City Council · 2024-07-09

Let's grab it.

We're gonna have to grab this fast, make this all work. So yeah, let's have a prayer and then Okay, so we're gonna, we're gonna start. We're gonna have a prayer. We'll grab the food really quickly because we're not gonna have enough time, and then we'll come back.

Father in Heaven, we're grateful we're here. We're grateful for the tour we got of the building and the progress that's being made and the success of the management of the construction. We thank you for the food we have to partake of and ask a blessing upon it and our events this evening. We pray in the name of Jesus Christ.

Amen.

Hey, grab some food and then we'll come right back. Twice.

Well, it's because he's got to compromise and do it.

All right, welcome back.

Okay, we all went and saw our amazing new city building. It's gonna be very exciting. It's progressive. We'll start out with item number 2, uh, temporary judge resolution for the Justice Court. And, uh, Jake, if you'd like to do that.

Mayor, council, thanks for the time, uh, this evening. Um, in the coming weeks, we anticipate, uh, preparing and bringing forward the resolution, uh, for the council to consider, uh, the appointment of temporary judges. What this really is, is this is the ability for our Justice Court administrator to have a roster of judges when our, when our current Justice Court judge is either ill, sick, on vacation, or otherwise conflicted or disqualified from hearing a case, that you would have a roster of other judges to select from so we can continue doing the business in the Justice Court. This is all governed by state statute. So again, the purpose here is when Judge Parkin with the York City Justice Court is unavailable, that we would then have this roster. In 2018 was the last time we brought this resolution forward for the council to make appointments. At that point, we listed 8 specific judges. for appointment for temporary judges. Among those were Judge Romney, who was the Provo City Justice Court judge. He retired last year. Judge Fenstermaker, who is the Springville and Mapleton Justice Court judge, she retired in 2021. Judge Kollenor from Utah County Justice Court, he is also retired. And then the other judges that we've had on our roster have also accepted other Justice Court positions. So their availability has become a little bit, um, more in demand because they're handling 2 cities', uh, Justice Court, um, calendars. So with that, um, as we've worked with the court administrator, um, the proposal that we'd be bringing forward in the resolution is to provide maximum flexibility for the Justice Court administrator would be that the City Council would appoint all sitting Justice Court judges and approved senior judges. A senior judge is a judge who has retired but is still staying active on the bench as a replacement judge or a temporary judge. And then a further recommendation would be to appoint all sitting Justice Court judges that are in adjacent counties. That would be our statutory limitation as to what we— who we could appoint is any judge within the district and any judge that, that is touching an adjacent county. With that, that would give us an active roster that if somebody were to retire or move to a different city, we don't need to come back to the council for a new authorization. Rather, we would already have that by having the more generic term by saying we appoint all sitting Justice Court judges. Um, and again, it gives more flexibility for that court administrator to reach out and say, are you available to cover this date? I'm not available. So rather than having a limited 7 or 8 judges, the roster expands to more in the area of 10 to 15. So that are the— those are the recommendations that we'd be bringing forward in the coming weeks by the resolution. And are there any questions from the council?

Are there any downsides?

There really aren't any downsides to this. The positive again really is that it gives the flexibility. I guess if there were to be any downside is the council aren't selecting a specific named person for the appointment. Rather, you're using generic terms. So if judges were to come online somewhere else that the council may not have wanted to appoint, By using the generic term, you wouldn't be able to select that person out. How often is justice brought in that's not our normal business? In a year, roughly? In a year? Once or twice? I'd probably say it's more in the area of 10 to 12 times. Okay.

How does that work as far as, yeah, we need somebody to sub? They've all got jobs and they're all doing their courts.

That's kind of the limitation as it is right now. So each of the judges handle calendars. Some judges have more availability because, for example, the Linden City Justice Court, that's more of a part-time court. They're not in session Monday through Thursday or Monday through Friday like the Warren City Justice Court is. So there's more flexibility, more availability for judge sessions. at Linden City to substitute in other jurisdictions. So there's a lot of negotiating behind the scenes by different Justice Court administrators of when's your judge available, when can they come in. And so because of that, there's usually a lot of lead time for when the judge is going to be gone for a vacation or judicial conference, or if there's a conflict, if, you know, the judge knows a specific defendant. Um, or they have a prior relationship and there's a disqualification that occurs. Generally, we're setting that case out in the area of 2 to 3 months to make sure that we're able to arrange that accommodation.

How does it affect the cops, like the cops budgeted for the judge?

That I don't know the answer to. I don't know if there's a bill that's ever sent. I think there's more likely a gentleman's handshake between the different judges saying, if you cover me, I cover you, kind of. and arrange that. But I've, I've never heard of any billing that's occurred.

I've never, I've never seen one.

So do they get paid when they come to do it, or are they just subbing it?

They're just generally subbing for free.

Okay.

As a professional courtesy to be able to come.

And then, sorry, how are they chosen?

So They would be chosen by an appointment by the council. So we, uh, this resolution would appoint all sitting judges. Um, is the question how is the Justice Court selected, or how would that—

The Justice— this, like, you know, normally you have judges on a ballot.

Yes.

Are these guys on a ballot somewhere, or this is just a higher position?

So when a Justice Court seat opens up, um, there is a judicial nominating committee that's formed. That committee is formed by local representatives on the city council or city staff, as well as members from the public, members from the bar. Usually there's a member of the defense bar as well, and they open it up for any sort of job application. And that judicial nominating committee will then select any resumes that are submitted through the administrative office of the court. They then do interviews. They select between 3 and 5 names. Those 3 and 5 names then go to the city manager or the mayor, depending on the local form of government. The mayor or city manager then selects the person to go before the city council in that jurisdiction, and the city council will then appoint that person to the Justice Court judge position. The last time we did that was when we appointed Judge Parkin back, I want to say, in 2012, when we opened our Justice Village.

And then that's the original commission. How were they selected?

They're formed by the local government. So, so when— yes, if we were to have an opening here for our Justice Court, I anticipate that Fran Ryan would work with the city council to select who would be on that judicial nominating committee. There would again usually—

So that committee is just formed as needed?

Correct.

It's not a standard committee? Okay, perfect.

As it pertains to this, then Jody, our court administrator, she would look at the roster and she would select who might be available and go through those negotiations that happen.

Thanks. Okay, any other questions?

Thank you. Thank you.

Okay, thank you, Jake. Okay, moving on to item number 3, uh, we're going to talk about our communication strategic plan. Pete, going to guide this conversation.

So I was kind of feeling like Brandon Nelson today because I get to present 3 times. All right, I'm feeling like a special guy. So our communication plan, I have the full one here. We're just going to talk on the slides at a very high level. Let me just do this. Oh, thank you. So it was developed with help from Alex Corris of Corris Communication. He's a PR consultant who's done a lot of work with Google and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. He's very big in the PR world. So he helped us put this together, and then the communications team did it too. And as you'll see through the plan, we're doing a lot of these things already, but this is just a way to kind of like solidify and really institutionalize the things that we're trying to do to get the word out on all the good things that happen in Orem. So I'll just take you through a high-level overview. So the purpose of the plan is to, number one, support the city mission. And we see the city mission as, you know, building a better Orem, Family City USA. Creating an environment where families can thrive. So all of our communication should ultimately lead to those ends. The plan also helps us establish best practices. So, you know, what are other cities doing? What's the best way to reach residents, get them engaged in the process? So kind of looking at those things. The plan also gives us structure and focus. So, you know, as we build this up, everyone in the organization will know the ways that Orem communicates. And so that gives us some, some good focus.

Hey, Pete, can I just say one thing?

Yeah.

Just to kind of set this up for Pete, this, this represents a big move forward for Orem on the communication side. And Pete has been working on all this, doing a lot of these things over the last— a lot of since, you know, the beginning of 2023.

Yeah.

Roughly. And so around that time, beginning of 2023, We made a strategic decision to really increase the resources, increase the staff, increase the impact with the idea that— Orms doing all these great things, but nobody knows about it. And if we want to build community and we want to have a sense of who we are, we need the community to be really involved and engaged. And so that's where this all has come from. And so anyway, that's just to set it up for those of you that are new.

Oh, thank you. Thank you. And, and then the last final point of why we're doing this is basically communications is everyone's job in the organization. You know, Melanie and I, we do it full time, but communications is such an important part of the organization that everyone needs to kind of have that mindset. And then the plan is reviewed monthly by us on the communications team, and then we'll update it annually as needed. So, as we're developing this plan, we first wanted to look at all our stakeholders. So we've got the external audiences and the internal audiences. And so as we're going through this, we're thinking about each of these groups and different things that we can do to reach each one of them. And in the packet, you'll see this— there's a slide in there about all this, so you can look through those. But each of these segments represents an important piece of all of this. So the first recommendation in the plan is to do a communications audit. And basically all that is, is you just look at everything you're currently doing and seeing how that stacks up against best practices. Maybe there's some things that, you know, we're not doing and we should be. maybe there's some things that we're doing we could do better. Maybe there's some things that we should just stop doing because it's not very effective. So some of the ways that we're going through with the audit is, uh, we reach out to professional organizations. Like, we're members of a national government communications organization. They do monthly trainings. We go to conferences. Uh, there's tons of trade publications that help you kind of learn new ideas and new ways of doing things. Uh, we have scouting missions where we go and meet with other cities. Uh, Melanie is actually going to Phoenix, uh, unfortunately for a funeral, but while she's there, she's going to stop in and Phoenix City Hall and meet with some of their communications people and see how they do things. So that's another way to get new ideas and learn better ways of doing things. We also, you know, communications is one of those things where you can experiment a little bit, try new things and see how it goes. And, you know, if there's— if it's a huge failure, you just don't do it again. But you have a little bit of wiggle room for that. And then one of the things that's been great for us recently is we've brought in all these interns who are studying communications, marketing, journalism, and they are just full of great ideas and energy. And so that's done a ton for us. So that's the update. The recommendation number 2 is data-driven decision-making. So basically everything that we do communications-wise and community relations should be rooted in the cycle of research, planning, implementation, and review. So anything we're doing needs to follow those 4 steps. And that's the way that we can judge month to month if we're being effective. We also, for the digital side of things, We have great feedback. So, like, in social media, digital newsletters, website, there's incredible tools that tell you how well you're doing and if it's reaching people. On the more, like, in-person printed newsletters, meetings, it's harder to track those things. And so we're actually currently developing a communication survey. It's the first one we've done in about 10 years to go out to the citizens and see how do they want to be communicated with? What kind of things do they want to hear about from the city? And then trying to establish that 2-way communication where they can tell us stuff. It's not just us telling them stuff. And so that's, that's recommendation number 2 on the poll. Recommendations 3 and 4 are similar, and this is one that we've already got going. It's essentially creating a citywide team of communication champions. And so the team that we have here in Orem is a representative, at least one representative from each department, and we call them the Orem Sunnysiders. And they're the ones who are, you know, trying to find, like, in their departments What are the great things that are happening? What are the big wins? What are the things that they need help getting the word out on? And so we meet with them every month and they tell us stuff. We pass information along to them. And so that way we're getting down into the departments to find all the great things that are happening. Because a lot of times, you know, in these other departments that the communications team doesn't work with on a daily basis, they're doing incredible things, but no one's telling the story. And so the Sunnysiders have been a great solution to that problem because they're the ones, you know, essentially in the trenches seeing it happen, taking pictures, doing the interviews. And then they can share that with us so that we can spread, spread the word. Number 5, like we talked about earlier, is learn the role of communications at every level. So helping everyone in the organization realize that they have a responsibility to promote, promote the city and be a good representative and build relationships. And so there's some trainings that we can do to help that. Another part of the plan is consistent messaging and branding, and we've gotten a lot better the last couple of years on this. So adopt key messages that support the goals of the city. Like, everything should drive back to the main focuses. So some of the examples in messaging would be your areas of focus for the council. Those are the things that should be driving everything we do. Building a better Orem is kind of the— our cry as employees, what we're here to do. Council USA is a great one. Orem Gives You More is a campaign where we show that Orem is incredibly— an incredible value for the taxpayer. And then my personal favorite, Orem is for Artists. Trying to show that Orem has a very robust art scene, because sometimes we don't get the credit I think we deserve for what we do for the arts in this community.

Mayor, if I may, and you get stuff out fast. You try. How do you do that?

So it's a lot easier now that we have a team of 5 versus before it was maybe just 2 of us doing it. And so, Melanie and Dorelli, who you've probably seen in a lot of ribbon cuttings, Alicia and Isaac. So, Emily's full-time, the others are part-time, but we're able to kind of divide and conquer now, whereas before we were just kind of—

You're taking advantage of interns, I assume, part-time people. Yeah, I'm impressed with how quickly you get stuff out. Thank you. Thank you for your team.

And then branding, and just a simple example of this is what we've done with all the city logos. It's just kind of making sure that they all follow the same pattern. They all include Family City USA. That way, when people are interacting with different departments or different programs, they know it's part of the Orem family. So one of the most interesting things in the plan, I think, is creating what we're calling the key communicator network. And basically, this is a top 50 people in the community that we can reach out to, and they can kind of be like our ambassadors in getting the word out in their little circles of influence. And so the thought is, you know, a lot of those people are already part of the ORM team on the boards and commissions. These are people who are highly dedicated, super involved, influential people in the community. And so bringing them in to help with the communication, I think, is a, is a great use of them and kind of elevates their status too, I think. This key community network could be a great place to go for some initial feedback on things we're thinking of. So if we have a new initiative that we want to do, maybe we take it to the communicator network first and say, hey, look through this, tell us what you think. And then we can go maybe, you know, broader with it. And then also it just helps build relationships in the community because if we have a good ambassador, they can go to their neighborhood or, you know, to their place of employment to be like, the city's doing awesome things, we need your help. You know, I think that is probably one of the biggest things that we're not doing currently that will be a huge benefit if we institute that. Another piece of the plan is to communicate, like, locations and economic development closer together. Because so much of what happens in economic development is really a function of communications and marketing. So, you know, celebrating our current businesses and promoting, you know, the success that they have while also trying to attract new ones, that fits right in hand with what we're trying to do. We have an economic development strategic plan, and a lot of the goals in there are communications-related. So we can go in and try to help the economic development team achieve some of those plans or those goals. And then once again, it's about building relationships. So, you know, we've done this thing called Small Business Saturday where we go out each week, interview a business, hear their story, promote them on the social media. And it's, it's been awesome because the businesses really value it. And they're frankly moved to the fact that the city cares enough to come out and do this thing for them. It doesn't, you know, it doesn't take us too long. It's really fun to do. Sometimes the team gets free food. They never ask for it, but sometimes it's offered. But it's built incredible relationships. And it's kind of let people know that Orem is business friendly. We promote and celebrate our businesses. And hopefully that leads to other businesses wanting to come because we have such a great environment here. Media relationships. This is one of the kind of PR 101s, just making sure that we have good strong relationships with the media players at every level. You know, a lot of times the Salt Lake media ignores us unless there's some kind of horrible thing. We're trying to work on that. You know, we've had some positive stories on TV lately, which has been really fun. And obviously working with the mayor who's kind of on one media outlet here locally, and just making sure that they're getting invited to events and milestones, making it easy for them. You know, all of media, newspaper, TV, internet, they're all understaffed. And so doing things to kind of help them, having the photos ready, having the videos ready, having kind of some basic information ready to go for them.

Makes it more likely to run our story than another one, right?

Exactly. So we're gonna, we're gonna get better at that. A huge part of what we need to do going forward is also crisis communication. So basically, you know, Keith in our fire department, he's done an incredible job of kind of setting up the structure. And so we find this communications team needs to start working on the scenarios. So like, if we were to have an earthquake, there's a lot of things that we could have prepped ahead of time should something horrible like that happen. So we've got to think of the most likely scenarios and then start working to put all that stuff together. that people are going to need in a time of crisis. That, you know, I tried to go fast, but that is basically the plan. You have the full copy, this whole thing here, so if you want to take some time to read through it and send me suggestions or questions, uh, totally open to it. This is just in draft format right now, but we wanted to reach out to you to kind of let you know where we're headed.

I love that you're doing this. I think it's awesome. Um, can you talk to me a little bit about— because I meet with the different commissions and probably all of you have similar experiences, and we'll be talking about this with that, so we should get that to Pete. If there are kind of sunny— what do you call it— sunny side up, like appointed on each commission? Or how do you, you know, how do you hope to interact with our citizen commissions?

Yeah, hopefully we'd be getting that from the staff liaison. Uh, that would be like one of their responsibilities to get to us. But, and, and I think that's a great idea. We could probably remind them like, hey, if there's good work happening at your— or things you want to highlight or advertise in the commissions, let us know. You know, we, we have a new form where they just fill it out, it just takes a couple seconds, and then we can assign a team member to help them put something together.

Great.

Yeah, that's a great idea.

It's helpful to know who that is now. We can just our commissions ask.

Exactly.

Hey, can you get the—

yeah. And like Pete says, we, yeah, we do have a plan basically to take our existing commissions and do a deep dive into them and try and optimize them and make them super effective, decide what matters, what doesn't. And the ultimate goal would be to have these very best commissions all active, working, and then having these commissions essentially attracting People who are very engaged in Orym and essentially want to be Orym influencers. And those people help get our messaging out, you know, by bringing that all together. So that's part of the picture.

Yeah, I think we have some incredible commissions that are very active and do a great job in fulfilling that role. Right. Yeah. And we can learn from those ones. Like, you know, what is it about those ones that makes it different?

Don't forget about radio.

Oh yeah.

just doing little 15-second, uh, blurb about something going on here would be a key for KSL or some of the radio stations in the area too. I know everything is video-oriented now, but, uh, radio also holds some, some of the older audiences like me.

That's a great suggestion. Thank you.

And the commuters, right? Brought our kids. Yeah, evening drive.

Yeah.

And we actually are about to have a survey come out, uh, that's going to be asking all the— percent of the residents about where they get their media, how they like to get their media. We're just going to try and gather information to see where, where people want to learn about Orem, where they are learning about Orem, and then optimize those channels. So that's coming up.

That's right, that should be ready no later than July 30th. So you'll probably— you may get questions about that. So then we'll send you the survey too so you can look at it.

Any other questions?

No, I'm excited for this. This is awesome. I went to the Business Alliance lunch today. And yeah, there were just some great comments about gratitude to you guys and your team for helping them in their business. You know, and how welcome they felt in Orem and supported.

So yeah, it's been surprising because, you know, to us it's not that big a deal, but to them it means a lot.

Yeah, we get that over and over at these different events, different things. I mean, Cheesecake Factory, I was talking with them, they came up and said this was the smoothest they've ever come into a city. This was the most cooperation, the most help that they've ever gotten in any of their openings, and they were just praising Orem as being an amazing place to do business. Yeah, we see that all the time. Different businesses are just so grateful for what you guys are doing, helping get their name out there.

I like to refer to it as the Dorelli boost. So Dorelli is a member of our team, and she's the one who came up with this idea. And basically businesses have reported back to us that there's been a huge spike in their, you know, their sales or their business after one of these videos posts, because, you know, people are looking forward to it. It's become— I think we've probably done close to 50 now. I would guess so. And businesses are now reaching out to us. I mean, we're booked until the end of the year on businesses that want to be a part of this.

Any other questions? Thanks. Great job. All right, so we've got, got time. So we're going to do City Council, um, reports. And so we got Tom and Lene. And so, Tom, if you'd like to— happy Tuesday. Great. Go ahead, talk about your commissions, your boards, and then Lene, if you got to follow up.

So Public Works Commission, great program, great committee ran by Chris and his staff, uh, very committed people who have a lot of skill sets.

In the area.

They're more than just advisors, or they have a skill set that helps. So I think it's one of the great committees. They're all great committees. This one has a lot of people who have a skill set appropriate to it. They give you advice on a whole bunch of things, and Chris prepares them well. It's a great committee. Again, hats off to you and to your chair, to people who join us from afar, I understand. So. when they can. The Orem Youth Council, primarily run by the legal group, uh, fun group of kids to come. It's the funnest committee we serve on. I mean, the 4 fire departments that do, uh, get attacked by dogs, they don't get attacked. And they see that, they see that, they see a whole bunch of real-life experience that I think exposes a lot of the, uh, youth from the 3 high schools here. Almost all of them are female. This, this go around.

We, we, yeah, that seems to be pretty typical. We usually have a lot more women that apply than, than boys, I guess.

Anyway, it's a great group. Happy to be involved with them. And then I've been on the IHC Outreach Committee with the Orange Community Hospital, who's actively involved in helping Orange with their gardens and other things that they do, their soccer fields. They donated some property to us a few years back. The outreach is an event. They bring someone in and tell people what's going on in the community. It's a nice public outreach. It's good to visit with them. I became pretty good friends with the hospital administration. Lenny and I will have lunch every once in a while outside of this meeting. Good group, and I think they're trying to reach out the ways that we would like them to. So there you go. Short report there. Thank you. all happy with each one of those committees.

Okay, sounds good. Thank you.

Okay, so I have kind of some fun stuff here Pete's going to help me do. So I'm on the Utah Lake Authority, and one— the reason I want Pete to put this up is, um, um, I just want to— it's going to show their website there. It's utahlake.gov. So go to that website. We've had some great meetings. Our new chair is Provo Mayor Michelle Caffucci, and our vice chair is Lindon's mayor, Carolyn Lundberg, with Luke Peterson as our new business director. And as you can see on their website, they have a list we just highlighted. We took this screenshot of the events. They have events going all the time. They have— if you can look at their management plan, if you're wondering what are we doing with Utah Lake and what did this legislation do, you can see some really great things happening. Some of the wins just this past month are that there's a goal to reestablish native plants along the shoreline. And they have put 7,500 native plant starts around the shores of Utah Lake so far this year. And Orem has— Orem City has graciously— we got approval from the mayor, Brandon, to— and Ryan helped with that, thank you— to be a sponsor of some of these new plantings and join their sponsorship program. Orem City has helped provide 1,600 plantings. For Utah Lake there. ULA received— that's Utah Lake Authority— received 2 recent grants that will also allow for 70,000 more plantings next year. So you're going to see some changes down there, some pretty exciting changes. The ULA worked with UVU and with Congressman Curtis and received a $5 million appropriation for the creation of the Utah Lake Nature Center. That was a huge win. For our communities. That's going to be in Lindon, but we'll have great access to that as Orem residents. Also, ULA received a Utah County TTAB grant, which is the Tourism Tax Advisory Board, right? And this is to cover the cost of and purchase of the installation of visitation trackers on all 27 access points around the lake, so we can get some good data, some good metrics. Where to? where people are going and, and what are the needs in different areas. So a lot of great things happening at the lake that I don't know that we're necessarily always tuned into. So, you know, they have fun events, carp shooting with bows and arrows, archery. So you just need to go to that site and you'll have lots of fun stuff to do. Um, my other one, another one I'm on is the Orem Arts Council. We meet once a month and I have some great community members on there, very talented. Adam Robertson, is our chair, and we're striving to first support our CARE recipients by helping to publicize their events. We're bringing some new events to Orem, like the International Folk Dancers and also a new and improved Come Together Concerts in the Park with Utah Live Concerts Foundation. And this will be on the 16th and 17th of August. There'll be fireworks after Saturday's performance, and I'm going to give you just a quick little preview here.

The excitement is building for the Come Together Rock Festival, August 16th and 17th at the Orem City Center Park. Music, food trucks, vendor booths, a classic car show, an extended farmers market, a free community breakfast Saturday morning, lots of giveaways and fireworks on Saturday night. Fun for the whole family. Entrance is free. Over 20 bands will rock the stage playing '60s, '70s, and '80s rock and roll that you love. The fun starts Friday, August 16th at 2:30 until 10 PM. Saturday, August 17th, 9:45 AM until 10 PM. Information and band schedule, check out utahliveconcerts.org.

Okay, so that's gonna be lots of fun, and if you happen to sit by Councilmember Spencer, he will tell you all the songs. I can name that tune in 3 notes. You're gonna sing them all. Yeah, yeah, I could probably sing them too. He might hit you every time he knows which one it is. Okay, uh, Neighborhood Commission. That's another one I'm on. There are so many great things happening on our new and expanded Neighborhood Commission. Our goals are to improve our community connections and communication with the neighborhoods in Olympia City. We will be scheduling neighborhood socials and improving our communication channels, and Pete's really going to help us with that. The big news, of course, is our partnership with the My Hometown program. We'll have a big reveal and introductions in our next city council meeting in August. And this is really a big win for Orem and for the Geneva Heights neighborhood where the community resource center will be located. I want to give a huge shout out to Jenica for all of her hard work. She has just done amazing things. Karina, Pete, Steve, your teams have all helped this come together. So watch for the big kickoff on Saturday, August 24th. And like I said, they'll be coming to our next city council meeting. Okay, then my last one are— there are great things happening. UCCU Center, I'm on that board. So great things happening there. One of my responsibilities—

The excitement is building.

To review their financials, and I want to report that they're very well managed and a tremendous asset to our community. So we have another video. to help you kind of understand UC— the UCCU Center and what they do. Okay, so yeah, think about that, 1,700 pounds of hot dogs. Um, and I think an incredible thing in that video is they have welcomed over 388,000 visitors to Orem, basically, right? So we're grateful to have this partnership with the UCCU Center. It's an amazing gathering place, such an incredible and valuable community asset for us, and we're truly fortunate to have it here in Orem. And it's going great, Mayor. That's my report.

Okay, thank you, Lynette. That's great. Any questions on that, anyone? Okay, good job. Okay, run through the agenda really quickly. Uh, looks like it's going to be a pretty easy meeting tonight. We'll have item 3, call to order. Item 4, invocation. So we've got Brooklyn and James Schellenberger.

Yeah, I have arranged these. David, as you know, just won the Republican nomination for District 58, I think. And these are his children. I advise him or his family to participate. So he's— 2 of his daughters are participating, but he's the backup in case one of them chickens out. So we'll see what happens.

Okay, so I'll— I'll— as we go through this, I'll just let you introduce them. Happy to do it if you can.

How would you like to do it? I'm happy to.

It's just as far as—

yeah, since you invited me, happy to do that.

Um, okay, and then we've got mayor's report, item 6.1, uh, the naturalization ceremony video, um, by Pete. And then 6.2, uh, presentation, uh, Sarah splash pad opening and the Sarah Shell new interior to show us some of the new things going on at Sarah. That's Peter again. Then we'll have personal appearances. And then we have item number 8. It's actually interesting how it says personal appearances 15 minutes. I just wondered, am I supposed to stretch 3 people to 15 minutes? Am I supposed to refer to 30 to 50?

That's the max.

Um, item 8, consent items. So we've got approval of meeting minutes. for June 18th. We've got approval of mayor pro tem, uh, for July to December, which will be Tom. And we've got item 8.3, appointment to the Arts Council, uh, Stephanie Goodman. Appointment 8.4, appointment to the Neighborhood Advisory Commission, Sydney Demmer. Demmer. Uh, item 8.5, Planning Commission Brittney Brunolfson. And then item number 9, our only scheduled item, is a public hearing. And this is to receive input from the public with respect to the issuance of sales tax revenue bonds, Series 2024, in the aggregate principal amount of not more than $11 million by any— And B, any potential economic impact of the project uh, be financed with proceeds of a series of 2024 bonds may have on the private sector. So, Brandon?

Yeah, I'll just do a brief overall thing and turn it over to you, really, for public hearing.

Now help me understand, so we've mentioned this, talked about it, this is just a public hearing, are we going to vote on anything?

There's nothing. You already on the May 28th meeting approved the bonds resolution. So it has a 30-day, if you will, contest period, in which public has an opportunity to contact you and talk about it with you. And then obviously the public hearing, which they discussed at that public— at the public hearing after that part's over.

You have the opportunity to potentially— if you do nothing, the bond resolution keeps on going. Um, at that point, you have— and you actually have beyond this point to— if you felt like you wanted to kill issuing the bonds, you still have period even after tonight to do so. Based on those public comments, you could do it right then or sometime before it actually—

Okay, so this is essentially— we're just going to gather information, let the public speak. Yeah. And, um, What? And then close it out. Okay. And then we've got item 10, city manager information items, right? You can do something for that. Are you gonna— okay. So, okay. All right. And then we'll adjourn, and we'll adjourn this meeting also.

So, so moved.

So moved. Thanks.

Hi.

Hi. Hi.

Do we move to German speaking?

No, no.

I don't know. He's enthusiastic.

Test, test. There we go.

New record.

That's pretty short.

So, and then the mayor often asks them something, but they don't say anything. But please, just with me and just bring it back. We'll all do it with you. We're excited to have you here.

Y'all ready? Yeah. Dad had the booster on. Okay, what grade are you going into? What grade are you? So do you all go to Fort Hill?

Why don't you take a seat right here on the front row? Oh, thank you.

So, so you represent our area then?

Yeah, so our area is from the city up to—

okay, so that's your son.

When you going to get sworn in?

No, you have to do all the general elections.

I'd like to call this meeting to order. Okay, I'd like to welcome everyone tonight, and we have a relatively light agenda, so, uh, this will be good. We'll start out, uh, with our invocation by Brooklyn Schellenberger and then the Pledge of Allegiance by Jane Schellenberger. And Tom invited these folks to come, so if you'd like to introduce them.

Well, no doubt Jane and Brooklyn are the stars of the show, but their father was recently elected as a Republican nominee for District 58 for the House Utah congressional area. And we thought we find out how good he is by listening to how great his girls are. So why don't you go right ahead and come on up, Brooklyn?

Our dear Heavenly Father, we're thankful for this day. We're thankful for all our many blessings, and we're thankful that we could be gathered here today. And we're thankful that we could have such an awesome summer so far. And Please bless that we'll all get home safely. And we say— I say these things in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.

Amen. Did I get the names reversed?

This is Jane and Kate.

We had them reversed on our thing. I'm sorry. Instead of Brooklyn. Kate, go ahead. Thank you.

Please rise.

Please repeat after me. 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.

Thanks. Thank you for helping with that. We're going to move on to item number 6. This would be the mayor's report. And we've got item 6.1, a presentation from Pete Wolfley.

Okay. Hello, Mayor and Council. Our first item here is just a quick celebration of all the things that happened in Sierra Park and at the Sierra for 4th of July weekend. And one of my personal favorite events is when they swear in the new citizens. So this year there were 20 individuals from 15 different countries. who took the oath to become citizens right here in Orem at the Sierra. And we just want to show a quick video, and it's, it's actually pretty moving to watch. Congratulations, my fellow Americans. So that part at the end where everyone's cheering for them, that just gets me. This is one— like, I love this event. We— the mayor and I got to go to it last year, and he spoke, and it's just no better way to celebrate the 4th of July than that event. And seeing the love that they have for the country, it's really awesome. So it was a great weekend in the park. So That is the report on that. Thank you, Pete.

Next up, we've got item 6.2, and this is the Sierra Splash Pad opening and the Sierra, uh, new shell exterior. Pete, if you'd like to tell us about that.

Yeah, so I've invited Chris and Bryce up if you have any questions about either of these projects that their teams worked on. Um, you know, we know that your time is, is short as, as elected officials, and so instead of going to visit these things, we wanted to bring the field trip to you. So, uh, this is— we'll start with the splash pad at Sierra Pool, and then if you have any questions, you can direct those to Bryce, and then we'll do the, uh, the wall after that.

Hi, I'm Sydney. I'm here with Orem Recreation, and we're here with Marcy at the splash pad today. And this is a brand new splash pad at the Sierra Pool, and we're just wondering, you know, what is your favorite part of I love the splash pad.

It's perfect to have right by the pool. I have 2 little boys that are 6 and 3, and they sometimes love swimming, sometimes not, so it's fun to have both. And they've both given me thumbs up 100 times and have told me this is the best day ever, so I think this is the perfect addition.

Perfect. Thank you so much. I'm here with Marissa, and she is the coordinator over the Syrah Pool, and we're here to ask her a little bit more about the processes of the Syrah Pool splash pad. So Marissa, how did this come about and what has it brought to the Orem community?

Yeah, so we went through a couple different vendors and we decided to go with Vortex. They were the most cost-effective as well as they had some pre-structured playsets already, and we kind of got to pick based off of those and kind of meet the accommodations that our community is looking for and what would be a good fit to our facility.

Perfect. And what were some of those accommodations and what can we kind of look for in the future?

What we look for accommodations is we noticed that our deep water swimming, our water slides really meet an age group specific to like 8 and older, and we really wanted to meet that demographic of some Someone who's 3 to 8, that younger age. And so we kind of accommodated the structure to that age because our old splash pad did have higher rise structure. And so we wanted to minimize it down so that it could fit those needs. And so that's kind of what we did to accommodate so that we have a bigger demographic throughout our facility and the pools. And then what we look forward to the future is we are currently working on adding heating to the water, and so I think that will be a good addition just because nobody wants to swim in freezing cold water. And so we really look forward to adding that as well.

Perfect, perfect. So I am here now with Rebecca, Liam, and we were just wondering what your favorite part of the Sierra Pool Splash The splash pad—

about this year's splash pad is the slides.

Perfect! And then what about you?

Well, I love that the kids get to come play on it. It expands the pool, and I also love the things you can squish down with your feet with the water.

Perfect! That was one way that we wanted to also make it accessible for kids.

Any comments, Bryce, on the addition? The—

are we on? Yeah, great. The video sums it really well. You know, we had just a wonderful prayer to start this meeting that talked about an awesome summer, and then we get to watch a video of an awesome summer. I love seeing the wet footprints from the pool on that drone shot over to the play structure. Um, for a— from a foot traffic perspective, though, it's been a wonderful addition. This is obviously a part of the CARE tax and being able to bring these amenities to our residents. Um, from year to date, we have actually increased our day pass sales 50% this year over last year, and we have doubled our family passes, our— the, like, the family memberships for 2024 compared to 2023. And, uh, some of that, you know, there's a number of factors, uh, but the, the goal for us as a recreation department is to make sure that people are coming and able to access their amenities, their facilities that they are that they're paying for through tax dollars or through membership passes. And like Marissa in the video talked about, really creating sort of a continuum of recreation from 0 to 99, specifically here at the Sarah Pool. So it's been very well received. That heat exchange, I think, is installed at this point. And so hopefully we'll be able to kick up the water temperature even a few degrees more. And we're just really excited to have it online and available to our residents this summer.

All right, now we'll move over to the, uh, the Sarah Wall Project. But the Sarah Shell is celebrating their 40th anniversary. To celebrate, we partnered with, with Adam and his team over at the Sarah to, to put in a nice new wall. And I'm sure several of you have seen it at shows.

I'm assuming this is all with CARE.

I believe so, yes.

Yeah, so again, thanks to citizens of Orem. This is your CARE dollars being spent. So, okay.

I'm Justin Gaines. I work at Public Works, and I am the traffic signal engineer. Used to be the lighting guy.

Hey, and tell us a little bit about the behind the scenes and all the work that went into building this new wall.

So after the, the guys who built the wall built the wall, we had to come back in and get the lights put on. So there's 2,400 feet of conduit throughout the wall, 7,200 feet of wire, and 82 lights on each of the panels or each of the columns, and then 6 gate lights that also light up. With the trail lights lighting up the sidewalk, it's just, it's really nice at night, really lights up the area. So if you get a chance, come see it at night because it's really, really nice.

Already we have had so many comments about how beautiful the wall is, and I think the thing that really is cool to me is the lighting. There were so many areas around the Shell that were very dark after a show, and now all the sidewalks on the east, on the north, the south, and even the area on the west side, well lit and just beautiful. Now when you drive by on State Street at night, you look over and you can see where the Shell is. It's beautiful, and we We've had so many comments from patrons and even just people that walk the park daily, how much more beautiful this has made the park and the Shell.

Yeah, it's been a huge improvement.

Okay, thank you, Pete. So Adam obviously represents the Shell, and then on the city side, it was Tyler Paye. Who was— I worked with to coordinate on this project. The project started about January of this year, and, you know, you all know that the fence that was around it was chain link. And in many cases, it was curled under, it was cut, kids would jump over. And I know it's hard to believe, but it happened. And so we put something in a little bit taller, a little more resistant from that, something that would really stand the test of time. And this kind of a wall is like— I would compare it to like an HDPE pipe that's going to last you 100 years. So the, the Sarah Shell's been around for decades, but this has just enhanced the beauty and the— again, I would say the ambiance and, and the look and feel. Like Adam said, at night you can see it kind of glowing from State Street. Um, $300,000 in CARE tax contributions were, were made and dedicated towards this project. So we do Appreciate the citizens for their support in bringing this to fruition. The project started in February of this year. There was— the original thought was maybe to put a fence in similar to what we did over there by the Heritage Park and around the tank there with Mr. Farley. The cost was cost prohibitive. We went back and looked at, and that's an HDPE kind of a fence, so it was very, quite indestructible, but it looks really nice and it's a molded plastic kind of material. This, however, was concrete. We went to— Tyler knew some locals and went to them. Steve Walker in particular and his family helped to build these precast tilt-up walls that were put in and then later stained. Marty Bradbury with Standard Fence then did the ornamental iron gates, which I think really set it off. And the illuminated gates and signs and the walls themselves, I think, I think we're inspired by, by Tyler and by Adam from the beginning. They felt the need to really light it up and make it a little safer, create a better ambiance and a better look and feel. So I think they've accomplished that. A couple of other enhancements that I'd like to mention that we did include in part in partnering with Adam was we enhanced the crossing there at 600 South 4th East. We've installed a rectangular rapid flashing beacon and a safe crosswalk that'll That is in place there at this time to help with a lot of people that do cross that during the events. We are also looking at installing 2 new monument signs, one on 4th East at the parking lot on the south edge of that parking lot there at Sarah, and then another one at the access on the west side off State Street. So look, we look forward to those coming in. They're gonna, they're gonna mimic and look a lot like the wall and have that same look and feel, but it will be also digitized as well for advertising for locals that drive up and down 4th Eastern State.

So thank you.

Thank you for that. Okay, lots of good things happening at the Sarah. Let's go to item number 7, personal appearances. We just have 3 individuals who have signed up to speak tonight, and first on that list is Aaron Aurelian.

So I know the procedure. I live on 58 North Palisade Drive. Is this thing on? So, and I, I know most of you, I, I voted for probably all of you. And so I've been in, um, my wife and I have been in Orem for now 23 years, and I used to be on some of the councils. My concern has to do what I saw on, uh, the news and also from my own personal experiences. I saw in the news that Utah ranks 5th in traffic accidents and traffic violations. So, and I know that's true because I go up and down, uh, Center Street a lot, and I go between 35 and 40, and I get passed by everybody or honked at to get over. And I see often, uh, people going through red lights. And so my concern is, is the public safety issue of this and, and obeying the laws. Also, I live on Palisade Drive, and I'm not sure if Tom has had this experience, but we've got people that love to go up and down that street and see how fast they can jump over the little— what do you call it? Speed bumps. Yeah, the speed bumps. And these are individuals that are on these e-bikes. And I've seen— I've seen a golf cart, and I've seen one of these all-terrain vehicles go up and down there fast. And we have a lot of little children in the area where I live, and I just don't want to someday just wake up and see that somebody has either gotten killed or gotten hurt. Um, I used to be a VIP with the Orem Police Department, so I'm, I'm a little bit sensitive to that. And, uh, I don't know if you have a— if you still have a traffic and safety commission. I'm— if there's openings, I would love to be on it because I have the expertise and I've been on commissions before, and I love to be a part of our, our city. And I appreciate all that you do. I know that Uh, you guys work hard, and, and, uh, and, uh, it's good to see people on the city council that I voted for and that I, I know are going to make a good, uh, contribution.

Even my former mission president was— is on there. So anyway, I, I know my time's running out, but I just want to thank you for all you do. And if there's any, any type of, uh, solution to that, then, uh, I'd be welcome to help on that, or whatever you want to do. Any questions? No, no real questions. What, what we usually do is, uh, so we've got all of our executive staff over here, and so if you could talk to the police officer, uh, in the back and just give them some specifics and some, you know, just kind of boil it down to what might be a way to, to figure this out better and And figure out some solutions. Okay. I'd encourage you to do that. I will.

And, uh, I'm glad to see that Steve Earle is still alive. I've known him for many years.

Well, we are too.

Anyway, thank you for all you do. Okay.

Thank you. Okay. Next we've got Donna Boyd.

I see you're doing many wonderful things for the city of Orem, but in my subdivision, Deerfield Park, frankly, we feel neglected. I was here on the 28th of May with a petition from 60 neighbors who are affected by this problem. their taxpayers and their voters, and they are petitioning the city to have the nuisance, which is according to your Code 11-1 in your, um, Orem laws, that the neighborhood properties need to be kept clean from certain, uh, hazards. And we requested that this be addressed by July 2nd before the fire, uh, the New fireworks season, and people on this list keep calling me saying, is anything going to get done? Has anything been done yet? And there was a crew that showed up on the Center Street side with a bunch of weed whackers, and they cleaned off the hill that's on Center Street. But our hill between Center Street on 1000 South and 100 South has not been touched. I would invite each of you to do your homework and come and look at this situation. It has gotten way worse since I was here on the 28th. It's a tinderbox. We're going to have as high as 107-degree temperatures this week, and we've had quite a bit of wind lately, and it's really a serious problem. I want to know, is there anybody on the city council who's assigned to our part of town? Who do we need to talk to? Do we need to talk to the property owner? I think it would be better if it came through official channels. But we've been fighting this problem for decades and we just cannot seem to get it resolved. So we— I want to know, what do we need to do?

Okay, thank you. Um, yeah, it sounds like we just need to dig a little deeper into this and figure out a solution. Uh, likely the best solution would be— it would be Brent. If he were here, he would take that. Yeah, but Ryan, and then also the fire chief, and then—

So what we can do is we can follow up with NIT and see if they're in the process of working with that property owner for those violations.

They, they may— most likely are in process, but I don't know if Scott knows anything with our police department, or if he can look that up quickly and maybe get with Donna, but We can follow up with NIT tomorrow and get back with Donna if she could leave her number.

Yeah, I left my phone number. I left a petition with you on the 28th with all the signatures and my phone number, so they should be able to contact me.

Okay, we'll look for that.

Teresa, do you still have that petition by chance? NIT has it.

Okay.

Also, we're wondering, is there liability if there's You know, because there's, there's homes all at the top of that hill, and the weeds are taller than me. And if the wind is blowing that way, there's a real danger to those structures.

Okay. So yeah, I can share if it's, if it's been through the judge, then they're in the middle of prosecuting that.

I don't know if Steve Earl is aware or updated on that by chance.

Okay, well, thank you. Would appreciate any of your help.

So it sounds like it's going through the court system.

Yeah, yeah, maybe Teresa sounds like she knows more about it than I do, but it sounds like it's been— there's an enforcement mechanism that we use to, to deal with nuisance violations. Unfortunately, it's— it takes a little bit of time sometimes to get through that process. And so I think what's happening is, um, they're prosecuting or they're pursuing this through a civil citation or civil violation. And then, you know, they try and get compliance from the owner of the property first. And if they can't get that, then they end up taking it before what we call an administrative law judge. And that administrative law judge is only here once a month.

And so sometimes, you know, you have to schedule in advance and send out subpoenas and notices and things like that. So sometimes that process can be a little bit slow. slow. But, um, it sounds like that's, that's what's occurring. But I think we can probably follow up with NIT and have them give you an update on where that, uh, stands in the process.

Okay, thank you. Yeah, if we could put something in place to where you've got a direct contact at the city that you can call to follow up on this.

I would love to have a direct contact. Who do I contact?

Okay, so for right now it'll be Ryan, and then Ryan will work with you to get a direct contact.

Okay, if he could write down his name and phone number for me, or email, or whatever.

I'll get that with you in just a sec.

Yeah, if you can just wait till the end of the meeting, then we can— we'll have him meet.

I've got another meeting to go to, but if she has something she can write it on.

Okay, so thank you. Yeah, Teresa, can you get that? Okay, thank you. And, and, uh, Keep on us if this doesn't get resolved. Thank you. Okay, next up we've got Greg Carlisle.

Hi everybody, usually I'm here on real serious things. Today I'm not. I am so excited about some of the things going on here. Forum Fest in June was amazing. I went to the Bluegrass Festival about 3 weeks ago right here, and it was something else. And that Colonial Heritage Festival 3 or 4 days ago, I saw some of you. That was so big and so, I guess, represented everything in our country and all the colonial times and the wars and everything. It was just something else.

So I wanted to be here to advocate for the next exciting thing, and you just saw this in your earlier meeting. I've been so involved with this. It's called the Come Together Rock Festival right here by the Senior Center behind us. It's not new. It's been 4 years. There's been thousands of people that have gone there, and I started going there and volunteered to do some radio commercials for them, and, uh, I just could not even believe the talent. 20 bands show up and they play for free, and they're some of the best bands in the state. Some of them been around since the '70s, some of them are new, but it's too good of a secret to keep a secret, I think. So we're asking maybe to promote that. Well, we got some help. Pete's been amazing. We've met with him probably 7 or 8 times, and the CARES tax has kicked in, and Dave and Jeff Lamson and all of you. So I'm asking you to be—

and Lynnae— to show up for this on the 16th and Pete's going to tell you a little bit more about it during the next few days. We have some time we could have you speak during Acts on stage. And Dave, you can't take too long, but no campaign speeches anyway. But it— I'm just really excited about it. And, uh, Looks like you picked. So we've got some fireworks going on after 5 minutes, right? We've got our farmers market combined with that. We've got a car show. But it is just an amazing situation. So if you can show up, City Council and everybody else here, I just want to get that out publicly. And the people behind this is about 40 or 50 guys and gals, and it's something else. So it's the Come Together Rock Festival, the 16th and 17th of August. So that's about all I had. Thank you.

Thank you. All right. That should be a great event, so encourage you to participate. Next up, we go to item number 8, our consent items. Item 8.1, approval of meeting minutes for June 8th, 2024. 8.2, an approval of mayor pro tem for the July 2024 to December 2024, uh, where Tom McDonald will be the mayor pro tem. Try to control yourself as Dave is going out as a mayor pro tem. Um, item 8.3, an appointment to the Arts Council of Stephanie Goodman. Item 8.4, an appointment to the Neighborhood Advisory Commission of Cindy Demeron. And item 8.5, an appointment to the Planning Commission of Britton Rinaldson. Yes, if any of those are here— Britton, would you just like to stand up, just say hi?

That's Sydney back there.

Sydney.

And then, I don't know, Stephanie. Didn't see. Okay.

Okay, well, you guys are in for some good experience, so we appreciate you saying yes.

I move for the approval of the consent items, Mr. Mayor. I second.

Aye. Aye.

Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. The consent items are approved. Thank you. Okay, next we'll move to item number 9, scheduled items, and we just have one scheduled item tonight. This is item 9.1, a public hearing to receive input from the public with respect to the issuance of sales tax revenue bonds. Series 2024 in the aggregate principal amount of not more than $11 million, and any potential economic impact that the project to be financed with the proceeds of the Series 2024 bonds may have on the private sector. So I just like to open that up for a public hearing for anyone. Okay, let me, let me introduce Brandon first. Sorry.

Thanks, Mayor. Uh, yeah, so just as a kind of a— to Outline what has taken place. So back on the council meeting on May 28th, um, you as a council authorized the issuance of sales tax revenue bonds of not to exceed $11 million for the purpose of financing the acquisition, construction, equipping, equipping, and furnishing of a fire training facility and improvements to our public safety complex, as well as any other public safety items that needed, if there are any remaining funds after those 2 projects are completed. As part of that resolution that occurred, a— at least a 30-day comment period was required. We've exceeded that obviously here in— by July 9th. And in that resolution, you set tonight as the night for a public hearing to hear any comments about that, um, issue about issuing those sales tax revenue bonds. And so at this point, um, that we are to that point to accept comment on public hearing. So I turn the time back to you.

Okay, thank you for that explanation, Brandon. Okay, with that in mind, uh, we'll just open up for a public comment for anyone that would like to comment on these revenue bonds. Okay, if we don't have anyone that would like to comment, we'll close the public comment time and we'll just move on with that. Thank you, Brandon. Okay, last up, uh, Brent was not able to be here tonight, and so Ryan's in his place, and Ryan, would you like to take care of any city manager information items?

Ryan just told me he's going to be about an hour.

Oh, good.

When they said we'd get out quick, I said, that's what you think.

No.

Yeah, Bryn asked me to pass this along and share this message with all of you. Speaking of the bond, in the world of public finance, the highest credit rating cities can receive is a AAA, and we're happy to report that Orem was recently upgraded to AAA status at the end of June. The city had been at AA+ for many years, but we have finally achieved elite credit status. We need to note that our utilities and enterprise operations have had AAA ranking for some, but now the city's general fund operations have joined this exclusive club. And I appreciate Pete with these statistics. He's good at finding this information. Of 20,000 cities and towns in the US, only 426 have AAA status. That means only 2% of the cities have the highest credit rating, and Orem is one of them. So I think much credit goes to our council and their leadership, to our finance team, and to our— all of our employees for being good stewards of taxpayers' money. The change in this rating stems from several factors that were cited in the report from Fitch. One is that Orem's ample level of budgetary flexibility and healthy reserves. Two is Orem's strong fiscal management capabilities and policies, and three is Orem's steady demographic growth. Graphic, economic, and long-term liability metrics. Receiving AAA status is a huge milestone for the city because it means we will receive the most favorable borrowing terms when the city needs to bond for a project. The AAA rating lets investors know that Orem is a safe bet. Getting this rating could save the city millions of dollars over time in interest payments. So props to all of you and everyone that's been involved in that rating. One last thing. Lane Gray mentioned to you earlier about our water tank project. We've reached a couple of milestones there that I'd like to share with you. The tank itself, pouring of all the concrete is now completed. They are inside caulking all the joints. Most of the scaffolding's been removed, and they're hoping to start filling that tank for a leak test here in the next couple of weeks. That's a huge accomplishment. I think they're actually a little bit ahead of schedule. Also, the 24-inch water line that is in 400 South that connects to the tank goes down 4 South to 6 West, all the way down 6 West, 8 South, and then down 8 South and ties into a pressure zone. It's also known as the spring water zone. Is that right, Chris? Yes. Okay, just make sure I don't mess that up. That massive pipeline is completely installed in the ground. So we're down to 1 pipeline left in 4 South of about 5, and we're hoping to have the westbound lane open in September. We will— Before school or maybe shortly after? It'll be after school.

Lane had hoped to get it before school, but we ran into some struggles with the irrigation pipe that was in the way of the water main. So irrigation pipe's back in place. Now we got to put the road back together. So going forward, eastbound will remain closed for another year. We'll be bidding out the pump station and the well house here in the next couple of months, and you'll start to see the tank getting backfilled, buried, and the park will start getting built on it here in the next few months. So good progress.

Thank you, Ryan. That's all good news, and that's, uh, very exciting news as far as the AAA rating. A lot of people don't realize what a big deal that is, but Only 2% of cities have that status, and, uh, it's really hard to get. And it's incredible that Orem has been able to make that happen. So congratulations. All right, I think we are going for a record tonight in the shortest meeting, I think, of my term.

So I think it's because you've got a new mayor pro tem who doesn't talk as much as your old one.

I don't, I don't think you've assumed the seat yet.

I don't think— yeah, he doesn't— he hasn't had He's not mayor pro tem yet, so— With all joking— I'll take credit for that.

I'll move for an adjournment, Mr. Mayor.

Second. Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye. Aye.

We're adjourned. Thank you.