Apache Junction Halts Downtown Development Until City Controls State Route 88—Bella Norte Caught in Ownership Stalemate

Call the city of Apache Junction work session of September 14th, [clears throat] 2026 to order and ask everyone to put their cell phones on silent. Roll call. Mayor Wilson here. Vice Mayor Schroeder present. Council member Cross [clears throat] here. Council member Hec here. Council member Johnson here. Council member Nesser present. And council member Ser here. You have a quorum your honor. Thank you. Presentation [clears throat] discussion on city code procurement procedure. Joel thank you Mr.

Mayor member city council. I provided you some background information on this already and so for tonight it's just uh a a status of where we're at. We've uh staff has been wanting to do this for a while. the the code was uh adopted in 2018 and before that uh the uh there was a change also in the 19 well late 2000s. So basically the city's growing and there's a lot more projects and they're more sophisticated projects.

Therefore, you need more sophisticated rules uh especially when there's bidding where bidding is coming from all over this uh the state. And so [clears throat] what you have before you is just a summary of what we're going to be looking at to bring you at a different time. uh and we'd be asking for a [clears throat] a uh direction to staff to have a procurement change and we'll be asking to do that uh probably in October. And so basically I I just went through the table of contents.

We're going to change some things on the purpose re refine the definitions because there's going to be more definitions. Uh there's going to be some procurement levels that uh we'd like to change because they are outdated that other cities definitely have other communities. Uh [clears throat] there will be u more specifics as to the in the invitation for bids, requests for uh procurement, requests for qualifications and there's other things also in the list. uh exemptions.

Um the emergency procurements, clarify bid protests and appeals, adjust ethical standards, uh penalize more clearly unauthorized purchases, update cooperative [snorts] purchase and job order contracting agreements, clarify departments. So I know that's that's a lot of information to understand. Um and it's just the current code that we're going to go through and provide changes to.

So, at the city manager's uh help with his help, we're going to have uh probably staff come up with some changes, but we'd like to get that going so we can uh do do our projects. Brian, do you want to say? I just would add, and I don't know if Angelie or Matt want to add, it's been eight years when we do this. It's time to review best practices. This is just the kick kickstart for you all to start diving into this.

We do need to get council direction of staff couple weeks or even in a month um to get some thoughts and ideas on some of these numbers, some of these changes. Matt, anything else you want to add? No, you covered the the reason why we want to do it and we'll bring forward if if the council directs uh a draft ordinance for them to consider and ask questions about and all that. Okay, that's it. Yes. Yes. Um so have a question on this one.

um on the procurement limit, the one from 15,000 to less than 100,000, you could do that without requiring three formal written quotes. So you could you had a $95,000 project, you could get one quote and do good to go. No, I apologize. That's that was a clerical error. That's not the intent at all. No, you you do we will do be doing procurements up to that amount. So no. Um cuz I thought that's a great that was a mistake. That was never in the ordinance nor our thought to propose.

I think you should say would require. Yeah. Would require. Oh, okay. Yeah. Yeah. Cuz I thought, man, that's putting a lot of trust in change the word without to will. Yes. Yeah. And I apologize for that. I just want to make sure. I thought that seems out of the way the rest of it set up. That seems a little out of Yeah, you are correct to point that out and I apologize for that. M. That's right. Thank um Yes. Are you going to be bringing us a redline version of this? Absolutely. 100%.

We will be doing that. I've Yes, I've started one even though I haven't have direction yet, but I know what you want and I know you want it in an easy way to um handle so that you can understand exactly what we're taking out and what we're putting in.

One other question under um uh 3-7-6 a little further down it says allow city manager to approve amended contracts value at 1 million but less than 5 million with 10% of contract value if we already have a contract that um has a maybe it's a 5% contingency I could understand or a 10% contingency I can understand but if it's a contract that doesn't already have that contingency.

If you had a hund a million dollar contract, you're talking about $100,000 just on a on a signature without council being aware checking back. But wouldn't that also be, you know, that's that's what the contingency is for. No, I said if it doesn't have a contingency, all of everything they provide us is single. It always has a contingency much to my dismay on a lot of the contracts. I sit there and say, "Well, put that in the bid.

there shouldn't contingency on something that you have the solid numbers for. But so I don't know if we need it if they're all with contingency or if we're doing things that don't have contingency, maybe that should have a different override. We will take that uh definitely back to the group and uh we will be back in touch with you on that. Thank you. Anyone else? Thank you. Okay.

Presentation, discussion and update [clears throat] on trans [snorts] jurisdiction a portion of the state route uh 88 from ADAT jurisdiction. Excuse me. Mike Wilson. Mayor Wilson and members of the council. Uh just a quick update here on where we're at on this. I'm going to explain to you some different options and, uh, who I've talked to and kind of give you an update of what's going on. Uh, so, as you guys are aware, uh, here's an overall picture of 88 in Idaho Road.

Uh, it goes through the middle of town here and all the way up to Canyon Lake. Uh, we have at least five different traffic signals uh, along this route and a roundabout as part of that. Uh this road has been here uh since the 60 was installed. Uh construction was done on the 60 and took over for Apache Trail. Uh so as part of this the ADOT went out and did a listen to the public. Uh several you conference council members were at that.

They heard you guys loud and clear that apache junction was ready, willing, and able to take over this uh this roadway. But what does that entail? how much a roadway do we want to take over? You know, how much is it going to cost the citizens and uh of Apache Junction to take this over? How much did it cost to originally be built? And then go through that process of do we want to take it over without any improvements? Do we want to take it over with improvements?

So, we'll go through some of those ideas tonight as part of this presentation. So, the first part of it is leg one, I'm calling it. Um, this leg is actually from the 60 all the way up to the stoplight here at Apache Trail. So, roughly about four miles of five lanes basically as we come up through here. We have also five signals. They have sidewalk curb and gutter as part of that and then also uh some storm drain as part of that.

So we had to go through did a quick analysis of what current current day cost would be for this new road if it was 11 lane miles. So again it's not just it's five lanes in certain areas and next down does some different things. So it's 11 lane miles uh four miles of sidewalk curb and gutter 2 miles of storm drain, five traffic signals and 17 street lights along this section. If they were to build that today, it'd be roughly about $31 million to build that in today's funds.

They're willing to give that to us if we want to take over that portion of the land. But with that comes the maintenance of those those areas. Obviously, they did a little fog seal this past year, made it look a little bit better, but eventually that road is going to be need to be milled and over overlaid to make it last another 20 to 30 years as we go through that.

Uh, as part of that, over the next 10 to 20 years, it'd roughly be about $9.1 million of re expenditures that we'd have to bring that road to keep it up to the existing conditions or better it so that it'll last another 20 years for the city of Apache Junction. That would be with no improvements. Those were the the cost of the city would have to take on as part of that. The next phase uh is from that stop light at Idaho in 88 all the way up to the roundabout or just past the roundabout.

That's roughly about 1.75 lane miles. The roundabout which is fairly new here.5 miles of sidewalk curb and gutter and about eight street lights that surround that. Um total cost to build that roughly about $2.6 million. It's fairly new. Over the next 10 to 20 years, it'll be about a million dollars to maintain that, keep everything back up to grade.

If we have to do a a fog seal or slurry seal, something that's not a mill and overlay, it would be a little bit less money to do that as part of that that process. Those would be some of the maintenance costs we'd have on that section. So, this would be that section we've just talked about there. And then the final section is leg three. Uh, this is from the roundabout all the way to the city limits to the north. Uh, this is roughly about 6.5 lane miles.

There's only one street light, not much out in that area uh to build that new 9.75 million. They just recently did a mill and overlay roughly about 3 to five years ago on that section of a roadway. Again, the rehabilitation cost for that over the next 20 years, probably more the 15 to 20 years would be roughly about 3.75 million for us to maintain. So, as you can see, there's cost even though they would provide that to us.

we wouldn't have to pay the overall cost for the infrastructure they built, but we would have to maintain that forever once they turned that over to the city of Apache Junction. So, in total, if we took over the entire route of 88 through the city, uh total new cost would be roughly about $43 million if we had to build that on our own. Um this is what they're willing to turn over to us. Uh over the next 10 to 20 years, we'd roughly have about $14 million in expenditures to maintain that road.

So, what does that really mean to us? The additional lane miles that we're adding here is roughly about 10% of what the city currently has, maybe just a little slightly less than 10%. Our budget on year-to-year is about 8 7 to 8 million for roadways today. So, roughly about 7800,000.

So, we're slightly short of those numbers as we maintained it if we added this on, but obviously we'd have to have additional tax revenue because these are more maintenance as we went through these to maintain all these roads out there. Okay, so this is the overall picture. Not sure what how council feels yet if they want to take over the first leg, second leg, or all legs at the same time. Uh, couple different options.

after talking to AOT uh they reached out to us after they heard from staff or from council when they were at some of the meetings and they said well there's several different options that we can do. Uh one of the options was hey we can immediately turn over ownership in the next 2 to four months within an agreement and city of Pache Junction can have whatever portion they want and maintain it forever after that.

You know it's no improvements so we get it as is but we're going to have to maintain that from here on out. Um, you know, some of the benefits is we can control the flow of traffic uh on this section of land. It helps PD where they don't have to call highway patrol out to maintain accidents. We show up to them and typically turn those over to them.

It helps utilities out because currently even though it's in in the city limits, water district, sewer district, our its we have to get permits through AOT and typically an AOT permit is 6 to 8 months to get that permit from AOT. So taken a long time period compared to the city's permitting process which is about a month. So there there are some benefits to that. Um explained on legs one and two some minor maintenance done but we'll need additional maintenance over the next 5 to 15 years.

And then leg three which we talked about earlier was recently redone with a mill and overlay. So we're looking more 10 to 20 years before we have to mess with leg three. Option two is request AOT make improvements before they transfer ownership to us. Uh we we've talked to ADOT. Uh it's not on their 5-year improvement plan at this point in time.

So this would be a long range plan with them of saying, "Hey, if if you mill and overlay it, you put a slurry seal on it, you bring it you bring it up to a better conditions than it is currently today and put in an agreement and they will do those, but we wouldn't be able to take over that road or ownership of it for possibly the next five or seven years or longer so we get to that agreement." So they could do those improvements before they turned it over to the city.

So again, all maintenance costs after that would be taken over by the city at that point in time. And then last one is that your options if you want to take over leg one, which is 60 to the traffic signal at 88 in Idaho, do you want to take over all the way to the roundabout or all the way to the city limits? Uh this street, as you guys are aware, is really goes through the heart of the city.

Um, so this is a main main corridor as we have our downtown improvements happening currently throughout here. It it's becoming a major corridor and working with ADOT has been difficult to do with traffic signals, different improvements that development needs. They typically require as you get north on 88 turn lanes, different requirements as part of that. These are some of those decisions that council will have rather than have to deal with eight out at that point in time.

So at that do you guys have any questions for me on this? Yes. I have a question. [clears throat] So the maintenance for leg one? Yes. Is that's does that include does those monies include the stop lights, the street lights or just the road work? That is everything. That's everything.

So that'll be and I have it broken down in Excel spreadsheet that goes through all these, but the traffic signals are roughly about a million dollars themselves because we have to bring them up to what we're currently using, how we can tie them on to our system with our fiber, getting on the network, with cameras, with everything that we apply to that cameras, not not for license plate readers.

We're talking about cameras for traffic signals that we can make sure we can control the flow of traffic through town. It also help us synchronize as part of that so we can keep that flow going through and if we decide to go either leg one, leg two or all three. Um, now this kind of throws in the roundabout artwork into play. So as of as it sits right now, any artwork we decide to put on that roundabout has got to go through ADOT. That is correct.

But if we're like, okay, let's go through one, two, three leg all three legs, two to four months you're saying would take for this to happen. Um, if we decide, hey, let's go for it and do it. So as far as they're concerned is they're just waiting on us to see what we want to do. Correct. So as they're like fine, if you guys want it, you can have it kind of thing. But the process takes a few months. Yeah.

So we can realistically if we make a decision about the legs today, um we can start designing this artwork in a way how we would necessarily want it instead of in a way how we think AOT would approve it. That is correct. Okay. Mayor. Yes. Leg one. Have we looked at that and how soon do you think it's going to need to be fixed? So, this year they did a bo seal over it. Um there is some uh portions in distress that we're going to be working with them on.

Uh we're doing an improvement on Old West Highway uh from basically Idaho to Tomahawk. That intersection they did not touch, but if you go through there, um it's very alligatored or has a bunch of holes or cracks through it. uh we'd probably do a disservice if we don't do something with that intersection currently because we already improved the payment west of Idaho. So, we leave this bad intersection. Um if we took it over, we could definitely get in there and repair that.

That's the only immediate need that I could see out there currently. Um some of the other needs would come probably more that 10year mark when we'd have to do some more. And leg two is okay. Leg two is okay. Yes. And leg three is good because they just did it. Correct. So, all we're talking about really is fixing the one intersection area immediately. That is correct. Yes. Okay. Yes. Um [clears throat] Mike, the um you said the annual increase to our budget 700,000.

So, be roughly we do roughly about 7 to8 million in road preservation each year. So adding this the the entire you know one two and three would be roughly an extra 700 to 700 to a million dollars annually those big improvements as we move forward maybe at that 10 year mark or later. Um so we'd slowly start building those up. Obviously we move projects forward and backwards as part of that.

Um and we'll see how things develop here in the city with developments and additional tax revenue as we went through them. Bambi. Well, my question is, you know, I've heard an awful lot over the people trying to push to put something in like a roundabout out at 88 and Lost Dutchman. I mean, is this something that ADOT is looking at because that's a very expensive proposition. And maybe I don't want to look at section three until that actually occurs because how much is a a roundabout put in?

Yeah. buy state land. I'm going to assume uh ADOT is not looking at putting any roundabouts in the near future. Um if we had issues out there, if there were safety issues or something like that, that'd be something the city would have to go after. Um I think that was part of how ADOT did the roundabout here, uh was went after safety money because the intersection was a little dangerous to that point in time.

We had enough traffic and incidents there that they were able to go get some grants and help us fund a portion of that also. So, that'd be something that we'd have to look at as as we grew as a city and we seen additional accidents or additional issues out happen uh further to the north and east of town here. Then we'd have to address those issues when they came about. But right now, I don't think there we wouldn't have any plans to do that. And I'm sure ADOT currently does not.

They have not mentioned anything like that. And you feel pretty confident that that whole stretch of uh 88 going out there probably won't need anything major for about 10 years. Correct. We may have to do a fog seal or slurry seal here in the next 7 to 10 years. Um those are roughly very minimal cost compared to a constructing the road or a milling overlay as part of that. So you're looking at 700 to a million dollars a year increase in budget but we get to actually control our downtown.

That is correct. Thank you. Yes. So might so I would I be correct to say that we could agree to transfer just leg one but at any point in time if we wanted to transfer legs two and three we could we could do that a dots it's not a oneshot deal. That is correct. Yeah you could take it down all at one time. You could do it one one leg at a time or even change the legs if you if you guys don't like how I laid them out tonight. Okay.

That they are open to anything that we're willing to work with them on and work through. Okay. Um then one other question and maybe this might be for Joel. Um while AOT owns the 88 if there were any issues with you know deficiencies with the roadway or something they'd be liable once the transfer goes through we assume that liability I would expect becomes a city. Yes and no.

I will say and I have to say it that way because there's some case law out there that basically says if uh your police department or a sheriff is patrolling a state route, this happened up in Prescat. I think it's Sanchez versus Prescott. um a a license plate, sorry, council member, a license plate frame had fallen off a motorcycle and what happened was uh someone hit that and it became a par paraplegic. So Prescuit got sued, so did the state and so did the county.

Prescott ended up having to pay for that and it was not their road. It was because the court said that road is something that the police department of Prescuit was patrolling and because of that they should have seen the live. They should have seen that and they should have done something about and it was a fouryear four fourhour gap from the time that the plate was seen and then uh there was an accident.

So to answer your question, there's some liability now because I I think uh when an accident occurs on 88, the police show up. Otherwise, you have to wait a long time for AOT. And I believe they do pass it to ADOT once they get there if they show up. So there is liability that in that sense but once it's totally transferred to us yes the city will be liable for any uh any accidents or any um uh defects in the roadway. Okay, another question. Okay baby.

Is Could you tell me the pros and cons of only taking it from Broadway past the roundabout since that is our downtown corridor? Um, for the downtown corridor, I think it'd be great. Uh, but we do have potential for development along Idaho just south of southern um as that state land currently today. So, I think that's an opportunity for the city to control the flow of traffic.

Um hopefully someday there'll be a large commercial user that comes into that that adds tax revenue, but as of right now they'd have to go through the ADOT process uh to to approve that. Um you can look at that. We have at 16th Avenue we have the fire department that's there roughly too. So this is helping move them along through this process so we can get them in and out of there. Um but it's truly up up to the council on what legs we want to take. There's some benefits.

There are some cons to it also. You know, obviously we're maintaining more more roadway, more traffic signals as we go through this. The biggest thing as part of it why we looked at some of the the pieces was if we take over the five traffic signals, we can synchronize those so that as we get flow of traffic through town, we can make sure that you have green lights all the way through rather than stopping every mile or every half a mile as you go through that.

Or when you're going east and west, it again creates those synchronizations all the way through the city. So, it makes it flow a little bit better controlling some of the the traffic movements that we have here. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. If I could ask one more thing. There's also a political issue here, too. Right now, you have a very friendly ADOT staff.

I believe that changes and that has changed over time where we've tried to do certain things on the roadway 10 years ago, 5 years ago, and you had a different staff that said, "Don't touch our rideway." And they get very angry about it. Right now, it sounds like they want to hand this off. That could change. So, keep that in mind, too. Wendy said, "Oh, anytime we can go for leg two or three if you do leg one." Maybe not. But that's speculative. I don't know.

I just know what Mike is saying right now. They'd love for you to take it because this is going to cost them a lot of money to maintain, mayor. Okay. If we're going to do it, we just should take the whole thing throughout our whole city because there's going to be growth out in the north, too, eventually. And if we own the road, we can make changes. If we don't own it, and that road, that big portion of the road's just been done. So that's good to go.

I If we're going to do this, let's just do it the whole thing. That's my opinion. [clears throat] Darl, legs, the leg one and leg two, they overlap right? Uh just slightly. Yes. We're right there at the that intersection, but then so if we were to to incorporate just taking over legs one and two, there's a little bit of a cost savings in the in your formula, I suppose, is way to say it, correct? What would that cost us on an annual?

Um, so that's roughly we're looking at 9.1 for that first leg, which is all the way up to the intersection here, right? And then also leg two, which would be from the intersection just north of the roundabout here. Right. So, and that was roughly 3.75. I'm sorry. 1.1 million about 10. It's fairly new new condition. Yeah.

I was going to say legs two and three don't add that much liability if you want to look at it that way on you know it's going to be further out for those maintenance costs because they've done that mill and overlay recently. Um so we wouldn't have those immediately immediate expenditures on that for maintenance of those roads. That's correct. Mike, I have a kind of a crazy question on that map where ADOT goes out there.

I forget what you want to call it up here in this section of land right here. Yep. Are they going to expect us to pave that for them? So, that is a county island currently today. Um, but there are some commercial venues out there. Obviously, we'd probably be reaching out to him if you guys wanted to take over that section and say, "Hey, we're going to maintain this road. It's now kind of a county island. The city owns it.

We prefer that you'd come into the city limits so we can manage some of that and have to work with some of those commercial developers and some private residential ones at that point in time. So that's included in if we take it over that would be part of it even though it's not in our city. That's correct. Okay. [clears throat] Yes. Brian, where where do we sit financially with this?

I mean, is this something that we could absorb into our budget and maint, you know, start maintaining it or is it something that's going to hurt us? We'll definitely [clears throat] have to be prioritizing. I think it's something we can manage. Matt and I were just looking at that. One [clears throat] of the issues is if you were to tell me the economy continues like it's going right now. It's a full strong recommendation because we want to be able to control this. This is a big statement.

Um but we never know what headwinds are coming around the corner, what could happen in terms of um the economy and changing. But we've been strong in terms of our revenues to expenditures. Mike and I I think feel like we need to take it. Um the only thing that I have on the the I was just going to add for council member Johnson, if we do take the first leg, I strongly recommend we get that area between Southern and the freeway. That's just a huge economic corridor.

So, I would say definitely go all the way up to the roundabout. Leg two makes sense. It could get us some control on the roundabout in that area. The the last leg is feels a little bit like it's still rural to me. A little bit less like a more like a state highway. We could come back, but like Joel said, there could be some reasons we'd want to start now. Mike, I think less a little bit more like now is the time. That's the best leg. What's that? [clears throat] That's the best leg.

That's the cheapest. It's the cheapest, right? 20 years, right? Probably. Um, so we would absorb that. It would be a prioritization. in Matt House would we describe that in terms of our street budget. So I think an important thing although our general fund revenues have been pretty good over the years hasn't changed and you all know the story of HERF same story that the state has.

So um it really becomes the the hope becomes we get more efficient and better technology that helps us do projects and maintenance cheaper over time because the the her fund is not growing. Um uh but but we've managed very well over the years and um we're pretty confident we could manage this. So financially I think we could and there have been many times over the years working here that I just wish we already owned it.

Um in terms of the ability to take control of our our own destiny, your honor. Yes. So [clears throat] Mike, if Lego one, if we if Apache Junction owned this road for past two years or year, whatever is ours on your priority maintenance scale, where what what section? This road, where would that fall? Uh, it would not fall high on our priority list throughout the entire city. We have other roadways that are in worse condition. It sits right now.

It sure it's going to need some attention soon enough, but if it was ours right now, that wouldn't be a focus of priority. Uh probably a low priority at this point in time. Um like I said, they just did a fog seal on it. Uh that would be something preservation project that we put on it to start with. Um like I said, the one intersection is the only one we noticed. We went out there and traveled it quite a bit to make sure it made sense with the dollars we were putting in there.

Um but we're probably looking at low priority now, probably next 5 to seven years, higher priority for preservation as part of that. So you're saying this first leg we're looking at five to seven years before we have to start That's correct. Invest reinvesting into the road. Yes. What about the light timing? What's that? The the lights the timing of the lights and everything.

Uh some of that would uh I guess some of those initial costs would be some of the lights to get them onto our system rather than a dot system currently. We'd have to add some different features to those. But we could slowly ramp that up over time as we went through that. They obviously have devices on them currently today uh with our program that we just tied in with Mesa with the RCN.

We actually can see those traffic uh cameras now as part of that and we'll keep continuing to move forward with that. But obviously we want to get them on our system so that we can synchronize those so that would make a better flow. Currently we can just see them. We can't change anything on today. Mhm.

So, I think one thing to keep in mind is city council kind of got this ball rolling because we were the ones that talked about having more control over Idaho road when we wanted to do some development here and they're the I think we were the ones that said can we get can we gain control from ADOT. So that's part of it. And also correct me too on the portion of the Idaho from southern up to 60. We already have half road improvements, don't we? From U-Haul south. Yeah. I mean, if Yeah.

South from our We currently already have half the road. We own that entire road. Yeah. South of 60. We own that entire road south of 60 today. Oh, I thought so. We didn't. So, no. Everything south of 60 on Idaho. It's ours. Is us already. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh, I thought we That was a big issue. I thought of trying to get from southern up to the from the 60 to southern. Oh, yeah. Sorry. That half mile is key key economic development for you all as we move forward.

There's a street called Wanita in Mesa that's like the half mile mark where that's where you're going to get into that state land section. Got it. at some point. I personally would like to see us take it all just because that's a good point that uh Mr. Stern brought up. We've all been to AOT for different reasons and it's mood of the day and clerk of the moment and you just never know when the tide of cooperation can change. Your honor, I concur with um Bandy [snorts] and and Brian both.

I think we should go for the whole thing. Okay. Okay. We'll bring this back when? I'll bring it back probably in the next couple months. I'll get with AD. Now, kind of give them an idea what we're looking for, see what kind of agreements we can agree on, and then I'll bring those agreements back to you guys with a recommendation on uh moving forward.

And I think I got direction from you guys enough that I I can start putting some of those things together and then we can bring back some recommendations to you uh for your approval in the end. Bring in just a moment. Yep. Okay. We'll do it. All right. Thank you. Thank you Mayor. Thank you. Thank you, Mike. Presentation, discussion of case P-25-46- CUP. Nick, thank you, your honor. Good evening, city council. Nick Leto to the development services department of the city of Apache Junction.

I'll be presenting the case information for Bella Norte P2546 C. This is a proposal by Bellafloor uh to develop the northeast corner of Idaho and Junction. The proposal is to have a 210 unit threetory multif family residential rental community. Uh it is 9.31 net acres. The property is currently zoned B3 city center and because of that it requires a conditional use permit to be approved by the city council in order to authorize that land use which is what this proposal is for.

They are surrounded by other B3 properties to the northwest and south and then to the east is a another bellow floor property that was previously zoned RM2PD highdensity multiple family residential for their skyline towns project.

Uh this is its position within the general plan land use map located firmly within the the heart of the downtown area, the downtown mixed use, which is a as we've reviewed previously, a land use designation meant for higher density residential, commercial uses, mixed use uses. And so this is something that fits within that that matrix of allowable uses. And the idea being that it would be more rooftops downtown that would be able to support the local businesses.

So we find that the general plan ultimately supports having some sort of residential within this area at a higher density. Shown here is the site plan. Uh going over it, the primary access with the deceleration lane is along Idaho Road. uh as is currently planned, the idea would be that there would be they they prepared the site plan with some kind of uh future coordination with the property to the north.

So there would be a shared entrance along Idaho Road and then there is a secondary access at Junction Street to the south. There are 10 threetory buildings. Um with that there's 48 48 parking spaces. Shown here is the landscape plan that also highlights the amenities a little bit better. They have a pool and clubhouse, pickleball courts, a dog park, playground, botchi ball and cornhole areas. And those are some some amenities that they provided along with some community space, green space.

Uh something to note also is that there as part of the downtown development proposal uh we have worked with the applicant to make sure that there is a trail system along the street fronts along both Idaho and junction designated as a 10-ft trail system adjacent to the sidewalk and uh which is kind of shown here in the brown.

And as part of that, I will note part of their request has asked for a deviation regarding the art arterial street sections which normally require a meandering sidewalk and they have said they have asked that in order to fit this with this trail at this section that they would not have to detach the sidewalk. Now, notably, they are going to be tearing out and re and putting in new sidewalk as they uh build this deceleration lane.

So, not everything is existing exactly as is, but that is just a a noted request as they implement that trail system. So, here are the elevations. They've worked with staff and have previously uh submitted elevations to council members in order for review and they've they've settled on this more PBLO sty PBLO inspired style as they've noted. [snorts] Now, the applicant has complied with all the necessary public notification requirements. They've been working on this project for a bit.

So, their neighborhood meeting was actually last year, Tuesday, June 24th, 2025. At that time, uh, we had six members of our community, at least some of them were are council members, and there were questions regarding site planning, parking, the crime-free housing policy, the funding mechanisms, uh, construction timelines, the development of the adjacent properties, and so forth. And, and since then, staff have received 23 letters of support.

11 were providing the staff report, and 12 more were were received just in the last few days and were sent out as an email package. and those were from local businesses in the Apache Junction Chamber of Commerce. Now, the the this case was heard with the Planning and Zoning Commission on August 25th, just a couple weeks ago. At that time, there were six council members, one of whom was absent, and ultimately they voted 33.

Uh the motion to recommend approval did not pass because of that, and no further motion was made. And so with that tie vote and no alternative recommendation, this application has been forwarded to the city council without any kind of recommendation from the planning and zoning commission. And uh we have our public hearing on Tuesday, October 6th, which point the applicant will also be here with presentation uh to to address some of the more operational questions. But happy to help as I can.

Your honor. Yes. Well, I would think one of the first things you should do is contact them and tell them to pull out of it because if this is a 88 road situation, I don't I personally don't think we should do anything until the road is ours. And if that's 4 months down the road, what's the point of hearing it? I agree. Makes sense. Absolutely not. Nick, what was the um what the uh commissioners that voted? Three yes, three no. What were the yeses and what were the nos? What? Why?

Um sorry, let me recount. Thank you. So some of the concerns that have been noted during the planning and zoning commission meeting uh were about any kind of deviations to the standard and also the the appropriateness of uh having the apartments downtown like there still has been some concerns regarding like what develops and where and uh what other potential land uses could be.

those who were in support believe that it was a good high quality project that uh you know with the inclusion of amenities and features. It's on the higher end of of some of the more some of the proposals that we've been seeing in terms of quality of life features. Um and of course there's the general plan motives to have more of that development downtown, more rooftops.

And so those who voted in favor uh cited those motivations and those who voted against there were just questions about how this would fit here and and uh if if everything would fit right. Yes. Um so Nick the there was also they were requesting a variation on or variance on the parking. Um, [snorts] I mean, it seemed like we're getting that more and more these days that they're wanting less parking.

Um, and it seemed like when they factor in ADA parking and all, they're only like 20ome parking spaces short. Um, but you know, I and and of course they're trying to give evidence that Apache Junction has much more stringent parking standards than other cities and such. Um, you know, um, that would be an area where we're talking about 88. We're not going to have we're not going to have on street parking or anything.

So, tell me what you what the thoughts on whether or not we're supposed to give consideration to allowing a reduction in their parking requirement. Uh, when it comes to that spec Thank you, your honor and council member Heg. with that specific item. It is not strictly part of the conditional use permit request as the parking code uh has administrative um relief within the percentage that they're asking for a deviation.

However, it is still something that ultimate decision comes down to to council. Um so the with the parking situation there they are permitted to request this administrative relief deviation as long as they provide these parking studies and are able to show that that they uh address the demand. Uh they provided the study. Ultimately, it comes down to the applicability of that information.

And as you noted, like on street parking is not something that is certainly there's certainly no available on street parking on Idaho. It's like that's a busy corridor, not even a possibility. And so we have we have worked with the applicant in order to try to get the parking where we can, but they have noted that they ask for for they plan to ask for the as part of the request the the deviation in order to fit and to provide the amenities.

And we find that in terms of the trade-off of the amenities that they're providing and in terms of how the site layout is formatted and and whether or not it's going to cause any kind of spillover problems and all that context combined um that is why we uh have have come to this point with the potential of that deviation. Okay.

So the the administrator can after evaluating all the information can say you know we recommend yes that they be given that approval for for fewer parking spaces that yes that's correct. Now that hasn't happened yet or that it nothing formally happens until the case itself is approved.

It's like a okay, you know, we don't have any kind of administrative authority to promise anything when there's no actual entitlement and the entitlement will come upon council's vote should they vote to approve it. So the there's but but should the council approve the conditional use permit for the land use itself then as part of the administrative relief process site plan review we would be able to approve that. Okay, your honor. Yes.

It kind of seems like they're assuming that they'll never have 100% occupancy and based on the um rent $2,300 a month. It's it's a it's a twoerson um income to support that in most cases. You know, that's that's more than a lot of people's mortgage, I guess, in a way. So, I mean to me reducing the amount of parking that we [clears throat] as a body up here voted to make those stricter parking regulations in place, you know, we went through months of of going through that.

The audacity for somebody to come in and say, "Well, we can't meet that." Well, change your plans, change your settings. You know, instead of 210 units, make it 200. I don't know. Just a thought. Thank you. Your honor, another question. So, and this may be question for Joel. Um, you know, this and I saw somewhere I think it was in the in the town hall meeting there was a discussion about the giblet. Yeah, thank you.

Are is that I mean that seemed like that was a factor in this development or could have been. Are we looking at this project completely independent of that? Yes, there is no giplet involved in this. Okay. All right. So, we are not we're not to engage with them because they they may be coming back looking for that. We're going to we're just saying this will be evaluated at all.

And that's a council discretionary thing if you want to talk about, but we've talked about that in the past with them with other items. It wasn't just glets, but that is not what this cup is all about at all. Okay. And that is good that we clarify that for the record because it was at one point but that is not on the table. What are they asking at this point?

[clears throat and cough] I am more I am more concerned over the fact that when we've talked about this several times that you know the shared driveway and another development which hasn't even been brought to us which so you're sharing with something that doesn't exist and we had talked about the traffic patterns on on Idaho. I am not convinced that this should be before us until we know for a fact of whether we have control of that road because we've talked about turning lanes.

We've talked about, you know, this is a bad intersection to put any kind of commercial into because we don't own the road. If so much of what we want to do is depending on do we own the road, I think we need to settle that question so that everybody's on the same page and knows who has rights to do what when this development comes before us. My opinion, your honor. Yes, [clears throat] Joe.

Question based on what Bambi is saying, um it's not the developers pro problem or issue that we don't own Idaho. Could we find ourselves into any kind of legal trouble by not approving something based on us not owning a road that's not they don't care whether we own it or who owns it. Mr. Mr.

Mayor, mayor, city council, council member, um Nester, uh under a conditional use permit, the city council can u put in conditions that are reasonable and that's based on the factors and the test that you are familiar with seeing. One of those is the traffic flow. And if you don't agree with the traffic flow, you can vote no. This applicant has has a right to bring it forward to council.

they've paid their money for the application um and they are before you and now whether they get scheduled near near in time or if they agreed to some kind of continuence, you just have to be careful with the uh continuence. I mean, there's some cases out there that talk about if you continue it too far out, you now deprive them of their right to come to council and essentially try to develop their property. So, you have to be careful with that.

Um, but I think you know the discussion tonight is they're probably sensitive to that issue of the roadway ownership and they may be willing to continue it to a certain time period after the road the ownership has been dealt with. U but I would I would caution a little bit that they have a right to bring this forward and they take the chance. they roll the dice on how you vote and it's up to you on how you want to vote u in whatever the circumstances are brought to you in the moment. Yes.

So Joel, um one thing about what you just said kind of stuck out of me. So you're saying that the continuants have were maybe infringing on their rights to be able to develop. Well, they purchased land that was not zoned for what they want to develop in or the reason why they're even coming to us is because it's not zoned for what they want to develop. So, how is it at all on on the heads of this body if we decide not to approve the cup?

How is that how is that taking away their rights to develop their land when they purchase the land uh knowing that it wasn't zoned for what they want to build? All I'm saying is they have a right to come forward with ACUP and they roll the dice on how you vote and however you vote you vote.

So it's really it's there a lot of risk right the risk I mean council has a right to vote it's discretionary you have a right based on the factors the findings and one of those findings of course is the traffic flow and if you feel that is a problem then you could vote accordingly.

So it's it's when you said it's on your head, it's not when I say if you try to continue it uh many times there's some case law out there and there extreme cases uh out of California but there are ninth circuit and they went to the Supreme Court. Monterey Dunes is one of the cases where they con the council continued an applicant 22 times over a two-year period. I'm not saying you would do that.

I'm just saying there are cases that you should be aware of that you're not you don't like the the road and we don't feel like voting right now. So are you going to continue it again? I just be cautious with that and there is no continue when is the next time when is this scheduled to come back for a public hearing? October 6th. Okay. So it's has it been advertised already? Yes. Okay. So it will come back on October 6th.

you can talk to them about that, how they feel about it, and whether they're willing to wait a certain amount of time uh to see if uh the roadways would be dealt with. So, what if they decide to continue it? They can continue it. They can make a motion to continue and they may want to look to grant that.

So, if we convey the message that, hey, look, until we have complete control of Highway 88, we have no desire to start talking about developments here and then it would be up to them to continue it. Uh they can to us all they want or you could vote in the moment and say vote accordingly how you feel. They could vote no. Yes. So they could take their chance and and show up here on October 6th after reviewing this meeting.

Well, they are coming and you're talking to them and it's already advertised. Yes. But I'm saying that I I believe they're going to hear that we have we have still have issues probably regarding the traffic pattern that we do not as of this day have control of. I'm sure that will be reiterated to them through the development team and then it is up to them whether they still want us to vote on that before while we still have those concerns. And Mr.

Mayor, that's why the findings I always try to get you to do the findings and you do. That's why they're so important because if there's ever a challenge to your decision, it's on the record and if it ever goes to a superior court, the judge basically looks at the record and was it discussed? Were the findings discussed? That that is that's critical. Okay. So, I'm going to make a comment concerning the the parking in the aspect on it.

And I know we've had to deal with it with other places and that, you know, they've carried forward outside the in and around the unit. There's no room for them to be able to do outside at all, whether we own the road or [clears throat] ADOT still owns the road. So, I'm definitely very concerned about the the parking in the aspect on it as well, your honor. Yes. Can you Can we park on uh junction? No. Yes. No. No. I I don't remember. I don't know if there's signs up there or not. Dirt shoulders.

Shoulder. Dirt dirt shoulder. Okay. But I mean that's what I'm saying. Can people are they would they get a ticket or something if they park there? I mean, does the developer know that people can't park out there? Yes, we've made sure that they're aware that Okay. Junction is not for parking. It would be it junction would be categorized as a collector like one tier below arterial. Um I've seen I've seen abandoned RVs over there a few times. That's what I'm saying.

You know what's up with that, Chief? Well, still there. Mayor. Yes. I think it made I made it pretty clear way back when about the traffic. Junction Street is not a good street to come off. It's it's horrible. 88 people are going to do dumb things and get creamed doing U-turns and stuff because it was supposed to be a ramp going straight north.

Uh until we can get control of that portion of 88, I really don't like having a lot of people in an area dumping into areas that are going to cause a lot of problems for our police department and a lot of pain and injury to our citizens. Thank you. Noted. Okay. I think we all set our piece. Yeah. Very clear. Thank you. [clears throat] Discussion on crime detection prevention technology employed by the police department.

Chief Pulley, actually Joel, we actually this is a discussion with council at this point, your honor. Um, we've done our presentation from staff. Chief could we could find it from last time, but that wasn't the intent tonight. I was asked to put this on the agenda so that council could have its discussion because we had our public hearing. Okay.

and and we certainly can have chief come up and ask questions at this point, but Joel is ready also to walk through some of the items we've sent if you wanted to chat too. That's it was for you. Yes, Mr. Mayor, mayor, city council. Uh well, we had that public hearing and it was interesting and you heard from the public and um I noted a whole bunch of items that uh some individuals were very strong about and Queen Creek recently adopted uh a code and they actually amended their code.

Uh they also have a police policy on it as we do. We have a police policy. Now, a policy is not a law. That's true. But the policy does include a lot of this, but if you want to make that part of the law, you can certainly do that through an ordinance and uh and there's certain things that you can address that are already in the policy, but that can be the law. And the first one to be access shall be limited internal law enforcement representatives only.

Data collection and record retention will include time limits on the information storage. Right now, it's 30 days. Some cities have made it seven across the country. Uh restrictions on selling information and types of information collected. That was a big issue. Um and so it would be restricted to vehicle type, color, location, date, and time. Uh or whatever else you want to do on that. Agency sharing will require supervision, supervisor authorization.

Uh query access will be require the incident number and supervisor approval. Audits will be required. they are now, but you can more define how often you want to do audits and what the audits are supposed to show and that would be publicly um uh available. Also, uh use of information for law enforcement only. Personal searches will be strictly prohibited. Approval uses will be investigations and hot list alerts.

Penalties for unauthorized access or use include termination of employment, and that could certainly be in the policy. Uh it isn't right now. Uh as also and more importantly make this a crime if there's any unauthorized use intentionally done. Uh you can make it a crime and it the city council can't say oh it's a felony. You can't do that. But you can say it's a class one misdemeanor and the class one misdemeanor penalties are up to uh 180 days jail. $2,500 fine.

There's also pen penalties and interest that can be added to that. I think it's uh 78 or 82%. So, it could be a $4,200 bill that they get at the criminal court on extreme cases per violation. You could also have a three-year probation period where they're on probation. Um, also you can make them do community service. Now, that part you can't you can't say out of all all those penalties we want to have those the most maximum.

You can't do that under the law, but you can say it's a class one misdemeanor. then it's up to a judge to basically sentence someone or a prosecutor to do some kind of plea agreement. So those are the the main items. Uh if you want to change if you want to create a code, you can do that with those items. You could also uh stay the course, do nothing. That's another option. You could also terminate the flock agreement. You can do that too. So you have options and uh Mr.

Solar was very um affordable about this. So I I think um he's looking at me like he has something to say. So I will be quiet at this time. Again, um Queen Creek said it right. You don't throw the baby out with the bath water. Um let's just admit what happened. New technology got out there. We didn't have all the guardrails and we didn't have it a crime to use it. And unfortunately, our city had one employee that misused it. Uh we need to put the guard rails on.

The chief's done a good job with that. Uh with the supervision where you got to get supervisor's approval, second set of eyes on it. I think if we incorporate these bullet points, and I absolutely believe I know the chiefs of police are going to run a bill to make it a felony uh when the legislation opens up after January, but I think just as a city council now, we should make it a misdemeanor one. It has to have some teeth to it and they should be arrested.

Uh I think he did a good job with the bullet points. If we put that in, there's a lot of safeguards in there. Uh as for the 30 days, I can tell you I work with Mesa. We've been working with this for decades and it's good to be able to go back in time. If you have a homicide and you find out a week later, hey, somebody was killed here, we can try to track back and find out who was in that area and build a case. Uh, so I like the 30 days.

I know everybody's upset that they think their stuff's getting run. Everybody's looking at it. The only things that get looked at are when we have a government purpose to look at it. everything else falls off in 30 days. That's a fact. Um, if you don't believe it, anybody out in TV land, ask the police to come and take a look at the flock system. But I also want to go a step further with this. I'd like to see these bullet points.

I'd like to see a misdemeanor crime and I would like to see it incorporated all uh AJ government uh surveillance. That is flock, that is real time, that is axon, and that is drone. If any of our employees, Apache Junction employees violate any of those systems for personal use, they should be charged with a misdemeanor crime. They should be fired. There has to be teeth and strict adherence to the policies because yes, it could be abused and we need to stop that from happening.

So, I would like to see it incorporate all of our uh surveillance technology. For any employee that misuses it, they should be charged and fired. So, um I'm good with what you wrote. I thought you did a good job, Joel, on getting the bullet points out there. I just like to incorporate the rest of it in with the uh real time drone and axons. And if any other new technology comes out that we're using for surveillance, it would be incorporated into that crime automatically.

Automatically in the future. Yep. Your I have a [clears throat] question. Um Joel, I have a question on and it's about an issue I don't I'm not sure I've ever heard it answered or addressed, but it might take the chief doing this. One of the concerns I've heard is with this collection of data, it's not so [clears throat] much the police department that's doing it, but once how does Flock factor into this? Do they collect this information? We may have zero control over what Flock does with that.

And I've had people say, you know, since they're a private entity, not a government entity, we can't get a Freedom of Information Act to them. What are do we have asurances that they won't use this in this tech the the data inappropriately? I guess that's that's my concern with this. Yeah, I asked the chief to come up to address that because he has been asked that many times and he knows the answers to those administrative questions. Good evening, mayor, members of council.

Um on September 11th, a new law went into place here in the state of Arizona. It is against the law for any of these tech companies to sell that data. It is our data. We own it. We have it. And yeah, is it housed in in the in a cloud? It is. It's housed in Amazon government cloud just like um thousands and thousands of other pieces of data from all over the place. It's a very secure thing. It's our data.

Um, and like I said on September, it was actually September 12th, right, is when that new law went into place. Um, that was one part of legislation we were able to get through this year. Again, we're I I support everything Councilman Solar said, we are, as Arizona chiefs trying to push the legislation to make it a felony.

Um, we know that with this great amount of data and it comes a lot of responsibility and we want to make sure we assure you as well as the residents that it's being used appropriately. Do you feel comfortable that Flock understands with this new law that they're they do not and cannot be putting that data out there? Absolutely. It it's in our contract as well. We could sue them as a city if they were to breach that contract.

It it is, you know, these tech companies, they they know better than that. We've been using bodywn camera video for decade that is housed in a cloud as well. And that has a lot more sensitive information than license plates that are out there. Um it is it is bodywn camera is the exact same thing housed in the exact same place and we don't want to get rid of body warn cameras either. Um a lot of our video cameras they're housed in in a cloud.

A lot of our different data bases are housed in clouds. Um our CAD RMS which is our computer AED dispatch our records management system. All of these things we we have to have some trust in these tech companies. They and and I you know it's it is with their business and it is their business model. It's in our contract and it's in uh and it's state law now. Okay. Big cloud. It is a big cloud. That's why we have data sessions. Go ahead.

Um, Chief, there was an email that went out um regarding the upgrading of individual flock cameras and and the individual cameras capabilities as they are right now and that they can just hit a couple buttons and reprogram that camera from a remote source. Is that possible? one and two, are you comfortable with um any changes that you wish to make in the abilities of any of the cameras have to come to the council for approval?

Um as far as the technology, the cameras we have do not have that capability right now and they cannot be reprogrammed to do that. It would have to be a complete change out of the camera. Correct. That's yes, that's what we've been told. I believe them. It's a license plate reader. It it takes a picture of the back of a vehicle and that's what it does. Um, as far as your other question, can you explain that a little bit better to me?

So, if you know, uh, Flock came to the department and said, "Hey, we have these new cameras that can do this." Um, it it now takes not just the back of the the vehicle, but also the entire side of the camera or the vehicle. And it can take if you, you know, put this one in, it can also shoot the vehicle coming and going. I don't ever want to see that. I mean, because we don't want that facial recognition, you know, that's what everybody's so concerned about.

But um that's called photo radar, right? A lot of different things, right? You know, so going through my head, you know, Johnny, and the one email reply was, "We have not paid for nor do we currently have flock free form in our contract with flock." If this department ever decided that they wanted to go with free form, what I'm asking is I would like to see that come to the council for approval versus Yeah, sure. We'll go with that. Yeah.

Any any type of upgrade or anything, we would come to the council for sure. Right now, we have no anticipation of changing anything new with Flock. Just using continuing to use the cameras that we have now. Yes, Chief. We still looking into removing them from the rural areas. They've been removed. Been removed. Yes. Are we looking at more along the lines of maybe the freeway entrances and exits and then maybe some of the main thorough ways through the city? Uh so where 20 25 we're at right now?

We're at 30 cameras. 30 cameras and they're as far as we're concerned that's that's it. Correct. And now with those 30 cameras, um, did we just relocate the ones in rural areas or now we're looking at 27 or 26 or 25? Are we less than 30? Yeah, we're we are less than 30 now. We had we've had 15 cameras damaged over the last several months. Um, several of those cameras we have not replaced.

So, we're using some of the cameras that we've moved to replace those cameras in different areas and and some of the cameras are going to be put more on the the entrance exits to the freeways and in the main thorough affairs like you said, mayor. Yes. On that note, I want to tell everybody out in TV land that's government property. [clears throat] There's no room for vigilanteism. You're not a hero. If you damage these things, we are going to investigate.

We are going to try our best to find you. And we do when we do, we are going to charge you and you're going to pay substantial fines, possibly do jail time. It is not a game. It's not a joke. It's a felony crime. And if you want that on your your record and you get caught doing this, it will be on your record.

I know some people want to think that this is like a hero that goes out and runs over government property, but there's no room in America for vigilanteism, and that's exactly what this is there. You're not a hero. You're a criminal, and you'll be treated as such if we find you. I just want you to understand that. And that's coming from a 37-year police officer. Anyone [clears throat] else? Thank you. Thank you. Okay, I will [clears throat] now adjourn this meeting. Thank you.