So I appreciate it.

You even saying the fire department has done something like this with their spot.

Yeah, yeah, you bet I can tell you from being the incident commander uh on SWAT and bomb incidents.

It would probably be harder for me to find an incident where we didn't use robotics.

Um I guess that's just my word.

I don't have data to back that up, so we will start collecting that for you.

Thank you, Captain Cooley.

And then lastly, I know that you mentioned that there are two units that are uh were regionally purchased, uh both in 2021 and 2024.

Can you tell me what those uh the names of those robots was it from the same company?

Uh no, uh Boston Dynamics is the only one that makes uh spot.

So those other two are uh ICOs, uh which is ICOR.

And that is utilized by the region, correct?

Yeah, yes, yes.

Thank you, Captain Cooley.

I see no further questions from the council.

Thank you for the presentation.

We will now open it up for public comment.

My name is Reed Harder.

I live on the corner of Edwards and Douglas, where every time it rains, the street floods and garbage washes into my lawn.

I'm taking today off work to come to the council and talk to you about this robotic dog project.

Wichita has a lot of real problems.

We have issues with sanitation, public transit, um, the stormwater systems, and then we spend 141 million dollars from the general fund each year on the police department while crime falls year to year.

That's 40% of our general fund budget.

I don't see why we need to spend even more money on toys when we have actual things that need to be done in this city.

That's all I've got.

Thank you.

I want to thank you guys for uh delaying this so that we could talk about it today.

I don't know if you've been paying attention to social media.

Um, but maybe for every 50 comments of people opposing this, I'll see one person that's like, this is a good idea.

And that includes all of the phone calls and emails and texts that I've gotten.

Umtimes we have to go back in time a little bit, like with the agenda item earlier.

We needed to understand the history so that we could understand what was the best decision to make today.

So I'm gonna go back in time six years to when we had an incident, and we had to hire a company and pay them to come in and figure out how to help City of Wichita, HR and WPD to get some issues taken care of.

Um, ever since then, there's been a couple FOP contracts where they've got more bonuses and pay raises without all of the recommendations being implemented.

The meet and confer process has been going on for a while without having those things taken care of.

And in the meantime, we've gotten drones, raven flock, falcon flock, um, and when we just you know begged poverty and we needed to have a sales tax um to help out our firefighters, and station 15 is my local fire.

It's just a quarter mile down the road for me.

Um, when I see what's in the CIP, what was the thinking where we needed to have this come year ahead when there are other priorities in the CIP that haven't been funded for years?

I'd like to know what the thinking behind that was.

Because if the CIP priority is keeping Wichita safe, having firefighters having to move their equipment and their personnel into other stations, um, looks like we have different ideas of what a priority of keeping Wichita safe means.

I would also like to know, well, I said that.

I want to know why the equipment asked does not include those costs.

You did kind of talk a little bit about that, but why are we asking for it if we don't know how we're gonna fund it in the future?

That should be part of the ask.

Also, um, why are the policies not in place that would protect citizens and the city of Wichita from risk if there's an incident with those dogs?

They're not dogs, robots.

Um, the uncanny valley I see have when I see those robots, I don't know that I want to see it walking around in my neighborhood.

They creep me out, so they're robots, they're not dogs.

Um, what is the cost per use of these?

I think the mayor asked that question.

What are the false positives for the C burn?

How many times have they, what is the data around that?

Because I know this company, they specialize in those things, uh, you know, radiation and that kind of detection.

Um, do we normally make large purchases without any policies in place?

And if we already have four, why wouldn't we get one potentially, see how that works?

And then just like the water treatment plant, we're keeping the other one as a redundancy.

Why wouldn't we keep those four in redundancy and purchase these in the future as those redundancies fails?

Um, someone brought up, well, they they can't get through a locked door.

I don't know how many of you leave your doors unlocked in Wichita, but I don't.

Um, so if they can't get in a locked door, then we're back to the same personnel.

Um I'm not saying that I don't support safe streets and policing and keeping our police officers safe, but I agree with the speaker before me that we have a lot of other issues in Wichita, and I don't think this is something that needs to be done right now.

If it's next year and we get around to it when it was originally in the CIP, we'll see how we're doing then.

But I think we have other priorities.

Oh, the robots camera footage available like body cam.

Can that be can we ask for that if they're going into people's houses?

Thank you.

Good afternoon, Mayor and City Council, Vince Hancock from Delano.

I'm generally in favor of this item, but I do have significant unanswered questions and requests for guardrails.

I understand the overall cost saving of buying two units now, but feel it's maybe more wise to crawl before we walk on these four legs.

We spoke about this a month ago.

Should have a couple of days.

How are we going to implement these safely when we do not have a policy?

Last month, you asked a very appropriate question.

Will these use AI?

And you were told, no.

That is the exact opposite of the truth.

In fact, Radica's own two-page sales brochure for their Cerberus variant champions that Boston Dynamics has advanced AI.

Tech journals published four years ago show that the audio capabilities, uh, speech recognition, video capabilities, the ability for it to recognize things that it sees and appropriately work with them, their locomotion, their actual ability to move all four of those legs and get down those stairs.

Every single one of those, oh, and the object manipulation, the ability to turn it on.

Every single one of those features requires AI.

They're running on an Nvidia chip called the Jetson AGX Oregon, and it's carried on the back.

Anybody who'd done their research on these would know that and have given you an honest answer.

Then we have a very important question of pricing.

Most of us are familiar that when we buy a car, it has a base price.

And then there are available uh additional things with additional cost for aftermarket add-ons.

The base price for a Boston Dynamics quadruped is $75,000.

How can Radico aftermarket add-ons and training increase the price 440%?

Will the gas sensors detect both the nitrogen-based explosives and the triacetone tri peroxide?

It's the new thing on the block.

Now, the good news is anybody with any knowledge of chemistry knows that it's only got 70% the power of TNT, and you're more likely to sign up for a Darwin award making it than anything else.

But if they're dumb enough to do that, I say let them do it.

How many for that for the full cost?

How many operators are going to receive training?

That training was not in the presentation at all.

And so many other times with our finances, we get wonderfully itemized invoices that show here's how all the individual costs add up to the total cost.

Where's our itemized invoice of how we get from $75,000 per unit up to this much?

So I will stand for your questions, but I don't have the answers to those.

Councilmember Hoheisel.

Thank you, Mayor.

Captain Cooley, do we have any response as far as um body cams and overall policy?

Mayor, before you do that, do you have any more speech?

Okay.

Well, we can wait until after, I suppose.

My name is Nancy Bradley.

I live in District 4.

The month before my father died at the age of 88, he celebrated his 54th birthday as an active member of Alcoholics Anonymous.

Years ago, I was still in grade school.

He received a call from the wife of an AA friend.

His friend was drunk, barricaded in a home, and had a gun.

The police were already on the scene.

My father went immediately to do what he could, which was really nothing.

His friend died that afternoon.

Suicide by cop.

During Captain Cooley's presentation last month, the first person I thought of was the officer in the bomb unit that was tragically killed.

The second person I thought of is a relative of mine who, along with two more deputies, were shot in the line of duty two years ago in another state during a SWAT call.

This call was a typical SWAT call, and it happens here as well.

Without miraculously, they all survived, but my relative had to take disability retirement due to his injuries and end a career he loved serving his community.

Besides the three men who were shot, their families and the officers they worked with were also affected, as well as the family of the man who shot them.

The use of this technology not only has the potential to save lives, but also to alleviate the trauma of everyone affected.

There have been a lot of hateful and disrespectful comments made about this request, particularly online.

Yesterday I made the mistake of reading the opinion of an obvious anti-WPD reporter.

He actually compared the members of the WPD to nagging children who demand their promised birthday present a year early.

He made fun of this life-saving technology by sarcastically comparing it to a living dog.

One commenter actually suggested replacing all our officers with robots, thus eliminating officer safety concerns.

Comments like this only fuel hatred for the men and women who would risk their lives to protect these individuals from harm.

While listening to the agenda meeting last Friday, I could not believe the audacity in asking Chief Sullivan to choose between two groups of officers who take additional risks in their duties to protect this community.

I have absolutely no qualms with his decision.

Nor did any officers I talked to in the last few days, none of whom are members of either one of these special units.

If you choose to only purchase one robot dog, how do you think the members of the SWAT team will feel?

What about their loved ones?

Are they not worth the investment?

It isn't just the SWAT team members that will be affected by this decision.

So will the alcoholics and drug addicts who that have hit rock bottom and can't find a way back up.

The person suffering from a mental crisis who just wants to give up and end it all.

The victim of domestic violence trying to get out of a situation alive.

Not only does SWAT respond to calls involving barricades or hostage situations, they also serve the high-risk search warrants to remove the worst threats to our community.

This robot, SPOT, has so many more capabilities than the current robots in use.

It enables communication with the suspect as well, giving the officers insight to what is happening and allows them to make decisions with as many facts as possible in the safest way possible.

It helps with the judgment of what action, including possible use of force, the team should be ready to take.

Last year there were act they were activated 43 times.

This year the number is already up to nine, including the event just this past Sunday.

That incident is a perfect example of how a SWAT event affects the entire neighborhood.

It seems to me the majority of the debate revolves around money.

This discussion really should be about the value of human life, the safety of all wichetans.

The cost of purchasing the two robots is 629,647 and 56 cents.

With approximately 400,000 Wichita residents, that's an investment of about a dollar fifty-seven per person.

When you break it down per citizen, that's not much when it comes to the safety of our neighborhoods, our districts, our city.

The officers in these two units are examples of all officers dedicated and committed to uphold the oath they took to serve and protect our community.

They all deserve the investment of this technology to mitigate the dangers they face.

Thank you.

Would anyone else from the community like to speak?

I see none.

We will now ask Captain Cooley to answer Councilmember Hoheisel's question.

I'm sorry, can you give me your question again?

Um body cam policy and policy in general.

Um Spot's camera does have the capability to stream back to the operator or to our real-time information center, but it doesn't capture photo like videos like a body cam does.

There's no recording.

The only way to record that is if we did a screen record on the operator's screen, or you took your phone and you recorded the screen.

Um the robot is designed to just show you live and real-time information on what's happening.

Um screen record, I guess, if if you so choose to do so, but it doesn't operate the same way as body cam does.

Okay, I think um for my preference, anyways, that we do record when it's in operation specifically, SWAT operations.

Um I think that is it's very important to capture whatever we have as far as conflict resolution goes, and just for transparency to the public as how these are being used.

Yeah, and it comes with that capability of a of an SD card in the handheld that is designed on purpose.

Again, that way spot is not in the cloud storage business like our body cam footage company is.

You take it and you plug it in and you can offload it that way.

So it's designed purposely not to have to, you know, store footage like our body cams do.

Okay, I mean, I don't think we would have it use as often as the rest of the body cams.

So okay.

Um, and then policy is that something we'll put on our transparency portal as well.

So we don't have a policy specific to robotics.

Um, we don't have policies specific to every item, you know, that we own or operate.

Um we have general policies that guides uh the officers on what they can and can't do uh with those with with technology in general, whether it's the computers or the cell phones.

Um, some of those we have specific policies from uh things that we've seen uh throughout the way, but um we have standard operating procedures of what the operators can and can't do with robotics, or um, it's very similar to uh we have a device that we can deliver inside of a residence to provide someone a phone so they can communicate with us and we can start de-escalating the situation.

Um all those are outlined in the standard operating procedures of what you can and can't do or how you should work it or function it.

But we don't have policies specific to all those items individually.

Okay, I think that's something maybe we need to look into, and I'll go ahead and bring this up now.

Um I'd also like to look into the potentially having a non-lethal robotics ordinance, um, something that we can ground uh can ground us going forward.

Um I know that's a policy, that's the company policy as well.

We have seen in the past, I believe San Francisco, maybe where they have scrapped explosives to robots to use that.

Um so that is something I'd like us to explore up here on council, um potentially just solidifying that in ordinance and again working through some policies as we move forward.

Yep.

Uh was Dallas, but we're familiar with what you're talking about.

We've had those internal discussions and and uh we support the manufacturers, you know, of you you can't weaponize this thing.

So that's not what we're looking to do.

That's not the uh point of what WPD wants to do with these robotics.

That's not what we've done with any of our robotics, and we've had robotics for uh 23 years that I can that we still have on the books.

There's probably robots that replace these robots, so we're probably 30, 40 years into robots.

So same thing with our drones.

San Francisco actually did the they allowed it for a little bit and then went back and revised it.

So appreciate that clarification there.

Um good afternoon.

Gee.

This is an easy one.

If it makes council more comfortable, we can create that policy, and we can just as we did with the drones, and we can explicitly state in there that it could never be weaponized, and any other restrictions you want included in there.

That's that's an easy one.

And then we would post that publicly, as we have all our other policies, all of our policies except uh a few that are very sensitive.

Our procedures we would not put publicly because that has some sensitive information.

But what you're asking for is not a problem.

We we have LexiPoll now, and we can just go to LexiPoll and make that happen.

Any specifics that members of council would like to see in that policy, please uh communicate that to me, and we'll make sure that it's incorporated in there so that you're completely comfortable with us utilizing this technology.

Yeah, I appreciate that.

I was also looking at guardwills for us in future councils as well.

So I do appreciate that, Chief.

Um, while I'm up here, I can address some of the other uh comments if you prefer.

Okay.

Um the 75,000 uh dollars is an old price uh that just still happens to be on Google.

That's not sufficient pricing anymore.

Uh, is actually the base price is 115.

That's what you're gonna see in a factory scanning inventory.

Um, then you got to add in another 75,000 uh for the arm, another radio for a half mile uh radius for approximately 50,000.

Uh the spot cam and uh pen tilt zoom uh thermal is another 50,000.

Um obviously through the negotiated price, I do have all the itemized quote.

Um that's not a secret.

I have that of every itemized thing, so that's quickly how you get up to the dollar amount that that we're at.

So that's quickly how you get up to the dollar amount that we're at.

As far as AI, I understand some of the information out there.

Says it has AI.

I think AI is probably thrown around loosely in today's uh age.

I can tell you that straight from the manufacturer.

What I'm being told is uh it doesn't have AI, it has what's called machine learning and reinforced learning, which they refer to as ML and RL, which is loaded up during the software development.

Once the software is loaded on the robot for the customer, there is no more learning or training that happens.

The only additional that the robot will receive is an update, much like your phone gets an update if the manufacturer pushes out an update to help navigate whatever, then they'll push that out.

Um the navigation uh is done by uh stereo cameras and LIDAR, and it's uh manipulated the task of opening an object is pre-trained inside of the robot, so it can't learn additional doorknobs along the way unless the manufacturer pushes out uh an update.

So that's the information that uh that I'm being told uh straight from uh Boston Dynamics, and I think uh that covered all the questions.

If I missed one, I'll be happy to answer it.

Vice Mayor Glasscock.

I meant to remove my name, but I was just gonna echo uh Councilman Hohaisel's point uh regarding the non-lethal ordinance, and so thank you for uh the chief's clarification on it as well.

But that was prior to the chief talking.

So thank you.

One quick question regarding the ICOR robots that currently are being utilized.

Do they have cameras?

And if so, is there a recording mechanism?

And if so, what is that policy?

Yes, they have cameras.

I don't know if they record.

Uh I've never seen that recording.

Um, as far as I know, and and last time we brought the subject matter experts, this time we didn't, um, or they would be able to answer your question.

Um I don't think we've ever offloaded the recording, which tells me it's probably just a live feed back to the operator, um, but I can figure that out.

They can, I mean, I can text them why we're here and get the answer probably.

I think um it's a tag along to the question that council member Hoheisel as well as Vice Mayor.

Excuse me.

Oh no, I'm still answering his question.

Uh and Vice Mayor Glasscock asked um about policy.

Um, I would be interested in also understanding if um the policy can include the um recording of this video for future evidence or even training purposes.

Um, and I think it should be clearly stated within the policy so people know that if this technology is utilized that uh it can be recorded.

Yeah, that's not a problem.

Sorry, I got we actually have a bomb call, so I'm actually working on device right now, so I'm I apologize, but I my focus is here as well.

So um, but this also gives me an opportunity to ask the iCorp question why I'm actually being texted about a device.

So I will see if I can't get that answer.

Thank you, Captain Cooley, and thank you, Chief.

And thank you to our four speakers.

We're now gonna bring it back to the bench.

I think I got gained a lot more clarity in knowing that um again one of those robots can be multi-purposed.

Uh, thank you, Captain Cooley, for uh sharing that information that um if we approve um one of those robots that there will be some internal operations that you would have to work out, but it would be utilized by both bomb and squat uh and SWAT rather, and so I would believe that that is uh a prudent next step being able to utilize it for two different special units.

Um, and so if that can be achieved, um I would be uh in preference of having one robot and that robot being shared between the bomb squad and SWAT.

Uh council member Johnston.

Thank you, Mayor.

Uh, this is a tough vote.

It is.

I've always supported the police department.

I still do, always will.

Um, but it's also a vote about priorities too.

Where our funding goes, what matters most.

I see a lot of deferred maintenance around the city that we need to take care of.

Um that's that's why I'll be voting no on this, yeah, even for one.

So thank you.

Thank you.

Councilmember Hoheisel.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um, this is a tough vote as well.

Um ultimately it comes down to not putting a price tag on people's lives on public safety.

Um, but that also needs to include how we approach other items in our budget moving forward.

So I think that's a challenge for this council, and I hope that extends into the budget discussions.

Fire apparatus and uh facilities.

We've heard that we have invested more in those in the past couple of years, but we need to continue that as well.

Um parks for healthy childhood development and health outcomes, those are things that affect lives as well, public safety, um, libraries, childhood literacy, giving kids options, third grade literature.

That's the biggest indication of poverty that we have.

Safety improvements, senior services, um, groups reaching out and uh reaching kids before they do decide to pick up a gun.

Those are other programs that we need to invest in as well.

So we need to keep that in mind as we work or work our way through the budget.

Um I do support one robot.

I do support the capabilities that they have, specifically bomb squad, active shooter and whatnot.

Um, these are tough decisions to make when you're up here.

They really are because every decision we make could potentially have an impact, and we have to be prepared for some things.

Uh so I do support one robot, and again, we need to keep this in mind as we go through budget discussions, pivoting away from uh some of the economic development that we focus on and actually get down to the nuts and bolts of what improves lives and quality of life moving forward.

Um, and again, going back to libraries, parks.

This isn't an either-or, but it is something that we need to include if we are talking about putting public safety first.

Thank you.

Councilmember Shepard.

Thank you so much, and I appreciate both of my colleagues, both Councilmember Johnston and also Councilmember Hoheisel, adding perspective to this very uh complicated vote for me as well.

I'm a firm believer in public safety.

I believe that it is important that we recognize the risk that our police officers put up every single day.

They leave their house wondering if they will return at all, their families, their spouses do as well.

I think that's a major sacrifice.

Um with that being said, to Councilmember Hoheisel's point, there is need for investment in prevention, and I think we've talked about it for too long.

And I think that there is not a pie of because police gets this, then fire shouldn't get this, or because police gets this, we also can't invest in prevention.

But I think that in District One specifically, that's certainly the perception amongst a large faction of my constituents, many of whom support public safety and want to see us making sure that our words align with our actions.

I'm open to innovation, but to me it needs to align with community needs.

Um, and in district one, that is consistent and viable, preventative safety in district one.

I believe when we do that, we reduce the strain from our police officers.

And it also means that when we invest in crime prevention, we strengthen our relationships between the community and police officers.

I've heard overwhelmingly that people in district one want to see more investment in community policing.

Um, they want to make sure that we are uh prioritizing a world-class training facility through the CIP so that our police officers can train at the highest level without doing so in our neighborhoods.

And we have to be honest.

That bonding for projects like this, it does come with long-term interest cost, and we need to make sure that we are making the right investments at the right time.

I do believe that waiting until next year when this was originally in the CIP would allow us to gather data, gather policies, gather diet uh guidelines, and equipment usage.

We heard today that there was a lot of things that we would like to see.

I thank Chief Sullivan for being willing to uh be amenable to those things, and yet I think about my time on the council, how much we have pushed back on other departments who've come forward, and they've not had that information, and we've delayed those things because that information was not readily available.

That is not a slight on Wichita Police Department.

Again, I'm very grateful for the sacrifice and service that you all give to this community.

Um, and I have, as you all know, voted in favor of the equipment that you needed to protect lives, but I do not believe that this is the right investment at the right time, and with that, I cannot be supportive today of both one and two.

I will not be supportive at all.

Thank you very much, Councilmember Joseph.

Councilmember Ballard.

Thank you, Mayor.

Well, I share a lot of the same thoughts, questions, and concerns as all of my colleagues.

Um, Councilmember Johnston, Hoheisel, and Shepard.

I worry about the policy portion.

We talk about policy what seems like sometimes too late in the conversation.

And so I know we don't want to delay, but is there any appetite to delay for a week to get some type of policy in place?

I'm just just for conversation.

I just am curious what my colleagues think.

But I do think that is an important piece, and um I received several messages since we've been sitting here actually all day.

Um, and when it was on the agenda a couple weeks ago, so I just am curious um what my colleagues think about the policy portion.

I actually have a question maybe to ask to staff uh how soon can you get a policy uh with the concerns that were raised so far very quickly.

I mean, I'm I'm confused about concerns because we've been using robots for 30 years, and this is what we've always done, continuously improved those capabilities.

I was out there Eastern.

We said we could really abuse spot out here because we added we did not have the ability to effectively communicate with our subject, and our goal there was to save his life and to prevent any type of lethal confrontation, even though there was a firearm involved, communication is everything, and the ability to get this is an extension of what we already do and have been doing.

So but as I said before, whether we approve it today or we or not to satisfy any concerns of council around policy, that is something that we will do very quickly, and are happy to do it.

We are a very transparent police department, that is why we have our transparency portal, and we're glad to share what ever information council would like us to with the public.

Thank you, Chief.

Councilmember Shepard.

Thank you, Mayor, and thank you, Chief, for that.

Uh, to Councilmember Ballard's point, I actually last night had the opportunity because I was really wrestling with this, as I've shared with many people.

It's it's a tough situation to be in.

Um, my job is to listen to the constituents in my district, and many times that is also an uncomfortable situation to be in.

Um, and they've made it clear that they are not overwhelmingly at a point where they could support this type of investment.

But to me, it's not about us crafting a policy that we want to see, it's about giving the community an opportunity to engage with law enforcement and building that trustworthy process that we talked about building when again I hate to bring up the sales tax again, but I think that was the loud and clear message that I take away is people want investment in these things, they're not opposed to them.

They want to be a part of the process of building out policy guidelines and understanding the data.

And in fact, in the CIP budget, uh WPD states very clearly and powerfully that I mean, and they've been doing it, they've been engaging with community.

So I wonder what it would look like for uh during one of their quarterly community input and listening sessions to take this out to the community, and if nothing else, give the community to be heard and also work alongside our police department to come to an understanding of what these robot dogs are for and the impact that it would have long term.

Councilmember Tuttle.

Thank you.

And I may have more comments in in a bit, depending on how this conversation goes, but I I am going to be supportive today.

Um I come from a law enforcement family, and Miss Nancy, and I'm sorry, I I didn't catch your last name, but when you made the comment of how do we explain to the SWAT team and the SWAT team's family that we're getting one that truly resonated with me.

So I just want to say thank you for being here.

I know you came for the proclamation, you've been here a long time, but your your words were certainly not lost on me, and I appreciate that.

Um I I also trust our police department.

You have a very small part of the CIP.

You have a large part of our operating budget because of personnel, so you don't ask for a great deal in the CIP, and this was a request that came to us.

Um the world is incredibly unpredictable right now, especially with everything that's happening in Iran today.

Um but the one thing that is consistent is this council's keeping our police officers, our firefighters, our first responders safety as paramount as well as our community members.

So I would not be supportive of a delay because we had this as an agenda item five, six weeks ago, and then we did a workshop, and then now we've waited a couple more weeks.

I think we've been talking about this for well over two months, and so there's been multiple opportunities for community engagement.

Um I understand we need to craft policy.

I'm not opposed to that, but we probably couldn't craft have community input and approve a policy in a week.

And the reason that I feel deadline driven is with Riverfest coming up, and Chief Sullivan and I have talked significantly to be able to place an order, have it delivered, and have staff trained to be able to utilize it, seems to be a concern of the chief and of the Wichita Police tournament, and you are the content experts, and I trust you.

So I would like to see us take action today so that we can be deadline driven for Riverfest.

Thank you.

Councilmember Ballard.

Thank you, Mayor.

Uh thank you, Chief, for for sharing that.

Um, I would just my comment to that would be we don't know what we don't know.

And so with the new technology, I've just received uh several comments, questions, and concerns.

So that's why I just was proposing the policy um conversation to see what my colleagues thought.

Councilmember Hoheisel.

Thank you, Mayor.

I I'm okay with delaying until policy, but that's again me, my perspective.

Um, I do see that uh the public does feel left out of a lot of these conversations.

I don't know what that looks like, but um it is something I would be open to.

Vice Mayor Glasscock.

Thank you, Mayor.

I want to echo everything that council member Tuttle said, and I agree with her whole wholeheartedly.

Um I think this is the first time that a majority of my constituents speak on any specific item.

Uh, three of the four speakers from my district, and all three offer different perspectives.

Um, I think to Reed's comments, we're able to balance other priorities in the city as well, including flooding, and I think we need to take that seriously.

Uh, to Vincent's point regarding policies, yes, we should have policies in place, and yes, we have policies that make sure that we protect private citizens, and when we're talking about non-lethal ordinances as well, that's something that should be paramount.

And to Nancy, thank you for speaking.

I think your comments um to Councilmember Tuttle's points struck me in asking the question of which of these departments do I choose and which do I elevate their safety beyond the other.

And that's not a decision that I'm willing to make from this bench because I believe all of our law enforcement officers need the help that they are asking for in these circumstances, and if this can help mitigate the loss of life, um, my paramount uh view on every decision I make up here is how to protect life, and I think that this is a way to do that very tangibly.

And so um I just want to say thank you for coming up there and speaking.

I want to thank everybody for coming up and speaking.

I think all of you uh act in good faith when it comes to these conversations.

I think of the last line of duty death we had um could have been mitigated uh with this technology, and that's something that isn't lost on me as well.

And I also want to say, probably in conclusion of these comments is that we're a representative republic, and that we don't govern solely by the will of a democratic vote on every single issue, and that's because our job is to be able to take the decisions that we're given and be able to make educated choices based on those decisions from this bench, and I think we should all keep that in mind and decisions we make as well.

And so I would not support delay to the same members' same points that council member Tuttle has.

Um I think often, and I'm not saying this is the intention by any means.

I think often delay is sometimes a way to just keep pushing things forward and forward and forward.

I think we have the information.

The public's been given opportunity to speak about it.

We've had a um town hall about it, and a majority of the constituents that have reached out to me, not exclusively as we heard from today, but a majority of my constituents that have reached out to me have been supportive of this.

And when I ran for this city, it was talking about how we can fully fund the Wichita Police Department and Fire Department, and that's when my commitment from this bench is when um things are needed, and uh there are very few times I've seen the chief lean this hard into something, um, saying that it is a necessity for the department, and I don't take that lightly as well.

So I would not support delay.

Um, and I can also count to four, and I know that we'll likely um get one um today, if not uh one in the near future.

But I think this is a necessity for our police department.

Councilmember Shepard.

Thank you, Mayor, and as always, I really appreciate the diverse thought process and philosophy present here, gives me a lot to think about.

So let me add to that color that we have in the conversation happening right now.

Um, I support the public police department.

And yes, we are in a democratic republic, and I've made votes up here that did not align with my constituents, and I stood behind that, didn't apologize for those votes, and my job was to mobilize that opinion and helping them understand why I voted the way I did.

So, Chief WPD, if you all ever want to have a conversation one-on-one about why I feel the way that I feel, I welcome that.

Um, I'm gonna stand by my vote today.

Um, even when you can count to four.

Um, Dr.

King often said, just because something is just doesn't make it right.

And so it's important for us to recognize that we can make votes up here that may align with what we agree to or have advocated for.

Doesn't mean that it's gonna resonate with everyone, and that's my biggest concern here.

I understand why you need this investment.

My constituents are telling me they don't.

And I I think that that would actually create more problems in terms of the perception of which talk police department if we don't take the time to hit the pause button, engage, mobilize the opinion, and actually look at creating a robust policy that meets the community where they are.

With that, I don't think I have anything else left to say.

Councilmember Johnston.

Thank you, Mayor.

I'll echo those thoughts.

I do support the police department, I've always supported them, and I still will do it in the future.

I think this is a question about priorities.

Um none of our pure cities on I 35 corridor have this.

Doesn't mean we shouldn't, but uh they don't technology, it's maybe it's rising now, but eventually it will fall, it will go down.

Um I just think it's about priorities.

Where do we want to spend our money?

Talk about CIP a little bit.

CIP is mainly straff driven.

Um then those things come to vote before us, and our constituents give us feedback on what they want and don't want.

So I don't think everything in the CIP is gonna happen.

Uh most of it does, there's no doubt, but it is staff driven.

I know we do approve it, but we don't go every line item and get a report over every line item over the next 10 years and and approve every line item.

That's why it comes before city council.

So like I said, this is a very tough vote.

Um I think it's about priorities, it's all money, doesn't matter if it's our budget, our CIP, it's all taxpayers' dollars, and most of it is property tax.

Um, I just think it's about priorities.

I see a lot of other needs in the community.

I agree that I think libraries um parks and rec should be funded better than they are.

Um, and I think we need to think about their priorities going forward.

Thank you to each of the council members for your perspective.

Um I would like to know from the chief if we approved at least one of these um robotic um technological items.

Would you be able to help craft policy and get feedback from the uh different uh districts because there are six districts uh before it gets deployed?

Yeah, absolutely.

We've done it before.

I mean, I just want to be clear that before we purchased new technology, we had listening sessions.

This is a continuation of what we've always done.

This is robotics, we've always had them.

That's the reason that that wasn't done.

But is easy enough to go back there if it makes people feel more comfortable.

This is just a robot, just that we have robots now.

This one has legs that enables it to get places that our current robots cannot.

But that means we're able to get there in very sensitive, very critical situations where we need to be able to communicate with someone who's in the midst of a crisis, or we need to get to an object.

When I first came here, I wasn't here very long.

Then I was the first bomb job I was at.

That was the problem that we came up with.

We had antiquated robots, and we were at not able to, what I consider.

I've been overseeing a bomb squad for 12 years in Philadelphia.

Uh in my in my estimation, we were putting we were putting the technician at unnecessary risk because of the inability of the robot.

And it's no different than what I've seen on SWAT jobs.

Been a SWAT officer, supervisor, commander, and I've used robotics throughout my entire career.

I understand the importance of them, and I've seen hundreds of times how they enable us to resolve things without anyone getting hurt.

And that is the purpose of SWAT.

Save lives.

That is any operator will tell you that's the reason that we that they exist.

If I can get them on scene to a situation, I know the likelihood of that ending peacefully just increases exponentially.

But in order to do that, I need to be able to communicate with the person and do so effectively.

Loud hailing, as we call it, is the worst way to do it.

That's what we had to do the other night.

It can actually aggravate the situation.

We want to have a one-on-one conversation.

We want to be able to see if we can identify where the weapon is, because the more intelligence that we have, the better opportunity we have to have a plan in place that will, once we execute it, will result in the saving of a life.

So that's the long answer, Mayor.

And I am passionate about this, because I gotta be honest with you.

But from my perspective, it's very hard to put a dollar amount on the life of a bomb tech or a SWAT operator.

Equally important.

A member of the public who's having a crisis, like the person did on Sunday, but we're also doing something extremely dangerous, and we needed to resolve that, and we did.

So I will do whatever council requires of me.

So when it comes to the CIP, we don't ask for a lot.

And the other thing that I really want to make clear is that when I came here, I was astounded of how far backward this department, how poorly equipped they were with technology.

So sometimes when I hear about how much that how much technology I've bought, I'm just trying to get us up to where we should be.

Let's run out and buy it.

We sat back, we watched, we talked to people that utilize it, we found out what they utilize it for, how successful it's been in their utilization, confirmed that the claims made our claims met, that it will perform as designed.

Captain Cooley has done an incredible job of scoping this out, of getting all the details, asking the hard questions.

So when there was an availability in the CIV, CIP, we followed the process to make sure that it could be moved up.

And it has been approved in the CIP.

So this council would let me know what they need me to do to get this to move forward, whether it be one dog or two dogs, we will make that happen.

Thank you, Chief.

Count Vice Mayor Glascom.

Thank you, Mayor, with a motion to approve the initiation of the project funding, the purchase of spot robotic dogs and RADECO Inc.

and the bonding resolution and authorize the necessary signatures.

Second motion, second discussion.

Again, this is for two dogs versus one.

I will have a substitute motion.

My substitute motion is I move that we purchase the spot robotic dog singular for Matico Inc.

and the bonding resolution and authorize the necessary signatures.

Second.

Motion second.

Discussion.

Again, uh, Councilmember Todd.

Thank you.

I have a uh Jennifer, I'm not sure if it's a substitute motion or a friendly amendment.

Go ahead.

Um, what I would like to see is if we go forward with one today, I am fearful what will happen is that we'll just get one and things will move on.

And data has been requested, policy has been requested, efficacy of this has been requested.

And so what I would like to see as a substitute motion is if today we move forward with just one, that the caveat is also placed that this item come back to us on July 7th with a data update with policy update.

We've had chance to get more community input, and the chief can decide at that point if we are in need of the second robotic dog.

I'm in favor of that.

Is there a second?

Second.

I think if I may mayor also um for the bonding resolution, right now the bonding resolution is drafted for two.

Um, if we're made the motion to um uh uh approve just one dog, would the bonding resolution would need to be modified accordingly?

If that could just be a friendly amendment to modify the bonding resolution to apply to one dog.

Thank you.

So would that be 330,000?

I guess if Mark's here exactly half, I I'm just sort of suspecting if we could maybe just authorize bonding resolution is as needed determined by finance to purchase one.

So we have a current motion that has been seconded that includes uh councilmember Tuttle's addition.

So this motion I will read again.

I move that the council initiate the project funding, the purchase of spot robotic dog from radico Inc.

and the modified bonding resolution and authorized necessary signatures.

Is that accurate?

Thank you.

So we have a motion and seconded by council.

Well, council member Hoheisel had uh seconded it.

Okay, any further discussion?

Yes, we just need to make sure that we include my substitute amendment to the substitute motion.

I don't want this to get lost.

Uh Chief Thank you.

And I'm sorry, I feel like we have put you through lots of hoops and taken lots of time from the very important work that you and your team has done.

And my fear, as I mentioned, is that you know, we're gonna get, I think if I can count the votes one today.

Um, but I don't want our SWAT team to be forgotten in the process.

We can celebrate the success of potentially one, but I I don't want any part of our City of Wichita team, let alone our police department to feel that they're not being protected.

And and I do want to make a quick caveat.

I know it's been a long meeting, but I do appreciate Councilmember Hole Hazel, Councilmember Baller, Johnston, all of Shepard, your comments.

I I believe library, I believe Park, I've been an adamant supporter of you know all of those, but this is uh a little different for me just because lives are actually in danger.

So I want to make sure that July 7th date is highlighted and not forgotten in the motion.

Thank you.

Vice Mayor Glasscock.

Do we have to vote on the amendment to the substitute or well?

If it was accepted as a friendly amendment, um, and I thought I saw a head nod, okay.

Then I don't think it requires a vote.

And if I could just add that we have received information that we think the bonding resolution amount should be three hundred and forty thousand dollars instead of the current six hundred and fifty three hundred forty thousand.

Yes, Mayor.

Thank you.

Councilmember Shepherd.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um, again, want to appreciate I appreciate all the advocacy that I feel is happening here.

I just feel the need to reiterate um if and when anybody from WPD would like to hear from me directly about my thoughts and why my vote, I believe that's my obligation, and I want to be able to do that.

I believe in public safety.

I've strongly support our Wichita police department, and I think I've already stated as to why I'm voting the way that I am today.

It's not that I don't value the SWAT team or that I that I'm not that I'm ignorant enough to believe that they do not put themselves at risk every single day.

They do, and I'm grateful.

And I believe what I have heard from my constituents is that we we have work to do to bridge the gap.

I don't believe that work is on WPD alone, and I'm willing to work with WPD to help bridge that gap.

Thank you.

With that, we have a motion and a second.

Any further discussion?

I see none.

Madam Clerk, please open the roll.

Motion passes 4-3.

Madam Clerk, please call the next item.

Simplifying short-term rental license applications, amending ordinance section 3.40.080 of the code of the city of Wichita.

Thanks, Shinita.

Thank you, Council.

Nave your Tyler Johnson with the law department.

I hope I didn't jinx us by including simplifying in the tagline of this item, but hopefully at least a little less complicated.

What we've got is short-term rental license ordinance.

We've had that since 2023 based on an ordinance adopted by city council.

Under this ordinance, the application requires several different signatures to be notarized.

Three of them are in the ordinance, just part of the application process.

But at the same time, the finance department and the licensing office are trying to modernize our application process, put things more online, more digital to enhance customer service and decrease the amount of time that we spend uh dealing with things administratively.

Um these notary requirements, which turns out are totally unique for short-term rental licensing as opposed to any other licenses that we have, haven't provided us any type of identity security or anything about the property that we thought might come up in terms of short-term rental licenses.

Uh this is distinct from maybe public safety issues that have come up with short-term rentals, and we've gotten a question about that.

We're trying to collect the data, work with WPD on that.

We don't categorize as I understand it, incidents based on short-term rental versus uh traditional residential property.

We're trying to collect that information.

This notary requirement, though, hasn't really provided us much benefit, but it seems to get in the way of everybody being able to submit their documents online.

Uh you can't notarize digitally, they have to upload a PDF, and it just is creating some additional barriers for the integration into our online platform.

And at that point, I'll hand over to our finance department to talk about some of the benefits that have come from that process.

Thanks, Mark.

Good afternoon, Mark Manning with the Department of Finance.

I just wanted to elaborate on some of the things Nate mentioned, why this is strategically important for the finance department.

Uh he mentioned we're trying to transition to an online licensing model.

And uh basically the notarization requirement was a hurdle for us that we could not overcome so that we could add uh these to our licensing uh online licensing process.

I want to tell you briefly how we're doing that.

Uh, this is an initiative that our city treasurer Shayla Franklin took on about a year or so ago, and she's done a fantastic job about it.

Uh but I wanted to give you an update on some of the things she's done.

We will not probably put every single license online.

We have some licenses literally we have one applicant for, so we're probably not going to invest for one applicant.

But our strategy was to use our highest volume licenses and then to schedule them based on the highest probability of when those applications were due.

And that's gonna drive the schedule that I'm gonna show you.

By the way, our feedback has been very, very good.

Uh, we have had one person uh that gave us negative feedback, and that was simply because they were having challenges on the computer getting uh getting their computer, and Shayla uh helped that person uh fix their computer so they could access our site.

So that was the only feedback that we've had that was uh not uh uh positive.

We actually implemented tobacco licenses in November, and I gave you a kind of order of magnitude, approximately the number of applications we would expect in a normal year.

Uh tobacco licenses, I think all expire in December.

That's why we did that one in November.

Uh, you approved a licensing or a lodging license, I think uh last year that took effect on March 31st, so that's why we chose to do it next, uh, so that we could get everybody's initial application for the lodging establishment online.

Pools, of course, are pretty active during the summertime, so we wanted to get them taken care of.

Fireworks in the related transient merchant license that a lot of the fireworks vendors need.

Obviously, that's coming up with the 4th of July, so we prioritize them next.

And then finally, uh we have drinking establishments and entertainment establishments.

That one's pretty complicated.

We originally wanted to do that early, but uh for the timing reasons I noted we pushed it back to April.

Uh we will uh do short-term rentals in May based on your approval.

Uh, if you approve this today, uh, then we'll probably uh attack mobile food vendors, and finally we'll finish up with our round one of doing massage therapy businesses and massage therapists uh probably in June.

At that point, we'll reevaluate.

We will have knocked out most of the major licenses that we have.

Uh, we'll evaluate whether the cost benefit is there for the remaining licenses.

Uh but again, your approval of this today will help us in our effort to uh expand our online licensing effort.