City Council · 2023-05-16

I'd like to welcome everyone to the second part of our work meeting. Field trip and water reuse and also the track station. So hopefully everyone's a lot more educated about that as we go forward. As far as first, so we've got an hour. We've got, uh, Sam Kelly is going to present our transportation master plan, and then, uh, second, Josh Adams is going to present a school safety presentation. So, friends, spoken with both of you, we'll adjust according to that, and then we'll still have some more things to go through as far as our schedule, because our schedule's packed tonight. Anyway, Sam, if you'd like to take it away.

Sure, thank you, Mayor. I brought John Dorney along. He's our consultant with Borax Engineers. He's got a presentation here to go through. Um, to your point, we want to try and keep this moved Moving along pretty well, so we got about 20 minutes or so. John's got a few slides, we can probably— we can try and wait to the end for questions if that'll help. So I'll turn some time over to John and we'll discuss our update to our transportation master plan.

Hopefully this is as exciting as a sewer field trip. When I went in college to the field trip, it was windy and you were getting sprayed. Oh good. As we walked down on the catwalks with the thing. Hopefully that happened. It did happen. Again, this is a master plan update, not a complete redo. I don't know why these aren't lined up, but everything in green has already happened. We've met with you once before. We met with OTAC, got approval there. That includes your extension advisory, the PWAC.

They adopted it and Does the PWAC usually adopt it?

Well, they—

I don't know if adoption is the word. They all voted in support.

Have you usually presented it?

Have you done that before?

No, we have not.

Planning Commission, and then now we're here. We have these other meetings coming up in June. Again, Planning Commission supporting vote, and then we hope June 27th adoption here. So the difference between the 2015 TMP and the 2022, we updated existing current conditions, base traffic counts. We'll show you where we counted. We updated roadway level of service based on the new counts. Roadway cross-sections, we always look at it, meaning how wide should the lanes be, how much curb gutter, how much sidewalk, how much planter strip. There's kind of a cross-section of a roadway that changes based on bike lanes and the different thinking at the time. Are narrower lanes better or wider lanes better? We did remove the elements of the state street master plan that had high-density cores. Those were removed because they were originally in there. Travel demand model also changed in 2022 from 2015. The MAG Travel demand model went from 2040 to 2050, so that 10-year change changed everything. We incorporated the 2050 recommendations that MADD presented, and we updated costs as best we can to keep up with construction. We also added access management standards. Has to do with access spacing, how many roadways you can have and accesses on different category of roads. Added traffic calming guidelines, a toolbox, and traffic impact study guidelines, and a specific area plan for the Southwest Street network. I believe I might have shown this before. This is kind of the process. You start off here on the left with the high-level travel model that goes from Payson to Ogden, and so it's not specific to Orem. So what we do in the green is we customize it for Orem. We look at your population, your zoning, your land use, your existing traffic, a number of things. And so we, we take a model that accounts for the whole state, but we say, okay, well, what in this model do you not agree with? This one traffic analysis zone may show that there's only 50 homes, but you have a 100-plan. Because MAG and WFRC have to plan for regional traffic across the state. And they can't always go into every single city micro changes. So it's kind of a task that we did with your staff. And then we create output recommendations. We go through this iterative process with OTAC, with you, with the staff. We look at the general plan and determine, are we contradictory to the general plan? We get public input, and then we go through the adoption process. What we're in now is— we would call this the adoption process. Yeah, but that lagging S did over there, but on my version today wasn't there, so I apologize for that formatting. This is a traffic count map of the counts we obtained. I don't know if you can see, but we have counts we obtained ourselves in purple. We have red ones that we did for the PMP tower, and then Orem provided some counts to us. So we used all of those, plus there's some UDOT ones that we used to also validate. Pretty extensive count map that not every city has. The public works staff keep a lot of count databases, a lot of stuff. It's not uncommon. So this is a really good count spread. What we do is kind of look at this map to the right. We're fighting mobility and access. The freeways have high mobility with no access. Highways have a little less mobility, a little more access. State Street has a driveway every 50 feet, every 100 feet, where that's not optimal. And so anytime we have really good access, level of service of that roadway deteriorates and goes down because you have conflict points. So there's this constant struggle between providing good access for businesses and other streets and moving cars. And as you know, UDOT wants to move cars and a lot of cities want local access. So there's a little bit of a struggle between mobility and access. And that's where the access management standards— we try to assign to collectors and arterials. We don't really have to deal with freeways and expressways, but we do have a say in some of those. This is just some road network that kind of identifies your signals, your hop signals, your roundabouts. It just kind of shows what you're at now with your different intersection types. It also shows arterials, minor arterials, and collectors, so there's some color coding there. What the classifications are. Um, when I discuss level of service, this is kind of a graphical representation. We have an A through F. People think C and D is bad because of schooling. It's actually good. Uh, we love C. You don't accept the D. And we talked a little bit in the last few meetings, um, to build yourself out of an E might be detrimental to the city or the residents. So sometimes cities are willing to accept them because they don't want to widen Center Street, take all the homes, mess with Long Island or whatever road. And so this is kind of the degradation of roadway based on kind of what you see out there. And currently I think the level of service is C. That's what the city holds itself to. That's what we hold developers to. If they come in with a traffic study and they don't make it to level of service C, then we try to get them to do something to make it C. So that's, that's kind of where the city is at.

Well, I think actually that's part of the— with this update too, I do have— I don't know if you guys remember, the Transportation Advisory Commission did provide a letter kind of expressing their thoughts, and one of those was to lower that level of service to a level of service B, understanding that we're going to Instead of, to John's point, trying to build ourselves out of congestion to get this to this level of service D that we would actually accept in our peak hours, where we would be a little bit more congested, and actually maybe that peak hour would be a little bit longer, and use that kind of as our benchmark. And from that point, we still essentially have the same types of projects we have for corridor widening and intersection improvements. It's just that those needs need to be pushed off just further down the road in 20, 30 years, or maybe they might even be eliminated because in some areas where we're fairly built out, maybe it'll be a level of service and that's going to be what we want.

Police Chief, we were talking before the meeting about access getting out over here, and I think you said 4:30 to 4:45 to about 6 is just terrible and it's backed up. So do we really want to build all these wide roads for a couple hours of the day? We always analyze for AM and PM peak commute, but the other 23 hours, is it worth it? So as you go forward thinking about the city, what you're willing to accept, build your way out of level of service or accept the lesser one on some roads. This is how it's calculated. This is kind of the math behind it. You have roadway level of service, which has to do with ADT, or average daily traffic, that's on the left. You can see 13,000, 15,000, 31,000. Those are cars per day that a 2 or 3 or 4-lane road can handle in a good condition. Anytime you add garbage pickup, residents' driveways, bike lanes, it restricts and reduces that capacity because of friction factors. Intersections are calculated separately. Those have to do with seconds of delay per vehicle. So there's a black box you put the numbers in and it says, well, this intersection has 36 seconds of delay per vehicle average. Some are there 2 minutes, some are there 10 seconds, but the average is this. And so that was Group D. And so you can see there's not much difference between, you know, if you're 30, you're fine. If you're 36, you're D. So it's in the seconds and they're not very much, so we have to take that with a grain of salt when we say intersection is F or E, and so we must fix it. It's like, well, is it only F or E for like 30 minutes every day? We'll need to take that story to the data right turn pocket. Those are some of the questions that— Any things we look at? So in the master plan, we usually look at roadway level of service. The intersection level of service is almost a little bit too micro for a study of City of Aurora. We do consider intersections. If we have 2 roadways or 3 or 4 roadways that are all failing, then we know that that intersection is probably failing. And so we looked at intersection level of service. You can see green and yellow and red signal heads. You can see green, yellow, and red roadways. The red are considered E or F, unacceptable. The yellows are D, so that's acceptable to UDOT and some city roads, and the A's. The greens are A, B, C, so those are flowing pretty well. Those are estimated. Again, I mentioned the TAZ and the MAG model. This is how these traffic analysis zones are subdivided within our WFRC might have a lot more larger TAZs. We go in and we divide them up a little bit, make it more accurate. And we run a scenario, what happens in 2030 if we don't build anything? These roads that are red will fail. What if we in 2050 we don't do anything for the next 20-plus years? What other roads will fail? And then what does it take to fix them? This is a 2050 map, and based on this map, this is where we go through the iterative process that I showed you and talk to your staff and leadership and say, all right, the travel model says these roads are going to fail with people in the back. Which ones do you want to address between now and 2050? Which ones do you not want to address? I do have pictures of this to pass out because it's a Hard bit to see. I know it's up against time, I'll just let those go. So this is kind of the answer. There's some color codes there. UDOT projects are red, MAG/ORM city projects are blue, and we also have some city-only projects in green. And that's meaning it's not a regional road, it's not a MAG road, it's not a UDOT road. 2 or 3 of those that are considered city funding. But basically, by adopting this in the next month, you'd be saying that you would be working towards this plan. So when you see the RTP Phase 1, 2, and 3, That is basically 2030, 2040, 2050. So anything that's a Phase 1 means it needs to be done now in the next 5 years. Phase 3, it's by 2050. And if it's vision, I believe the digital version behind me has an update. And on paper, you'll see a vision up there on 600 North. That means it's beyond 2050. I think it's So if you remember, the roads across the lake used to be a pipe dream that's never going to happen. Well, slowly those have been put on the map and they're called vision plans. Well, eventually they'll be 2060 plans or 2065. And so as roads and needs are beyond 2050, they call it vision, meaning there's no planning, there's no funding, but likely this might be needed. Some of those are on here, at least one of them on 1600 North. We may not want to widen that to 5 lanes because of the social impact on the people on that roadway, but in 30 or 40 years, maybe. And this just states the need. This doesn't mean we're going to go out and build anything right now. If there's any other visions—

So the vision one would be Center Street.

Okay.

I bring up Center Street in the past because that's one where you drive down where you've got high school on the right, and you got hills and homes and stuff. And so there's discussion about widening Center Street. There's definitely a need for it, but do we want to build ourselves out of that level of service or just accept every traffic? I believe this is the future roadway. I think that's the last slide. This just shows where signals and roundabouts and intersection changes are needed and planned, and none of these happen without your staff looking at it closer and seeing what's needed.

And that's it.

Yes.

So the vision for 1600 North, you're saying that that's a regional transportation plan vision coming from UDOT? And so how does UDOT and how does Orem City— how are we involved in that?

So there's, there's West 1600 North. I'm talking about— Any road that's large enough to be regional gets on the regional transportation plan, even if it's in your city, and that unlocks funds for the city. You can get corridor preservation funds, you can get access to certain funds through MAG. If, if it's not a regional road, then MAG doesn't help fund anything. So that area of 1600 North is a joint effort through your city staff. They go to MAG every 2 years and ask for money, and the projects get ranked, and they send out $60 million every 2 years to the Utah County cities for projects. And so if the city wants to pursue that project, that's this— that's this— that's the method, that's the process. MAG doesn't do anything without the cities requesting the funding.

So if we want to say we really don't see a benefit to our citizens on the east side of 1600 North, we see it more as a detriment. I mean, there's 5 schools that are accessed off just the 1600 North over to 8th North. And then if you continue that 8th East, you've got Cascade also accessed off there. So if we as a city want to say, you know, we really don't want to even entertain that idea, of having that in the regional transportation plan, just as a service for the safety of our residents. Can we say we prefer that not be on our regional— on the regional transportation plan?

We can. The only downside to that is, is if at some point in the future we do recognize that we need to do something there, and if we want to go after another funding source, which is what John pointed out earlier, then The first thing they do is they look to see if it was on our transportation master plan, and if it wasn't, then it really wouldn't qualify for all those dollars. Just like what we started to do with 16th North, we started out kind of putting it together in pieces at $5 million every funding cycle so we could go ahead and at least move forward with getting right-of-way, knowing that you're looking at probably a $25 to $30 million project. It's something that the city couldn't fund on its own, but we could go after federal money to go ahead and do that. And we can go ahead and remove that. It would just be that at some point, if we wanted to add that project, or at some point we saw a need to have it, we would have to go through a process of adopting it, putting on our plan. It just puts it out, you know, years and years. But if you guys wanted to choose now to go ahead— And that's why I said, when you look at levels of service and looking at congestion, Maybe we go out to 2050 and it's going to be at a Level of Service E, it's going to be congested, and we're fine with that. Go ahead and eliminate it.

Because we do these plans every 5 years, we update them. So we've got till 2045.

If it—

because if it was supposed to be implemented in 2050, we could ideally 2045 add that back in there if we see the need and still be— or 20, you know, '43, so we got 2 years buffer, whatever. Sure, right?

Could we—

could that be a possibility to then see where the landscape lies instead of possibly accelerating by continuing to have it on our plan against our will?

Well, it's—

yeah, it's not really against our will. I mean, when they put together the travel demand model, they look at State Street. Is it congested? 8th North, is it congested? They put all these roads together and they look, okay, where is traffic the And obviously it's a best guess because they're looking at population growth and all other factors, and they say, well, this is a main road, it connects from here to here. If it continues to grow, continues to do this, this is going to be a problem. And then they bring it to us, say, hey, you guys, this is a problem. This is what we put in our model. This is what we see having an issue. Do you want to keep it there or not? If we don't want to, we can just say no. It's really not a big deal. But what they're doing is they're looking at— because they even looked at, if you look here on Main Street, Main Street is supposed to be widened to 3 lanes and eventually to 5 lanes. But that's only if there's an interchange south of 2000 South and north of Center Street, probably somewhere, right? And if they never put an interchange there, there may not be a need to ever widen Main Street. But when the transportation modelers at MAG put together these plans, they looked at, hey, this is a need. There's a bunch of congestion here. This would help solve that and alleviate it. And really, it's just lines on paper. But if we want to go ahead and eliminate that, I mean, we, we can do that. It's just that I would just say, knowing that it will take 10 to 15 years to ever fund it, it would just take longer to put it in the plan and go through the process. We can gladly do That. It's just understanding it takes time.

Can we keep it in the plan but not move forward with it? I mean, it's something that we don't want to implement, but keep it in the plan and say, no, we're okay with the need for the level of service so that we can continue to keep that funding and pause the option as an option. without pulling the plug on the project for the, you know, whenever it needed to do that, then at least we still have that mechanism in place to do that, to keep that moving forward versus unplugging it. I mean, so I guess the question is, do we still have— we would still have control over what would happen?

Yes. Yeah, we still have control. And to John's point too, even though the lake crossing is a Vision Project and they're looking to move it up to Phase 3, MEG is also changing their philosophy of how they're going to fund all these projects. Initially in their plan, they had taken into account that we would be bonding for all these projects. Well, that's not necessarily going to happen. We're not looking at all these billions of dollars of projects that the state's going to be using their bonding capacity So they're having to change that to be a pay-as-you-go. And because of that, there's Phase 1 projects that are going to be pushed to Phase 2, there's Phase 2 that are being pushed into Phase 3, and Phase 3 could be pushed into vision projects. So I mean, the reality is, is that by having this as a vision project doesn't really do anything. It just says, hey, we're aware that this is a major piece of Orem that could serve as a route for folks coming from Aitkorn to State or vice versa, but The reality is, I mean, it's fairly built out. There's really not much going on there. At Canyon Tech Park, if that decides to change and become more residential, you could see an uptick in traffic, but really not much. So essentially, it kind of acts as a placeholder. And then at some point in time, if the powers that be decide to widen it or do something different, and then we do that.

To your point, it really doesn't hurt anything by keeping it as a vision. None of these seem to be prioritized or date estimated. Is that correct? Well, at least not on this page. Phase 1 is up to 2030. So if you see a Phase 1, it's 2030. Sometime between now and 2030.

Yeah, but it isn't this project's number 1, this one's number 2.

It's up to the city. Yeah. Thank you. So MADD will not come in and build this road. The city has to push that forward. This could be on the map for 10 years, and if the city never says, hey, we want to build this, MAG will never do anything. And you have to do 7% match anyways, which would have to be approved by you. So there's a lot that has to happen.

So what's the harm in taking it off then?

So if you have a— let's say there's a spot intersection that you want to fix pedestrian issues or a trail or a bike lane, And if you take it off the map, you no longer have access to any of those funds either because it's not on the master plan. So there's what they call CMAQ funding, so air quality funding, and there's road funding. And if you have an air quality project that you want to do something down there but you take all those roads off, you no longer qualify for any funding because the first thing MAP does is they check your master plan and say, yep, it's not on there, you don't qualify.

Isn't that—

isn't there safety funding also though? Safety grants that MAG can give to us. I mean, that's what they told us at one meeting. Yeah, there's like the roundabout, the 4th East issue that we're having right now, that's become a big safety issue. So—

But understanding too, to his point, it's because 16th North is also on the plan too.

So if we say that, like Jeff said, that we accept the Level of Service E, then does that not dictate that we need the we then accept that level of— so can we isolate roads for that, or does that have to be— because I think you said that means we have to accept that everywhere throughout the city. That's our standard.

Well, it's not only— it's not just for us, but it's also for developers as well.

Right. So then level of service of E, any traffic studies, they just need to come back with an E, which is nothing really, which means—

Yeah, like I said, there's a— it's a matter of seconds.

Your traffic studies will not fail, in other words, for a developer. Like the one on 1600 North, his traffic study he did twice, and the first time it failed, the second time he got it to pass, but that was Level of Service C. So that was the tipping point, right, is the C to an E. But if we're at E, if we design— if we leave this on the plan and we say E is acceptable, than every street in Orem, can we distinguish different streets for different level of services of failure? That's my question.

Code-wise, you could probably be specific. You might have to talk to NEPA, but yeah, we probably could say this corridor is so bad we're going to accept lower levels of service. I don't see a problem with that.

We couldn't necessarily add ask for a higher level of service than what the current existing level of service is unless we had a plan and we are actively pursuing ways to improve that, if that makes sense.

So is this the plan then, is we're saying we're going to restripe it at 5 lanes?

That's the need. If you never want to act on it, it never has to be done. If the city doesn't want to do it—

You see what I'm asking?

There's transportation, and I, and I had a citizen ask me this the other day, which I didn't have an answer for. It looks like Orem's transportation plan is working really hard to help other surrounding cities. It's not getting people home fast. It's, it's all these roads going through Orem and exiting someplace else. But there's the other study I think that's really important is the quality of life study. And the people on 16th North, when I was running for office 4 years ago, live in fear on the 8th side of 16th North that that road's going to be widened to 5 lanes. The people on 8th East, it's the same issue.

And I think we owe the citizens—

there's an issue about quality of life and disrupting homes and disrupting houses and taking away the parking from their home that has to also be part of this. if this wasn't on the master plan, they don't live in as much fear as if this is on the master plan and they see, oh darn it, I live on 16th North and 400 East, and that's gonna be a 5-lane road. And does that mean they're gonna buy my house or take out my house? So I mean, there's another—

I understand what you guys focus on is moving cars through Orem, and we appreciate what you do.

But I'm also concerned about the residents in Orem, how this impacts them.

If we put on—

if we say widen 8th East to 5 lanes, that sounds easy to do.

Drive up and down 8th East and see what you do to a neighborhood.

So not you, but you know, I'm just— So traffic knows no boundary, right? They don't— your neighbors can build high-density homes or high-density things and they can go right through your town. So you can't control it, we can't control it. And traffic doesn't care if it's all over Provo, they'll go through the shortest route possible. So we try to predict based on growth trends and land use. We get down to your, your land use plan and neighbor land use plan. That's why it goes from case to case. What is everybody doing? Where do they want to go? And this map is just if things continue based on the zoning that you have and the zoning that Lindon and Provo have, this is the estimation of where cars want to go. You don't have to build it, you don't have to want it. You can say, that's fine if your model says that, but we never want to build that. That's fine. That happens all the time. I'm not a proponent of widening it to 5 lanes. I'm just telling you that the model says you'll have complete congestion if you don't do something, and if you're okay with it, um, but how do you keep cars from driving across city boundaries?

So I would love to see the model, um, improve State Street, improve 8th, right? North, you know.

So yeah, we can see what I'm saying based on like, like, do you want us to take businesses on State Street to widen State Street or not?

Right, no, I'm not saying that. I'm just saying that that's the UDOT— I mean, to me, that's kind of where those are their roads. Let's concentrate on that instead of taking our streets in front of our residents' homes. which once you— once you restripe 1600 North to 5 lanes, I said really by 2040 we're going to be pulling homes out and widening it.

So we open up all those roads. Anything that's going to be built in the plan, we account for it. So if anything's planned to be built by 2050, we put it in the model, we run it, and it's just like pressurized pipe flow. Where do they want to go? And so the model does that already. UDOT, State Street gets filled up, and so where do they want to go? Well, they go to 600 North.

They go to the next exit. Let's get Provo to build some more exits.

820 North, they already have one, but a toll one. So I mean, I've been trying that for 50 years. I'm not trying to be too bad.

No, I understand totally what you're saying, and I'm pushing back because I'm saying I'm trying to represent our residents here and where they are. We've got 5 schools, you know.

It's hard to arbitrarily force cars to not use an attractive road. And so, you know, we can, we can force them not to go there, but the model is showing that's what they want.

And, you know, I live on 1500 North, so I know what that street is like. So, and I'm willing to accept that level of service. at 3 lanes, at the existing 3 lanes.

And by accepting this, you're not accepting that'll be built because so much has to happen.

I feel like I'm endorsing it if I allow it.

Yeah.

Okay, but that's not you. You're doing your job. You're doing a great job.

Well, what we're just telling you, this is what the roads say need to happen. So what do we have to do tonight on this? Is this just information? Right, just our work session, making sure that you're aware of the current—

We're just highlighting some issues.

Right, that's what I thought.

So June 27th would be for adoption. So yeah, now then I can come back.

And these are issues I've already received contact from residents about.

So, okay, you define what— so if it's a vision project, then when is the most, you know, what's the nearest time it would be likely to be built if that's a vision project versus if it comes off and then it has to go back on? as a vision project. What are those time frames? So vision projects usually beyond 2015, so 2016. But this was put on a vision project not because it's not— because it's not wanted. So the model says it's needed, but because Orem doesn't want it, it's on vision, right? So we've already Stated, all right, by 2050 it needs to be 5 lanes. However, the city doesn't want it, so we're going to kick it to vision, meaning it's still likely needed, but we're not even going to do anything for it. So that's why it's vision, is not because it's needed after 2050, it's because— I guess what I'm trying to understand though is kicked out. If we take it, if we take it off, what would be the soonest that that would be likely completed? Versus if we leave it on, what's the soonest it would likely be completed? Potentially, if it's a vision. And I understand vision— 2050 would be when it's needed, but only if you guys want to pay that money. But I'm just trying to quantify this vision. In other words, if it's on here, when can we potentially complete that road? 2050? And if it's not on here, when can we Anything beyond 2050, there's no number to it. Like I said, the lake is just—

You couldn't do it before 2050 if we established a need?

Well, we could add it back into the plan. Yeah, '40, we could add it in '23-'25, we could add it. And then it just depends on where it falls. I mean, you have a choice where to put it. You can put it on vision for the next 30 years, you can have it off, you can put it back on. Like I said, this isn't— you're not giving someone permission to do anything.

Yeah, I guess the only— I mean, to remove it, the only downside would be if there's a signalized intersection that we want to add a right turn lane, or we want to add some lanes. With the vision component here for 16th North, then we can go to MAG for intersection improvement dollars, which would likely be buying 4 homes, $500,000. There's $2 million there, right, that we would have to ask for money match. 7% of that and build that intersection. Whereas if we remove it, we see an intersection improvement, that's all on our dollar. So that's the other piece of that, is as long as it's on a vision, it qualifies because it's in that corridor. We can do intersection improvements without doing corridor improvements, right? Because we all realize that some of the choke points for our corridors are at the intersections. So that is one plus to having that. But, but we can remove it just as easily and go through that. Maybe we remove it.

We don't—

we We need any intersection improvements, and we're fine.

Joan and Sam, is it truly all or nothing? I mean, could it be that there— that we could acknowledge potential needs for intersection improvements or bike lanes, but try to conscientiously direct, you know, I guess, potential traffic increases along other corridors and say that In terms of vehicular traffic, our vision or plan is a maximum of 3 lanes. Does it have to be completely all 3 lanes versus 5 lanes, or could we be— could we more narrowly tailor the plan through that corridor?

I mean, it doesn't necessarily—

I mean, we can—

I guess you have the perfect scenario of wide new road and you're building all 5 lanes, you're building a shoulder, which means you're taking homes. We could just as easily go through this exercise and maybe it's a function of restriping. We have strip takes on either side and that still allows for maybe 30% increase in capacity and you still have a lot of friction points, but it gives somewhat of a relief valve and buys us time. So I mean, I guess there is that as well. It's just like Understanding that it says 5 lanes, but it doesn't necessarily have to be the 5 lanes that we're looking to do on 16th North. It could be similar to what 106th South in Sandy is.

So there is also scope of project too that we would look at to see.

And even for 16th North, when that was still our project, we went through that scenario of doing a strip take on each side, widening to the south, widening to the north. north, and the folks that live there actually endorsed the widening to the south because they looked at if we do a strip widening, now all of a sudden I don't know where I'm going to put my garbage can. It's already hard for me to get in and out. I understand, I've lived here, but it's already a pain to get out now. So they were fine with widening to one side or the other. So even though it's on here, we would still go through a very public process.

Very open, and it wouldn't be unless it was under the direction of the council for us to pursue it, to be very honest with you.

It wouldn't be. I mean, right, right now, for example, we are coming up on a MAGTIP funding cycle where we have the opportunity to submit for projects. And I would obviously— I'm going to look at our map, look at what our needs are, then I'll consult with Ryan and Bren and see what our plan would would be, and then we, we bring that to the council as well, understanding that we have to match 7%. So if we wanted to look at widening 8 East from 8 South to Center Street, we would bring that forward and say, is this something we want to look at, starting out with maybe a study? Is it needed now? What are our actual conditions? How long can we go for? And just being on the other side at the MAG table when we're there and all these communities bringing forward 5 projects, the first thing we do as the Technical Advisory Committee for MAG is we ask, hey, is this on your master plan? Because there's been communities that came in and they wanted to have money for signals, and it made sense, but the corridor that they were putting them on wasn't on a master or a transportation master plan, so it didn't score very well and they didn't get the funding.

And then have to come up with that, that's all of themselves. If you were to direct SAM staff to say, find a way to not have 5 lanes, but what else could we do? You could go to MAG, we could get a study. They're willing to give $50,000 or $100,000 to study any day instead of saying give us $10 million. And so if it's off the map, you can't— you don't get that paid for. So there are definitely creative ways to say, you know what, We don't want 5 lanes, but what else can be done? Go look at it a little bit closer. Really need 12-foot lanes. So yeah, any one of these roads, um, could put that closer and change and have more scrutiny on it. I don't want to go way over. Sorry. I think it's kind of like a couple that just got married and they're planning for what they're going to do in retirement in 40 years. Odds are things are going to change. You know, it's, it's a, it's a wide—

it's a plan that's out there many years from now.

We don't even have the plan. When I was a transportation engineer, this, this was concepted 20 years ago and nothing's happened on it. This is a concept and an idea because one of the, one of the X factors here, I think, is what's going to happen at, um, at the old WordPerfect complex. If, if 500 units go on there, well, that's an additional 7,500 Cars or 500 units. Yeah, if it's 100, it's 1,500. If it's 1,000, that's 15,000. I don't know what's going to happen there. Maybe nothing will happen there for residential, but there's ideas about that happening. And so decisions that council makes today is going to affect what happens on the roads tomorrow.

Okay.

Any other questions? So what's our next process from here? I think if you're not going to adopt it by June 27th, we need to talk and fix something. I get with Sam and say, okay, we don't want to show up to adoption and have half the council say we don't like this. It's not going to happen. So we want to go through that process.

Because Planning Commission hears it tomorrow.

Yeah, Planning Commission will see it tomorrow. They'll provide a positive or negative recommendation, or if it's a positive recommendation with some items, and then we can go ahead and—

if those are acceptable, or if you want discussion. Not to take this longer because I don't want to, but as far as the choke point, it seems like Center Street. Micah Phineas, just center, going down Center, Micah Phineas, State Street. It seems like a mess, so I don't know. And it's on Vision, so I don't know what the plan is with that.

Well, so when we were going through our Transportation Advisory Commission, one of the— they had a few things in there that they touched on. One of them was that we cannot build ourselves out of congestion. They want to balance the needs of Drivers, pedestrians, and bikers. Those are the guys on the pedal, not the cars. And then they want good planning and transportation infrastructure, encourages active transportation. I think you guys may have gotten a copy of this letter, but I mean, one of them was that they didn't want to have any more 7-lane facilities in the city because it creates a big barrier. The maximum they wanted to build was 5 lanes. So that was one of the Pieces that we put Center Street to a vision project, because maybe at some point in 50, 60 years we're going to realize, hey, we need to have this as a facility.

Well, and here's the issue with Center, right, is now BYU games, people get off at 1600 because Center is a mess. So that's why I talked about using— utilizing State Street, having UDOT utilize that in a better way, is just that example.

Vineyard is going to keep going. Huge traffic from Vineyard, you know, or be a center. Anyway, that just seems like that would be a pretty high priority, more than a basement priority. Mayor, one of the challenges with Center Street too is if we widen Center Street, we'll take out a number of businesses. So for me, I've never been a huge fan of widening Center. I'm also not a huge fan of widening 6th and 8th because I don't think we'll ever build ourselves out of congestion.

So, especially it's costly to come up that hill.

Isn't it easier to widen Geneva Road than it is cities that are built out in Orem, like 8th East? Or, you know, Geneva Road, make that a 5 or 7-lane highway. It is 5 now, and I think it's planned to go to 7. Yeah, right on. Lakeview Parkway and Geneva are parallel on both 5 lanes plus.

But up in our areas where We need it. Yeah, right, from 1600 to University Parkway. Are they going down farther?

But you could move traffic north and south along Geneva, and then they cut across instead of having to go up 16th all the way down 8th all the way to Center.

You know, it'd be easier, like Dave's saying, just cut across Center from Geneva.

Yeah, I mean, I think you could— I think Geneva would take a lot of pressure off. Well, I drive Geneva a lot right now, and Terry, I agree with you. The challenge is State Street comes on an angle right out of Pleasant Grove, right where Geneva connects, and everybody chooses to go through the central of the county versus down on the freeway. Yeah, because Geneva is not as busy in the morning commute or the evening commute like State Street is. And it's—

you made it a nice road, people would go there.

It is a pretty nice road, actually. It's 50 miles It's the angle of the roads within the state. Geneva, it's like that. So people don't turn, it's an odd angle. But Brian, Sam, John, I've actually heard kind of multiple suggestions of maybe there's a better prioritization that we try to establish or suggest, you know, given this current window of looking at it. That helps assuage some concerns and show and ultimately send a message of where our priority would be in the, in the short term. Okay, so, so as far as going forward, we may need to have more meetings about this fairly soon to get these things nailed down because we're getting cut off by the clock. So But let's, uh, let's go ahead and grab our food, um, and take 2 minutes to come back to your chair because we've got to go over a lot of stuff. So let's have a prayer. Um, Father in heaven, we're grateful for this food, for those who provided it for us. We're grateful for this opportunity to meet together. Please bless this meal, and we say these things in the name of Jesus Christ.

Amen.

Amen. Got you.

Well, you know where I stand.

All right, welcome back. I don't think this will work from a physics standpoint if I'm supposed to use this and all the rest of this. Okay, um, Chief Adams has, uh, agreed to move to another meeting because this just won't work as far as time. We appreciate that. Okay, okay, we don't, we don't have any city council reports. That's good today. Um, we'll go right to item number 3, call to order. Item number 4, invocation, inspirational thoughts. Would you like to introduce them? I can, or you can, it doesn't matter. I'd be happy to. I just like— sure, I'd be happy to call them. Welcome everyone. Okay, and then item number 6. Mayor's report. We've got a presentation, Farm Fest review, and that will be Karina. And then, uh, is that the room? Okay, and I have 6.2, Heritage Advisory Commission, and that will be Pete. George Handelander is the committee chair. Okay, and I'll probably, I'll probably introduce Pete, and if you want to introduce the committee chair.

Yes.

Okay, and then we've got item 6.3, presentation on that national Public Works Week, and then we've got presentation from National Police Week. This is Josh. Go to personal appearances. We've got three consent items. We've got approval of meeting minutes, uh, for May 9th, 2023. We're getting very caught up. We are, yeah, we are caught up. Good job, Teresa. We've got item 8.2, resolution, an appointment of Chris Pease to the New Bus Special Service District. And that'll be— all right, it's actually consent item. So, Persky presented on it last week. Yeah, unless you have a question about it. Okay, so we'll just mention that part. And then we've got item 8.3, in order to implement various sections of the code or Place the word Summerfest. That was interesting reading. Thank you, Steve Earl, from Summerfest to Cornfest. Great stuff. And those will be considered— that's a great rule of mine. Absolutely. That's all we hire, some of his finest. We've got item 9, item 9.1. Thank you. How do we want to introduce this? Do we want— you want me to read this entire thing? You don't have to. Just introduce 9.1 regarding the PF zone. I think that's enough. Okay, I'll turn it over to Jason. And then Jason's gonna come up and take us through this. Myself and Ryan. Our tech fixed. That's always the answer with tech. Okay, so we'll do the 3XL one. So, Steve, do we normally discuss this as a council while we're having the presentation, and then after that open up for public hearing?

Typically what happens is staff will give a presentation, which Jason will do, then council has an opportunity to ask Jason any questions they want.

As soon as the council's done with questions, then you open up the public hearing, take public comments, close, come back, then you have discussion among yourselves, ask any other questions that might have come up in that motion. Okay, sounds good. We've got item 9.2, an ordinance amending the license fees we've been speaking about. What did we end up with? Sorry, I missed the last part of the work session. Or will it be told to us then? Yeah, it's pretty simple. The proposal is to exempt accessory apartments From the annual license fee, that initial one. That's what we talked about. Thank you. That was the simplest for us. Quickest presentation tonight.

What's that?

It'll be the quickest presentation tonight. There are a lot of people who will be excited about this, so just so you know. Um, We've got item 9.3, resolution for the care tax allocation. And that's going to be Brandon Nelson and Trevor Bell.

That actually should be ordinance.

It is an ordinance, care tax allocation. I guess I think we just got a miss— just a mistake there. Should be ordinance, but there's an ordinance prepared for your signature.

I have one question about the $10,000 to the attention of this, um, someone talk to them.

Yeah, they have to relocate. Okay. They have to pay more than what they've done.

They're here now. Voting on that $10,000 tonight.

We can change it. He put it in. Okay, I disagree. Thank you for being here.

Be different.

That's fine. Item 9.4, adopting a policy regarding city-owned flagpoles and city social media. He's going to present that. Item 9.5, resolution adopting rules and regulations for government in the state— for government city council. Mayor, I'll just note on those, we've discussed both of these items in a previous work session, so I'm going to be competing with Ryan for shortest presentation. So good luck. Um, and lastly, at 9.6, meaning Section 2.3-10, uh, to authorize the City Council to retain separate legal counsel. And I'll leave that presentation to you. And communication items— Pete, is that where you're talking about introducing that award? That's the only time to do it. Okay, yeah, I'll do that. Uh, yeah, we just got the Milken Award, uh, that's named the best performing— is that how it's phrased, best performing city, or is it— That's how it's being presented, is best performing city.

Is it Provo and Orem, or is it Provo alone?

Yeah, actually, the metropolitan statistical area, that is all of Utah County.

For sure.

So, so are we just going with— there's the quote that you, uh, provided.

Okay, there on the back there's some things about It was in the newsletter today. The city didn't mention it.

If you want to mention it, however briefly, I think it's important. But I know it was probably— okay, I'm just curious. The best way to introduce it is probably the way the award said, which is the formal forum. I would emphasize the forum. All right, we'll work on that. And we have some manager information items. And just told me he's got to get up at 3:45. AM tomorrow to go to the airport with his family. So what are you saying, it's going to be brief? Yeah, will the meeting be over? I was actually just saying I'll be on vacation, uh, available until next Tuesday, and then just make sure you're aware of that. Ryan will be the in-person main contact in my absence. And then the puncture repair work on 1600 North is set to begin this Sunday. Hallelujah. Okay, well, let's adjourn and go into the next meeting. Dave? Dave? Yes, Mayor.

All right.

Hey, your mouse. I got it. That's your sound. Your mouse is on top of the table. Yes, Tim. Test, test, test.

We get first.

I'd like to call this meeting to order and welcome you to our City Council meeting tonight. We appreciate you coming. We'll start off with an invocation from Chris Kilpack and a Pledge of Allegiance from Dean Flygher. And I asked Tom to introduce them.

These are 2 long-term friends and Orem High graduates, I think both, aren't you? And people whose caller ID wasn't working in the last few days, so they accepted my call. Thank you very much. Chris, if you'd come up first.

Our Father in heaven, as we begin this public meeting, we're grateful for the opportunity we have to gather.

We pray that the proceedings of this counseling together will benefit and strengthen this community. Grateful for all who serve and who give of their time, talents, and energies to bring to pass much good for the individual citizens and those who reside within this community. We're thankful for our many blessings, for the opportunities that are ours in this nation, and for the opportunities that we have to assemble and to discuss and to come to understand those important matters that are before us on the agenda this evening. We invite thy blessing and spirit upon us, upon all who will participate in any way. and do so in the name of Jesus Christ.

Amen.

Amen.

Thank you, Chris. And we'd like to have Dean come up and lead us in the pledge.

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, Dean. Okay, we'll move on to item number 6. We've got mayor's report items referred by the council. First, we'll start out, start out with item 6.1. with Karina Ekern to come tell us about Orem Fest.

Okay, good evening, Mayor and council members. We're really excited to be presenting this year's Orem Fest. My name is Karina Ekern. I'm the new SPIE events coordinator. I'm excited because I'll be talking to you about some of the changes that are happening for this year's Orem Fest. I'll talk a little bit about the schedule and then the staff. And then this is Ashley Mann, a member of the Orem Fest committee, and she'll be presenting first on the theme and the logo.

Yes, Karina said I am Ashley Mann, longtime Orem resident. Born and raised, and I have 7 years, I think, on the Orem Fest committee. So we're excited to be here. Um, first and foremost, we are so excited about our new logo, and we just wanted to thank each and every one of you for your input on that and getting it through and everything. And our committee has just been tickled with, with how it turned out and how it looks. And so we just are super excited about that. So as for our theme, our theme this year is Be the One, and the committee decided on this theme— oh, sorry, okay— based, um, on our grand marshal this year, which is the American Legion. And the Legion has a national program for veteran suicide prevention, and the program is called Be the One. So the committee thought that it not only tied in with, with our grand marshal, but also a great theme of encouragement for the community. So again, our theme, Be the One, just ties it all together as for Orem Fest.

Okay, I'm going to be talking about some of the changes that we have. So the first one is On Monday, we're going to be doing the kickoff party with the Rev Road Car Show, and that is a big thank you to John Whitaker for coordinating schedules and making this event, you know, a really memorable way to kick it off. I know it's a little bit different from the past, but we're really excited for this change. The Orms Summer Night's Dream, which is on Wednesday, June 8th— Ashley Coleman has done a fantastic job at finding our storyteller and entertainment for the evening, which is Sam Payne and his jazz quartet. We will also be offering free ice cream sandwiches, and characters are going to be wandering the ground that you can interact and take photos with during the event. For stage entertainment, we've added some, several new local entertainments, including the Sierra Acting Up, the American Rhythm Folk Ensemble, and the Ballet Folklórico Cuatesque de Utah. Also working with Stacy Carlinzi, who is our fitness coordinator over at the Orem Recreation Center, we've added Zumba in the park on Thursday at 7:30 PM, and then yoga in the park as well on Saturday at 9 AM. These are just some examples of stage entertainments that we have, and we feel like this is something fun for everyone. We really wanted the Orem residents to feel like there are many, many options that they can choose from. Next, thank you to Ashley Mann, who is in charge of our summer pool party, and she has worked really hard in revamping the party by adding a DJ and other fun activities to just truly make it a big splash. And then, as you can see, Ann Turner has added some additional times for our kids crafts. It was important to us to increase the accessibility of having more family-focused opportunities. And then lastly, working with Adam Robertson, you can buy tickets through the Seara website starting now to purchase tickets for 50% off to the Mary Poppins production, and that is June 9th through the 24th at 8 PM. And then this is just a general overview of what the schedule looks like. So again, on Monday we have the Rev Road Rally Car Show. We'll have free dinner, the hot dogs, and then kids activities. Tuesday is the Orem Fest pool party, DJ, long games. Wednesday is the Orem Summer Nights Dream, which is located at the Orem University Place Mall. We'll have the storytelling, the characters, music, and then free ice cream bars. And then Thursday is when we start the carnival. So that will start at noon, and it's the family fun day, and we'll also have the food eating competition. Friday, continue on with the carnival. We'll have the added boutiques and then the O-REMS Got Talent. And then Saturday, we have the baby contest in the morning and then the grand parade and the fireworks. There are just a couple other things that I wanted to add and just let you be aware of, and one of them is with tickets. So you can get a discounted wristband, which is $25 prior to June 9th. And then during the event, during the carnival, you can get the wristbands for $30 per individual. So you get that wristband, you have access to the rides and the activities all day. You can also get the presale wristbands or tickets at the Orem Library starting May 30th. With the carnival, we got some great feedback from last year, and we're excited to incorporate more of family-friendly rides for younger children. Any rides that have a 36 height minimum, which is 11 out of the 19 rides that will be coming, parents are allowed to ride along with their children. It was really important to me to meet with the representatives of K'eva Works about making sure that we have rides for everyone. We're working on creating a balance from thrill to family to kiddie rides, and we wanted to add more rides that toddlers and parents can enjoy together. And then lastly, safety. Safety is our top priority. We want to ensure that the community, the community is safe and has an exciting experience while attending Orem Fest. So myself and Liz Wolfe, who is the chair of the committee, are implementing ways that we that we can keep the parade traditions alive while also maintaining protocols that ensure public safety. And then just lastly, I want to give a huge shout out to all of the committee members and all of the staff who are working on Orem Fest. This is a huge event that really showcases the enrichment of traditions here in Orem and then also highlights the values of family.

Thank you, Karina.

Any questions from the council?

I was like, so this is one that I get to oversee as my council assignment, and these are very committed people. They do a great job. They always want it to be safe, fun. And so I appreciate all the work they do. And also, big shout out to Ken Matthews, who really works hard on are getting donors and donations so that, so that we have the means and the money and the, and the food or whatever you want to, to put this on. So special, special thing to Kenna. And but we invite you all to come out and enjoy. I'm sure we'll be getting information from Tess. Usually you give us parking passes and all that stuff in a schedule. And if I'm understanding, the magazine drops next Wednesday. Wednesday. So everyone will be getting a magazine that will outline everything at your home address. So please make sure you keep that and refer to that. And it's, it's a great family fun activity. So thank you.

Thank you, Jeff.

I had the opportunity to serve on the Summer Fest committee for a lot of years, and, and it was a lot of fun and a lot of work. So just want to say thank you to The whole committee and to the supporting staff for making this happen. It's— it is something that we look forward to every year and such a great event. But if you would just give our thanks and appreciation to the entire committee, that would be great. Thank you.

Thank you.

So, Corinna and Ashley, uh, no, we are very excited to see this all come together, and we really appreciate all that you've done and are doing. We're expecting the best Summerfest ever, and it looks like we're on track. So thank you.

Thank you.

Okay, next up, item 6.2, Heritage Advisory Commission. Pete Woffley, if you'd like to present.

Thank you, Mayor and Council.

It's my privilege and honor to introduce George Vandewater, who serves as the committee of the Heritage Commission.

He—

you, many of you are familiar with George.

He's been a longtime emcee for our event.

How many years did you do it?

Since 2006.

Yeah, so since I graduated high school, you've been doing it.

We almost get it right.

George has been a wonderful person to work with over these many years, and I will pass it over to him to kind of tell you what we're doing this year.

Well, we're, we're excited this year. Um, back in 2006, when we took over the program from the VFW post, Max DeSt. George had a practice of placing crosses at the cemetery of all the veterans buried in the 2 armed cemeteries. At that time, we put up 300 crosses. And we continued to do that up until the start of the pandemic, COVID. Then we quit, uh, not sure why. We let things slide. We didn't even keep up to date on who the veterans were that were buried, to be honest with you. This year we met up with the new VFW post, the Max Saint-Jean Post, which is appropriate since he was the one who started the cross project, that we restart the project this year. So we've been in a process of building 300 new crosses, putting name tags on them, and getting them ready and alphabetized to go in. So this is going to be a special Memorial Day program for us. We want to get that project back going and and hopefully the cemetery committee will help us find space to put the crosses. That's always been our problem. Anyway, our telling you about our program is kind of like singing to the choir. Many of you have been participants in it, and we're grateful for that. I've been reading this post 26 years, so as a process of doing that, as as post commander and as county commander, I've had a great experience with the city of Orem. I've come to love it. I've lived here in Orem more years than I've lived anywhere else in my 25 years of the military. So this is home for me, and we appreciate the, the city and the council, and, and the employees in the city have been great. I enjoy working with the people on Heritage Commission, and they'll keep me as long as they'll let me stay. Anyway, our program this year is very similar to what we've done in the past. We always start our program with an introduction from the mayor, um, then we have the invocation. Our invocation this year will be given by our post chaplain, Guy Gurney, 96 years old. a veteran of World War II, Korea, and Vietnam. He still does the military funerals with us as we do them. Then we, uh, the mayor will recognize, uh, visitors. We have a special musical number by a guest speaker, a guest singer, and I won't tell you who she is. It'll be a surprise for you. It's exciting. Then, then we go to the flag ceremony. Our flags fly 24/7 for 6 months, and they get fairly ragged, so we change them out every 6 months, Memorial Day and Veterans Day. We start out by lowering the service flags, taking them down, and then this year the police department honor guard will pleasure us with their performance. in lowering and retiring and posting the new national colors. In November, Veterans Day, then it'll be the fire department. We really appreciate their support over the last couple of years becoming involved in this program with us. Once those are posted and they— the high school orchestra will play the national anthem. It'll be sung by our guest singer. Kelly Kirkpatrick, who is a member of our local post, he's a vice commander, will lead the audience in the pledge. After that, the band will play the different military themes as we repost the national service flags. We now have— how many people remember the days when we only had 4? Army, Navy, Marine Corps, and Air Force. Now we have the Merchant Marine and we have Space Corps. So we are growing in what we do. Um, once that is completed, our firing detail will fire a 21-gun salute, play Taps, and then the mayor will come again and introduce our speaker. Who's going to be Dave? Dave Spencer. I thought it was his dad.

I'm sorry.

Yeah, that's Dave.

Okay. Yeah, great. And we're looking forward to hearing that. After that, we have some remarks again by the mayor. And we will have a booth set up providing poppies for those who want. We will have escorts to help people find their names on the crosses. And we implore you and welcome you all to join us at this day. It's, it's one of the things I look forward to every year. Um, Wren can tell you, I, I don't always get it right, but when I do, I I'm willing to admit that I did it wrong. Thank you very much. We appreciate taking your time.

What time will it be on Monday?

Pardon?

10.

Okay, 10.

Any other questions? Thank you, George. Thank you, Pete. We look forward to that. Next up, item 6.3, Chris Shirkey, Public Works, National Public Works Week.

Mayor and Council, it's a pleasure to be here with you tonight. I just wanted to mention to George that we have a place for you at Public Works to store your crosses if you would like. We've tried to offer that in the past. And so I'll, I'll meet up with you and after the meeting about the crosses that you need to store.

I won't be here.

I have to take care of my wife, but okay, I will contact you.

Okay, we'll be in touch. Okay, thank you. I just wanted to mention, Mayor and Council, that next week is the National Public Works Week, May 21st to 27th. The theme for this year is Connecting the World Through Public Works. You all, you are all invited to our facility where we will be hosting a nice luncheon. It'll be catered by Mobetas. You're all invited, and exec staff and all of our Public Works employees.

Who—

that is Tuesday next week, so that is the 23rd, from 11:30 to 1:30. Just had a few comments I'd like to make regarding our public works organization. We have 7 sections that have a variety of men and women who have a variety of skills that provide services to the citizens of Orem and have done so for many years. I've asked each one of them to give me one or two little, little factoids or points to share with you tonight. I thought I'd start with Parks since theirs was the most humorous. The Parks division— division man or section manager said the majority of our park staff was born after the 2 leaders at Parks started. So yeah, we have a turnover that's occurring, and our leadership is getting older and is going to be retiring soon in Parks. This year they've had some struggles with some staffing, but they have been doing ball field prepping. I just learned this today, from 10 PM to 2 AM for ball field prepping. I'm not exactly sure why. I'm going to find out about that one. Our water section produced 2.7 billion gallons of culinary water last year, and they also installed over 7,000 water meters. In the last 365 days. In our Water Reclamation section, they treated 2.93 billion gallons of wastewater in 2022, and they were in 100% compliance with the State of Utah and the US EPA. They removed over 12 million pounds of pollutants from our water system. Our stormwater group, they, they collected over 2,000 cubic yards of debris off of our public streets through street sweeping program. They try to sweep every street at least twice a year, 2 or 3 times a year, and they do an excellent job at that. Our street section, they laid over 5,000 tons of— or excuse me, they used over 5,000 tons of salt this year. You've had some opportunities to meet with them recently. This is over almost 2.5 times what we normally use. This year we've had a record wet year, and with snow and ice, and so I'm proud to say that they've been able to keep our streets relatively clean and free from debris. However, they've been punished through the, the weather and the harsh weather elements, and, and there's been a lot of potholes that we are now addressing, and so we will be getting on on that quickly. In our fleet section, we have 325— 324 licensed vehicles and 238 pieces of medium-sized equipment that's not licensed, and over 640 units of small pieces of equipment they have to maintain during the course of the year. In our traffic section, we own and maintain 37 lights, but we also maintain 40 lights that are owned by UDOT. And so we do all of the coordination for all of our signal timing throughout the city. And the center point of the signal timing system in Utah County is actually at 800 North and State Street, and that's where it all starts from and emanates from. We also maintain over 35 miles of fiber conduit— fiber, I should say, fiber cables. Some of those cables have maybe 500 strands of cable, so we have thousands of miles of fiber optics. This is totally separate from Utopia fiber. This is fiber that's interconnected and connecting all of our signals throughout the city. I'm proud to say also regarding some certifications, this last year recently we had 3 Grade 4 water distribution operators that received their certification: Denver Foot, Colin Mackey, and Dustin Pace. We've had 1 Grade 4 sewer collections employee, Jace Barr, who received his certification and won Grade 2, also Alex Smith. We also had 7 other employees in our Water Reclamation Section take the exam for the Grade 4 sewer collections, Grade 4 certification, and we will find out shortly how that's going. So we have a dedicated group of employees, men and women, who serve this community and are place a lot of value on quality and, and the services that are provided, level of services that are available to you. I'm proud to say I'm a part of that organization, and I'm grateful to have been here for the last 28 years in this, in this great city. So we look forward to sharing a great lunch with you next week. Come, please come by on May 23rd from 11:30 to about 1:30. We'll have lunch with you. Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Any questions for me or comments?

Yeah, do we have any questions? Okay, I think we're good. And I'll just say, because we've met with your employees in a couple of those lunches, and I've been really impressed as far as you— your organization, Public Works, really is the heart of the beast, and that without you guys doing everything that you do, nothing else would work. So you've got a great organization. Thank you.

Thank you very much. I think— I believe a lot of their DNA is in the trenches of the city, so grateful for the hard work that they provide for us. Thank you.

Thank you, Chris. Next up, we've got Chief Adams for National Police Week.

Thank you. If I could give a quick shout out as well to the Streets Department. They keep a fleet of in excess of 100 police vehicles on the road in spite of the things that we tend to do to them. And I can tell you, as, as a long-term police officer here, nothing is more important for us in the wintertime than to see our snow removal people out working. They directly control the call volume of police activity during the day during inclement weather. And I can tell you that I don't know if they ever went to sleep during this last, last winter we had, but we did not experience any level of proportional rise in the amount of traffic accidents due to roads not being clear, and we attribute that directly to the Streets Department, and I thank them as well. It's my privilege to be here with you tonight to recognize National Police Week, which is currently ongoing. In 1962, President Kennedy designated May 15th as Peace Officers Memorial Day, and the week thereof is National Police Week. In, in the US, there are currently about 800,000 officers serving. Historically, there's been 26,290 officers who have died in the line of duty, 147 of them being our fellow citizens of Utah. This year, Orem Police Department's memorial fundraising efforts provided for 4 of our officers to attend National Police Week in Washington, D.C. They should be landing in about 35 minutes and back to work tomorrow, where they were able to represent us at a number of functions there. We also had 4 additional officers pay their own way to attend and represent us, and I'm grateful for those efforts as well. In 2022, Warren Police Department responded to over 75,000 calls for service and initiated nearly 45,000 contacts with the community, that being traffic stops or approaching people for different issues or other proactive activities. In those, in those efforts, we have solicited the feedback of community members we come in contact with, and we can advise you that we are currently, as of about 45 minutes ago, we have an approval rating of about 85.1%. Based on the activities we generate, the interactions we have with the community. And I will tell you that that's far above any other measurement of any other police department that I know of. I attribute that to the men and women that are out there right now. We actually— I had the notion of trying to bring in the ones that are on duty right now. I looked at the call volume right now and it's hopping, so They're not going to make it in here for— I'm hoping they make it in for dinner at 9 at this point. It's, it's a busy night.

So how many do you have on duty like right now? How many people is this? 10, 10 cops?

More than that.

So what do we have on right now?

I would have to look, but more than 10, probably about 12.

Okay.

Just wondering.

Yeah, and they're, they're, they're dealing with a few fun things right now that we won't go into details on, but it's a busy night in Orem, Utah. I just want to express the gratitude I have for the diligent and careful manner our officers carry out their duties every day. They don't have an easy job. They lean on one another very closely. And I love them and I honor them this week and always. And I would invite you all, Mayor and Council, to attend our honors evening that we'll be having on Thursday at 5 PM— excuse me— here at Library Hall, where a few select awards are given out. And it's just an overall opportunity for us to honor them and the efforts they do. We're blessed to live in a community where we have a a huge amount of support. We're blessed to have a council and mayor that support us, and we're blessed to have surrounding police agencies that come in to come in and cover the city for a couple hours so that all of our officers can actually attend this event. And then we in turn do the same for them and get along fabulously that way. We appreciate again all the, all the support that we receive, and that's it.

Thank you, Jeff. Do we have any questions from the council? Terry?

Just a comment, Chief. Thursday night was the Hope of America, a big event in the Marriott Center, and, and you had a number of the officers there and guys from the fire department. Couldn't have been prouder. In fact, the director, who happens to be my wife, moved them down a row so they were on the floor. They were in front of all the VIPs because they are the big VIPs. So we had all our policemen there, or not all, but I think 8 or 9 policemen on the front row, firemen right behind it.

I'm glad that we were on the front row.

Actually, I appreciate that. Thank you, because I told one of the fire guys, I said, this is not any, any statement, but they all were laughing about it.

That was a statement.

But you're right, Chief. Anyway, it was a great event and they were so loved by kids. There's like 2,400 children sitting across from them. getting to see policemen. Anyway, it is so proud of our guys.

Great night.

So, Jeff, I'd like to hear a little bit about your bike ride that you participated in as part of National Police Week.

So some of you may know that in 2001, my brother, who was just older than me, was shot and killed on a traffic stop as police officer. In the time— in those years following up, one of the meaningful projects I've been able to be a part of is what's called the Police Unity Tour. It's a nonprofit where we ride from the New York City area down to Washington, D.C. on bicycles over the course of 3 days. It's about 300 miles. Obviously, I was not designed to be a bicyclist. You know, it's, it's a, it's a bit of, you know, crawling into my black hole and pedaling for 3 days. It's the 5th time I've done it. And it's, it's meaningful to be able to ride into Washington, our nation's capital. It's meaningful to be able to ride into the memorial. It's meaningful to be able to drive past, ride past my brother's name etched on the memorial wall. And it's meaningful to be with the 40-some-odd thousand police officers that convene this time each year in Washington, DC. And I don't know that I'm going to do it again because I'm just getting too old and too heavy, and my bike doesn't like me.

So, yes, Renee.

So I just want to comment on just a great side of the police that I've seen, and that is your reading to students in our elementary schools. So uplifting. such great role models and such great interactions. I want, if you can communicate that to those who participate in that, that it does make a difference and it's appreciated in those schools where some of them where my children attended, where some of those kids don't have fathers in the home and they don't have a great role model there. And that just shows a really strong, soft individual that will read to them and help them and show them love. So please tell your officers thank you for doing that.

I will. I appreciate that plug. It's something that's very near and dear to us. You know, as a police department, recognize that the children in this community are the most important commodity, and there's nothing more important than them. And we too recognize that for some of the children in our community, that school that classroom is the safest place in their world. They go home to chaos. They come to school for peace and respite. And it's important for us to be able to engage them in a peaceful place. And we enjoy— I've enjoyed— I can tell you that many of our officers have shed tears at the opportunities they've had to interact with some of these kids in these schools reading a book. And I tell you, for— there's not a better— it is by— There's nothing better that I do. That is my favorite thing to do in my, in my job. There's— it's gotten to the point now where there's a little bit of a fight for the slots. The schools are busy and they have curriculum and they don't have a lot of open time, but they're able to carve out times for us to come in and read with them. And we love that. And we appreciate that. And we look forward to— I know we lost— we didn't have time tonight, but I'll be able to present to you in the next work session some of the those statistical accomplishments and stuff, but it's been a significant year for us that way. Appreciate it.

Thank you.

Anybody else? Okay, well, thank you, Chief Adams. We appreciate all you do. All right, next up we've got personal appearances. We've got a little bit of a We just want to make sure we've got everyone speaking in the right place. So we've got personal appearances here, and then we're going to have a public hearing, item number 9 in the meeting, to talk about the rezoning. And so when we have the public hearing for the rezoning, that's when I'd like people who want to talk about rezoning come up then. So let me just try and clarify. And if you, if you're not planning on talking about the rezoning and you want to talk about something else, if you could just raise your hand and then we'll have you come up now. So I've got Abe Sanderson. The zoning. Okay. And then I can't read this next name.

About zoning.

And then we've got Helen Kleinman. She's got zoning. John Barrick. John, are you zoning or— You're—

Okay.

And then we got the last person, that's zoning. Okay, so let's, let's just go ahead and have John come up now and speak about whatever you'd like to in the public hearing.

Hi, thank you for the opportunity to speak. My name is John Barrick. I'd like to talk a little bit about ASD's recent announcement of restructuring or splitting potentially. First, I want to thank the City Council for those that pushed Proposition 2, and while it was unsuccessful, it brought enough information to those across the district that the board is now saying that there's enough friction that they're willing to have a study on restructuring or splitting the district. I'm not sure that that's totally honest, but that's what they're saying, so we'll take them at their, at their, at their word. But I wanted to thank you for all that you did to bring that information forward. Almost every city within the Alpine School District is asking some of the same questions that you asked, and when they have to provide every city with, with numbers, they can't lie about what's happening within one city. As an example, in their February work meeting, the board has been getting a number of calls from angry citizens across other parts of the district claiming that they're tired of subsidizing Orem, you know, $30 million a year. Now, as you know, the Utah Taxpayers Association said that's patently false. But ASD can't say that they lied to, you know, convince Orem to stay with them. So they're getting heat on it, so it's always nice when things come back karma. As you know, Alpine School District announced the closure of 5 schools, including 2 in Orem. They only had— they're blaming that on the bond, as I've said before, but there was only one fix for a seismic issue on the bond in 2026, 5 years, you know, 3 years from now, but they're closing 5 schools because of seismic issues now. That math does just doesn't add up, kind of like ASD's claims about Orem's finances. In addition, they are— they have announced, you know, like I mentioned, the restructuring split, which they want to have a study done by this fall and put it on the 2024 ballot. And once again, I would like to thank you about that. My wife did send you a letter about the rezoning issue, so please take a look at that. But I would like to mention to you that Lehigh City and the Alpine School District jointly passed a resolution in 2018 that says, whereas Lehigh City, Alpine School District, and the City of Saratoga Springs, owners of property throughout Lehigh City further described by the legal description as our public places, and which is similar to what you're doing. I don't know why they're treating Lehigh and Saratoga Springs different than every other city within the Alpine School District, but I applaud you on, on your changes that way, and thank you for your time.

Thank you.

All right, we'll move on to item number 8, the consent items. And the consent items on our agenda are an approval of meeting minutes for May 9th, 2023, and item 8.2, a resolution, an appointment of Chris Pease to New Voss Special Service District. And we discussed that previously. Item 8.3, an ordinance amending various sections of City of Orem code to replace the word Summerfest with the word Orem Fest. So would somebody like to make a motion on those?

I move that we approve the consent items.

Second.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye. Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

The consent items pass. Thank you. Now we'll move to item number 9, scheduled item. And this is to talk about our new zoning ordinance that we're proposing. So we'll have a presentation from Jason Bench and Ryan Clark. And then we'll have a discussion and then an open meeting.

So if you'd like to go ahead.

Yes, thank you, Mayor, members of the council. Tonight we want to discuss the application before you tonight, which is to rezone public facilities, city-owned properties, and also Alpine or school properties located within the city limits of Orem. So there's various sections that we're going to talk about. One is the creation of the PF zone, which is public facilities zone. public facility zone, and then also rezone the properties that mentioned to that. We'll show you on a map those properties that are included. You can see the zones that are part of that rezoning, all those to a PF zone, and also amending portions of the general plan to specify the reasons and justifications why creating that PF zone. A couple of the things that we want to just talk about, the purposes why we're doing this. One is to preserve public land. That's a priority for the council, and so the application tonight does preserve those lands. It's public facilities, those that have been used in past history, whether it's schools that have been around for a long time or city properties, whether that's a detention basin, this city building, or other facilities that are currently and have been previously used. We want to rezone those to public facility. Part of that is to identify— if somebody's looking at a zoning map, it's not uncommon for a city to identify public facilities in a different zone. Orem has not had that in the past, but there are other cities, 2 of which I know in Utah County— Provo City, which is obviously its own school district, but Lehi City also has properties. All their properties, whether it's Lehi City property or Alpine School District property, is currently zoned as a PF. That was done several years ago. And then precedent is also in Provo, where all of their public facilities, including schools, with the exception of the new high school out in the west— they have not caught up with that zoning— but the other zoning, or the other Dixon Elementary, Timpanogos High School, all those are— Timbview, excuse me— are zoned PF. So it's not an uncommon thing or request to rezone those. If somebody is looking at the map, they would be able to distinguish that as a public facility different than a residential zone. Right now they're all— a lot of them are zoned R-8, which is hard to distinguish where the school is on a zoning map. It also helps the city in looking at when we do density studies and different things. We have to now extract out all the public facilities. It's easier if that's not included in that zone. It allows us to do a little better data collecting as well. The other purpose is to ensure that that is those properties are preserved for future. It's a public facility now. People move into neighborhoods knowing that there's a school there, knowing that there's, you know, some facility there, and they want to make sure that that remains. And so this is an option for the city to rezone those and then still have the option. As you are aware, being on the council for quite some time, we have requests for rezones all the time, and that is the process that they would use to come in if They want to rezone that property, they would go through that normal process that any other developer typically does when they want to rezone a property. So just, I want to go through some of the changes. I'll go through them quickly, but it basically— this is the sections that we're amending, basically creating the PF zone. We currently obviously don't have that in there, so we're creating that language that would allow us then to rezone properties to the PF zone. And as you go through that, you'll see that there's modifications there. We also creating standards within the PF zone. You can see the column there outlined in red. The minimum lot size of a PF zone would be 5 acres. Minimum lot area is 5 acres, and then the setbacks. If someone were to redevelop the school, wants to add on, or converts to a different type of use, whether that's a charter school or whatever, then there would be standards typical you see in other zones, 25-foot front, 25-foot rear, and a maximum of 48 feet high, with a stipulation. You can see down below that if it's within 150 feet of a residential zone, that it would be limited to 35 feet. So there are some clarifications on that as well. And you can see there's different sections that basically add the public facilities zone to the sections. The land uses that would be a part of that. So we will create a PF land use standard land use code. And basically you can see that the different land uses that are proposed— single-family is one of those uses, some different residential uses that are currently allowed within a residential zone, and then anything that would be similar to, you know, government use, whether that's a detention basin, whether that's a well house, those types of things. And then also public schools, private schools, and charter schools, including, you know, athletic fields, general parks, orchards, things like that would be typical of what you'd see in a public facility zone. These are the only uses that you see here that would be permitted in the PF zone. So this is the proposed zoning map. You can see in the light blue, those are all the public facility zones. They're not distinguished between Let me go back. I think I skipped over that map. Here's the distinction between Alpine School District and Orem city properties. Blue is the Alpine School District properties. You can see all the schools outlined. The yellow is the city properties. You can see the golf course, parks, those things that are adjacent to the schools, cemetery, those types of things are outlined in the map. So as we go to the zoning map, You will see that all of those now are treated as one zone, the PF zone. And as part of that, we also update the general plan, which we talked about a little bit, just to start describing in the general plan the purpose and reasons for the public facilities zone. And then the general plan map will also match the zoning map to show the properties that will be public facilities in nature. I'll turn some time to Ryan.

Mayor and Council, we reached out to our financial advisors, Lewis Young Robertson and Burningham, to look into some data that would suggest that the future of these properties in Orem would lend itself to being preserved as public open space. And it's a difficult task. It's kind of trying to predict the future when we don't necessarily know what the future holds. But they came away in this memo they published, and we sent that out to you in your emails. If you haven't had a chance to review it, it is in there, but I will touch on those main points right now. There were 5 things that they kind of identified as elements that should be considered, including preserving land for future schools, whether they're public or charter. Multigenerational living could impact our school numbers, housing turnover as our population ages, ADU units as those continue to grow in numbers in the city and increase population growth just in general. Charter schools. Just since 2013, and these are 4 requests that specifically I received asking for assistance when I was doing economic development, had 4 charter schools, 3 reach out to me looking for land in Orem. One was actually proposed a zone change so that it could locate relocate into an area that didn't allow it, and that zone change was denied at the time, and that school still remains in its current location. So we think there is, uh, based on this memo and just our past experiences, there could be a possibility that charter schools will need land in Orem in the future. Um, some research that KSL did in an article in 2022 showed that charter school enrollment continues to increase in the state. So even though public school numbers may go down, charter schools numbers may be going up, and that could impact Orem as well if charter schools continue to grow in size or new schools are developed. Multigenerational living— this is when you have multiple generations of family members living under one roof. A couple of examples are grandma and grandpa are aging and they need someone to help take care of them, so grandkids move in with their families or their children move in with their children to help take care of grandma and grandpa, or their kids who have kids now need help with daycare, so they move back in with mom and dad. And so some of the data out there shows that in the US, about 19% of households are intergenerational. And so if you apply that number to Orem at a conservative 12%, that could account for an additional 228 students in a very conservative manner. Housing turnover is probably what would impact school enrollment more than anything in Orem, and the population continues to age as the boomers reach up into the 65 and older, and Orem's demographics are showing that that's happening from 1990 to 2020. alone, the number of people over the age of 65 in Orem has greatly increased. Using that data and applying some math to it based on the life expectancy of Utah residents, you can anticipate that during 20— between 2042 and 2046, approximately 20% of homes in Orem will turn over and be bought by younger owners. Now, of course, by 2042, Millennials will no longer be millennials. We'll have other generations of youth that are now that age that are buying homes. But based on current data from the National Association of Realtors, current 23 to 31-year-olds and 32 to 41-year-olds are 43% of our homebuyers. Of course, if you're that age, you're usually going to have children still that are living at home. And so as those homes turn over and people age out, we should see a school enrollment increase. Also, with the addition of accessory dwelling units, they are growing in Utah and in Orem every year. I think, Jason, remind me, we're adding about 35 units approximately on average.

Approximately.

Those are typically occupied by singles or young couples with smaller families. And so you could see some kindergarten to 6th grade children that are living in ADUs, especially with the housing prices the way they are. Those young families have to start out somewhere, before they can afford a home. And then just in general, we talk a lot about MAG, the Mountainland Association of Governments, and they deal with population predictions as well as the state of Utah does. And their data is showing us reaching a population of 127,000 by 2050. A lot of factors have to come into play for us to hit that number and densities associated with that. Right now, we're adding a lot of density. And so it's— who knows if we'll ever hit that number, but if we did, that's a lot of people we'd be bringing into Orem, and that's equivalent to many small cities. And so how many school-age kids are associated with that number, we don't know, but the odds are there's a pretty good number. The conclusion in their plan, again, is that nobody can know that any of this will certainly happen. These are just possible possible scenarios, elements to consider as you debate if we should set aside this land for future public use. But I know, as we as staff have looked at it, we, we're guessing— we were just talking on the side, a sidebar— that we're about 90% built out in areas of residential development. And most of that area is down in the southwest part of Orem that hasn't been built out. So for someone to come in and build a school later on down the road, acquiring that land is going to be very expensive. It's going to be very difficult. We're, for example, we're struggling to find land to buy for a fire station, and it's been a real challenge to find that availability, availability, and we're only looking for a couple of acres. So imagine looking for a 5 to 10 acre school site, be very difficult to find that at some point in the future. One last thing, this is outside of that study, but just as you're well aware, Alpine School District just voted to look at a potential reconfiguration of the district. At this point, we have no idea how that will impact our schools, and it's one more reason that that land should be preserved right now while we find out what will happen with that study that, from what I understand, will hopefully be done in September. And we'll know what the results are. With that, I'll pass it back to Jason.

So the Planning Commission did review this request. They did make a positive recommendation to the council to consider creating the PF zone, to consider rezoning the properties outlined to that PF zone, and modify the general plan and general plan map as proposed. I'd be glad to address any questions.

Debbie, I know we had several open houses And I'm assuming you captured some information, perhaps tallied their views. Do you have a sentiment of what the open houses— were people in favor, against? Do you have any feel for what that was like?

I think we should have copies of all the minutes and things that we did. It was a— I think it was an even split, at least at the meetings. I felt more positive comments towards the rezoning. As we looked at the data, it was more of a split between that. So it's— it was So it was kind of a, I would say, 50/50.

Okay, thank you.

Could, could a fire station be built in a PF zone?

Yes.

Thank you.

Dave.

So Jason, we received quite a few emails from people and, and the question is asked, are we trying to devalue the property so Alpine Scooters can't sell it?

And the answer is no.

And can you, can you maybe clarify what happened with Hillcrest? Because I know for a fact that Optimus Goods wanted it commercial so they could get more money.

And I'll defer that to Ryan because he knows more about that.

Okay, maybe you can help us on that because—

Yeah, from what I understand from the process, and I wasn't involved at the time, so Brent filled me in a little while ago, so he can speak better to it. But we appraised the value of the land based on a residential zoning. Which is what the zone was at the time, was R-8, and that was what the appraisal came back as, and that was what we paid, the value associated with that. Now, there were 2 appraisals done. The school district had an appraisal done, and we did an appraisal, and then the 2 appraisals were averaged together, and that is how state code determines how that valuation is, is completed.

And then I have a question for Bren. So also in the email, it states that that we haven't met with Alpine School District.

So we met with them on Tuesday morning, March 21st, sorry. And in, in the agenda for that meeting, we intended to talk about the rezoning specifically. It ended up being about a 2-hour meeting where we talked about a series of items, so we didn't get to the, the rezone subject in person in the meeting. However, immediately afterwards, I went and emailed them the, the what we were looking to do with this rezone notification. And I got relatively quick responses back from, from Rob Smith and Shane Farnsworth, the superintendent and assistant superintendent, indicating that essentially just kind appreciation and they looked forward to to continuing to meet with us and work with us moving forward.

Okay, thank you.

And doesn't our staff meet with them regularly?

Yeah, I mean, Ryan can give a little more update on, on that.

Yeah, we have a monthly meeting where we— their operations team meets with kind of our operations team, and we met last week and went over just a couple things, and we have a very good working relationship where We help them with problems they're facing and they help us with problems we're facing, and we coordinate our facilities that we share together.

And then our efforts to have a board and council combined meeting, our requests, I guess you would say, the response that we've heard about that. Bryn, would you comment on that?

Sure. So a couple of weeks after that initial meeting on On March 21st, I followed up with, with Shane, and essentially, in summary, his response was that they intended— their board intended to kind of treat the City of Orem the same as they treat and interact other cities in the district. Namely, on a case-by-case basis, with a couple of their board members that, that are kind of over maybe a particular jurisdiction. meet with a couple of council members of a respective city to talk about an item that is, is sort of mutually desired to speak to. So that was essentially Shane's response, that their desire was to kind of interact with the city on a case-by-case basis in that manner, like they do with other cities.

And that's like going forward into the future, right? That's our that's our anticipated meeting schedule into the future is based on what their request was?

Correct. That was at least their response.

And that, just to clarify, that was a couple council members and a couple of ASD board members would meet, but they didn't want to meet as their board and our city council. Is that correct?

Correct. That was their response.

Yes.

Correct, right? A smaller meeting doesn't need to be noticed.

Correct.

Unless there's 4 city council members. Yeah.

Like you had with them on March 21st.

Correct.

Yeah.

So I've got also some for, for Jason and Ryan. So in this email it says that this person reached out to some experts who are people who are experts, including city administration. So they may call you and ask you about this Do you have any idea of the zone?

No.

So I guess you're not experts, I guess.

Apparently not.

Okay, thank you.

Any other questions?

Okay, Debbie.

Um, you know, Sharon and Windsor are next to parks, so it really does make sense to keep them public. But what about something like Parkside that is kind of an odd school where it's at? Geneva's been leveled. At some point, if that one were closed and they rebuilt, let's say, on the Geneva property, how would that affect Parkside? I guess I'm trying to figure out the future, what that would look like for that. So it's a little different than the other ones. And, and like I said, it's a— would we deal with that on a case-by-case basis, or what are you thinking?

It could be. I just like the Hillcrest, when the Alpine School District decided to sell the property. Could happen with Parkside. Geneva's property, and they may have too much property to maintain, the first right to purchase the property is the City of Orem, right? We do have a park in that area, so it would make sense for the city to come in and buy that and convert it into a park. Now, if in the event the city chooses not to, then Alpine could go through the same process that I discussed earlier and come in and request a rezone, or a developer could come in if that's— our decision is not to buy it. allow them to sell it to somebody else, then they would go through that same process that we require everybody to go through, which is the rezoning process.

Right, so we, we could deal with a unique piece of property in the future is what I'm trying to get at.

Yes, and the main thing I guess I want to point out is, according to state law, the City of Orem has the first right to buy any school district property. So I mean, there is a safe, I guess, guard or whatever between somebody just claiming that they're going to develop it, they got a developer already ready in line, they're going to sell it immediately. That's not the case based on the state law requires them to offer it to the municipality first.

May I ask a question? So the, the PF zone, when you say for governmental use, is that for municipal governmental use?

Yes.

State— well, state's exempt from any local zoning anyway. So A city or a state use could go in any zone regardless of what the zone is, so the PF is not designed for a state government entity. It's really for the municipality.

And does it, does it more easily facilitate a state zoning taking?

No, the state will preempt any, any zoning that we have.

So these PF— I'm looking at your Appendix A, the residential uses. 1261, 1262, 1281, 1285. Um, can you maybe explain those to me?

So those are uses that are currently permitted in that area, the R-8 zone, or similar areas or similar locations around the school. Those are some uses that we thought would be appropriate in the fact that they're already permitted subject to those standards.

So, okay.

Any other questions? Okay, we'll go ahead and open this up to a public hearing. And I guess just for order, we can go down this list the way it is, and then anyone who would still like to speak after that is public hearing, so they're welcome to speak also, even if you haven't signed up. Um, first we've got Abe Sanderson. If you just give your name and address.

Yeah, I have about a page that I prepared. If I read real fast, I can squeeze it under 3 minutes, but my son also said I'd like to introduce him, explain why he's here today, and he said he would like to address. So I think combined it should be no more than 4 and a half minutes, 4 minutes. Is that okay?

Yeah, that's okay.

Introduce myself first. My name is Abe Sanderson. I've been an Orem resident for 10 years, and all 4 of my children have gone through Orem schools. Some of them are graduated out and currently attending UVU. Most of them are still in Orem school system. Thank you, Mayor Young, council members, for letting me speak today. Like most of my neighbors, some of whom I have brought— who I've invited today, the first I'd heard about the rezoning proposal was when I received this mailer 3 days ago. The text seemed innocuous enough, but the inclusion of school properties was puzzling to me. Having lived, lived 10 years within walking distance of 3 of the school properties listed, it seemed that the maintenance of the green spaces were in good hands. Lawns have always been well manicured and watered, and the school will have abundant shade from trees. My gut told me this was a solution in search of a problem. On the surface, the request seems reasonable enough. I, like many other Orem residents, enjoy the trees and grass that keep the city feeling personable and quaint in the face of rapidly expanding young populace. If your proposal is limited to only city parks, cemeteries, and the wildlife regions near Utah Lake and Provo Canyon, I suspect you will find little or no resistance. But on the subject of Orem Schools, this body has already broken a delicate trust with the members of the city. I will not endorse a decision to hand any greater degree of control over the school properties to the council's hands, and I will not allow this body to perform an end run to wrest control of the school district through manipulation of zoning laws and landscaping regulations. There is no more important issue to me as a voter than education. In fact, it is so valuable that since Saturday I've done a significant amount of homework. Though you have claimed that the zoning proposals is not about rehashing old issues around our disagreements with Alpine about policies and funding, the facts show much of the affected land for this rezoning is currently owned by Alpine School District, and any process to repurpose the areas would involve approval from Warren Planning Commission. As the laws stand today, by switching to a general public facility zone, there are much fewer barriers to at best micromanage the groundskeeping of school district properties, and at worst convert school properties to park spaces. Both would only serve to further strain the relationship the city has with our school district. Nothing about this proposal would resolve our funding problems around schools. Any resident or council member here just doubts or disputes this, I will happily point to the relevant sections in the text of the ordinance and the attached appendix. The most probable outcomes would leave Orem students in a much worse place with regards to their education, more cramped schools and disillusioned, tired teachers. We must find healthier ways to cooperate with Alpine School District to settle our school finances, and we must stop demonizing our teachers and school officials over their Over their best efforts to handle—

If you can reset that clock to 1.5 minutes, just give them another 90 seconds.

I'm almost finished. We must stop demonizing our teachers and school officials over their best efforts to handle a once-in-a-lifetime, once-in-a-century health crisis. This next section, just one paragraph. I would like to address specific council members. If not, I can just read the text. I'll read it as addressed to the body.

You can do it however you like.

Okay. In the previous council hearing on this topic, other residents expressed the concerns I have raised. At the time, it seems much of their concern was waved away. Perhaps Mayor Young felt they were, quote, confused about the issue, similar to how he explained away the resounding defeat of last year's ballot measure that rejected a formation of an independent Orem School District. To the council members who supported Proposition 2, put simply, you lost. Despite overspending opposition groups by over 4 times, despite testing the limits of ethics and laws related to electioneering, the voters told you in no uncertain terms, this is not what we want.

Okay, you can have 30 seconds. Try and keep it factual and try and keep it factual. There were no election laws that were stretched. So if you can stick with the facts, we'd appreciate it.

Yeah.

Right. No. If you can, if you could, if you can let— you've had over 3 minutes and you said a minute and a half for your son.

So, okay.

I'd like— this is my son, Colin Sanderson. Today we had a conversation about education and why education is important. He's had a hard time, just like those city officials, just like the school officials over the last 3 years. And now he's facing the consequences of it. I will not allow you to mess with his education. I'm sorry.

It's okay.

Go ahead.

I think I'm Colin Sanderson, and I think education is extremely important, and I think you're undermining the opinions of the students, and I think you are— sorry— overstepping a bit of your power. And I think that there shouldn't be parks in between education. Also, I think that this is going to mess with some people's education, and I think that it's It's going to do more damage than you think it's going to do good, and I just don't think it should happen.

Thank you.

Okay, thank you.

I have a copy of the text here.

Okay, next up we've got Helena Kleinman.

Mayor and City Council, Helena Kleinlein, Orem resident, and I am supportive of of rezoning public school properties to public facilities, just as Lehi City did in 2018. This provides us an exceptional opportunity to encourage charter and private schools to come into Orem after a much-needed law was just passed. So in the last legislative session, the state of Utah passed Utah Fits All into law. This now means that every single family with a school-aged child, regardless of income levels, will now have the opportunity of $8,000 to spend however they want— homeschool, charter, or public school. Orem school system was built on community schools. Alpine does not support community schools. They want much larger schools. We can now see that Alpine has every intention of closing. Closing many more of our community schools in the next 5 years. Once this land is sold to developers, we will never be able to regain this valuable land for the purpose of educating our children. Thanks to this new law, Utah is absolutely going to see an influx of charter schools. What a wonderful opportunity Orem now has to welcome and even encourage charter and private Schools into our city. Sharon Elementary School, which is being closed, scored 2 out of 10 on an academic achievement score. That is not acceptable for any child under any circumstances. If a charter school bought that property, it would be so beneficial for our children, our families, and the Orem community at large. One of the best things we can do for our children is to offer competition in the academic environment, because no one should be happy with a 2 out of 10. This would also benefit children who choose to stay with the Alpine School District, because if Alpine has to compete with charter schools, they will be forced to address the low scores in the critical subjects of math, English, and science. Every charter school currently in Orem scores an 8, 9 or a 10 out of 10 academically. As our police chief said, our children are our greatest resource. Every child in Orem deserves a solid academic education. And thanks to Utah Fits All, we now have the opportunity to welcome charter and private schools into Orem by following Lehi's leads, by rezoning all our school district land into public facilities.

Thank you.

Next, I've got Dan. I can't quite read the last name. Dan, there's gotta be a Dan out there.

I can't, but I can sign it. Okay.

Well, it looks like Dan Puri. So anyway, anyone named Dan is welcome to come up.

So my name is Dan Pulver. I have 2 properties in Orem. Both are adjacent to the PF zones, one on 1600 South in Orem and one, luckily, right there in front of Nielsen's Grove Park. My question to you guys, being an Orem resident for over 30 years, talking To you guys multiple times, maybe not the same group, multiple times when I've turned around and approached the council. Orange City does not like rezoning. They call it spot zoning. And in my mind, what we're doing right here, this looks like a great big huge thing of spot zoning. Maybe you guys can clarify my mind. Over the 30 years that I've been taught that this— to me, this looks like you're trying to spot zone.

Thanks.

Thank you.

Well, this is a public hearing. If there's anyone else would like to comment.

Hi guys, you've seen me before. I also got up and I gave comments when the Planning Commission had a meeting about this. And oh, I'm Karen Adamson again, still. Um, I think that this is something that is past due. This is something that we needed to have done a long time ago before Orem was anywhere near 90% built out. We watched the orchards go. And this is something where we need to have something. We— Orem is going to be a city for a long, long time, and our public needs are going to change over the years. It won't always be for a school. It won't always be about Alpine School District, but we need public facility zones so that we can have property for a fire department, like you said. So I think this is my opinion, and my comment is just that this is long overdue.

Thank you.

overdue.

So thanks for considering it.

Thank you.

Do we have anyone else that would like to comment? Okay, well, thank you. We'll close the public hearing, and we'll open this back up to the council to discuss.

So someone mentioned teachers, and, and I would like to publicly thank the teachers in Orem. We've had— I was educated elementary school, junior high, high school in Orem. My wife was, my children were, and there's incredible teachers. There's teachers that were really invested in what's going on in Orem. They bought homes there. They still have homes here. They've raised their children here, and they care about what happens to our education of our children. So to them, I thank you. And to those that have served in the PTA, I thank you. A lot of mothers, fathers were involved with the PTA these last few months, and, you know, very disappointing, they were hearing all sorts of information. And I think their heads were spinning because their, their intent was what's best for our children. But I thank those that serve in the PTA that care about our children. I care about our kids. So it's interesting. I mean, this history of, you know, trying to preserve schools in Orem. Alpine School District was— had a bond proposal, $595 million. So that's a lot of money. They were having public meetings to talk about that. And one of their meetings, I believe, is on October 18th. They put a slide up showing possible closures and consolidations of schools in Orem. I believe there were 7 on that slide. So that slide was shown to the people talking about the bond at that time. They talked about what they were going to spend in Orem. There was just 2 paychecks they're going to— 2 amounts of money spent in Orem. And this is kind of significant, I think. One was Orem High School, the newest high school in Orem, was going to get a multi-purpose room. The other one was Timpanogos High School in Orem was getting a multi-purpose room. That's it. So $595 million, there's very little spent in Orem. People whose children go to Mountain View, just kind of make a mental note of that. There was not anything being spent on Mountain View, and I'll circle back about that. But so anyway, there was a citizen in Orem, did a press release, sent that to the local press saying Alpine is talking about possible— catch that, possible— school closures. That's what they talked about in Orem, up to like 7. Right after she put that press release out, Alpine District, which is a billion-dollar company— that's with a B— went to work, trashed this lady for her report. KSL, See if I can find it here. KSL retracted the story where they were talking, where they showed the slide that the district had shown at a meeting. And let's see here. This is really interesting. KSL— so, oh, and Alpine School District sent an email, by the way, to every parent in the district saying that was categorically false. That's what's sent to every, every parent in Alpine School District. So the end of this article, the KSL article retracting this press release showing what the district was going to do, said Alpine School District says it is not closing these schools. That was October 20th. So since that time, that's not that long ago, they announced Sharon and Windsor. They're closing. They just said they're not going to close any schools. They closed 2 more. By the way, they already closed 3. So, well, that, you know, if they close it, then hopefully that's great because the money stays in Orem. Well, not so fast. Hillcrest was sold. Orem City paid, bought Hillcrest. So you as taxpayers bought it twice. You built Hillcrest and then tried to protect that neighborhood. The city buys it. So taxpayers, we buy it again. Uh, Geneva's closed, leveled. Uh, Polaris, an alternative high school which was greatly needed in this part of the district, was closed and sold. Now, not one penny of that went back to Orem. The district took it, took it someplace else. So I'm just building up for why I support what's going on here. But, uh, so anyway, after, uh, after this lady was trashed about her, uh, press release saying what was going on, then the district— and the district denied it. Then a few months later, they announced they're closing Sharon and Windsor. So if you live— I mean, if your kids went— and you can call me crazy, but look at the slide. If your kids went to Mountain View, that's pretty prime property. That's on Center Street in Orem. What if the district has that on their list to close? They're not spending any money on Mountain View. How about, how about Orem Junior High on 8th North in Orem? How about Lakeridge across the street from UVU? So that's, that's pretty devastating to our city. So I just, I just mentioned this, this is a concern as a member of the City Council, is where are children going to go to school? I appreciate the Lewis Young report that Ryan showed us. Very interesting, the study that they did. Talking about potential growth in our city. So the children now in Orem either go to private schools, charter schools, home schools, Provo School District— which a fair number go to Provo School District, by the way, really bugs me as an Orem citizen— or public schools. So our children are not all just going to the Alpine School District. So I think we have a responsibility as a city council to say, let's preserve the schools. The district can do, you know, will do what they want, and that's their decision. But we as citizens need to say what's going to happen for our future. There's, there's a huge benefit of a public school and a public school and of neighborhood school. And you all think about your experience in your neighborhood school. By the way, I think most of you here could name all of your teachers in elementary school?

I'll bet you could.

Isn't that interesting, the impact they have on your lives? I can. I think I can. So I think it's really important as a city council we say we need to be responsible, we need to protect these school sites if the district came back or if charter school or whoever moved back to that school. So, Orem, we have 2 representatives from Orem that are on— that serve on the city council. So, you know, of course they would have been supporting Orem because we elected them. They, they serve us. So anybody wonder how our 2 elected officials voted when they said, should we close 2 schools in Orem? They vote absolutely yes. They voted for it. Kind of disturbing. That's the people that represent us that voted, yeah, close the schools. None of the money stays here. So as a member of the City Council, I strongly support changing this zone. The demographics in Orem are changing, at least they are in my neighborhood. Older people are dying off, as the Lewis Young report stated. As they're dying off, younger families are moving into those homes. Now I live in a 40-year-old neighborhood. Maybe your neighborhoods are newer and that's not happening, but I'm seeing it in my neighborhood. And so You know, I just look for, uh, you know, this opportunity to say let's be loyal to our teachers. By the way, I mentioned the teachers the first. Where's that teacher going to go that bet their career on teaching in Orem? Now, now the district's saying best of luck. So now are they going to drive to Eagle Mountain? Nothing against Eagle Mountain, but if any of you want an experience, drive to Eagle Mountain in the middle of the wintertime along that road. Uh, and I won't even tell you what a member of the Alpine School Board said when I served there. I won't repeat what he said about people that have to drive on that road, but anyway, that's pretty scary. So, uh, that, that doesn't show a lot of loyalty to the teachers. They were trying to be loyal to us, and they have been loyal to us as citizens. So, um, you know, I mean, I could keep going, but I, I just think it's really important that we show that we support the teachers, we support the students, we support parents. We care about education as a city council. Let's preserve those properties so those will be schools. Anyway, I'm done, Mayor. How was that? How's that for a 1-minute comment?

That was great.

Dave, did you want to make—

you're flashing.

Oh, okay.

I'm sure everybody wants to say something. Who wants to go next?

He says you can go.

Well, so Steve Covey said, do the right things for the right reason in the right way is the key to the quality of life. And for me personally, I feel like we're possibly going about the right thing, but we're going about it the wrong way. I, you know, we— I feel bad that we have— I think we all have the same goal, the same vision in mind that we want what's best for our children, for our students, for the teachers. My hope would be that we could come to a point— I mean, yes, Alpine School District has said that they're going to be closing some schools or restructuring the district and having that, those conversations. I feel like we should be invested in those conversations. I feel like we should have open public meetings and be a part of that meeting process to make sure that our needs are met, that Orem citizens' needs are met, and that our educational needs are met for our children. I have some concerns about these properties sitting vacant if they are closed, and if they sit vacant for a long period of time, worried about the liability that this will become. And I'm concerned about what happens with this property. What does this property become? Do we start having broken windows? Do we start having graffiti showing up on these vacant buildings? I'm concerned about those who have property adjacent or in the same neighborhood, that their property values will decrease. And so to me, it feels like you know, maybe this is the right thing to do. I feel like our best interests and our best process would be to collaborate and to work with our community partners rather than tear them down, to be negative. And, you know, I feel like we can do more working together than we can tearing those partnerships apart. And I know that that goes both ways. So I, you know, my hope would be that, that we could get to a point that we could work more collaboratively and more in a partnership with those who have vested interests in— vested interests in the City of Orem as well.

Thank you. Do we have anyone else would like to say something?

Could I just say one other thing?

Sure.

Is that okay?

It—

and I hesitate to say this, but listening to— and that's all I'm trying to do is listen. I don't know which way I'm going to go on this thing. I'm trying to listen, I'm trying to decide, and I have to say that there is a— from the communications that I've been receiving, there's a concern from a lot of our citizens that this is a gotcha move against Alpine School District. And so if, if If that's the case, shame on us. And so I feel like, as elected representatives, I'm glad that we're able to have this open discussion openly. But I'm concerned that that many people in the public feel that way, that we're doing this for some other reason to control this property, and we could go into land use rights and, and all of those kind of things, devaluing the possibility of this property being devalued. I, as was stated, I don't know what the future holds, and I think it's, I think it's wise to put aside property because they ain't building more land in Orem. And so, but I guess my concern is the way that we've gotten here. Sometimes doing the right thing for the wrong reason can lead to a different situation. My hope is that we can do the right thing for the right reason. And to quote Dr. Covey, is the right way to the key to the quality of life.

Thank you.

Dave.

Yeah, I just want to make one, uh, a few comments, um, for Mr. Sanderson. Uh, he mentioned that, uh, we lost. And my question, my, my comment to you is the reason I put it on the ballot, because men and women died for our freedom to be able to choose. So we gave you a choice to say yes or no. It doesn't matter how you voted, but we gave you that opportunity. So that's my stance. No, I'm speaking.

You can't speak.

No, you can't. So my, my, my thing is, Jason, is this a retaliation to Alpine Scooters?

I asked that question before. No.

Not in my opinion.

So my question here is, if this zone is changed, it just adds another step that Alpine has to go through if they want to change and do something else. So to me, I think it's the checks and balances, and I think that is the responsible thing to do for the citizens of Orem and the children of Orem and the teachers of Orem. I, I believe strongly that My dad fought in the military, and that's in my DNA, and I'm not going to take anybody's choice to vote away. And that's, that's my— and I've been— that's been my stance from day one. So don't say I lost, because everybody lost if you didn't get an opportunity to vote. So I'm, I'm in favor of the zone because I think it's just the checks and balances. It's not a retaliation against Alpine School District. Even though they've retaliated against Orem. So, you know what, I think this is a good step. Lehigh has it, and so does Provo. So why did they do it? And why did Alpine School District agree with Lehigh? See, so it goes hand in hand. So I'm voting yes for it.

I agree with it.

Thank you.

Anybody else?

Wow.

Yeah, I have some things to say too here that I hope can bring this— first of all, I want to say partnerships are not based on assumptions. Partnerships are based on communication. And I just want you all— I just want to communicate right now at this point that when this discussion came up for us to move forward with the zoning, the entire council, 7 to 0, agreed. that we would move forward with presenting and researching this type of zoning. So, you know, I have seen things written that, you know, we're divided, it's the whatever, but that's not true. We work together. We all— everyone sitting up here has the desire to make the best choice for Orem's children and for Orem. And I just want to say this. Too many times I've seen online, or I've seen an email sent to me, words like, this appears to be, this seems like, I don't know for sure, but, and these thoughts of mine lead me to conclude that. And I guess my comment to all of that is really, and then of course to conclude that this zoning is not necessary. And I guess my, my response to that is to say, you know, there is wisdom in planning for the future. There is wisdom in preserving land for our children into the future. There is wisdom in preserving park space and open space for our city to enjoy. This is not just about school properties. This is about park space also, to make— to put into places, as Dave said, checks and balances. So if something wants to be developed on these lands, there is a public process that will happen to where it can be presented more fully to the public. in order to give their opinions before any decisions are made. This is not a hard and fast, nothing can change here, but this is putting into place opportunity for the public to really be engaged. I know years ago when I was busy with my children, I did not have time to pay it to listen to every city council meeting to see what was going on. If some of these properties are going to be rezoned, for other purposes than what we're putting tonight, there will be notices mailed out to the public, to the residents, so they will be notified and they'll understand. Those notices were mailed out in March. You didn't get it 3 days ago. The first one was mailed out in March. We've been, we've been looking at this since April. I mean, we have— yes, because our neighborhood meeting was March 29th. So please—

I received one a different notice just this week that was mailed in April. So it does happen. I don't know what it is with the Postal Service. I'm not saying— I'm not disagreeing with anyone. I'm just saying it happened to me. I got a notice the other day that was mailed in the middle of April.

So, okay.

But to that, there have been multiple notices sent out over the last several months.

I've gotten 2 different postcards for this. So I guess I'm trying to say, I just— here's where I am right now with this. I would just please, please, to our public, on this issue and on every other issue that you see something different on social media, please seek facts. Please learn truth. Don't guess or assume or think it feels like or seems like or believe the opinions of people who won't even put their name on something. I've seen opinions on social media. Well, my friends, an undisclosed source said this. If they're not putting their name on it, maybe we should— you know, we're trying to teach our kids critical thinking when it comes to social media and, and media. Let's use those same guidelines ourselves too. Like I say, please seek facts, learn truth, don't guess or assume or rely rely on the opinions of people who are guessing or promoting their feelings as facts. There truly is wisdom in going to the source and asking. I applaud you for coming tonight, you know, I really do, to hear the presentation of where we are. I applaud anyone who cares enough to get involved and to really seek. And frankly, I really applaud you for having a different opinion. I don't have a problem with opinions. I do have a problem when you start attacking me personally for my opinion. So if you can take the emotion out of it, but to call people names or to insult someone personally— I'm not— you, not you, you're giving me the look. I'm not referring to you, for me anyway. But, um, I think that's, uh, poor statesmanship, and I really think we're better than that here in Orem. And I would really like to see us have some real positive communications here. I really think I think everyone, no matter how they vote tonight, cares about the kids, cares about our open space, cares about our parks, cares about our future. And that's what I see this as, is preserving Orem's future. Thank you.

Tom, thank you very much. First of all, thank you to Jason and to Ryan for your presentation and for the Alerting us all about what Provo and Lehi were doing. That was very helpful, and I appreciate the information. I think it was David and I who were on a phone call with several of the administration here at the city on like the 16th or 17th of March, just before this meeting and before the mailer went out. And my caveat was I could support this if we could talk to Alpine School District before we sent it out, and we did not. We talked to Alpine after it was already hot and in the box. Uh, it was already in the box when it mailed on the 20th, and it came to my box on the 20th.

We spoke with Alpine before it went out.

Not before the mailer was already done. Brent spoke to them after your meeting, after your meeting on the 21st. Is that correct, Brent?

Yes.

And it was already in the mail, so I said I could support it.

It was in the mail, but yeah, Brent talked to Alpine after it was in the mail but before it hit the boxes. So it didn't hit the box. It was It was already— go ahead.

So I wanted to talk to our partner before we went forward with our plan was— what's that? Yeah, yeah, they shouldn't have read it that way. I thought that didn't go the way I would have liked it. That being said, um, yeah, we notified them, but after it was already gone. I get that.

We—

fine, but it was already— it was already going to come to their mailbox. is what I'm saying. Yeah, yeah, I understand that. We also— some from this dais have called Alpine School District members liars. I don't think that's appropriate for us to do either. And whether the property is on 8th North, on 13th South, or Center Street, if it's zoned R-8, that's all it can be. All right, they can't change it. They, they may have wanted to switch it to commercial property, but they couldn't. All that being said, normally the landowner requests zone changes, not the city. That's typically the way we get zone changes requests. I'm also grateful that, Brian, you brought out that you contacted Lewis Young Robertson in Birmingham, and in their second report paragraph it said, it is well known that trying to predict future outcomes with certainty is impossible. I think you said that line. There's also certainly no guarantee that the current status quo will continue. It seems like families are smaller with less demands on schools. Additionally, neither the city nor the school district has time to evaluate the impacts and unintended, unintended consequences on student population and community characteristics from the schools that have been closed or that are being evaluated for closure. This includes the potential need for additional public land, especially in an area where limited developed— developable land is remaining for public schools as demographics shift. So I don't think we fully explored this. I don't know how much land we need, but I think a point has been made. Should there be a need in years to come for a change in this zone, they can request it like anybody else can, a zone change. So, well, I'm not opposed to this particular zone. I'm, I'm with Jeff, a little unsure about how we went about it. Wish we had called our partner while it was still being hot, while decisions were being made, and before it got in the mail. I won't question that they talked to before it hit their mailbox, but it was going to come. So for that reason, I'm not going to— I'm not going to support this zone change.

It was in the mailbox. You said you agreed to it. I said I agreed to it. And we did under your—

we did what you asked.

It's semantics.

Mayor, I have a question.

Yes.

If we have a member of the City Council that has a signed agreement with a developer should they recuse themselves from this vote? I mean, if that would impact the future property, this land, if it couldn't be developed, if it has to stay school zones. Yeah, I guess that's a question for Steve. Is that— is there an issue with that? If there's—

Basically, the rule on recusal is that if a council member has a personal or financial interest in a matter that's being deliberated by the city council, they should recuse themselves. Obviously, you've just brought this up for the very first time, don't know anything about it, so all I could probably speak to is generalities. That's the general rule.

Okay.

So, Mayor, I was on a call with, with Councilman McDonald, and he did agree that if we notified Alpine scooters, he would be all for it. So, and that was like on a Thursday or Friday, I think, right, Tom?

So do we have any other comments?

I, I just have—

I have a question before you do a motion. I'm gonna—

no, I have an amendment to the motion.

Okay, go ahead.

So I just, I just want to ask staff, are you recommending this zone change?

Yes.

And Steve, as Orem Legal, are you recommending this as well?

Well, you know, personal opinion or professional opinion, I think— I personally think it's a good idea. I think it would be wise for the city to preserve these properties. I mean, just maybe a kind of summary of what the staff presentation was. I think the key point is the school district, obviously, they're making decisions based on what they think their data, their trends, their projections show. And I think the concern that we have is that, are they going to decide to sell off some of these properties that have historically been used for schools to a developer? For example, maybe you develop these, say it's in an R-8 zone. You sell it to a developer to build single-family homes at 4 or 5 units to the acre. You know, if you've got a 10-acre property, let's say that results in something like 40 or 50 homes being built on that parcel. What, what that means is that that property is gone forever. You'll never have that available for school use in the future. And, and I think the point of a lot of what's been presented here is that We don't know what that population of students is going to be in the future, whether that be 10 or 20 or 30 or even 40 years from now. What we're suggesting is that there's a lot of factors that could potentially result in an increase, an increase in student populations, you know, whether that just be an increase in growth overall in the city, which, you know, There's projections we're going to increase by 30% at build-out, whether that's an increased number of ADUs, whether that's these intergenerational families where you have maybe more younger children living with older parents or grandparents, whether that's changing demographics, as a number of people have spoken to, where a neighborhood that gets, or even a city that is growing older, at some point is going going to turn over with, with younger families and potentially have more children. So the problem is, I think what we're suggesting is that all these factors, and maybe even some additional factors that we don't know about, might result in a reversal of, you know, what we've seen with declining student populations. You might see an increase in student populations in the future. If that's the case, then you're probably going to need more schools, and where are you going to put them if you've lost that land that's, that's historically traditionally been used for schools? And, you know, and the other factor is that, quite frankly, you know, I think that both the city properties that are being proposed to be put in the PF zone, as well as the school district properties, they've been paid for by Orem taxpayers, right? I mean, a couple people have mentioned that they've already been paid for public— by Orem taxpayers for public use. And so I think it's reasonable— my personal opinion— I think it's reasonable then to preserve those properties for future public use, whether that be schools or whether that be some other type of a public use or a municipal government type use. Another thing that's been mentioned, couple of times, but I think— when I'll back up, when we, when we originally started thinking about proposing this public facility zone and rezoning these properties, you know, it was due, I think, primarily to the fear that some of these properties might be sold and redeveloped and lost, as I've just mentioned, for public use forever. But there's been some additional things that have happened since that time. that I think provide additional rationale, reasons. I'm sorry if I'm sort of advocating here, but I— this is just kind of my thought process. And that has to do, you know, with the school district. I think Mr. Barrick mentioned this and Ryan mentioned it as well, that the school district itself has mentioned that they're looking at reconfiguration of the school district, and we have no idea at this point what that's going to look like, you know, whether that— probably not just going to be Orem only, but it might be Orem and Vineyard and Linden and Pleasant Grove. Who knows? We're just speculating on that. But the point of it is, we don't know what the needs of that potential new district, of which Orem will probably be a part, what the needs of that new district will be, what the demand for public school facilities will be. And so it seems It seems reasonable to me in light of that new development that we would want to protect these school— existing school properties that we have, you know, certainly until at least we have more clarity on what that looks like, what that new district might look like, and what the needs of that new district might be. Another, another point that I just— I find compelling personally is the fact, you know, I think Alpine School District is saying they're seeing declining student enrollment, but I think there's also evidence that we are seeing increasing— sorry, this has been mentioned already— but increasing charter school enrollments. And the fact that the legislature has now authorized or passed these incentives for— is, in my opinion, probably likely to increase charter school enrollment even more. And so, you know, where are they going to go, I guess, is the question. You know, charter schools are public schools. They're not, they're not private, they're not for profit, obviously, they're public schools. And, and if the, if the Alpine School District, for example, doesn't need a certain school in Orem, it may very well be that a charter school could succeed very well in that location and meet the needs of Orem in that, that location. So I just think personally it makes sense. to preserve these public properties for future needs, which we don't know. Again, we don't know for sure what's going to happen. But given that we don't know, and given the very real possibilities that we might need those properties in the future, I think it makes sense to preserve them for those, those future needs.

Before you do your motion, Okay, I'll just say a few things. Most everything's been said, so I'll be short. As far as I'm concerned, Alpine School District, no Alpine School District, this is just purely common sense. I mean, over the last 104 years, our city has developed and evolved, and it's been built out. A lot of cities aren't built with the appropriate amount of school land for schools. They don't have the parks. They don't have the public lands. They just cram in as many density as they can, and then they deal with that later. Well, we're really lucky here in Orem because over the last 104 years, this has been laid out systematically where we've got parks, we've got schools, and we've got a great setup. We never really anticipated that we'd be in a situation where our schools would start getting shut down. That wasn't really a part of the plan. We were just built out. And so when that became an issue— and well, and it became an issue with our public lands first. I mean, we had an issue back in 2008 where the cemetery— the city was in some financial straits. And so the city was talking about just going forward and essentially selling some land up by the cemetery to raise money. Well, back then, the way it's structured right now, The city council could just do that. They could just do that. They tried to do it. They put it out. They could never get anyone to buy it, and so they didn't do it. But the fact is, is they easily just tried to do it. Well, this type of a zoning change for city lands, public lands, that's— that would be impossible. You'd have to go through the public process. You'd have to involve the public. People would be allowed to have their input before you were ever able to do that. And that's simply what this does is it essentially forces— it makes it so the city council can't just do whatever they want. It forces the city council to go through a public process and hopefully get the most input to make that happen. And as I see it, by implementing this PF zone, we're essentially protecting what the city's built out the last 104 years. And so to me, that's pretty straightforward because our structure right now where our parks parks are, where our schools are, is optimal. We can't just willy-nilly be shutting them down. And, and based on where we're at right now, like I said, this isn't about Alpine School District, but based on where we're at right now, we have no idea what's coming next. I mean, we've been told so many different things. We don't know if the district is going to split. We don't know what that looks like. We don't know, we don't know a lot. So in all this uncertainty, We need to preserve what we have. So this is simply a land preservation act. Um, just a few things we said as a city council, and we've said it over and over, that we're— we're— Orem is Family City USA. Essentially, Family City USA drives our decisions. So if something makes us more like Family City USA, so generations going forward can enjoy the same type of community as we've enjoyed in the past, if it moves us toward that, then we should vote for it. And if it takes us away from that, then we should vote against it. And in my mind, this is 100% Family City USA, preserving the structure that we have. Another thing is, is essentially when I ran one of the big issues and the reason we changed all the zoning on State Street, eliminated 10,000 apartments, was because we were elected to protect the family neighborhoods. And so we've been working overtime to protect the family neighborhoods. And Jeff had mentioned, well, if you shut— you know, if you change the zoning, then it might devalue the neighborhood. No, it works the other way. Essentially, anytime you have a park, that increases the value of the neighborhood. Anytime you have a school, that absolutely increases the neighbor— the value of the neighborhood. So, so that's not even an issue. Well, it's—

if you—

okay, thank you. I'm just saying, as far as if you look at the demand for property in our city, you could ask our planning people, it's off the charts. The chances of some, you know, I mean, yeah, it's nuts. As far as we were talking about that last night. Um, you know, and as a city council, we really have accomplished a lot in the last 15, 16 months. I mean, there's been all kinds of things that we've worked on. In my mind, preserving our public lands and preserving our school lands would be towards the top of that list. Finally, um, If we have closures, we have school closures, like, you know, as Terry outlined, if those school closures continue to go on, that land's gone forever. I mean, there's no way we're building a new school over by Hillcrest. That, that's, that's history. So if we continue to close schools over which we have no control of them being closed, that land's gone forever. So essentially what you have is you have a situation where Land is being— schools are potentially being closed. We don't know what's happening next, but if schools are potentially being closed based on issues right now today, okay, they're closed. Let's move forward. Fast forward 10 years. The population turns over, the number of families, kids expands and starts to grow again. We have no options. This is about giving us options. So anyway, that's, that's my take on this, and I would absolutely support this because I think it's the— I actually knew Dr. Covey, and I believe this would be the right thing to do.

So.

Mayor and Council, if I may just speak a little bit to, to some of staff's perspective. And first of all, you know, thank you for, for the opportunity to work with you and go through this process and everything. And, and I am absolutely never, never above being held accountable if there's something I can do quicker or do better. And I absolutely hope to always keep, keep doing better. But if I may just say that Steve Earle, Ryan Clark, Jason Bench, ever since working with them on impact fees and, and the land use aspects of that years ago, I just had a tremendous amount of respect for them, and I know their ability in a detailed and in a consummate professional way of dealing with, you know, difficult land use issues. So I just wouldn't want any you or anyone in the public to think that, that they don't try to completely act in, in objective professional ways. They've always been examples to me of, of, of doing so. And then also in terms of just ongoing relationship and professional relationship with, with the school district and with Superintendent Shane Farnsworth in particular. I have followed up with them verbally a couple times, you know, over the last couple of months, and I even have talked to them and brainstormed about, you know, if something were to happen with some of these schools, would there be a willingness to continue to partner with the city to make good public use of the land and use for recreational or open space type uses. And, and I don't think there was any hesitation or any sort of negative feelings or negative comments in return from Superintendent Shane Farnsworth, and there seemed to be a ready willingness and desire to explore, you know, partnerships with the city of all kinds, including in the use of these properties. So just want you to know. Again, that my perspective in terms of the level of professionalism in how we've tried to approach this whole process.

Thank you. Any other comments, questions? Renee, you had something.

I just have an amendment to the motion.

Can I make—

I would like to pull out under Appendix A, I'd like to pull out uses 1261, 1262, 1281, and 1285. I feel like our purpose for making this zoning change is for future public use for schools and municipalities, and these look like they don't fit in that.

So can I make— can I speak to that? Is that okay?

Yeah, tell us what those are, please.

Yeah, so I'll—

yeah, thank you. Okay.

So, so, as you can see on this, our SLU Appendix A chart here, 1261 is residential facilities for disabled persons, 1262 youth transitional home, 1281 assisted living facility for elderly persons, and 1285 residential facility for elderly persons. The reason why those uses are there is because they're basically permitted in every zone where a residential use is permitted. So, and essentially, they're homes, if you will, for people with disabilities. So, basically, under federal law, the Fair Housing Act, we have to allow homes for people with disabilities in any zone where we allow residential use. So, and these, each of those facilities that you've mentioned, they basically have a maximum number of residents of 8. So they're small, they're designed to be in a single-family type home. I guess what I would suggest to you is that we take out all of them, including, including 1110 single-family, or we keep all of them in, because they just kind of— they go together.

Yeah. And I actually agree with that. In fact, there was something with the 1 to 5 acre thing, but I actually feel like the purpose for doing this is to preserve public spaces for schools and municipal use. So that would be an amendment I would make to the motion, is to pull out the residential uses there.

I may have missed it, but I don't think a motion's been made yet, has it? Okay, you're just talking about what you would like to see happen.

Gotcha.

Sure.

Yeah, if somebody wanted to make a motion to that effect, they would just say if it's a motion to approve the zoning change and the creation of PF zone, it would be, but to strike all of those or to remove all of these uses that you listed, 1110, 1261, 1262, 1281, 1285, make them all not non-permitted uses.

Yeah, go ahead.

So Steve, taking out 1110. And then that follows with the others. Is that— do you see a problem with that?

No.

Well, I mean, would you advise that, or would you—

what would be your legal opinion?

You know, I think that the more uses you permit in a certain zone, probably the better. But, you know, the question is, is that consistent with what you're trying to accomplish?

So And I'll just say, I wasn't asked, and it's kind of interesting because Linnea and I did not talk about this. Yeah, but I, I would— I fully agree with that. I believe this is to protect schools and parks. And that's the point. And so I, from my perspective, I completely agree with that, even though we haven't talked about it.

So Jason, do you have any Comment on that?

Oh, there's just a lot of reading. Whoever's making the motion.

I'll make a motion.

This question— so that, that's not devaluing the property?

No. Oh, sorry, you're looking that way.

Is what devaluing the property if you're taking out the residential component? I, I couldn't speak to that. I don't know if it would devalue the property or not.

It would still be part of the— if they were to sell it, if the city didn't want to buy it, then there would still be, you know, they would get their own, uh, the city would get theirs, and we'd— they'd have to come to a middle.

So, and it would only be a residential component from the standpoint that you'd have to have a 5-acre property. So if somebody want to buy a residential 5-acre property, my understanding is somebody based on the way that's outlined right now, right?

Right.

And does a, you know, evaluation of the property and comes up with a recommendation, they're going to look at what is around the property, not necessarily what is not allowed. So it probably would be valued more of a residential property if they were to sell it. So that's something that, you know, you'd have to—

But they'd still have to come back and go to the Planning Commission if they wanted to rezone to residential or whatever.

Right.

Keep in mind that this— the city still has the first right on any, any school property to buy it.

Yeah, I mean, but the issue with this is It's a 5-acre piece of parcel. And so you can, because of the 5-acre constraint, yes, you could do residential, but you have a 5-acre constraint.

That's correct.

To me, that just benefit— would benefit potentially a very limited number of people, potentially. And so if it's about parks and schools, that's why I agree with what Lenee is proposing.

And I think to Ryan's point and others that may have mentioned it, because Alpine is looking at splitting, you know, looking at a study to possibly split into more than just 2, maybe 3. We don't know the outcome of what that would be and how the impact on Orem City would be, and whether or not we need more schools at that point or whether we need more property. So I think because there's some ambiguity, it makes sense to, to, you know, go forward with this plan.

So this protects the goal, and then if we— if it needs to change, then it comes back to the council or the Planning Commission and follow the same process that we've currently Everybody else.

Yep.

Sure.

Are you ready for a motion?

All right.

I move that we amend portions of Article 22.9 of the Orem City Code to create the public facilities or PF zone and other provisions pertaining to the PF zone, amending Appendix A by enacting standard land use codes that are permitted, conditional, and not permitted in the PF zone. And amending Section 2253A and the zoning map of the City of Orem by rezoning various properties currently located in the C-2, HSM-2, OS-5, PD-5, PD-6, PD-15, PD-16, PD-36, R-6.5, R-7.5, R-8, and R-12 zones To the public facilities zone, the PF zone. Also amending the Orem General Plan by amending Section 2.1, Land Use Classifications, enacting Section 2.1.6, Public Facilities, enacting Section 3.1.6, Public Facilities, amending Section 8.3, Educational Support, and amending the General Plan map by changing the land use designation of various properties to public facilities, with the exception of—

I think the change you're suggesting is you would be amending the proposal that was originally brought to you by making SLU codes, Standard Land Use Codes 1110, 1261, 1262, 1281, and 1285 as non-permitted instead of permitted.

Okay, which also—

you can just say what I said.

Okay, what Steve said.

Type that up.

And I'll second what Steve and Lenee just said.

Thank you.

Okay, so we're ready for a vote.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Nay.

Okay, the ordinance passes. Thank you all. Moving on. Item 9.2, amending Section 12-9-6, license fee of the Orem City Code, exempting accessory dwelling units from the annual rental dwelling license renewal fee. Ryan, if you'd like to present that.

Yes, Mayor and Council. As you recall, we came forward to you about 2 work sessions ago after looking at a number of ways that we could modify the rental dwelling license program due to some concerns that have been raised to you from our general public. So it's my pleasure to actually come to you and ask for elimination of a fee. I know that doesn't happen very often, but you have a chance to get rid of a fee on our public. And so, not to rehash everything that we've been through, but I'm bringing forward to you the language we discussed in our last work session, where essentially we would eliminate the ongoing annual licensing fee for those that own a home with a legal accessory dwelling unit. So currently, if you own one of these ADU units, you are required to pay an initial licensing fee when you file your application, and then each year you pay an on Renewal fee on an ongoing basis. We would eliminate that ongoing fee, so you only pay it when you license your unit. The only other modification is if a home were sold to someone else that has a legal ADU in it, that, that new owner would have to come in and register and pay that fee. So most of the work associated with an ADU is getting that initial application into our database so that we are able to know who owns that unit should we have any problems. problems or concerns. And so if you have any questions, I'm happy to address those.

Have any questions?

So I just have one question. So if they've currently already paid the fee, then they're done, correct? We're not going to send them anything else. And only if they sold their property would they, the new owner, get, get something, correct?

That is correct. So this would go into effect on July 1st.

July 1st.

Okay, thank you.

Anybody else?

Happy to make a motion if—

Hang on one sec.

Oh, sorry.

I just want to make a point. Ryan mentioned that we rarely get to vote on reducing a fee. And the reason we're having this opportunity to vote on reducing a fee is because the City Council was proactively— we're always proactively looking at everything in the city that affects our citizens and trying to make sure they're getting the best deal possible. And so that's where this came from. And this was when we went back in the campaign when I was knocking doors, talking to people. These fees were the biggest thing that I was— people were concerned about that I happened to talk to. So anyway, we appreciate you working through this, Ryan.

You're very welcome.

Someone like to make a motion?

I think we'd all like to, but I'd love to be voice if I can. I move that we amend Ordinance Section 12-9-6, license Receive of the Orem City Code exempting accessory dwelling units from the annual rental dwelling license renewal fee.

Second.

And everyone seconded.

Hey, Terry.

Hi.

Hi.

Hi.

Hi.

Hi.

Hi.

Thank you. The ordinance passes. All right, at the request of some on the council. Uh, we just want to take a 5-minute bathroom break, and everyone will be back here in exactly 5 minutes.

Go ahead.

You going, Tom? You just don't know. You just don't know.

I know, exactly. Oh, I'm still gonna say $10,000 for the Japanese. Here's the deal, they moved from— I don't know that. I don't know, because he told me at the Stars when they honored him at the Sierra, they weren't going to hear him. So when was that, March?

I don't know. I don't know.

To me, it's not going to Had any more vegan gluten-free brownies lately, Mayor? That was so— that was so funny. You're like, as long as it's chocolate, it'll be fine. I love a good chocolate too, but that was— she goes, what's a little funny texture? I remember saying that to you. Oh, you weren't there. I would wrap around We had dessert. He and I both had the galette chocolate. It was vegan and gluten-free. It was a little nasty, I'm not gonna lie.

Oh, you, you already know.

You can have an opinion, but you have to respect it.

Always.

Oh, what do you mean?

Yeah, I agree. I don't think it's that much money.

You got $3,000.

All right, let's reconvene the meeting. Okay, we're, we're ready to go.

Yeah, they don't have— they don't have ours.

Okay, welcome back from our break. We've got— we'll move forward to item 9.3. You guys stop, please. Okay, we've got item 9.3, a resolution for the CARES tax allocation, and Brandon Nelson and Trevor Bell will present that to us.

Mayor, sorry, could I interject really quick on something? On 9.3, it's listed as a resolution for care tax allocation. In fact, that is supposed to be ordinance.

Okay, I apologize.

So I just want to make sure that you will not be passing a resolution, you will be passing an ordinance governing the care tax allocation.

Perfect.

Just—

I appreciate that. I have 2 copies of this. My other copy has that written on it.

Okay.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Okay, carry on.

I hate it when Steve beats me to the punch. Mayor and Council, so this is just a follow-up from the work session from last week to, like Steve said, pass the ordinance to approve the allocation of CARES tax dollars and the awards to the individual entities that applied. Just as a brief synopsis, the presentation that you see before you is basically the same as in the work session, other than in that work session it was identified that perhaps we wanted to increase the amount to the Timpanogos Orchestra, Symphony Orchestra, and so that this reflects that, and as well as a reduction in One of the other areas, let's see, which one. The right here, the seashell facility improvements. So increased one, decreased the other a little bit, and then used up some of the higher available budget that we—

that was so that the remaining amount that was left over was smaller than it was originally.

So Just to go through— oh, sorry. So you see the Timpanogos Symphony Orchestra was increased from $2,500 to $9,999, which puts it in the mid-major category. And then we reduced the Sierra Shell facility improvements from $200,000 to $195,000. to cover a portion of that increase, and then the remaining portion of that increase was in essence taken from available budget. Just as a synopsis of what we had, several meetings near the end of April with the CARE Commission where we listened to presentations from each applicant, and at that time the Care Commission, along with Councilman Spencer and Councilman Lamson. We went through those presentations, put together a Care Commission recommendation, and what you see on both the mini grants here, as well as the mid-major grants, came out of those meetings. We then, in our— as I mentioned in the work session, also then came forward with major grants as well as other grants, other arts grants, as well as on the following page related to recreational and parks grants proposed, gave in essence a recommendation to you. in relation to those applicants, and, and that's what you see before you today. And that's all I have outside of questions you may have, deliberation that you may want over any particular thing here that we can potentially address.

Do we have any questions, concerns?

I have a question.

Sorry.

So is this Yeah, supposed to be 50/50, right? 50 parks, or third, third, third arts, and 50—

are we there?

We're at third, third, third.

A third, a third, a third.

Yep.

So that was never the original plan, was a third, a third, a third. So is that— that other third is the city's third creeping in, or what is it?

So it was agreed that in order to help fund the Lakeside Sports turf part that the recreation and parks components would join together to be able to accommodate for that facility. And then there was, because of varying needs, the arts component, there was not a need for a half there in relation to that. Because, but originally wasn't We have in the past done 50/50.

It's been 50/50.

Up until, I believe, last year, maybe in the last 2 years allocations.

So, I wonder if they ever get that back to 50/50 because the arts is who suffers, right? I mean, the arts was 50%, now they're a third. And we're using the rest for really another tax, an OREM tax. We're sending.

I mean, it, it's a legitimate concern. I think we even went through the full last 10 years to try to calculate what that has ended up being. And Bryce, maybe you remember and can speak to real quickly what that calculation ended up as. But the, the reason— the reasoning behind last year of this third, third, third really just had to do with Hale Centre Theatre moving on from the city and then, and then starting off everything by maximizing the, the CERA award consistent with their full request. And then, as we were going through the process of working with the, the county's TRT, TRCC process, trying to meet the, the match requirements of that grant application.

But yeah, Brent, I can add to that and clarify that. I think there's, yeah, 2 pieces to that. First off, we were able to work with Carson in the City Manager's Office and do an analysis on the 10 years of the CARES tax, and the third, third, third was meant to be a temporary to get us closer to the the 50/50 over the course of the 10 years. And so I don't, I don't want to be loose with the numbers since I don't have it in front of me, but I want to say that there was a $1.7 million discrepancy between what the arts and then Parks and Rec together had had over the course of the 10 years. And so going a third, third, third for the last funding cycle brought us back to the 50/50 arts and Parks and Rec for the for the totality of the life of the care over the 10 years. It also, like Bren said, did allow us to activate a $1.7 million grant from the county, which required matching funding from us. And so by going a little bit heavier in 2 of the years, it kept us at 50/50 over the decade and allowed us to get the $1.7 million from the county.

And so our commitment going forward as a city would be So essentially, there's a process to renew the CARES tax.

And so in— this would be the last year under the current 10-year term under, under the current CARES law that you're referring to.

Right.

And so in terms of moving forward from this current year, we would of course need to bring back what would actually be put on the ballot, which we would of course, need to do consistent with you as a Governing Body's desires, which—

Which should be the same language we had 10 years ago, which is 50/50.

Yeah, which would be 50/50.

And that's what we talked about, is in the future, moving forward, going back to 50/50 and keeping it that way throughout. Uh, there were just some things that have happened over the years that we were able to bring that back into balance. Yeah, luckily that worked out really well.

And that's as under y'all's direction. When we see a year where we need to go 20/80, you know, because of a project or a timing or an urgent need, then the next year we'd make sure that we go 80/20 or something like that.

Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

So I was just trying to say that that decision in terms of moving forward would be a separate decision from this in terms of how to separate and distinguish the next 10 years.

So I have one other question. Are all of these Orem businesses— because the Utah Shakespearean Festival, unless, unless that's changed, I don't think that's in Orem.

No, but they do a lot in Orem. That's the reach is what we were looking at when we were at the committee with Jeff and I, Councilman Lamson. And I think they all met that criteria that they do things in Orem. And they have a good reach.

So they're all— all of these do things in Orem? Absolutely, yeah.

They, they do, uh, some things in our schools and they expose some of our, our students in these schools to the arts that they may not have an experience otherwise. So they— there are several of them that do this, but they come and they, they, they come and do a short program. so that they have that experience and that opportunity and have the opportunity to, to see how much fun it is to, to watch a play or to experience different kinds of music and whatnot.

So yeah, I think if I remember correctly, the Utah Shakespeare Festival did 3— does 3 little mini programs at, uh, high schools and junior highs.

Yeah, I think the, the key thing is they're in the schools, and I think that, that helps them out a lot. But I have a question, Brandon. Can you go up to the The final with the $200,000 or the $195,000? The SARA? Okay, so that's share of facility improvements. It shows awarded $195,000, right?

That's how much is being proposed to set aside, yes.

Okay, and then if you scroll down to the—

here?

Yeah, so the, the So then you've got the Sarah Park improvement, 75%, $75,000. So is that— was that the playground?

So those would be things related to the park. Yeah, to the Sarah, um, anything in the Sarah Park.

Okay, and then I think one note we need to remember too on, on arts, you know, Parks and Recreation, they have a budget and arts doesn't. So that's why it's key that we keep 50% to the arts. So we don't want to keep doing a third, third, third. It's not— that's not what— they don't have a budget, they have no money coming in. So we just want to make sure we're, we're protecting the Sarah for one, and then the arts.

So. Again, great points. Maybe just to speak a little bit to the Sierra Park improvements, where that— the genesis of that thought was to improve the wayfinding signage and monument signage associated with the Shell and in front of the, the outdoor pool. In terms of in front of the outdoor pool, where that has the visibility along State Street, we would do digital signage similar to what we've done in front of our fitness center. And then we would work with the SIRA to have a portion of that digital signage to to speak to and, and announce potential Sarah Shell items. So currently the Sarah Shell ground is, is, uh, owned by the City of Orem, and so that's why it was kind of put in that portion of, of the table.

And you're working closely with Adam at the Sarah for— with those improvements, I would assume?

Yes, the—

I—

the idea for that and working to improve the signage and the way wayfinding signage came in a kind of joint conversation that Mayor and I and some of us staff had with, with Adam.

And I would assume this would be an ongoing thing that we're doing for the Sarah and that facility every year. We would have money in that for improvements, correct?

As long as the CARES tax gets renewed, yes.

Thank you.

Any other comments, questions?

Okay, I'd like to make a motion that the City Council, by ordinance, pass the CARES tax allocation for 2023-24. Is that correct? As it's shown in Exhibit A.

Second that.

All through to 4th.

I feel like—

start.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Thank you. The ordinance passes. We thank you for that presentation. Item 9.4, resolution adapting a policy regarding city-owned flagpoles and city social media accounts. Steve, if you'd like to present that.

Yeah, so Mayor and City Council, this is a proposed policy, as you just said, regarding city-owned flagpoles and the profile picture and cover photo displays on city social media accounts. Basically what this does is it's basically a City Council direction of city speech. First part of it deals with city-owned flagpoles. That deals with the traditional flagpoles you might see out in front of the, the auditorium, library auditorium, for example, or also the light poles where we have little bars that allow for the displaying of flags. We specify in this policy which types of flags can be flown on those city-owned flagpoles. This includes obviously the, the city flag, the state flag, United States flag, Army Armed Forces flags, UVU flag, and so on. This obviously does not apply to any flagpoles on private property and what, you know, other individuals in the city can do with regard to display of flags, only city-owned flagpoles. The second aspect of the policy deals with the display of logos or emblems or flags that can be displayed as part of the city's profile picture or cover photo. on any social media account, again specifying that those emblems or logos would, would be limited to the Orem City flag, the city logo, the Orem Fest flag, the United States flag, state flag, armed forces flags, UVU flag, or official Orem Police and Fire Department badges, and other Orem City logos and badges approved in the Orem City brand usage and style guide approved by the City Council. So just to note, as it states in the policy, that this provision is limited to just the profile picture and the COVID photo on Orem social media accounts. It does not apply to posts that may be made by, for example, the, the city's public information officer, of which there are many. Usually there's a couple a day regarding city events or city-sponsored functions or interesting things that are happening in the city. That— those kinds of posts, you would be allowed to display, you know, the Kiwanis logo, or it might be the Sierra logo, or, you know, different things like that. So the policy is only applying to the Orem cover photo and profile picture. So Also, just want to emphasize that this does not also apply to any comments that might be made by individuals in response to a post that might be made by the city's PIO on our, say, our Facebook page, something like that. So any, any questions I could address?

So can I ask one question? So when you talk about like the Kiwanis, I mean, I think I remember those examples that you gave. These posts would then be city-sponsored events, correct, in order to have those particular logos or promotional—

Yeah, I mean, usually it's in connection with an event of some kind. I mean, I just gave those examples because I looked at what had recently been posted by our PIO in the last month, for example, and one of— I can't remember what the event was, but there was some event sponsored by the, the Kiwanis. was a few others that, you know, basically the city partners with, or we want to help promote or get the word out, you know, regarding events that they're holding in the city that we think our citizens would be interested in.

Okay, so that's the intent of this.

Yeah, perfect.

Any other questions?

Sure.

I move that by resolution we adopt a policy There's a question if this is public comment or not, Mayor.

No, it's not public comment. It's not public comment.

I move that by resolution we adopt a policy regarding city-owned flagpoles and city social media accounts.

Second.

Oh, sorry.

Aye.

Aye. Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Thank you. Resolution passes. Okay, moving right along. We've got item 9.5, resolution adopting rules and regulations for the government of the City Council.

Thank you, Mayor, City Council. Yeah, so this again is another policy that's being brought to you for your consideration. Basically dealing with operations of the city council. Basically, one of the, the main provisions of this is that a majority of the entire city council can make administrative decisions related to the business of the council, that including things like entering into or negotiating a professional services agreement. or an employment agreement, maybe directing an item to be placed on the City Council agenda, maybe giving direction to city staff to look into a particular issue, maybe research an issue to give you— provide you more information. So this is really not changing anything. This is pretty much how the City Council and city staff operate already. It's just codifying it, if you will, or making it a more formal arrangement by policy. And so again, it's got— it's— these decisions can, can only be made— it provides based on a majority, a consensus of majority of the entire City Council.

So any questions?

Yeah, Mayor, I hit my button, but you really said what I This has really been what we've been doing for the 10 years I've been on the council.

Right.

Thank you.

Dave, did you have a question?

No, I was just gonna make a motion.

Okay, any other comments, questions?

I was just gonna say, I think this is great because this— for the public always wonders how we do our business and what our policies are. So I really appreciate you working on this, Steve, and putting this together because just reading through it, you know, I really— I think it helps our public understand and, and really be more involved in our, in their municipal government.

So thanks.

And one other comment I just want to make, it also provides that, you know, all actions and decisions have to be made in compliance with the Open Public Meetings Act. You know, you're all well aware that the 4 of you can't get together and talk about a city issue outside of a public meeting. And so these, these decisions obviously have to be made in conformance with, with the law in that respect.

I agree. As far as, I mean, anything we can do to have more transparency, more openness, and make sure that everyone understands the rules is a benefit to governance.

Okay, I'd like to make a motion. Okay, the City Council, by resolution, adopting rules and regulations for the government of the City Council.

Second.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Resolution passes. We're making good progress here. We're down to item 9.6, another ordinance amending Section 2-3-10, Functions of the City Council, to authorize the City Council to retain separate legal counsel. Steve?

Yeah, so, um, once again, you, you just, you just said it, and it pretty much sums up what's being proposed here. A proposed amendment to Section 2-3-10, which allows and authorizes the council to retain separate legal counsel in addition to and apart from the city attorney, provides that the separate legal counsel would be appointed by and maybe removed by the city council. and would take direction, report directly to the city council, and also provides that this separate legal counsel will either be an at-will employee of the city exempt from the appeal rights essentially that are provided in Utah code, or can be retained on a contract basis as a legal consultant without being an employee.

Any questions?

I'll make that motion, Mayor, unless there's any questions.

I, I don't really have a question but a comment. I appreciate our legal department and everything that they do, and personally I feel like it's a redundancy of legal services. I mean, I feel like it's duplicity of costs, and I have nothing against our current person. I have a great relationship with him and he might not invite me to play pickleball ever again, but I feel like it's—

Did you lose?

Huh?

Did you lose?

We haven't played yet.

He just invited me.

Anyway, that's my personal feeling is I feel like it's extra taxpayer money being spent when it doesn't need to be.

So it's my 2 cents.

So any other comments?

Dave?

So Steve, I mean, you work hand in hand with, with Jesse. I know you guys worked hand in hand on the, uh, looking at changing the form of government and how that was a contrast, pro and con. I mean, so your opinion, I mean, is it a help for you because that's just another set of eyes, or, you know?

Um, yeah, I mean, I think, yeah, at times it's definitely a help. And we certainly try to work together as much as we can for the common good of the city. So yeah, we both, we both are trying to represent the best interests of the city and work together to promote the common good.

So, and then, and I mean, I appreciate you and what you do. You're awesome. And I just think this is just an added benefit for you.

So thank you.

I think if I, I just got a quick list here of the responsibilities of the current legislative counsel. Because I think if you understand this, it will help you understand that this is more than, you know, just Steve can do. So this is a— I mean, if, if we don't have our own counsel, then this just piles a lot more work on Steve. Essentially, the main responsibilities are lobbying, you know, updates the city council on pending legislation and new laws, attends hearings and reviews pending legislation. Represents the City of Orem with the League of Cities and Towns. 2, amends and revises the Orem Municipal Code as necessary. 3, provides legal opinions to council members regarding various legal issues. As far as a number of these things that we just voted on were worked on by Steve and Jesse. 4, draft policies and procedures, resolutions and ordinances. And 5, oversee special projects, including research projects. such as the school district feasibility study, form of government research, research relating to First Amendment issues, and other issues relating to city governance. So from my perspective, there's, there's a huge benefit to us having our own legislative counsel.

Terry?

I mean, I mean, interrupt, interrupt, just make a comment.

But okay, no, go ahead.

No, I value both. And I think they play a little but different roles. I talked to Steve today and had some legal questions. I talked to Jesse probably Friday. So I value that we have both. I think they work well together. And as a city council, I think it's really important we also have a voice that represents our interests as well as when we talked to Steve about the city's interests and the legal issues dealing with the city. So I I value it. Thank you.

Any other comments?

So I'll just add one.

It's kind of redundant, I guess, but I just agree. I mean, my thoughts are that a second legal opinion, you know, you get 2 attorneys together and it's kind of fun to hear them talk because they do, they go back and forth. And, and I really like the objectivity that you hear as they vet ideas. So I really feel like it does that. It brings a diversity of thought. And is a valuable tool for OREM. So I appreciate that. I should say I appreciate both of our legal counsels, Steve and Jesse.

Thank you.

We good? Anybody else have a comment?

Okay.

I'll just say that, as I think, again, I was maybe one of those that initially was worried about you know, would this be a source of conflict or contention? But I think, as I've observed things more closely over the last few months, I do think that there's been, you know, good professional back and forth that's ended up in better results at the end of the day.

Thank you.

I'll make the motion, Mayor. Yes, I make a motion that we amend Section 2-3-10 functions of the City Council to authorize the City Council to retain separate legal counsel.

Second.

I'll second.

Aye.

Aye.

Nay.

Aye.

Aye.

Nay.

Nay.

Okay, the ordinance passes.

I would say one thing, those that think it's redundant, probably call Jesse, talk to him. Let me, let me finish my sentence. But I think it would be good, you know, to get a relationship and see what value he does add and make that, then make that decision. If you're not using him and you're making a value judgment, that's a little tough.

But anyway. What's that? Okay, we'll move on. 2 last items. We're to item number 10. We're on item number 10. Moving on to item number 10.

Okay.

Okay, that's the communication items. And this is, this is something that I thought was extremely cool. Pete called me this morning and said, did you see we won the Triple Crown? We won the Milken Award. And what that is, is it's an award that Milken Institute puts out for the best performing city in the nation. And we went out with Provo, so it was the Orem-Provo, Provo-Orem metro area.

Orem-Provo.

And essentially, it's, it's a big deal. Pete was explaining to me that there's a lot of different awards that come before cities. A lot of them are essentially pay-to-play, where you have to sign up and pay and then you win this award. This is not one of those. This is data-driven. It's Pure Analytics, and they've got set criteria that they, that they evaluate the city by. And this is the 3rd year in a row that we won this award as the number one city in the country. So it's a big deal. And as far as, you know, it's a credit to, you know, our business leaders, our city workers, our entrepreneurs. Our council. It's a, it's a, it's an award for everyone in our community. So we're excited about that. I just wanted to make that announcement.

Mayor, the Herald has an article in it that hit during our meeting. Oh, so it's online now, probably be in the paper tomorrow.

Okay, great. Thanks. So we'll close with the city manager's comment, acting city manager's comments.

Yes, just a couple of things.

One, Councilmember Terry, Took a— showed me his watch, told me to get out of here because I'll be on vacation over the next 7 days. And, uh, of course, available phone, email, but, uh, Ryan Clark, our acting assistant city manager, will be, uh, sort of, I guess, available and in charge in person.

And Brent will be getting up in 6 hours to go on this trip, so we wish you well on that.

And then, uh, One important announcement, just because we've of course received a lot of feedback from our citizenry in regards to the, the pothole repairs on 1600 North and the need there. Yeah, that— so public announcement, the UDOT will begin those repairs starting this Sunday in the evenings over the following, you know, few days from there. So we're moving.

Okay, thank you.

And for right now it'll be pothole repair, although we have begun—

we have heard that additional work on 1600 North will— is coming along nicely in terms of the whole process of, you know, applying and working with UDOT to get that to happen. So we are very encouraged with a quicker timeline on additional improvements along 1600 North in between I-15 and State Street.

Brent, if I could add, Claire, a little bit more information I have that you may not have. I believe it is a mill and overlay, and starting Sunday they will start They'll have to do some jackhammering and lowering manholes so that they can pave over the tops of those. So I imagine they'll do some pothole repair to get us through while they are doing the mill and overlay.

What's the word you're saying?

Sorry, mill, where they mill the edge and then overlay. Sorry, it's late, in my defense.

And that's why Ryan's our acting assistant city manager.

He has those kind of details.

If I could make one more request, please don't bother Brent on his vacation. Bother me, because he really needs a break. He's been working really hard.

So—

No, I agree that— call Ryan. And Brent, have a safe trip.

Thanks so much.

Would someone like to make a motion to adjourn?

I'll make a motion that we adjourn.

Second.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

We're adjourned. Thank you.