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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2025-11-18 TranscriptionIowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [00:13:29] There we go. Well, it is Tuesday, November 18th, 2025. And I'm going to call the City of Iowa City work session to order. I want to make sure that Councilor Weilein that you can hear us and we can hear you. Will you say hello, please? [00:13:52] Can you hear me? [00:13:52] Yes, we can hear you. Welcome. [00:13:55] Welcome. [00:13:56] All right. We're going to move on to item number one, which is the University of Iowa Student Government updates. Welcome, welcome. [00:14:09] Hello. So sorry, miss. Last session, I knew council was on election day, and for some reason that didn't compute. That we probably wouldn't be having normal scheduled council. anyway, we just have a few announcements tonight. first things first is we mentioned the multicultural food drive. a couple weeks ago a new update for that that will be happening during the spring semester. So we can have more time to plan everything out. We're currently reaching out to various establishments downtown. the senior center, places like that to host donation bins. we've also got the coat check program that I've talked about. Right now, we're currently still looking for, like, a home for it downtown. that's all the update I have on that. [00:14:51] 1 don't have any updates. [00:14:52] 1 said her announcement. I'm so sorry. [00:14:55] All right, well, welcome. I mean, good luck next week because you all are going to be off, right? Yes. All right. We're going to move on to item number two, which is clarification of agenda items. Hearing nothing from the agenda, we'll move on to information packets. Item number three, starting with November 6th. Moving on to November 13th. And we have two items that we do need to discuss. One is a memo from the city manager, and this is relating to the sister city. so wondering if there is a desire for council to kind of just select someone now to be that representative between now and the end of the year. And then when we do our January, is it the second organizational meeting? Page 1 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [00:16:03] Sixth, maybe sixth. [00:16:05] The sixth. Okay. Sixth, when we do January 6th, we'll be able to select someone. Then officially. [00:16:14] And what are the requirements and what is the scope? [00:16:18] 1 think the so if we go back to the resolution, essentially the council appointment is something that this council had in the resolution where we said we want someone on that board of directors. and so I guess if you're asking, which is a fair question, what is the expectations of the sitting councilor? I think it's to one kind of make sure that the I won't even say the will of the council is being voiced, but kind of just making sure that in those meetings they're present, someone is present. Can recite, remind what our resolutions are. I think be a part of the conversation from you know, this elected bodies. [00:17:12] 1 think you're going to be following everything that their board of directors, rules and bylaws. So, yeah. [00:17:23] 1 will say that Mayor Pro Tern brought this to the council in 20. 17 or. [00:17:28] 19. [00:17:29] 20, 19, 2019. and so I would, I would. [00:17:35] 1 was just going to say that I think she would be wonderful if you would want to do it. [00:17:38] 1 really want to do it. But I don't want to say like, I want to do it without like. [00:17:42] 1 think you would be amazing. [00:17:44] Oh, thank you, thank you. All right. Yeah. Thank you for the trust. Page 2 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [00:17:49] All right. [00:17:50] Sounds great to me as well. [00:17:51] All right. Thank you. [00:17:52] So we're going to appoint Mayor Pro Tem Sala as our representative again in January. We will have an official vote. But if something happens between now and then. [00:18:03] Yes. [00:18:04] Have fun. All right. And then we're going to go on to Ip6, which is a memo from the city clerk. And this is the proposed schedule really have to kind of nail down a lot of the budget season. [00:18:19] So I have a strong preference for the Saturday date. I know that that's January, the 31st, January the 31st Mondays would be very difficult for me. I'm not sure if that works for everyone else though. [00:18:30] Let me look. I think it'll work. [00:18:41] Better days also work well for me. [00:18:43] Yeah. I'm okay on the 31st. I can do. [00:18:46] The 31st. [00:18:47] January 31st? Yeah. Saturday. [00:18:50] The January. Page 3 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [00:18:50] January. [00:18:51] January 31st. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yeah. I'm not going to be here in December. So. [00:19:01] Megan, does that work? [00:19:03] it's just the the mayor's innovation project conference is the 31st. [00:19:09] Yeah. [00:19:10] And isn't the mayor's isn't your. [00:19:13] Yeah. I mean, that's just leaving on a Friday, I think. So the 31st, if it works for folks. [00:19:22] Yeah. [00:19:23] I'd appreciate that. [00:19:24] So unless there is a is, is there an opportunity for a different Saturday? [00:19:35] I'm asking who. [00:19:39] one. I'm asking us as well as staff. Can we move it to the 24th. Is there an issue there. [00:19:49] , 1 can do that. [00:19:50] 1 mean, that would be preferred, but I don't know if that really crunches staff. Page 4 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [00:19:54] But. [00:19:56] 1 don't have any problem on 24th. [00:20:00] Yeah. [00:20:01] 1 have a problem. [00:20:04] Should be okay. Do I'm looking at Jacqueline. And when we're going to get the budget out because we'll probably get the budget to you. maybe that week of the fifth or the 12th. So you may not have a whole lot of time with it before that Saturday. But if that's all right, that's okay with us. [00:20:23] All right. We'll go with the 24th. [00:20:25] Thank you. [00:20:27] Thank you. [00:20:28] We said, what time? So we can put it on the you know. [00:20:32] 8 a.m. [00:20:33] We generally would start at 8. [00:20:34] A.m., 8 a.m. Okay. [00:20:37] All right. We'll be here that Saturday the 24th. Great. [00:20:43] Page 5 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. And then. [00:20:44] And then let's look at any other dates we need to nail down right now. Kelly, that you think. [00:20:52] That was the only one that really we didn't have a set date on? I know you had mentioned to have folks look at the the tentative schedule to see if there was any conflicts with anything else. [00:21:02] Yeah. And I think if we can just take a look and make sure that we don't have sometimes we don't want to, schedule something on a, an event that we know typically happens in the city or a holiday that could affect one of us up here. or we would like off and not meeting. So if we can review those dates, forget. [00:21:26] When the CIP date is Wednesday, the 21st. Yeah. [00:21:33] 1 don't have anything. [00:21:40] Hearing nothing. All right. We can always revise it as we go along. We're going to move on to item number four, which is an update on housing authority planning. And Tracy is coming on up. Welcome. [00:21:56] Thank you. Thank you mayor, I'm pleased to welcome Kayla Stanfield from Baker Tilly as part of the pro housing grant, the city engaged Baker Tilly to help strengthen the housing Authority's organizational effectiveness to increase our financial sustainability and look at how we create a pathway to develop internally affordable housing. So previously, you heard a presentation from Cordell. This is not to be confused. Caudill's presentation was how to reposition our public housing units out of the public housing program into a section eight platform. This strategic plan considers us moving forward with repositioning and managing our own housing portfolio outside the public housing program. So tonight, Kayla will focus on the strategic plan and pathways to expand our affordable housing. Our development. options and discuss our operating model. And just as a footnote, we have one of those items on your agenda tonight, the hiring of financial coordinator. So welcome, Kayla. [00:22:53] Welcome. [00:22:54] Hi. Thank you. Mayor, council and city leadership team. Thank you for having me today. as we give an update on the strategic plan and operating model, I also have two other team members that are joining Page 6 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. virtually today. Caitlin Hummer, who is a principal with Baker Tilly, and Caitlin Nuss, who is a consultant as well. So they will be interjecting some comments throughout the PowerPoint as we go today. All right. First, just a high level agenda is that we'll give an overview of the strategic planning process, and then we'll go into some more information on what the actual strategic planning elements were. And then we have some recommendations on the development and organizational structure for you all. And then we'll end with some implementation recommendations and some next steps. So beginning with the Strategic planning overview we're going to cover the scope, the phases that were part of the strategic planning project and the stakeholder engagement that was involved in it. So our scope here was to provide a comprehensive evaluation of the current operations and provide a detailed roadmap for the future. We assess the organizational structure. We looked at staffing levels. We also did some peer benchmarking and the efficiency of the staff roles and the responsibilities. We analyzed some pathways for increasing development of housing opportunities, and we facilitated a strategic planning process which consisted of multi -year strategic planning. And as Tracy mentioned, Baker Tilly is also serving as the development manager for the pilot project. So here are the four phases that entail the project. And so we're currently in phase four. But the project began in May of 2025 with a kickoff meeting, where we sat down with the staff to decide what the scope is going to look like, who would be involved in the stakeholder engagement, and those deliverables that we would present to you all in phase two, we did a lot of heavy stakeholder engagement and the analysis we did document review, data review of existing documentation. We had multiple, documents that we requested from the staff so that we can do a thorough analysis. And then we had stakeholder interviews with internal and external partners. And then we did benchmarking assessment as well. And then in phase three we came on site here in June in July, and we did a strategic planning workshop with your leadership team and with the housing team. And then we've done some organizational, legal and financial review as part of our assessment. And so now here we are. We are presenting our findings thus far for the strategic plan. And then we'll be providing after updates today, the final strategic planning document, which will also consist of a communication strategy on how to get those changes and when changes are made, as well as an implementation action plan. Also. So just a brief overview of what those stakeholder interviews look like. We interviewed members of your city leadership team. We also interviewed the Iowa City Housing Authority staff. And then we also interviewed some of your internal or excuse me, your external community partners in some similar housing type programs here in Iowa City. So during those interviews, we gave them an opportunity to share their insights, things that were going well, things that they had to recommend, and also give us some ideas on some of the strategic objectives that they would like to achieve. they were asked to ask targeted questions on the organizational aspects operational, financial and service delivery also. And so after all of those interviews, we took the information and we synthesized those themes that we heard that were recurring themes. And we provided the staff with a discover summary report. And then, as I mentioned, we were here July 22nd and July 23rd, and we met with the Iowa City leadership team. And so we conducted a full workshop where we helped identify who Iowa City Housing Authority's customer was, or their main customers that they wanted to identify. And then we talked about a vision and mission statement, and then we identified with them strategic goals and objectives and initiatives that would tie into those identified goals. So here's just a snapshot of the deliverables that we've provided throughout this project. So we provided the discover Phase summary report. We also provided a document that had the strategic Page 7 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 202S (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. Planning workshop results in. It. We'll be finalizing the final strategic plan and operating model. And a report. And also will be providing an implementation action plan. So just a little bit more in this next part of the agenda of what the strategic plan actually looks like. So the elements that we looked at were the vision statement, the mission statement, strategic goals and objectives, strategic operating initiatives. And we also identified some of the gaps that we that we heard and observed during the workshop and during those interviews to help us guide some of those recommendations. So after the Iowa City Housing Authority team identified who their main customers were and the types of services that they wanted to continue to provide and or new services that they wanted to provide. We were able to use that information to come up with a vision and mission statement. And so the vision statement that they came up with was strengthening communities through affordable housing. And then the mission statement to be a collaborative leader in affordable housing through programs, partnerships and policies that help all residents thrive with a commitment to respect and service excellence. So we felt that that really fit what the goal was for the for the housing Authority both now and into the future, as well. And through the workshop, they identified five high level goals to focus on. So goal number one was to increase stakeholder opportunities and prosperity. Goal number two to develop internal financial management capacity. Goal number three, preserve and expand affordable housing units. Goal number four to enhance organizational capacity and structure. And goal number five to implement technology effectively. And so each each of the five goals the team focused on creating a definition for each of the goals. And then they also assigned initiatives that would tie into those goals. Not all of the goals were being or not. All of the initiatives are starting over from scratch. We also incorporated things that they were already working on that were in progress as well. And so we won't go over necessarily every single one of the goals that's listed here, but there's a few that we're going to point out throughout today's presentation. So the first one there, you'll see number one was to increase the number of residents and the family self-sufficiency program. So this one was important because this HUD initiative helps families and subsidized housing achieve economic independence and reduce the the reliance on assistance. And so some of the goals of the family self, excuse me, family self-sufficiency program is to have goal setting and a coach that will help them set employment, education and financial goals. And they also give them an opportunity to create an escrow savings account. So some of the benefits of this program are savings, growth, skill development, support services and a path to independence. And you'll see there on point number three, there was also to excuse me, point number four was to utilize full capacity of specialty vouchers for high barrier residents. And so this is another initiative through HUD programing. And this targeted populations that have significant barriers to stable housing. And so in this program, they're usually distributed through referral systems that prioritize them with the highest needs. And so some of the target areas are those that have chronic homelessness, severe mental health or physical health needs. History of institutionalism. might be victims of domestic violence or human trafficking. Youth that are aging out of the foster care system and, maybe some that have poor rental or challenges with credit history as well. So the purpose of this is to really help families achieve that housing stability and release and reduce their resilience or re release, reduce their reliance on emergency systems as well. So goal number two was to develop the internal financial management capacity. And you'll see those initiatives listed on this slide. as mentioned you'll be talking a little bit more later about the financial coordinator. But this was one of the things that we identified as a recommendation through our research. because as the Housing Authority is looking to expand their services there is a need to bring in this particular Page 8 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. position because there's different funding sources, compliance regulations and reporting mechanisms. And as we analyze the staffing they're at capacity for being able to accomplish all of these tasks that would be needed to cover the expanded services. And now I'm going to hand this piece over to Katelyn Nuss to cover the HCV admin reserves. [00:32:36] Hi. Good evening. Can everybody hear me? Okay. [00:32:39] Yes, we can hear you. [00:32:40] Great. Thanks so much for having me, Katelyn. when speaking with the team in Iowa, we talked about the need for section eight reserves. So what is a housing choice voucher? Admin reserve? It is the essentially a savings account for housing authorities who are funded through HUD. and allocate housing choice voucher programs or traditional tenant based section eight. The purpose for the admin funds is to provide a buffer against fluctuations in funding or demand. So it helps ensures continuous funding, stability. Obviously, in the last few months, we've had some uncertainty in the federal government. That's exactly when Housing choice voucher admin reserves are to be used. program funds can be used for that program stability. So covering shortfalls when HUD funding is delayed or reduced. So families don't lose housing support. It could also be used for voucher expansion. So supporting additional vouchers when demand exceeds baseline allocations. So if you need more vouchers out on the street, special initiatives such as landlord outreach, housing, mobility programs operational flexibility, the reserves can be used to help with the administrative costs, such as technology upgrades or staffing needs. These can be also referred to as management improvement opportunities. So later we'll talk about how the agency is working through some technology upgrades. The reserves can be used for the purposes of training and implementation of that software system. That is all I have right now on the Housing Choice voucher admin reserves. [00:34:31] 1 have a question on that. Oh, oh, it's probably the same one. I want to know how much we have in our current, housing reserve. And we can wait till the end I guess. [00:34:52] The housing authority I think that we looked at it yesterday and we have 3.17 million in that reserve right now. [00:34:58] Great. Thanks. [00:34:59] Page 9 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. And also, I have a question. I don't know if this she said like expansion of housing voucher or what what was exactly she said one of the things is expansion of the housing voucher. Like having more vouchers. That's what it means. Or. [00:35:19] Yeah. So one of the eligible uses for voucher expansion is that if you have excess reserves, you can use those to put more vouchers on the street. I will caution housing authorities. this is a risky practice because once your reserves are gone, you may not be able to renew vouchers. And so HUD will certainly if you're continually operating using your reserves as part of your general operations and not as like a specialty focus or a special projects you'll have to work really closely to make sure you're not over obligating and then have to call back vouchers in the future. [00:35:58] And also is this can be also using of like, I don't know what the word that I should use here, but you know, you know like sometimes the vouchers for three bedroom is 1700 or something like that. And the market price is 1900 is that cannot be expansion of the voucher itself, like increasing the the threshold of the. [00:36:26] Yeah. So I think what you're referring to is your payment standards. And so that's speaking directly to how much funds can be used for a voucher by bedroom size. That's something that the housing authority evaluates annually what their payment standards are going to be. And they have to work very closely with HUD to develop what they call a two year tool. And that just forward forecasts how much voucher allocation they have to spend on the street to make sure they don't run into what is called a section eight shortfall. And that's where you have more commitments on the street than you're eligible. subsidy coming in to pay for it is. [00:37:05] Okay. Yeah, because that's one of the really problem happening right now in the community. I thought maybe we can figure out a solution for it. We will find houses, but the voucher is not covering it. [00:37:21] Okay. Thanks. [00:37:23] Thank you. We'll move on to goal number three. And that is the goal of preserving and expanding affordable housing units. And so the key one we wanted to point out on here is in parallel with Baker Tilly's development advisory team. they have been supporting the executing the pilot project. And so that initiative is to develop affordable housing units on vacant city owned property to alleviate the pressure on the existing affordable housing unit housing stock and provide much needed support for the citizens of Iowa City. And so far partnering with us, they have analyzed and chosen a site. They completed some draft architectural massing and zoning confirmation. and they've put together a Page 10 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. preliminary capital plan as well. So as this preliminary work is completed, the next step is to procure an architect and begin the process of designing the building and the site. And this process is going to involve multiple public review periods to ensure that the project pilot is a success for the neighbors as well, and those in the community. And we'll also be assisting in soliciting the best financing options for that as well. And then they will select a general contractor that will lead you all through a public procurement process. [00:38:40] I'm curious to understand how expansive in this particular setting of the preservation of affordable housing is. Does it include the city owned affordable housing and all housing that's under that? 30% of your gross income in the city? That might not really be part of a city program, or is it really just focused on the ones that the city has some level of control over? [00:39:07] I'm talking about what. [00:39:08] We are doing and what this contract is for. [00:39:10] Well, when, when, when the goal is to preserve and expand affordable housing. Yes. Great. Let's do a lot of that. I'm but my my curiosity is I know that if we purchase an already existing unit that's providing what would be market rate affordable housing in the city where maybe not benefiting the whole city. We're just transferring transferring one from one owner to a different owner. So that's why I'm curious in your analysis or what his definition of affordable housing is, it just narrowly focused on the city's affordable housing or the whole city? The city owned one government owned ones versus all. [00:39:48] Depends on which hat we're wearing. So for this study, we're preserving our housing, our public housing units that get repositioned to to section eight platform, as well as maintaining those units. So we have 86 in the public housing. We have 2324 units outside public housing. So we have 123 units. We need to preserve those. We need to sustainably operate those that we cash flow, and that we provide the maintenance and the repair that they need. We look to build and to increase that portfolio. So we'll go from 123 units to one, 41, 51, 61, 70 that will operating now in other programs outside the Housing Authority. We will use our CDBG home funds affordable housing fund to work with the community to preserve community wide affordable housing. [00:40:32] And and for the purposes of expansion. For this, it wouldn't include expansion to include existing affordable housing. It would be all new construction, new. [00:40:43] Page 11 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. That's what our focus is on. That's what the pilot project. That's what to take to teach us. [00:40:47] Reconstruction. Jump ahead. [00:40:49] 1 don't want to limit it, especially with the loss reserve loss funds coming up. You know, maybe we have opportunity to acquire new construction that typically would not be affordable. But our intention, as I see it right now, is not to buy affordable housing stock that's affordable in the market and convert that just to subsidize housing. So our concentrate will be concentration, will be on acquisition of new construction or to build it ourselves. Okay. If that's if I'm. [00:41:11] Answering your question, very helpful. Sorry, I just we the the term affordable housing has many different meanings in different contexts. And I want to make sure which version we were using here. [00:41:21] Okay. So thank. [00:41:22] You. [00:41:25] good question. Yeah. [00:41:27] Question. I suppose my question was and I think it might be jumping ahead a little bit. So apologies if that's what is happening. But the admin funds we have right now, did I hear that that was 3.7 million around there. [00:41:44] 3.17 million. [00:41:47] 3.17 million. and as we're talking about this is something for months I've been thinking about, you know, as we're talking about expanding our housing authority's operations, you know, obviously that will include more staff. The more and more units that we need to maintain and manage. and I know that the housing authority is already cramped where it is. And so one thing I've been thinking about is it keeps me up at night a little bit. Is just making sure that we have, like, the physical space capacity for expanding our housing authority so we can take on that extra what we want to do. So my misunderstanding. What we were just talking about in terms of what were you talking about? Risks of maybe using some of those funds we have right now. Because to me, what keeps me up at night is just Page 12 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. not spending that money that could potentially be clawed back with our uncertain federal environment. so there's a question in there somewhere, I suppose. I suppose my interpreting that correctly. [00:43:04] Oliver, this is Kaitlyn. you're absolutely correct. There is a risk of potential clawbacks if those federal funds are not spent, which is why it was highlighted as as one of the findings of that is a significant amount of reserves. HUD will mandate you have a specific level in the team, in the Housing Authority, are very aware of what the minimum requirements are, but your reserve levels are far above that at this time. And so really it's evaluating what are the possible uses available to the community and what is the right fit. Certainly using some of the funds to aid in relocation or expansion of services specific to the section eight staff would be allowable. funds could not be used for things that are not related to the section eight team, so it would have to come down to the staffing and who reports to which budget. [00:44:04] Thank you. [00:44:05] Okay. Thank you. [00:44:12] All right. If no other questions, we'll move into goal number four. And this was to enhance organizational capacity and structure. And so this one we do have some recommendations that we'll be sharing on the organizational structure in a few slides ahead. but one of the things that we did want to point out on this one is bullet point number five there. And it's a rebrand. And it is prioritized as something that may not occur right away, but something that we wanted to draw your attention to as we did the interviews and the workshop. This was something that was a resounding theme across our internal and external stakeholders, and part of it would be as you're working on new strategic initiatives, as you're expanding your services, sometimes it might require it is recommended to kind of really look at your branding and what that might imply, not only just for the public perception, but to really clarify the identity and the role that the the Housing authority is going to play, as well as it shows the support of change across the board. And it will also build that trust and engagement from your participants and your community. Excuse me, your community as well. one of the things that was pointed out in our analysis is that, you do have other counties that are part of the Housing Authority as participants. And so having a name that is associated with just one of the particular counties can create some misunderstandings as to who you serve and who the the reach is for the housing authority. And then goal number five was to implement technology effectively. And this is one of the areas where the housing authority has already started. several of the items listed here, such as identifying some software to make their processes more effective and some process improvement opportunities, they have already begun on. We wanted to make sure that that was still a high level goal of continuing to improve the technology efficiently. And with that, I'm going to hand over the next section of this over to Caitlin Nuss and to Caitlin Hummer to cover the development model and the organizational structure, structure, recommendations. Page 13 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [00:46:27] Great, great. [00:46:30] Thanks, Kayla, so much. so first, I wanted to just outline that based on conversations with Iowa earlier we discussed that the the vision and mission statements were to be evolved. And when focusing in on those vision and mission statements, it's clear that your city and your housing authority are very proactive in finding solutions to meet the needs of your affordable housing community. The vision statement of Strengthening Communities through affordable housing is a very strong statement, and I applaud you for creating a focus on that. housing authorities across the country have taken this more proactive approach to development, not necessarily out of aspiration, but a hint of desperation. The reality is we are in a true affordable housing crisis. Every community needs it and it's really up to the leaders to step up to the plate to say, we are going to be a community that creates affordable housing, not just laissez faire and letting it happen organically. what I've outlined here are four possible pathways to creating additional affordable housing in your community. the city can pursue one or multiple. You could go one way and then pivot to a secondary. You could run two pathways simultaneously. It's really a structure that is flexible to meet the needs of what the economy can supply. And also what the demand is asking for. So please note that these are interchangeable and can be used at different different in different ways at different times. There is no single quote, unquote best pathway. It really needs to be a community driven plan. So the first option here is a co -development pathway. This is where the housing authority will partner with an experienced developer. They will be joint in planning and execution of projects they'll share and resources risks, revenues. And it helps the housing authority build capacity through collaboration. There are ways that the Housing Authority can generate, generate revenue in this option. It could be something where you have a strong developer who is providing financial guarantees. Maybe they're taking 80% of a developer fee. The housing authority is at the table providing nonprofit status or project based vouchers to a project, and they're going to take 20% of the developer fee and also manage the property once it's complete. The co -development model is very common for smaller communities or housing authorities that have less resources or less experienced staff. [00:49:19] In this co -development model, do you do it for a project or for a period of time? [00:49:25] It could be both, and it could be project by project. Or it could be, let's say, for example, your housing authority wants to build capacity. So you're going to use this pathway to building the skills necessary to do your own self development. Maybe you do it for three years or you do it for three projects. Whatever it takes for your staff to have the right scalability and then also have enough project generation to be able to afford additional staff resources. etcetera. [00:49:56] Page 14 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. Follow up question. probably true for multiple of these, but when you're working with a private partner, how do you select that private partner? [00:50:05] That's a really great question. most communities will do a request for qualifications and solicit development partners through a public procurement process. sometimes it happens where a developer may have used a similar model in a different community. And then there's piggyback opportunities, Intergovernmental contracts can be utilized. but it really is up to your community to decide how you want to approach that. [00:50:31] Thanks. [00:50:32] Can you repeat again, what was the partner will be look like between the housing Authority and this developer? Like an ex developer? [00:50:44] are you speaking to, like, what a master development agreement might look like between two partners? [00:50:49] Yeah, no. When you say like co -develop between the housing authority and developer for, like, exactly like specifically for like tech programs. How does, like what are you envisioning? You said it, but I really didn't get it in the beginning. If you can just say whatever you said in the beginning. [00:51:08] Sure. So in this co -development structure the Housing authority would partner with an experienced developer so that experience developer oftentimes will have the staff and skills necessary to do a full development project, but they may be needing in resources such as the nonprofit Status project based vouchers. other things that your state housing finance agency may mandate. Right. And so this is a collaborative co -development opportunity that would be defined under a master development agreement, an MDA that clearly outlines roles and responsibilities. Who's going to be in charge of what and what any revenue and risks may be shared. So, for example, the earlier example I gave was that a an experienced for profit developer may come in and they've got the staff, they've got the engine to create affordable housing, but they're partnering with you, the housing authority, who's going to provide project based vouchers to their community. You may also be the property manager because maybe they don't have a local property manager. Right. So in that particular situation, when you're looking at risk versus reward and revenues, that developer may earn 80% of a developer fee and the housing authority would earn 20%. Now fees are negotiable. It's going to be very project specific. It really depends on what resources are being brought to the table. [00:52:35] Page 15 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. Yeah, that's exactly what I thought. I understood. That's why I want to ask you again to make sure. But also, I still have a hard time understanding what the big benefit from partnering with low income tax credit developer who already there to provide 80% or 30%, like already providing because of the tax credit they already providing affordable housing. Why should we partner with them by using our vouchers where we can use these voucher for non like high tech developer who just have a market price? Did you understand where I'm coming from? [00:53:14] 1 know absolutely I understand your your question there. I think the greatest benefit is for the Housing authority to work alongside the developer to build their internal capacity. It is also a tool that you can help utilize to incentivize developers to do projects that work for your city. Developers typically come in and they they use a model that works for their financial structure. Right. In most developers are looking to make money and then they exit at year five or year 15. in this particular structure, it can be negotiated that the housing authority maintains the right of first refusal, right, so that you can guarantee in 15 years, when that tax credit expires, those are not going to fall out of affordability, but rather that you have some type of control or say in what happens to them. It's also a way for the housing authority to generate revenue if they are sharing in that developer fee, they can start to assemble a pool of funds that can be used and recycled for future projects. So it's a little bit of a nest egg that, as they grow in their skill sets, they're building up a loan pool that they may be able to utilize for future projects. It's helping build internal capacity and keeping those resources in your community. Instead of a developer coming in building it. And then leaving. [00:54:36] Okay. Thank you. [00:54:40] The second option is self development with consultant support. And so this is similar to what is happening in the pilot project. This is where a housing authority truly takes the driver's seat and leads the development activities. But we acknowledge that the housing authority may not have all of the skill sets necessary to complete a project from A to Z, and so that's when consultants come in and provide technical and strategic expertise based on the needs of that particular project. It's a more balanced approach that allows you to have control of a process. and, and really driving it, as I said, from A to Z, this will enhance the organizational learning. So this is excuse me if a co -developer is not looking to partner with the city. Right. Let's say you do a request for qualifications. You put it out to the world that you're looking for developers to partner with, and nobody responds. Well, your option is to either do nothing or to take the driver's seat and do it yourself. And so this option is a great in-between of like, you want to do it, but maybe you're not quite sure how to do it yet. So you're going back to my earlier of maybe not aspiration, but desperation. The reality is the community needs the affordable housing and nobody else is stepping up to the table to do it. So we are going to take control of our community and what the needs are. And so we're going to do it, and we're going to bring in the right partners to help us get the project through. Page 16 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [00:56:14] 1 had a question. Yes. so for me, I guess I could be missing a couple puzzle pieces here, but in terms of us doing it ourselves, in this manner or with hiring a consultant it and you might this might be a part of one of the other options that you're going to present. But in terms of just hiring staff with the experience already is there kind of like a comparison in terms of what is generally the most cost effective or what has worked in other communities? because 1, 1 guess in my brain, I just think, okay, we need people with certain skill sets and we just create those positions and hire them. [00:57:07] Oliver, your timing is great because that is a perfect transition into option three, which is the full self development. and full self development is really where the housing authority is operating as a developer, you manage the the right people, you oversee all phases of development from site selection, financing, design, construction, compliance. You've got the right team, the internal capacity, expertise, et cetera. and you just do it on your own. There are housing authorities that do this nationally. the majority of these large or the majority of housing authorities that do full self development are large authorities. These are ones that have over 50 million in operating revenue. They are the ones that have very large portfolios and extremely large staff to fall back on. if you're looking to go down this full self route it's not an easy calculation to come to, but you're looking at hiring an architect, hiring a site superintendent, hiring you know, people with finance skills, et cetera. that's a lot of overhead for the city to carry from a payroll perspective. That's why we suggest typically to go through the self development with a consultant until you have enough internal capacity, as you're building out your team to go full self development. The other thing I will caution is that investors are looking to make sure you have qualified teams and experience, and so you're going to need, you know, five years of time and, and projects to showcase to an investor that you are a worthy organization to work with. it is a risk proposition to go into a deal with someone who's never done it before. And so a lot of communities will require that you have a minimum of three tax credit projects under your belt before you can do it on your own. And so that's something that every state is a little different. And Iowa also changes every two years. What they're qualified allocation plan may or may not state. And so you just have to keep a pulse on what does your state require. If you're looking to do tax credits, what are the requirements of the state to apply. And then also what is the appetite of the investor community? Are they willing to take a risk on you? Do you have the connections to make that happen? Do you have the financial balance sheet to provide financial guarantees, et cetera. [00:59:41] For full self development? when one needs to require the capacity and experience to qualify as being a qualified developer, do you gain that qualification by being a co -developer, or do you need to be the self developer with the consultant support.? [01:00:01] Majority of states will allow you to earn that experience by being a co -developer. some states will allow it as self development with the consultant. It is going to be very much state specific. and as I mentioned, it can change from year to year. It depends how you're qualified. Allocation plan is written. Page 17 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [01:00:21] Okay. [01:00:25] the last option I wanted to present is really just a contract with a developer. So going back to that mission statement earlier to be a collaborative leader in affordable housing through programs, partnerships and policy. that option for contracts with a developer is really a tool to be used when looking to partner with people. So this to me is a pathway that is not as fulfilling with the Housing authority taking the lead and coordinating these efforts, but rather this is something that may be able to run simultaneously with other efforts. This could be engagement with private developers for land like maybe you have land available and you want to do affordable housing, so you're going to do a request for qualifications for affordable housing providers to provide proposals for vacant land. And you're going to sell it to them for a dollar. It could be the tools such as the project based voucher that you want to just give them away to advance affordable housing in a specific location or for a specific target demographic, et cetera. This is a lower risk, faster delivery model. So if it's something that you need to mobilize very quickly, you want to just contract with the developer and move. my understanding is that your community is already doing this. So I listed as an option, just so you know, that you can still do it while working through the other options, but also know that you guys have tools in your toolbox, and you can use different tools at different points of time depending upon what the needs are. [01:02:07] And another question. So I imagine communities that take on becoming developers themselves a lot of them probably have different overall goals or different visions for the future. I'm assuming correctly. Right? Yes. So, you know, I speaking for myself here, I'm somebody who is extremely excited about the prospect of becoming developers because I view it as like one of the main pieces to creating non -market housing. And solving the housing crisis locally is going towards a route where we have very large, robust housing authority that has a lot of capacity, something like like the Vienna model, which the municipality owns 25 to 30% of all housing in the city or Singapore or something like that, versus, a community that just kind of wants to put their toe in and a little bit to the overall landscape. So I guess my question for you is, are there different options that you would recommend for different goals or different visions for the future? [01:03:27] It's a very good question. I would say that the different options are really going to be contingent on your capacity and expertise on how you can execute. it's also a local choice on the appetite for risk that you all have, the desire to have control, the speed at which you want to pursue it. and truly, the, the financial sustainability of it. this has to be a community aligned initiative. If you're looking to go the bigger scale, like the in the examples that you provided, that's something that the housing authority, in and of itself cannot financially support. So it would take it would require larger policy changes to have funds available to do that type of large scale growth and initiatives. it is not impossible. I really just think it depends on what the needs of the community are and what you're willing to put in for resources. Page 18 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [01:04:33] Thank you. [01:04:39] All right. Kayla that is it. As far as the the development goes. So transitioning now into the organizational changes, unless there's any other questions. [01:04:53] There's not. [01:04:54] Okay. so as far as organizational changes Kayla and Caitlin can jump in at any time, but really, the goal here is, is to help in the mission of advancing affordable housing. Just high level. What we're looking to do is, is to elevate the housing authority's role while also freeing up time for the executive director. So right now the the housing authority is it's a little confusing to be to be honest. It's a division within a division within a division which is not what we commonly see across the country. So our first recommendation was to elevate the Housing authority to be its own division, specifically directing the reporting through the director. And so the reason we do this is for a couple of reasons. It's to enhance the credibility of the housing authority when it's the Iowa City Department that falls within three layers under the mayor, it kind of loses credibility. We want to create a sense of efficiency, adaptability, stronger advocacy. create more eyes so that people know who the housing authority is, who it reports to, who oversees it, et cetera. So having it be a standalone division helps create more, outlined support. [01:06:24] Will you explain exactly what that means? They would no longer be a department of the city, and. [01:06:30] They would still be a department of the city. And I apologize, I don't recall the division that they're under right now. So they are a what is the Kayla, help me with the layers. [01:06:43] Hey, Caitlin, this is Tracy. So right now the Housing authority is part of Neighborhood Development Services. We have three divisions right now. Development services, MPO and Neighborhood Services. And then the housing authority is a division under Neighborhood Services. So this would create a housing authority would be a division just like development services. Neighborhood services, MPO and the Housing authority. So we'd have four divisions instead of three. And then it would be under neighborhood services. So the housing authority would be their own division under NDS. That makes sense. [01:07:13] Still under NDS? No. Page 19 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [01:07:15] Still under NDS. So the executive director of the housing administrator would be a direct report under me. Got it. So it'd be Danielle. Erica Kenton, Rachel. That helps. [01:07:26] Yep. Thank you. Yep. [01:07:29] Thank you Tracy. the second item that we had suggested was to change the title of the housing administrator to executive director. This is a nationally recognized title. The executive director, housing administrator. when discussing in the inner circles of affordable housing and specifically public housing with Rad repositioning, et cetera. that is a confusing title. And so when interacting with the outside community to help create a sense of credibility, we recommend changing that title. the third item is the creation of the housing counselor position. The housing counselor position strengthens the resident services. goal that we we discussed earlier by providing a dedicated support and guidance. it also helps alleviate the current housing administrator, hopefully future executive directors role for oversight. So this would be someone who could help achieve the goals of the housing counselor to advance family self-sufficiency and resident engagement support, while freeing up time for the executive director to refocus attention to development. [01:08:54] Don't we have already something like family positions? [01:09:00] This would be like a supervisory role for that. [01:09:06] In how many people we have doing family, self-sufficient for things. [01:09:14] And I apologize. I went out of order there. the creation of the financial coordinator position. is another strategic investment in long term strength of the housing authority. So when we start talking about affordable housing and the regulations under section eight versus public housing versus rental assistance, demonstration versus tax credit versus, you know, CDBG home, it becomes very complex. The other thing I will caution you is that affordable housing in my time at Baker Tilly, we refer to it as lasagna financing to get these deals to balance, you have to accept, you know, five, six, seven, eight funding sources. And it makes it extremely financially complex, with a lot of different compliance reporting requirements. And so creating a financial coordinator position allows a team to be very dedicated in reviewing the financials, being prepared for the complexities of the compliance and future reporting. So this would be an investment in bringing someone in. Now having the organization become stable. In that financial coordinator role while slowly adding on additional complexities as the Page 20 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. development team is successful. The last item is the development manager. And I think a development manager is really focused to free up time for the executive director. As you take on additional projects a development manager can help facilitate the needs of the organization and manage projects on behalf of that executive director. So it could be someone who can coordinate with your tax credit investors, someone who can connect with your general contractors. It really is a special projects person. and that development manager could be something that is filled temporarily based on the needs of the project or could become a full time position based on the pipeline of growth that the Housing authority is able to achieve. [01:11:26] With these new positions, would the dollars for these lines be able to be spent with those reserves with some of the reserves that we have? Or is this general fund. [01:11:42] , are you referring to how we can continue funding this? That's what you said. [01:11:46] Well, I'm just wondering, with new positions that we don't have yet, how do we how do we pay for them? [01:11:55] with the financial coordinator position, that is something. And, Rachel, please feel free to to take lead here. the financial coordinator, because it is supporting section eight that is an eligible expense for reserves. when it comes to the development, that would have to be paid for, ideally out of those fees that you're earning as a developer fee for the projects that you have in your pipeline. [01:12:20] Okay. [01:12:21] What about the housing also? [01:12:23] Yeah, what Kaitlyn said is correct. The financial coordinator position can be absorbed in the in our current admin reserves. And what we get annually from HUD for those admin fees. [01:12:33] Right? [01:12:34] Right. The housing counselor position we actually wrote that into the Pro housing grant when we applied for it. So we have some funds for a couple years through the pro housing grant for the housing Page 21 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. counseling position. And we believe that we're able to sustain that within Housing Authority, enterprise funds. we're wanting to really flush out, make sure our federal funding is in place before we come to you. With the creation of that position, which is why you haven't seen it yet. We want to make sure we have sustainable funding for it before we make that request. right now, we believe we'll be able to sustain it, but we want to make sure, which is why we haven't brought it to you yet. [01:13:09] Right. Start the pipeline. [01:13:11] Yeah. [01:13:12] You mentioned that the financial coordinator position will be paid by HUD. [01:13:17] If we can sustain it with our current HCV admin fees that we receive monthly from HUD. [01:13:24] And for the for normally what, like. The reserve that we have normally now these new positions, what we were doing with the reserve money before is this also could be like creation of new affordable housing or like anything else or, or it has to be only administration. [01:13:51] Yeah. Only administration. We're not able to use it for hard units is what we call a physical unit. So we can't buy or develop or purchase units with these funds. [01:14:00] So that's why it's administration funding. [01:14:03] So yeah. [01:14:04] Okay. Good. You. [01:14:06] Thank you. [01:14:07] 1 kind of want to connect the the development path Louise slide with this recommended organizational changes. Slide. are these recommendations the same for development pathways one two and four. Just Page 22 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. not self development. These would these recommendations be the same for the co development self development or contract development methodology. pathways is what you use. Or would these recommendations be different for different choices and development pathways. [01:14:44] No. These recommendations would be the same except for that full self development. You would need a larger scale team to be able to do that. But for, you, options one, two and four, these three positions help alleviate the burden of the executive director's administrative oversight right now to free up time. to focus on development. [01:15:07] So in pathway four, were you contract with the developer, you would still want an in-house contract developer to work with. The out of house developer. Is that correct? [01:15:18] Yeah. So the title we used is Development Manager. That really can it's adaptable. It could be like a special projects manager. Right. This is just the person who is the main point of contact to help facilitate those. [01:15:31] Owners. Representative. Yeah. [01:15:33] Yes. Yeah. And I think we should clarify that that function doesn't have to be you know, we think of that as a function and not a position. So with the self development, with the consultant support that development management could be provided through the contract with the consultant. So there's sort of different ways to get to that function. That doesn't have to be a full time employee. [01:15:58] Okay. [01:15:59] And normally that will be funded by the fund from the developer. The project fund. Right. For if the if the development manager is if I understood it correctly, the one we're going to take care of all the development for new project for example, if that's really paid by the new project funding or this is have to be part of the housing authority reserve or or any other like, I don't know, city money, I don't know. [01:16:32] Ideally it can be paid for by the project. It really depends on your your partnerships and what the projects you're looking to advance are. there's always value in having city funds allocated to the specific role. If that is a strategic priority for the city to advance affordable housing. Having funds available to Page 23 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. have a person to lead those initiatives, is always a good investment up front, and then the project can help support it. In years two, three and beyond. [01:17:01] And that's something used to be covered by the executive, by the housing administrator, right before. [01:17:09] Correct? [01:17:11] O kay. [01:17:14] 1 was going to ask again about, you know, we're talking about some new positions, and I hear you explaining right now that it isn't necessarily a new position, as in we hire a staff, but it could be through the consultant. But I just think about in terms of the physical limitations of our current facilities and how we do need to expand. I was just wondering if that was taken into consideration at all or or what? you know, Rachel who works in there every day thinks if this is something that's feasible and wouldn't something in space would need to be addressed first before we do this. [01:17:58] that's definitely one of the recommendations or initiatives that's listed in one of the goals. And so these again, are just recommendations for positions that we see based on the expansions of your services. But that would definitely need to be a physical logistics assessment that would need to be done and how everyone would be placed to do their roles effectively. [01:18:21] Okay. [01:18:21] Thank you. I was going to add this is Jeff Oliver, the the topic of office space is, is we we cover that ground quite a bit here in the last year. We know that there's additional office space needed for the housing authority. There's a lot of variables in play right now, including some of these decisions. And, you know, before you today, in terms of how many staff are we going to add, what type of approach are we going to take? Rachel mentioned uncertainty with future future federal funding. how that space is paid for. Currently the housing authority is not paying rent here in City Hall. Right. So if we could lease space out there, but that's an additional administrative expense. We can only charge the section eight staff. So then you got to figure out the public housing staff. And we're also repositioning those public housing units. So I feel like there's about 6 or 7 balls in the air that we're juggling. And from my perspective, I'd like a few of those decisions to be made. And variables to be resolved. And then I think we can make some decisions on on where that space goes. But there's shared understanding here within the staff that the space that's currently housing the housing Authority is not adequate. Page 24 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [01:19:39] Okay. Thank you. Yeah. [01:19:44] Are there any additional questions on the organizational recommendations? [01:19:56] Great. [01:19:58] Kayla, I'm ready to cover the legal structure if you want to move to that slide. Thanks. Hi, everyone. This is Caitlin. Now so as you going back to sort of the other project, you know, Tracy mentioned at the beginning that you're working through with Cordell. You are repositioning as part of that repositioning process. those housing units that you reposition have to go into a different legal structure. So there are two options for that. As you reposition. there's those can be placed into a nonprofit entity. They can be placed into an LLC. the one that we have been having the most discussion with, with the Housing Authority team as well as your legal team at the city is around the nonprofit entity. it's very common in the housing authority world to have a nonprofit affiliate that is part of the part of the housing entity or related to the housing entity wholly owned by the housing entity. We should say exactly, because HUD requires you to transfer these units into a separate entity from the housing authority. so it's not uncommon. and we're working through the specifics of what the governance might look like for that. with your with your legal team, I know that they're getting ready to make a recommendation around that. And we'll bring it before you. but just some kind of notes on that related to if there if you were to create the nonprofit entity, the nonprofit actually holds the title to the property the public Housing authority really retains control of that housing by how you set up the board structure and the governance structure for that entity. So we typically see things like overlapping or semi overlapping boards, which would mean that the board of this nonprofit entity would be made up of city council or mayoral appointees, plus city staff. the executive director of the nonprofit would be the executive director of the housing authority. and so there's that overlap and continuity of decision making. this is you would have the tax exempt 501(c)(3) status, which allows some additional access to grants and charitable donations. There are some benefits, unique benefits to the LLC structure. when it comes to sort of lie tech investments and things like that. But that can always be you can always create an LLC affiliate at another point in time. But you know, there's the as I said, the specifics of this are still being worked through and sort of it it's complex. And so I know that the team will be bringing a recommendation around this and some more details, but we did want to touch on it today as it was part of what we started to explore during our reporting process. [01:23:03] With the nonprofit structure, do you forego some opportunities for when you describe the lasagna of funding for some tax credits? I hear you, you've described ly tech, but I know that you'll rely on multiple Page 25 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. other tax credits and brownfield tax credits or historic tax credits. Do you lose that opportunity with the nonprofit structure? [01:23:29] This is Caitlin. That is correct. If you are looking at a low income housing tax credit or other tax credit in order to receive that benefit, it has to be structured as a for profit company, that that is how it's structured. That's typically through an LLC. Sometimes it's put into an LP. but yes, that would be a different structure. My understanding, based on the Cordell report out is that for the Rad conversion specifically for your existing public housing, the the tax credit structure may not be necessary and hasn't been evaluated. So at this time it could be put into a nonprofit entity structure. And then if at some point in the future, you do need to recapitalize or go after additional credits to reinvest in that existing public housing, then you could convert it to that LLC structure where the nonprofit owner becomes a general partner and 0.1 percent owner. [01:24:27] Oh, okay. So you're not stuck with one or the other. You can just add a. [01:24:32] That's correct. You can adjust. [01:24:33] It later. Yeah. [01:24:36] I'm looking. [01:24:40] All right. So next we'll look at some implementation and next steps for the project. So one of the things or deliverables that we're providing to the Housing Authority is what we call an implementation action plan. So we'll be taking some of these decision points. And the analysis that we had and provide you with steps. Who would be responsible for overseeing some of the initiatives. We also have will be providing some key performance indicators as well, and how you'll be able to track to make sure that progress is being made. So it'll create that continuous improvement also, and provide insight also as to when things should be reviewed and how often the strategic plan should be updated. So just some next steps. So we're taking all the information from today's discussion. And we will be providing the Housing Authority with a final report of the strategic plan and the operating model recommendations. And then that way they'll be able to move on into starting that implementation action plan. And we're also going to be providing a thorough change management plan, which will highlight how the changes should be communicated, whether it's staffing, whether it's building changes just all the many different things that will be happening throughout the next few years as the strategic plan moves forward. And who should be part of that messaging, how often it should go out with the frequency and what method should be used as well? Page 26 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [01:26:11] Well, community members or, you know, voucher holders etcetera. will they also be impacted? I mean, will this be something that information that they should know. [01:26:21] As well? And in that communication strategy plan we're providing who, what, when, where, why? The communication should go out to staff leadership team and the community as well. [01:26:33] Okay. Yeah. I just based on just the presentation, you know, this has been much more internally focused. And I just wondered once these changes start to happen, you know, their stakeholders too. So thank you. [01:26:46] And then last we just have some routine strategic plan updates some recommendations. we usually recommend that there's like a quarterly update on your KPIs that will be brought to the leadership team, as well as just being transparent to your community as well, and looking at management should be looking at it a year in review as well. Oftentimes, we recommend that some of the updates be presented during your budgeting process. Also. With that, that brings us to the end of our presentation. We thank you for the opportunity to share the updates with you all, and thank you for getting me out of Phoenix and enjoying some cool weather. [01:27:22] Today. [01:27:23] Can I ask one question? And I'm sorry, this was way back when you were talking about goal number one. and so I'm it's sort of a very generalized question because you had a lot of specifics, but as I was taking down notes, you the synthesis that I had was that essentially goal number one was about increasing housing and programing. and a number of the bullets really had to do with sort of for more challenging situations that some individuals face. and yet increasingly, we've seen over the past several months that HUD seems, particularly bent on cutting a lot of programing for situations that are intended to help those situations and individuals facing that. So I just wondered, in terms of. Kind of environmental and policy, actually not environmental policy shifts from HUD. How does that can you perhaps look at give me an example of how that you can point to that reconciles some of the goals that you have?, that reconcile this apparent contradiction with the policies that seem to be moving, that HUD is moving towards. [01:28:47] That was a really good question. Page 27 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [01:28:48] I'm sorry. I just I was sort of, you know, I mean, I'm trying to be specific enough and yet, general it just seems that there's a real contradiction here. [01:28:58] Sure. So in that goal, number one, that you mentioned, the the initiatives have their increased number of residents in the family, self-sufficiency program. Oh, thanks, Kayla. Thank you. So I think as you've all seen three years ago, we had one family self-sufficiency coordinator. We've grown to four. HUD would like to give us five, and we don't have the capacity for that. We're going to stick with four. and part of this is as we increase to four, we have to increase the number of residents we're serving, what we see consistently over the last 25 years is that both the Senate and the House, every year in the budget negotiations, the congressional level, they support the family self-sufficiency program. It's really kind of the darling program of the world. It shows significantly positive results. It shows so many people leaving the section eight program to self-sufficiency. Essentially, we have many of our FSS participants move to home ownership. We also have a very strong program nationally. We have some of the strongest statistics that there are in FAS for the FSS program, which is a real testament to what our staff do on a daily basis. and so while you're absolutely correct that we're really seeing some conflicting information coming federally about what they're supporting, we're also seeing in the budget conversations, FSS continues to be supported at the House level, and the Senate level. So we'll continue to move forward with the path that our funders are giving to us. HUD continues to have positive remarks to us about our FSS program. We just applied for our next round of funding, and we received positive remarks on that application. so there's that FSS part of this is increasing service offerings to family self-sufficiency. Participants. While we have great numbers and we continue to show great success in our FSS program, we always have room to grow. We continue to have new challenges. Today was Community Connections Day that the Housing Authority is deeply involved in. We had 203 people there today. Last year we had 60. So we're continuing to see a great need. And as we see that need increase and change, we need to increase our services and change how we're offering these and be innovative in what we're providing to our residents. So that's kind of what that's addressing. you know, when we know better, we do better. And we're knowing better. So we're trying to do better right now. and the rest is, you know, the housing counseling program. I think that we mentioned were we're cautiously approaching that path with the understanding that some of those federal priorities have been shifting. landlord incentives, probably some of you have seen that we announced some landlord incentives, which has been a really popular item. My email is very busy right now with it. and especially vouchers. I think that that's where we're going to see the opportunity to show some of our innovation and our flexibility as city leaders in how we approach the changes at a federal level. And we don't know what those look like yet. I think we're starting to get a taste for what that looks like for some federal funding sources for rapid rehousing services because of the release of the Nofo for those last week. and we don't know what that will look like for us yet. It seems that we're hearing the voucher funding is safe, but how we're collaborating with our community partners may shift as their funding streams shift. [01:32:24] Sure. Page 28 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [01:32:25] Well thank you. That's actually really heartening to know that at the level that you're working at that, that there's still the support, the funding is there for the specific programs and the fact that you've been able to pivot, adapt and be innovative to to meet needs. So thank you. Because, yeah, if you just sort of look at the overarching, it's pretty scary. And so I'm glad that actually we don't have to jettison goal number one. So thank you very much. [01:32:55] All right. Thank you so much. Thank you. Great. Any other discussion by council and wondering if staff need anything from us today. [01:33:04] Nothing more today. [01:33:05] O kay. [01:33:07] All right. Hearing nothing else we're going to move on to item number five, which is food discussion. We're going to have our city manager, Geoff Fruin start us. [01:33:16] Yeah, I'm just going to do a really quick introduction. This was an item that mayor and Mayor Pro tem thought would be timely. It certainly is on the agenda. And when thinking about how to present it, one of the ideas that came was to have the United Way of Johnson and Washington counties come up and talk about the code. If you're not familiar with the code, that's the community organizations active in disaster. So essentially a team that is meeting regularly that can assemble quick action plans to respond when when something comes up. And I thought that would be a good introduction for, for you all and for the public to understand a little bit more about that. And then to, to learn about how the code came together or has come together, continues to come together in the moment of food crisis that we found ourselves in the last few weeks. And then after the United Way, we have Shannon McMahon here from city staff. To give you a little bit of update on our food drive and promotion efforts. So sounds good. I'll have Emily Meister from United Way of Johnson and Washington counties come up. [01:34:17] Great. Welcome. [01:34:18] Good evening. I'm Emily Meister, I'm with United Way of Johnson and Washington counties, and I am our director of community impact and engagement. And also chair our code also I've got Nikki Ross from table to table who joined tonight. And when we start getting into some of the specifics for what our Page 29 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. food pantries are experiencing, she's going to come up and be able to give a little more information on that. Jeff, thank you for the introduction. and what a code is. I want to give just a little bit of history about the code here in Johnson County. and actually began in 2008 after those big floods. And that was in partnership with Johnson County Emergency Management. And, a code is not a it's not a term specific to Johnson County. They're all over the country. There's also adds a voluntary volunteer organization active in disaster or which are long term recovery groups, and they're all similar. But in essentially they are a coalition of community partners that can be nonprofits, individuals, local governments, funders that come together and meet regularly in order to support official government response and expand on that when that's not applicable so the the code came together in 2008. It was very needed. Then our emergency management wasn't, of course, not able to meet every single need of our community members who were affected. and that group met and was fairly stable and productive for quite a few years. But out of sight, out of mind. When we didn't have another really large scale disaster in our community for a while, that group kind of lost energy. so we've at United Way spent the last two years really working hard to build that back up and build the capacity back up. We were able to respond to a tornado in March of 2023. That was kind of right at the beginning, and we were able to quickly learn what some of those gaps were. a fire in April of this year. again, that was a much more coordinated response. but still showed the areas where we need to improve. one of those is that we need a shared leadership structure within the code. So, by the emergency support functions with Johnson County Emergency Management, United Way is named as the coordinator for this code. And that puts me automatically in the position of the chair for that committee. however, we there's a lot more people in this community, a lot more very important partners who need to be involved in that work. So one of the first things we did was develop this leadership structure. We now have representation from Johnson County Public Health Emergency Management, several other nonprofit organizations, social services on a steering committee. And then we've developed subcommittees that can work towards specific items. We have a volunteer management committee, a long term recovery group, a unmet needs group, and I can't remember them all off the top of my head right now. But the idea is to bring in community leaders to be able to take their expertise and bring it to the table when we need to respond. so a lot of times when we think of emergencies, we think of natural disasters. there's also public health emergencies. So COVID was a time when the code did assemble a little bit this time with the snap emergency which is what we're calling it, because it truly was that it became a public health crisis when 10,000 Johnson County residents very quickly lose access to their food sources. fortunately, we have a really collaborative community, and we have a group called the Food Access Network that has come together within the last year. that's made up of 18 different food access partners in Johnson County. table to table being one of them. that does food rescue and transportation. But we also have our three large pantries with Coralville, North Liberty and Community in Iowa City. A lot of neighborhood pantries, school pantries. So a really wide breadth of food access partners have come together. And because of that and because that structure already existed we as a code were able to take our lead from that group and make sure that the response that we're sharing out with the community as a whole is guided by those that are closest to the work. the main points that we've been sharing throughout this disruption are one, how to how to find accurate information, which honestly was the hardest thing to share. especially in the days coming up to that, people didn't know if their benefits were going to be available after October 31st. and so we tried to go the safest route, but also acknowledge that that was a Page 30 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. retraumatization and a crisis for those affected over and over again as the information kept changing. we pointed people to local food resources that they could rely on. we, we guided people towards two on one either to call or online to find other resources. and then we tried to direct the community support in the most effective way. one one such way was to encourage folks to support their local food pantries and those existing partners that are already doing the work. additionally, we launched at United Way, a food access Network relief fund where individuals who wanted to donate to the collective, but also wanted to make sure that their funds were local, could donate to this Food network fund. and then within the coalition coalition of the Food Access Network they could decide amongst themselves how to equitably distribute those funds to do bulk food purchasing and really make the the best use of them. additionally, we shared out communication about food drives. If anyone wanted to do really large scale food drives and wanted to support all of the food pantries or all of the food access partners instead of just one we could help coordinate that. And then table to table will help with the distribution and get the right items to the right. Food pantries. and then lastly, just encouraging residents who who see an unmet need to try to connect with the network and make sure that those ideas and that energy is best utilized in the support not to discourage mutual aid and and making dinner for your neighbor or, seeing someone you know personally and supporting them. But when you want to get involved on a larger community level, to really put that energy and time and resources into these existing partners. So that was kind of the philosophy around our response. And like I said very much guided by the Food Access Network. so I want to just give a couple of data points on what that looks like, what this disruption looked like in Johnson County. So we have 10,000 residents who rely on on Snap benefits in Johnson County with a total of $1.7 million. every month. so when you think about what that that's $1.7 million worth of food. but that's also increased when we think about the economic benefit to our community. So it becomes more than just about the food available. That is the most crucial part. thankfully, we found out on Friday that EBT cards were filled and that individuals received their benefits, which was great news. And I know that a lot of people were very relieved. we also want to acknowledge that there is some after effects from a situation like this. And Nikki's going to start to share a little bit about that and just continue to make sure that even though this is not as high profile in the headlines as it has been, it's still going to be a really significant need for our community to continue supporting our food access and our food security. So, Nikki, would you like to share? [01:42:49] Hi, I'm Nikki Ross, I'm the executive director at Table to Table. and we help facilitate the food Access network. we are, despite it being a crisis and something unnecessary and terrible to have to respond to. We are incredibly proud of the coordination between the Food Access Network and the code, and we feel like it really demonstrates what the United Way and the code have been trying to build. and utilizing these community, existing community partners that are already doing the work together. So as we talk about so first let's talk about those what we consider three weeks. It was only two weeks of nonpayment. But you may or may not be aware that many times Snap benefits don't meet the full need anyway. So folks get toward the end of the month and they already need some support from pantries, which is why about 25% of the folks that are food Access Network are serving already receive Snap benefits. So we were talking about those folks needing additional food. And then in addition to that, in addition to the 11,000 Unduplicated individuals, our network serves in a month on average, another Page 31 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. 10,000 people trying to serve them. So in those first three weeks we don't have all the data in yet, but we we're still collecting this and we'll plan to sort of put out a report the Food Access Network partners distributed 25% more food. That's 5 pounds of food. and saw an increase of 15% of the number of households. and so I don't have the, the unique individual number is going to be really pertinent here as we look at that. and that is those three weeks in comparison to the same period of time last year. So that's like your best comparison number. So as we yes. the, the snap crisis in this iteration has ended. The the payments have been made. but there are some after effects. There are two things. There are some after effects for folks who didn't get those benefits on time. And then there's also the sort of hidden crisis that we were never able to talk about, because right at the time that that was about to hit, we had this other thing pop up related to snap. So first some of the ongoing challenges for folks who didn't get their snap benefits is what do you do when you don't have money for food? You can go to a pantry, but not everybody can get there and it doesn't work out. and how how folks manage their budgets is moving the money around to their various bills. And we know that typically food money goes toward rent. Like that's what normally gets done in this case, because there was no notice, because there was no opportunity to plan in advance and get some food and hold it. Folks use their rent money, they use their utility money and putting money on a Snap card for buying food does not put the money back in the bank account to pay that utility bill. It doesn't put it back in the bank account to pay the rent bill. And you know, to not face eviction now that you're behind. And so, you know, that is something that we really don't have a good plan for how to address, except for one of the things that we can potentially foresee is that, as I said, and as we all know, the phrase rent eats first. So what we might see is these folks continuing to use pantries even as they've gotten their their food benefits to further supplement those budgets. And so they can turn that money into their money for their bills. So that is one of the ongoing things we see. Let's talk about this other crisis that was already happening, which is the changes in eligibility guidelines that were happening starting November 1st. which was changing who was being required to work? and specifically our legal immigrant and refugee participants and staff. You know, in, in the in the terms of supporting refugees that come to our country, one of the things we commit to is supporting them when they come here with these types of supports. So to cut off food benefits for these folks and now they will be heavily reliant on food pantries. So we were already expecting to see this change. and because we also had this other influx, I don't think we will fully understand what that looks like. Maybe for the next six months. But it is something that we're that we're keeping an eye on and that we can just expect will be a continued increase. Did I cover everything? Yeah. Okay. Thank you. [01:47:36] All right. So Nikki mentioned how proud she is of the of the response. the code and the the food access network. I also want to acknowledge how proud I am of our community. Nikki mentioned 25% increase in in pounds of food, or 15% households. I think our, our food partners experienced maybe a similar increase in level of support. we have seen increased financial donations across the board, not just to the fund but to individual pantries. food drives that are making it. So maybe they can reserve those funds. until after the holidays. There's always more support for those kinds of organizations in November and December and January. And then it gets to be a really hard time in the February, March and April. So these things are starting to be able to pad that safety net that our community is going to continue Page 32 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. needing. but I just want to again, emphasize one, how grateful we are that our community has showed up. And I'm very proud to live in Johnson County and see this sort of response. And two, that we need to continue it and keep folks kind of on top of and I know it's difficult. We just had a housing presentation and there's a housing crisis in it, and it feels like everything is a crisis. And in some ways it is. but I want to emphasize that seeing this action really gives us hope that we can locally come together. Our code is also a representation of that. Our our community organizations active in disaster is the only support we have when there is a natural disaster that doesn't meet the the qualifications for state or federal funding. and so just a, I guess a closing remark is to encourage individuals to continue engaging in these efforts and aligning with this collaborative work that's already happening. and to, to just kind of remember, who who this is impacting and who is closest to those and to take our guidance from those individuals and honor that expertise. Thank you. Do you have questions? [01:49:56] Just a quick one. I'm curious. The geographic boundaries of the code and the Food access network, and if they're exactly the same and also our neighboring communities keeping up. [01:50:05] Yeah. So United Way, our United Way is Johnson and Washington counties. however, our code is specifically Johnson County, as is the food access Network. Washington County has had a separate response that's more focused in the public health. Yeah. [01:50:24] Actually, the Food Access Network, while is largely funded locally there are about five partners who see quite a number of folks from outside of our county, and we will continue to see that increase as those resources are unable to keep up. [01:50:42] Thank you for that correction. Yes. All of the agencies are here, but we, for instance several serve rural communities right outside of of Johnson County and into Washington. And they've actually seen an increase in visits from out of county participants likely due to a little more robust response here. [01:51:03] And then second question, the the government's funded through January 30th. That's it. Right. So what lessons learned from this last. Are there any lessons learned? I mean, it sounds like you guys are trying to build up a little bit of reserves, but what's how do you prepare for this really unpredictable government? [01:51:24] 1 don't have an answer for that. Josh, I think what we'll do from a food security standpoint, specifically is just focus on our own, our local community, resilience. I think sometimes there's a little bit of a push and pull between a mutual aid type of support and then more established nonprofits. And I think that it's time to kind of move past some of that and acknowledge that both are necessary to truly meet the need Page 33 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. and just think about, you know, what is your goal? Are you trying to to to help your neighbors and your friends? then can it keep at that local level and do what you can if you want to organize some larger scale community support, please do try to engage with the collaborations and the systems that already exist. and this part's really important too. If there is an unmet need to also do that. it's it's not to say that we're trying to ignore pockets of need. It's really important to know about those and figure out a way to meet them as a community. [01:52:28] Thanks. [01:52:29] Not really a question. Just wanted to say thank you. [01:52:32] Thank you. [01:52:33] Thank. [01:52:33] You. [01:52:36] All right. I wanted to say I wanted to say thank you as well. Also, thank you so much to our city staff for being just so Johnny on the spot with all of the fundraising and the food drives and the messaging that you all did. that was super effective. So thank you. From the city manager down to everybody else. that was really cool to see. also just wanted to ask if I know that we're talking about there might be After Effects to this, or we know there will be After Effects to this, but and we might not know about them for six or for months on end. I suppose I was just wondering if maybe if there was a way that we could get some type of extra attention on things like utility shutoffs, like, are we seeing an increase in things like that? because because, like what everybody was saying, you know, if a lot of people I mean, it's an impossible choice between rent, utilities and food. But at the end of the day, food is, you know, you need that to survive. so I guess I'm just interested in that data going forward. And I guess I would like for us to keep track of it. I guess that's what. [01:54:02] 1 think a goal of the Food Access Network is to track these sorts of data points, and it's one of the our collective data is one of the most powerful things we have. in communicating the impacts. So one of the things we'll be looking at, as you know, community crisis Services offers financial assistance, which includes utility type things. And then working with Johnson County General Assistance to see how many more, how much increase they've gotten in sort of requests. And so I think we have a good functional way of collecting that sort of thing, and then reporting back as to what we're seeing. Page 34 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [01:54:32] Gotcha. Thank you. [01:54:33] Yeah. And just to add on what Nikki said, I don't believe at this point there's been, you know, a quantifiable increase in shutoffs and things like that, but definitely an increase from those partners that provide utility or rent assistance and increase in requests. and, for some of our housing partners an increase in the percentage of nonpayment at a certain point in the month. And thankfully, those are those that that wouldn't evict immediately. But hopefully we don't see an increase in evictions in the private market moving forward. I think to kind of echo one of the closing statements to and to all of ours question is we do need to come together around all of these issues as a whole. and just last week, there was a conversation brought together by one of our county supervisors to kind of see what that might look like. And my being involved in that, in that meeting, my my first response is, you know, let's find what is what's the appropriate venue for that, right? Who are the right people that need to be there? There's a new collective starting the Johnson County nonprofit collective, which is open to any nonprofit in the area. and kind of let that that's a great convening point. And to ask the questions from those closest first before deciding on a response. [01:56:00] Thank you. [01:56:00] Thank you. [01:56:02] Great. I'm going to call up Shannon at this time. And we only have like three minutes. [01:56:07] 1 can do this quickly. [01:56:08] All right. [01:56:10] Good afternoon, mayor and council. My name is Shannon McMahon. I'm communications coordinator for the city. in response to community crisis services outreach regarding growing concerns of food insecurity in our community, the communications office introduced Neighbors Helping Neighbors Food Drive on November. On Tuesday, November 4th, in our community has stepped up. We've seen strong public involvement and staff participation across city facilities at grocery store partner events and neighborhood park pop ups, all donations support community crisis services and food bank donation activity. To date includes 3,200 pounds of food, which has been collected and delivered to the Page 35 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. community. Crisis Services $405 in unanticipated cash donations were received and will go directly to the same facility. We placed ten donation boxes at separate city facilities throughout the community, providing convenient access points for residents and employees to contribute throughout the drive. Our grocery store events were held on Friday, November 14th at three locations West Side or West Side, fairway, and two Hy-Vee locations, North Dodge and Hy-Vee on First Avenue. These events themselves generated almost 2,300 pounds of donated items. Volunteer participation from staff and amazingly supportive community helped make this event possible, and then finally, we have neighborhood park events going on as we speak. These events started on Monday night at Happy Hollow Park. Are being held at James Alan McPherson Park tonight, and Wetherby Park on Wednesday from 4 to 6 p.m. [01:58:03] Cool! [01:58:05] This, this initiative wraps up November 21st, but we do want to say thank you to everyone for the partnerships. from our staff who stepped up the community, our community is fantastic. we worked fast to put this together and it's the biggest initiative that we've had since I've been here for 19 years. So anyway, thank you very much. [01:58:29] Thank you for the report. And thanks again to everybody. That was participating to spread the word and for the community members that came to meet this timely need. we're going to move on to item number six, which is council updates on assigned boards, commissions and committees. [01:58:50] Nada. [01:58:52] All right. We can consider ourselves adjourned. Mike's great. All right. It is 6 p.m. on November 18th, 2025. And I welcome you to your city hall. I'm going to call the City of Iowa City meeting to order. Roll call, please. [02:13:32] Alter here. Bergus here. Harmsen here. Here. Here. Teague here. [02:13:38] Wilson here. [02:13:42] All right. Well, again, welcome to your city hall. Those that are in person and those that are joining us virtually, we're going to move on to proclamations to a as national Native American Heritage Month. Whereas long before European settlers arrived in North America, Native Americans, Alaska Natives and Page 36 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. Native Hawaiians had established thriving societies founded upon principles that continue to inspire us today, including sustainability, community, and respect for the natural world. And whereas, despite centuries of injustice, broken treaties, discriminatory policies, and other harmful governmental actions, Native Americans, Alaska Natives, and Native Hawaiians have continued to demonstrate resilience, leadership, and generosity, contributing in countless ways to the growth and success of the United States. And whereas we honor the Iowa people whose ancestral homelands include the area now known as Iowa City, and we celebrate the enduring connection between art, land and community that they and other indigenous people uphold. And whereas we recognize and honor indigenous peoples for their vital role in shaping the history, culture and fabric of our society, now, therefore, I. Bruce Teague, mayor of Iowa City, do hereby proclaim November 2025 to be National Native American Heritage Month and to receive. This is Marie Krebs, Great Plains Action Society. you're the executive director, correct? [02:15:28] No, I'm. Protect the sacred director. [02:15:30] All right, there we go. [02:15:53] O kay. [02:15:55] It's always an honor to stand here. and our wonderful community. thank you. To the city for being so inclusive. I just want to recognize some of the nations that have that belong to Iowa or migrated around Iowa. The Omaha nation, Meskwaki, Otoe, Ponca, Winnebago, and of course, the Iowa, which were were named after, plus many others who've migrated and been forcibly removed, such as the Kickapoo„ there is one thing I do ask that you all think about today. we we have here pictures of our Native American folks, South American folks, and our Latin American folks. My I, my ancestors are indigenous to New Mexico. Abby's ancestors are indigenous to Mexico. this time last week, literally this time last week, Great Plains Action Society received a call about a woman named Leticia Jacobo, who had been detained. in Des Moines. She had been detained and was going to be deported. that's problematic in general. but Leticia is a member of Arizona's Salt River Pima-maricopa community. She's Native American. so as you look at me and you look at Abby as you look at our relatives here, I just ask that you consider that we did not cross borders. Borders crossed us, and I ask that if you're going to stand in solidarity with indigenous peoples, please stand in solidarity with indigenous peoples, not some indigenous peoples. All indigenous peoples. Thank you. [02:18:01] Thank you, thank you. And and thanks for accompanying Abigail. Yes. All right. We're going to move on to our consent agenda. Items three through seven. Can I get a motion to approve, please? [02:18:19] Page 37 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. So move. [02:18:20] Second. [02:18:21] All right. Anyone from the public like to discuss topics on our consent agenda? If you're online, please raise your virtual hand. Seeing no one in person or online. Council discussion roll call. Please. [02:18:40] Alter. [02:18:41] Yes. Bergus. [02:18:42] Yes. Harmsen. Yes. Mo. Yes. [02:18:45] Yes. [02:18:45] Teague. [02:18:46] Yes. [02:18:46] William. [02:18:47] Yes. [02:18:48] All right. Motion passes 7 to 0. We're on to item number eight, which is community comment. This is an opportunity for the public to comment on items not on our agenda. the council cannot engage in discussion or debate during due to open meeting laws. I want to see the hands of how many individuals that are present in council chambers that would like to speak today. Okay. All right. we'll be you'll be given three minutes each. I ask that you, there is in the back a little name tag that you can pre -fill out and drop it in the basket. So I invite people to go to the back. When you come up, please state your name and city you're from, and you'll be given three minutes. welcome. At this time. And. Yeah, come on up. And there is a sign in if you need to sign in. at the desk. Welcome. Page 38 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [02:19:48] Thanks. my name is Megan Vollenweider. I'm from Iowa City. I am the president of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Local 183, which represents a substantial number of workers here at the city of Iowa City. I come bearing a letter from the local 183 executive board the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Union, AFSCME Council 61, AFSCME local 183 represents nine bargaining units, including hundreds of public employees who keep Iowa City, Coralville, Tiffin, and Johnson County running safely and smoothly. We stand firmly for the dignity, rights and safety of every person in our community, including our immigrant neighbors, and we urge the Iowa City City Council to adopt the Fourth Amendment resolution proposed by DeVos and its full and intended form. Our members work daily in public buildings and shared community spaces. We are responsible for keeping these environments safe, welcoming and orderly for all who walk through the door. To do that, employees must have clear protections that defend our constitutional rights. When outside agencies, especially those with a history of overreach and community harm, attempt to act without proper legal authority in our workplaces. We also need the practical measures outlined in the original resolution. Thorough employee training, clear signage marking restricted areas requiring a judicial warrant, secure facilities and a reliable, enforceable protocols that protect both staff and the public. These are not political issues. They are fundamental expectations for safety, human dignity and lawful practice. Many city employees have expressed deep concern and confusion about how to respond if Ice enters their workplace. No employee should be left to navigate chaotic, intimidating or legally questionable encounters with federal agents without guidance or support from their employer. That uncertainty threatens employee safety, undermines public trust, and erodes our ability to serve the community. Ask me local 183 urges the council to join other cities that have already adopted strong protections to keep workers and community members safe. We fully support the resolution as originally proposed by DeVos, protecting our workplaces also protects the immigrant families who are part of the fabric of Iowa City and the broader community that we are proud to serve. Thank you. [02:22:04] Thank you. Welcome. [02:22:11] Thank you. Good evening. My name is Alejandra Escobar, and I stand here as an immigrant, a mother, a community organizer, and a resident of Iowa City. Every day many of us wake up with a quiet fear that shadows even the most ordinary moments. We got to work. We take our kids to school. We attend community events. But in the back of our minds, there is always the question is it today the day I'm going to be racially profiled and taken by Ice? For many of us, this fear comes from real experiences. We have seen our members be taken at their workplace in violent ways. We have seen our members being detained at their ice, checking. We have seen our members being questioned without explanations as represents the voice of 500 immigrants who have held the line while being targeted. We have marched, spoken, cried publicly and showed courage that no community should have to demonstrate just to show their value. And yet, despite all of this, we watch decisions, stall, not because the need is unclear, but because the politics around us are louder than the suffering of the people living through this crisis. We Page 39 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. deserve acknowledgment that immigrant families are facing violence right now, not someday. Not in theory, but now. I'm here tonight because I'm sick and tired of watching the immigrant community be harassed, mistreated, and forced to be the ones constantly holding the line while others in power stay silent. When conflicts of interest overshadow human suffering, the community that already carries a heavy weight starts carrying a heavier one. I'm asking for honesty, moral clarity, and for leaders who can put the well-being of an entire community above the comfort of political relationships. My hope is that you councilors, understand that the Fourth Amendment is not a special protection. We invented. It is already the law of the land. What gives residents a false sense of security is not clarifying constitutional rights. What creates confusion and danger is failing to communicate those rights. Leading people to fear interactions with local government or worse, to believe they have no rights at all. This resolution that not that not promise protection from federal immigrant immigration enforcement. It does not offer legal status. It does not misrepresent what the city can or cannot do. What it does is ensure that every person knows and understands the rights they already have under the Constitution. Knowledge is not false. Security. Knowledge is power. If we shy away from affirming constitutional rights because we worry some, someone might notice, then we must ask ourselves, what does that say about our conviction in the values we claim to uphold? [02:25:24] Thank you. [02:25:25] Yes. [02:25:31] And I'll ask people to hold their applause. Thank you. Welcome. Please state your name and city you're from. [02:25:38] Hello. Thank you. My name is Tom Martinez from Iowa City. With the federal shutdown now over in November, snap benefits being distributed, the Johnson County Food Access Network, which is an organization of local food pantries, free meal sites and other partner organizations, is concerned about a much deeper crisis looming for families in our community. While the shutdown captured headlines, a broader storm is brewing. Thousands of families relied on pantries, meal sites and community fridges to fill the gap during this crisis. And even as Snap resumes, we know the challenges are far from over. The federal reconciliation bill passed this past summer dramatically restructure snap, including pushing several vulnerable communities off the program entirely, either through direct means or through administrative means like work requirements. More concerning, the reconciliation bill also threatens to upend Snap entirely in the state of Iowa if the state is unable to meet stricter accuracy guidelines, it could incur up to $50 million in penalties. This is a bill that the state. This is yeah, this is a cost that the state is unlikely to fund. This could force the elimination of Snap and shift the entire burden of hunger relief onto local communities, including Iowa City. Despite these challenges, the Food Access Network remains deeply proud of the community response during the shutdown, the anger, the frustration, and Page 40 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. the pain that we've seen in our community are real. But so is the outpouring of support. Thousands of people in Johnson County have stepped up to volunteer, donate food and money and to keep their neighbors fed. We are grateful we are resilient and with the continued support of our community and city governments, we will not stop fighting for every person's rights. Basic rights to food. Thank you. [02:27:28] Thank you. Welcome. Yeah. [02:27:35] Thank you. [02:27:36] Please state your name and city you're from. [02:27:39] Iowa City. Good evening. My name is Ed Moreno. I am a member of the Amigos and the current director of Iowa LULAC, the League of United Latin American Citizens. LULAC is the nation's oldest and largest Latino civil rights organization. Founded in 1929, LULAC is committed to advancing the rights and opportunities of Latinos through advocacy, community building, and education with a network of councils nationwide, LULAC remains steadfast in its mission to protect and empower millions of Latinos, contributing daily to America's prosperity. LULAC councils 308 and 373 of Iowa City stand for the dignity of all persons and shares concern for the well-being of individuals and communities in Johnson County with Exclusivos and other local organizations. In addition to the Iowa City's councils, Iowa LULAC has councils in communities across Iowa. Know your Rights training for community members, businesses, school districts, and government agencies has been a focus. Protecting community members civil rights through the adoption of sections of the proposed resolution is important because of what we know is harmful policy that is, having an adverse impact on our communities. We assert detainment and deportation without due process are not legal and have filed multiple lawsuits in Iowa and the nation to stop wrongful immigration enforcement actions and voter suppression. We request the city of Iowa City and Johnson County work with us through the resolution sections. Intent. Thank you for your consideration, and please feel free to contact me with any questions. And thanks for the opportunity to share this public comment. [02:29:48] Thank you. [02:29:49] You're welcome. [02:29:54] Welcome. Page 41 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [02:29:55] Hello, my name is Clara Reynen and I live in Iowa City, Iowa. I'm here tonight as the Unity Chair for the Campaign to Organize graduate students, cogs you local 896. our union represents graduate workers on campus, including international students who are graduate workers. And as unity chair, it is myjob to make sure that members of our union feel represented fairly and equitably. And this means that I work closely with our international student Representative Political Action committee and department stewards, to name a few. Cogs supports a voces push for a Fourth Amendment resolution, and Cogs urges the city to reaffirm the rights for all international students and immigrants, regardless of their documentation status, to call Iowa City home within our union on campus, it is evident the chilling effect that Ice has had international students on campus do not feel safe and are anxious to engage with the union at all, despite being members of our bargaining unit, many are afraid that participating in organizing will be seen as political and could result in their visas being revoked. Additionally, when asking administrators what to do if Ice appears outside of a classroom, their answer is essentially called general Council. As a to myself, I am often nervous about what I would do if Ice were to knock on my classroom door. Despite having policy and procedure in place, per the employee Handbook on campus, without adequate training and opportunities to practice responses, it feels nearly impossible to be truly prepared. This example of the climate on campus illustrates the necessity and benefit that passing a strong Fourth Amendment resolution would provide for the city, as well. That's because providing city employees with the resources they need to be prepared and effective is important, and this is a way you can protect city staff by making sure they feel comfortable and prepared. That's going to make them feel more comfortable doing their jobs, focusing on the task at hand. Many of the suggestions from a Vos in their original resolution would be very easy to take and implement, particularly having signs in public areas with information about the type of warrants Ice need to have and other information about responses. The city could even provide an easy access online PDF document with signage and suggested training materials for private businesses to use. I would hope that that's something that the university could even adopt for graduate workers and other staff to use. And finally, I just wanted to touch on the fact that last spring, our union successfully negotiated the first raise above legal minimum for the first time since collective bargaining rights were stripped. That's because we continued to show up. And even though it was risky and made people nervous, we did it anyway. And it worked. And the city should do the same thing with this Fourth Amendment resolution. Taking a risk is worth it if it's going to make community members feel safe. Thank you. [02:33:00] Thank you. [02:33:12] Iowa City I want to thank our hosts on this land here today, especially recognizing the natives as as the host for all of us. We are all immigrants and we can all be expelled if they choose to. And this is what Ice has been trying to do. ice has become a symbol of immigration system that is not only broken, but harmful. It's an agency that has separated families, detained children, and and carried raids on and torn apart communities at workplace and at homes. too often it has operated at a minimal oversight and maximum fear. Fear is that what they are striving for? And this is what we are asking the city of Iowa Page 42 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. City to provide a reaction to this kind of operation. The city have offices, the attorney's office, the civil rights office, the human rights office can can work with those communities ahead of time. Some of those people can can be legal if their paper has been filed in time, and they might need help because they don't know all the rules and the regulations. And I expect the city council to work with these communities ahead of time and activate the available resources of the city of Iowa City to help our communities in Iowa City. And that is something you guys can take the lead on. We don't have to prompt you to do that. Also, I guess our community is being attacked. The the the the Muslim community today, the governor of Texas has declared that care is a terrorist organization, which is a civil rights organization. So we've been working in this country for for a long time. And now there has been additional attacks on additional communities. If we don't stop the buck here, it will keep it will keep scraping and and attacking more, more communities in Iowa City. Thank you. [02:35:09] Thank you. Welcome. [02:35:17] My name. [02:35:18] Is Erica Finken. [02:35:19] I'm born and raised Iowa City. You have heard many reasons and from countless community members to pass this for a resolution, I would like to pose the question to everyone here and let it be seen online as well. Why haven't you voted yet? I think there's a lot behind that question for everyone to consider. [02:35:43] Thank you. Welcome. Please state your name and city you're from. [02:35:49] Hello, my name is Abigail. Abigail. I'm from Iowa City. I am an up and coming scholar at the University of Iowa and PhD candidate. and I'm here to speak as a concerned citizen. While Native American Heritage Proclamation is warranted, we understand that institutional recognition means nothing when our brothers and sisters are getting hunted in the streets in front of their children, spouses, friends, neighbors, and complete strangers, let us not forget that Ronald Reagan gave us Martin Luther King Day as a national holiday. Black Lives Matter protests in the summer of 2020 gave us Juneteenth as a national holiday, and we're still here. Let not these seemingly progressive proclamations deter us from meaningful demands for social justice. I stand before you to urge Iowa City to take a bold and principled step to adopt a due process and safety resolution affirming Fourth Amendment protections, especially for indigenous migrants and all others seeking safety and dignity. We know that Iowa law currently prohibits formal sanctuary city policies under chapter 27, a, requiring cooperation with federal immigration enforcement, but that does not prevent us from affirming our values and creating local Page 43 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. protections that strengthen trust, safety, and inclusion. Across the country, cities have adopted measures that do not violate state law, yet still send clear messages. Everyone belongs both over compliance and general indifference, are harmful stances and unacceptable responses to this moment. We need leaders who rise to the occasion and stand firmly for the people. Why is this urgent? Indigenous migrants, many fleeing violence, climate disasters and systemic oppression, face unique vulnerabilities that were not of their own making. We are living in the afterlives of slavery in settler colonial legacies, capitalist colonial interest and what seems to be a heiress tour for white supremacist pride. Right now, we are at a critical juncture where we must decide for whom to stand alongside declaring Iowa City as a sort of sanctuary. It's not just a legal designation, it is a moral commitment. It means investing in community based resources, legal aid, mutual aid, community oversight over police of all kinds, civilian protections for those willing to protect people, and language access, housing support and partnerships for indigenous and migrant organizations. It means ensuring that no one is denied city services because of immigration status. [02:38:56] Thank you. [02:39:02] Welcome. Please state your name and city you're from. [02:39:05] I'm Kim Long, Iowa City. Thanks for hearing us tonight. I live in Iowa City. I grew up in Solon. I moved back to Iowa City from Seattle to care for my mother. through dementia. At the end of her life. And to raise my daughter in a place where we have community. I'm going to try to get through this which in these times is maybe the biggest thing keeping me here. I am a trained or nurse. I worked on the front lines during the pandemic with an infant at home. I'm also now a clinical social work therapist who cries as well as an artist. I know some of you here. And if I don't yet, there's probably one degree of separation between us. we're all trying to do our best in. And I'm really sick of this word. Unprecedented times. It's so hard to know what is the right way to help or which choice helps or harms. When I read the request in the Fourth Amendment, Fourth Amendment resolution this kind of preparation feels a lot like medical world preparing. And every hospital I've worked, we have run drill after drill for how to respond to codes of all kinds. so that everyone knows their role, they know where to be, and they know what they're able to do in a worst case scenario. We understand that it keeps our community safer if we plan and prepare for the unthinkable. The other piece that comes up for me is from my own. Growing up, my siblings and I were all adopted from Korea in the early 80s. we were part of the over 300,000 Korean children sent all over the world, but mostly to the US following the Korean War, a practice that is under international scrutiny. Scrutiny and investigation for human rights violations. I was raised by a white family and an all white community, so I experienced the feeling of being invisible and also hyper visible. All of my childhood. I was never fully, fully a part of the fabric of Solon and always viewed as an outsider despite only knowing rural Iowa culture. When I was learning about the civil rights movement as a kid, I remember looking at the horrifying photos of dogs hunting down humans of fire hoses turned on bodies of the police brutality. And I asked my parents who lived through that time, what did you do when this Page 44 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. was happening? What did you do? How did you help? And their answer was, that wasn't our fight. What could we have done? What I know now is that what I was asking was, how would you protect me if people in hoods or with dogs or batons came and hunted me down, tore me away? What would you do? And the question I know my own child will ask me one day will be the same. When people in masks with zip ties came and abducted people. When kids were ripped from their beds and forced into u-hauls in the middle of the night. What did you do? How did you help? I am one of the more fortunate international adoptees, and that my parents completed my paperwork for citizenship. Many adopted children do not have citizenship in this country, despite being brought here as infants by US citizen parents. November is Adoption Awareness Month and parents often ask me, how can I support my children better? Which foods or holidays or books should we offer? And my response is see them. Thank you. [02:42:14] Very. [02:42:29] Welcome. [02:42:31] My name is Mary Gravitt and I'm from Iowa City and I see we we all have problems with our government, but the one I really came here to congratulate the people who voted on on November 4th 2025, because that signified the first shot. In an American Revolution to unlike American Revolution one, this battle was fought with the ballot, not the bullet, proving people united cannot be defeated. The cause of Revolution two is the fact that President Trump sold the US out to the Zionists. Miriam Adelson and Elon Musk, AIPAC and the oligarchs to win 2020 four. He covered his by making any criticism of Israel criminal behavior. Treason punishable by deportation. Trump, using anti-Semitism as a cloaking device, stripped away First amendment freedom of speech and press. Congress and six Supreme Court justices are part of the Zionist bargain. The American people, both Jew and Gentile, suffer under Trump's betrayal, while Trump uses the word anti-Semitism, words matter because they can inflict pain and control behavior. Trump uses anti-Semitism to keep Americans docile. anti-Semitism recalls Holocaust.1.0, where the Nazis demonized the Jews and attempted to eradicate them from Europe. Holocaust 2.0 is Gaza. No one wants to think of himself or herself as a racist or anti-Semitic. Trump and his company, of all million thought police use anti-Semitism against you. For examining what you know to be deception, lies, fear and shame. Keep America's mouths shut. But truth, when thrown to the ground, will rise up. The Republican House and Senate live in fear of losing support and funding from the Zionists and oligarchs for their political campaigns. What can we do? We must continue to vote and command as commander in chief. We can't outgun Trump, but we, the American people can outvote him. One man, one woman, one vote. Republicans are sure that by January we will forget about the suffering the government shut down and and vote them back into office. Keep track of all government wrongdoing, register vote, knock on doors and please. I was the city council. I'm pleading again for a full time maintenance man in Iowa City Public Library. Things are improving, but they need additional help and we need bus shelters now. Winter is coming and people need to be protected. You know, this is our Page 45 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. local government. This is our blue city in this red state. So I'm expecting the council to look out for the people. Thank you. [02:45:38] Thank you. All right. And thanks to everyone that gave comments today. We are going to move on to item number nine, which is planning and zoning matters. Nine A. Preliminary final plat for Coal Hill resolution approving the preliminary and final plat of Coal Hill Subdivision, Iowa City, Iowa. Can I get a motion to approve, please? [02:46:46] So moved. [02:46:47] Second altar. [02:46:48] All right. And welcome, Danielle. [02:46:50] Thank you. Mayor Danielle. Neighborhood development services, this is a resolution for preliminary and final plat. It's a single lot subdivision with an existing single family home on it. It was part of a larger parcel of land formerly part of the forest View and North Dubuque LLC. Development. this is just to create a single lot around that existing single family home to allow it to be sold to the homeowner. At coal. It's a 2.84 acre portion shown here in the white outline. like I said, this land was previously part of a development proposal that's not come to fruition at this point. It was rezoned in 2019 and pretty much stopped at that point. this preliminary plat would create that single family lot, allow for right of way dedication for eventual extension of Algonquin Street to connect through this area and through the undeveloped land to the east and northeast. Eventually it maintains that zoning that was in place before, which has a variety of conditions that don't really apply to this land, but are being carried forward just simply because of its existing zoning. They could be rewritten or overwritten with a future rezoning, which, honestly, we anticipate this land around it to go through another rezoning. Rezoning. When redevelopment proposals pick back up as far as reviewing this particular preliminary plat, this review criteria are compliance with the comprehensive plan, which there is a district plan and a future land use map in the general plan. This is in compliance with the existing comprehensive plan, which really anticipates conservation, design, single family. But as I said, no development being proposed at this time. Just simply creating a lot for the existing family home. We reviewed the subdivision standards that were relevant since no development is proposed, none of the sensitive areas are being impacted. Single family homes do have an exemption anyway. that extension of Algonquin would eventually include both the roadway and the sidewalks needed for that. And we did look at open space dedication, which there would be none because of the no creation of new additional units here. So as I said, this land was part of a previous rezoning. That's not really relevant at this time. Simply creating the single family lot to transfer ownership. this is the prelim and final plat step. There is a subdividers agreement Page 46 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. that lays out some of the conditions and triggers from when the roadway would be installed. It ties it to building permits for this site or eventual redevelopment of the land connected to it. So we've covered the city's interest in ensuring that right of way gets developed in the future, when it's needed. The Planning and Zoning Commission saw this one on their agenda on November 5th, and by meeting of 6 to 0, concurred with staff's recommendation for approval. I'm happy to answer questions. [02:49:35] Don't hear any questions. Thank you. Anyone from the public like to address this topic? If you're online, please raise your virtual hand. If you're present, please come forth seeing no one in online or present in the Council chambers. Council discussions. Roll call please. [02:49:56] Bergus. Yes. Harmsen. [02:49:58] Yes. Mo. [02:49:59] Yes. [02:50:00] Yes. [02:50:00] Teague. [02:50:01] Yes. [02:50:01] Weiner. [02:50:06] Yes. [02:50:07] Alter. Yes. [02:50:08] Motion passes 7 to 0. Item number ten is our regular formal agenda ten A is downtown Ssmid renewal ordinance amending title three. Finance, taxation, and fees of the city code to reestablish the Iowa City downtown. Self -supported municipal Improvement District. Pursuant to the provisions of chapter 386 Page 47 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. Code of Iowa and providing for the establishment of an operation fund and the levy of an annual tax in connection therewith. And I'm going to open the public hearing and welcome Rachel. [02:50:43] Hi, mayor and city. [02:50:43] Council. Rachel Kilburg Varley, economic development coordinator. Let's see, I get my right. so given this is probably repeat information for many of you, but since this only happens once every ten years or so, I thought it would be worthwhile to just review. So I'll be brief, but, I wanted to just give you some context about the downtown districts renewal and expansion efforts and the process. So first, what is a ssmid? It's that Self -Supporting Municipal Improvement District, which is a self imposed taxing district, which is created by the property owners, a certain percentage of property owners agree to impose that additional tax upon themselves in order to provide funding for additional or enhanced services within whatever that ssmid area is. Iowa Code authorizes Summit St and I'll walk through kind of what that process looks like to create or renew one. So the item before you is for the renewal of the Iowa City downtown district Smid that was established originally in 2011. It was renewed in 2015, and that renewal will expire this coming June 30th of 2026. right now there's Ssmid levy. So that tax rate that the property owners have imposed upon themselves is the $2. It was $2 per $1,000 of taxable value for the first five years of the current authorization, and then $2.50 for the last four. Five. I'm sorry. And then the the ssmid itself is kind of that legal entity which the legal taxing entity. But the Iowa City downtown district is the 500 and 106 organization which manages the Ssmid. so included in your agenda packet was the petition submitted by the Iowa City downtown district for their renewal? the map on your screen shows what those current boundaries are, which is that light gray outline. And then the red would be the proposed boundary. So you see an expansion of their new area. Their petition proposes to extend the current Ssmid for another ten years. So that would start July 1st of 2026 when the current one ends. and then it requests a levy rate of $2.50 per $1,000 of assessed value for the first seven years. So it would stay the same as it is now for the first seven years, and then for the last year, that last three years, they have the option to increase that to $2.75. If the board of directors, determines that it's necessary, they'll use the revenue from the that's collected through this levy to help fund their activities. So that includes operations like business support activities, marketing, advertising, programing, special events, festivals, and other activities, placemaking activities, physical improvements. So they're enhanced cleaning, lighting improvements. They're seasonal decor. signage, banners, landscaping, public art. And then of course, their staff to actually carry out their work. So in many ways the petition they've submitted is kind of a continuation of what they're doing. And also an amplification of that. As I mentioned before, Iowa Code lays out what that process looks like. to create or renew a ssmid. So the first step is for the property owners to decide they want that Ssmid. And then they sign a petition to the city declaring that we received that petition on September 15th of 2025. after that, staff reviewed to verify that it contained all the requirements that Iowa Code section 386.3 requires and that it contained signatures of at least 25% of the property owners, representing at least 25% of the assessed value of the proposed district.. After a staff completed that review and verification we notified you through your October 7th meeting agenda packet, and then that was forwarded on to Planning and zoning where Page 48 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. they were required to complete an evaluative report on the merit and feasibility of the proposed ssmid. They completed that at their October 15th meeting. and then you set a public hearing on October 20th, the city clerk's office posted that public hearing notice as required. Also mailed a copy by certified mail to all the affected property owners at least 15 days before the public hearing. And having satisfied all of those steps, the ordinance now before you would be your first consideration. for the renewal of the Ssmid, three readings will be required to establish the district. The final cannot occur earlier than 30 days after the public hearing. So we can't be or we cannot expedite this item. And then the final adoption will require three fourths vote or or six votes. if a certain percentage of property owners were to protest, then you would need to have unanimous vote. and the state code does outline or does establish a mechanism for challenging the petition. If there were a percentage of property owners who wish to do so, whoops. That's all I had. Any questions? [02:55:57] 1 just had a couple questions. Out of curiosity. I was wondering what kind of law or limitation there is on what type of tax the ssmid can impose on itself? Is there like a cap? Is there a minimum or. I was just curious about that. [02:56:18] There is. Let me look here. Unless Eric knows off the top of his head. [02:56:22] That's 5%, right? That's $5. Well, yeah. Yeah. Sorry. [02:56:46] So no worries if it is something that you can't dig up right now. [02:56:59] 1 don't know if. [02:57:01] 1 think it's something that certainly can be circled back to Councilor Weilein. [02:57:06] Okay. [02:57:07] Thank you. [02:57:08] Yeah, I apologize we don't have that answer. We can get back. [02:57:10] Page 49 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. To you. [02:57:10] That's 100%. Okay. and I was also going to ask about the 25%. The. So we in order for this to be established, it needs 25% of all of the property owners, as well as that has to equal up to that has to equal a minimum of 25% of the overall value of the area. Is that correct? [02:57:40] Of the assessed value? Yep. [02:57:42] Assessed value. And I just want to make sure I'm understanding this correctly. So if that 25% threshold is reached, the tax is imposed upon all who are in the district, not just those 25% correct? [02:57:59] Correct. Not residential properties, but the rest. [02:58:02] Yes, yes. [02:58:03] Not residential. and so if somebody, let's say, 25% of the property owners commercial property owners buy, you know businesses sign a petition, but that 25%, it's smaller businesses. So they don't reach that 25% value, then they can't proceed with the application. [02:58:29] Are you asking if a unique owner, if owners could have multiple properties? [02:58:37] I'm asking if, like 25% of businesses in the ssmid can somehow not reach the threshold of 25% of the assessed value. So there could be one person who owns or one entity that owns as much as 25%. So them alone could reach a value. But there are 25% of the property values that couldn't reach that number. Am I making any sense? [02:59:09] I, 1 think it's a possibility. Yes, yes, I think it's a possibility. But. [02:59:16] Yeah. [02:59:16] Go ahead. Yes. Page 50 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [02:59:17] Okay, okay. [02:59:18] We're gonna we're gonna have. [02:59:19] O kay. [02:59:19] Sorry. [02:59:20] Betsy Potter come up and answer. [02:59:22] That. Betsy Potter with the Iowa City downtown district. So there's two thresholds that you have to complete. 25% of unique owners. So that can be any value, and then 25% of total assessed value that had to be met. So we met 38% and 45% in those categories. So to answer your question they they do that so that it's not just one property owner or 2 or 3 property owners that can implement the ssmid on smaller properties or larger properties. Does that make sense? [02:59:55] Yes. And I have an additional. [02:59:57] Question 100% answered my question. [02:59:59] Okay. [03:00:00] Great, answered mine. [03:00:00] Too. Yeah. Oh, good. [03:00:02] So can you repeat the two? Number, the 38% was for the distinct property. unique unique unique owners. Page 51 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [03:00:08] 38% of the unique owners and then 40. 1 think it was a little over 45% of assessed value. [03:00:14] Okay, that was my question. [03:00:15] Is that does 100 100% of people participate or you just get far beyond what you need? [03:00:21] The legal threshold is 25% for each. So we like obviously just wanted to get more than we needed to. [03:00:29] But you shouldn't assume that if there's 38% say yes, then 62% said no. That's an incorrect assumption, is what I'm. [03:00:36] Getting at. Yeah. And there's a number of properties. you know, that couldn't sign. The city owns a large portion of properties, and the city can't sign the petition. For example. [03:00:47] Thank you. [03:00:49] Okay. [03:00:49] I'm not sure. Oh. I'm sorry. [03:00:51] My, my my question is. Sorry about that. My questions were just specifically about curiosity. I think this is great. I just wanted to make sure I understood all of the operations correctly. So thank you. [03:01:06] staff has been frantically searching for the maximum tax rate, and I believe we're not able to find it because I don't think there is one. I will certainly circle back if I find that that's incorrect. [03:01:16] Okay. [03:01:17] All right. Thank you. Eric. Page 52 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [03:01:20] So it was helpful for us to ask a couple of questions, give you a little time. [03:01:23] Between. [03:01:25] Any other questions by council hearing? None. Thank you both. All right. And we're going to move on to the public discussion. Anyone from the public like to address this topic? If you're online, please raise your virtual hand. And if you're present, please come forth. You'll be given three minutes to speak. Welcome. [03:01:58] My name is Mary Gravitt. I live here in Iowa City and I went to my doctor today and came back and I took the bus. And so the seats bus take you on a circular route because you got to pick up people so they can go to work. The disabled people. But the problem was I looked at Coralville, and Coralville is eating our lunch, and we had better do something because it's no excuse. You look, they got every restaurant in the world and everything, and you're looking around. What happened to us? Coralville used to be a place with cheap rent, and the only thing they had going for them was the Coralville Mall. And I didn't like the mall because I get a feeling that the walls are closing. But Iowa City had better sit down. Look at these businesses and and do something, because I hate to see the city fade. And we are Iowa City, the blue City is the attraction for the whole state. But if something's not done about it, because at one time it wasn't one member of city council, I member and von Marr was in the mall and he moved to Coralville and took von Marr with him. So we got to, you know, weed out the traders and get it together and get financially together or we won't matter at all. I mean, we have protests and you listen to people, but you have to have finances to do what you want to do and to make the city progressive. I'm not saying the city is not progressive, I'm just saying, I don't know. I think I remember when when you first got this thing, it only took it took like 1 or 2 blocks. But something has to be done. And Coralville just can't kill us because this is what's going to happen. Because Iowa City, we depended on Walmart on one end. The city down and on the other end. I don't think it that used to be Sycamore Mall. It changes his name every two years and doesn't seem to make any progress. Something has to be done and I hope something will be done. And I hope I know what I'm talking about. Thank you. [03:04:12] Thank you. Welcome. [03:04:22] Hi, I'm Clara Reynen from Iowa City. I'm just here as myself right now, not as the Cogs unity chair like I was earlier. I just wanted to say, I think the kids are really cool. That was something that before I started to get involved in local politics, I didn't really know what it was. And one thing I heard a lot from community members, as I was, you know, running for city council is just that, like a lot of people don't Page 53 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. understand how those sorts of things work. And so one thing that I heard from folks while I was running is just that, like if there was an easy way to find information about what these kinds of things are, it would be a lot easier for general community members who aren't business owners or who aren't located in a ssmid to know what they are. And so I think. Renew the. Yes. But then in addition to that, if there was even just like a little glossary section or something on the city's website where folks could go to learn more about Smids, I think that would be really useful, because I think it is a cool partnership between the community and the city and business owners. And so I just think that that's something that the city could do for a lot of different programs. But in particular, I think Smids would be really worthwhile to make sure we're doing more public education about. Thanks. [03:05:35] Thank you. Welcome. [03:05:43] Hi. Good evening. My name is Karen Kubby. I own a business in the new in the renewal area, so I'm very excited to be involved. And I just wanted to say in a different way that the ssmid legislation makes sure that not just small property owners can control this process and not just large property owners, but we have to collaborate together to get to that. 25% of signatures that represent that value. And the unique owners. And we had owners coming to the current ssmid saying, we want to be part of this. We feel like we're downtown. We want to avail ourselves of the marketing, the safety, the cleaning, the services, the programs of the Ssmid. So the new boundary really reflects that. Those requests that came into the ssmid, it also reflects the feel of where downtown boundaries actually are. So there were lots of signatures from property owners in the new area, and I wish I could have a map to show you all of those signatures, but that was really important to us. There was an exponential number of unique owners between the new boundaries and or the old boundaries, and the new boundaries, and so getting to 38% was really a big deal to us that so many people were interested. And part of the beauty of the ssmid, a lot of things came together at the same time. The downtown district, the 21 ordinance and the 500 foot rule work together to ensure that downtown is activated from 7 a.m. to 3 a.m. and that we are not skewed in just day life or nightlife. And so this broad activation is a real important value to us. The other thing that's so important to me personally is for people to acknowledge that the downtown is such a big proportion of what brings money into the general fund that allows the city to do more than just mandated things, but to do all those things we want you to do civil rights, human rights, education, sustainability. and other protections and programs for the city. So about one third of the budget comes from the Ssmid tax. the other comes from generous donations from the University of Iowa, from sponsorships, from ticket sales. and one of our challenges for the new boundaries, assuming that you vote yes tonight, is for us to make sure that we're hearing from all of those new property owners, especially the multifamily property owners. What is it that you need from the Ssmid that we don't already know about? So our job will be to ask the question, listen to the answers, and then incorporate that into our services and programs. So I hope you all vote yes and thanks for that. [03:08:46] Thank you. Page 54 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [03:08:48] All right. Seeing no one else. Oh come on, come on. Yes. [03:08:55] So as probably. [03:08:57] As your name and city you're from. Welcome. [03:08:58] I'm Cady Gerlach with Greater Iowa City Inc., and I'm a resident of Iowa City and also a self self ssmid geek. So I have to come once a decade when this happens. Oliver, I would love to speak with you more about Iowa Code in chapter 386, because I think it's probably one of the weirdest written chapters. but it does have those intricacies and interesting points. You identified. And so it's fun to nerd out on that chapter, but I'm here today to speak in support of this mid on behalf of Greater Iowa City Inc, your community and economic development organization and local chamber of commerce. this renewal aligns with our mission to strengthen the regional economy and create vibrant neighborhoods and districts. And I think it's important to note that when you look at the vibrancy of downtown, it did not happen by accident ten years ago, downtown looked like a very different place. 15 years ago, downtown looked like a different place. And so we have to remember it didn't happen by chance. It's a quiet engine humming in the background that we would only miss if it wasn't here. And so we're here today to speak in support and hope that you'll vote yes. [03:10:01] Thank you. [03:10:02] All right. Seeing no one else. Council, I'm going to close the public hearing. All right. Council, can I get a motion to approve, please? [03:10:15] So moved. [03:10:15] Second, Tyler. [03:10:17] All right. [03:10:18] Council discussion. Page SS Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [03:10:21] Really exciting. I'm very, very excited, especially because we're going to expand and, like, businesses outside that, like square or what you call it is will be added more to the, you know, to this one. Yeah. I'm very excited. [03:10:38] Yeah. [03:10:38] I'll just second what Mayor Pro Tern said, especially with the boundaries expanding and that, that, that the people who have opted in and have said, please, let's work on this to expand this mid a reflecting sort of the feel of downtown. But I think to perhaps, as gravity point that it's going to look and feel even more like downtown in more of downtown as the ssmid sort of has that quiet thrum. Right. And as the building continues and as the shape of it sort of starts to build and grow. so I'm really excited for this. and kudos. I know how hard it is to stand this up, to activate it, to keep it going and growing. And now for the next ten years. So kudos to everyone who's participated and has made this happen. it's hard work and this is great. I'm really excited. [03:11:32] Probably don't have to start again for another eight years. With that thing. That piece of it. Yes. Nice job and welcome back to the Ssmid. [03:11:39] Yay! Yes. [03:11:41] Thank you all for your work and for blowing past the 25% threshold, because I do. I do think that really is indicative of the wider support that's out there. And I think it's important for us to see and hear and know that. So very exciting. Thank you. [03:11:56] I'll just pile on. I appreciate the work that the downtown district does and see the value in it. And every year there's something new that comes up. And the most recent addition has been the block by Block initiative. And they just add that on top of the things that are already doing. And I think it's been a huge success. We can't wait to see the next thing that's innovative and interesting. That comes from the downtown district. [03:12:16] No pressure. [03:12:17] Page 56 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. There's something new Friday night right? [03:12:20] So yeah. [03:12:21] Can't add much more except excited to vote on this for the living room of our city. So all right, with that being said. [03:12:29] 1 was just going to. [03:12:30] Oh yes. the voice in the sky. [03:12:33] I'm going to pile on guys. yes. I would absolutely love to meet with you and nerd out about this code. I've tried to read it and it's hard, so I would love to talk with an expert. or someone who's dabbled in it for so long. and I'm especially with lost being passed. in the opportunity that come from that this being the center for so much of our sales in Iowa City, you know, just this investment and it you know, it works together so well. And also so many of the same people on this team for the Ssmid were involved in the lost campaign, which overwhelmingly in all three. Big cities, bigger cities, North Liberty, Coralville, Iowa City and Tiffin. So thank you all so much for all your work on that as well. and you know, I'm really excited to see what you know, especially since we have we're going to be seeing an increase a little bit in how much is collected. I would like, you know, I'm, I think we all know that our downtown ambassadors, our sanitation workers, downtown do just just such an amazing job. And everyone in the community loves them, and they make our our downtown, so clean and awesome. So I'm excited to see with this investment how we can help repay them. and, yeah. So I'm excited to vote yes on this and see what can happen. [03:14:07] Roll call please. [03:14:09] Harmsen. [03:14:09] Yes, Mo. [03:14:10] Yes. Page S 7 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [03:14:11] Yes. [03:14:12] Teague. [03:14:12] Yes. [03:14:13] Wilson. Yes. Alter. Yes. Bergus. [03:14:16] Yes. [03:14:17] Motion passes 7 to 0. Can I get a motion to accept? to. To accept correspondence. [03:14:25] So moved. Alter. [03:14:26] Second. Salih. [03:14:27] All in favor, say aye. Any opposed? Motion passes 7 to 0. Next page. All right. We're going to move on to item number ten. B parking ticket appeal process and towing impoundment procedures ordinance amending title nine entitled Motor Vehicles and Traffic. Chapter five, entitled Parking Meter Zones and Parking Lots. Section six, entitled Penalties Parking Tickets to provide for an updated and streamlined process to appeal parking tickets and chapter nine entitled Towing and Impoundment Procedures. Section four, entitled impoundment for Accumulated Parking Violations to increase the amount of accumulated parking fines that result in adding a vehicle to the impound list from $50 to $150. This is the second consideration, and staff is requesting expedited action. [03:15:28] 1 move that the rule requiring that ordinances must be considered and voted on for passage at two council meetings prior to the meeting, in which is to be finally passed, be suspended that the second consideration vote be waved, and that the ordinance be voted on for final passage. At this time. [03:15:41] Moved by Moe. Page 58 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [03:15:43] Second, Bergus. [03:15:44] All right. Anyone from the public like to address this topic? If you're online, please raise your virtual hand. Seeing no one online or in person. Council discussion. Roll call please. [03:15:58] Mo. Yes. [03:15:59] Yes. [03:16:00] Teague. [03:16:00] Yes. [03:16:01] Weiner. [03:16:02] Yes. [03:16:03] Alter. Yes. Bergus. Yes. Harmsen. [03:16:05] Yes. [03:16:06] Motion passes 7 to 0. Could I get a motion to pass and adopt? [03:16:10] So moved. [03:16:11] Second. Moe. [03:16:13] Roll call please. Page 59 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [03:16:15] Yes. [03:16:16] Teague. [03:16:16] Yes. [03:16:17] Online. [03:16:18] Yes. [03:16:19] Alter. Yes. Bergus. Yes. Harmsen. Yes. Mo. [03:16:22] Yes. [03:16:23] Motion passes 7 to 0. Ten C. Ordinance adopted an incorporating SUDAS design manual and specifications ordinance amending title 15, 16 and 18 of the city code to adopt and incorporate the design manual and specifications. General supplemental design standards and specifications and City of Iowa City design supplement and specifications. Can I get a motion to pass and adopt.? [03:16:50] So moved. [03:16:51] Second, Bergus. [03:16:53] Public discussion. At this time. Anyone want to discuss this item? If you're online, please raise your virtual hand. If you're in the council chambers, please come forth. Seeing no one Council discussion. Roll call please. [03:17:08] Teague. Page 60 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [03:17:08] Yes. [03:17:09] Wilson. [03:17:10] Yes. [03:17:11] Alter. Yes. Bergus. Yes. Harmsen. Yes. Oh, yes. [03:17:15] Yes. [03:17:17] Motion passes 7 to 0. We're on to item number 11, which is? Announcements of vacancies. New. And I just want to, make note that all of our boards, commissions and committee applications can be found at the city website. and it is a long one, but it is in our agenda for folks to see so 11 a announcements of vacancies new. We have Climate Action Commission, one vacancy to fill an unexpired term upon appointment through December 31st, 2027. Applications must be received by 5 p.m. Tuesday, December 30th, 2025. Can I get a motion to accept correspondence? [03:17:59] So moved. [03:18:00] Second. [03:18:00] Second. [03:18:02] All right. [03:18:03] Well, even though you are probably delayed on our end, I'm going to give it to Bergus and to Wiley. [03:18:12] And I was trying to sneak in there, so. [03:18:14] Page 61 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. Thank you. [03:18:15] All right. [03:18:16] Just cut out. [03:18:17] We're going to do item number 12 which is announcements of vacancies. Previous. 12 A is going to be planning and Zoning Commission one vacancy to fill an unexpired term. And applications must be received by 5 p.m. Tuesday, December 2nd, 2025. [03:18:33] Mayor, I don't think we had a motion in a second, but I don't think you had the vote on the motion to accept correspondence. There. [03:18:41] All right. I'll backtrack. So we had it by Bergus and then by Wilson. All in favor, say aye. [03:18:49] Aye. [03:18:49] Any opposed? Motion passes 7 to 0. Yes. That was missing. All right. We're going to move on to we're going to continue with our announcements of vacancies. Previous airport zoning Board of adjustment, one vacancy to fill a five year term. Airport zoning Board of adjustment. One vacancy to fill a five year term. Board of adjustment one vacancy to fill a five year term. Board of appeals one vacancy to fill a five year term for a licensed electrician. Board of appeals one vacancy for HVAC professional to fill an unexpired term. Historic Preservation Commission one vacancy for Brown Street representative to fill a three year term. Historic Preservation Commission one vacancy to fill up for Jefferson Street. Representative for a three year term. Historic Preservation Commission one vacancy for Woodlawn Avenue. Representative to fill a three year term. Vacancies will remain open until filled. And we're at item number 13. City Council information as at this time. [03:19:50] Just a reminder that what the last park donation drive through is tomorrow at Wetherby. 4 to 6. So anybody on the south side come donate some stuff. [03:20:10] All right. We're going to move on to item number 14 which is report on items from city staff. City manager's office. Page 62 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at https:,[/citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [03:20:15] Nothing. [03:20:16] Tonight. City attorney. [03:20:18] 1 do have something I'm looking forward to on Friday. Going with a couple of other attorneys in my office to the Iowa municipal Attorney's Association annual seminar in Johnston. It's a great time and it's very focused, which is wonderful for us. [03:20:33] City Clerk all right. We're at item number 15. Can I get a motion to adjourn, please? [03:20:41] 1 would be happy to do that. Move. [03:20:45] Second. [03:20:46] Moved. Seconded by Burgess. All in favor, say aye. [03:20:50] Aye. [03:20:50] All right. We waited for you. [03:20:53] Thank you. [03:20:54] We are adjourned. [03:20:56] Thank you. [03:20:57] Have a good night. Page 63 Iowa City City Council Work Session of November 18, 2025 (audio and video recordings can be found at htLps://citychannel4.com/city-council.html) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription through Verbit: AI -Based Transcription & Captioning Services. For greater detail please refer to the meeting recordings. [03:20:57] Everybody. [03:20:59] Yes. [03:20:59] Thank you. Page 64