City Council · 2020-10-27

conditions, and then it would just be a permitted use. So it kind of avoids the public— I guess not avoids the public process, but avoids a lot of the clamor that may come in front of a public forum type setting. That would just eliminate that option. And as long as they can comply with the requirements, then it would be permitted.

Yeah, I mean, my concern back then was you know, safety and, you know, the streets. But if you're taking off-street parking, I think, you know, you might find it hard to find, to be able to handle all the parking on site, so.

Yeah, yeah, the parking is going to be a pretty significant limitation to anything going forward in the future.

Mayor Pro Tem, this is Steve Earle. Can I make a comment to that? Yeah, please do. To answer that question. We generally like to eliminate all of the conditional use permits we can and make the uses either permitted or non-permitted. The reason for that is we found that over the years that conditional applications for conditional use permits have become fertile ground for lawsuits simply because oftentimes it gives the— I guess you might say the public or the city council the impression that you have more discretion than you actually do. And so with conditional use permits, courts have really said that the discretion is quite limited, but the public often thinks that you can do whatever you want, you can deny it for any reason. And so, you know, there becomes an expectation on the public that you might be able to deny something when legally you really can't. And so we've just found that it's just much easier for everyone involved if we just decide they're either permitted or they're not permitted. And, you know, if we want to make them permitted, we set up a number of standards that apply, as we've done here, and then we're just a lot safer legally at that point.

So this is Debbie, Terry. What Steve says makes a lot of sense. It seems like if they meet the qualifications, we shouldn't have to go through all the rigmarole.

It kind of, with that whole issue, it almost became a discrimination thing, and I want to certainly avoid that at all costs.

If they meet it, they can do it.

If they don't, they can't.

So I think that's a little neater and cleaner.

Mayor Pro Tem, can I ask a question?

Please.

Hey, Jason, so how would this apply to, say, a young mother who is watching, you know, has a daycare in her home and it's right there in their residence, or even a preschool?

They have different standards. So this does not apply to a person that has, you know, up to, I think, 12 or 8. children that come into their home. Those are under different standards. These are simply commercial standards, or commercial daycare that have to meet all these criteria. A daycare that's run by a, you know, a wife or a mother that stays home or whatever is under different requirements.

Okay, thank you.

So if that's it, we will bring it back, go through the Planning Commission and City Council, probably bring it back in December if that sounds okay to the council.

Okay, thank you. Any other questions or discussions? Okay, thank you, Jason.

Thank you.

Uh, I saw that Laura, uh, I think signed on to Zoom while we were talking. Uh, Laura and Chris, are you ready for the utility Capital improvement project funding discussion.

Yes, I am here and I apologize for my tardiness.

We're glad you're here.

Thank you. Chris, do you want to lead out with anything or do you want me to just launch into the presentation?

Yeah, I'll lead out. So Mayor and City Council, or Mayor Cortez and City Council, We've been considering other alternatives other than pay-as-you-go for the 2016 master plan projects. Back 5 years ago when we did this analysis with Bowen Collins and Associates as well as Lewis Young Roberts and Burningham, we determined that a master plan is really good, but a master plan that's on a shelf collecting dust isn't very helpful. And we realized back then the importance of creating a financial model, financial plan that would support the implementation of the master plans for sewer, water, and stormwater. So Louis Young Robertson Burningham performed that back 5 years ago. We were asked to look at a variety of options for funding. One was pay as you go. The extreme was to bond on the other end. And so we performed, I believe, 3 different models. And in the end, the council at the time decided that we wanted to do pay-as-you-go, which we have been implementing successfully. The rates have been supporting the plan to date. This last fiscal year, we did not, have an increase for water or for sewer, but we did our final increase for stormwater. And so stormwater had 5 years of rate increases, whereas water and sewer had 4, and there are 3 remaining. We have been asked by management and the city council to look at other options, which would include bonding, and to consider, well, what may happen to rates and also what may happen to the ability to construct these projects, perhaps in an accelerated fashion. So with that background, I'm going to turn the time over to Laura. We've been working with Laura on evaluating bonding options and other alternatives. So Laura, please, time is yours.

Great.

I'm going to attempt to share my screen and You'll have to let me know if you can— oh, someone's going to need to let me share my screen. It says screen— it says host disabled participant screen sharing. I don't know who the host is, or I'd ask really sweetly.

Steve, are you the host?

Okay, let's see. There we go. Yes, okay, all right. So I I have prepared what would be called a plethora of numbers over the weekend and worked on it again, tweaking it and whatnot, even as late as last night, and figured you didn't want to go through pages and pages of Excel spreadsheets. So I worked with my staff and your staff to try to boil it down to a fairly short presentation. I am happy, you know, with a minute or two to pull up the supporting data to walk you through Any of the detailed spreadsheets that you might want to see. And as we go along, you're more than welcome to ask questions, or you can wait until we get through it and ask questions and have a discussion at the end. So by way of introduction, just so that you're aware what the city has outstanding in terms of its utility system revenue bonds, you have 2— we have a total of 4 transactions. 2 of those pay off in 2026, one pays off in 2029, and one goes out to 2032, but it is a 0% state loan. It was put in place years ago when you did a very, very large water tank. Chris can give you more detail about that if you care to know. So those are all outstanding. Also, I think you're aware that the city's utility system has capital improvement plans in place, which just talked about, that have not to date been fully funded. So there's still projects that need to be accounted for and how we're going to pay for them.

Laura, do we have the amounts of these remaining debt somewhere?

Are you going to go over that?

I'm not, but I can get that information for you. Okay, so the— that'll take a little bit more time. There's not a— there's not a ton. Like, I know the state loan is only about $650,000. The other 3 I'll have to look up, but I can do that. So the city has, as Chris indicated, you've been, you know, with the pay-as-you-go ideal from several years ago, you've been saving up and you have significant balances for many of the projects that are identified on your capital improvement plan. We have taken those funds on hand, many of them into account. I'll talk about why I chose to use some and maybe not use all. But we can, you know, tweak that if you decide you want to move ahead with this. And then, you know, it's certainly wise to think of the fact that for multimillion-dollar multigenerational projects, it takes years to save up for those projects, and it can be perceived by your constituents to be unfair of, you know, you're building all of this into my water rates today, but I'm not going to be the beneficiary of that You know, bigger tank or better pressure or whatever it is that your systems, you know, as they get better, will provide. And so it's certainly not uncommon to look at longer-range, you know, large capital items to be done as financing. So that's what we're looking at here. So the construction building costs, again, this is a In a way, at its very basics, this slide kind of encompasses everything in, again, a very high-level way that you'll need to know, and we'll go through a deeper dive. But the construction graph that's here below on the left of your screen is from Bowen Collins. It was a presentation that I think they gave to the city in September of this year. I don't know if that was to the city council or just to certain people, so What it indicates is that in 2016, what would cost— what would have cost $95 of work in 2016 dollars costs $115 today. So that's about a 20% increase in 4 years, which is nearly— not quite, but very close to a 5% annual increase. And so that you know, I I did reach out and try to get some information from DFCM. I was meeting with Stuart Adams about a month and a half or so ago, and we just were at a dinner together and we got talking about, you know, Utah economy and how great things were going. And in the course of that conversation, he indicated that they're seeing at the state something like an 8% construction cost inflation right now. So, you know, 5% seems to be very defensible, and it's what we've— what I've used in this analysis. Nationally, if you look up construction cost indexes, they're a little bit below that. But again, as you know, we have a lot of very large construction projects going on in the state that are going to be going on for several years. And so I don't expect to see a reduction in that construction cost inflation locally anytime soon. So you, you know, keep that figure of if I'm going to pay for it over time, it's going to increase by 5% a year. And you compare that to the municipal bond index. The bond buyer produces a, a 25-year municipal bond index, and its 10-year average is 4.28%. You can see the graph on the, on the right that, you know, that's gone up and down, up and down. But now we were— We're not quite at the bottom part of the trough, but we are very close. close to that. And in running the debt service numbers, um, for proposed new issues that we'll discuss here in a moment, we have determined that in today's market, the true interest cost on Orem City's debt with your great rating would be probably about 2.8% for 25 years. So in its very simplest form, the question is Would you rather pay 3% over time, or would you rather pay 5% over time? I mean, all the numbers that I'll be showing you support the simple answer, which is, oh, I'd rather pay 3% over time. And so it kind of sums it up in one nice slide there for you with that in your, in your back pocket. So the project costs and the bonding considerations. We provided in a table below— Chris provided me a very detailed, you know, line item by line item by each utility, what year it was master planned for, etc., etc. This is my attempt to summarize that for your quick purview. We've got water sewer and storm sewer broken out, and then we've aggregated that. And it's worth noting that when we issue bonds, if you choose to go that route, that in order to keep the bonds tax-exempt, you have to have reasonable expectations of spending those bond proceeds within 3 years. Well, as indicated here in that second column, the master plan for some of these projects identified in each of these utilities goes beyond that 3 years. So due to that anticipated construction timeline, and I'm not saying that Chris and his team, you know, might want to, if you decide to do bonds, they might want to, you know, put some of that forward. You know, maybe they're in such a place they want to put 1 or 2 projects back. So it's just based on what I have here for, you know, illustration for this discussion that I assumed that we would issue 2 bonds, one in 2021. I'd have 3 years to spend those proceeds. We'd issue another bond in 2024. You'd have 3 years to spend those proceeds, which, you know, captures all but I think one very small, like $200,000 stormwater project. which I figured they could maybe squeeze into the 2027 timeframe. So the sizes and timing of actual bond issues will be finalized if you decide to proceed down this path based on that construction timing. The construction timing elements will be what will drive whether we make the first bond issue a little bit bigger or smaller or whatever. So for the 2024 transaction, the chart below shows the construction costs, the 2016 or 2017 is what was identified in your master plan. I went through the math and have a detailed chart I can show you with that to put all of those costs in 2021 dollars. That next to last bullet point though notes that, you know, we're— because we've broken this into 2 bonds, I've— everything that falls into the 2024 bond, I have, you know, continued to add construction inflation to the that, so that we've sought to capture that in the proposed 2024 bond issue. I have planned in these numbers to have the city use approximately $31 million that you've saved up in the utility funds to help pay for identified project by project by project specific uses for those funds. I had asked— oh, there we go. So you'll see that asterisk down there at the bottom of the chart. There are additional monies available in your fund balances. and from impact fees. I know that they're available. It's probably, you know, at least another $10 million. The impact fees do have to be used, I think, within 6 years of when they're collected. So the high likelihood is if we're funding with bonds projects that are in that impact fee study, we would pull that impact fee money in and further reduce the bond size. In regard to the fund balances, that becomes a bit of a balancing act because again, I'm trying to get you the highest rating possible. And one of the things that the rating agencies look at are your fund balances. In their ideal world, and it doesn't mean we can't get a good rating if it's not a full 365 days of cash on hand, but in their ideal world, their highest-rated credits have 365 days cash on hand. I've worked with, you know, several clients that have that much cash on hand for, say, No water and storm sewer, but not for that, not quite that much for sewer. And, you know, they're still okay. But that's kind of the platinum standard, if you will.

Mm-hmm.

And so even though I know, you know, Chris and Brandon and Jamie, Brandon and I will have a discussion about how much do we save in FunValve, or how much do we use. The reason that for this analysis I haven't used it all, I haven't used any of it. is because I want to make sure that we are cognizant of, of that element of needing to have some cash on hand and not, you know, dragging it clear down to, to zero, if you will. So know that if you choose to go down the bond path, we will further perfect that and decide, you know, how much of that to use. And, you know, may very likely use, you know, more of those funds and reduce the, the amount of the bonds.

So, Laura, if I could make a comment there.

Perfect.

We do have $30 million saved up as a result of the increased— increase in revenue rates. And then, like you suggested, it was around $8 to $9 million are in our fund balance that are available above and beyond what we have designated as 6-month operational fees or costs in the event we have an emergency in the city. We have conservatively, conservatively planned for being able to tap into that 6 months' worth of savings. So this is above and beyond that, that's that amount that's been designated for emergencies, just so you're aware. Regarding the impact fee balances, we have approximately $1.5 to $2 million worth of impact fee revenues that are ready to spend, but that Laura mentioned are needed to be used for this financial analysis. So she'll perfect that as we get into more greater level of detail.

Great.

Any—

and good time to pause. Any questions so far?

I assume the reason we're doing this analysis is the very reason you explained earlier, is that we've been collecting arguably $30 million that Chris talked about and more for projects that will last 30 and 40 years. And we're doing that as a current bill. And for some, this is a difficult thing to pay for the increased water and sewer. Any idea of what this would— this allow us to drop our rates, keep them the same? What would this do to us, Chris, if we implemented some or all of this?

Well, that's really what we're trying to drill down to, Tom. That's a great question. We have to date, as I expressed, $30 million on hand. The projects that we're targeting are not just 30-year projects. They're probably 50, 75, or 100-year projects, such as the water tank. We anticipate that lasting maybe 3-plus generations. I think that's where we're headed heading in this in this analysis, and that is what will this do to our rates? Can they be leveled out? Can they be lowered slightly? What what gives? What will we have to change in our plan? Can we accelerate construction in the name of saving some money as well by bonding? And if that's the case, then we're coming to you for your kind of counsel and direction regarding. How much is acceptable in the form of a revenue bond? Is $10 million, uh, is that, is that a small amount? Is $50 million too much? Is $70 million too much? We have the money in the backing to do this and get excellent rates to do it. The time is probably no better than right now to do what we're suggesting.

So, well, and Chris, I would bounce this right back to you. Can we reduce rates if we do this? I mean, you spend the time analyzing it. We're strategic at the top level. What's your recommendation?

Chris, can I jump in? And I know the question was asked of you, but we have talked to the city about updating your utility rates. And this is kind of a key question in figuring that out. Because as you can imagine, if again, a future slide will show that if you're going to try to pay for all of these improvements, which are on your master plan within the next 6 to 10 years, you're going to have to spend more than you've been spending. You're going to have to save more than you've been saving, and that will likely drive rates up. If you implement the bonds, and you can kind of see that from a coverage table that I'll show you in a minute, a debt service coverage table. If you implement the bond strategy, it appears at its surface that you would be able to lower rates. Now, you know, what that doesn't take into account are what are the capital projects beyond these 6 and 8 years? I mean, I don't know, there might be looming, you know, a new water treatment plant out there in 15 years or something that we have to start saving up for, right? So it appears from what I can see in, you know, this timeframe of, you know, the 6-ish years for these projects, it appears that you might be able to lower rates. But what ideally we need to do is get some direction. Yes, we like this idea, the concept of of looking at bond issue, then we will build that into the updated model and be able to answer that for you quite specifically.

So Laura, if I might add there too, we are in the middle of updating our master plans too. So we have a few different moving targets, not just these rates and so forth, but also the capital facility plans for water, sewer, and stormwater. Stormwater is one that we anticipate growing quite dramatically. Water and sewer and stormwater, none of them included the master planning changes on— along State Street in 2016. We do anticipate that there will be fairly significant capital improvement increases that will be needed as a result of that adopted plan by the City Council back in 2015 or '16 or whatever that was. And so there will be some changes and additions to that. With that said, there will likely be some deletions. For example, Vineyard may not be serviced directly by Orem in the future directly. We are working on a 3-party, 4-party agreement with Metro of Orem, Orem City, Central Utah Water, as well as Vineyard to provide and convey water via the Central Utah Water Project. which is not our project, but it will take the burden off of our capital facilities in water to the point where that could be reduced a certain amount as well. So there are a few moving targets here, Tom, that I'd like to be able to give you a definitive answer, but like Laura suggested, it appears that if there aren't any significant changes, that it could lower.

This is Jamie. Let me be a little more specific to Councilmember McDonald and others. Obviously, the way we layer in all of these projects into a future capital construction model are going to obviously drive fees, but it is at least my primary intent to work towards maintaining or decreasing these water rates over time.

And again, I think—

That's why the boss is paid the big bucks.

He can succinctly answer. Thank you.

So when I think you see the debt service coverage table, it will— it gives you a good sense, you know, again, the hope for what I'm going to call a probability that you'll be able to achieve that goal. Okay, so as stated before, in, in the current plan that's in front of us relative to your capital facilities plan and the timing of those transactions currently, they could be moved up. I plan to issue a bond in 2021 and the other one in 2024.

Oh.

Below, I've got the statistics relative to Those 2 bond issues. Again, if you try to add up the construction proceeds and tie that to the previous page, it's off because we— I mean, the numbers here are right, they're in 2024 dollars. The previous page, the projects for the 2024 bond in the previous pages were in 2021 dollars, and there's a reason for that. We'll show you here in a moment. So with that, the Series 2021 bonds, the The true interest cost estimated is about 2.2%, which is lower than I even stated, I think, one of the bullet points I had. Series 24, we got some updated information. The Series 24 to 2.774%. You can see there what the construction proceeds would be, our estimate for the cost of issuance, the original issue premium and discount. And I don't expect we would need a debt service reserve because, you know, you're strong.

metrics.

I don't believe we would need any capitalized interest because you're already collecting these revenues. It's not like you're waiting for an increase to come online so that you could afford it. So we don't have to build any kind of runway in with capitalized interest. So those are the metrics of the 2 bond issues. And you can see there, which are figures that will show up in the coverage table, of the average annual debt service for the 2021 bonds is about $1.7 million, a little over $2 million for the Series 2022.

Thank you.

2024. So here you might have to put on your reading glasses. There's a lot of data here, um, and this is me even trying to boil it down. What I have here, um, with, uh, Brandon's help, we have the look at the audit online. Brandon provided the preliminary unaudited numbers for 2020, and the revenues and expenses from 2020, we have grown at a inflation factor of 3%. I've grown both of them at 3%. And, you know, you could argue that that might be a little bit high for growth, probably closer to 2.7. But again, even if it's 2.7, the new debt has been added below. So you've got your revenues for each of the systems, interest fund earnings. I chose to Decrease the interest fund earnings. You can see by about 60% was my aim in 2021, because I'm assuming if you issue the bonds, you'll use your $30 million on the projects and you will have less to be invested. And so that's why I've taken that down. I'm not, I'm not suggesting that I can see the future and know that interest rates are going to plummet further. I just think your reserves aren't going to be there to invest.

Okay.

The operating expenses, again, from the rating agency's perspective, they care about the cash, you know, the coverage based on cash on hand. So they don't look at depreciation. So these expenses back out depreciation. And you end up with your net revenues. They're about, you know, a little bit more than halfway down. Then you've got the 4 bond issues you have outstanding, which I indicated. You can see the remaining—

5.

payments on that. Those are both principal and interest. And then you can see the proposed bonds that we have listed coming on in 2021 with that debt service of $1.7 million once we have a full year in the debt, and then about $2 million once we have a full year in the debt for the series 2024. As you can see, your coverage is, um, I would call it phenomenal. I, I have other clients who names I won't use, that struggle sometimes to have 1.25 coverage. And, you know, and are making sure they're maintaining that with their 1.25. 1.25 is what you are required to maintain pursuant to your outstanding bond issues. And it's kind of the, the minimum industry standard, you know, to get a good rating. Obviously, the higher coverage that you have, the, you know, the more the rating agencies like that. There's a point at which it's crazy because then it just means you have so much cash on hand that your citizens are wondering why, you know, their rates are where they are, why you're not giving them some reduction. So one thing to note here is that this particular coverage table shows sewer revenues, and your existing bonds do not have sewer projects in them, and so they only pledge— Water and storm sewer. So this coverage table looks, you know, a little bit more robust maybe than your other one would, but you're doing sewer projects, so we obviously would throw the sewer revenues in as coverage. So as you can see here, clearly you're well above that 1.25 coverage that's needed. And so it, you know, my note there in that third bullet point is you've got got that coverage, you've got the capacity to issue debt, certainly without the need to raise rates. But your coverage is so great, it does argue, you know, that there's— it appears that there is a probability you could lower rates. Again, the thing that will— that could change that are what other, you know, things are going to get identified in that capital facilities plan, because what you don't want to do is, you know, lower rates in 2021 and have to come back and raise them again in 2024. I mean, that would be silly, right? So we want to take a longer look at that and make sure that, you know, we can achieve that. But as Jamie indicated, it looks pretty clear that we'll be able to at least maintain your rates and possibly lower them.

So, Laura, if I can also interject here, the 3% inflation rate that you've proposed here is consistent with the 2016 financial plan as well for sewer, water, and storm. We had the inflationary rate increase tied to that model, and that was adopted back then as well.

Great.

That, and which is, it's not the same as a rate increase necessarily. This is an inflationary increase to cover inflationary cost increases, which exceed that, as we've shown.

All right, um, that calls to mind— I do have some clients, so that you are aware, that adopt their rate schedules so that their rates automatically adjust every— I mean, they have to hold a public hearing or whatever, but that, you know, for 5 years at a time, their rate—

Oh yeah.

Based on inflation. I'm not saying you need to do that or don't need to do that. I'm just saying that some Some local governments choose to do that.

Oh.

They have an inflationary increase and then they come back every once in a while and add, you know, something above that inflationary increase. But just an FYI. Okay, I've put in this slide that compares your utility fees. It says utility fees and tax rate comparisons. I pulled this in from another presentation. I didn't bring in the tax rate sheet because I don't think it's important to this particular discussion, but I thought your utility bill— utility bills were important to the discussion. As you can see, you're right there in the middle, if you will, relative to stormwater and sewer. Your water rates are low compared to, you know, your— the comparable cities that are here. I'm not saying that that is the reason, you know, the end-all and be-all of raising your water rates. It just gives you some sense that it's always good to have information in your hip pocket that people complain to you about their rates, that they're not so bad off. Maybe, you know, maybe they'd rather live in West Jordan if they don't like your rates. I'm just joking. Okay, so with all of that data, I have a very, very large spreadsheet that compares year by year by year of If you're trying to save up and do pay as you go versus, you know, go ahead and do the bond. And the best way I could think to, you know, bring that to one presentation sheet was just to, you know, pull from that big spreadsheet, you know, some of the kind of some sample years, if you will, of what do things look like in 10 years from now, 20 years, and 25 years from now. So if I utilize the assumption that the city is going to keep putting in, you've been spending that in that top, you know, list of estimated construction costs, initial funds available, that line that's bolded, you've been spending about $6.5 million a year on capital improvements. If you keep spending $6.5 million on capital improvements, and I've got the $94 million in in the construction costs that have been identified in 2021 dollars, less the initial funds available, that $30,980,000, that means you still got $63 million to fund your construction projects. We talked about using the 5% construction inflation and where that came from. If you keep putting in $6.5 million a year, then this is what this amount, analysis on this page shows. I went ahead and updated the interest earnings because as you're accumulating those monies, obviously they're going to earn interest. I used yesterday's— or from the 26th, yeah— the Treasury rates for the first 5 years. I've used the 5-year Treasury. In 10 years, 6 to 10 years, I use a 10-year Treasury. So it's my best, you know, approximation of what those funds might earn over time. But I do try to take those things into account. So if you keep setting aside $6.5 million to try to catch up to being able to fund the $63 million in today's dollars, you know, with those metrics, 5% construction cost inflation, and, you know, the interest earning assumptions that I've used, you will save and save and save and save, and you do make a dent in it. But in 25 years, when again, from the bond scenario, the bonds will be paid off, your project's done, bonds will be paid off. If you're trying to save up and only spend $6.5 million a year, at the end of 25 years, you will still not have funded $22.5 million of those $63 million in projects. And I didn't ask Chris this question, but I'm willing to bet that over 25 years you have more that's going to be added to that in terms of needs. So it's, it's a pretty clear snapshot of what, you know, pay-as-you-go looks like. So then I asked myself the question, okay, well, what if, what if they said, okay, in that same timeframe, instead of spending the $6.5 million, we wanted to spend, you know, whatever it took to, to do those projects in 25 years? So in order to do that, again, the snapshot of, you know, what it looks like in years 10, 20, and 25, and I have it year by year by year if you care to see that. But you would need to set aside about $7.3 million in, in construction proceeds in order to have that completed in the same timeframe, again compared to about $3.8 million in debt over that same time. And that's because you just can't get far enough ahead in terms of your interest earnings to, you know, to start to overcome that construction inflation. I did, you know, for kicks and giggles, as they say, I did look at what it would take for you to set aside per year if you wanted those projects done in 10 years. It would cost you almost $10 million a year. And if you wanted to complete them in 6 years, it would be about $14 million a year. So again, Tom, maybe this gets, you know, it's a good point for your thought about rates of, you know, we can leave rates the same and maybe lower them if we bond and have bond costs of about $3.8 million once both the issues are in place. Leave them the same or lower them, or if you want your projects done, you know, truly on pay-as-you-go and you want them done in 6 years, you're going to have to figure out how to raise rates to make that, you know, $3.8 million, $14 million, or the $6.5 million. You've been spending about $6.5 million, so you'd have to more than double that. So it gives you a pretty clear indication of what, you know, again, that would put a lot of pressure on rates needing to go up. With that, then we'll get to my final thoughts and certainly my recommendation. I certainly understand the tendency to avoid debt. What is unique in this particular time— and it's not the only time I've seen this in my career, but certainly it's staring us right in the face today— is your current construction inflation is high enough and the interest rates are low enough that it really is prudent to go ahead and issue bonds rather than do pay-as-you-go, if it's your intent to fully fund the capital improvements that are necessary.

Thank you.

Quantitatively, again, I've got this on a spreadsheet if you want to see all the number crunching. Quantitatively, a present value analysis, and the analysis is this: if you spend $7.8 million a year, and I think it took about 22 years or something like that, if you spent $7.8 million a year for 22 years versus you're spending $3.8 million for 23 years, 5 years. If you do a net present value of both of those calculations, you save your residents in net present value dollars about $55 million in today's dollars in bonding at the low interest rates compared to trying to keep up with construction cost inflation. Now, construction cost inflation is not going to be a straight line always at 5%. Some years it's going to be 10, some it's going to be 2. But, you know, the idea is to give you a sense of, you know, with interest rates being as low as they are and construction inflation being what it is and is likely to be for the foreseeable future, it really does— it's a compelling financial argument to strongly consider issuing bonds. And with that, then we will take questions and then turn it over to Who would prefer to lead the discussion? I'm assuming Mayor Pro Tem.

Any questions?

Harry, I have more of a comment than a question. Um, you know, first of all, we've also seen construction costs go down, and so no one can really predict the future. But this is not, for me, a question of how much might interest rates go up or down by. For me, it's more of a question of of more evenly spreading the cost of the product over the 40 or 50 years. So to me, that's what resonates with me more than trying to be able to guess with any degree of accuracy what interest or construction costs are gonna be a decade down the road. But I think it holds water just to try to more evenly match cost and expenses with the of why our rates are low, low, and a lot we owe to our forefathers whose shoulders we stand on for good decisions they made. Uh, it has become a burden, and I'm sure many of you saw that as you've talked to, uh, to citizens, that for some the water and sewer rates, although they're competitive, are tough for them. So if this could alleviate some of that, that would be a good idea in my mind. Welcome, Mayor.

Hi, how are you? Sounds like a good discussion.

Well, Tom, I like, I like the concept of it holding water.

And, and I'd like to also echo Tom's comments. I, I think it is wise though, with the, um, with the construction costs as well as interest, it seems like it would be prudent to move forward with this, not only spreading across this, but just, just the numbers make sense to me. So I think it's got For me, it's, it's the, it's the numbers make sense, plus of course spreading it across generations.

So I don't know what you need from us, but I'm certainly in favor of moving forward with bonding.

So it— that would have to go forward with a vote, but I would like to say that I'm in favor of what is being presented as well. The cost of money is so low that to me it seems to make a lot of sense to to do it this way and to spread the burden out over a longer time period.

Mayor and City Council, this is Jamie. I don't think our intent today in bringing this forward is to request a decision of you. This is not a decision point discussion, but rather an update to suggest to you that we are following the path you requested in evaluating our utility rates. And in the course of that evaluation, we are updating our capital facility plans and our impact fees so that as we make these, I guess you could say, pointed fee adjustments, we are considering current-day circumstances and not relying upon reports and studies that are 4 or 5 years old. So when we bring these rate adjustments to you, they will be representative of where we are going rather than where we have been.

So Jamie and Council, I was just going to say, uh, in our City Center discussion, we talked— Laura brought up about interest rates, and interest rates in the last 24 months are down 40%. That is dramatic. Now that doesn't mean that 24 months from now we don't go back up 40%, but we're at— we are at such a low rate, I think that this deserves our attention to take a serious look at bonding because the cost of money is so low. Any other comments? Terry, I'll take it from here.

Okay, welcome back.

And thank you. I wore a tie so I could look like you, Mayor. You look great. You look great. I love the shirt too. Thank you. Any other comments or questions? All right, well, Laura, thank you, and we will keep working on this and take a look at it as a council.

Right.

Thank you all.

All right, thank you. So let's go ahead and—

we had the discussion on the commercial daycare.

Okay, we did it out of order, so we've had those first 2 discussions for Laura to show up.

Yes.

Okay, thank you for saying that. All right, so we'll go to our hub district zone amendments discussion and turn the time over to Jason Basham.

Thank you, Mayor, members of the council. As we get in to discuss this, let me pop up my screen here. So today we're talking briefly about the Hub District. We are looking at making some slight modifications to the district. Just want to go through and highlight. So this is the Hub District. This is down at the crossroads of University Parkway and State Street. As you know, the mall is on one corner, the Hub is on the other 3 corners where the In-N-Out and other places are located. We have had in the past a couple requests to look at modifying slightly the ordinance along the parkway, specifically for pad sites. We've had some shopping center owners ask us, because of the leases that they have in some of these major— from the major tenants, that they have stipulations in their leases that limit the height of these pad sites. And so in order to redevelop these pad sites, or look to the future to redevelop them. They have asked us to look at possibility of modifying to allow a 1-story pad site, keeping the existing ordinance in place for the existing shopping center if and when it redevelops. They don't have a problem, at least the ones I've talked to, don't have a problem meeting the 3-story minimums. What they do have an issue with, I guess, is being able to allow some redevelopment along the the corridor without having to renegotiate all the leases on some of these bigger tenants. So what we're proposing tonight is to, just as a brief discussion, we'll bring it back to the City Council for some formal action, is to create what we're calling an edge district. You can see the lighter pink color is about 200 feet from the back of sidewalk on both the north and south, on the west part of University Parkway, and then also on the east side on the south, some areas that we're going to call the Edge District that would allow some redevelopment and would allow developers, property owners to come in and redevelop and put a pad site there as long as they have retail uses. So the next slide indicates the retail uses. The majority of those that are, as you drive by that corridor, are going to be fast food, Or sit-down restaurants. There are some other— obviously there's an ice cream shop, there's some cell phone type, you know, things. So there are some other uses that are permitted. So as long as it's retail, and these are the uses that we're going to outline in the ordinance, allow them to redevelop with these uses. With that, there are some minor modifications. This, of course, changes the ordinance that allows that area to No height limit, so it does allow it to go to the one story. And as part of this, you recall the parkway was just widened, obviously with BRT, and it's very limited as far as the available space for parking. So we are proposing to change the space. Let me turn on my pointer so I can— The space here. So not between the building and the street, but other places. If somebody wants to put a parking lot right here, for example, right now they have to have a 20-foot setback. With the space limited along the parkway, we're proposing that that be a 6-foot landscape strip. So maintain the landscaping, require the sidewalk, and then put a minimum 6-foot landscape strip to separate the parking lot, the drive-through, or any of those types of things from the actual sidewalk. To allow them to take advantage of the parking they have currently along there. So that's another proposed change. And then a couple other minor housekeeping issues. J basically consolidates all the requirements that are currently on State Street and puts it in the hub district requirement. As you recall, Appendix TT, when the BRT came through, we actually created its own ordinance that Stipulated the landscaping along the parkway. Appendix TT is that landscaping requirement. So any redevelopment along the corridors simply would have to maintain Appendix TT and the requirements that are outlined in that. So it's just kind of adding that into the district. And then K outlines that if somebody wants to come in and build to the core standards, they're more than welcome to develop to the core standards in the edge zone if they choose to do that. But if they choose to develop to the EDGE standards, then all the development that they develop needs to meet those standards. We did hold a neighborhood meeting through Zoom last week. We had a couple of property owners on the call, but for the most part, there were only 2 people actually that showed up to that meeting. I did contact Carroll Square's owner this afternoon. This morning, excuse me. And he was more than willing to see these changes come forward because they are looking at doing a pad site next to the tower, their bell tower thing that they have right there. So they're looking at doing that in the near future as well. So I'd be glad to address any questions that you have concerning the proposed changes.

Any comments or questions?

Mayor, I'll make—

this is Terry— I'll make just one comment. I know that this is also an issue with some businesses along State Street. So where they wanted to expand the size of their business and they had to do the 3-story addition to do that. So will we consider that on some of these cases along State Street as well?

Yes, I think we will. Once we look at this district and how it performs, I think we will definitely look at that. And to be— or, you know, by the way, we are looking at modifications as we go. I mean, case-by-case basis that comes in, we will be looking at making some modifications as we move forward. The way that we can best facilitate redevelopment along State Street, we more than are willing to look at modifications.

All right, any other questions? Well, thank you, Jason, appreciate it. Um, go ahead and move on now to a discussion on our city retention schedule, and Jackie Lambert is going to lead that discussion. Jackie, we'll turn it over to you.

Okay, thank you, Mayor and Council. Um, can you hear me?

I assume.

Yep.

Okay, excellent. Um, okay, so then this is just the next session— uh, section, excuse me— of our ongoing approval for the overall retention schedule. Um, this is covering the Recorder's Office Division. So these are often longer-term and permanent records that it's attached in the packet and We're, we're nearing completion of going through this process, and we appreciate the time and everything our staff has put into this and for the council to review this with us. So I'm happy to take any questions, or you can also email me or Jody about this process.

So Jackie, just to refresh my memory, How and where are you retaining these records?

So we have 4 archive rooms within the City Center campus where we maintain our records.

And these are downstairs, is that correct?

Yes, the majority of them are in the basement. There is one on the main level in the courthouse building that has, um, many fewer records than other areas, but we are working toward Um, cleaning some of those up and getting some of our permanent records in a consolidated place, and then our more fluid records that are coming due, as they say, for destruction would be in another location. And especially as the city has moved toward paperless functionality, we're seeing fewer and fewer actual boxes of records. And, and so yeah, we've, we've been moving forward with this for about a year now, and, and we've seen some, some really good progress so far.

Okay, any questions or comments? All right, well, thank you, Jackie. Appreciate it.

Thank you.

We'll now move on to an update on the range fire, um, and I believe that we have Chief Mark Sanderson, Sean Hurst, and Chief Stevenson here to update us. Chief, we'll turn the time over to you.

I appreciate your time, Mayor and Council and staff. I just want to take an opportunity to just quickly brief you on this Range Fire, set the stage. October 17th, this fire originated at 11:56 in the morning. All 4 of our stations responded along with Provo, Pleasant Grove, American Fork, Utah County, Forest Service and DNR, which is the Division of Natural Resources. We had an acting BC, Captain Dunn, who served as our incident commander. Both—

or all—

Chief Earle, Chief Hurst, and Chief Myers, along with Emergency Manager Heath Stevenson, all responded that first day to lend support in setting the stages of what we hoped would be a simple fix that Obviously has led into a much longer-term event. Before I turn the time over to Shawn to give you the meat and potatoes of the incident, I just, I can't express enough the gratitude that I personally have in our leadership team, the experience and the commitment that each one of them bring to Orem Fire Department, not only day to day but over the last 10, 12 days in, in the working with this fire specifically. And so with that, um—

Chief, a question for you. Were you, uh, in town when that occurred, um, and were you out to the fire?

I was. I, I responded. I was actually Friday and Saturday, I was out on the Pony Express Trail. I just finished a 100-mile race And so no sleep for 48 hours. When the— I got— I just come around the corner in Eagle Mountain when the working fire notification went out. And I could see over the mountain. And I was just praying that the white smoke was the power plant. But the more I came around the corner and then noticed the white smoke on the mountain, I had enough time to get home, quickly shower, And then that first day, I only spent a few minutes up with the team at incident command because I was absolutely of no use with no sleep for 48 hours. And so that's where I truly appreciate our leadership team in stepping up where I really wasn't in any position to get involved.

Sure.

Okay, and then you came out to the fire and helped at that time.

Yeah, it was the following morning when we realized this was a much bigger incident and going to be a much bigger incident that we really regrouped and just made a plan. At that point, Chief Hurst was assigned the liaison as Orem City Fire rep because the thing that I learned, I should have known right off the chute, that we were ultimately in charge of this incident. It was interesting when the state stepped in Um, and really took over all of the operations. Um, it wasn't until a day or two in with some changes they were recommending and that— I mean, we were involved the entire time for sure, and Shawn even more, but they made it clear that this is Orange City Fire and how we want to see things run, how we want things released as far as media or press. They really looked to us, which that cooperation was amazing. And this is what these guys do every single day, not what we do every single day.

Sure.

This has been an eye-opening experience, I think, not only for our department, but just the continued work and training and effort that we need to make in our wildland program and just our urban interface with our own jurisdiction.

Sure.

Good.

And so if you don't mind, Sean can give you a quick rundown of, I mean, a day, step-by-step, day-by-day interaction. And then I believe Heath played an amazing role and he has some updates for you as well.

Great.

Yeah, you know, the younger, the skinnier, the better looking, they just run faster. It's unfortunate.

Great, go ahead.

Thank you.

No, I don't run 100-milers. Well, I'm gonna go ahead and share my screen. Will everybody let me know if they can, uh, they can see this?

Yes.

Okay, so like Chief said, uh, right around noon, uh, we were dispatched to this fire. We responded with all of our, all of our resources. plus a number of resources from our partners. This picture is at 1:52 PM. I just wanted to give you a perspective of the rate of growth of this fire. And you can't see any of them at this time, but there's actually helicopters already on scene on this fire. This is a— this type of fire is something we have created a game plan for over the years. We knew this was gonna happen again. The last occurrence of this scale was in '96, and so we had developed some kind of basically a pre-plan of how we're going to deal with this. So the initial IC was Acting Company Officer, or Acting Battalion Chief Dunn. He very quickly made a call for additional resources as well as aircraft to help us with this fire. I was called by dispatch at that point. I called the county fire warden And our wildland team specialist firefighter paramedic Mike Hickman responded in and helped with the command post. So this is roughly 2 hours into the incident. So this picture is Sunday at 5 o'clock. Just prior to this picture, roughly 3 hours prior, Was when, uh, really the state of alarm was at the highest for this incident. As you can see right in the middle of the screen above the smoke, you can see a helicopter bucket. That burnt hillside is what really triggered the alarm with the incident command team as well as the county resources. Just over that ridge to the right is Sundance. The initial thought was that that fire would not climb over that ridge that we see in the middle of the screen. Once it did that, that's what started triggering the alarms for Sundance, and they were put on a notice to prepare for evacuations at that time. And this right here is, like I said, 5 o'clock Sunday night. At this point, Sunday morning, we officially transitioned to what's called a Type 3 incident management team, and that's when Orem signed over as the authority having jurisdiction of the fire. What a Type 3 team means is at that point Orem resources, I was assigned as a liaison, we did have ambulance responsibilities as well as some fire engine responsibilities, but the bulk of the incident command structure was built out by county resources Forest Service and Division of Natural Resources teams at that point. So this slide will show you how fast this thing progressed. Currently we're on the 27th. Most of the growth of this fire occurred between the 10th, the 17th, and the 21st. So if you look at the green, we're at 14,000 or 1,437 acres. And that was at 7 o'clock the first night. That was the first 7 hours of the fire. So the next morning at 10:49, that had doubled once again to up to 11,000 acres. That is with 6 helicopters on it, 6 fixed-wing aircraft, and I believe at the end of the day of Saturday we had somewhere around 150 fire personnel from the western U.S. coming into this fire. Now the orange is on the 18th. At that point we start to see— that orange is that big bump I was talking about on that right-hand flank. That canyon is called Lost Canyon. That orange was what triggered the alarm for Sunnup, is that climbing up over that ridge and then coming down. And you can see most of the growth was done by 10/20. We only gained a few acres after this map was established. That red, the red layer, that last 47 acres, as we came into Wednesday, we were forecasted with what's called a red flag event, and those are extreme, predictive for extreme fire behavior. And so even though we did not have much fire activity past the 20th, We were preparing for the probability that that wind event could pull that red line up and over and into Sundance. So where we stand right now, this map has changed a little bit ever since this transitioned back to a smaller incident over the weekend. This map has changed a little bit. If you look at the Little Baldy area that is red, that is now black. The only area that hasn't been designated as contained is that red strip right above Nuns Park. So currently we sit at 93% contained and 7% of it is in what they call basically a management state. The terrain is limiting. We can't put personnel on that slope, and so that is going to remain at 7%. Until we have a weather event that can take out that last 7%. The storm we had over this weekend definitely did help, but what they deem as a season-ending event this time of year is about half an inch of rain. So once we see that, then you'll start to see that, to see that red go away. Where we stand right now is the fire is being managed by the Utah County Fire Warden, and it's not actively being fought. It's just being watched. Now, if conditions were to change, if we get into warmer weather, the fuels dry out from the rain and the snow, then that may change. But as of right now, it's just in a— we're just managing and watching how things progress. This next picture, this is from a helicopter right about the middle of the fire looking north toward Timpanogos. Shortly I'm going to hand it over to Heath and he's going to talk about where we go from here now that the fire is at its current status. Does anybody have any questions as far as suppression activities on this fire?

I'd just like to mention that I appreciate what the combined fire departments did and our fire department. The fire came within a block of my house and we could see We could see it right up on the ridge. It only had to come down another 150, 250 feet and it would have burned our neighborhood. So we're really thankful that they did such a great job.

And to speak to your neighborhood, Mayor, the quick actions by our initial IC to get the ball rolling on resources. The largest air tanker we had arrive on scene arrived just in time to do a long draw. Right down over your neighborhood. I mean, you probably see the drop. It goes almost from Little Baldy right down to the gun range.

So I watched him, I watched him do that. And when after the drop he flew over my house, and I think he was only 75 feet above the house with, uh, like a, an A1— an A250-120 Airbus tanker. It was huge.

Anyway, keep going.

Yeah, yeah, they're incredible pilots. If our initial incident commanders hadn't made the calls they made very early, I don't think we'd have had that kind of resource there before dark.

That's great.

Thank you.

Anybody else before I have Heath step in?

I have one question. I didn't see that any structures, homes were damaged. Is that accurate?

That is accurate. We did have one personal vehicle that was left in the fire area get damaged, but yeah, we did not have any homes. We did have some threatened that first night in northeastern Orem and in Provo Canyon, but we did not lose any structures.

Thank you, that's great news.

Now, Shawn, this is Jamie. From my understanding, we do have some water infrastructure that we're taking a closer look at to determine determine if in fact we need to replace or upgrade some of that equipment.

Yes, yeah, I should have mentioned that the water section, they were incredibly responsive. I think I was communicating with Clint or Quinn, I can't remember, until midnight that night trying to get map layers to the fire so they knew where our infrastructure was, what not to drive over, and what to attempt to But yeah, it did burn through a lot of our water infrastructure, and they are going to be working on some of those areas, the Alta Springs and above Tent Park.

Can I ask a quick question also? Thank you again for your great work. That was, if I recall right, the opening of the deer season. Were there any hunters that were up in that area that needed help getting out of there? That was, that was an initial concern, you know, knowing that there were probably people up on the mountain unaware of what was happening. And man, when that thing started spreading, it went quick.

Yes, so initially we called Utah County Search and Rescue. They sent up, I believe it was 5, 5 of their members on dirt bikes. And they rode the area above the fire looking for people. And then if you look at, well, it's kind of that the right slope coming up from the picture where those pines are, one of the helicopters ended up plucking 2 hunters off that point Saturday night that were trapped above the fire. Anything else before we pass it on to Heath?

I'll just make one comment about Sean. So I was watching— we were out of town watching television, and I'm proud of this guy. You know, sometimes you see representatives from different cities and they're not real articulate. Man, he stood up there and I go, this is one of our guys. Anyway, Sean did a great job answering questions from the press. Which I know is a little stressful. But anyway, thanks, Sean. We were proud to say he's our guy.

Thank you. Thanks, Captain O'Rourke. All right, well, I'm gonna go ahead and pass this on to Heath.

All right, thanks, Sean. If you just leave your picture up here on the screen, uh, that'd be great. So what this is, this big— the black part here with the burn scar Kind of the next step is there's always the worry after you have a big fire of the next— they call it the next 3 years. If you have any big storm events, water, those kind of things, then that kind of becomes a problematic area because all of your vegetation and everything that used to hold that water in those slides kind of up on the mountain, it's now an issue. So what— the next steps, that Type 3 Incident Management Team, before they ever left the scene, they brought in— it's called a BAER team, B-A-E-R, and it's a Burned Area Emergency Response. And so what that team does is essentially a group of specialists from all sorts of different fields— geology, hydrology, engineering, you know, pretty much all the big words that end in Y. They all get up there on the mountain and they'll go do tests. They'll test Start at one end of the fire, work all the way to the other end of the fire to see kind of how hot everything burned, how much damage was done throughout the area. And then based on the results of their tests, they'll reach out to the different jurisdictions that were involved. Where this one up the canyon, there was 3 or 4 different jurisdictions. And kind of just talk about what they have found, their findings. And then based on their situational assessments, they could come back to Orem, come back to us, and recommend different mitigation strategies, whether that's above the parks, whether that's above the city, or around that water infrastructure that Jamie had mentioned was up, up there. And then so based on their recommendations, and though, like I said, those have already started, We're just waiting to hear back the report from this bear team. Based on how big the damage is, how much the damage is of the land there in Orem, we then have different avenues that we can go down to get financial help from the federal government with our emergency watershed protection and other FEMA money that could be involved. And so we have a meeting tomorrow with some members from Public Works to discuss our water infrastructure up there and kind of just begin to go down that road because it is all time sensitive. Obviously, with the weather starting to change, we want to get as much in place as possible prior to any other big weather events that may take place any— at any moment. So that's just kind of the quick rundown rather than getting all bogged down in the woods. So if there's any questions, feel free to—

Heath, this is Jamie, and obviously you can speak to this, but what is kind of interesting is the footprint of this fire in many respects looks like the fire we had back in 1996. And so there is some potential predictability as to what we expect might be problems up on this up in this area, slide areas where we would or could anticipate the debris problems to, to result and such. So while there's nothing ever really good about a fire, there is a little bit of a silver lining in knowing that we've actually had a similar event in this very spot 25 years ago. And to some degree, we can use what we learned 25 years ago and apply it to this situation today.

Mayor, if I may.

Go ahead.

Thank you. Just, you know, most of the time you're happy to not be noticed by the public. You do your job and you don't need to be on the press, but I wanted to echo what Terry said. The way that we— not only you folks kept us informed, informed. But the whole— the way social media kept all the citizens informed as well as the TV, I, I— a lot of positive comments on that. Of course, you always get some negatives, but a lot of positive comments about how our team— maybe because Jamie was gone and wasn't there to muddle it up— but, uh, how the team reacted professionally, articulately, which Terry's already pointed out, but just gave me confidence. And I've always said I hope to never need a first responder, but the whole city needed a first responder that night. And thank you for your efforts.

Thank you.

Any other comments or questions?

Mayor, I just have one more comment.

This is Mark.

Sure. I really appreciated the leadership from Bren, working daily with him, keeping him in the loop. However, and also Jamie's, um, Zoom meetings and from his vacation keeping us accountable to making sure that we're doing and reporting what has turned out to be very good. I personally have worked with Hillary today in conjunction with Jamie's administrative assistant. In the future, I'm going to be planning my vacation according to Jamie's vacations. And so I can do that in confidence knowing that Shawn and Chief Earl are here, like Brent is, that we can miss these big incidents together.

Jamie's not getting any more vacations, Mark. You should know this.

Well, then we're going to have to have a discussion. That's not— that's all I got, but thank you very much.

Well, thank you to you and to Shawn and to Heath and everybody that worked on the fire. The thing that I was impressed most with was, as you can see the fire line there, the teams worked building fire lines very hard to protect structures, the water recycle water plant and the homes, the canyon, the roads. They just did an outstanding job in containing the fire. and pushing it up the hill. So it turned out very well that way.

So thank you.

Mayor, this is Jamie. Might I just add a couple of points? Obviously, when we have an incident like this, we are looking from an after-action perspective as to what can we learn from this type of incident. Sean and Heath are obviously, from a fire perspective, going to take this incident and build upon it as related to the fire department. We anticipate that this incident will result in a broad discussion about our range and the safety protocols and the policies that we have associated with the operations of the gun range and what we might do in the future to mitigate these kind of activities. The range is an important asset for our law enforcement personnel and allows them the opportunity to train and to meet necessary annual training requirements. And so for us to take some time and effort and improve that site in hopes of mitigating these kind of issues in the, in the future is important. I've already had a brief conversation with Chief Hurst about this, and Chief Adams is also involved and in the loop, and we will move forward and we will evaluate how to best make improvements at that range and in that general area so that we can continue to benefit from that facility while at the same time obviously mitigate any sort of future event that, that could result from use of that property and that facility.

Okay, any other comments? Thank you, Debbie. Go ahead.

Yeah, Jamie, do you have any more idea about costs and how much we'll be required to pay for this?

That's a, that's a good question. The last number that I saw, and Shane and Heath might provide a better update, the overall cost of managing this incident is about $2.8 million. We have a relationship with the state of Utah. It's a memorandum of understanding that commits us to do certain things on an annual basis. to maintain that wildland interface that we have between our community and state lands and the like. And in return for that, those costs of fire on state property are borne by, uh, the state of Utah. And so our financial responsibilities at this point are limited to the costs that we have incurred to have personnel on site and managing the incident on our property, and the costs associated with fighting the fire on state lands, those costs are borne by the State Division of Forestry and Fire and State Lands. Am I correct in that, Shawn and Heath?

Yeah, that's the original intent of the MOU, is to protect the cities from this type of event. I can't speak to how this event— how it relates to if we cause the event potentially, but the MOU is written should we have— say it leaves our city and goes on state lands, and that gives us the ability to have them incur those expenses.

Yes. So obviously we're going to be closely monitoring and having conversations with The state and with the Forest Service as to, obviously, the fire and moving forward there, I'm sure, will be a conversation as to the cost. But this is not something that was intentionally set, but rather an unfortunate accident, and not unlike other incidents that we've seen this year and in years past.

Thank you.

Okay, any other questions or comments? All right, well, thank you very much, Chief and Sean and Heath. We appreciate all you've done and are doing. Uh, let's go on to our next discussion, which is a discussion on the purchase of Hillcrest Elementary property, and Jamie Davidson is our presenter.

Thank you, Mayor. I'm just going to share, uh, Let's see, share my screen here.

Is that a skunk on your desk?

Yes, it is. It, it is, uh, today we're having kind of a week-long celebration, or essentially a week-long number of events in anticipation of Halloween, and this is a skunk pad that I received several years ago. And it also is one where we can raise the tail at the back of the hat.

That's pretty special.

Today was a hat contest, so I had to break out the scummy hat.

Okay.

But I want to share with you the, the screen that I have here up as related to Hillcrest and provide you an update as to how things are proceeding with our Hillcrest property. And, um, just a little bit about the details associated with our property sale: 9.33 acres. The, uh, the transaction also includes the assignment of 2 cell phone tower lease agreements that we have with cell phone companies. There is a cell tower located On the northwest corner of the property. The Alpine School District, the Board of Education unanimously approved a resolution of sale of the property to the city on October 13th. And finally, just want to remind you of the purchase price that we have for the property, set at $5.605 million. Since the conversation began with the school district and we agreed to terms, we actually began and initiated a series of reviews as part of our due diligence period associated with the property. What you see on this slide is just a quick overview of the work that we have done to this point in relation to the property, everything from a Phase 1 environmental that has been completed To visual inspection of the property. We had representatives of our Development Services Department, including our chief building official and our facilities manager, walk through the facility and identify particular concerns. They did report back and noted that the facility is in relatively good shape. Obviously it is— certain portions of the building are 65 years old, so It is an older building. We also spent some time and reviewed a report that the school district completed back in 2013 relative to asbestos in the facility. And yes, as you might expect, we've identified asbestos in that facility, specifically in the flooring and on a number of fittings that are found in the mechanical areas. of the school. So we expect that if we were to do anything with that building, including the demolition of the building, we would need to mitigate the asbestos issues that we have in the building in advance of demolition. And we would expect and anticipate that that kind of work would probably take 3 or 4 weeks to complete. We've also taken time to review the seismic evaluation that the school district completed back in 2006, where it specifically identified 4 sections of the building and categorized each of those sections as, you know, very poor, poor, good, or fair in relation to seismic strength and sustainability. As you might expect, the latest addition that was constructed in 2004 provides the best seismic performance rating. All of the other sections of the building are either fair, in fair condition, or in poor or very poor condition as related to earthquake concerns. Kind of some outstanding issues to resolve in relation to the property.

The—

obviously there's the cost of the property and how we pay for the property. We were on a call earlier today with our finance staff as well as our city attorneys, and we believe that we have found a way to pay for these properties using RDA dollars that are tied specifically to the RDA area that includes Hillcrest Elementary. In addition, use of our park impact fee dollars and some reimbursements that are permitted for work that was completed by the general fund that can be reimbursed by the redevelopment agency of the city. So you recall we have a $5.6 million nut to crack between those dollars that I've identified as well as some outstanding dollars that we have previously set aside for economic development. We believe that we can meet that $5.6 million price tag and not have to dip into our capital project fund dollars that we have set aside for future projects. Just an additional note as it relates to future land use, the property is currently zoned R-1-7.5, so it's a single-family residential zone. However, the surrounding zones around the property are mixed-use or commercial-type zones. So, for example, you have what we call a C-1 zone that is traditionally set aside for non-retail-related commercial uses, C-2 properties which are tied to retail-type uses, and of course we have our PD-34 zone, which is the University Place zone that was created a number of years ago specifically For the campus of University Place. We have had much discussion about use of this property in the future for parks. As you well know, we do have an existing park on that property. However, it is one of the smallest— well, it is the smallest neighborhood park that we have in the city. But as we have anticipated a discussion about expanding that park space on that location, we have dug deeper into our Parks Master Plan that was completed back in 2017. And just a brief kind of overview of that Park Master Plan. The Park Master Plan identified 3 specific types of parks. In the city. Now, by parks, I'm not talking about any properties that are owned by other jurisdictions or agencies outside of the City of Orem. So I'm not talking about properties owned by the Alpine School District or properties owned by the LDS Church that are used for recreational purposes. I'm talking specifically about park properties owned by the city. In addition to that, I'm not talking about Sleepy Ridge Golf Course. which is owned by the city but classified differently than a park. And classification as to regional, neighborhood, or what we call mini parks are not necessarily based on acreage or the size of a park, but rather amenities that are found within a particular park. So for example, Geneva Park is only 3.8 acres, However, there are some unique amenities in Geneva Park, at Geneva Park, specifically our futsal courts, that make that park a regional draw for the entire city. Now we have obviously much larger parks like Palisade Park that serve as a regional draw too because of a splash pad, or Lakeside Sports Park because of the number of athletic fields. That we have. But size is not the sole classification for deeming a park to be regional in terms of benefit. Sharon Park is another example. That park is 5.2 acres, but because it has pickleball courts that make it unique within the city, it is classified also as a regional use. People will drive to this park and not necessarily just walk to this park to take advantage of these amenities. Another example of this is our skate park. It's less than 3 acres, but because of its specific unique use, people will drive to that park to use it. Now, the master plan initially identified a deficiency of park acreage in southeast Orem. That deficiency was primarily the result of Hillcrest Park not being owned by the city. So because it wasn't owned by the city, we didn't include that park as part of our inventory, and therefore we identified that part of the community as being deficient in terms of park space. The moment we own this area, this property, then that area is deemed part of our overall park master plan, and that acreage is included in the city's portfolio of park acreage, and that deficiency, for all intents and purposes, goes away. Just a quick reminder about all of our parks. You will see how they vary in size, everything from 54.3 acres with our Lakeside Sports Park All the way down to the skate park and the existing leased Hillcrest Park, which is 1.6 acres. I've identified in italics specific parks that have regional benefit and use, and as stated, they are not necessarily tied to a particular size, but rather amenities that are found in the park. And An additional, an additional kind of consideration that I want you to be mindful of is, as part of our master plan, we identified what we call a level of service, which essentially identifies the number of acres of park space that we have in the city divided by the city's population. Which gives us a level of service as related to parks within our community. And you can see that it is not the end-all calculation, but it is and serves as a starting point to compare ourselves with peers or to identify whether or not we are a park-focused community. And as you can see, as we compare to some of our peers, and this is not information that I have collected, this is information that comes directly out of our 2017 Parks Master Plan, you will see that we are a very park-rich community offering 2.8 acres per 1,000 residents versus Spanish Fork or St. George or Provo that has a much higher level of service. So they are not as park-rich as the City of Orem. Understanding that you wanted to take a portion of the— at least a portion of the acreage at Hillcrest Park and develop it into something greater and better, for the residents in that particular neighborhood and the city as a whole. Several weeks ago, I worked with our engineering staff in the development of some quantities that could help you understand some of the costs that might be associated with park development in the future. I know you can't obviously see that slide, so I took the liberty of breaking down some of what was included in that past table identifying some of the costs associated with park development. So for example, if you are looking to landscape and irrigate and sod an acre of a park in the City of Orem, you're looking at about a cost of about $67,000 per acre. For every restroom building that you build, it's about $250,000. For every parking stall you put in place, it's $3,300. Any concrete flatwork that we do, it's about $7 a square foot. So if we are to take, for example, a 3 or 4-acre park, let's say— and I actually think it's— I think it was greater than that. I think we included 7 acres. So if we wanted to include a 7-acre park on that property, and have it include 4 to 6 pickleball courts, a tennis court, one playground, one restroom, one pavilion, 60 to 70 parking stalls, we're looking at about $2 to $2.5 million to develop a park.

Jamie, just a quick question. There is a— it seems like a good functional restroom building On site as well as a nice pavilion on site.

Yeah, so, yeah, and so we would, we would obviously look to see if, for example, that infrastructure is appropriately positioned in whatever new design we come up with. And then we would also look to see if there are improvements that we need to make. For example, some of our restrooms may need to be improved. To meet ADA requirements. We may also wish, because we're expanding the size of the park, we may be looking to expand the size of the pavilion that is on property. But yes, we would, for example, look to try and benefit from, in the case of the restroom, existing sewer connections, existing water and power connections, so that we could minimize some of the cost of new park development. And then just finally, kind of going forward, what we are in the process of doing, and this is a conversation that I've only had with one or two of you, specifically with Councilmember Pedersen. Obviously, there's great energy and excitement associated with this property and what we might be able to do with this property. We have retained the services of Landmark Design, which is the landscape architecture firm that worked with us in our 2017 master plan to essentially develop a couple of park concepts for you to consider going forward. One of them is a 9-acre regionally significant park with the removal of Hillcrest Elementary School, and another one is a regionally significant park that includes joint use of the elementary school in conjunction with a bigger park. And by including the term regionally significant, we would expect that some of the amenities that would go in this park would be unique to this park in the city and would serve as a regional draw to residents from throughout the community to come to this specific park for use in the future. In addition to that, you're aware, and I know you've participated in a Zoom call with the private party that is interested in this park— excuse me, interested in the school and using it for a business purpose. That is still a conversation that I know several of you have had, and we continue to engage this private partner, uh, in those conversations. We also plan to bring to you the, the, uh, The financing of this park and how we will pay for this park on December 8th as part of your regularly scheduled City Council meeting. And per, obviously, your approval, we would expect to close on the purchase of this property by the end of December 2020. So those are the specific things I have to share with you in terms of where we are with the property and the project. But I also understand that you are wanting to have a conversation about the future of this property, and so I will now turn the time back to you, Mayor and Council, for that discussion.

All right, um, well, I want to bring up a couple of items just to start out. I think it's important to look at this park and say, is size the most important item, or are the amenities for a regional draw the most important, and to look at what the costs are. I know the party we're talking to has suggested they'd like to buy half the land, 4.5 acres, and if in fact we pay for the park through the RDA funds and the impact fees, could use that money for the amenities. I could see personally a splash pad, pickleball courts, fixing the tennis court back up, having some items like that that would be a regional draw. And I think at that particular point, we would have a beautiful park that would serve all of the city, not just Southeast Orem, and would be a real draw with the amenities that would be there. Those are my thoughts. I'd like to hear what the rest of the council has to say.

So, Mayor, this is Terry. I have, you know, several items I want to cover, so should I let other people speak first, or should I just go ahead and jump in?

Uh, well, let's see if anybody else wants to say anything first, and then if not— Brent, are you awake there?

Okay.

Do you see me?

I thought I could see you. Maybe that's what the Maybe that's, uh, I'm sorry, that's Dave.

Oh well, I know Dave's asleep. Anyway, on your— I've had trouble with my computer here, but anyway, what you just talked about, does that include the third party coming in on Hillcrest?

That would, yes.

Okay, I wasn't sure on that.

They would buy the buildings, we would not Demolish the buildings. We would not remediate the buildings. Any improvements and remediation would be to their expense, so we would not suffer any of those costs. And, and they would take half of the land and the building, and we would take the other half. So we would end up with a 4.5-acre park area.

Okay, thank you.

Dave, you want to mention anything?

Sure.

Um, I was not sleeping.

Okay, so, uh, so we—

I had a Zoom call with Railroad, um, with Terry and Jeff, and, uh, I'm meeting with them tomorrow, uh, to go to see their building. I guess in Provo. Um, you know, I, I, uh, I like the idea of a full park. But I also want to look at, um, you know, with that building, if you carve out really 4.5 acres, you know, what, what can you put in there with parking and everything? Well, how would it look, um, for the citizens of Warman? How— and then how much money we would get for the building to help offset, maybe pay for the park. So I think there's a couple different moving, moving, uh, items that, you know, I want to look at and go from there. But I like the idea of a full park.

At 9 acres.

And I also want to look at the other side of them buying the building and then what that cost is.

One thing I should mention is if they were to purchase the building, we would have to surplus it as a council, and then Jamie would have to put it out, and we put it out for sale on an RFP, and whoever brings in the highest price, uh, would be the one who would purchase the The park. There would be no guarantees, there would be no underwriting, there would be no special dealings going on. It strictly comes out as an RFP.

Yes, Tom?

Highest price within the zoning that we would approve. So we're, we're not opening the zoning map.

We would still—

We're not changing the zoning, no.

So if David's done, I'll share a couple of my thoughts.

I'm good.

Go ahead, Tom.

Mayor, this is Jamie. If in fact we were to move forward with a hybrid property use, meaning that third party were to come in, we would have to have a zone change.

Yeah, but again, it's a limited zone change. We wouldn't limit it, we wouldn't zone it for any high density.

No, no, correct, correct.

So my thoughts are, I too am in favor of a park there. How big it is, I don't know. Sometimes when we talk to city things, uh, we're like a child at Christmas. Well, of course I want a full park, and of course I want a splash pad, and of course I want this, that, or the other thing. But until we figure out what these will cost and what the layout can look like without the building there, just in full 9 acres or whatever part we need to carve out, I really— I was hoping we'd see a layout in a future meeting, Jamie. I wasn't expecting it tonight. But a layout of what that park will look at, because A, I'm not willing to spend like a child at Christmas without any understanding of what the costs are, but B, I also need to see the layout. So we can't get a new bike and a new train set and a new whatever. Let's see if we can afford a full park, what the layout would look like, and then let's see what the layout would look like at something less than that. And I, I don't have that yet. I have talked to several of the people in that area. One of the ones I think sent an email to all of us was Steve Schallenberger, and he said, oh, I didn't know there was another option. Of course you need to consider the options. So I want to consider the options, and we don't have those yet, but we will at a future time. So as for whatever date in December we need to buy the land, absolutely. I think Terry and I had talked about let's get a citizens committee to kind of study out what the park would look like, etc. So we We only have one chance to do this right, and I don't want to— I don't want to bankrupt us, and I don't want to shortchange us. So I'm gonna— I'm, I'm very open to consider both reasonably thought-out options when we have them.

Okay, thanks, Tom. Anyone else want to make a comment? Debbie, go ahead.

I'm similar to, um, Tom. I'd like to see a full 9-acre build-out, what that would look like, as well as leaving the building intact and what that would look So for me, it looks like 2 things.

I know there were a few houses.

I don't know what that would cost to demolish or buy those homes and kind of square that up. But I'd like to see the 2 options myself. And I like the idea of regional significance, giving some unique factors there. I think that engaging the citizens community would be great along with the architects. Thank you.

I think we've done a good job with some of our other parks, futsal courts, Altogether Playground, of engaging people.

So I think I like that idea.

You know, as you bring it up, as you and Tom talk about it, if you remember when we started out with the pickleball courts and we were looking at 3 different parks to put them in, the community park, we were looking at Cascade, we were looking at Bonneville. And, you know, I requested that we go around and talk to the neighbors. And if you remember, every neighbor in all 3 parks said, uh, absolutely not as far as the dog park. And when we went to Sharon Park for the pickleball courts, they said don't put it in the middle of the field, which is where we were planning on. Put it over in the drug-infested weeds on the left south corner, and that would work out really well. Both parks ended up coming out really well, but I think because— a lot because we involved the citizens and asked their comments who lived in that area. So I would really encourage that we do the same thing here, that we involve the citizens that live in that area to find out their opinions. Jeff, did you want to make a comment?

I did, yeah, thank you. And that, that was the thing that I wanted to emphasize, is I think it would be very important to have the citizens' input, the people that actually live in that area, to see what they would like to see happen there. My initial reaction is that, you know, I'd love to see that whole thing grass and trees, uh, and all of the, you know, all of the great amenities. But I guess, Tom, I'm like a kid at Christmas. So, uh, but I, I agree also that we need to look at the feasibility of it all, that we not, you know, overextend ourselves. And I think it would be— I would be excited to see— Jamie, I think one of your slides said kind of a comparison of all the options and what that actually means. And I'm just— I'm so excited about this park. And I agree, we, you know, we got one shot to do it right. Let's make sure we do that.

Okay, uh, any other comments?

Mayor?

Yes, I do.

Let me, let me just— a couple of questions. Uh, with the third party, I, I think it'd be important on that, uh, design or whatever we're doing there, uh, to get a traffic study included in that. Uh, I'm afraid if it goes to a third party, there might be overwhelming traffic in that area. And I'm sure, Jamie, is that included in your options? That would be part of what we would require as part of a rezone. We would require a traffic analysis. But, but what you're giving to us the 8th, will that have any traffic pattern? Or what we're— I just You're giving us some options.

The 8th?

Yeah. Is that what I understood?

Would that have a traffic study in it? Will not, no.

Okay.

Another question on the third party. If we have to put that out to bid, um, could that go south on us? No, I, I mean, I, I think you as a, you as a council would determine the uses. So if we are to surplus that We could be quite pointed in what you as a council would expect from whoever we were to partner with in using that property. So I think you can control it to the point where you can be very specific about what you expect uses to be on that property. Okay, thank you.

Okay, thanks, Brent. Yeah, thank you.

Terry?

Yes, as you know, this is something I'm very passionate about, and I just wanted to go over some, uh, a few thoughts. Um, first of all, green space right now I think is so critical. Uh, uh, Jamie showed us the slides, but we, you know, we have— we're a little distorted. We've got some huge parks, and then we have parks next to a lot of elementary schools, but I think the city has done a great job with parks in the past. I think we have beautiful parks in our city. There's so much political tension, pandemics, everything else going on right now, and people need a place to clear their heads. That location, I believe, would be a destination park. That the intersection— Jamie, you can correct me— that used to be one of the busiest intersections in the state of Utah on State Street and University Parkway.

It's the second busiest in the state.

Thank you. Second busiest in the state. And, you know, talk about real estate location, location, location. That would be amazing to have a park right there. You've got, you've got 2 different major bus lines that stop right across from the park. You have students going back and forth between Orem and Provo. Not just students, but a lot of people using that bus. What a great spot that would be to have that park right across the street from where they're going. And our demographics have changed. The mayor brought this up a few discussions ago about this area. Since in the last few years, after the next building is built over at the mall, there will be 1,000 units between Ashton, Devon, and the other facilities. built. That's 1,000 units. Some are 2 bedrooms, some are 3 bedrooms. So we've added about 2,000, 2,500 people that live in that area. In addition to that, Vasa, which is right across the street from the park, is one of the most successful franchises in Vasa history. I walked through the parking lot the other day, 450 cars. 450 cars. This was last night. parked at VASA. And I talked to some of the people walking in and out and said, what would be your feelings about a, you know, pickleball courts and splash pad and different things? And, you know, everyone of course is really supportive. So I just think that we— and Tom is right, we have one chance to do this right. Why would we not? And where it's the center of town, town, take advantage of the mall. You know, people could go to the mall, grab a sandwich. We've got so many places to get food. Go over to the park with your kids, go to the splash pad. Some of this takes space. I also talked to the people that run the Orem Rehab Center, which is just west of the park. 75 residents, 104 employees. And I, um, see if I can do this without getting emotional. I asked the man who, who is one of the directors of that, what would happen if there was a park next door to your facility? And in fact, Jamie and I talked about, you know, something for older people too that I thought was a great idea. But I asked him, what would that do to your park? And he said that would be— I mean, excuse me, for your facility. He said it'd be fantastic. He said, uh, it's a short-term slash long-term facility. So some people are there just for physical therapy and then they're leaving. Other people will be long-term residents. And to have a place where they could walk around the park, maybe there was a pond with a fountain, I mean, different things like that would be incredible for their facility. And he was just so grateful. He said, would we maybe be able to do some of our physical therapy in the park? I said, sure you would, it's a public park. I mean, so that would be directly on the west side of it. What it would do to the neighborhood, what it would do to existing businesses. One of the biggest law firms in our city, Dexter and Dexter, is right next to the park. They would be adjoining the park. Squire and Company, one of the biggest CPA firms in the valley, is right— you know, you get the point. There's so many businesses, and taking advantage of the mall and making this a destination, people driving down from Heber to go to Costco, run over to the park with your kids for an hour. So they're asking questions about the neighborhood. There is a— there are several petitions that have been going around. The house, one of those 2 houses that you're asking about, Debbie, they've been passing out petitions trying to request a park. And in the petition, it talks about a splash pad, pickleball courts, and other things. So I might— I hear there's around 500 people that have signed that so far. And because there's nothing— there's not a pickleball court south of Center Street. And this is not what, you know, you don't do that with 3 or 4 acres. We need to take advantage of the whole thing. One comment about Red Road. I don't, you know, bless them. I hope they're very successful. I drove— I was curious about, because they talk about shared parking, you know, if they ended up being somebody that bought that building. I drove around their building today at 12:45. There was over 100 cars on the west, north, and east— west, excuse me, north, south, and west side. There was over 100 cars parked in their facility. Anyway, just a comment. But I just think that the key is location, location, location. And if we have the amenities, people will come from all over.

Thank you.

And what a great— there's not a better central location. It's like putting Central Park in the middle of New York or Hyde Park in London. What a great thing that is for those cities to have a park in the middle of their business district. So I plead with everybody to consider, let's don't shortchange the city. We'll never get another chance to have a 9-acre park in the center of everything going on in our city.

Thank you.

So, um, but, and thanks for all the comments. So, you know, I think we all, we all want a park. It's just working through this, and it sounds like we have the money. We're not broke. We do have the money. But anyway, um, all right.

Appreciate it, Terry. Any other comments? All right, well, let's go ahead and move on to a review of our agenda. And Debbie Larray is going to be giving us our prayer and our pledge, and then we're going to have a report from the Recreation Advisory Committee. Then we'll have personal appearances, and then we have our consent items. The first one is the approval of the City Council meeting minutes of October 13th, 2020. The next is appointments to boards and commissions. So we have 2 being appointed to the CDBG Advisory Commission, Eileen Black and Ashley Gill. Any of you know those 2 individuals?

No.

And I read their resumes, uh, look like they're really interested in the City of Orem. I think they would be good choices. For the Orem Neighborhood Advisory Commission, Margaret Black, who we know, Reed Farnsworth, who's been around. Any comments there?

Both excellent choices.

Yeah, I can recommend them both.

Okay, so is everyone okay with those 4, uh, committee assignments?

Yes.

Okay.

Great. How many more positions do we need to fill? Okay, so item point three is a resolution to approve certain sections of the Orange City Manager's. Department retention schedule. The last one is a staff appointment, uh, our— to appoint our new police chief, Chief Josh Adams. And typically when we make a department, uh, hire like this, then the council needs to give us advice and consent. And I need to know if you're all okay with the appointment of Uh, Josh Adams is our new police chief?

Much more than okay.

Okay, anyone not in favor of that? All right, and when we're through, uh, with our scheduled items, uh, then, uh, our deputy city recorder will go ahead and administer the oath of office.

Um, Mayor, That will, that will actually be Jody, the city recorder, doing it because I believe Chief Adams will be in the council chambers.

Right.

And Jody will also be there.

So. Right.

Okay. So, uh, Jamie, uh, just so you're aware, so we're together on this, uh, once we have the consent items, I will ask for a vote of approval on that, and then afterwards Turn the time over to Jody. Did you want some time with you first, or—

Yes, if I just may introduce Josh.

That's fine.

Uh, and then I'll turn the time over to Jody, please. Okay, great.

Uh, then on our scheduled items, we have a public hearing, uh, on the CDBG CARES Act additional funding. And basically what we're looking at is adopting the recommendations of the CDBG Advisory Commission on some of the use of that money and to approve a substantial amendment to the 2019-2020 Annual Action Plan. And Ken O will be there and Ken Ransom will be there. And then, Jamie, do you have any comments you wish to make?

Yeah, I just have a couple of items, Mayor and City Council. We are fast approaching the end of our Library Hall project. I'm happy to report that by the 10th of November, which is the date we have scheduled for ribbon cutting on the facility, we will be substantially complete on the facility. Now, I qualify that completion as being substantial because there will be a number of outstanding things we'll need to take care of, but we look forward to recognizing completion of that facility with a small in-person gathering outside the, uh, the south doors of this new facility, and then we will invite all of you to participate in that in person if you are comfortable. If you are not comfortable, we will be live streaming the event. And then thereafter, we will be happy to take on a socially distanced tour people through the facility to show them what we have constructed. Obviously, this is a unique time. We didn't anticipate that we would build a facility and then lock the doors thereafter based on our current COVID situation. But that's the world that we're in, and we want to obviously give you an opportunity to see the facility. And to celebrate its completion while at the same time being sensitive to our COVID concerns. In addition to that, as related to COVID-19, you're well aware of rising case counts and the challenges that we are experiencing throughout the state associated with the pandemic. We remain in a categorized high transmission area here within the state. And last week we made some decisions here internally where we are going to, to a greater degree than we have in recent months, encourage our staff to engage more in remote work type activities similar to the efforts we had underway at the beginning of the pandemic. So while we plan to keep our doors open, We are looking at staggered shifts. We're looking at certain groups of employees being on-site while others work remotely if possible so that we can minimize face-to-face interaction and we can do our part to flatten the curve. There are obviously a number of functions we have in the city where we can't appropriately work from home, i.e., our public works employees, Our public safety employees. Given those particular situations, we are going to continue to require masks, social distancing. We're going to limit in-person meetings and interactions to the degree possible. But I just wanted you to be aware and mindful of the fact that you are going to see fewer people in the city center and in some of our city buildings. based on this current pandemic, pandemic situation and desire on our part to do what we can to maintain and reduce case counts in Orem. And finally, I just wanted to let you know we were advised earlier this afternoon that Dr. Shane Farnsworth, who has been serving as an assistant superintendent in the Alpine School District, has been appointed As the new superintendent of the school district beginning July 1st, 2021, replacing Superintendent Sam Jarman. We have had a great relationship with Dr. Farnsworth. He has been a wonderful partner in working through everything from the, you know, the day-to-day kind of interactions we have with the school district and school operations throughout the city. But most recently, he is the one who has been working with us with our fitness center and those negotiations tied to the interactivity between Mountain View High School and the Orem Fitness Center. And we're delighted to congratulate him. I wanted to make you aware of that appointment.

Is Sam retiring?

Yes, he is. And we will be sure to send our well wishes to Dr. Farnsworth in the near future. And finally, just want to wish a happy birthday, best wishes to Councilmember McDonald, who had a birthday last week, and Councilmember Sumner, who has a birthday next week. While we're not able to enjoy treats together, They're still both worthy of recognition, and we wish them a wonderful another annual ride around the sun here this next year.

Thank you.

And we will hold off from singing happy birthday, but happy birthday to you all.

That's the best gift you could give us. And that's all I have here.

Thank you.

Jamie?

Yes. I was just wondering, is our fitness center, the one at the senior center, Is that open or closed? It is open, subject to some very limited, uh, well, subject to restrictions in terms of how many people can be in the facility and use of the facility. And Debbie, I think, is on the line.

Yes, I'm here.

Can you speak to what's going on there, Debbie?

Sure.

We just have the same restrictions that most people have as far as, or most businesses have as far as requiring masks as you enter and leave. We don't require them while they're working out. We've been able to offer some of our aerobics classes and other classes, just we've had to limit the numbers so that we can properly space participants. And most of the equipment that we brought over, because there's so few, We're not having to limit the number of people that come in. The equipment itself kind of limits the number of people that come, and so we are open, but it's a very small-scale operation.

Do you need to make appointments?

No, you do not.

So if you have too many, do you turn them away?

If we got to the point where we had too many, we would probably start In the children's area, is that still the case? That is correct. And, and we do not take appointments there either. You were open for business The leisure pool is not open until, I believe, 3 in the afternoon when we have enough guards and kids are out of school.

Thank you.

Is the hot tub operational? It is. That's very limited in numbers. You can have people on one end, on either end. So if you're from the same family, a couple people on one side and a couple on the other. If different households, then only 2 people socially distanced. Thank you.

I remember the days when we packed 15, 18 people in there.

Well, we might get back to that, but right now we're limited.

Okay, thank you.

Uh-huh.

All right, if no further comments, let's go ahead and adjourn the meeting, and we'll start our general City Council session at 6 o'clock. Thank you.

Thank you.

Hey, Mayor. Yes, walked in the door, so I think I'll have him do the pledge and I'll, and I'll do the prayer. I don't know which one's first.

So, uh, God before country.

Okay, so I'll pray, I'll pray first. Okay.

So you're gonna pray?

I'll pray and Jim will do the pledge.

Okay.

Do we need to get a flag? We can find one, or do we just say it?

No, we're okay.

All right, thank you.

You bet.

Sure, what do you want me to say?

Hey.

Good. So this is Mayor Brunst, and I would like to read a statement prior to starting our City Council meeting on December the 20th— I'm sorry, on October the 27th, 2020. This is a notice of an all-electronic meeting and opportunity for public participation pursuant to Mayor Richard F. Brunst's proclamation dated October the 5th, 2020. The Orem City Council meeting on October 27th, 2020 will be an all-electronic meeting. There will be no anchor location for the meeting. The city cannot ensure the recommended minimum of 6 feet of social distancing for meeting participants at the usual anchor location at the Orem City Council Chambers. Therefore, holding the meeting at the City Council Chambers would present a substantial risk to the health and the safety of those who may be present at the meetings and may contribute to the spread of COVID-19. There will be no public access to the Orem City Council chambers. Those desiring to view or participate in the meeting must do so electronically. To view the meeting, please go to orem.org/meetings. To make a comment, please submit your comment Through orem.org/comments or citycouncilpubliccomments@orem.org. Comments will be accepted before and during the meeting. All comments received will be entered into the records and forwarded to each city council member for review. Comments will also be read aloud during the live meeting when required by law or when time permits. Once an item has been voted on, that item will be closed to additional comments. Thank you for your cooperation during these challenging times. I would now like to call the meeting to order, and we've asked Debbie Luray to give the opening prayer and her husband Jim Luray to lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance. So Debbie, we'll turn the time over to you.

Thank you. Our Heavenly Father, we're grateful for the opportunity we have to gather as the City Council and to discuss the pertinent business of the city.

We are thankful for the recent participation and precipitation that has helped calm our fire, and we're grateful for those who served, our first responders, to help with this. We are grateful for this country, and as we come along election season, we hope that all will engage in the process us to pick leaders locally as well as federally.

We're grateful for the opportunity to serve and the great people of this community. We ask for thy spirit and wisdom as we discuss the business of the city, and we say these in thy holy name of Jesus Christ.

Amen.

Amen.

Thank you.

Pledge of Allegiance.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America.

And to the Republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Thank you, Debbie, and thank you, Jim.

Our pleasure.

We now would like to have a report from the Recreation Advisory Commission, and Skip McWhorter is the Advisory Committee Chair. Are you online, Skip?

Okay.

Can you hear me okay?

Yep.

Thank you, Mayor Brunst and Orange City Council and those that are on. Grateful for the opportunity to share just a few ideas and thoughts about what we've accomplished and put our time and energy into as a Recreational Advisory Commission. If it's okay with you, Mayor Brunster, who's controlling the Zoom call, if you'll allow me to share my screen, we've got a little PowerPoint presentation that, that may help explain a little bit better what we're doing.

Sure.

Okay, super, thank you. Okay, let me pull up our presentation here. Can you see that okay? Everybody see my screen okay?

Yes.

Super.

Okay, well, again, we're appreciative of the opportunity just to share a few thoughts, and my remarks will be brief, and then certainly we'll answer any questions afterwards as long as they're not too hard. The Recreational Advisory Commission is comprised of 8 of us. I'm currently serving as the chair, along with 7 other individuals, and Dave Spencer is our City Council representative. The interesting part about the committee is we all have a little bit different perspective. We come from different avenues and obviously all members of Orem City, and we have different tastes and perspectives and opinions. But I think that's made for a really great mix of looking at the city as a whole and where funds could be spent, how to provide better recreational activities for the community, and more importantly, drive the community to parks and recreational opportunities. As you're all aware, the Orem Family Fitness Center has been our primary focus over the last few years. And I don't know how many of you have had a chance to see it recently. As a Rec Commission, we've had a couple of opportunities to take tours of it, and I'm blown away at each tour how much more has been accomplished, how it takes shape, and what a central focus point for the community this is becoming. Something that I think all of Orem City residents will be super proud of. As you're all aware, we had our groundbreaking back in August of 2019, and the rec center construction has really taken shape and been on track. We've been super excited about the method group that was involved in the design and the architecture and then right into construction. And, and how well the construction group has been on task and on assignment and on time with things. In fact, we've got a brief little video that will take just a minute to share, if that's okay.

If I— here we go.

Whoops.

Now I'm going to pause it right there for just a minute because, uh, I would like for each of you to take a look at the northeast corner. That's the pointed corner that points out to the Mountain View High School football stadium. And the reason I bring that up is because if you haven't been in it lately and been up on that second floor and looked out to the northeast, this is the view that you see. And how the design group and all the way through construction have captured that whole bay of windows there. And if you follow that bay of windows onto the east, you see Cascade Peak as well. But to have a workout area, a recreational center that captures that whole view corridor, and when you keep in mind that it looks over the Mountain View football stadium, which at least for quite a while will be a protected zone, nothing will ever impede that view. It's just phenomenal and quite breathtaking. Again, something that we feel the whole community will be proud of, will be accepting of, and will be involved and engaged in. Great opportunities for all kinds of things, and we've been super surprised and impressed with attention to detail, maximizing the efficiency and use of space, and to provide opportunities for anyone at any age to come in and enjoy the rec center, and really get the most out of it. Super proud of what that's turned into. As you may know, the Recreation Advisory Committee continues to be super supportive of recreational projects in the city. We approved $4 million of CARES tax money to go towards the fitness center, $1 million a year. We think that is absolutely the best use of those funds for what it will bring to the community, and individuals and families alike. Another point I wanted to make about the use of CARES tax money and, and what recreational efforts the city has been engaged in. All of you know the Altogether Playground was finished a year and a half ago or so, but we put it on this list just to demonstrate how much people are loving and appreciating and using the recreational offerings here in the city. Even during COVID this summer, watching that All Together Playground was just as busy as any other time, if not more so. And just a great, a great center focus for that brings people together. We used CARES tax money on the dog park that's used regularly, the mountain bike course that's next to the dog park up in Timpanogos Park area. Not sure if you're aware or not, but besides individuals that bike Orem City has OYCA, Orem Youth Cycling Association, that represents Mountain View Orem and Tippanogos High Schools. There's somewhere between 130 and 150 kids in that, and they use that course regularly, as well as cleanup projects and ongoing work that's done on the course where they volunteer hours. Another big benefit of recreational use and funds that have gone to it are the futsal and pickleball courts that have been built in existing city parks in Orem. If there's anything we hear, it's the beg for more pickleball and futsal courts. Although the activity does bring with it a certain amount of concern because there are a lot of people that want to use them and there's always a standing line, it's literally 7 days a week. It brings more and more people out Orem city parks more than just going and throwing a ball around or walking your dog or on occasion having a picnic. Now these are destination parks where people are coming and because there's a destination, something to do that brings more people. We threw on here the Palisade Park and splash pad up on the old Cascade Golf Course area. The reason, again, that was finished a year, year and a half ago. The reason it's on here is just to demonstrate how many people are getting out and enjoying the parks. It's been phenomenal, and much of that gratitude goes to the leadership of the city that's allowed CARES tax funds to come in, allowed them to be used in areas that really benefit the city as a whole and the people that live here. I guess the final point I wanted to make is related to how that reflects in the city. The Fitness Founders grassroots fundraising, I believe, just officially got launched today. The site is up for people to go to and donate, whether that is something very minor, $10, $15, $25, $50, up to $1,000 or more dollars that have been donated. Debbie, you can correct me if I am wrong, but I believe that even prior to officially opening up the fundraising opportunity, we had already received about $16,000 in donations. So I think that's a direct reflection of people that are engaged now in parks that may or may not have been before, enjoying more activities related to those parks, not just passive but active activities in those parks that draws out individuals and families, and certainly a great use of tax dollars that benefit everyone in the city. As a member of the Orem Recreational Advisory Commission, it's really been fun to see how dollars go in, how dreams get put into plans, those plans get built, and then to see the Orem city populace come out and enjoy those opportunities. I think one last thing I wanted to bring up that I think speaks volumes to the leadership of the city. This past summer has been a pretty difficult summer. I'm going to stop sharing because— well, maybe I should keep sharing. You don't need to look at my face. But one of the things I wanted to point out, in addition to the Recreation Advisory Commission, I serve on the Orem Youth Baseball Board and have for many years. I've got 6 kids that have all come through Orem, although they've played at 2 different high schools. Every one of them have played through the city program. And so when the governor and then the county leaders and then city leadership allowed us to move forward in a yellow environment, mild risk, and allow youth sports to take place, blown away at the number of kids and more importantly parents that got engaged and were so appreciative. This year more than any other year, by 10 times, we had parents thanking us that that a program was going on, that their kids weren't sitting at home playing video games. And that's not just baseball. Debbie and all the work that her team has done with the Orem-sanctioned sports, you know, tennis, volleyball, soccer, T-ball, little kids programs, you name it, it's just been a blessing. We, like most programs, we were about 85% of what our normal capacity is. Had we left registration open, we would have been 150% because all the other cities around like Provo that canceled their kids' programs were all flooding to Orem to play. Obviously, we limited that and didn't allow extras in because we wanted to run a safe environment. But every night, we're 300 or 400 kids playing and 700, 800 families showing up. The elderly people were wearing masks to be protective, but grandparents were still coming out to cheer on their grandkids, and it was, it was just an awesome sight to see. And again, more gratitude from parents than ever before in a shortened season and a late season that still allowed kids to get out and participate. I truly believe, and we've had multiple parents tell us this, that Orem set the standard for how to negotiate a tough environment with COVID but not give up on the kids and what was important to them. So Hats off to the leadership of Orem City that, that could see those things and allow good things to happen. Not just putting money into programs that allow recreational opportunities, but then allowing those things to happen. So Mayor Brunson, City Council, we really appreciate your direction and guidance and latitude to run good things to benefit the Orem City people.

Thank you.

Thank you, Skip, and thank you for the good job you're doing with the Recreation Advisory committee and the committee members. And we love our sports and we love participation in the City of Orem, and it's great to see people get out. So thank you very much.

You bet.

We'll now go ahead and go to the personal appearance portion of our meeting. Steve, have you received any personal appearances as far as written comments? Okay, so we're gonna have 1 minute open for anybody who wants to write in a comment, and then we'll close it. So 1 minute will start right now.

Mayor, still no comment.

Okay, we will close the personal appearance portion of our meeting and move on to our consent items. If anyone wishes to move any of these items onto our scheduled items, please let me know. So our first consent item is 8.1, the approval of the City Council meeting minutes from October 13th, 2020. The next one is, is 8.2. This is the appointments to boards and commission. Appointment to the CDBG Advisory Commission.

Second.

of Eileen Black and Ashley Gill, and to the Orem Neighborhood Advisory Commission of Margaret Black and Reed Farnsworth. Item 8.3 is a resolution approving certain sections of the City of Orem's City Manager's Department retention schedule. And the last item is 8.4, which is the appointment of Josh Adams as the new director of the city's police department. I move that we go ahead and accept all of these consent items. Is there a second?

Second.

Okay, let's go ahead and start with a vote. I'll start with Tom.

Aye.

Okay, Dave.

Aye.

Debbie.

Aye.

Jeff?

Aye.

Brent?

Aye.

And Terry?

Aye.

Okay, and Mayor, I vote aye as well. So the consent items pass. We now would like to turn some time over to Jamie Davidson for the administration of the oath of office for Chief Josh Adams.

Thank you, Mayor, members of the City Council, and those who are in attendance tonight here in our city center. We have a limited number of individuals here to recognize and participate in our new Police Chief Josh Adams taking his oath of office here for the City of Orem. Chief Adams will officially He will officially begin his service on Monday, November 2nd, and how delighted we are to have him once again rejoin our Orem family here as Chief of Police. Many of you are familiar with Josh and know him and his years of service and dedication to the City of Orem prior to assuming responsibility as the police chief of Linden City. And tonight we have an opportunity to welcome him back as our leader of the police department. As you well know, we went through a rigorous recruitment process, and Josh capably rose to the top of candidates that we were interested in, in looking at and hiring. He is a consummate professional. He understands and appreciates where police service and law enforcement is heading. He has the support of those that he will be working with and serving with, and he also has, I believe, the energy to allow us to go and do great things into the future. I had an opportunity as part of this recruitment process to have a conversation with Lyndon Mayor Aserson— Jeff Aserson— as we were going through this effort. And sometimes it's a little awkward to have a conversation with an elected official from adjacent community about an individual that you're interested in recruiting and pulling away from his organization and inviting him back into our organization. And I think this comment speaks for Josh and the level of the individual that he is. As I talked with Mayor Acerson, he made the comment that you would be very, very fortunate and lucky to have Josh as your chief of police here in the city of Orem. And so today I express my full support and appreciation for you as we have gone through this recruitment process. I also publicly express appreciation and support to Interim Chief Carl Hurst who's done a fantastic job bridging the gap between our past chief, Chief Giles, and now today Chief Adams. And I am delighted to introduce to you Chief Adams as he accepts and takes the oath of office from Jody Bates, our city recorder. Josh, I would invite you and your family to come forward, and if you wouldn't mind, I think we can for a Thank you, Alderman Demong. Thank you, Alderman Demong. I'd like to ask us to just for a brief moment maintain our distance and allow Chief Adams to take off his mask and to introduce his family who is with him tonight, and then we will have an opportunity for him to take the oath of office, and then we would appreciate it if you could just make a few comments, and then I have a brief presentation thereafter. So, Chief Adams. All right, this is— I think we're trying to fit in the camera here.

Over, over, over, over.

There we go. So I have 4 daughters. One of them is away at college, so she's probably watching this.

And then I have—

this is my old— I have twins, so her sister and Taylor, she's 18, will be 19 soon. Hunter turned 13 yesterday. And Riley, who is 14. And then we'll have Julie. And Joey is the other 20 minutes away. So—

Good luck in family.

Thank you.

I really don't need to be in the picture, so I'll just let you stand right there. So raise your right hand and repeat after me.

I, state your name, I, Joshua Adams, do solemnly swear, do solemnly swear, that I will support, obey, and defend, that I will support, obey, and defend, the Constitution of the United States, the Constitution of the United States, the Constitution of the State of Utah, the Constitution of the State of Utah, the laws and ordinances of the City of Orem, the laws and ordinances of the City of Orem, that I will conduct myself in a professional and courteous manner, that I will conduct myself in a professional and courteous manner, that I will provide professional quality That I will provide professional quality and compassionate service.

To the residents of Orem.

To the residents of Orem.

With dedication, pride, and integrity.

With dedication, pride, and integrity.

That I will discharge the duties of my office with fidelity.

That I will discharge the duties of my office with fidelity.

Very good.

Congratulations.

Congratulations, Chief. Nice to have you on board.

A few words, very few words. I'll do my talking starting on Monday.

But I'm excited.

I was here for 17 years.

I never thought I'd leave, and I certainly never thought I would come back.

So I had actual plans to actually be out of law enforcement by now, but I'm happy to be here. I think there's a lot of progress to be made and a lot of good work to be done, and I'm excited to have the people that I have alongside me and supporting me, and we're committed to doing some great things in the future for the Thank you, Josh.

We look forward to working with you.

Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, uh, Mayor and City Council. As, uh, as you know, Josh is not in uniform today, but a big part of any officer's uniform is their badge. That is obviously representative of who they are and who they represent, and tonight it is my pleasure to, uh, present to Chief Adams his badge and welcome him formally back to the City of Warren. Thank you, Josh. And might I also add that this is somewhat of a gift because it is also Josh's birthday today. So we have an opportunity— and I don't want you to sing to him.

That's not—

Been there and done that. But we want to wish Chief Adams a happy birthday as well. So appreciative of his family coming and supporting him and the limited number of people we have in attendance tonight. And we look forward to seeing Josh on duty Monday morning.

That's right.

So, Mayor, Council, appreciate it.

All right, um, let's go ahead and move on to our scheduled items. The first one is 9.1, which is a public hearing. This is a resolution. The city will receive public comment on the Community Development Block Grant, the projected use of funds for CARES Act CDBG-CVD funding, and consider approval of a substantial amendment to the 2019-2020 Annual Action Plan.

Second.

Ken Ransom, our advisory commission director, and Kenna Matthews, community service manager, are our presenters.

Good evening, Mayor and Council. Hopefully you can hear me. This is Ken Ransom.

Yes.

All right, happy to be before you again. We've, we've done this a few times. I would like to take a quick moment and Welcome our 2 new commission members to the Community Development Block Grant Advisory Commission. We welcome them and look forward to serving with them. So thank you for approving those, those 2 new members earlier today. We appreciate that.

You bet.

All right, if we can move to slide 2, please. All right, so we've presented that, uh, the grant amount that OREM's been given for a CDBG COVID allocation. And projects that have been funded by the— we've record— the commission's recommended and the council has funded are listed there on the screen. And so at the bottom there, left to allocate to specific projects, is one just over $197,000. Next slide, please. And these are the funds are intended— the list here is what the funds are intended to be used for COVID-related funding and cannot be used to offset revenue shortfall or for duplication of benefits. Next slide, please. Thank you. And the council, we've listed this slide previously. These were the council's priorities for this COVID CDBG funding. And you can see that they're listed there. And so we're presenting tonight for you— the Alpine School District is asking for $12,000 for touchless drinking fountains for 8 Title I schools in Orem. And the note at the bottom there, other Orem schools will be provided fountains from Orem CARES Act funding. So our commission recommends that the, that the $12,000 be funded to the Alpine School District for those 8 schools. And the amount that's left to be allocated, which we'll have future recommendations on, is listed there, $185,000, just over $185,000. And the city has an additional allocation that is coming— I don't know if it's come yet, but— or sometime soon in the fall here of additional $287,000 to allocate. And the commission will make some future recommendations for those— for that funding as well. All right. So the note on this slide— so the— there's a process with other entitlements to see what remaining needs there are in the community. And we're discussing needs for rental, mortgage, and utility assistance with Community Action. And the next steps are listed there. We've been through this a few times now, so you probably don't need this slide, but there's the next steps listed. And any questions?

Any questions or comments? Okay, seeing none, this is a public hearing, so I will open it up to the public for any comments. Um, and we will go ahead and start now for 1 minute to allow that to occur. So Steve, have you received any comments?

No comments.

No comments there.

Okay, then we will close the public comment portion of our public hearing and bring it back to the council. Any comments? All right, I'd like to make a motion. I move that the city council adopt the recommendations of the CDBG Advisory Commission and approve a substantial amendment to the 2019-2020 Annual Action Plan. We will go ahead and start off with a vote. Dave?

You need a second first, Mayor.

I'm sorry, is there a second?

I'll second it.

Okay, I'll start with Dave.

Aye.

Okay, Debbie.

Aye.

Jeff.

Aye.

Brent.

Aye.

Terry.

Aye.

Tom.

Aye.

Mayor, I vote aye as well. So the resolution passes. Uh, we will thank you, uh, Ken, and thank you, uh, Thank you, Ms. McKenna. We will now move on to any communication items. Jamie, do you have any information or communication items for us?

No, Mayor, I shared them in our work session.

Thank you.

Okay, then I move with no further items to cover that we adjourn this meeting. Is there a second?

Second.

Okay, all in favor say aye.

Aye.

All right, the meeting's adjourned. Thank you very much. Thank you again, Terry, for filling in.

Oh, it was my pleasure.

Thanks. You bet.

All right, I can help you now.

Wash my hands.

I will slice up