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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2021-01-05 TranscriptionPage 1 Council Present: Bergus, Mims, Salih, Teague, Taylor, Thomas, Weiner Staff Present: Frain, Kilburg, Dilkes, Fruehling, Grier, Ralston, Hightshoe, Knoche, Havel, Bockenstedt, Davies, Brotherton, Tharp, Bowers, Carman, Sovers, Nagle- Gamm, Seydell Johnson Others Present: Longenecker, Van Heukelom (UISG) Capital Improvement Projects (CIP): Teague/ For those that are tuning in, this is the City of Iowa City work session on January 5, 2021, and I think we'll go ahead and get started. I'm going to have someone reach out to Mayor Pro Tem, um, to make sure that she has signed on. Kellie, if your office can do that that'd be great. Thank you. And we're going to start, first, Happy New Year, everyone. Happy to see you here, and Happy New Year to everyone in Iowa City. We're going to start our work session today. We're starting early. Normally we start at 5:00 P.M., but we're going to start with the Capital Improvement projects, and, um, because this will be a longer session, Councilors, I think if you are needing to take a break, if you want us to stop, you might want to send me a message. Otherwise, I think, just feel free to take a break and then come back whenever. So we're going to get started with our Capital Improvement Projects planning, and I'm going to turn it over to our City Attorney... City Manager Geoff Frain. Frain: And I'm probably... promptly going to turn it over to our Finance Director and Public Works Director, who are going to lead you through the presentations tonight. Knoche: Mr. Mayor, Council, good afternoon and Happy New Year. I'm Ron Knoche, Public Works Director. Today we're happy to present the Iowa City Capital Improvements Plan. We will use the ESRI storybook platform for the presentation. With that, I'd like to thank the Engineering division, and in particular Killian Laughead for producing the final presentation for us. The Capital Improvements fund can be found in the proposed budget document, starting on page 481. Today we have five objectives. The first Dennis will go over the plan development process and the fund summary. Second, staff will discuss the ongoing projects. These are projects that are not included in the CIP document, but continue to have work completed on them. There will be 11 projects that will be discussed. Third, staff will discuss the annual projects. There are 17 recurring projects that are identified in the CIP. Four, staff will discuss the 125 projects that are identified in the five-year program. To try to save some time in this presentation, we've attempted to condense some of those projects that are similar in nature or are going to be completed at the same facility, to try to save some time in regards to that. And with that being the case, the projects as they're presented won't necessarily follow directly right along with the capital program as its shown in the budget document. And then the final objective that we have is to discuss projects that are considered to be on the radar. These are projects that are on the unfunded list and staff believe Council should be aware of. We This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 2 appreciate this opportunity to present the 20...2021-2025 CII', and with that I'll tum it over to Dennis. Bockenstedt: Hello, good afternoon and ... and we're going to bring up the ESRI presentation here, and I've got about four slides to cover, essentially to walk you through the ... the process of how we pull the CIP program together. You know, how we gather (mumbled) the data and compile it, review it, and then also to give you a broad overview of what is all encompassed in the program, where the dollars are going to and where they're coming from, and how this program kind of lays out from a big picture over the next five years. So the first slide, this is the actual dates that we put together when we..when we start the program and put together a calendar of dates. This starts about a month before our annual budget process, and it actually overlaps our budget process, and then at the end we bring them both together. So September I", the Finance department sends out forms to the departments, and this is really to update projects that are in the program and for ...also it gives them a chance to submit new projects into the program, and we give them about three to four weeks to compile and update those programs, and then when October hits, we produced that initial report. There is a committee that may have a ... a variety of different departments that meets. We begin to review those projects, see how they overlap, how they over ...how they work together. We gather that input and then we ... we take a first massage or amendment to that report and to the program, and then we come back and issue an amended or follow up program. Once again then later in October, that committee meets. We review that amended program and kind of come up with what I would say is a final program. It's... it's ... it's usually might be tweaked or amended as we go through the budget process to make sure that the funding sources in the operating budget mesh with the capital program and that they both work together, and generally we do that in early December, where we ... we bring that capital budget, capital program. Merge it with the operating program, and then we submit that to the City Council. This year is was on December 18th is when that kind of goes out the door as part of that budget book. So the next slide ... is it gives you an idea of where the spending is at, and you can see that the Streets funding is ... is by far the ... the largest category of...of capital spending and ... and that's been that way for years. That's... that's nothing new. We do have some fairly substantial projects which you'll hear about tonight, one being the Dodge Street reconstruction is in there for about 17 million of that 82 million. Then we also have a planned project about five years out for Taft Avenue of about 11 million, and then our annual street rehab, pavement rehab comes to about 11.5 million. So those ... those are the biggest chunks out of that 82 million. The next largest area that we ... our capital planning is Wastewater... at 23 million. So you can see it's a pretty large step down from ... from Streets funding to ... to the next one, which is sewers, and the biggest part of that is going to be the digester complex reconstruction in a couple years, of just under $8 million. So one project makes up about one- third of...of the full capital planning for the sewer fund, the wastewater fund, and then the third largest in this pie is Transit, which is a little bit skewed because 20 million of that 20.4 million is one project, which is our transit maintenance facility, which right now we're... we're... have slotted out a couple years and also it was really contingent on receiving federal funding, and then the next largest is park maintenance at 14 million, and then in ... from down there it...it drops down pretty quick into smaller... smaller pieces. And so how we go about funding these projects, which will be our next slide. This ... this tells you where the money is coming from. So This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session January 5, 2021. Page 3 this is for all the five-year program and the biggest slice there is the GO bonds at $66 million, and so over the next five years, we are projecting to issue $66 million in general obligation debt, and that primarily goes towards streets and parks, where the biggest sources of funding and probably next would be fire trucks after streets and parks. And then the next largest sources of funding for the capital plan or the capital projects you're going to hear about this afternoon are ... are federal and state grants. So they make up a ... a significant portion of our overall capital program, and the federal grant portion does include $16 million for the transit maintenance facility. So it is funding we ... we haven't had much luck in getting the last few years, but hopefully... hopefully we'll have our time here and we'll get funding and that project will take place. And then the next largest after that, it's ... it's almost a tie really between road use tax and waste water. Wastewater is one of those business -type funds that sell funds through... through fees and charging for services, and so there's other than revenue debt, they really pay for their projects as they go. Then ... and for the road use, the ... the bulk of that road use dollars goes towards the annual pavement rehab ... and also fund some other things such as u ADA crossings program and ... and our traffic signal program. The bulk of that goes towards pavement rehabilitation. And then the last slide I'm going to cover tonight, or this afternoon. Sony (laughs) is how that program lays out over the next five years. It's a little bit of a unusual layout. Typically you see the ... the highest dollar is being planned and in the first year and then a taper downward and kind of a downward slide. What this tells you is we have a ... a number of large, significant projects that we are planning ahead for in 23, 24, 25. So, you know, we do have a large number of dollars planned and... and Ron mentioned there's 125 projects out there in 21 and 22, but in 23 that's where the $20 million transit facility's currently programmed at, and also that $8 million digester complex is planned in that 2023 year also. So you can see that we have a number of very large projects planned and in the middle of this program, and then in 20 ... in 2024, we've got almost $16 million planned for the Dodge Street reconstruction. So those large projects have kind of pushed the dollars in these outer years up, and then in 2025 we got $10 million planned for the Taft Avenue reconstruction, and then also out there is a referendum -based product of roughly $6 million for the City Park pool. So...that... that kind of causes us to be a little bit un ... unusual pattern for ...for our capital program, but it also tells us that ... that there's a lot coming down the road here, and ... and there's a lot to look ahead to here. So that's the last slide I was going to cover, and ... and I'm going to hand it off to Jason and he's going to start taking you through the projects, and he'll go through with each of the divisions to talk about those projects and ... and then if there's questions later on in regards to financing of the program, I'd be happy to answer them. Havel: Good afternoon, Jason Havel, City Engineer. So I'll start things off, as Ron mentioned, with ongoing projects. So just a reminder, these are those projects that either are partially complete that we are looking at completing here in the upcoming year, or those projects that were planned for a previous year that are not yet complete. So starting things off here with the 2020 asphalt resurfacing project. This is one we completed a number of overlay locations this previous year. There's one main section that remains, that'd be Muscatine Avenue between 2nd Avenue and CourtStreet. So we anticipate that work beginning in the spring and complete in 2021. Just a reminder that will also include the pedestrian refuge island there for the Court Hill Trail on kind of the south end of that section. Next we have the Idyllwild storm water drainage diversion. So This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 4 you guys have seen this recently. This is actually in the bidding process. So we anticipate taking bids for this project early this year. Again, this will be construction of a bypass along the ... kind of the west side of the Idyllwild area to help alleviate or deal with some of the ... the localized flooding that has occurred historically in this area. Just a reminder, this also ... this Friday will also include as a bid alternate the pumping station that would be for the area as well. The Riverside Drive pedestrian tunnel, this is one that's been in the works for a while, we actually have nearly finalized design plans for this project. Late in that design process we received word from the railroad that they were no longer supportive of the project. So with that, we've kind of gone back with ... back to work with our consultant to try and figure out ways to respond to some of the concerns that were raised by the railroad and ... and find a way to move this project forward. So the plan is still to install a pedestrian tunnel. Again, this is along the west side of Riverside Drive between Myrtle Avenue and Benton Street, and it would essentially include not only the tunnel through the embankment there, but also sidewalk connections to the north and south. Next is the (mumbled) Court sanitary sewer replacement. This is a sanitary sewer line that was badly in need of repair and we were having maintenance issues out there repeatedly and ... and quite frequently. So looking at replacing that line, essentially replacement of a ... an existing line. With that, we also are looking at making some improvements to the sanitary sewer and storm sewer alignment. There's actually a sanitary main that runs underneath one of the buildings there. So we're looking at realigning that to take care of that issue, as well as some storm sewer alignment improvements as well. Looking at that construction, the plan would be in 2021. American Legion road reconstruction, this will be complete reconstruction of American Legion Road from Scott Boulevard out to Taft Avenue. It includes going from a rural section with ditches and turning that into an urban section. So we'll have curb, gutter, and storm sewer. Also will include wide sidewalk on one side of the street, include bike lanes ... on -street bike lanes, as well as utility improvements. This project will also include the roundabout at the Scott Boulevard and American Legion Road intersection, as well as the pedestrian underpass near the new Hoover School. This is a ... will be bid through the DOT and we anticipate that happening in March. So this will also be likely a two-year construction window. First Avenue and Scott Boulevard intersection improvements will include a new roundabout at the First Avenue and Scott Boulevard intersection. There'll be some utility improvements as well, but the majority of the project will be the installation of a new roundabout there. That one is currently under design and looking at 2021 construction as well. 2nd Avenue bridge replacement, this is one that's currently under design, looking at construction hopefully in 2021. Essentially it will be replacement of the existing bridge, which has reached the end of its useful life. There'll be some slope protection or bank stabilization work as well. Also water main connection likely incorporated into the bridge design. With this it'll also include sidewalk infill. So it'll not only have a sidewalk crossing on the bridge, but also connect to existing sidewalk to the north and south of this location. Continuing on the sidewalk infill, Gilbert Court sidewalk infill. This is a location where we've received complaints from time to time in the past. There's a section actually on both sides of the street that lacks sidewalk on the Gilbert Court area just north of Highland. Sothis will look at basically extending sidewalk on both sides of the street from Highland, up to where the sidewa... sidewalk currently ends along Gilbert Court. Again, this will be one that we're looking at construction early in 2021. Scott Boulevard trunk sewer, this one is actually on the agenda tonight to hold a public This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 5 hearing. This will be extending the sanitary sewer, trunk sewer, basically from where it currently ends just north of the railroad tracks, extending that up to American Legion Road, kind of the alignment there shown in yellow. As part of this project we'll also be able to remove the existing pump station that is located just north American Legion Road, kind of at the north end of that project. Down at the Wastewater plant, we have a dewatering roll -off pavement project. Essentially what this will do is install a pad where they can then utilize that for the use of dewatering roll -offs, and what these are typically used for are those loads from such as sand and car wash and septic haulers. Basically it's a way for them to dewater those loads before they ...they deal with them down at the plant. So this will just give them a more solid working surface and make it much more efficient. Rehabilitation of collector wells three and four, so this is on the water side of things. Basically what they'll look at doing is clean out the existing laterals for wells three and four, as well as repairs and rehabilitation of the pumps and the wet wells for those facilities. That is the ongoing projects. So we will next move to the annual project section. So these will be the projects that have money every year within the program, and it looks like we're going to kick things off with the Park side of things. So I'll tum it over to Juli. Seydell Johnson: Okay, so the first project we have up is City Hall annual improvement ones. Um, sorry! This is ongoing projects. So in year three, it is or this year it is carpeting and painting on the third floor of City Hall. Future years include roof replacement and a few other things. So it's ongoing maintenance and repair items in City Hall. Next we have the Park annual improvement project. Is it... Kellie, are you moving the screen? Frain: It's moved, Juli. Go ahead. Seydell Johnson: Oh, okay. It's frozen on mine. Okay so Park ... the Park annual improvement is park signs. This past year we did basketball court replacements. We are adding benches, bicycle racks, bike fix -it stations, and grills throughout the parks. So these are smaller projects throughout the parks and then also gives us the opportunities when partner or grant op ... opportunities come up. Number three is the park ADA improvements. These are access improvements to different parks. It could be curb ramps or additional paving of paths to get to the playgrounds or other park amenities. Inter -city bike trails is smaller trail projects that are generally connection projects or finishing out small sections of trails. A recent one would be a small section right in front of the Parks maintenance shop on Gilbert Street. But this one is annual Rec Center improvements, access improvements, entrance repairs. One of the next ones coming up will be redoing the entrance paving at Mercer Scanlon. Right now at the Rec Center, which the reason I'm doing this from home (laughs) is that we have demolition happening in the Rec Center for the on -deck restrooms. One other small project there (mumbled) some other things like that, and then number six is tree planting. One of our newer ongoing capital projects, we are right now in the process of preparing the bid documents and letting the neighbors know in the Mackinaw neighborhood and then also along Scott Boulevard, for tree planting projects that will happen next season next planting season. Think that's it for Parks and Rec. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 6 Havel: All right, back to me for annual stormwater improvements. So this is an account that we use for improve ... or issues that come up on the stormwater side of things. So every year we kind of deal with repairs to stormwater infrastructure, such as intakes, san ... or storm sewer pipe, dealing with issues of damage pipe, collapsed pipe, open joints, that kind of thing. A lot of times we'll see... similar to what's here in the picture is sinkholes. A lot of times they're an indication of that. So just replacing ... or repairing those facilities and ... in those areas as they come up around town. Next one, I think, is the traffic signal projects. So this is something that we use every year. Helps to fund either new traffic signal locations or a lot of times it's to help repair or upgrade traffic signal locations that are existing. This one ... this project will also include the installation of pan, tilt, zoom cameras, at a number of locations that don't currently have those. I think those were scheduled for 2022, um, will be the next time we look at installing a group of those. Next one is the traffic calming account and this, again, is kind of based on need or request. So this is for construction of traffic calming measures that make it all the way through the neighborhood process. So once they're selected and approved and the neighborhood has voted to approve those, then the actual construction dollars come out of this account. Next one is the curb ramp, ADA, and this funds an annual project where we go and look for locations that need either new ramps or upgraded ramps. Typically our priority is those locations that have sidewalk facilities, but do not have any curb ramps. So those areas with full curb would be our top priority and then we also then work our way down the list of those sites that may have ramps that are not compliant. Either they're too steep or don't have truncated domes, but those locations are ... are throughout the city and will vary from year to year. Next one is our annual pavement rehabilitation. So again, this is, uh... the asphalt overlay is obviously a big portion of that. This account also pays for PCC patching, crack sealing, chip sealing, other pavement maintenance projects that we have throughout the city and those, again, will vary as far as locations throughout the city. That's also... comes from recommendations from our recently completed pavement management study. Underground electrical facilities, so this is an account that will help pay for those times when we look to help relocate the electrical facilities from overhead to underground. A lot of times those are situations where we have other projects in the area, and the ... Mid American will need to relocate their facilities. Depending on the corridors and costs, we'll sometimes have conversations with them to look at ways to relocate underground. Helps from obviously an aesthetic standpoint, also from a safety standpoint from Mid American's side. A lot of times what that'll be is if they already need to relocate we'll pay essentially the up -charge that is necessary to go underground versus just relocating in another aerial position. Next is the annual bridge maintenance and repair project. So this is one that we use for our biannual inspections. So every other year, we go through and inspect all the bridges in Iowa City. From that we also get repair and maintenance recommendations from our consultant. So this account would help to fund those. Typically those are the... again, kind of repair and rehab projects. Anything that would be a full replacement or anything like that would actually cut... typically be its own CIP account. So this would be more the ... on the repair and rehabilitation side of things. Next the annual sewer main replacement. So this is a ... an annual fund that typically will find a couple of different projects, one being the sewer lining project. So that is going in and looking at lining existing sanitary sewer or sanitary manholes, and what that typically does is for those ... those sections that are in decent shape, but maybe starting to show some signs of needs of repair. We can go ahead and line those and get a lot of This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 7 life out of them for a ... are ... relatively economical standpoint. And then, as well as the lining projects, we also typically have a sewer repair project every year. And what that'll do is go in and complete spot repair. So maybe the ... most of the line's in good shape, but we have a section that may have some deficient joints or pipe issues, and so we'll go through and make those spot repairs out of this account. With that, I will turn it over to Kent to talk about the ... the bicycle master plan. Ralston: Yeah. Greetings. Good afternoon. Kent Ralston, Transportation Planner. Most of you will remember that back in 2017 the City adopted a very ambitious bike master plan. And with your continued support, I'm happy to report that we've really made some tremendous progress. I just wanted to take a minute just to give you a quick update on a few of the projects that we completed back in 2020. Jason had already mentioned one, which was the American Legion ... or excuse me, of the McCollister Boulevard project, where we have bike lanes now between Gilbert and Sycamore, in 2020, and we also finished bike lanes on Dodge Street, south of Burlington, and also completed the four to three-way conversion, uh,four to three -lane conversion of Dodge Street between Bowery and Kirkwood. So we've got that continuous bike lane now essentially from north Iowa City on Dodge Street, all the way to Bowery. We also completed a ... implementation of bike lanes on Burlington Street across the Iowa River, you may have noticed. That was a major barrier that was identified in the bike master plan, and it's nice to get that completed. As far as upcoming projects in 21, Jason did mention the American Legion Road project, where we'll have bike lanes, as well as a 10 -foot wide side path. That'll be a nice project to link up to Hoover School and one that's been needed for some time. We also have the Highway 6 side path, Fair Meadows to Heinz, which you may hear about later today. And then we've also introduced a 2025 project in the CIP to continue that side path from Fair Meadows to Sycamore, and that really completes the entire, uh, once those two projects are complete, continues the entire Highway 1/6 trail corridor, which is something really special. As part of our planning efforts to become a gold bike friendly community, I also wanted to just mention a few things that aren't capital investment related, and staff has been working on a host of other educational and promotional work. We've created a series of 14 episodes of bike shorts, videos we call them, which really educate the community on everything from how to maintain your bike, to how to ride at night, to how to ride safely on bike lanes, and so on and so forth. We created a rules of the road brochure and translated that into six different languages to try and reach as many of our residents here in Iowa City as we can, and then in addition to a host of other things, we also have been creating some weekly maps highlighting popular routes and encouraging folks to use our trail system here during the pandemic. We know that's good for both health ... both physical and mental health. And I think you'll hear about most of the capital projects here in your ...in the rest the presentation today, but I'll be here for questions, if necessary. DeLoach: Good afternoon. We have quite a bit of facility updates that we need. This is our 40th year of the Senior Center being here since 1981. As you see, this is a picture of some of the water damage issues that we have going on. We have been working with a consulting... consulting firm here for a majority of this year to get a master plan. We're about 95% complete with that master plan and we'll be coming back to you all later to kind of go into detail of some of the This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 8 updates and needs. There's some tuck pointing, some ... some wood floors that need to be changed, as well as we need furniture replacement for multiple reasons, lots of remodeling. We have some ADA... significant ADA needs. We have some immediate needs for ADA, to make sure that the facility or the population we serve, as well as the public. So we'll be working on those things as soon as we're able. But so far, the plan is to work on some of those immediate needs and go on down the line. It will be quite a bit of work. It'll be a couple of years before we're actually completed, as well as we'll have some long-term items that we'll need to restore. We're restoring a lot of the historic portions of the outside of the building, as well as really having it more focused on the west side of our building or a new entryway. We always have had the Washington Street entryway, but we really want to bring some focus there as well as create an exterior for folks to be able to really know which door to come in, to help with wayfinding in the building, which will help with folks over time with diminished capacity, as well as new folks coming into the area, to know where to come into the Senior Center and having our receptionist desk moved down to that door so that it's a little bit more centralized for folks, as well as carpeting that needs to be changed, walls ... as well as moving some offices around. creating new fitness spaces, as well as looking at some of our new classroom spaces. So we're really excited about those options for us. We ... we really appreciate the ... the public input that has been provided to us, and we've been able to accommodate it and move things around to making our plan work, and so the plan is still up and going, and we'll definitely keep you all up to date. Nagle -Gamin: There we go. Good afternoon. This is Darian Nagle -Lamm with Transportation Services. Happy New Year, everyone. We have the last project of the annual projects list. Itis simply parking operations and maintenance of our parking facilities. Our annual project includes concrete restoration, application of (mumbled) control joints, and ... and just generally all of the things that we need to do to help maintain our facilities, which are of course open ... open air, exposed to the weather, get lots of wear and tear and whatnot. Also part of this project, too, is I think our last remaining lights maybe that the City manages or the lights on top of our ramps that are not yet (mumbled) over to LED lights. We're hoping to pull that into the project and get those on a more energy efficient... more energy efficient system very soon. Tharp: All right. Good afternoon. I'm Mike Tharp. I'm the Airport Manager for the Iowa City Airport. Walking you through the ... the Airport CIP, we are one of those departments that does depend on funding from other agencies in order for our CIP plans to go forward. The FAA funds, when they fund a project with us, they fund 90% of that project. The State has a similar program to the federal side. They supply 70 to 85% of the funding, depending on their... their... the project and through the budget process, the City gives us $100,000 that we use as matching for those grant opportunities. With that, one of the things that the ... we encountered with the CARES Act last year. The CARES Act did turn our fiscal year 20 grants into 100% federal shares. So we were able to ... and we're planning on using some of those grant matching funds that we didn't have to allocate to the federal grants to do some projects at the Airport that don't typically meet the ... the scoring criteria to get awarded funding. Starting off our project list is the 12-30 obstruction mitigation and part 77 airspace mitigation. This is actually phase two, but because of the timing and some issues with the environmental ... with the Protected Species Act ... brains This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 9 going blank, sorry (laughs) We are actually out to bid for that and that will happen this winter. But last year, we went through a major mitigation project with the... the... the neighborhoods around the Airport, and during that time there were about a dozen or so other trees that were tagged as being too tall and encroaching into the approach pass of the Airport. So we are working with neighbors to mitigate those. The next project is the Airport parking lot expansion. This is actually one of those projects that typically doesn't score very well with the State scoring system. So we are hoping to use those grant funds that we didn't have to spend on ... on the federal projects to do this. As you can see from the picture, the last couple of years the Airport has been at capacity for parking on many occasions. It does make it a little bit harder for folks that are using the Airport to get in and get out and, you know, just make it a little bit more convenient with some more parking. 3465, the runway environmental assessment of runway 7. This is a project that may or may not come to pass, based on FAA criteria, but the initial plan for the runway 7 end is we can stretch a couple hundred more feet of runway in that ... on that end to increase our landing distance. This is a project that comes from our Airport master plan. That master plan is a roughly 20 -year plan on how to develop the Airport and the air side needs of the Airport. It is blessed by the FAA and FAA uses that kind of as their planning mechanism. Again, this one would be the start process, make sure there's no environmental issues or...or anything else to adding that couple hundred feet to the end of...of 7. So keeps everything within the square footprint of...of the Airport. Runway 25 threshold relocation, this is something we're working on next spring. It is kind of the ... the end result of our master plan update and ... and the goal of that was to take the Airport, take the... the... the infrastructure that we have, and without really dramatically ...without expanding the footprint of the Airport, maximizing the efficiency and the use of the Airport facilities. So with that we're able to bring that threshold back about 800 feet. That'll get us not quite to our 5,000 -foot landing distance on runway 25, and that 5,000 -foot landing distance is a pretty big number because a lot of our charter... our charter operators use that number for being able to land at the Airport and also for taking fuel for aircraft that ... that does land at the Airport. The runway 12-30 displace threshold and relocation, this is one of those projects (mumbled) tight ... is tied in with the mitigation work, making the Airport just a little bit more efficient. We can slide the landing distance on the northwest side of the Airport down a little bit, and we do add a little bit of concrete to maintain our existing distances on the southeast side, but it does shift the protection zones, the approach zones that are over the northwest neighborhoods, a little bit closer into the Airport and allows... allows the protection airspace over the neighborhoods to be higher in the sky. Airport apron expansion, this is a more or less an airplane parking project. We do get fairly busy especially during football season with airplanes. The FAA has a formula for ...based on operational activity and how big of a parking apron you can have, and we are looking to expand our parking apron, based on that formula. And then the next one is runway 7-25 pavement repairs. This is a ... a crack sealing pavement maintenance project. The runway 7-25 was a project that was started in 2008-2009 in terms of the rehab. So we are at a point now where some basic maintenance, crack sealing, you know, crack sealing, stuff like that will extend the life of the pavements and we won't have a major reconstruction project on our hands in the near future. Runway 12-30, the next project is the same thing. Again just slotted for the end of fiscal ... of the end of 2024, so the end of this plan to do the same crack sealing, pavement maintenance, and that is the Airport's plan. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 10 Grier: Good afternoon, everybody. John Grier, Fire Chief. Have a couple projects to talk with you about today. As Dennis indicated in his opening remarks, we have ... over the next five years we have a few apparatus that are due for replacement. That's the bulk of our capital improvement program. Just for your refresher, we base our replacement on a fleet management score, working with the Equipment division and number of years and service, and then if we happen to have a ... an apparatus that develops a problem that's not fixable, we ask to have it replaced a little sooner, but coming up in this year we have for the next big purchases the ... our big ladder truck, which works out of downtown, and then we take a couple years off and we replace our smaller ladder truck, which is stationed on the west side of town, Station 2, and then the Scotty House is that fire safety house that we take around to the schools, and then we have some pumpers coming up due for replacement in 25, and then in a couple future years after that. The second project is we developed a crack at Fire Station 1 floor and it has slowly been expanding. So we had some design professionals come in and look at it, and their assessment was is that it needs to be removed and replaced. So that's the $95,000 for this year. Any questions, I'd be happy to answer them. Thanks. Carman: Hi, I'm Elsworth Carman, the Director of the Library. We've got three projects to speak about today, and feel free to ask questions if...if you've got any. We are in a great building that's really heavily used and it was finished in 2004, so about 17 years into the building life, which I think as you're starting to hit that sweet spot of things starting to need to be replaced and refinished. So we're looking at a multi-year project hereto replace all the carpeting and famishing in the big parts of the library. The ... the cost of this project includes both the replacing of the flooring and ... and some of the furnishings, but also on the demo and prep and moving the materials to facilitate these ... these replacements. This is simply maintenance that needs to be done in a building as it ages, and I look forward to hopefully making choices that will last as long as this first round did and continue to very carefully steward those resources. (mumbled) first one, and our second project here is looking at an automatic material handler. This library and many, many other libraries use RFID tags on our materials. So when they're checked in and checked out, our computers communicate with those chips to keep track of the items, and that's kind of how our catalog operates. (mumbled) takes part of the human input out of those systems and this building was designed to facilitate (mumbled) machine downstairs in our first -floor returns area. They're (mumbled) system of conveyor belts and bins that does some of the initial sorting of materials for you. Libraries that have these machines get benefits like increased return time from when an item is returned to back on the shelf; more accurate circulation statistics; fewer hands on the materials before they're back and ready for reuse. The reason that ... that I'm bringing this up right now is there's... our library uses volunteers to do a lot of our check-in work. So we're feeling pretty concerned about will those volunteers come back after this COVID experience. The trend that we're seeing nationally as libraries that are ready to bring their volunteers back aren't seeing that. So this piece of machinery would help us bridge that gap, between a task that was done very heavily with volunteer work, to allowing us to ... to keep doing what we're doing, have staff doing other ...other dynamic work. I want to be clear with this one, that there is no intention of reducing staff, if we did introduce this machine. That ... it doesn't supersede the work of human beings. Here it would replace some of the work This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 11 done by volunteers in anticipation of maybe (mumbled) do different work to get those folks in. We are one of the few, if not the only size eight library in Iowa, that doesn't use a (mumbled) They're... they're a very common piece of library machinery, and it ... I think that we'd be coming in at a great time when the technology is pretty advanced and ready to do the work that we need. That's it for that one. And the last project (mumbled) was to look at doing a facility study, looking at space needs and environmental impact. Kind of like with that (mumbled) project, you know, we're ... we're getting... our building is aging, and we want to make sure that we're doing everything we can to set ourselves and future generations up for success. So we want to make sure that our spaces are being used well, that we're ... we're doing the best with our large and small systems to agree to, you know, a greener future, and make sure that we're ... we're incorporating that into the plans. So this is a multi-year project that would first start with having experts come in to do those evaluation of how we're using the space, how we're impacting the environment, and then going on to implement some of the changes that may be suggested. Thank you. Ralston: Yes, hi. Ken Ralston again. Neighborhood and Development Services has just one project in the plan this year. This is for remaining funds for implementation of our new software package, although the package is largely up and running. The software handles everything from tracking of residents requests, to tracking and processing subdivision applications, and is also used to process building construction plans and housing inspections. Seydell Johnson: Okay, moving on to Parks and Recreation. This is Juli Seydell Johnson, Parks and Recreation Director. It's fun for me to look through this list, because in the five years I've been here we've accomplished just about this number of projects. So it's fun to keep moving forward and we appreciate support on a number of things. The fust project I'm going to talk about is ... is simply replacing the roads or resurfacing the roads at the cemetery. They haven't been done in a number of years. So this replaces some of the asphalt within the cemetery. The second project Kent Ralston actually already talked about. This is one of the trail segments on Highway 6. This is a Broadway to Fair Meadows section. Later on in the project list you'll see the Heinz Road to Fair Meadows trails. Both important trails along the Highway 6, Highway 1 corridor. Item number three is the City Park pool replacement, and we know and love City Park pool. It's a nice, historic pool, 72 years old. This summer one of the oldest pools in the state of Iowa that is still operating. We will be embarking on a recreation and aquatics facilities master plan this spring and summer, with one of the questions being what should be the future of City Park pool. Do we renovate it as it is? Do we replace it? What are the needs of the community that can be best met with this? And so this gives us a ... a placeholder for that project in 2024-25. The next one is ... three very popular splash pads, one at Fair Meadows, one at Wetherby, and one at Tower Court, and specifically the ones at Fair Meadows and Wetherby are beginning to show their age. The equipment is becoming more difficult to maintain. The ... it's fading. There's some equipment errors in it. So we will be looking at replacing the above -ground equipment. Not a wholesale redo of the splash pads, but simply a refreshing of them with new play features on the top, and that is in 2023 and 24. The next one is behind the scenes, but very important, and this is upgrading building automation controls. This is what runs our hearing, cooling, dehumidification systems throughout the City, through our government building staff. This will This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 12 replace the systems in a number of facilities, including fire stations, the Animal Care Center, Senior Center, and I believe there's one more. But this is ... it's all behind the scenes. What it will allow is for all of the systems to be on the same platform so that staff can monitor them and do an amount of adjustment remotely, as ... as needed. It gives us a better record of what's going on and will help increase the energy efficiency of all of these facilities. Item number six is two new parks eventually, one in the Palisades area in the northeast area and the one in Stonebridge, just kind of north and east of where Frauenholtz- Miller Park, where the St. Pat's Catholic Church is. We have land in both of these areas, and this would just develop smaller public use parks on those lands. Item number seven is Chadek Green restroom and shelter. This is one of our largest or second largest community garden site, but that is all it is right now is community garden site and open space. Gardeners would really like to have a gathering place in the shelter, along with the restroom and probably some kind of counter space for washing vegetables or doing potlucks or something like that within the shelter. That's scheduled for 2022. Item number eight is the rec center improvements, both to Robert A. Lee and Mercer Scanlon. We have been ongoing... doing smaller projects and doing projects... tonight on the agenda you have a dehumidification project and tuck pointing project at Mercer Scanlon. This project in the future years will look at both locker rooms for ADA accessibility and just making them more inviting to the public in general, along with some renovations at Robert A. Lee to change some of the classrooms and use spaces to match public need. Once again, one of the questions we'll be asking as we do the master planning next spring and summer. Item nine Whispering Meadows, this has been in the plan for a while as an upgrade by adding a shelter and small playground and some access paths, but we recently received a State resource enhancement and protection REAP grant. So that moves part of the project up to 21, as we have $90,000 from the State to do ecological improvements. So we'll be working on the wetlands plantings, removing some of the invasive species, and replanting the area and getting it one of the new park signs. Item 10 is shelters and restroom replacement in Lower City Park. Later on, we'll have one in Upper City Park. We've been looking closely at the use of these facilities and the number of facilities in this park. Following along somewhat with the City Park, Lower City Park master plan, moving things eventually away from the river and up towards the hillside, as with the new playground that just recently opened. What this will do is consolidate the shelters, so there'll be fewer shelters and restrooms, but they will be higher quality and we think that really matches the amount of use that the park is receiving and has for a number of years. Number 11 is Kiwanis Park, this is a 2023 replacement, most likely of the playground area primarily. It ... it did include the shelter at one time. It's in really good shape. So I don't know that the shelter will be replaced. The playground is a favorite because it's built into the hill and it's got naturally... some natural areas into it. It's also very hard to maintain and is very much showing its age. So leading up to this we will definitely have a neighborhood process to look at what type of playground people would like to see as a replacement. It might be a nature playground again or it could be something completely different. I think that the (mumbled) wide open for that large of an area. Number 12 is renovating softball fields at Napoleon softball complex fields (mumbled) eight. This includes regrading, getting the drainage repaired and fixed up, so just makes them more... easier to maintain and safer for players, as well as maintenance staff. Number 13 is the Upper City Park shelter and restroom, 2024, similar to Lower City Park. Looking at consolidating the number of restrooms and shelters that we have in Upper City Park This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 13 and replacing them with ... with better quality facilities there. Number 14 is Hickory Hill Park, the north... the Conklin shelter, replacing that and the restroom. I believe this is the last one we have of this style that's out there, and this would be 2025 and it would simply be a replacement of the restroom and shelter with the similar design that we've used at Creekside, Willow Creek, Wetherby, and a number of our other parks at this point, following the Park master plan. Glendale Park and shelter will be next summer. This is a smaller park where we'll be looking at replacing the playground equipment and then adding a small picnic shelter for that. So we'll be doing the public input process on this in the coming months and have the work done on this next summer. Number 16 is the Court Hill Park shelter and playground. In this particular park, the restroom is fairly new. So we won't be replacing that, but we will be probably once again replacing just one and there's currently two shelters. Probably replace one, remove one, and then replace the playground that's there. It's one of the older playgrounds we have still in our park system. Item number 17 is Robert E. Lee pool filter and dehumidification process. The project ... this is all the behind the scenes equipment that makes the Robert A. Lee pool run and function. This will also kind of...this will be one of the questions that's asked on the recreation facilities master planning process of what should the future Robert A. Lee pool be as well. So that... would there be changes or should it continue as it is but this is all the behind the scenes, filters, pumps, and it would add the dehumidification for a more efficient operations. Number 18 is the Happy Hollow playground replacement. As you remember just a few years ago, we did replace the restroom and shelter. We did some court refurbishment, some ... of the field refurbishment this summer. But one thing left to do there is the playground and that will happen in 2023. Terrell Mill skate park has ... is reaching the end of its useful or salvageable life (mumbled) well used every day, I believe, with a number of skaters out there. So in 2025 we're looking... or 2024, looking at renovating the skate park. We've had requests recently for ...for lighting and some other renovations to bring it up to more current standards for a skate park. So we'll be looking at that .... and doing the renovations there. City Park ball field improvements are happening, um, now it's a 2021 project. This includes fence and dug out repairs, grading of the fields, which has already happened, and some lighting improvements, some of which will happen and some will still happen before next spring. Twenty-one is Mercer ball park diamond improvements and this is 2023 through 2024. This is where currently City High plays. Holding this off till 23 or 24 will give us time to work with the School District to determine if indeed they will continue to play their varsity baseball at this site or they will be moving to a new field, closer to the high school. This particular budget includes artificial turf, which would need to be a partnership with the School District, if we went forward with that, and then a number of other improvements to all of the other fields at that facility. Item 22 is Hunters Run Park, and this would be a new shelter and playground in the park. Once again, also one of our older areas of park equipment. In this we'll replace that with ... we would have a public input process to determine what type of a playground and then a small shelter, similar to our other shelters. Item 23 is the Fair Meadows to Heinz trail along Highway 6, which Kent already mentioned that. I've already talked about a little bit. Twenty-four is events facility improvements. So this is for our Terry Trueblood event center and the Ned Ashton House. Things like staining the outside of the building, which is just a regular maintenance, ongoing maintenance task, and then at both facilities also upgrading the BAS system so that HVAC can be monitored, along with all the other systems within the City, and some audio-visual equipment upgrades at the TTRA lodge. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 14 Number 25 is off-road bicycle trail development. We are looking at a new site that we just acquired through Public Works, along the Elks Golf Course, and develop this along with some other property that we have down in the river bottoms there into an off-road bicycle track, single track bicycle course. Number 26 is ped mall playground. This one has been moved forward to this year. In fact we'll have the kickoff meeting hopefully for it later this week. The ped mall playground has become very difficult to maintain. We are no longer able to get replacement parts for a number of the slides and different pieces of equipment. In fact, it's ... it's short at least one slide, if not two, right now just because we haven't been able to find replacements for them. So this will look at replacing it with something new and we'll be doing a process with the Library staff, the Downtown Association, and other stakeholders in that downtown area to come up with something really, really unique and... and attractive for the ped mall. Number 27 and 28 look to 2025 projects. The first one is Benton Hill. This replaces the playground. It's rather a small playground, but replaces it in 2025, and then College Green playground is a larger playground, which will get also replaced in 2025. In both cases, probably not the shelters at those parks as they have various structures, different structures, that are important to the sense of place. And those parks with the playgrounds are reaching an age where they definitely will need to be replaced. Number 29 is asphalt resurfacing at the Park maintenance facility. The number one thing probably asked for by staff right now (laughs) the driveway is literally falling apart. So we look forward to getting that repaired and having safe access in and out of the Park maintenance facility. Same thing with number 30, the Willow Tre... Creek trail replacement. This is a well -used trail, we're finding even more now this winter, as we've been clearing snow and ice for more of this park. But as you can see from the photo, we've got roots that have come up through the asphalt. We'll be doing some remedial work in the spring to make it safe for use in the meantime, but then looking at a replacement for it in 2023. And the final project on our Parks and Rec list is ADA elevator improvements. So City Hall, Senior Center, Rec Center, the elevators all need to have some changes made to make them ADA compliant, things like voice active or voice audible sys... systems and some other things that make them more accessible to more people. That's all for Parks and Rec! Thank you. Brotherton: Okay, Denise Brotherton with the Police Department, uh, Interim Chief for another week. We just have two projects up here. The first one is our digital photo management, and what this would do would give us the ability to house digital evidence from any source, and maintain security and efficiency in our evidence room. The way that evidence comes into us has changed and evolved, and we need to catch up with that, and as you can see, it's crowded in there, and this will give us the ability to clean that up and have a more secure way to store photos, recordings, downloads, and other type of digital evidence that come to us and the next one. (goes silent) Fruin: Denise, you're ... you got muted accidentally there. Brotherton: Am I back on? Yes. Okay, so again at the Shelter. There's no backup power when we lose electricity and with things like a derecho and other natural events we've had happen in the last couple years, we find it can get very hot, very cold in there. There's not a whole lot of This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 15 ventilation for the animals. So especially in that summertime. It ... it was always a future plan to have this when they first built the facility. It was too expensive to do then. But we've... we've wanted to do this, and as we have more incidents now and we lose that electricity (mumbled) it's imperative that we get that in there for those animals, and I am available for any questions. Havel: All right, moving on to Public Works. Starting things off out at the Landfill, a ... a group of projects here. First one being the replacement of the equipment building. So this will be a new building that would actually allow for storage of all the equipment or...the availability for storage for equipment out there. Currently, some of the equipment actually doesn't fit into the existing building. So this will help to alleviate that. The compost pad improvements (interrupted by talking in background) out there (talking continues) so L3333, this will be basically improvements to the compost pad area, helping to make that area more usable and more efficient for the composting operations. The landfill dual extraction system. So that'll be an expansion of the existing system that is out at the landfill for leachate and ... and gas. There's also a project for future a landfill cell design. So this'll be kind of the design phase of that, and then construction in a .... currently an unfunded year, but a future year. The bulk water fill station. So we have these at a couple locations throughout the city. But basically what this does is it's a ... a way to fill large tanks. It would be usable for staff or contractors as needed. It also could be used for ...for firefighting operations as needed. And typically what this would do is to fill tanker trucks and that kind of stuff. There's a project for the leachate lagoons. There's currently two lagoons out at the landfill. This would look to essentially fill in one of the lagoons that's longer being used and then making repairs or renovations to the ... the other lagoon out at the landfill. Then finally expansion of the landfill gas infrastructure, so the gas collection system out there at the landfill, so that group out at the landfill. Next one is the South Side Recycling site. This is down off of Riverside Drive, near Sturgis Ferry Park. This would install pavement and other infrastructure to allow for a recycling site here. Also would include lighting, signage, that kind of stuff. Would also hopefully make it available for providing compost and wood chips to users as well. Next one is a couple pieces of equipment for resource management, first being a couple of automated curbside collection trucks. Again replacement vehicles there, and then replacement of a bulldozer for use out of the landfill as well. Number four is out off of Westminster Drive. This is an area where in the past we received complaints of localized flooding during heavy rain events. So this project will look to address the ... those issues, look at upsizing storm sewer out there, as well as some intake improvements and other stormwater improvements along that section. Rundell Street, the ... the pump station vault out there. This will do a couple of different things. First, it'll make some modifications to the hatches and the top of the vault there to allow for ADA improvements, so it'd be compliant sidewalk and curb ramps in this location. It'll also make improvements to some of the equipment actually included within the pump station is reaching the end of its useful life. Number six is River Street. So this'll make improvements to the storm sewer out there. Right now it's an existing ditch along River Street. This is an area where we have issues from time to time regarding debris and other stuff that causing blockages. So this'll look at installing storm sewer and making related improvements to that area. Number seven (mumbled) Place storm sewer, so this will look to again upsize existing storm sewer infrastructure. This is an area where we've, again, received complaints of localized flooding. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 16 It's ... we have some infrastructure that's in need of repair. So this project will repair that and, again, upsize some of those facilities. Number eight out at the Public Works site sand and salt storage bunkers. These are ... were originally included in the Public Works site project and due to budget constraints were removed. Basically this will install covered storage out at the Public Works site can be used for obviously sand and salt, could also be used for topsoil or rock or other materials as needed for ...for City operations. Number nine will address the non-public safety radio system, making upgrades to that system. Essentially, again, equipment that's reaching the end of its useful life, and is in need of repair for ...for moving forward. There's some pieces of equipment that will no longer be supported here in the near future. So again, just making those necessary upgrades. Number 10, the Melrose Avenue improvements project. So this is on the west side of town. We'll reconstruct Melrose Avenue and IW V Road out to the landfill. So basically between the landfill and Highway 218, complete reconstruction. This will remain a rural section. So it'll be a roadway with ditches. Also includes water main extension out to the landfill as part of that project. Currently looking at bidding that through the DOT, probably mid -year this year. And again, this is a joint project with the County. Number 11, so reconstruction of Dubuque Street from Washington Street to Iowa Avenue. This is another project that stems from the downtown streetscape master plan. This project would be done similar to what was done along Washington Street a few years ago. So it would address not only paving, sidewalk area, utility improvements, as well as lighting and some wayfinding as well. Kirkwood Avenue to Capitol Street connection, so this is down in the Riverfront Crossings area, just north of Riverfront Crossings Park. This would look to extend Capitol... or Kirkwood Avenue and Capitol streets. This project will look at the functional design for that. So basically laying out the project, the alignment, that kind of stuff for the preliminary design for those extensions, as well as utility improvements as well. Any funding for actual construction would happen in a future year. Court Street reconstruction, this will ... this project will look at a complete reconstruction of Court Street from Muscatine Avenue to 1 st Avenue. Again, this will be all new pavement, sidewalk improvements, curb ramp improvements, as well as utility upgrades and repairs. So complete reconstruction of that corridor. Out on Benton Street we'll be doing a rehabilitation project which will be an overlay of Benton Street, from Mormon Trek to just west of Greenwood Drive, which is where we had done overlay a few years ago. So kind of continuing the next section here. It'll include... include not only an overlay, as well as curb ramp improvements. We're also looking at some water main improvements and with this project we'll also install official bike lanes on Benton Street for this stretch. Reconstruction of Rochester Avenue, this will go from I st Avenue essentially to Ralston Creek. Again, this will be another one that looks at a ... a full reconstruction. So new pavement, new sidewalk, as well as utility improvements throughout the corridor. Next we have a couple of roadway improvements studies. So the first one will be at Highway 1, Highway 6 intersection and this is ... we'll look at basically a ... with a fixture reconstruction of the intersection what that might look like. So it'll be kind of laying out that alignment and looking at what that future improvement might look like. A big piece of this will also be pedestrian facilities, connections to the tr...nearby trails and sidewalk connections through that intersection. The second one listed is the Oakdale Boulevard extension. So this will essentially be an upgrade or an update to a study that was done a number of years ago and will really focus on future extension of Oakdale Boulevard to the east of Highway 1. With redevelopment proposed This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session January 5, 2021. Page 17 or...or expected to happen in the not too distant future in that area, it really helps to kind of lay out that preferred alignment so that as redevelopment occurs, we're able to reserve that right-of- way for ...for future use. This one's been mentioned previously, so Dodge Street reconstruction. This will be a big one, uh, a joint project with the DOT. We'll reconstruct Dodge Street from Governor Street on the north to Burlington Street on the south. This one will include all new pavement, sidewalk, and utility improvements as well. And like I mentioned, it'd be a joint project with the DOT. Orchard Street reconstruction, this is one that we have under design right now. Uh, be re -complete reconstruction of Orchard Street from Highway 1 to Benton Street. This is pavement that obviously is in need of replacement and so it'll be all new pavement. It'll also include sidewalk infill along the east side of...of Orchard Street. So there'll be continuous sidewalk from Benton to Highway 1 on both sides of Orchard Street. Also will include a ... a pedestrian crossing of Orchard Street on the south end at Highway 1. This project also will include some sanitary sewer repairs or replacement, as well as water main replacement. So ... on to north Gilbert Street. This will be another reconstruction project. This will be, again, new pavement. We'll also look at adding sidewalk along both sides of north Gilbert Street, from Brown Street to Kimball Road. So it'll tie into the improvements along Kimball Road that were done with the Gateway project, as well as pavement and sidewalk. It'll also include new water main, sanitary, and storm sewer improvements as well. Gilbert Street bridge, so this will be a replacement of the existing bridge with a similar structure. In addition to the bridge it'll also include some slope protection along the ... the creek, as well as sidewalk improvements, some storm sewer replacement as well along Gilbert Street, and other associated work. Park Road reconstruction, so this will look to reconstruct Park Road from Rocky Shore Drive to Riverside Drive, again tying into improvements that were recently completed with the Gateway project, similar to the other projects that include new pavement, sidewalk, and ... and utilities throughout the corridor. Taft Avenue out on the east side of town, so this'll be another complete reconstruction. This one will probably be similar to what we're ... we're going to be doing on American Legion Road. So this would be, again, another rural section that we'd be looking at upgrading to an urban section with new curb and gutter, utility improvements throughout the corridor, and so this section will be ... cops! This section would be for... from American Legion up to Lower West Branch. Foster Road elevation, so this will be a functional design for looking at the elevation of Foster Road, essentially from No Name to Dubuque Street in that area that flooded back in 2008. Obviously with the Peninsula neighborhood located where it is, this is the ... the only access to that area currently, so this will look at what that ... what the design would... would include to elevate Foster Road to ensure that that access remains open during flood events. Next is a couple of sidewalk infill projects, the first one on Highland Court. There's a couple of properties there that currently do not have sidewalks. So this would install sidewalk along those two properties and tie a ... tie into existing sidewalk on both ends. Similar along Scott Boulevard, there's a section of sidewalk along the dog park there—or a missing section of sidewalk along the dog park there that would be completed as part of infill with this project. Burlington Street bridge replacement, this project will look at replacing the two existing bridges and combining those into one bridge. Sothis would be a joint project with the DOT, as well as the University. In addition to the bridge component of the project, we also would look at the ... the corridor from Front Street, essentially all the way from... through Grand Avenue up to Melrose. Been some preliminary conversations with the University to look at This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 18 how that might be done better. And so this project would look at not only kind of studying the area, but as well will include design of the projects. I would note that construction will ... is actually outside of the current five-year plan, right now scheduled for or planned for 2026. Reconstruction of Fairchild Street. So this would be a couple of blocks of Fairchild, similar to what we did on Davenport Street a couple of years ago. So this would go back as a brick street. Essentially what we would do is ... is construct a PCC street and then have a ... a brick layer on top of that (mumbled) it will definitely improve the longevity of the street. Likely it will include some utility improvements as well. Next up is a couple of sanitary sewer improvement projects. So these are projects that will be essentially replacing existing sanitary sewer, just those areas that are in need of replacement. First one is on... along Nevada Avenue. This is actually along the backyards of properties along Nevada Avenue. So again, replacement of existing sewer there. Rohret south sewer, this will be upsizing the sanitary sewer along Abby Lane from the park to the west to Highway 218, and then it would extend new sanitary sewer under Highway 218 to ... for access to the west of Highway 218. Then the Benton Street trunk sewer project. This will look to upsize and relocate an existing line near Benton Street that will help with not only repairs to the sanitary sewer line, but also greatly help access to the line which is currently difficult to do. Next one down at the wastewater treatment plant, the digester complex rehabilitation. This project will look at making a number of improvements, not only to equipment within the complex, but also some operational changes in how phosphorus is removed from the stream. That will help us deal with the struvite issues that we're dealing with down at the wastewater plant. So kind of twofold improvements as part of that project. Next there are a number of projects that will be looking at replacing existing equipment down at the wastewater plant. So again, these are pieces of equipment that are currently existing, reached the end of their useful life. Many of these are operating nearly full time, so it just gets to a point where they need to be replaced. It includes the influent rake and screen replacement, which is essentially the ... kind of the first step of the ... the treatment process down at the plant. Then there's a number of...of pump replacements for the influent pumps, the activated sludge pumps, and the recirculation pumps. In addition, replacement of the grit classifiers and heat exchanger, and then finally, there's a number of buildings down at the wastewater treatment plant that have roofs that are in need of repair. So this will be funding over a number of years to help kind of start the process of replacing those or repairing those as needed. A few improvements at the wastewater treatment plant. First thing being some of the mixer portion of the plant, looking at making some improvements there, mostly on the efficiency side, and helping to reduce energy usage. Looking at making improvements to the biosolids conveyor, extending that and making it, again, helping from an operational efficiency standpoint, and then a couple improvements to the aeration basins and equipment down at the plant. Number 31 is a number of lift station improvements, starting things off with the Hawkeye lift station. This project wou... actually would remove the existing building, make some revisions to the lift station there, and turn it into or convert it to a wet... wet... wet well setup so it would no longer have a building there, making improvements to Napoleon lift station, and again, it's been in operation for a number of years and just have some equipment that's reaching the end of its useful life. So making some upgrades and repairs to that location, and then making repairs to the Highlander lift station that is located up off of Highway 1, in the ... to the ... the west there and looking at making some capacity and just age improvements to that facility. Project number 32 is the (mumbled) truck This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 19 replacement. So this is a picture of the existing truck. This is something that has, again, reached the end of its useful life, so making a replacement of this vehicle, just getting to the point where maintenance costs and downtime are starting to add up and so looking at replacing it with a new vehicle. Moving over the water side of things, a few water main replacement projects. So again, these are projects that we'll be replacing existing main and in existing locations. The first one, Bradford Drive, that's down near Southeast Junior High. The second one being Highway I from Hawk Ridge over to Westport Plaza, and then off of Highway 6, Fair Meadows to Industrial Park Road. Again, all pretty straightforward water main replacement projects. The fourth one there, again, replacing water main along Dill Street. I ... I would note with those street projects, we also are looking at some sidewalk infill, kind of from the Black Spring Circle to the east to Teeters Court. Project number 34, again on the water side of things, making improvements to some of the well locations. The first one would be Jordan well, looking at replacing equipment that's reached the end of its useful life, so improvements there. Out at the Peninsula well field, looking at doing some electrical work to provide redundancy to the well field out there, and then finally looking at collector well number two, cleaning, upgrading there again, cleaning laterals and ... and making repairs and rehabbing the ... the actual well. Moving out to the water treatment plant, some improvements out there. First one being the high service pump, the variable frequency drives there. The ... this is again existing equipment that is in need of repair or replacement, making upgrades to the chlorine feeder system, updates there, as well as improving staff safety with that system, making improvements to the front meeting room out at the water plan. It's a large meeting room, definitely used for training and other large gatherings. But the audio-visual equipment there is certainly dated. Also those improvements will help to improve the functionality of the space. And then the chemical room and outdoor lighting upgrades will be upgrades to LED for the equipment and also help with just the usability of the spaces and improved lighting for ...for those areas. The GSR or ground storage reservoir generator enclosure replacements, so there's three locations, the Rochester Avenue, Sycamore Street, and Emerald Street. The ground storage reservoirs there have backup generators. Currently the existing enclosures are getting to a point where they're no longer weatherproof and so making replacements there to help extend the life of that equipment. Out at the water plant or I guess part of the water system, looking at a treatment technology study. With nutrient removal becoming more and more important as we move forward. This will be ... help fund a ... a study to look at the nutrient removal process and... and provide some guidance on how best to move forward with the system. And then finally looking at asset inventory. So the City is currently in the process of implementing an asset management software and program and so with this, this will allow for data collection to get essentially the ... the water and wastewater systems, get data for the entire system and have that ready to populate within that software and ... and allow for that asset management system to really be beneficial and utilize that ... that existing data. With that I think I will pass it off to Darian for Transportation. Nagle-Gamm: Thank you, Jason. We have nine projects to present to you this evening, the first of which is the replacement of our electronics in our smart parking meters. So this was a project about 10 years ago. It was quite a revolution, at least to me. I didn't have to carry change anymore, but now our parking meters allow us to ... to sh... you slide your credit card in and out This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 20 without having to carry change around with you. Fortunately though they're reaching the end of their useful life, so we're having more parking meters malfunction, but probably more importantly the 3G technology that they're all based out of, if you if you follow technology at all, it's pretty old and outdated, and it's going to be discontinued very soon. So we are in the process right now of updating the ... the internal computer components of our parking meter. The second project is video cameras for our parking facilities, and these are really security cameras and they're designed to help keep our ...our customers, their property, our property safe and secure. The third project is parking enforcement vehicles, and this is really an expansion of a program that we already use today. So we have this vehicle before you, but it would be duplicating it, to enhance our services with li... excuse me, license plate reader technology to really aid in enforcement, and it really helps to ensure we can get to the areas of town that we need to, and as you might imagine, it takes a long time for a person to walk through our ungated parking facilities and this is designed to help ... to help improve enforcement of those areas. All right, our number four project is parking ramp automated parking equipment, and again, about 10 years ago we ... we jumped into the automated parking equipment world. It's, you know, you get a ticket in, that you feed a ticket out, you can use your credit card for payment. It's been really convenient for the public. It's been very popular. But again, it's reaching ... our equipment is reaching the end of its useful life and we are spending a lot of additional staff time for our maintenance crew to help customers when they do have equipment that malfunctions. So this project would be to help renew that automated parking equipment in all of our parking facilities. The fifth item is the replacement of our LED fixtures in parking facilities, and again, we were ... we were pretty early adopting with our LED ... LED fixtures. We ... we saw a dramatic decrease in electricity usage and the amount of funds that were required to keep the power going in our ramps, because those lights are on 24/7; however... however much we love the electricity reduction, unfortunately they don't last forever. So we're at the point now where we really need to invest in another round of LED fixtures for all of our parking facilities, except for the Harrison Street facility, which was built in 2017, but the remaining of facilities really do need to have their equipment upgraded. The sixth project is Tower Place drainage modifications, and this parking facility was built to turn stormwater inward to the center of the facility. And unfortunately, at the time, this was designed, I don't know if they were quite, um, assuming maybe some of the changes in climate that have been happening to us in recent years and during extreme rainfall events. We do have flooding in the very lower level of this facility. So this project is meant to help divert some that storm water from the center of the facility and help divert some of that around the outside of the facility, to reduce some of that pressure on the pipes which can't handle some of those extreme, you know, 15 -minute extreme weather events that seem to be increasing the frequency. The number seven project is, of course, our Transit maintenance facility or relocation project, and Dennis talked a little bit about this earlier. So this project would involve the construction of a new Transit facility at the Public Works site off of McCollister and Gilbert Street. It would be a new facility for maintenance operations. It would be a new facility for storage. Some reasons why this project is important is because we are currently hemmed in at our current facility. We cannot add another bus. In fact, we have a bus that sleeps in our bus wash every night, which might be the equivalent of sleeping in a bathtub because you don't have enough bedrooms sort of thing. So if we get into a position where we...we want to expand our service, we are ... we're limited at this facility. Other ...other This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 21 reasons why this facility is important is because we're really at a kind of a crossroads in transit and there's vastly, um, and a rapidly changing drive -train technology. We're looking ... we are foraying into electric technology. There's also hydrogen fuel cells and building a new facility, purpose built for alternate transit fueling will be really important... it will be a really important aspect of this project. Another item is that we have some environmental issues on site at this location that precludes us from expanding here. So being able to move to a facility a ... a different location that does not have those environmental concerns, constraints, will be ... will be really useful. And last but not least in terms of funding, as Dennis mentioned earlier and (mumbled) also alluded to, you know, Transit is also relies pretty heavily especially... especially for large-scale projects like (garbled) buses and for facilities, on federal and state funding sources. We have been actively pursuing federal funding for this project specifically. We're hoping our luck is ... is better this year. We've been submitting multiple federal applications for the last several years, and we will continue to do so. Those usually will net 75 to 80% of the project in terms of reimbursement. So we'll continue to go after funding sources for this project. The number eight project is our Transit bus shelter replacement and expansion, and you may have seen a few of our new shelters around town. We're replacing shelters that are, you know, damaged, beyond their useful life, or we're adding shelters at locations that could really use them. We did press pause on this project during the last year because, again, we are ... we're in the deep dive with all of our routes and stops, and we didn't want to, you know, invest in ... in a stop until we knew for sure that ... that it was ... it was part of the Transit future. However, we are picking that back up again as that picture becomes more clear and you can expect to see more transit amenities and facilities such as these transit shelters at stops in the future. Last but not least is transit interchange and bus stop improvements, sort of piggybacks off the last project, but this is really to improve pedestrian safety and traffic flow at the interchange, and to improve amenities, again, at transit stops throughout the community, and that can be anything from our bus stop signage to seating, shelters, you know, information boards. We received some really good recommendations from the consultant team that assisted us with the transit study. So these funds would be earmarked to help implement some of those recommendations. And with that, I believe, I'm turning it back over to Jason. Havel: All right, starting things off with the fire station. John, were you going to speak to these? Grier: Sure! I can chat about them real quick. Fire Station #5 property, I think we just closed on that recently, and that's the one located down on south Gilbert Street, across from the softbil... softball diamonds. So we're doing some future planning. This will help us, so with response on that part of the city and into downtown, and then ... the second one is the relocation of Fire Station #3, from American Legion ... from Lower Muscarine Road, I'm sorry, to the American Leagro ... American Legion Road. Again, this will give us the opportunity to just increase our coverage areas and help reduce response times. Havel: All right. The Burlington Street bridge reconstruction project. Again, just wanted to note that the current five-year plan includes the study and design of the project, but the construction of the project actually would be outside of the current five-year plan. So more just kind of a...a heads -up. This is going to be along time incoming for this project. It's obviously a significant This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 22 one with the importance of the Burlington Street bridge. So, again, just a reminder we're talking multi-year construction, probably in the 26, 27 time frame. DeLoach: Good evening, just again, this is our 40th anniversary coming up. We're working through our master plan, which is about 95% completed at this point. We'll be connecting with some architects to finish up. We've had a couple opportunities for public input, as well as we've had an ADA study, space needs study, as well as we had a opportunity early on to partner with UI Public Policy to get some overall community input about the future of the Senior Center in its usage. So just wanted to touch back on that and we'll keep you updated as we continue to move along with this process. Seydell Johnson: Okay two Parks and Ree projects to keep on your radar screen. You've seen these several times before. The Lower City Park master plan improvements. We had a study done about four years ago, looking at how to better live and access the river, while getting our amenities out of the way of the river. Some of these things have have been happening. The new playground has been moved. The boccie courts are now ...have been moved out of the flood area. You've seen a number of plantings, including prairie plantings, but this plan would go further with that, uh, raising the roadway up to provide additional protection to the stage and the ball fields. And then the other one is the East Side Sports Complex on the east side. We had some additional work done on this this year to look at feasibility and look at numbers for it. Community meetings that ... the baseball community is still very interested in having this happen. It is good land. We've done a tree buffer out there, but this just keeps it on your radar screen for the future as well. That's it for Parks and Rec projects. Knoche: All right. Mr. Mayor, Council, that wraps up the presentation as far as the Capital Improvements Plan. We're open to answer any questions that you would have in regards to what we've presented. Teague: Thanks to all of the staff for (laughs) kind of a marathon through a lot of the capital improvement items. I do want to open it up to, of course, our Councilors to ask any questions or make any comments. Thomas: I have a few comments and questions. The pavement management study, is that available online? Havel: So we are just putting the final touches on that. We anticipate that being available probably here in the next... hopefully matter of weeks. I believe at some point we ... the plan was to have a presentation to Council of that report as well. Thomas: On ... on the ridership on the bike system, do we have a ... a sense of when we we complete these projects, the level of ridership that we see on these bike lanes that're going in? Kent, maybe that's a question for you, if (both talking) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session January 5, 2021. Page 23 Ralston: Yeah I can ... yeah, this is Kent Ralston. I'm having difficulty getting my video on but hopefully you can hear me. Um, yeah, we do, John, we actually go out when we do our peak hour accounts and we do count bikes that are both on the sidewalk and in street, so we do get a sense of that. It just takes us a little time after those facilities (garbled, goes silent) Thomas: I have a couple of more questions. On the Dodge Street project, if I'm not mistaken, I thought I saw cross my...my...my desk, so to speak, the possibility or the study of reverting Dodge to two-way traffic. Am I mistaken on that? Jason? Havel: At this point the plan would be to ... for those to remain one-way. I ... I think there's been some discussion in the past, but I think at this point the plan ... or the plan at this point would be to have them remain one-way. Thomas: So there is ... there wasn't any study that was going to be considered for that as a possible... Havel: Not recently as part of this process. Thomas: Okay. Ralston: We ... we had done, John, sort of a preliminary investigation. Boy, it's probably been eight or more years ago now, that I could dig up and take a look at. But, as Jason said, nothing in the ... in the book, so to speak, for now. Thomas: Okay. I mean I ... part of -part of my reason for asking is, I ... I've had ... had the opportunity to speak with some neighbors just in a kind of more social setting, but they pointed out how in front of some of the homes along upper Dodge, as you're coming down the hill, residents have installed barriers basically because of cars leaving the roadway and, you know, they're trying to protect their homes with these barriers. So the two-way street, I think, could potentially help with that, in the sense that traffic speeds might be ... might be reduced. A couple of other questions. On the tree planting, I had an opportunity to sit in virtually on a (mumbled) Cedar Rapids discussion. Trees Forever had a symposium not too long ago. I think Tyler may have attended as well. I saw his name, and I have to say I was really impressed with the ... what Cedar Rapids is doing there. They're working with Trees Forever. They've also brought in some consultants, including Jeff Speck to help with the master plan, which would be a 10 -month effort, as I recall. And, you know, Cedar Rapids is in a much more dire situation than Iowa City is in terms of its tree canopy, but we've lost a considerable number of trees, and I would say one of the issues that I've ... I've always felt would help us accelerate our plan, and what I sense is what Cedar Rapids is doing is by partnering with Trees Forever, they will be able to have a fairly robust volunteer component to their plan. And that's, I believe, if we're going to try to accelerate our tree planting, that would be one component that I think would accelerate it, as well as engaging the community in what I think would be a real strong community engagement effort. So it would serve many purposes to do that, and I'll be following the ReLeaf...Cedar Rapids ... ReLeaf Cedar Rapids program. I think there may be lessons that can be drawn from that effort. So, thank you. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 24 Teague: Anyone else? Mims: I'd just like to thank staff, but given the time... rather than getting into a lot more questions and discussion, I would encourage that we take about a 10 -minute break before we get into our work session. Teague: Does ... does anyone ... have any objections to that? I'm not hearing any, oh, go right ahead. Salih: You mean we coming back to the same thing, or just we finished now and... Teague: We'll come back to this link. Salih: No, no. I mean, to ... to ask question, continue asking question to the staff or... Teague: Well, I think we can ... that's up to us. So if you want to continue to ask questions. Um, that's a decision we make as a ... as a Council. If you have a question, I would say go ahead and (both talking) Salih: Yes, I ... this one question. Just I want to make sure if we done, so the staff has... doesn't have to be there waiting for us. Anyway, I ... I just want to ask Natasha, she's still here? DeLoach: Yes I am! Salih: Hey, LaTasha, Happy New Year! I just, you know, my... my every year questions (laughs) which is the kitchen. DeLoach: Yep! Salih: Have you done anything about that? DeLoach: The kitchen is a part of the overall master plan. So it is in ... it's in the plan. It's set up to be a ... a culinary kitchen that will be used for classroom, as well as for catering. So it is a part of our master plan process. So it is a part of the CIP process here. It's ... I think it's a part it...it will be in our second or in our third tier, because we have to fix some of those infrastructural pieces for the overall (mumbled) of the building, but yes, it is in our priority... area for sure. Salih: Thank you. (garbled) DeLoach: No problem! Salih: That's it for me. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 25 Teague: Great! Any other burning questions before we go to a break? All right. We'll be back at 5:00 P.M., see you soon! Continue discussion of the Preliminary Plan to Restructure the Iowa City Police Department toward community policing: Teague: It is now 5:00 P.M. and we are ... still in our work session for the City of Iowa City on January 5th. We just finished Capital Improvement Projects, and we took a short break for 10 minutes. And so we're going to continue our work session. I do see that all of our Councilors are present. Mayor Pro Tem is actually in transit from ... and will be joining us here momentarily. Soother than that, I do see Ryan from USG. And I ... I'm looking for Eleanor our City Attorney. Yes, she's there. All right. I think we are ready to go. So we will jump right back in ... on, um, and I even see Anna. I see Anna. So welcome to both of you from USG. I want to just get us back into the work session. And we're going to continue our discussion on the preliminary plan to restructure the Iowa City Police Department towards community policing, and I think I'm just going to open the floor to Councilors to kind of chime in wherever you want to on this item. And I guess, personally, I'll start (laughs) if that's okay. No one jumped in. So I'll jump right in there. Um, at least for me, I am still weighing through all of the items as ... as this is a huge document, as we all know. I am certainly starting engagement with people in the community, on more specifics within the documents. Um, so I am not in a place to give much comment at this time, personally. I know that there hasn't been some input from some of the individuals that were a part of the process, and I'll name two of them. That is the South District... Neighborhood Association, as well as Black Voices Project. They haven't had a meeting yet ... yet this year, since the document was released. And so I am kind of reserving for their ..for them to weigh in as well, personally, and so I don't have very much to add on this topic at this point. So that is where I am, as of now. Mims: Mayor, I would concur. I ... I think, one, like you said, it's ... it's a pretty weighty and detailed document that ... with which we've been presented, and I want to, you know, thank the City Manager for that and all of his work and ... and staff who've been involved with that. And this is a really important process. And I think we want to be as ... expeditious but also as cautious as we can, in terms of making sure we get the public input, that we have a chance to really read through it in depth, and I know in the last probably week and a half or two weeks, a lot of us have been sidetracked from that in terms of reading the budget... because we have some pretty tight timelines with the budget. So I'm the same place you are, Mayor. I don't ... I don't have a lot to add at this point tonight. I want to hear more from a broad range of the community, and I do want to make sure it really is the broader community, not just narrow segments that we ... that we really need to hear from. So for any of the public that are listening, I do hope that you will give us some feedback, call and ask us questions, and I think it's important as we look at these recommendations, you know, as ... as the City Manager said, you know, look at the rationale behind those, not just at the recommendations themselves, and... and then personally I think what we should entertain is a work session devoted just to this, maybe in a month or so, and I think we need structure for that work session. I think we really need to think about how we are This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 26 going to do it with 36 recommendations or whatever. I don't think it's going to be a productive meeting to just open it up, once we are ready to really talk about it. I mean, I think we really need to think about a structure for that work session, so it can be really effective and productive. So ... that's where I am at this point. Taylor: Well, Mayor and Susan, I think you kind of took the words out of my mouth. I ... I ... I agree, it's a lot to digest. It's a big document and so I ... I appreciate Geoff and staff that took time to put it all together, but there is a lot of information in there and ... and things that ... that just can't happen overnight, things that we really have to give a lot of thought to and, Susan, I appreciate your suggestion and I totally agree that we should have a work session that... that's totally devoted to this, so that we can really take time to ... to look at each item and ... and look at the consequences and ... and what it would mean to the community, so I agree. Salih: The only thing is about work session is people cannot speak. Do you have an idea when can we hear the public speak and give us give us feedback, or do you want to open their work session for people to speak. I just can't ... yeah, I agree with you, but we ... we need time but I would like to make sure. How we going to get the input from the public? And, you know, because as you all agree that this is big topic, we need to hear more, and we need to hear the view of a lot people, so we can make our mind. Mims: Well for me, I mean, I think there's a place on the website for input. People can always call us. People can always email us. I guess the question is ... typically ...in the 11 years I've been on Council, I would say probably 99% of the time that is ... is how we have gotten our public input is through individual conversations, emails. We've done community input events. We still, you know, we still could do something like that. But when it has come time for the Council meetings, like the work session, that has been devoted to Council dialogue and Council discussion, trying to get all that input ahead of that time. And then, of course, once we come to that point of taking any formal action in a formal meeting, we've always opened that up for input. Tome that is ... that's almost too late for people to really give us input that might have a strong influence on our decisions. So I ... I would just encourage people through the website, through phone calls, through emails, and maybe we want ... once we get through the budget, maybe we want to think about doing some more public engagement, like we did during the input process. So I'm not sure what other people think in that regard. Salih: I know, I'm sorry, I'm going to say one last thing before (mumbled) I just want to say that yes, I understand that the work session is important to Council and everything. I just ... my goal is to make sure they will understand it. This document now in English. A lot people, they don't understand what is this document. And what it means, what the City can do to make sure everybody understand what's going on, and also feedback, like the way that we receive feedback, is not working for a lot of community. And I think this is important topic. We need to give the opportunity to reach out to a lot of community, so we can have their input. That only thing I'm really, you know, we can devote the work session for the Council to do only. That's not ... I don't mind that. But I just want to make sure... we don't forget to just to include everybody on this and try to think about a way how can we include them. That's all! This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 27 Teague: I do wonder if we don't consider having an opportunity at are... either within the formal meeting .... or we set an aside, another opportunity for ...and then when I say the formal meeting, maybe 30 minutes of community input on ... on this item, or we do some type of a ... listening session just for this via Zoom, where we can get people input. So that's what I might think, you know, we might want to think about as we're continuing this discussion. Bergus: I agree that getting a wide variety of public input .... and I think elevating the members of our community who we expect may be impacted the most by restructuring the police department is really important to me, and that I especially, as Mayor Pro Tem was saying, just, you know, reaching out to ... to communities and parts of the community. I do think we need a little bit of a process around that. I think this is the type of subject matter that, you know, having the ... the feedback form on the website is to me maybe not enough, you know, to get the information out and to get feedback. So absolutely agree that, you know, encourage anyone who has input to contact us individually and ... and to, you know, engage through those mechanisms, but I ... I think we do need to do a little bit of organizing around it. Um, I was wondering about ... if Councilors are interested in working groups. So the experience that we had with the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, where, you know, Janice and I were kind of a subcommittee on that topic and then met with a variety of, you know, interested people and kind of reported back. I don't know that the Council has to, you know, lead that kind of thing. But to me, if we can divide up the 36 rec... recommendations, maybe by subject areas and even the plan itself has a few different ways we can kind of cut that up, and then consider having, you know, even if we're just encouraging or facilitating, making sure that the people who we think may have input, who, you know, might need an invitation to ... to that table, to be able to provide that input. I don't know what people think about... about that. Weiner: I mean I think that it ... that it really does warrant extra and extraordinary in—efforts, much as we put (mumbled) not dissimilar to what we put into the TRC, and that it's also incumbent upon each of us as part of that to reach out to a wide variety of people that we know, not just expect people to come to us. It would be great if they all did, but I think we all know that that won't happen. So ... and we ... I ... I believe we each of us know a really broad cro... cross section of the community. So in it ... so I would support what ... what Laura is suggesting (mumbled) in sort of an informal subcommittees and I also really urge every single Member of Council to essentially to make a list and start reaching out to... to people and whatever cross (mumbled) segment of the community you know the best or think you can ... you can be effective with. Thomas: I guess I'm going to ... it sounds like no one is going to provide common ... at least, you know, in a more general sense, to the draft and in my mind to the the process, as it's unfolded up to this point. But I guess I felt a certain obligation, perhaps is the word, to at least express my feelings at the moment, in terms of, you know, what ... what I've gained from this and ... and some comments related to the draft. So I, you know, prepared some thoughts on that that I'll share with you. Obviously as ... as I think all of us understand, there's a much ... much needed further discussion within the community in terms of getting a response, both to the draft and, you know, their just general... sense of...of how this question of policing should be addressed. But I This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 28 did want to kind of give an update in terms of where I am at the moment, based on what I've seen and experienced. And ... and by way of a summary, I would say that the focus of...of my observations and comments is that in terms of this strategy that's laid out in the draft, avoiding calls for police services, which is referred to as prevention, whether that's initiated by community members or by police officers themselves, I think that is the critical approach in terms of trying to address what I understand to be some of the concerns related to our police efforts. Replacing those interactions with public health professionals, you know, there's a lot of talk about home ... the homelessness issues, the mental health issues, interpersonal conflicts, and things of that sort. All of them clearly seem to lend themselves to that ... that notion of addressing those kinds of calls for service with the professionals that are properly trained and suited for those kinds of calls. And I certainly ...I think that's ... I'm in agre... certainly, you know, that makes a lot of sense. One of the things that came out of the draft was that ... that was different from what I was hearing at the meetings and also in my conversations with IFR was the... the... the model for that interaction and, you know, there was a... certainly with IFR an interest in the CAHOOTS model. I read some pieces on ... on ... on CAHOOTS and how it was structured and, you know, that it's being considered by many cities throughout the country at this point. That, you know, that ... I was kind of expecting that that would be knowledge included in the report, and I ... I didn't see any evidence of that. So that .... that's something that, as we move forward, I would certainly be...be concerned with and interested in ... in following. As I mentioned months ago, I found the ... the architecture that IFR had presented to be a useful one. I felt it did bridge between the kind of more generalized discussion that we see nationally on Black Lives Matter and conditions in Iowa City. And ... and the five components of that plan were mental health, anti- homelessness, interpersonal conflict, road safety, and drugs and alcohol. You know, the three first categories, you know, I just discussed, but I felt the ... the question of road safety was ... was an interesting one in the way that it intersected with Black Lives Matter, and so ... so that's something that I'd like to comment on a little bit. You know, if you ... if you look at our budget, it's very clear that road safety is a top priority of our field operations within the police department, which is the largest component of our police department. It has 78 full time employees and I've ... I've said before and I will say again that I think there's several potential ways we can advance community wellness and public safety on our streets, while reducing the need for police officers to enforce traffic laws through traffic stops, which will thus address the issue of driving while black. I do think many ...many members are ... of our community, you know, the interface they have with our police officers while driving is a very important part of their experience in town here, and so that... that... that was why I felt there should be some emphasis on that. As we learned at one of the listening posts, in addition, traffic stops can also be traumatic for persons with special needs. They're very sensitive to sirens and flashing lights. So I began to see that there ... it wasn't simply the BIPOC community, but others as well who are impacted by the experience of the traffic stop. The draft plan noted that 25% of our calls for police service are traffic stops and collisions. In fiscal year 2019 there were 14,482 traffic stops. These tri ... these traffic stops are mostly police - initiated, rather than responses to a public request. My belief is that the fewer times our police officers interact with people when enforcing traffic laws, the less likely those interactions will go badly, and people will be able to more peacefully go about their lives. And months ago I mentioned how I felt some of those things could be addressed, one of them being eliminating This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 29 traffic stops for minor infractions. That is recommendation 21. I think perhaps more could be done along those lines. In fact, I found one of our pieces of correspondence from Donna Ruth Barry mentioned the idea of a seasonal card check event. I know I've talked with other Councilors about this concept. I think that's one way of taking something out of that current condition where you're talking about an armed police officer stopping a vehicle for a minor traffic infraction, whether it's defective equipment or what have you, and turning that event into a very positive experience where it's a more kind of community... service and event. So that ... that's one way I think we could ... we could address it. The second, which did not make it into the draft plan, was implementing changes to our road conditions which impel drivers to dre... to drive at the speeds that are posted as our speed limits, and I refer to those as self- regulating streets, that do not require police -initiated traffic stops, and thus will vastly improve traffic safety. Some examples of...of self-regulating streets, ways we can do that, we've already implemented. They would be road diets, traffic lane... narrowing traffic lanes, and so forth. This .... this in my view is really the ideal approach to our traffic safety, is making sure that our roads are consistent with the speeds that we feel are safe within our community. And as I mentioned, these are already underway in Iowa City. So what I would say is the emphasis, I'd like to give it is that ... now that we understand how this issue intersects with Black Lives Matter that we accelerate that effort. I would argue it should be accelerated for the ... from the standpoint of transportation equity, but there are a number ...a number of ways in which implementing these ... these changes in our road conditions and accelerating that program will benefit the community. And then the third was the deployment of the automatic... automated traffic enforcement, such as speed and red light cameras. There's ... what I would like to add to what I've said before is that considerable research supporting their record of reducing car crashes and traffic speeds exists now, as well as reducing the ... the traffic stops. Just one of many examples that I ran across with Seattle's program, which saw a reduction of 23% in car crashes and a third of a drop in crashes involving pedestrians. So in brief, I would say that implementing these changes to our ...our policing policies will be more successful than our current practices in achieving our ICPD's field operation goals of reducing traffic crashes and significantly improving police interactions with the public, especially people of color. And then lastly, on the question of drug and alcohol use. You know, we historically... substance abuse plays a significant role in policing in Iowa City, along with road safety. Those are the two goals that I see in our budget that are referenced as top priorities for the ICPD. My..one of...one of the things that I felt was interesting was we ... the impact of COVID on access to drinking establishments did provide an opening for exploring possibilities for creating other venues for all of us to socialize more safely. And... and I would like to continue those conversations, again, with the emphasis being on the prevention of alcohol and drug buse... abuse, rather than its criminalization at the back end. So ... so those are the ... the, again, my observations up to this point. We've been working on this for months. You know, I ... I'm certainly interested in ... in hearing how people feel about we can restructure the police department. But I did want to report back to those who are following this, as to what my...my feelings are with in terms of the draft as it stands now, and also the way I would envision moving forward. Taylor: I think, John, you make some very good points and one in particular, and I think a lot of the points we need to, if we continue to ... to look at this and try to modify it and make it a workable This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 30 document. The one item that really always stands out for me that you talked about are those traffic enforcement cameras, and I think we need to give that some serious thought. As we've said, they're... they're colorblind. They just note the license plate. And I think that's moving on our way to the anti -racist aspect of..of the policing and... and the traffic policing, traffic enforcement. And I think it's an excellent thing. And along with that then the idea of having some sort of a safety clinic then, to follow up on that, to bring these folks in. We already participate with several mechanics in the area with the bulbs program. So they would, I would think, be more than happy to also be a part of this clinic and help folks get their ...their bulbs replaced or whatever needs done. I think a precedent has been set with the fire department does this with the child -safety seat. So they ...they already do this. So I think it would be only natural for the police to pick up something like this. So I'm ... I'm in agreement with that and think we should really give that some thought to include that. Salih: I really want to add again, I had received a lot of feedback from some people, but 99% of those feedback was from white people in this community. You know, I ... while I understand their feedback is very important to me and I appreciate it. They reach out, even though they have a very, very nice feedback. I'm going to acknowledge that, but I really want to hear. I always believe that when ... when we get the solution for the people, from the people who affected by the issue, it will be really amazing and great solution because it come from the people (mumbled) been affected. They say, hey, that what we want to see. That's will make us feel comfortable. We make a feel like we are part of this community. That's how you solve it and (mumbled) for it. That's why I want to add to what Laura said. We really need a project, we need a campaign for this. We need a plan. And what I really going to suggest right now here is the City can have some budget of translation. Believe me, that's very important part. If we can create some money or allocate some money I mean to translate the document to at least three language, because the big population in this community right now it's a Spanish, French, and, you know, Arabic, where we provide this document to the associations — Black Voices Projects, Sudanese Association, Immigrant Voices Project, CWJ, and Latinos, and everyone asked them (mumbled) meeting to discuss this with your members, because they have monthly meeting, so they can discuss this document in their language, and... and tell us feedback and email it to the City Manager. So we have, like, we don't have to go to individual and we make the community involve. I'm real ... I'm willing to reach out to those people, if that document has been translated because I know translation is a big deal. Please give this a full consideration in ... and give it some money, so we can contact everyone and make them involve. Teague: All right. So it sounds like there is some consensus for there being some type of a structured meeting or input from the community, and so I heard works ... work groups. I've heard ... if we get things in different languages those communities can respond, I think independently to the ... to the...to the Council. Um, there's also listening session out there. Um, so I guess with ... with me pointing out those kind of three ways to get input from the community, I haven't heard a consensus on which ... I still, at least for me, I think getting it ... getting it in different languages I think would be important, and ... and I'm seeing some nodding of heads here, the majority of nodding of heads. So wanted to maybe direct the City Manager to get it in different languages, and we're sounding like the three. Are we okay with the three, and I'm .... yeah, I This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 31 see ... yes, I'm seeing a majority... for the three languages. All right, so we'll go ahead and do that, and then as far as ... setting up opportunities for people to weigh in as the community, do we want to ... do we want working groups, do we want listening session where people can just come and share their thoughts on this item. Fruin: Mayor, may I make a suggestion (several talking) This is a broad suggestion. But as you all have seen, you've had this document for a couple of weeks and it's not the easiest to wade through and even if its in different languages, I think people are going to ... are going to struggle to find the time to get through it all. I really encourage you to think about breaking it out into groups, however you want to group them. It doesn't have to be the same types of groups that I used to ... to format the document. But much like you did with the listening posts, where you had a focus on ... on each session. You can still take comments on the entire plan, but I'm ... I fear ...what I fear is that if you just put a call out and you do a listening post to tell me about the plan, you're going to get very high level comments. I don't like it. I don't like it. I like it. That sort of thing. And I'm not sure that's going to be helpful for your deliberations, maybe it will on some level, but if you can really break down to however many core issues you feel need to be addressed by this type of plan, I think the quality of feedback that you will get, the insight that you'll get from community members, will be much more valuable. Salih: Geoff, I agree with you but the listening post, you guys can listen but how many immigrant were there? Be honest. You know, to be honest with you, that's... that's not the type of outreach for immigrants, you know. I ... you going to see white people coming to that, you know, listening post, more than even black people. You know, I ... I really when I say like this because I want like even if I'm immigrant and came to the listening post and see all those people, I will be afraid to speak up. Maybe because if I speak up maybe my language is not okay and I'm ... I'm scared that they don't understand me, but in like a community session, in your own language, people will just speak up more. That what I have been discover from my working with the (garbled) of course is ... is majority, but I ... it is my really obligation that to tell you what my experience is and how those things work, and it is (garbled) Weiner: But I agree with you, Maz, and I would be happy to help lead a session in French, for example, with ... but and I also think that along with what Laura said initially that ... that perhaps we could have a couple of Councilors agree to sort of go through the document and do the breakout, so that we can figure out which ... which of these ... which of these recommendations belong, sort of in which group we'd be ... we'd be dealing with. I mean, I know some folks, for example, in the French-speaking community I could reach out to and ... and try and set something up. But that's sort of...that's my niche. Every people... other people have their ..their niches as well. Mims: Yeah, I mean I would agree. (several talking, garbled) ...did a listening post like out at Pheasant Ridge. I mean, we had a lot of members, I think, because of the Sudanese community. People were very comfortable. They spoke up. Rockne Cole and I happened to do that one. So I totally support and hear what you're saying. I guess the question is with the pandemic still going on, you know, how... how do we want to do ... how do we want to handle that. I'm limited English (laughs) You know, I wish ... I wish I wasn't, but I am. So no, I think trying to reach out This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 32 and ... and either do some smaller groups in person with people like that, you know, because of the pandemic. I'm totally open to that. I think we really need to try to do that. I want to go back just real quickly to the translation. I don't ... I really question (mumbled) all the cost. I really question translating the entire document. I think ... I mean I think we start with translating the 36 or whatever recommendations, and if maybe there's a paragraph or two that kind of gives us some rationale, maybe we do that. I don't think we're going to get many people who are fluent in English reading this whole thing. So would... would you be comfortable, Maz, if we looked at like doing the actual recommendations and maybe a short paragraph or two for each one? Does ... do you think that's reasonable? Salih: Yes, it is. I was trying to say that too. I agree with you. If we can also ... there is some item that is very important to them and maybe those like only selected item to be translated and the recommendation, as you said. Yeah, I agree with that, totally. Thomas: I would agree as well. I would suggest, and I ... I think the meetings, kind of in ... in the place where the—the people we are trying to make contact with actually live would be helpful. I think, you know, having ... if -granted it's COVID. I, you know, I'm not sure how the South District, for example, meets, but if...if we could attend virtually, if necessary, one of those meetings and discuss this, and I would ... I would suggest that it'd be a much more open-ended conversation than focusing only or primarily on the plan, partly be, you know, because I think... it's... it's a document that I'm not sure it speaks the language of everyday experience basically (laughs) You know I ... it certainly can be .... I don't mean to suggest that it shouldn't be discussed, but I think it would be useful to go beyond that and to try to understand when ... when at these meetings ... how people... struggle or benefit from our current policing policies, and ... and try to leave it a little bit more wide open as to how we can improve them. More again in the ... in the calls for service. I really felt that's the interface right there. How do people actually interface with our police force? That's where I think, you know, that is the crux of the issue. How do we ... how do we improve that, and as I said in my...my comments, where possible reducing those contacts with better outcomes is ... is what I would also suggest. Teague: I did want to do one clarification with Mayor Pro Tem, because I think I understood that she mentioned that she wasn't suggesting, at least for the ... the different communities, that there actually be listening posts or any Council presence is really documents that will be within their language and for them amongst themselves would have conversation and they would reach out to Council. Like we can certainly make initial contact is maybe what I understood to ensure that they have the document within their language, and maybe have a point of contact just to let them know the Council is willing, but I ... I wanted to make sure that I understood Mayor Pro Tem correctly in what she was sugges ... suggesting. Salih: What I ... yes, Mayor, what I was suggesting is, uh, yeah translate whatever we want to do that, like Susan Mims, maybe a selected, you know, items to three language and give it to the association and like some like difference organization, as well like Black Voices Project for the black community. So ... and we will ... they will meet and they will discuss it amongst themselves in their language. And after that, if they would like to meet with two Council, like (mumbled) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 33 and they have question, maybe they will call you and ask you for qualifications, not like call ... ask you, invite you to come, maybe for example, invite Pauline Taylor and ... and Janice to come to a meeting with the Congolese community, and, for example, they say, `Okay, we have question. After we discuss this, we had this question and after you do this(mumbled) questions, answer the question. They will give you their recommendation. If they have any change, if they want to add something, if they don't like something. So this is will be their recommendation, but if they feel comfortable and they have (mumbled) don't have to meet. They can just send it to a contact person, a City Manager or the City Council. (mumbled) Aftei the group met, they can do that themself, but if they need us to come so they can ask us question, I think they can just send us an email and ask us to ... to be present, you know, after they discuss it by themself, but give them the chance to do it amongst themself without any pressure from Council. Teague: So what I might suggest is when we did the listening sessions related to Black Lives Matter, um, Kellie, our City Clerk, reached out to various communities. Now potentially there was some communities not on the list. So what I might suggest, at least for ...if we were to go with what Mayor Pro Tem is suggesting is that if there is any more communities that we want to reach out to, that we give that... that... those list of contacts to our City Clerk, and maybe she can dispel the information. If... if...if the ... if the ... if we're really looking for public input or a space for public input, of course we heard the work se ... working groups, as well as the listening sessions. Would people be in agreement to maybe start with the listening session, um, and see where we go from there? Instead of maybe breaking it out in groups at this point. I ... I know that our, you know, Geoff Fruin, our City Manager, made mention of working groups to get a little more information. We are getting some information, I think, through emails, and as people begin and digest this information and read it, associations will weigh in, I'm assuming, just like they have in the past -what some ... it varies what we get, right? Some are detailed in writing, some are verbally detailed, and some ... so I don't know. Um, I think we ... if we can kind of come to a ... maybe a step one. It sounds like everybody's in agreement that we'll do the translations of the 36 points, and that'll be disseminated. I think our City Clerk can certainly help us with that. So if we can focus now on what would be the next way to get the public engagement, whether that be through creating work groups or would that be through a listening session. Salih: What you mean by (garbled) what the different? Sorry! Bergus: Sorry, go ahead (mumbled) Teague: Well, I'll let ... I'll let you answer what's the difference between a listening session and a work group. Bergus: Okay. So yeah, I just wanted to kind of make my pitch for what I meant when I said working group, because I think what we have is 36 recommendations. I do not anticipate, and please, you know (mumbled) talk about it now if I'm wrong, but I do not anticipate that this is like a up or down vote on the plan. Right? We have 36 recommendations that are pointing us in a direction, you know, or multiple directions on how we can implement change based on these This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 34 different sort of areas or themes, and so what I was suggesting was trying to dig into that, right. I mean I ... I do agree that we need like overall input, but I think what we're doing in the appendices to the plan itself really illustrated this for me. What we're doing is something new. What we're doing is ... is not ... I ... I would challenge any of us to find communities in the U.S. that are really undertaking a more comprehensive overview to try and... and accomplish something like this. And so I want to get more concrete. I really fear we're going to take up a lot of time, and maybe even lead people astray, if we leave it open-ended, because we need to get to the actual implementation of the changes that we've committed to this community, that ... that we would make. And so what I was talking about is maybe having sort of smaller group meetings that would be based on the topic areas. So, for example, John, you brought up the the CAHOOTS model. It is mentioned in the appendices relating to San Francisco, cause they have a similar type thing. There's information about it in the Eugene, Oregon, description, and all of the diversion that we're talking about, right. So CAHOOTS is a model where there's not co - responder, and we are absolutely talking about that. So we have a recommendation for increasing funding for CommUnity for mobile crisis. We have a recommendation about making sure we can implement 9-1-1 integration. Those are concrete things that are not labeled with the word CAHOOTS, but are taking the model of mobile crisis that is our communities service, that we know we have strong non-profit support for, and making that into something bigger that can actually respond more comprehensively and divert those calls away from ... from law enforcement. So maybe we have a group of people who are talking about the mental health response issues. And can, you know, use the data that we have. Absolutely agree, John, calls for service, right, that that's ... that is the place where people are interfacing with our law enforcement. So being able to break that down, whether it's by calls for service topics and saying, Okay, what ... what is prevention look like in these types of incidences, right? What can ... what can that be. In any case, I'm kind of rambling now, but that was kind of what I was envisioning is like topical working groups where we have people in the community who are invested in that already, who we know are going to be partners moving forward. And 100%, Mayor Pro Tem, thank you for saying we need to elevate those people who are most impacted and how we got to this point is by needing to make change to be anti -racist and to improve the lives of people of color when it comes to interactions with law enforcement. And so that has to be ... that has to be top of mind, that has to be front of mind. Anything we've already gotten some input about that as well that, you know, we ... we really need to be making sure we're not losing the race part of this as we're talking about it. So that's kind of what I meant about working groups. I would be happy to participate in any of that or, you know, facilitate to the extent possible. I believe that I'm going to be reaching out and having conversations anyway. And, you know, would kind of like (laughs) I guess the blessing of my colleagues, if...if you all think I'm not crazy. Teague: Yeah. Go right ahead! Weiner: To only agree... agree that this is a ... a pi .... an important piece of the way forward. Thomas: I ... I (both talking) This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 35 Salih: I agree with you. Taylor: Go ahead! Thomas: ... mentioned the Truth and Recon ... you know, our commissions, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, Human Rights Commission. I think those seem like potentially good venues... where, you know, the public could comment, you know, both the commission members themselves and the public could provide community comment at...at those meetings. So it seems to me that's a possible way in which we can outreach as well. Teague: I know, Councilor Taylor, were you wanting to chime in as well? Taylor: Oh, I just wanted to make a quick comment about working groups as such. I think what I saw was at the listening posts we had, which we had some wonderful comments from these folks, but it was kind of the same people who came to each one of them each, and every one of them, and I think that would happen with these working groups too, and I thank them for their input. They gave some very good input, but they would probably repeat the same things at these meetings. Is ... I just would have concern about that, and I would have concern about Councilors that weren't at a particular work session, not seeing the whole picture and not getting... getting input, everybody's input. Teague: Okay. All right. Um ... it did sound like the majority of people felt that the document is ... we need to take our time to work through the document. Seem like work session, work groups are important. I wonder if we did ... I think just for the sake of today, are people ... I want to make a recommendation that we actually ask maybe Councilor Bergus and Mayor Pro Tem, and City Manager Geoff Fruin, to work on this, maybe talk about what those work groups look like, break them out, and then come back on the 19th at our next work session and kind of give us some thoughts to move forward. What would people ... what are people thoughts there? I'm seeing some shaking of heads. Mims: I think that's good cause I think ... I think we've had a lot of conversation here, but we're not walking away from this with any definitive plan or structure. So to have a couple of Council Members work with the City Manager and maybe get us some more specific structure of whether we're going to try and do some Zoom listening posts, whether we're going to try and do working groups, whether we're going to try and do a combination of those things. I think that's a good idea, Mayor, because I was ... as we were getting ready to leave this topic, I'm like I'm not sure any of us really know what direction we're headed. And so I think that's a good way to do it. Teague: And ... and if I might even include Councilor Weiner, because of all of her work as well as with different groups, the French-speaking. Would Councilor Weiner ...would you be amenable? Weiner: Yes! This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 36 Discuss Miscellaneous Council Meeting and Communication Items: Teague: Great! All right, we will revisit this on the 19'11 Moving on to the next agenda item. So this is a discussion of miscellaneous Council meeting and communication items that I ... that I and Mayor Pro Tem had been in conversation about, as well as some ... some of the staff a little bit before having this item brought here. And there's three items, and so we'll kind of just go through each item and one is moving meeting start times one hour earlier. So what this would mean is that our work session would begin at 4:00 P.M. instead of 5:00 P.M., and then our formal meetings that now start at 7:00 P.M., let's start at 6:00 P.M. So, you know, I ... I want to open it up and ... but I also wanted to at least maybe mention to the public, you know, what this could mean for everyone. Right now we're ... our meetings are on Zoom, and so this is really the focusing on when we're back in regular session, seeing people face to face. Although ... we don't have to wait (laughs) until that happens because we really don't know when that's going to happen, but wanted to just bring this up, and also allow opportunity for people in the community to weigh in, if...you know, on this one hour change. And so I'll leave it at that for an introduction as to what this is and then I'll... Councilors, please, weigh in. And one thing that I might note is that as we have this conversation, we ... I think ... the intention is for the public to have opportunity to respond to some of the things that we're proposing. Mims: I personally.... it doesn't impact me either way. My ... my schedule is flexible enough that moving it to an hour earlier is fine with me. I guess what I'm most interested in, and I know it's hard sometimes to get that public input, is how members of the public perceive this and whether they see it as better, um, if they're coming down to the meetings once we get back in person. They can get home earlier. Hopefully it means we get done earlier. We don't just extend the hours (laughs) extend the meetings an additional hour. So I'm ... I don't want to make a change that negatively impacts people who really want to attend meetings. I think, as an aside, I think it would be better for staff, you know, they're getting done work "at five o'clock" and, you know, then having to do potentially our work session and then come back and do a formal agenda, and depending where their item is on the agenda, they're not getting out of here till later. So it would ... I think it would be advantageous for staff, but I do think we need to try to get some input from the public. Salih: Yes, I agree too, but I agree also for like not extending our meeting one hour (laughs) I remember the latest meeting that we have was midnight, and I just like, you know, maybe we can just have a limited at 11 instead of midnight, because we are extending it one hour. I don't want to go like, you know, 12 midnight, and we have it one hour more. (mumbled) plus I really just find out that when we had this meeting online, a lot people had the chance to (mumbled). We need to think about maybe we can have some time (mumbled) like online. I don't know interaction or what you call it, if we want back the in person, if there is a way that still we can have (mumbled) for Zoom people can just Zoom in, and ... and talk to us. I don't know, but I just find out a lot people, I think, City Council meeting (mumbled). So if we can also do something like that, that will be great. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 37 Thomas: Yeah, it seems to me there really are these two issues. One is the timing of the event and then also what's ... is it ... is it an in-person event or is it a hybrid event. You know, it does seem the ... there are advantages, as much as I would like to get back to in-person meetings, there are advantages to having it virtual to the community. So ideally, it seems to me, once we do go back to in-person events, that if... yeah, as Maz was saying, if there's a way in which there's still the opportunity for people who for many reasons cannot make it to City Hall or do not feel like sitting there for four hours waiting for their item to come up, would have a way of more conveniently participating at Council meetings, short of actually going to City Hall for that event. So I ... I'm with Susan. I ... my time is very flexible. It doesn't really matter to me. I think maybe if they started sooner perhaps we could figure out a way to have breaks. I ... I do feel we kind of burden ourselves because we don't, you know, we meet ... our meeting, our formal meeting, might be three hours and we don't have a break, and I don't know how all you feel, but you know, I'm kind of running on empty at that point. So, you know, I think the two things of...and I'm ... in terms of the timing, I think it's really what does the community benefit from, and then the... whether we can try to maintain a virtual presence once we're back in City Hall is the other issue. Weiner: Yeah, I think we'd ... we need to hear from people. My only concern with starting what the one meeting earlier is what it ... how anybody who wants to listen in, is that impacted by their work schedule, and you might get some people we wouldn't otherwise get, so it may be a wash. I don't know. But ... but I think we should find out. Teague: So it ... so it does sound like on this item ... now, if anyone else want to weigh in, please do. But it does sound like on this item, starting one hour early, we're open to it. We're just wanting some public input. Um, I did hear Mayor Pro Tem mention maybe a hard, fast stop time proposal. I think I heard 11:00 P.M. (laughs) because the latest... actually I think the latest we went was about .... was it 1:30? Mims: Well, I think, you know, that gets managed with the agenda, and I think staff is very good with managing the agenda, but I think we do have to recognize there are certain occasions when things come up that we end up just from a timing standpoint, uh, we end up with a jammed agenda, you know, maybe we end up with a bunch of rezonings or something... or some other major things. So I don't think we have to set a hard and fast. I think staff knows what our limit is and their limit is on a reasonable meeting and a reasonable agenda, but I think we all have to acknowledge those occasions, it's ... it's going to go long. That's just the way this is. Teague: Okay. And what .... what could happen is any one of us, if we're noticing the time, you know, going along, uh, pretty late, what we might suggest is having a discussion on anything that we can potentially push back to the next meeting, if it's not time sensitive... or maybe having a special session just for a few items that we decide we don't want to continue. So I think we don't have to make that decision tonight. It's just in the back of our head, if meetings are going long, we have that option as Council. So the other thing would be the virtual option. So the hybrid model that Council Thomas talked about and the virtual that Mayor Pro Tem talked about. I think that will be something that we can probably ask staff to look into, to see what This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 38 that look like if we were in-person and also had a virtual option. So, all right! That's item ... that's one ... one of the things. So we want the public to definitely give their thoughts on that. The other is public comment and signing in procedures. So right now we use Zoom and it's ... it works really slick. People raise their hand, and I can see it on the side, as the individual that is calling people up front to ... and giving them their time to speak here publicly to ... to us, and so when we're back in session, it doesn't always go so smoothly, because people have to sign in. And if it's individuals that have never been to a Council meeting, it can be a little bit intimidating, when you come up and then, you know, whether I mention to sign in at the beginning, and ... and that process. It can be a little cumbersome, and so wondering if we might consider having a sign up outside in the lobby, where people sign their name, and then that's handed to me and maybe they'll have which item they want to speak on, that's handed to the Mayor, and then the name would be called and they will be able to present. The other thing could be a timer. So that could be up on the ... up on the screens here in City Hall or sometime or somewhere where people understand that they are within their five-minute, three-minute, four - minute, whatever has been asked, depending on how many people have signed up for an item. So wanted to get people to weigh in on that. Salih: I really like the model that the School District use at their Board meeting. While like it go like to red when come to your time going to be ended, and it is on the screen. You see it in front of you. So people like don't need to remind them and when it is a time finished... finished. So I don't know if the... of course it is up to the staff to, you know, to see if that's something that we can implement or not, but that's what the ... the model that I really like. Taylor: And ... and, Mayor Pro Tem, they also. their model is that they ...you have to sign up ahead of time. You fill out your name and ... and that you're willing to speak and it gets passed up to the ... to the front desk. So yeah, I ... I like that model also and the timer. They keep the timing, which is good. I like that. Mims: I like the idea of the timing, just because we do have some people who go long winded. and I think in all fairness to everybody, to really kind of enforce that. I'm not as much of a fan of people having to sign up ahead of time. I think people sometimes don't... come and don't plan to speak, but then they ...they hear something that really hits them in a certain way and they feel compelled to want to speak. I have been ... I don't know. I've done this for 11 years. I just ... I haven't seen the sign -in procedure be that cumbersome and that wasteful of time. You know, occasionally you get somebody who hasn't signed in, and... and they take a few minutes to get their name down and everything. So that's not as compelling to me. We don't... it's not that often that we go to our 8:00 cut off for comment, which is on our agenda. You know, if people are still commenting at 8:00, we cut it off and then would come back to (mumbled) meeting. We very seldom have to cut people off and say, `Oh, we can't take any more public comment.' So I'm not so worried about people having to sign in ahead of time. One of the things that we're not getting during the Zoom, which ... and we sometimes weren't getting this in the regular meetings that I wish we would get back to enforcing, and that is people indicating their address. Right or wrong, we're elected by residents of Iowa City, and quite frankly, I am going to give more weight to input from residents of Iowa City than people who do not live in Iowa City. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 39 I ... I'm fine listening to their opinion and if...particularly if they have expertise on an issue they want to share with us, but when people don't live here, I'm going to listen to them as an expert and not as somebody who just wants to complain about our city. So I ... I'd like to know where people live when they comment. Weiner: I ... I would also like to know if people are residents of the city. Everybody's welcome to speak, but whether it's on Zoom or in person, these are ... these are our constituents, every... every resident of the city are our constituents, and ... and I want to know if someone's actually part of...essentially part of our responsibility. Salih: Mayor, just correct me if I'm wrong. My understanding is, yes, you sign up ahead of time. But while the public comment in session, you still ... if you decide ... if you moved by the public and you decide to do you can go and sign in and hand it like ... hand (mumbled) because that what I've been seeing at the School District. Where people... even if they came late, they still can go and give the secretary, you know, a piece of paper with their name and address and (both talking) Teague: Again, I think it's up to us how we, you know, institute that. We currently have ... when we were in session, people sign up at the bat, you know, they go and get their sign-up little thing and they, you know, put the sticker down. So it's ... it's kind of the same process, but I think to Councilor Mims' concern, we can certainly, um, you know, do that last call for anybody out there that didn't sign up, giving them an opportunity, because again, there are people that ... like she mentioned, you know, they're moved by a topic and we've ... we've seen people that sit there and they say, I just have to get up, you know, and say something. So I think we can still allow that, as a part of the process. The name and the... and the address writing, we ... in-person we have that sign-up, and I think if people are wanting that to be a part of the initial response when someone speaks via Zoom, I can ... I can certainly institute, you know, introducing the person's coming to speak and asking them to state their address. We can even have them write it in the comments section, but again, this is just an opportunity for people to weigh in. I do see our City Attorney. So hello, Eleanor! Dilkes: Hello, hello. Um, I'm not ... it's not clear to me whether we're talking about sign-up just for public comment of items not on the agenda, or if we're talking about every agenda item, because you ask for public, you know, public comment on every agenda item. And that seems very cumbersome to me. I haven't ... I haven't seen a School Board meeting in a long time, but I don't believe they allow public comment on every item like we do. So, I also think with respect to public hearings, I'm not wild about the the sign-up ahead of time. I think that's a time for people to speak when they want and if it's spontaneous, it needs to be spontaneous. If it's in response to somebody who just spoke and they want to correct an error, then I think they should be able to do that. I also think we need to be careful about the time limit for applicants. We have, you know, unlike the School Board, we have people who are coming to us with the zoning application or this application or that application. And they shouldn't be limited to the five minutes, just like staff isn't limited to the five minutes in making their presentation. The This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 40 applicant shouldn't be either. So I don't have any problem with the sign-up for items not on the agenda, but to do it for every agenda item seems cumbersome. Salih: I really mean the public comment, Eleanor, only during the public comment. Of course the public hearing, that's something different. Everybody have to weigh in. Sometime, you know, yeah the applicant have ... they need more time. We ask them question, and yeah, I totally agree with you. I just meant during the public comment only for item that is not on the agenda. Dilkes: Sounds good. Teague: I wonder if...something different could happen. You know how you go to churches and then in the back of the seat there's this little, you know, card that you pull out if you want to, you know, have ... sign your name. I ... I wonder if we don't have either someone at the beginning of our meetings or throughout the meetings, they just walk around with cards and ... and give it to people that want to sign up. That way they can be at their seat when their name is called because I think that's a part of it. When ... when people are coming up, there's just a little delay. When ... when people are coming up and so maybe there could be some explanation about, you know, if you want to speak there's ... we will ask that you sign up and here's a sticker, do yada, yada, yada. So maybe we can have some more thoughts around that, that we are asking the public to weigh in on these items. And we'll ... we'll put this back on the agenda, is that all right? All right. And then the last thing is the Council emails and correspondence. So there's been an increase of correspondence, at least in 2020 (laughs) So I think there's ... I think there's a little growing frustration because all of the items that are addressed to the Council appears in our information packet, and sometimes I think there could be some response to ... to some of these emails that come in the correspondence. I'm going to ask maybe Geoff or...or Eleanor to kind of have some ... maybe guide us through this conversation a little bit. Dilkes: So this item ... staff started, er...thinking about this because of kind of the ... the nature of the correspondence to Council. I'm not talking about correspondence to individual Council Members, but emails to the council@iowa-city.org email address, and for years and years, you know how those have been handled. They ...they are not ... you don't get them in real-time, you... they're put in your ...in your next agenda packet, and I think ... I think some of the reason for that has been that... couple reasons it's... it's handy sometimes to get a staff response to those before... you... before you see them because staff has some information. And ... and then I think there's been some concern about `replying all' and having a meetings violation, but it seems ... it seems that...it doesn't... it's... it's odd for staff to get those emails and you not get them then, when they're directed to you, particularly when they're of a nature that staff is not really... doesn't really need to chime in. This is just something that they want you to hear. So I think there's two issues with emails to Council. The first is when you get it, and the second is whether all Council correspondence or...goes on your ...your Council agenda, and ifs ... it's not the info packet. It goes in the correspondence under ...on the formal agendas. Kellie did and Kellie, you can help me out here if I ... if I mess this up, but Kellie did a survey of other cities and essentially what she found was that most cities don't have a group email. They just have individual emails, and of the two ... there were eight cities, of the two that do have a group email, one of...one of it This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 41 receives it in real- time and one it goes through ... by the City Manager first. With respect to whether correspondence to the Council goes on the Council agenda, it was pretty overwhelming that that just is not a typical thing when it's not related to an agenda item, rather just a list of correspondence that the Council gets. I think only one of the eight cities puts an agenda item on the agenda, if it's not ... if it's not an agenda item and then only if it's requested to be put there. So ... those are kind of the ... kind of the issues. I ... I think the, as I said the ... the reason it's been done this way in the past is in order to get some staff response or information that you might want to have before you respond. The open records concerns. I don't really know why the Council correspond... this started long before I was here, why all Council correspondence goes on the agenda. I think it certainly creates challenges for time and focus. I think it also... sometimes you're having a discussion about something that you really don't have a full picture of. On the other hand, I think its something that the community has gotten used to. So that's probably the flip side of that its kind of a community expectation at this point. A couple... Kellie and Jeff and I were talking, one of the ways we thought you could handle this is that ... your Council e .... the emails that go to the Council email address could be forwarded to you, to your individual emails, and that would be a reminder to you that you don't want to be `replying all' Only Council... correspondence to Council relating to an agenda item be put on ... on the agenda, and then if a Council Member wanted to discuss an email received, they could ask that it be put on the ... on the agenda. Those are just some ... some possibilities, but those are kind of the ... the pros and cons. I have to say you got a lot of emails in 2020, but I have been here for a long time and there have been years when there have been lots and lots and lots of emails. So ... I don't think it's actually that rare. Mims: I like the idea, if it's not hard for staff, to take those that come into the Council email address and obviously if...if staff looks at those and thinks there's a reply that is appropriate from them, that then gives us further information, for them to do that first. But then to have all those sent to us. So if you get an email and its like, Okay, this is just some general comment on a particular topic. There's nothing really for staff to clarify or respond to. then we just immediately forward it on to Council. Oh wait a minute, the second one, there really is a question that we can give a clarification on, and that would give more context for Council. Then do that and then send it on to us. I like that idea. So that one, it keeps our packets a little bit smaller, if we're getting this on a more regular basis between... rather than all of them at one lump sum. And from there I don't have a problem with only putting the correspondence in the agenda packet that is related to items on the actual agenda. And I'll tell you, in the last year or two, we've spent more time talking about the consent agenda than I've ever spent in Councils in the previous nine or 10 years. And theoretically a consent agenda should be something that a body simply motions, seconds, and votes on. It's... it's... you look at, I don't care if it's a board of directors for a bank or a non-profit or whatever, just when you look at organizational structure, a consent agenda is something that that board should not be spending much time talking about. If they are items that need a lot of comment and discussion, they shouldn't be in the consent agenda in the first place. And so that's where I think, as a Council, we have really started getting into a lot of in - meeting discussion of items on a consent agenda that we don't necessarily need to. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 42 Bergus: As far as the public perception or expectation that you mentioned, Eleanor, um, I think I want to make sure I understand the distinction. If an individual sends an email to our seven individual email addresses, that will never get into the packet. Is that ... unless we forward it to Kellie saying please include in the packet. Is that right? Dilkes: Yes, that's right. Bergus: Okay. Cause I think there's some ... and ... and even, you know, when I was kind of reading up before... before joining Council, I think there's some ... that's not very clear, and I think that's not clear necessarily to the public either, that if they send to council@iowa-city.org it'll be included in the packet or be...be on the agenda. I kind of liked the idea of having ... I ... I would want to communicate it first, but the idea of if a person wants that published, you know, to ... to have some way of indicating that. On the flip side, there have been emails that, you know, I should have probably clued in in my head, it would be helpful to put in the packet, you know, that maybe all of us received, but we're not, you know, I don't think we're in the regular habit of just forwarding those to Kellie to get them into the packet. So there's just some inconsistency with... residents who reach out to all of Council, you know, they're either in the packet or they're not. Dilkes: It seems to me that we do a pretty good job of...or Council does a pretty good job, maybe I'm wrong, of forwarding tho... those emails that go to all of you, all of your individual addresses, to us to put in the packet, and there is an automatic response to the Council email that says, "This will go in the next agenda packet," so ... so they should know ...they should know that. We could ... we could certainly send that... change that automatic response, depending on what you all decided to do. I have a little hesitancy about staff having to (mumbled) as ... as, Susan, you were talking about having to make decisions about which email ... right away which emails we're going to forward immediately and which ones we're going to hold back and answer and then forward. That ... that may get a little complicated. I think I would suggest that we, if that's what you want to do, if you want to get them in real-time, we simply forward them to your email addresses and then you will get the staff response as well, if we choose to respond. Thomas: Well I do like the idea of...of getting correspondence in real-time. I think that there's some benefit to that. Clarification of Agenda Items: Teague: So it sounds like what we'll do is we'll bring this back on the work session agenda and allow the public some time to weigh in on this item and the other items and we encourage people to let us hear your thoughts. Anything else on ... on any of the three items that were mentioned? All right, clarification of agenda items. This ... for our formal meeting. Moving on to information packets, December 17'x'. Moving on to December 23rd information packet, and if I'm going too fast, just slow me down. Information Packet Discussion (December 17, December 23, December 30): This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 43 Taylor: Oh, I'll make this real quick, Mayor. Just IP 2 on the December 23rd, the Johnson County Affordable Housing Coalition, the memo from Sara Barron, looking ahead to 2021. I just...I really appreciated her memo, and I want to thank thank her, as well as the community partners, who have helped secure rent and mortgage assistance, and advocated at state and federal resources, ensuring that very critical needs for some of our most vulnerable members of our community, that have been able to make it through these trying times, that we're still not seeing really the light at the end of the tunnel yet for that. So I appreciate her work and also all the community partners out there that ... that have worked really hard to help those, as I said, very critical to those members of our community that needed that assistance, and thank them. Teague: Great. Salih: I second that, Pauline. Teague: Absolutely. All right. December 30th information packet, and I did want to just touch base on IP 3, pending work session topics. We had ... on our work session topics last year, up until today, COVID. We just had it as a standard item. Wondering if...I know that Councilor Weiner had mentioned having Public Health come and speak to us, since ... update us on COVID as it relates to our community, or even having the University of Iowa, but also having some reports on the vaccination. So wondering and, Councilor Weiner, please chime in, but wondering if we would be open to having either the ... the University of Iowa or just County Public Health come and speak to us on our formal agenda, maybe once a month or...and this is Councilor Weiner idea, so please feel free. Weiner: So ... so what I ... what I was interested in having ... have happen, just basically for the entire community or anybody who's listening, is a regular report, probably at this point by Johnson County Public Health, to tell us where the vaccination roll-out stance and if there any other sort of hotspots or other things we should be ... we should be paying attention to, so that we're really ...it could be the ... it could be UIFC as well, but Johnson County Public Health, I think, is going to be integral in rolling out the vaccination plan for ...for our communities. So that we're getting information directly from the people who are ... are making the policy and implementing the policy. Or from the scientists and not from those of us who are trying to choose somehow to interpret what's going on or interpret what the scientists would like us to know. So I ... and it just ... because there's been ... there's been from ... from my perspective anyway at this point, a dearth of information out of this ... out of state (mumbled) from Iowa Department of Public Health on...on how the ... what they're going to do in terms of vaccine roll-out, aside from medical professional and (mumbled) professionals and and long-term care. They put together a commission or working group that's not public. So it seems ... seems to me that it's really what they're doing in terms of deciding the priorities for vaccination probably more important than almost anything we deal with under,...under public meetings law. But so the ... but the short version is, I thought it would be useful at least once a month for us to get just a ... whether in the work session or in the formal meeting, a short report, um, where do we stand with vaccination roll-out, what are they recommending. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 44 Teague: I think it could be valuable if we're ... if our intended audience is for the greater of Iowa City is for it to come during our formal meeting. Granted there are people that chime in on our work session, but I think the majority of people actually wait till 7 ... or 7:00 P.M. for our formal meeting, so I will be supportive of it and just wanted to get our other Councilor thoughts. Mims: Yeah, I would agree. And I think the formal makes more sense. Because I do think we have a larger audience. I think it's key to keep it short, two to three minutes, but like you say, Janice, an update, you know, maybe where they're at in their plans and what they know. There's a huge educational component that has got to continue to go with us to hopefully encourage those people who are hesitant, to educate them, you know, get them as much information and answer questions, you know, so that we can get as many people to participate as possible once they have the opportunity. So I think if we can just keep it a real brief update once a month, I think that makes sense. Teague: Okay. Any ...I'm seeing some heads shaking. So we'll, City Manager, Geoff, if you can reach out to Public Health, that'd be great. The other item that we have to discuss on December 30th is IP 5 and this is a memo from our City Manager. Fruin: Yeah thanks, Mayor. Real briefly, this memo just updates you on a planning process that is just starting to unfold jointly with the County. They own property at 821 South Clinton, which is the corner of Clinton and Benton Street. That property is often referred to as the Car Quest Building and you may know it as the current home of the winter shelter. They are envisioning the future of that facility, and as have graciously invited us into .... into that discussion. And just thought I would check in with you to see if a Council Member or two would be interested in ... in joining staff for those discussions, as we'll be working with your elected counterparts, with the Board of Supervisors. Taylor: This is Pauline. I was really happy to see this actually as I drive by that building so many times, all the time and ... and I ... in my head think of all kinds of wonderful things that that space could be used for, so I would very much, if you do put together some partners to meet with ... with the Board of Supervisors and others, interested parties, I ... I would like to be one of those Council Members. Salih: I also called Geoff during the meeting and I ask him to be a part of it, and I really am passionate about this and I would love to be part of it. Teague: Any other .... one, general comments on this. I think ... thanks for the memo, personally, and I think it's a great opportunity to explore, and I'll leave my comments at that. And are there any other individuals that want to comment or that is interested in this, to be a part of the ... this group? Mims: Well, I'd be interested. I don't know how many we want from Council. So ... we'll just... This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021. Page 45 Teague: I...I think Geoff mentioned two. So I guess we have ... we have three that's interested. I'm ... I'm personally comfortable with Councilor Taylor and Mayor Pro Tem. (both talking) Mims: That's fine. I mean, any decision has got to come back to full Council and in terms of...City or (several talking) position on anything. So... Council updates on assigned boards, commissions, and committees: Teague: All right, so sound like the two will be a part of those conversations. So thanks to both of you. Any other item from IP .... from 12/30? All right, Council updates on assigned boards, commissions, and committees. Um, during the three weeks that (laughs) we had off that (laughs) was a little unusual at the end of the year (laughs) but appreciated. Salih: Nothing for me. Teague: Okay. Weiner: The only thing I have is that the JECC has a new chair and vice chair. The new chair is from North Liberty and I'm the new vice chair. Teague: Great. Good. Salih: I really want to say something. I didn't have a chance to say to everyone Happy New Year to all our (mumbled) you know, Council Members and also to the staff who are currently here and to the staff always work behind the scenes to make our city really comfortable for everyone. And I just want to say Happy New Year. It was very tough year to go through 2020 especially, never going to be forgotten. But, you know, we ... we went through it safely. It is for me as a black person and as a black leader for the City (mumbled) Mayor Pro Tem, we went through a lot, but I think we done a lot of work that need to be done. We done some improvement, but there is a lot more to do looking forward to working with the staff and City Council for 2021 to make it even better. Thank you. Teague: Great. All right. Anything else? We will be back at 7:00 P.M. for our formal meeting and remember to sign out of this Zoom meeting into our 7:00 P.M. Zoom meeting, and we will see you all then. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council work session of January 5, 2021.