Flagstaff Council Unanimously Advances Three City Housing Sites; Shark Bite and Thorp & Aztec Placed on Hold Pending Infrastructure Coordination

All right, we are ready to get started. Yeah, I'm serious about this. We're getting started. Today is Tuesday, September 9th, 2025 and a hush came over the crowd. Yeah, it simmer down.

Calling this meeting to order and giving notice to the council and the general public that at this meeting the city council may vote to go into executive session which will not be open to the public for discussion and consultation with the city's attorneys for legal advice on any item listed on the following agenda. Can we have a roll call? Mayor Daget here. Vice Mayor here. Council member Alen here. Council member Garcia here. Council member House here. Council member Matthews here.

Council member Spence here. Thank you. Uh, Council Member Alen, would you lead us in the pledge of allegiance? You stand as you're able. United States of America to the stands for all. Thank you, Madame Mayor. The mission of the city of Flagstaff is to protect and enhance the quality of life for all. Thank you, mayor. The Flagstaff City Council humbly acknowledges the ancestral land homelands of this area's indigenous nations and original stewards.

These lands still inhabited by native descendants border mountains sacred to indigenous peoples. We honor them, their legacy, their traditions, and their continued contributions. We celebrate their past, present, and future and future generations who will forever know this place as home. Thank you. All right. First up, we have open call to the public. And this enables the public to address the council about anything that is not on today's agenda.

And because it won't be something that is on our agenda, we can't answer questions or ask you questions or um so forth, you have three minutes. There is a clock right here that will tell you when your time is up. Amelia Mason Good afternoon, Madame Mayor, Council. My name is Ameilia Mason. I'm with the Flagstaff Public Library, and I'm here today to let you know about library card signup month, which is September.

Um, so the Flagstaff libraries have over 28,000 card holders, and that's more than 37% of our population who holds a library card. However, every September, we try to help increase that number to get more and more people into our libraries and to promote literacy and learning. And part of what we're doing this year, we're doing two different programs. One is our library card punch card, which anyone can get by, you can stop by the library.

I've also left several of these on the counter in the back or the table in the back. Um, you check out a you get your card, check out a book or any item. Doesn't have to be a book. Get something from the Library of Things. Uh, you read that book or use that item and get punches along the bottom. Turn it in at the library by the end of the month and we enter everyone in to a raffle for prizes that we have. Um, this is at least our second, maybe our third year of doing that.

Um, but this year we're very excited because we're doing a new um thing. This is a map of local businesses that have agreed to partner with us for this month where if someone comes in and shows their library card, they then get to a discount, a free item with purchase, a sticker, whatever the business can afford to do.

We're really proud to be partnering with these local businesses because it lets people it gives people another reason to get a library card and it also encourages them to visit these local businesses. Um, I've also left some of these maps in the back and the information is available on our socials as well. Um, the timer's not going, so I'm going to assume I have a little more time.

And I'm just going to give you some quick fun stats about our summer reading program that's uh we just finished in end of July this year. And this year we had 1,700 people uh participate, 11,000 kids and more than 600 adults. Over 2.2 2 million minutes were read during this summer and we passed out over 1500 prizes, held over a hund no held 150 events and gave away 725 free books.

So we're always proud of the work that our youth and adult services do and just wanted to share some of that information with you today. Thank you so much. Thank you. and Yay! Public Library. [Applause] All right, next up, Mary Williams. I had something to say on one of the agenda items. Oh, okay. Jenny Neman. Good afternoon, Mayor and Council. I am Jenny Neman, climate action section director, and today I'm here to talk about our carbon neutrality plan update.

Uh we are going to be hosting three open houses in fall in the fall and we would like to invite you as well as our Flagstaff community members to come to those open houses. As we discussed in May, this year's update to the carbon neutrality plan is really to make this document better. It's to make it more accessible, more used by the public um and and more transparent in a lot of ways. at these open houses.

Um, we're going to be talking about how this plan is used and where people want to see climate action. As a reminder, this update will not revise our climate action goals or our carbon neutrality plan goals or the strategies and how we get there. But what we want to talk to the community about is how we're taking climate action, where they want to see climate action in their neighborhoods, and how they want to partner with us. So, we've got three open houses in the next month.

The first is next Saturday, September 20th, at the Murdoch Center at 10 a.m. The next is online, September 25th at noon. And the final one is October 1st from 4:30 to 7:00 p.m. at the East Flagstaff Library. Um, I've got little flyers and we'll follow up with an email. But um mostly we just wanted to invite you and the public there and we're excited to uh talk to the community about how we're taking climate action and how they want to see climate action show up in their neighborhoods. Thank you.

All right, we're moving down to proclamations and we have a proclamation for IT professionals day. So if you would all come down and join us on the deis, I'll read the proclamation. We'll take a photo and then if one of you would like to speak, um please feel free to do so. Are we ready? Information technology IT professionals play a critical role in ensuring the efficient and secure operation of modern government services.

The IT professionals of the city of Flagstaff Who can we talk to about that? The IT professionals of the city of Flagstaff IT division provide vital support to all city departments by maintaining secure, reliable, and accessible systems that enable the delivery of highquality public services.

These dedicated individuals work tirelessly to support enduser devices, applications, communication networks, and data systems, ensuring the city staff have the tools they need to serve the Flagstaff community effectively. IT professionals are essential to protecting sensitive data, responding to technical challenges, implementing innovative solutions, and continuously improving digital infrastructure.

Their behindthe-scenes contributions often go unrecognized, yet their impact is felt daily across every level of city operations. Now, therefore, I, Mayor Becky Daget, mayor of the city of Flagstaff, Arizona, do encourage all employees and residents to recognize and thank our IT professionals for their invaluable contributions to the success and resilience of our city operations. I do hereby proclaim next Tuesday, September 16th, as IT Professionals Day. And then we get the photo. Sure.

I'll say something quick. Uh, thank you, Mayor, Vice Mayor, Council. Um, you know, I like to think of every day as IT professionals day because the day we're not here is the day none of y'all can do your jobs. Um, so we're here to, you know, fix your computers, your smartphone, your email. Uh, we're here to explain for the hundth time that the cloud isn't some magical place that your files just float up into or that uh AI isn't here to take over the world and enslave us all. At least uh not yet.

Um, but you know, when when there's a 911 call, um, you know, the real heroes are the ones that respond to that call, but behind those heroes is an IT professional who makes sure that that call can come through and that that officer knows where to go.

Uh when we had the museum fire several years ago, the real heroes were there to protect our families in our homes, but there were IT professionals right there ensuring that there was proper communication and information flowing to the incident command post. You know, we're not the real heroes of the organization, but we're there to help support. We're there to help serve those heroes and city staff to have the tools that they need to do their job well.

Um in it, we say that our purpose is to provide the secure tools to make your job easier tomorrow than it was today. and I hope uh we've lived up to that motto this last year. Um so on behalf of the IT division and all IT professionals uh thank you for this recognition. We really appreciate it and it means a lot to us. Thank you. Okay, next up we have review of draft agenda for the September 16th, 2025 city council meeting. Hopefully you all have had the opportunity to take a look at it.

Do you have any questions or comments? All right. All right. Moving down to item number seven. Presentation and discussion of cityowned land for housing. I can't tell you how much I really wanted the library to announce if we filled our punch cards, we got personal pan pizzas from um like the reading challenges when we were kids, but that's an awesome program. I don't have a drawing at the end of this presentation, just a heads up. Mayor and Council Sarah Dar.

I have the pleasure of serving as a housing director um for this organization. And today the item um is presentation and discussion of city owned land for housing. Excuse me. Go over our purpose and outline for this afternoon. We're going to review the city-owned land that is designated for housing, provide you with some staff recommendations, and then with the goal of receiving feedback and direction from you.

The outline of the presentation is some background and past projects, what our current assets and opportunities are, staff recommendations, and this feels redundant, but council feedback and direction. Um, I gave the same presentation to the housing commission a few weeks ago um, for their review and feedback. And while I am the one standing before you, I stand surrounded by a crowd of others.

I would not be here without the numerous other staff that I have consulted that have touched this project. overall um housing staff, which probably doesn't need to be said, but housing staff um real estate planning and development services, pros, engineering. Um this is I have the pleasure of standing up here this evening, but I am no means by myself. You just can't see them right behind me. What can we do? What can't we do as a municipality? We live in Arizona.

Um, which means we cannot require others to build affordable units. And this is not just specific to Arizona, but we cannot control or dictate the market. What can we do? We can incentivize developers to include affordable units. And we can control how city-owned land that is not restricted in some way is utilized. And what do I mean by not restricted in some way? Um, while the city does own um plenty of land around the community, it has not just been purchased for fun.

It's typically purchased with a specific use in mind, with a specific funding source utilized, etc. And so, as I'm going through parcels and in your head, you think, what about? Um, if it's not in here, um, it means that there's another use or purpose or something restricting that piece of property. Um, we do, um, acknowledge parcels where there's an opportunity for partnerships.

I'll talk about that in a minute, but other restrictions could be source of funding like turf funding, um, certain parklands etc. Options for city-owned land. Um, this is the it's not an abbreviated list, it's a simplified list. There are models underneath each of these. Um but for simplicity these are the basic tools with other iterations within them. We can hold city- owned land. We can sell it. We can sell with conditions. We can lease. We can lease with conditions.

Um we also have the opportunity to initiate development on our own property as well. Key to each and every one of these is partnerships and funding use considerations for housing. Every time we look at our land inventory and we talk about what the opportunities can be, what the opportunities could be, etc., we look at several critical things as we take those pieces into consideration. This is not a comprehensive list. It's a starting place.

Um, we look at the value, um, access, flood plane, infrastructure, resources, and slope. um what type of funding sources would be available if this were to be utilized for um an affordable housing purpose, proximity to transit and services. What other popular popular what other possible uses might there be? Each piece of land is unique. So, of course, each one comes with different considerations, but this is our starting place when we um consider land for development. Is this a new model?

It's not a new model. What I'm going to talk about this afternoon is I'm going to give you an overview of a sampling of the times that we have utilized city-owned land for housing in the past to frame it not only for you but for the community as well. Um, the housing authority was first established in 1942 and the first development of city-owned land took place in 1952. Um, before that it was they were called housing coupons at the time, but they're called vouchers now.

And so I'm not going to go back to 1952. I promise. We're going to start in the 90s, which feels like yesterday, but then I look at the calendar and it's not. So in the '9s um one of the city's first foray into a more modern um structure of wow words uh a more modern structure and of land structure of land use for housing is used to be called Mountainside Village now called Cedar Crest. This was purchased in 1994. Um, I'm sorry.

The developer purchased it in 1994, and in 1996, constructed our first low-income housing tax credit project in the community. Low-income housing tax credit is a funding source, which is actually an IRS program where credits are awarded to each state based on a formula. Developers can apply for those credits. they get sold to major investors which creates upfront development capital for the building of rental housing.

Um program was established in the 80s by the Reagan administration and is the most prolific affordable housing production program within the country. Um this land was sold with affordability requirements. There's 81 units and they had a 30-year commitment starting in 1996, but in 2015, the um a different developer applied for a purchase rehab and they up re-uped the 30-year commitment at that point in time.

We do carry uh seller carry a mortgage on this um which they still are paying interest on, etc. and all units must serve 60% area median income and below. Give you a little orientation on the map. Isabel Street is the street running north and south up and down. Um, and you're going to see a picture similar to this because there is a cluster of city-owned land in this area that has been used for other purposes.

Immediately adjacent is a domestic violence shelter and some traition transitional housing. um for transitional housing, which has turned into permanent housing. Um we usually don't discuss the name of this location, just acknowledge that it's there. And that was previously city-owned land as well. In 2002, the city issued an RFP for development known as Rio Homes um and entered into a development agreement with a public private partnership in 2003.

We sold the land for both financial consideration and the provision of permanently affordable units. The proceeds of this sale of property was used to purchase additional properties for housing purposes. There's 153 units in the development overall with a commitment from the developer to create 30 permanently affordable units. This was the first permanent affordability in Arizona. We learned a lot. Um, I was not the one who came up with this original concept.

I'm the one who has been implementing it and adapting it and amending it as we learn our lessons over time. We did not have a model to follow. So, we created raw documents um and and it's been a minute since we did this and in that intervening time we learned a lot of lessons. This property was actually identified for housing use in 1996 and the city waited until adjacent development was taking place in order to be able to extend infrastructure and make it usable for development.

At the same time, an RFP was published in 2002 with the DA resulting in 2004 for a public private partnership for a piece of property that is between High Country Trail and I17. It is a sliver. It has um high power power lines that cut across it. It's on a rock shelf. Um it was a difficult piece to develop. We partnered with um a low-income housing tax credit developer on this property.

Again, the land was sold both for financial consideration and the provision of LITC low-income housing tax credit units. Proceeds from the sale again utilized as seed funding for the purchase of other property in the future. There are a total of 180 affordable rental units within this area. It was developed as three separate projects. You see them listed with their unit totals there.

High Country Estates was the last to be developed and it was developed under the LITC program as a tenant lease purchase. So eventually um renters there will have the opportunity to purchase those units. The city does not have any control over LITC other than what we were able to put in the afford in the the development agreement. Um which is okay because the LITC compliance is much more stringent than anything we'd be able to do. We don't mind being the small hammer in that box.

years ago, um we started using remnants left from the Butler widening project to construct smaller type units. Uh one on the bottom, you see the starter homes on the top. All of these were done in partnership with um Habitat for Humanity. There are two land trust program homes along the corridor Butler corridor with 99year leases and then the first two starter homes under Habitat starter home model which I think most of you were at the ribbon cutting not that long ago.

I was going to put a year on it but I don't dare do that. Um, and so as we have worked through using up remnant parcels, we're seeing results along the Butler corridor. Across the street from the Hal Jensen Recreation Center and the very first project I talked about, Timber Trails, is Isabelle Holmes. Um, this land was purchased with community development block grant money.

blighted structures were demolished and it has ultimately resulted in n in 99 99 year leases under 16 land trust program homes. The first 10 homes were built by love and contracting and the last six by Habitat for Humanity. Um this is it was a a long process. We saved money to be able to be order be able to purchase it and we did multi-year allocations in order to be able to do that.

Then we had to save to do the remediation and demolishing of the buildings that were on there and then the resulting construction which was interrupted by the great recession. Today these homes are all sold and occupied. Another model that we've utilized was a land trade with a private developer which resulted in a land trust u program home within a sixunit market rate project. The piece of property you see highlighted in red here. Butler is the street on top.

Old Lone Tree is the piece you see on the right hand side. The developer actually owned the lot immediately south of the the red circle and was able by trading with us was able to combine those two lots which was able to result in six units instead of two. Um the orientation change to face Butler, one you're more familiar with as it's newer. Uh Woodshshire on Butler. The city issued an RFP to sell a remnant parcel with an obligation of building five permanently affordable units.

The property was sold to the developer of adjacent 50 unit condo project with five permanently affordable units resulting within there. Last one. Um, and again, this isn't fully comprehensive, but it is a listing of the different models we've utilized. Uh, this piece, uh, used to be referred to as Isabel South. It's now called Isabel Street Apartments Council.

In the last several months, you approved a long-term lease with Housing Solutions of Northern Arizona to allow the construction of 11 three-bedroom rental units which will be targeted to households experiencing homelessness or those who have a history of domestic violence or sexual assault. Um, I believe you have recently been invited, as in yesterday or the day before, to a groundbreaking celebration on Wednesday, September 24th at 2 p.m.

So, this one is um in process and we're excited to see the construction happen here. You're going to hear me talk about shared uses a couple times. This is the first one is there's a community garden on this piece. I can't think of a better shared use than community gardens and housing together.

And so, um, community gardens went on the community garden went onto this piece years ago with an understanding with, um, sustainability that that garden will be moved at some point in time due to the eventual construction of housing on the site.

I know that housing solutions is or has recently I don't remember it was either last week or it's next week meeting with sustainability to talk about where that garden goes um and how that move will take place doing the best to avoid shortening growing seasons etc. Um it's a very very complimentary use. All right that's enough on what we've done in the past. You can see there's a number of different iterations that we've utilized in order to accomplish um housing units within the community.

I'm next going to cover nine sites. Seven of them are vacant. Two are currently utilized. I'm going to include um the size, the zoning, the considerations. Um, as we went through these sites and created staff recommendations for you to consider, we took into account 10-year housing or 10-year plan goals and different sight specific opportunities as well as staffing capacity in reality and also a review of last um opportunity sites.

The recommendations are going to come to you in the following categories. The first one will be hold more work required. I'll explain what that work is when we get to those. um hold for a nonprofit opportunity or a city initiated project. These are going to be on much smaller parcels and then a recommendation to move forward within the 10-year housing plan. Um these are the these are the goals and objectives that came into focus as we reviewed um the city-owned parcels for development.

Um, one is ensuring affordable housing as part of every Flagstaff neighborhood to work to address disperate impact as part of any development or redevelopment. Um, encourage a diversity of housing options in all neighborhoods, understanding exclusive communities are incompatible with the city of Flagstaff missions to protect and enhance the quality of life for all. Three, create three was create a dedicated funding source for affordable housing in Flagstaff.

And then the real one, because that's why we're here, is prioritize development of city-owned, city of Flagstaff owned land designated for affordable housing and evaluate other city- owned parcels for affordable and mixed income housing. I wanted you to be aware that there is a process, a staff process in place that when any property is being considered for use or disposal, there is a process for housing staff to weigh in on that.

Um, a good example is the piece of property at 106 Butler that um, Bryce with real estate brought to you recently. We had lots of discussions on if it could be utilized for housing, how could it be utilized for housing? It's in the flood plane. Do we build a house on stilts? Do we put it to RFP? So, that process is in place. So, as things come forward and if there are opportunities for partnership, um, the organization is paying attention to those.

There are plenty of parcels that this city owns that are not compatible with a housing use. There are some that are and as you hear over and over for me is I love the word and instead of the word or. Um Rebecca Sers and I have an excellent relationship of parks and housing. If there are places where it makes sense to use a piece of something they're bringing forward contiguous to residential development. We've had that conversation many times. We're going to start big.

Um, this one is commonly known as the shark bite. Um, it's along John Wesley Powell. Um, the zoning is manufactured housing. This was the city obtained this um from a settlement with Pine Canyon. This was Pine Canyon's contribution, original contribution to affordable housing. The original DA commits to 125 units of affordable housing. Um, it was then deed to the city many years later. We received it in 2007.

Um, it is still zone manufactured housing and there are infrastructure challenges with this site. Uh, namely um, gravity sewer. It cannot be gravity sewered by itself. It has to be a gravity sewer to an adjoining property. Um, and additionally the topography. This bottom map right here shows you the topography. Um, it is sloping down into the canyon right there. Is it developable? Developable? Yes, it is. But there are topography and resource challenges on this property.

Um, we continue to explore possible shared use with fire. Um, as fire has identified, this area is an ideal location for a fire station and housing has said, let's see what we can figure out, knowing that there needs to be some type of compensation to housing um for use of the property in that way. That doesn't have to be cash. It could be infrastructure installation. It could be something along those lines.

um but working to be a good partner within the organization looking at different compatible uses for this. Um it is part of the John Wesley Pal specific area plan boundaries and as that continues to move forward we're paying particular piece to our attention to our piece here. We want to further coordinate timing with the surrounding development and extension of John Wesley Powell. And with that our recommendation on this one is hold. There's more work required. we need more information.

Um, how can it best work to be incorporated into the specific area plan, etc. You'll see on slides moving forward, the vast bulk of them have their last opportunity site numbers identified. These were identified as opportunity sites within the last study. Go ahead, Council Member Sarah. Um, regarding the gravity sewer lines, I know we had a pretty good discussion about it uh, several months ago on a private development.

Um, and I had remembered or understood that um, we're at a point where we have realized that um, we we need to start considering pumped sewer lines. and I thought we were moving. I know this is probably not for you to answer, but maybe water services, but um so it seems like that can be mitigated because we're already having those discussions. Mayor, Council Member Matthews, thank you. Yes, and I have pressurized lines written down. I just didn't say it.

Um yes, and it is a a consideration for this site. It always has been. The challenges right now is that there are not sewer lines running adjacent to the property either. So yes, we have we would have the ability to do a pressurized line. Um but there's nothing to connect it to yet. And so as John Wesley Powell is extended, as further development is extended, um that will become more of a realistic option. Thank you for the question. I appreciate it. Council member Garcia.

Thank you, Madame Mayor. I have a kind of a followup to Council Member Matthews question on that one. Um, so help me understand what you're saying about um, potentially adjoining properties being able to help us out. Are is are you saying that in order to tie into the utilities, we would have to have the utilities structured next to us first? Potentially. Yes. Or sewer lines extended in installation of infrastructure as as you are all aware quite expensive.

um housing doesn't have a lot of money. Um and so yes, we're looking to share in those expenses or to be able to identify funding sources to do so or as development happens further down along the corridor. Um those opportunities can be identified within the specific plan. Thank you. That makes sense why you would have it on hold for those purposes. Um, another question maybe too on um the usable usability of this plot of land because of of the slopes.

Uh, when it was when when they deemed it 125 mobile home units, uh, did they consider that? In other words, is it feasible to put that on the property or um, was that a a a hope and then realization is that we can't? When Pine Canyon did the original development agreement, I think I was still in high school and so I can't answer your first part of your question. What I can tell you is that we have done internally and I say we broadly as if I had much to do with it.

Um, other divisions here within the city where I had the opportunity to participate have done some site planning on this piece and the simple answer to that is yes, not only 125 but more. I was thinking about that when you think about uh you know per acre my hope was for for quite a bit more. So I'm glad that you guys are looking in that direction and I appreciate your presentation up to now Sarah. Thank you. Thank you. Council member Spence. Thank you Mayor.

Um can you give us the origin of the nickname Sharkbite? I can try. It is a bite. The property surrounding it is has been historically owned by one entity and so it's kind of a bite out of that piece. That is what I understand. Um other than that we it's been called the shark bite. And related to that, um, it it seems like Pine, you you mentioned that Pine Canyon designated this 27 acres as their quote unquote contribution to affordable housing, but it's, I'll use the term ghetto.

Um, it's isolated from the rest of Pine Canyon, which is more upscale development. So, I think I've heard you say in the past that your goal is to have affordable housing mixed in with all other uh classes of housing so that uh people living in affordable housing are not uh as identified or not segregated. Um I won't use the term red line.

Um, so can you explain a little bit about how Pine Canyon got away with this or alternatively how the city came up with their current with your current and our current um model of having affordable housing units next to unaffordable Mayor Council Member Spence, this development agreement was done in the mid 90s. Philosophies were different at that point in time.

um and Pine Canyon designated this piece and it was originally their responsibility to create the housing through various um legal actions. Uh it came to us as part of a lawsuit settlement and so it came to us at that point in time. The 125 units has stayed as what as what was originally mentioned within the DA. Of course, our goal would be to maximize that. Um all 27 acres do not have to be developed as lowincome units.

It would be our intent um when this comes forward possibly after I retire that um different income it could be a mixed income development. We've explored um different models that could scatter units back into surrounding areas. development is happening on the pieces adjacent to it as well and we're always seeking opportunities to be able to um integrate where we can. I would be very surprised to see all 27 acres developed as strictly um capital A affordable housing.

I think mixed income projects make more sense. They make for stronger neighborhoods, etc. Thank you. That's very helpful. You may proceed. Thank you. Um, the next piece of property is at Thorp and Aztec. Aztec is this street on the right hand side. Thorp is on the bottom. Clark Homes is located over in this area right here. This is a multi-use field um utilized by pros and um I want to point out right away that Clark homes is while we fee manage that property, it is not a city-owned property.

It is managed by the housing authority on behalf of the Flagstaff Housing Corporation. And so it has a reversionary clause where it would come back to the city. I I think we've got another 20 years or so on that reversionary clause. So, important to think about the fact that we don't own the adjacent property. Quite often the assumption is that we do. The ball fields are on this this little green patch down here on the right hand side is one of the little league fields or baseball fields.

Um it's about four acres, the back half that you see outlined in blue. Um, this has been a long-standing conversation with with pros, with city council, etc. over the years. This was actually the original location for Clerk Holmes, which fun fact, that's where my grandparents moved in the 40s when they came to town, um, was into units that are in the area outlined by blue. The purple circle that's a little hard to see is an existing Head Start building through an agreement with Nikk.

Um, Head Starts located next to low-income housing are perfect. Um, shared uses, and you'll see that pop up a couple times when we get into talking about our housing authority properties. The vacant portion is available for use for affordable housing. Um, utilities need to be extended up Aztec Street, which is a significant expense. Um, as the drive going into Clark Homes is not sufficient to support traffic, um, to support the number of units that could be developed on the back piece of it.

Um the parcel would need to be divided separately from the soccer field and there are some there are some things that require more work. Um one of those things is ordinance number 425 from 1957 which was discussed heavily by council during the um discussion of the use of the old public works yard. Um, and um, there is a piece I'm going to use my mouse.

This area right here when Aztec was realigned, it biseected a piece of property that was dedicated to the city for use of a park by the federal government. It is a very narrow strip. We can't cross it. We can't build on it. We can't have an easement across it without going through a process that involves um state parks and the federal government as well. Is it doable? Absolutely, it's doable.

We have to dedicate land of the same area in another location and go through a process both state and federally to do so. Is it something that can be done? It can be done. Is it something that has been done? Not yet. And so this recommend site recommendation for this one is to hold more work required and it's mainly that easement and then a discussion um concerning ordinance number 425 before I before I go on any questions. Excellent. Thank you so much.

You'll see that this one also has a last opportunity site number. The next one does not. This parcel does not have a last opportunity site number because it is so small and there are two of these in this presentation. They're designated for housing use, but they are small. This is along West Street and Linda Vista. The big building you see on the right hand side is Cedar Safeway. The green is Buffalo Park. This is the wedge where all of the storm water activities are taking place.

Um while it is 1.4 4 acres. Um, less than an acre is actually usable site usable site as that there are access to the Cedar Safeway shopping center and this complex in the back that cross the property. Our recommendation on this is to hold for either a possible nonprofit opportunity or a city initiated project. Why did we pick those words? Well, we picked those words because it's not big enough to pencil really for another funding source.

um low-income housing tax credit thresholds cannot be met on a piece of property that's small. Um it's really going to be something that is a niche opportunity either by um the city deciding to put um development on it, going ahead to release it for an RFP.

um because it is so small and the it's going to be difficult to identify a funding source to create affordable housing on this site, we typically hold these until we become aware of a viable funding source rather than putting it out and not getting responses. And so our staff recommendation for this one is to hold. Um go ahead. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor Sarah. Uh can you can you explain the logic behind that a little bit more? Um specifically not putting it out there.

Uh what's the downside of it of a proposal not coming in? Mayor, Council Member Alen, the the time and energy and staff work that goes into something without a viable response. Can you paint a picture of that a little bit more? Um, in in very general terms, uh, are we talking like a 10-page document? Are we talking site visits? Uh, all sorts of stuff. U, we are. Yes, absolutely. For full procurement. Um, I offer to you an example of um some of the habitat pieces along Butler.

until there was an entity ready to develop or had funding sources identified. We held um a one-unit development uh development one construction of one unit is very different than others. The site capacity on this is going to be low. There is an access easement that runs across the northern part of it etc. Um, and it is quite common for our local housing nonprofits to approach us and say, "Hey, so and so has a funding source. It's this x amount of money. It's a one-time thing.

What do you guys got?" So, holding this for an opportunity to be able to allow us to be a responsive partner to a unique funding source is where this recommendation is coming from. So, it's more valuable to keep our powder dry, I suppose, in an instance like this. the the the origin of my question was was uh coming out of a spirit of why would we limit ourselves. Uh but obviously um I I appreciate the answer.

We up here never fully understand or appreciate how much staff work goes into everything that happens within the city. Um so I'm really grateful for the clarification. Thank you. We also hope by including or city initiated project means that we could figure something out and put it out at that point in time if we identified a viable partner or a selection of viable partners council member Matthews. Thank you mayor.

So um and you mentioned this um in your response a few minutes ago about u the habitat homes. That was what I was um thinking of when I look at this um piece of property. I've I've driven by it multiple times for different reasons. Um and I do remember the easement that we put on there uh on the north end of the property. Um I thought was temporary for those residents that back up into it to have access to their property while we were fixing uh the streets and the flood mitigation.

Um, so I don't know if that was a permanent easement or that was just temporary to allow them, but um is is the normal course of of business where um if Habitat um for instance um I know they're busy building their 10 plus homes out by Timber Skies, but if a nonprofit um you know had a project, they could just approach the city and say, "Hey, um you know, we'd like to put up a couple of tiny homes or something similar. Um, and we could go into negotiations at that point.

Mayor, Council Member Matthews, my understanding from consulting with real estate is that that access easement um is not only temporary, but it is also in line with where access to the site would make sense as well. And so we could create access for that um that would respect both the access easement and allow access to the site. So those two things could line up easily. And your second question, yes.

And so quite often an entity will come in and say, "Hey, what about a partnership?" We would then embark on a procurement process at that point in time. Vice Mayor, thank you. And thank you for the information so far. I guess I'm wondering to kind of bring it home. How do our partners know about all of this land? Are we making it available to them so that they know, okay, we I've got 0.91 usable ac um acres on this parcel and I have an idea and now I'm going to go to Sarah and try and pitch it.

Um how do they know about all of this besides this presentation? they know. Um we we we meet with them um quite often on a number of things and they don't always know that has never stopped them from asking um and so it's what what do you have? Sometimes they come in the door and being like hey I watched your presentation on September 9th and I saw this and what do you think? Sometimes it's we have an opportunity. Do you have a way you could partner with us? Is there something that may work?

um those things have happened organically over the years. Um and the smaller parcels such as this one make sense to be able to respond to those opportunities, especially to support our nonprofits in the community that can't always um undertake a much larger development. Thank you. That's it for right this second. All right. Thank you for the questions. I really appreciate the discussion. Um, I never know how much information to share, how much of the story to tell.

I could have turned this into four hours, but I knew nobody wanted to do that. The next piece also falls into the hold for a possible opportunity in the future. This is along Butler and Olyri. Ori is the street that comes down from the top and curves. I said Butler, I meant Lone Tree. Lone Tree is the piece um right here. And while when you map it and you look at it, it's almost five acres.

Um really about a third of an acre is actually buildable due to flood plane, due to slope, due to the fact that these parcels are bisected by um roadways etc. And so the map on the bottom shows um flood plane. Um so we do share this site with a community garden. The community garden is located down here um where water flows which happy for a garden. Um and the zoning is public facilities with it.

When the um community garden was putting in a water line, pulling it across Olyri in order to provide water for the community garden, we were provided the opportunity to pay to upsize that line that could eventually support housing development. And Southside Plan identifies this site within it as a as a housing opportunity. There would be no need to relocate a community garden on this site. The community garden could stay where it is. There was a it wasn't even a formal concept plan.

It was a concept drawings of what could fit on here. Um it was up to eight cottage style homes that could be supported in the buildable area which is the piece that runs along Oly. Coming much down closer to Lone Tree, we run into traffic implications etc. And so our recommendation on this one is hold. It's a third of an acre. Um, is it buildable? It is buildable. We already have water to the site. It is adjacent to the Southside neighborhood. There's a multifamily use across the street.

It makes sense for housing here. Um, and and we've had developers approach us over and over about you guys have about five acres and like yes, about a third of it is buildable. So, oh, okay. And so, um, this is a remnant parcel left over from loan tree realignment and widening. All right. Thank you. Thank you. Now, on to staff recommendations that are a little bit different. This piece is located at 180 in Schulz Pass. It's just a little over three acres.

The zoning is medium density residential and housing funds were used for the purchase of this property and to bring utilities to the site. It is bisected by a regional gas line. Um, a little bit of orientation. This is 180. This is Schultz Pass. You see that this map actually extends up into here. And these are not just random lines, but the city municipal boundaries, city limits are right along this back line.

So, it literally backs county land or land that is in the county, not owned by the county. It's privately owned. On the bottom here is a concept drawing from a number of years ago. You notice this giant gap in the middle. That is where that regional gas line runs. We are able to pave over the top of a regional gas line. We are not able to build over the top of a regional gas line. It can be parking. It can be green space. It cannot be housing.

And so this concept plan is not uh a a dictatorial thing in any way, shape or form. It is an example of what could be utilized uh what the site could be utilized for. It is identified as a last opportunity site. This was part of a scattered sites project back in 2017. And our staff recommendation for this one is to issue a solicitation prioritizing development of housing units for the local workforce. Why, Sarah, is that so broad?

Well, it's so broad because we would like to see what the possibilities are with this. The more restrictions, the more requirements we put on it, the less creativity we allow the private market to answer with. And so our 10-year housing plan identifies the needs for housing um not only for low-income individuals, but for our local workforce as well.

So we have an opportunity here to be able to open this up um to to be able to see what type of responses we get uh with a recommendation of prioritizing for our local workforce. Sarah, Council Member Alen has a question. Yeah, I'm hoping you can get into the engineering details of this. Um, how difficult is it and how feasible is it and how expensive is it to move a regional pipeline? Um, lots. I um it's been a number of years since I've looked into that.

Um, however, it wasn't viable from the very beginning. It extends throughout the community. starts on this side of the picture, goes up and beyond out into the forest. Okay. I I figured as much if if I there may be someone else here with us right now who can provide a little bit more insight into that, but it's not it's it's not essential. I'm sure you all are know where I'm going with my thought. Um so if it's if there's useful information in there, would love to hear from somebody.

Otherwise, uh thank you. It was a question I asked back when we acquired this property in 2006 and it was a no-go mainly from the the um utility company standpoint that those easements are recorded and I don't see anyone running to my rescue. Okay, next site is um addressed off of Elden. Um Elden is old Lone Tree. Um new Lone Tree is the road you see immediately to the right with Butler the Road at the top.

Um you will see that this site does not include this house on the corner, which is where Linton Real Estate is located. Uh when I gave this presentation to the housing commission, I could not remember for the life of me that it was rent linton real estate and I went with a uh description of the house with the mannequin upstairs um utilized by real estate company. I've since looked it up again and it is Linton real estate. Um this is a fairly flat site. It has very few resources on it.

Um if you're picturing it in your head right now, you're like, "Wait, that's a construction staging site." Sure is. for Lone Tree overpass. Um we have worked to be a cooperative uh partner within the organization when capital has projects going on in this area that it can be used as a staging site. Those agreements require um the site to be returned to the receiving condition. Um and so the zoning is highway commercial.

Um highway in highway commercial housing is permitted above or behind commercial uses. In the past, this has been put out to RFP two different times. Um, the last time was part of the scattered site project for the purpose of affordable housing. Um the previous one was for commercial use and we actually were in the process of negotiating a final agreement with the highest responder to create two commercial pads on this site with between 8 to 10 units of housing on it as well.

This site is uniquely positioned within our community to hold a commercial use. It is adjacent to commercial. We received this um as part of um we received it from Sawmill as part of the development agreement for affordable housing uses. And thank you for letting me look back down at my notes. Because of its unique location in the middle of the community, we have the opportunity to put it out for use as commercial with housing if it can be accommodated as well.

If that's the direction, um to be able to start to create an ongoing funding source for housing. We don't have an ongoing funding source for housing at this point in time. It is a goal within the 10-year plan. Um, as we've discussed previously, um, it's going to be difficult to do an ongoing funding source without either the creation of a new fee of some type or taking money away from a different city obligation.

Um, in this instance, which we know is viable because we've had a viable response in the past. um that for for it to be put out for commercial use where the city could share as part of a public private partnership um through lease fees being charged with long-term lease on this piece. So our recommendation is to issue a solicitation prioritizing receiving ongoing funding for housing programs via a public private partnership. Council member Spence. Thank you, Mayor.

And I'd just like to make a comment on uh your comment that this is an ideal place for commercial. It's adjacent to other commercial, it's on an arterial, etc. I would just like to give my observation that we have, I would estimate five or six buildings. These are all four and fivetory um apartment complexes built across Milton and Butler. five or six of these u multi-story buildings that have vacant commercial space.

They're they're not boarded up because these are brand new buildings, but you can see that they're designed to be commercial space and there are no occupants. So that's just my comment that I would prefer to see this prioritized for housing housing, low-income housing because it's on the transportation route. It's uh in the nexus of of community college, uh shopping center. Um I think it's ideal for housing and I would submit uh we don't need more commercial space at this moment.

Thank you for that feedback, Council Member Matthews. Thank you, Mayor. Uh, two questions. Um, is your, uh, you've mentioned a couple of times, um, some of our property is kind of we're looking at for affordable housing. In the presentation, you're using a lowercase A. So, does that give us flexibility to um broaden the scope of housing to workforce or is it all capital A? Mayor, Council Member Matthews, the use of capitalization in my presentation is not intentional.

Um the it's it's an informal term, capital A, lowercase A. The pieces of property we're presenting to you tonight, with a few exceptions coming up that we've talked about so far, are unencumbered by other obligations due to funding sources or previous obligations. So, they are for your decision um for what that could be used for. This piece has no specific obligation other than being used for a housing purpose.

um that has previously been interpreted that um funding resulting from such use of property also going towards a funding a housing purpose um has been that satisfies that requirement.

So my second question is um and we've had other discussions um on property in this area related to the Lone Tree overpass and the road um does the Southside neighborhood plan um talk about this area for housing and even though it's zoned for um com you know commercial use um is it something that we look at if we were going to use this property um and go back to the Southside neighborhood plan and what their intended use for that area was. I do not have Mayor Council member Matthews.

I do not have the Southside plan answer off the top of my head. I believe Sarah Dector is online. if she has additional information. If she doesn't, um, she'll stay quiet. Um, as we I can get back to you on that for sure. Um, with it zoned highway commercial, I think it was also identified as a potential housing opportunity site, but not exclusively. So, thank you. Hi. Um, Council Member Matthews, I can look that up and send it to you in an email with a citation. This is Sarah. Okay.

And now for a detour. I did not know how to go to the last piece of property to talk about without framing it first. So, you notice that our little detour sign isn't bypassing anything. It just kind of goes a little sidetrack. So, a quick detour ahead. I wanted to talk next about our public housing sites. Um these are our biggest sites. These are the ones that actually have um the potential for the greatest number of housing units to be realized in our community.

All of the public housing and the associated property with it in Flagstaff is owned by the city of Flagstaff. That ownership is restricted by declarations of trust put in place by HUD that limits its use to affordable housing. Don't try to read the declaration of trust. It's just a graphic to show there's a declaration of trust. Um, but that's what they look like if you care to to read. They're they're quite fun.

Um, and so as we have two large sites of public housing, um, I'm going to cover those in just a second. The redevelopment of those is um, an opportunity in front of us. You've heard me talk for a long time about RAD, the rental assistance demonstration project uh created by HUD, which will allow housing authorities and cities that are involved with housing authorities to access the underlying capital that sits in the value of the land underneath the housing units.

This gives housing authorities more flexibility to access both public and private funding sources and it reduces our reliance on unpredictable and unreliable appropriations from Congress. Right now, um I can't tell you how much money we're getting for public housing next year. Sometimes it it stays on a fairly um level allocation. Sometimes it varies widely depending on other priorities within um within Washington. Um moving towards I'm going to give another Okay. Yep. I have it. Tada.

Um I'm going to say section 8. I don't mean section 8 vouchers. I mean a section 8 contract. It's a funding platform. It is not converting our land to vouchers. So, the redevelopment um preser preserves and improves affordable housing, allowing us to convert to long-term section 8 contracts. What does that do? It gives us a signed contract for a dedicated funding amount with an escalation cause ex escalation factor built in year-over-year.

So, we will be able to budget more than 12 months out for um housing units that we own and operate, which would be a dream because right now it's like, well, how much are we going to get? I don't know how much we're going to get. How do we take care of the capital needs, etc. Um, capital program for public housing has been underfunded for decades nationwide. We are fortunate in the fact that we have had excellent management before me. Um, that sounds like I'm a bad manager.

We've had excellent management that started before me um that was able to address the major systems within the units. We do not have condemnable units. We do not have um units where people should not be living. We do have old units. They are expensive to keep up. Um, and we quite often have a hard time finding parts that go into their major systems.

uh RAD allows leverage of investment from private sources for redevelopment and this program also the most important part is that it protects residents. Um tenant rights are uh the one of the main cornerstones of this program. There will be no loss of housing assistance. Affordability will continue. Um, we may have to temporarily relocate people, but everyone has a right of return. If they choose not to return, we are required to issue them a section 8 voucher.

And so there is no loss of assistance to households currently living within um public housing. We're also required to undertake um a public participation process where um not only the public but more importantly the residents that live in our public housing have a voice as to what this will look like, what amenities will be on site etc. So we are embarking on that process. You will see a contract within the next few months.

Um, we put out a solicitation to identify a project management partner so that we're not putting permanent staff forever. Um, we have identified a successful respondent and are bringing that contract to you in the next couple of months so that we have someone to help us move this forward. That's the end of the detour. Let's talk about the sites that we have. Siler Homes is on Fanning and Fanning. Um 66 runs along the bottom. Lockett is the street along the top.

The public housing units are highlighted in blue here. There are 100 units on 19 acres. And before you do the math, that's about five units an acre. Um the zoning is highdensity residential and this public housing was built in 1970. You can see the different unit counts. Uh the different bedroom counts among those 100 units. It is also identified as a last opportunity site. Also on this location is our main housing authority office, our largest maintenance shop and activity center.

um called the Siler Homes Activity Center. Sometimes referred to as the shack, not because it's a shack, because that's how you pronounce the acronym for Siler Homes Activity Center. Um and that's currently occupied by Tinkertopia, which is a great asset to our neighborhood and also a Head Start Center. So, this is really an interactive neighborhood with some support services on site and will be one of the sites, main redevelopment sites under the RAD process. Uh, excuse me one moment.

Council member Garcia. Thank you, Mayor. Um, Sarah, I don't uh just uh tend to identify with RAD because it fits my personality as a word, but it's also partly of what I ran my campaign on, unbeknownst to knowing that you guys were actually working on this. the passion I had in mind when I went to the Siler Homes neighborhood and talked to all of the neighbors that it was a concern that they had and that's why it was at the forefront of my campaign to get into this seat.

So, I just had a quick question related to silent homes. Um, does the RAD program I mean if you have this information um c can it uh would that mean like the red development of the entire site including the places where there's no not housing currently and what does that look like if you can give us a glimpse into into the future of this program or am I missing the mark on what RAD will do for Siler? Mayor, Council Member Garcia, you're not missing the mark.

There are a couple different ways to implement RAD. One of them is simply a paper transaction that shifts the funding from public housing platform to section 8 platform, invisible to residents. Um, another implementation piece would be major rehabilitation. We could just rehab the units we have. Why you hear the recommendations you hear from staff regarding um the use of the RAD program for redevelopment is because the density is very low. The units are old and expensive to upkeep.

Uh there's only we're at five units an acre, which is an incredibly low density. And the opportunity that these locations provide to increase the number of housing units, not only affordable, but potentially mixed income. Um, I started that sentence one way and then my brain finished it another. There's a lot of opportunity here. And that is what the staff recommendation is based on is if we just did a take down to the studs and rehabilitate, we're not really gaining any units.

Um, we can't just build a second story on all of the units to double it, but our potential here is vast. um the sites that don't have housing on them. This middle piece right here serves as a retention basin. Storm water people don't throw things. I always mix up retention and detention. Um but also serves as a playfield and a playground. And so the comment that HUD makes often when they come up to look at our units is these look like such cute little campgrounds.

And while that's great, we have an opportunity to use them differently to create housing units desperately needed by our community. Thank you for that information. All right, moving on to Brandon Holmes. Brandon is located um off of Lone Tree um bounded by Kaya Contente, PO Del Flag, and Woodland Drive. Um it's kind of an unusual outline. Um this development was built between 1952 and 1962.

And so we have units in here where we have a really hard time getting plumbing parts and our amazing maintenance staff actually retool plumbing parts to be able to get them to fit because we have not had a capital allocation large enough to support um both our ongoing needs and fully replplumbing all of the units. Just one example. It's almost 23 acres big. It's zoned medium density residential. There's 127 units. I did the math for you. That's about five and a half units per acre.

Um, it's not all buildable. There are slopes. There's trees. Um, there are also other amenities on site. We do have an office, a maintenance shop, and Cogdale Recreation Center, which is currently utilized by the Boys and Girls Club. It's hidden in the middle. You can drive the entire development and be like, where where is it?

So, we have an opportunity with the redevelopment of this um location to further um integrate within the neighborhood, update our units, um create additional density um within the neighborhood. You see how it kind of jogs along the um right hand side. Um and that's just the development pattern of the time. Neither of these sites were surrounded by much when they were first developed. They were kind of developed on the outskirts of town.

And as we all know, they are now not on the outskirts of town are ideally located near transportation lines, other amenities um as well. This is also identified as a last um opportunity site. I tell you all of that to tell you this. We own a site immediately adjacent to Siler Homes located at the corner of Miller and Lockett, I'm sorry, Lockett and Fanning. It is addressed off of Miller. I don't know how I did that. The parcel number must be addressed off of Miller.

It's at the corner of Lockett and Fanning. A lot of people proofread this, I promise you. Um, it's just a tiny bit over two acres. It's zoned Heiden City Residential, and we purchased this in 2018 in order to have an additional asset to incorporate into redevelopment. This site is unencumbered by a deed of trust from HUD. It's unencumbered by its funding source and gives us great flexibility in incorporating it into the surrounding development.

The goal is for it to not be se to developed separately from the Siler Homes redevelopment but rather incorporated into the neighborhood design. Um it is identified as an opportunity site within LAS. Um, we have talked with transportation over the years. Uh, we will be taking into consideration the transportation needs along Lockett and Fanning as there is potential of redoing that intersection and potentially some additional ride ofway being needed.

That still leaves plenty of buildable area along this um the pink units at the top up here right too. That's also one of our scattered sites for public housing. that is not proposed as part of redevelopment at this point in time within the Siler Homes redevelopment area. Our staff recommendation on this is continue the RAD process including this piece of par this piece of parcel this parcel in that process. All right, Council Member Matthews. Thank you, Mayor.

Um, and maybe you said it and I it went over my head, but um to continue the RAD process. What is that look like? Because I remember right after our housing bond was passed um in 2022 um was it 2022? Yes. Yeah. um you gave us a tour of city-owned property and and we talked about this parcel um as well and the development and you know that was three years ago. So um what's a timeline and what does the RAD process look like? Mayor Council Member Matthews, thank you for the question.

We in the intervening time have tried to carry this project as staff and we simply don't have the capacity. That's where the consultant group project managing that I talked a few minutes ago about comes into it. You should see that contract within the next few months. Um we get a final scope of work from them I believe this week. We'll finalize that contract and then the the schedule is not um 10 years out. The schedule is moving forward now.

And so you're going to start hearing a lot more about it with much greater detail than we've ever come to you with before. um partially because we will now have the capacity in order to move this forward in a meaningful way. Good. Thank you. Thank you. All right. I have the recommendations listed for feedback and discussion. Um our first ones are the larger parcels, the Thorp and Aztec and the Sharkbite. The smaller parcels which the larger parcels were hold.

We need more work here that can be built into work program going forward. The smaller parcels to hold for future opportunity given their site and site constraints. And then our recommendations for moving forward 180 and Schultz Pass issue solicitation prioritizing development of housing units for local workforce. Elden Butler Loan Tree issue solicitation prioritizing ongoing funding for housing programs through public private partnership. and lock it and fanning.

See, I got the address there, right? Redevelopment of public housing. Continue to move forward with that process. The next step you will see is the contract for um the project management team coming on board. I want to take just a second here and acknowledge our real estate team.

Um, we are fortunate to be surrounded by support services and while um, housing is no longer a part of what used to be community development, real estate um, is right by our sides ready to um, assist with any procurement process that uh, you direct us to put out. And with that, I'm happy to answer questions. Council member Spence. Thank you, Mayor. I would just like to share one of the um lessons I've learned since uh becoming a city council member last November.

And I I mention it at this time in part to thank the housing section for division for coming forward with this uh comprehensive review and to to get to the lesson that I've learned is that city-owned property can be developed without state oversight or interference. appearance.

So, I appreciate you coming forward with all these nine parcels and the the the difference between these nine parcels and uh many of the other parcels that we uh consider for affordable housing is that the city has more free reign on these nine parcels than we do with other uh parcels that are under uh other development agreements or um come with a lot more um restrictions on how we can do it.

So, I commend the staff for this comprehensive view and um I can see that this is going to help us meet our 10-year climate housing emergency uh plan. Thank you for the presentation, Vice Mayor. Thank you. And I am just so excited that we are having this conversation tonight. I didn't know I told you earlier. I've been waiting. It's fun. Um, a couple of questions to kind of expand on what council member Matthews asked.

The timeline on not just the RAD projects, but the ones that you're recommending to move forward if passed tonight. What would the timeline of those be and what would the next steps entail? Mayor, Vice Mayor, um when putting these recommendations together, we very carefully took into consideration what can we do and not do given what else we have going on.

Um and so my recommendation would be to move implementation forward with if directed to do so the 180 and Schultz property first with Butler Loan Tree second. Um perhaps overlapping somewhat while we continue to move forward with the overall redevelopment process. that timeline could look as soon as this fall getting a solicitation out. Um, we talked about having a goal of having if we were to receive direction tonight to put a a piece of property out, you guys get to pick the order.

Um, we could have the entire process completed prior to summer break next year. I know that sounds like a long time, but one of the things we want to do when we put this out on the street is give plenty of time for respondents to be able to create meaningful responses to our solicitation. And so that's not all staff time.

That is time for respondents to be able to look at what funding sources they may be able to utilize and do the analysis necessary to create a meaningful response to our solicitation. Great. Thank you. Um, music to my ears on that. And I do have one other question. You know, I'm big on reporting out to the public our our progress. Do you are we thinking about that moving forward? How do we let the community know kind of where we are on these nine parcels? And what what are we working on?

What are we putting on hold? And when does that change? How are we letting the community in on that? Mayor, Vice Mayor, um, as we do our newsletter, we do a newsletter every other month. Um, these parcels can be included in there as where we're moving through. We often use that tool to update the community. We could create a section on the web page. You'll also hear about them in the 10-year plan implementation plans and in the progress reports that we issue on an annual basis. Great.

I I think that that covers it. I would like to at least see it in the newsletter, but everything you listed, depending on staff time and what you're able to do without adding a lot of extra work. Um, I think keeping the community informed, this is a very big topic that means a lot to to us and we want to know where we're at with it. So, thank you. Thank you so much. One of the careful lines that we walk is development is is slow.

um or I shouldn't say slow, it takes time and so monthly updates aren't always meaningful. Monthly updates are the RFP is still out on the street or the ranking committee is reviewing responses. And so that's one of the reasons that we space updates is because quite often the updates stay the same for a bit and then all of a sudden there's an accomplishment. And so thank you for the recognition of that and the endorsement of the tools we're using.

I appreciate that and the hard work of your team. The presentation was great and again I just am very thankful to have this conversation tonight. Council member Garcia, thank you, Mayor. Um, thank you for the for the presentation, Sarah. And and when I thank you, I'm I'm really thanking all of your staff. I know that you have a vast a lot of people standing by individuals who probably are at work right now. That's why they can't be with us. have.

So, I really do appreciate the time that you took into the the consideration that you took into to letting the community and letting us know um on a deeper level where we're standing right now. So, you brought forth some recommendations and prioritizations and I stand behind all all of them um with the exception of one and it's not because I want to change it.

just because um I have some angst in waiting and of course that's the shark bite because since the first time I walked into this room we've been talking about that some 18 years ago and and it's even be way beyond that. Um it's our biggest opportunity and and I mean I just wish and and hope that that things can move quick quicker in that direction but that has nothing to do with staff or or or or us. Um it it has to do with the time that development maybe takes place around that area.

And with Lone Tree or I mean with the the John Wesley Powell Boulevard opening up there at Lone Tree, we can we can hope and aspire that that could be quicker than than um than later. Um that we might be able to see some of those and maybe we won't have to wait until you retire unless you don't retire for another 20 years. Retirement's not too far away, so it should happen pretty fast. Um that's I think uh maybe that's a lot like washing your car and hoping for the rain.

So So um so so I'm on board with with all of those things. I did have a question and I don't know if this is the particular venue or or topic that we're going to that we're going to be speaking to this this question. So if it's not I'll save it for the time when it is. But we did mention that um 2.9 acres at locket and fanning there and and and the fact that we did purchase that at one point. Do we have uh some money in the till purchase more property like that?

How what does that look like uh for the city as far as our current um you know acquisition of new property out that's out there? Can we look forward to getting more more parcels of land? Um because like going to council member Spence's um uh comments, it's nice for the city to be able to kind of do things locally and give people more opportunities because of that. So do we do we have some money set aside or and how does it look like as far as procuring more land in the future?

Mayor, Council Member Garcia, this past budget year is the first budget year in many years that that was a lot of years um that some funding was allocated towards the potential purchase of future property. It's not much. Um in the past, the reason we were able to do what we did was because I like to hoard it until we have enough to do something meaningful. Um there are different opportunities that present over time.

Um the for example the property at Schultzen was 180 was brought to us by a developer saying would you like to buy this at cost? We'll extend utilities to site um at cost um letting us use that process instead of paying remobilization and all of the things to do it ourselves. So we like to have some money available to respond to opportunities as they present. this moment we're not sitting on much significant funding to be able to purchase um to purchase much more.

However, um when those opportunities do come up, we visit with the budget team, with the city manager's office, etc. to say, "Guess what has presented itself? Is this a possibility?" And so given council's declaration of a housing emergency and the budget team's commitment to making sure that there is funding in place, that's one of the reasons you saw funding recommendations that you saw that you approved that started creating that fund. Again, that's that's wonderful news.

I mean, um, not the fact that we don't have a whole lot to to contribute to those future projects, but just an overview for the public and for for council. It makes me feel rest assured that when those opportunities comes up, you're going to be, you know, jumping right in as much as you possibly can.

And I want you and your staff to know that me as a council member will be will back you in those in those times because uh having um local control over our affordable housing and housing in general is a passion that I hope to forward at my time here on the DAS. Thank you, Council Member Matthews. Thank you. Uh, mayor, um, I'm definitely supportive of, um, the recommendations that you have put forward. Um, and I'm hoping that the, uh, shark bite won't be on hold too long.

I know there's a lot of discussion about development right now. Um and I just want to thank you for um you know expanding outside um the normal course of action and getting uh consultants to fill in the gaps when we don't have the capacity. Um, you know, that helps just relieve the workflow of your division and, you know, put somebody on task on it and then you can just give them a really hard time and drive them to get it done, right? Um, and um, man, that budget team, I'm going to be on that.

They seem to have like really all the all the power here. Um, so um, I'm in I'm in favor of of these um, plans. I hope that um things move faster than we um think um because we do have that housing emergency and I hope this discussion tonight will move it forward and start making things happen. So, thank you. Thank you, Council Member Alon. Thank you, Madam Mayor. Thank you very much, Sarah, and to the whole team.

Um you've been working diligently on all of this since I came on to council in 2018. And when it comes to the housing crisis, which is ubiquitous all across the entire country, of course, um you know, we often end up left feeling overwhelmed. Um as an organizer, I always used to say, if you want to lift an enormous box, you have to put handles on it. Uh and the truth is there's not a lot we can do as a municipality under the great state of Maricopa.

Uh but but and some of the things that we can do I don't believe we should do um like building on open spaces or in parks for example. Um to me this entire proposal is something we can do and should do. Uh proud of the work you guys are putting into this and I'm fully supportive of staff's most aggressive recommendation.

Um, I wanted to add to just throw it out there, uh, piggybacking off of Council Member Garcia, I would say that the purchase of future land for housing ought to be, uh, always contiguous with city limits and not satellite properties out in the county somewhere. Just thought thrown out there. Thank you, Council Member House. I feel like I can hear her voice in the lobby. Council member House, it looks like you're not muted, but we cannot hear you. Can you hear me now? Yes. Okay.

Uh, thank you Sarah and staff for the presentation. Um, I am uh appreciative of getting this information. Um, obviously this this isn't the first time I'm seeing this. Um, but always good to see what the team is uh presenting and um providing by way of advancing our housing goals. Um, sorry, I'm trying to remember exactly what I said while you guys couldn't hear me. Uh but um I uh as others I am on board with uh and appreciative of what you have presented.

Um very excited to see opportunities for us to move some of these uh uh potential projects forward and um the opportunities that we have to expand um the housing options that are presented to our community. Um, a couple of thoughts came up, Sarah, while you were presenting um that I I don't want to belabor during the meeting.

Um, we can maybe connect uh uh offline to talk through some of those, but um one of them was just um well, maybe I'll share just kind of two um of the thoughts that I I was having.

Um, one was in regards to your comment about um the natural location of uh I believe Head Start programs um near certain housing development and um just knowing some of the federal actions that are are taking place now and reducing programs like that, I'm wondering about um potential partnerships with organizations like FUSD D or even um uh I am completely blanking on the name um but the the organization that does uh and supports Elevate PreK um those sorts of programs to support the expansion of school programs and early education um in conjunction with our housing goals um and meeting that collective need I think is a a unique ique opportunity that we may have with some of what's been presented.

Um also just uh considering the option that is presented by I know uh FUSD and other school boards have been looking at um options to expand their workforce housing um adjacent to uh school land or or properties and um just wanting to consider what that might look like in terms of the partnerships that we'd be pursuing.

Um, and then the last thought was just in terms of um, and I don't think this is a question that is even necessarily for you Sarah or that could be answered tonight, but just um, in terms of potential properties that we have for uh, development or redevelopment even as um, affordable or attainable housing options. Um, just remembering the parcel of land where the Arrowhead Mobile Park used to be, um, off of Blackbird Roost.

Um, I know we've had conversations about that parcel in the past and, um, had been looking at it for for different opportunities. Um, and just wanted to call that forward as another thing for us to to keep looking at and um keeping a breast of whatever is happening there. Thank you. Thank you, mayor, and thank you, Sarah. Thank you. Uh, okay. I have a couple of questions. Um, do you see the RAD program as being vulnerable with all the changes that we're seeing federally?

Mayor, I see vulnerabilities everywhere. With RAD particularly, I don't. Um, is it a risk? Absolutely, it's a risk. It's federally funded and that landscape is unknown. However, what the RAD program does is eliminate the need for ongoing capital fund allocations to continue forward accompanied with public housing and puts it into one bucket. That gives us more flexibility. Right now for public housing, we get two funding allocations.

One for housing subsidy for the units we own and operate and the other for capital improvements. What converting to the section 8 contract platform does is it's not more money but it takes that money and it puts it as one source which allows us to budget it where we need it. Does it come with requirements? Yes, we have to invest in replacement um replacement reserves. Uh we have to set aside um operating costs etc. However, it gives us more control locally over what those monies can go for.

Public housing exists across the country. Um, we are lucky that um we don't have units that are not occupiable. We're not in a position where HUD can make us do um or participate in the RAD program, but rather we are in the position to take advantage of it um because of the condition of our units not being condemnable, etc. And so, do I think there's a vulnerability there? It's federal money. Yes, there's a vulnerability there.

Do I see a lot of logic in being um in Congress continuing funding this? I do. Otherwise, our homeless numbers across the nation are going to skyrocket. Thank you. And is there any significance to the number associated with the last opportunity site? like were they ranked um or is it just you went from one side of the map to the other side of the map and they got numbers? My understanding is that they're not ranked that those are that's how you find them on the map. Thank you.

Um and this is a true statement. And I believe that approximately half of the residents living in Flagstaff um qualify as low income. Low or um to moderate income or is it low income? Low mod income. Yes. About 47%.

So when we're talking about the housing needs in Flagstaff, um they I mean there's a reason why a housing emergency was declared because the the problem is significant and it's significant from um from getting people shelter for the night through um people who have been living and working here for sometimes decades, sometimes generations, um keeping a roof over their heads. We have such limited city land that is available um for really any need, but housing um especially.

And um I think to not take advantage of of what we own and what we control would be um a big misstep on on our part. So, thank you for bringing these forward and thank you for the work day in and day out to try to chip away at this um huge problem. And and when we look at, oh, there are 220 units being built here, you know, some people, and we've heard people in here say, well, that solves the problem, uh because we just had those units built, so we're good now.

Um but the housing plan laid out that we needed um some 7,000 units um that was that the plan said that we wanted to impact 7,000 households within the 10 years of the housing plan. So that gives us some um a look into just how big the problem is and it's bigger than those 220 units um that we're excited to see built because I'm I'm beside myself to see people have a little bit of breathing room in this community and be able to stay here and stay invested in their community. So thank you.

Thank you. Uh, Deputy City Manager Keane. Yes, Mayor and Council. Um, I would just like to echo my thanks to housing uh and the housing team and the other divisions who worked on this presentation.

Um, I did just want to remind council that uh during the budget process, we had the discussion about changing the uh reporting structure for housing, pulling housing out of community development um creating uh a new division um and having housing become a division and we are working through that process and you know I think hopefully you've already seen it's kind of allowing us to be a little bit more nimble, work faster through the procurement and legal process.

us and Sarah and I get to spend a lot of time together which has been a lot of fun. Um, Council Member Garcia, just on your question regarding the Shark Bite, um, we are currently in the process of procuring a design firm for the fire station that's being done through um, capital and, um, you know, the plan is to hopefully get a design firm that can also work on on housing and parks and kind of look at that entire that entire property. Um, but just thank you.

I just wanted to add a couple of points. Thank you. Thank you. All right, council. I'm going to take public comment now. First, we have Mary Williams. Thank you, Mayor and Council. Um, I'm here on an educational mission. We're missing one student, however, so uh I'll have to get with him later. Um this is in regards to the 180 and Schultz Pass parcel. There, uh are maybe urban legends. I don't know. There have been a few regime changes since 2017 and maybe the knowledge has fallen away.

Um it's described as a 3.06 06 acre parcel, which it is. However, on some of the other ones um parcels, it said the acreage and then it said in parenthesis the developable pullable acre, you know, portion of that. For some reason, that keeps getting left off of this. So, I'll explain. The gas line that goes through the middle of that parcel has a 70 foot wide easement and you cannot build any any of that.

When it was first developed the south of that gas line, there were no utilities run because they couldn't run them under those three huge high-powered gas lines. There's no water, there's no electric, there's no anything. all the utilities. The gas line runs across the very back of that property along the fence line.

So I've gone out and measured it and it is the you know in a rough estimate to me with a 15t setback at the back of the property it is 45 ft deep and about 550 ft long which equates to.56 acres. So it looks like you have a 3 acre parcel of property when in reality the developable part is just over a half an acre. And this keeps getting forgotten, not mentioned. I don't know if it's maliciousness or laziness, but it just it's forgotten. But but that's a fact.

The other thing is um it always says housing funds were used for the purchase and to bring utilities in the site to the site. But when this first came up for a development discussion in 2017, um it was ultimately determined through a lot of research. Um, and this is from Josh Copley, who was the city manager at the time, August 30th 2017.

He says, "Regarding the monies that were used to purchase and improve the Schultz Pass parcel, my understanding is that the funds used for this were ultimately derived from the city general fund and not from a restricted source, eg. affordable housing or revenue bond grants specifically designated for affordable housing or federal dollars designated for affordable housing obtained through the housing authority.

I think that there has been some confusion surrounding the nomenclature of the housing fund. Thank you. Thank you. Your time's up. Okay. Thank you. But can I just say I think it's disingenuous to put this out for Thank you. Your time is up. Mary, your time is up. Okay. Um staff, did you have anything that you wanted to respond with?

Mayor and Council, the site plan reflected here on the bottom takes into account the required setbacks as well as the easements for the gas lines, the utilities when installed took um the considerations into account etc. And there has been much research done regarding the use of the source of funds for the purchase of this parcel. You heard me mention early on in the presentation where we sold a few pieces of property that seated the affordable housing land purchase fund.

Also within that fund was used to be an annual contribution of general fund dollars that went towards um land purchase similar to what started again this past year. Um those funds have been broken out. I do not have the numbers off the top of my head. However, the bulk of those funds were the receipts from the sale of other pieces of property. Um our former city manager uh Mr. Copley may have been without some of that information at the point in time that he provided that answer.

Okay, thank you. Oops. Jody Clemens. Hello. Thank you, Mayor, City Council. Several years ago, a woman asked me to sign a petition to save the sunflowers. Now, I like sunflowers and petitions, so I stopped to hear her out. I declined to sign, though, when I learned that the scourge the heroically that the scourge she was heroically opposing was affordable housing. I think people are more important than sunflowers.

What I didn't learn until some years later, though, was that the sunflowers weren't even in danger. The new housing would merely be between her house and the sunflowers, so she might not be able to see as many of them from her windows. I've lived in Flagstaff for 21 years. In the first eight years, already I couldn't afford stable housing. I lived in nine different houses, not counting the year I learned to drive a semi so I could live in my truck. After nine tries, I gave up.

I officially couldn't live to afford to live in Flagstaff anymore starting in 2012, and I've been homeless ever since. Though I have refused to leave and I work and pay taxes and spend money and vote here. There are hundreds of us here serving your economy and living in cars and RVs in the woods. I don't really expect any of you to care about homeless people, though. Why should you care about me? I'm just one little canary. I'm sure you all will be fine.

Because there's another way that lack of housing affects all of us. Not just people like me. Most people when they can't afford to live here, they just leave. They don't get attached. But how many people in this room know and love and miss someone who's always talking about how they wish they could afford to move back to Flagstaff, back home? How many of you think Flagstaff would be a better place with that person in it?

So many amazing people have been lost to us over the last couple of decades along with their energy and their vision. and they would have done amazing projects and created art and built things for us here and our town has said we don't want them here and I'm mad about that.

I'm angry that although the 20 the 2023 AONA report estimates that Flagstaff needs around 10,000 new units to satisfy the local existing demand, we have to hem and haw and argue and push for a few dozen new units to get built around town. I mean, okay, staff just recommends pushing forward on some of them, holding back on others. I understand a lot of their specific complaints, but really, I want you to act like we're in a crisis. I want you to approach this with a sense of urgency.

The city should be pushing all of these lots and more, buying more, buying as much as we can, as much as our budget and our imagination will allow. I'm angry, too. I'm en enraged, in fact, by the people who fight against housing whenever they can, whenever this comes up, who want their local service class to live in squalor and insecurity, who pull up the ladder behind themselves, who consent to the impoverishment and the brain drain of our community.

You'd think we were coming to get them, to take their homes away. Really, we just want to build new homes beside them, even if that means they have to go outside to look at the sunflowers like the rest of us. Thank you, Jody. Charity League. Good evening, council. Charity League, Capstone Homes. Um, I'm I would like to mention a couple things. Um, every couple years a presentation is before council and it is about city-owned property and what you can do with city-owned property.

And most of the time things don't actually move forward and produce housing. And and most of the time it's because of um community members such as um residents around uh the Sunflower parcel off of Highway 180 that don't want any housing. So, I would encourage you as you move forward with your decisions to be strong, but I would also encourage you to move forward with all your available properties um that can provide housing for Flagstaff, including the Shark Bike.

Now, um Capstone Homes and its partners, Symmetry, we surround the Shark Bite and we're right now in our planning stages. So, we would really love to work with staff. Maybe we could even look at a public partnership, private partnership. But I think if there's barriers right now as far as sewer, let's overcome them. Let's look at the site together.

Right now, we are um currently designing and we'll be submitting the plans for JWP for the section of state land and we're looking at the sewer and we're trying to figure out capacity. So, we really need to work with the city to determine what capacity would be on the shark bite. So, I would ask that um we can work together and figure that out and bring more housing to Flagstaff now. Thank you. Thank you. All right, council. Any additional questions? We have one online comment. Forgive me.

Yes, online commenter. We have one online commenter, Tyler Denham. Tyler, if you can address mayor and council and proceed with your comments please. Hi there. Um, this is Tyler Denham. I'm speaking today as the executive director of Flagstaff for Affordable Housing and I'm calling in to say that uh we really appreciate the work staff have put into bringing forward these site proposals.

As mentioned by several of the council members before, development of city-owned land is one of the most straightforward ways to create housing permanently affordable to lower income residents. Light Staff Affordable Housing understands that it will take even more staff time and effort to bring all of these proposals to fruition, but we believe it's worth it and we look forward to supporting this work as it develops.

Aside from that message, I'll say I really loved all the questions and the discussion from council members. Thank you so much for your time. Thank you, Tyler. All right. Any additional questions or comments? Council member Matthews. Thank you, Mayor. Um, thank you for those comments. Um, Charity. Um, I agree with you. I was kind of thinking about that and knowing the development, but I wasn't really sure on the timeline.

So, I would like to encourage um city staff to um be part of that conversation because this is the time if we're putting in utilities and capacity and stuff that we really need to know what um is being planned. I know part of the Shark White, they are talking about the fire station um but you know definitely different um types of housing and stuff and so to get that number would be really beneficial.

So, um I'll change my first thumbs up on everything and how it was um how it was suggested and put the shark bite up on something to move forward and investigate on how we can how we can have that conversation now instead of later. All right. I believe that you received unanimous support for moving forward with all of these pieces. Did you I'm sorry. Did you want to um I I did if I may, Mayor Council Member Matthews, thank you for the comment.

And I realized what I did not couch, which I should have couched, is that these are recommendations. These are direction for housing staff to move forward. In many ways, as uh deputy city manager mentioned, there are plans taking place. We are moving forward. Engineering is working on the plan, etc. we're holding while um that site plan, the site analysis, etc. is being developed.

Housing staff is not moving that piece forward, but rather other partners within the organization are and we are participating within that process. So, while we're not going to stand in front of you in the next coming months with a housing plan for that parcel, um it's not sitting without work. that more work that is needed is already underway. So, thank you for offering me the opportunity to clarify. Thank you for that clarification. That's great. All right. Thank you so much.

So, we're moving down to item number eight, updates to the Flagstaff Water Services Enforcement Response Plan. Okay. Got it. Okay. Uh, good afternoon, mayor, council members. Um, my name is Jolie Mononttoya. I am the water services regulatory compliance section director. I'm here to take uh here today to tell you about the changes I proposed to make to the enforcement response plan.

Uh, next week it is already on the council agenda for those the resolution changes, but I wanted to come here tonight and see if you had any questions, make uh make sure you understood what those changes were going to entail. Uh, so a little bit of background. Uh, our enforcement response plan has two mandates behind it. uh the the storm water general permit for our MS4 program which is the municipal separate storm sewer system. Uh it is our citywide storm water permit.

Uh and so we file an NOI and a notice of intent to comply with the state permit and one of those regulations is we have to have an enforcement response plan. The second is our pre-treatment program. Um due to our our water reclamation plant size, we are mandated by EPA and therefore EP uh ADQ to have a pre-tri industrial pre-treatment program. As part of that pre-trip program, we have to have an enforcement response plan.

Um so our ERP for the city includes the pre-treatment, cross connection, and storm water. Uh we decided um back in 20 uh 2018 when we revamped the enforcement response plan to combine all of these things. Um we have inspectors for all of all of these sections for which we would do this enforcement. So we wanted to make one encompassing plan.

Uh this this plan provides our direction and clarity to the regulated community as well as gives our our staff direction on how to respond to instance of the non-compliance and also tells them how to go about escalating the enforcement options. And like I said in 2018 this this document was adopted uh as it stands except for a small update in 2022. So, how we use the enforcement response plan? Mostly inspection reports, uh, and warning letters.

So, uh, inspection reports are done by our inspectors, um, our pre-treatment inspectors, our storm water inspectors. Uh, that usually gives the community something to say that they were out here, they saw stuff, and sometimes it's fine. Sometimes they say, "Hey, make these little changes and we can do follow-up inspections and things are all good." Um, the next level is a warning letter. That's pretty much said that during the inspection, you didn't fix these things.

we're kind of we're putting you on more of a formal notice. It's just a letter with a red lettering to kind of impress upon the community that we really want you to fix this or we want you to work with us to fix this. Uh those both can be issued by inspector. Uh warning letters can also be inspected uh can be issued by our our supervisors. Um notice of violation um is the next level. Uh so that's pretty much if you haven't fixed what was in the warning letter.

Um sometimes we'll give you another letter said say hey you haven't followed up. But if we're still being so quote unquote ignored, uh we will put another notice button violation out, uh giving a a hard deadline, but also giving the opportunity to meet with staff to say uh why the things haven't been fixed. Uh these are the three most import uh issued uh most frequently used ones we do in our our business.

Um also ones that are in the refor enforcement response plan are significant non-compliance. Uh these are definitions in city code that come from EPA code that says if you do these things or don't do these things you are now found in significant non-compliance. Uh that has the um the the enforcement upon that is that uh for our industrial pre-treatment program if an industry is found in a significant non-compliance we have to publish in the paper every year.

Uh administrative fines those are defined in ERP as a point system. So, we have points assigned to certain activities that have have not or have been completed. Uh, and if you have four points in in a quarter, you are issued $1,250 for a fine. Uh, these changes are not changing any of that. Our point system will still be the same. Our fines are still the same. So, none of these changes that I'm proposing will have any effect on that. Uh, we also have uh administrative order.

Um we coordinate with our city attorney um if we have to go that far to to get some uh the company um industry in back in compliance. Uh all of these have been used but they are very rarely used. Uh so how the ERP has been used for the cross connection program uh this mostly about our annual backflow testing. Uh there are devices on commercial sometimes residential industrial places that um protect our water system.

they inhibit the water being able to go back into a distribution system in case there's any contamination in that water, it will not contaminate us. So, we want to make sure those devices get sampled uh get tested every year um per code and sometimes that doesn't happen. So, there warning letters are usually issued to those places.

Our pre-treatment and fog program um both the businesses and staff know what to expect from our code violations or permit violations for those who are industrial pre-treatment users. Uh so these are to protect our wastewater reclamation plants um and our wastewater collection system. Um those mostly are uh for the fog, the restaurants, um other businesses that have uh food service establishments within them. We want to make sure that they're getting pumped on a regular basis.

If they're not, we visit them, get them back on their regular schedule so we can make sure our collection system is protected. As for storm water, most of the time it's with our contractors uh for construction sites. uh we want to make sure that they're keeping their their controls, storm water controls in place and that they're kept up to par as the the construction progress is going on.

So the most of the times that's our storm water inspector going out checking on those talking with the contractor uh and those more are like the inspection reports but occasionally things will get escalated and we have to put them on notice to make sure that they fix what need to be fixed. Uh so our proposed chang uh changes to the plan um very administrative. We're um updating some narrative to storm water so um so it matches the other sections in within the plan.

Uh we also added in uh I worked with the storm water section. They wanted to add in the flood plane language from city code. So that this codes so what is in the proposed DRP is already in in city code. They just wanted to make sure that everything was storm water was included in there, not just the the parts that were for the MS4 program. Um and then the next couple slides we just are updating um our titles.

Uh so there's been lots of movement since uh 2018 uh that our section or our program division has changed some titles. Um so we no longer have a wershed specialist but we have storm water project managers and we have multiples of those so that any one of them can be able to write an inspection letter or a warning letter. um for the managers um literally it would be two people who were allowed to do a notice violation um the way it is currently written.

So we wanted to change that into a water services manager and section director to be able to give more uh leeway or give more um more people that opportunity to have a say and being closer related to the the issue for the enforcement that they'll be able to write this letter and be able to issue it out. Uh and then we also put in some violations uh for their scavenger waste program. Uh this is our hauled waste septic tanks grease grease that are brought to our Wildcat Hill facility.

Uh we als we already have a permit in place for the haulers and we have city code um uh in place but this was to give direction to the personnel who are going to write any of these letters of how to write it and give them the opportunity to be able to write it. And with that is there any questions about the ERP? Council, Council Member Spence. Thank you, Mayor, and thank you for this presentation.

I did uh read through your um proposed changes to the uh regulations and I I have a a question regarding the um intersection of storm water um issues with sustainability.

Um, I'm aware that there are some jurisdictions, I think I heard Colorado being one, where it is forbidden to divert storm water landing on your roof to a uh storm water collection system that in those jurisdictions, I I don't know why they do this, but these jurisdictions are trying to protect the aquafer, I guess, and they say it's illegal for a landowner owner owner of a building to divert storm water which is rainwater hitting your roof into a collection system.

And as I read through what you've pres presented to us tonight, I have not heard any prohibition. Am I correct in understanding that uh it is legal for people in Flagstaff to collect and store rainwater for their personal use, be it landscape watering or if they wanted to go to the trouble of of u uh chlorinating and and using it for drinking water, they they could do that as instead of opting to buy city water. Am I correct that it's legal to collect your rainwater in Flagstaff?

Uh, thank you for the question, Council Member Spence. Uh, as far as I know, we don't have any code that says you're not allowed to do that. We have our water commission, our water conservation crew that actively promotes water barrels. Uh, so as far as I know for our city code that we have no prohibition of people being able to collect their own rainwater and being able to use it for landscaping.

Um, I don't know if our storm water group has any other thing, but as far as I know, that's not prohibited. I I want to give you my congratulations that you're not doing that and please don't do it in the future. Sterling, you have a comment. Yeah, I was just going to confirm what she said. We don't have any state law either or local law that prohibits the collection of your own rainwater. Um that said, we would not be recommending any from a legal perspective anytime soon. Thanks.

Uh Vice Mayor, thank you and thank you for the update. You may have covered this. I just want to clarify. Does the inclusion of the flood plane language in the city code create an any new compliance requirements for residents or builders? No, it does not. It just takes the language out of code and puts it in in the in the enforcement plan. Okay. So, it was already there and now we're just adding it. Okay. Thank you for clarifying.

Makes plainer English easier to find so we can be able to enforce upon it. Got it. Thank you. Any additional questions or any comments? Thank you. All right. Moving down to nine county comprehensive plan 60-day review. Good evening, Mayor and Council. Michelle McNelte, planning and development services director for the city of Flagstaff. I'm just coming up here this evening to introduce Melissa Shaw.

She's a long range planner with the Cookanino County and she's the project manager on the Cookanino County comprehensive plan in vision 2045. This is the city I'm sorry this is the similar to the city's um Flagstaff regional plan update and our general plan. Um, but the C but our regional plan is an element of the comprehensive plan and Melissa is going to talk more about that, where they're at in their public process and how it relates to our regional plan. All right. Thank you.

Thank you, Michelle. Good evening, city council members. Um, appreciate or afternoon, evening. I guess it's on to evening now. appreciate you making time for this on your agenda and we this will be um fairly quick. We'll I'm going to give you a very high level overview of the county's comprehensive plan and where we are in the process and how it's intersected with the regional plan. So I'm Melissa Shaw um with as Michelle said with uh Cooko County Community Development.

So, um, just to kind of give a little bit of context and do I just advance the slides. Do I Oh, okay. Thanks. So, the county's comprehensive plan, our current plan was adopted in 2015. And so, um, with that then we're on a very similar time frame in terms of the 10-year adoption as the regional plan. And so, that's why, um, there's been a fair amount of overlap um, between the two processes.

And we just wanted I wanted to show this graphic because we started back in January of 2023, similar time frame as updating the regional plan. And we're moving now into concluding the update to the comprehensive plan with public hearings.

And this image um I kind of like to show because it does represent the blue square around the flag around Flagstaff is the regional plan boundary also puts into context the size of Cookanino County and as you probably know it reaches all the way to the Utah border on the north and it's the second largest county in the contiguous United States.

So, um although the population is um about 149,000 total with most of the c the county's population living in the Flagstaff region, but um this this map also shows land ownership. A large part of the county is um either federal or state land or indigenous nations. So, um about 12% of all of the land in the county is actually private. So, just for additional context, it's um yeah, it's this is this is Cookanino County in a very quick snapshot.

And just another um kind of zoom in view of the region and um just to give a a a big thank you to Sarah and the rest of the city staff for being so inclusive of the county in the region plan update because there um was a lot of benefit um I think to the county um by working on the region plan simultaneous with updating our comprehensive plan because there are quite a few opportunities that we can see um and that we've been able to learn from each other and working you know in a way into the into the complimentary plans so that um you know we're at least understanding what we're what each plan is trying to achieve and where we're going with it and talking to each other during the processes.

So it wasn't it was a lot of work. I mean there are pros and cons to that approach but um just want to say thank you to Sarah and everybody. It was it was a really good experience at least from a staff level. And so this is um this I don't know if some people have described this as looking like a flying saucer if you will but this just uh shows the relationship of not just the regional plan but um other planning efforts that that go on in the county to the comprehensive plan.

So this was intended to kind of illustrate that the comprehensive plan sort of hovers above all of these other planning efforts. And then the next uh radial down are plan amendments including the regional plan including uh the 10 different county area plans which are like your specific plans and then also the joint land use study which you all may be familiar with. And then beyond that our subdivision ordinance, our zoning ordinances are aligned with the comprehensive plan.

And then the outer ring really shows all of the other um county initiatives that are basically in collaboration with the comprehensive plan. So it just shows the relationship to all these different planning efforts. But importantly I think for for this body is to recognize that the regional plan does become an amendment to the comprehensive plan and it is currently and with the readoption of both plans it will it is it will continue to be that.

So, I'll get into a little bit of detail about uh this update to the comprehensive plan and what's new new there. Um, it's of course a complete update to all of the chapters. Like with the regional plan, there are required elements per state statute. We don't need to go into that detail unless you would like to hear that. Um, right now we have 58 goals and 179 policies, which is quite a bit reduced from our current plan. We had hoped to streamline it more, but this is how it's ended up.

The plan has an entire new section on just housing because housing is also one of the major issues countywide. Um we have in our water resources chapter and again a big thank you to city staff as well as the uh Cookano Plateau Water Advisory Council helping us put together uh projections on water demand. Um many of the goals and policies have what we call descriptions. So where we felt that there might be more information needed behind a goal or policy, we've added that into the plan.

And then we have an implementation plan that is uh cross reference to every goal or policy. So wherever there's an implementation item, it is directly related to a goal or policy and that's um in a numbered implementation plan which is also prioritized. I would say softly prioritized in terms of high, medium or low priorities.

We actually met with the board of supervisors and our planning and zoning commission earlier today um and during a work session and so they are um learning a lot more about those specific uh implementation items. Uh we're happy to say that the county is our county GS department has built an interactive map site. So, one thing we really always appreciate about the regional plan is you can go online and zoom in and look at specific details about the maps.

Well, now the county will have something not quite the same, but similar where you'll be able to go look at each map um individually in much in a much greater detail by being able to zoom in. And then just organizationally um you'll see on the right side of the screen that that's the table of contents. And we've we've really organized this plan into three main sections and they follow all of the values that we learned about during the public outreach.

And I'll just get into a little bit of detail about those in a moment. Um and yeah, so I'll just go on to the next um next slide and you'll see um more clearly how those three sections, the rural lifestyle, the natural environment and the diverse communities and services relate back to the values and then also how the chapters that are nested under each um or organized. And so this plan um our current plan, our 2015 plan is is really clearly um a conservationbased plan.

This plan hasn't changed that much, but we've added to it in the sense that we've learned that the pl some of the planning priorities really revolve around maintaining the county's rural lifestyle. That's been a very important value that came out during the public outreach and that includes though providing for economic vitality and having accessible housing. Housing issues are countywide. They're not just in the Flagstaff region.

So that is a main um planning priority is maintaining the rural character everything that goes along with it. Also protecting the natural environment, protecting water quality and supply and restoring forest health is as you would probably guess a pretty major theme in this plan update. And then um finally providing responsive public and emergency services and infrastructure to the county's diverse communities. The county as you saw is huge. We have um you know the county sheriff's department.

We coordinate some of the um efforts in terms of the county is not a water provider. The county does not have a fire department, but we do work closely with all of those agencies to try to have a coordinated response in terms of emergency services. So, we'll just jump into a little bit of detail and um I promise you this won't take too long, but in terms of the rural lifestyle value um there there is in each section um pretty specific um statements about what that means.

And so, as far as rural lifestyle, um the community values a vibrant county economy and dur diverse accessible housing that support integrity and sustainability of the rural lifestyle. And then there's a vision statement that goes along with that again that gets into more detail about rural scaled economic development, more sustainable lifestyles and housing. A theme that came up clearly was visitors and tourism is very much um recognized as an important driver of the county's economy.

But respectful tourism is an issue and um our county residents um have seen impacts from tourists and part of one part of what this plan is is try trying to achieve is getting the message out in terms of what is respectful tourism? How do we message that? And then you'll see the last bullet point under the vision that all cultures are valued, respected, and preserved. That's a theme that that crosses all of the different sections.

And so in our rural lifestyle section, we have land use growth development circulation transportation, and resilient economies and housing. And that's the the new one of the new pieces there. And then our our middle section um is called stewards of the natural environment. And really simple value statement, we are stewards of the land and natural environment.

And it gets into some specific visioning ideas about um making that open trails and public lands and recreation facilities are connected and accessible to residents and visitors. And then that with that though we protect the natural environment resources and ecosystems again respecting cultures across the county. And then in that section we have four chapters.

The natural environment chapter, the parks, open space, trails and recreation, sustainability, resilience, energy and climate and water resources. And then the final section, if I could get this to advance, there we go. Is diverse communities and services. And this is uh valuing and um recognizing that we are inclusive and respect and honor honor the diversity of our communities, people, land, and cultures through vibrant communities connected with partnerships and countywide services.

And the vision statement really recognizes that infrastructure, emergency services, public safety, and public services that we that we need to be collaborative in how those are built and basically maintained. and it requires partnerships, frankly, across the county to make sure that that those services are provided countywide. Um, and then the two chapters that that um encompass that section are community services and public safety and then one called diverse cultures and community character.

And just to let you know where we are in our process, then we um concluded the 60-day review period was May through July 18th. And um we we um had a number of different outreach opportunities for that. In total, we received um just over 200 comments. We had 195 online comments. And I won't go through all of these, but um about 33% were related to readability and clarity. Um followed by land use. We also um had comments on um parks, recreation, trails, open space, and sustainability.

So those were if you kind of look at the whole those were the main focus of our public 60-day review comments. And I am almost done and I'm happy to answer questions. So, where we are now next is um as I mentioned today, and this is a little bit um out of order now, but today we had another work session with the planning commission and board of supervisors and had some good feedback on some specific questions in regard um in response to the 60-day review comments.

And then our planning and zoning commission last month, they've been having updates at um every month at their study sessions. So, we are scheduled to have our um planning and zoning here, public hearing on uh the on the comprehensive plan on September 24th. So, that begins at 5:30 p.m. So, that's this month. And after that, then depending on what the commission if they decide to recommend approval onto the board, then uh we'll have another work session with the board October 7th. That's it.

At least right now is scheduled for 1:15 p.m. and then moving on to uh public hearing with the board of supervisors on November 18th and that's an evening meeting. So, um I have a link to our interactive map site. I don't know if I need to show that to you, but just we're very excited to have that available this time around and um that's just something that we like to brag about a little bit. But with that, um I'm happy to answer questions and comments.

I know it was a very high level overview, but um we do have the public hearing draft and this is a copy of it um available online and we're happy to provide that to you. Thank you very much. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Thank you and thank you for the presentation. This is such a heavy lift for both the city and the county and I appreciate everyone that participated and um we've come a long way, a lot of work in this.

I'm wondering what mechanisms are in place to ensure the ongoing coordination between the county county and the city after the plans are adopted. Great question and um I will just put a plug in for implementation plan because in there are there are 50 items there. It's overwhelming. Yes. But it is important to keep track of what we're doing. And so part of our implementation plan recognizes ongoing efforts and the city of Flagstaff and other municipalities are listed as partners in that.

So we know clearly that that's something that's important to do in all of our efforts. And in particular, I'll just say that one of the um implementation items is to do a to do a housing needs assessment for the entire county. and it was brought up just earlier today with the board meeting that how important it would be to collaborate with the city on that. So, um just for that's one example. So, just as a warning, yes, the city is mentioned in our plan. Thank you. I appreciate that.

Council member Garcia, thank you very much, Madame Mayor and uh Miss Shaw, it's great to see you again. Um working on the regional plan 2045 committee. you were always there at the meetings and um you know my time sitting there it was impactful to hear what you know to have the county's input at every uh corner and at every question. So u things that were discussed during that time that pertain to both the city and the county were that the city and the county are in some ways very much alike.

You know when it comes to value sets and population um the demographic things things like that. But in many ways, the county and the city are very different. You know, different climate zones, geography culturally environmental and even polit political. Um, you know, it's it's kind of like that old rural versus um versus uh urban city environment thing. So my question now as it was many times working on the plan is in your assessment um where the city plan and the county plan connect.

Do you see uh is there is there a lot of mechanisms put in place to have a very seamless transition between all of those differences and also strengthening the um the the similarities that we have together as a city and a county. Thank you for that question.

The way I see that working uh to ensure that we're both um meeting needs of both entities then is so when the county staff and the planning zoning commission board supervisor are are reviewing a project that needs discretionary approval then um if it happens to be a project that includes a a property within the Flagstaff region we review both documents. There's even possibly a third document if there's an area plan included.

So, they are um we will be looking at all of the goals and policies in all of those documents every time a project is proposed and then reporting back to the planning commission and the board of supervisors where those are in alignment. So, and Sarah might want to chime in as well, but there's, you know, in terms of the county processes, that's ongoing every month. Wherever there's that kind of overlap, we're reviewing all of those policies simultaneous.

Sometimes our planning commission or board of supervisors get a multiple page review of the separate policies in each document to make sure that they're in alignment. But I I will say that being involved with the regional plan and um you know we've I think that they're very complimementaryary. So I have not seen anything where they don't work together but they are different plans and they do do serve different geographies.

So just by the very nature similar to an area plan for instance we've got an area plan in the Flagstaff region for Belmont for Cacina Village Mountain Air Don Park Timberline Fernwood and up the 180 quarter. So, they're very specific plans. I really appreciate that commentary. Um, as a city council person, it's important for me to make sure that as things run downhill, they do it with fluidity and uh some course of of assemblance.

And um I don't want the county to ever feel that that we're we're in any way working contrary to that. Um we are just significantly different and we handle things a little bit different. But where we can align mainly on those connectivity points, the borders each other is um where you have my support and I hope to uh help in that process. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member Alen. Thank you, Miss Shaw. Um so obviously uh this is a a a big overview here and and we we rushed through it.

Uh Cookanino uh county is a very large county, one of the largest in the country. Um, I'm curious if you have the data and if you can explore just a little bit your survey results uh and where where they were coming from. So there are a couple um responses to that question. And um when we did our original community outreach, we conducted 29 29 or 23. It's one of the other focus groups all around the county. Um we tried to connect with as many individual county communities as we could.

And with that, then we we connected with and I I would have to go back and look at my notes, but several hundred uh residents across the county. Following that up, then we contracted with Global Local Vision, which is, you may know, a local research firm, and they conducted a a countywide statistically valid countywide survey that followed up on those focus group results and um basically found and confirmed a lot of what we heard.

So that was our way to connect um and you know make sure that what we were hearing from those individual focus groups um resonated countywide. Are you able to just sort of pop off a couple of the locations of each of those focus groups just to represent the you know the pop quiz time I guess. Absolutely. I'm I'm mostly just curious, but it's also an opportunity uh for you to highlight that this is hitting every cultural um element of a very diverse culturally diverse county.

I will work off of this map. Actually, maybe this map is better. So, I will say our first focus group was down in Forest Lakes, which is the very most southern community at the county in the souththeast corner there and then we went all the way up to Fredonia um and had a meeting there. We went to Paige so everything in between if that helps understanding geographically where where we traveled. Um we we there there's a list of um in our plan of you know Cooko County communities.

So, did you guys make it into the Supai area or we didn't get down to Supai, but we got on to the um the indigenous land. So we we met um in Tuba City several times and we did connect specifically um we held um in our office over on 180 what we called an indigenous focus circle and we invited um all of the uh individual Native American nations to that meeting and to do a specific focus group to get their input.

Um, and we we didn't travel down to Supai, but we, like I said, we did travel to Tuba City and um, and then had that specific focus group. So, we've had um quite a bit of contact with the individual Native American nations. I'm really just thinking out loud here. Um, but that seems to be a a bit of a blind spot in a comprehensive county plan. The Supai and the Walapai and the folks who live in the canyon have incredibly important perspectives on the future of Cookanino County.

Um maybe sweep back around and make sure you catch some of that. Yeah, thank you for that, Council Member Spent. Thank you and thank you for your presentation. Uh forgive me if I missed this in your presentation, but my question is what is the ultimate step in adoption or defeat of this comprehensive plan after after it's presented in November to the board of supervisors? Is that the end of the process or is there uh something beyond that? Thank you for that question.

That's an important clarification because that is a uh a significant difference between the city and the county. The city and towns in Arizona are required to um list a general plan or region plan on a ballot measure. Counties are not. So you're right, the final adoption of the comprehensive plan lies with the board of supervisors. It won't then be put on a ballot measure. So that November 18th hearing date, if that is if that holds, will be the final um approval for the Thank you. Thanks.

You you kind of um answered my question. You I don't know whether you were here for our conversation about city-owned land for housing and and um what we're going to do with that. And I'm assuming that the county also has county owned land. Have you ever talked about um using county land for housing? Well, that may have been a conversation that has gone on. I haven't been part of those conversations. there.

The county does own land and that's one of the reasons why this comprehensive plan is proposing that we do a study for the a housing countywide housing study, a needs assessment and a housing study to really understand what are the needs, where are those needs, what's available, what are the resources, who can we work with to provide different housing options.

So, in terms of my understanding, I I haven't had a specific conversation about that because we feel like we need to understand more before we start to just say, "Oh, this piece of land could be used for housing." Excellent. Thank you. I'm so glad to hear that you're um that you're doing it because of course the the housing strains that we feel are broader than just the um the city limits.

Um, and I know that there are housing issues all throughout the county and throughout cities in Northern Arizona. So, I'm really glad to hear that. All right. I don't see any other questions. We very much appreciate um you coming here and sharing this information with us. Well, you're welcome and thanks for your time. If any of you would like um I can forward on a link to our public hearing draft if any of you want some additional reading. Thank you.

Okay, we're on to open call to the public and I don't have any cards. So then we're on toformational items. Two from mayor, council, and city manager and future agenda item requests. And I'll start with council member Matthews. Thank you, Mayor. I have just a couple of um I think exciting things to share. Um many of you know that our county attorney has been re uh pursuing a detox and rehab center and I've been working with him as well.

I've had multiple conversations with our chief uh prior to learning about Ammon's uh efforts and I'm just so inspired by um what he's been able to accomplish and identify so far.

Um we're they're at the stage where we're talking to our uh state and federal partners and um he's had some really good conversations with Senator um Tothali and Representative David Marshall and um I was able to coordinate an in-person meeting with um Senator Rogers yesterday that involved Ammon and our deputy um city manager Shannon Anderson and the chief.

Um, and why this uh meeting was a little extra special is because um you may all know that um the Senate majority at our state level um has access to additional discretionary funds. Um Senator Rogers uh gave some of those funds a couple of years ago about 9 million to our 180 covert. um she was instrumental in uh giving some of her funds through her discret discretionary budget funds to open up the pioneer museum.

And so that was kind of our focus to get in in front of that conversation before um they start budget conversations which we have learned start in November. Um she is very supportive. She's done some ride alongs and um Ammon and her also discuss putting a bill forward that um Representative David Marshall is doing and so she'll mirror that as well as her discretionary funds. So this was really exciting yesterday to start having some financial conversations about the the bigger picture.

Um, in addition to that, um, it was just a a busy week, um, this morning with Deputy City Manager Joanne Keane and Paul Mood and, um, Jeff um, Bowman. Um, Senator Rogers lives off 66 and the Woody Mountain Road, we've all heard about it. It's very dangerous. Um, and this has been a a a personal focus of hers uh to get a street light in there sooner than later.

And uh she has already allocated some of her discretionary funds from the budget as well as AOT um has um agreed to then you know put forth their money that they had to it.

So, it looks like we're actually going to have um about the time that Wars um gets open with their 221 units, which is really going to create a um traffic issue that um within the next several months, we could have at least a temporary light, which I know a lot of our uh public that live and work in that area will be really happy to hear because it's um it's been just a really concern about safety um for traffic and stuff.

So, we had a really productive week and I was happy to be a participant in both conversations. So, thank you, Council Member Garcia. Thank you, Mayor. I would like to invite all the members of the public to the Flag Staff Mall this Sunday, September 14th from 12 to 5:00 PM for Fiesta Independes Vivo Bal, excuse me, Berin for Glorio in parento la. And that's all to go to say that this is a free event featuring a live band folk folkloro dancers and pinata for the kids.

Uh this celebrates independence. There will be food and other items to purchase at the event. One thing that I think is highly impactful and I'd like to invite all of the community out for this is the um the consulate, the Mexican consulate from Phoenix, Arizona will be there at the event and he will be um he will be performing a historic El Grito ceremony at approximately 3:45. I think that he'll also be bringing his team for those who may or may not have questions for him.

That's Sunday at Flagstaff Mall 12 to 5:00 p.m. Thank you, Council Member Alen. Um, I'd like to request a future agenda item for council consideration on whether Flagstaff should adopt a film regulation similar to what we see in the federal explore act and in Phoenix's administrative administrative regulation. Flag Staff is naturally attractive to the film industry and because tourism is already such a key part of our economy, visiting film crews fit well here.

They not only contribute BBB revenues that support parks, arts, and open space, but they also spend money in hotels, restaurants, local businesses, uh, from stylists to equipment rentals. We've created a part-time film commissioner position to help capture this economic opportunity. But unlike Phoenix, we don't yet have a regulation clarifying the roles of other city departments in helping to facilitate productions and get to Yes.

A cohesive policy would help us welcome projects while still protecting residents and public safety. One area worth exploring is small productions. Other jurisdictions, including Phoenix, uh, Park City, Paige, and Albuquerque have reduced or eliminated permit requirements for low impact projects, which makes them more competitive destinations. If the National Park Service can allow small crews to Wapatki or Grand Canyon without permits, Flagstaff should reasonably revisit our approach as well.

Uh this past fiscal year, our film office issued nine permits and assisted with 33 inquiries. Projects like the Nike ad at Flagstaff High School brought 150 cast and crew and filled multiple hotels. Um and it was it was a bit of a hassle and a a nail-biting experience to make sure that all they all had what they needed at the last minute. With a thoughtful policy, we could attract more opportunities like this, boosting our economy and showcasing our city. Thank you, Vice Bear.

I'm going to keep mine pretty light for tonight. If you like a banjo and a mandolin, this weekend is for you. There's Picking in the Pines out at the Pepsi Amphitheater Friday through Sunday this weekend. And what I love about this festival, it brings in people from all over the country, but it really focuses on our local um our local fun and I just it's a great festival and if you're looking for something to do, I highly recommend it. Thanks. Thank you.

And um Council Member House is on her way to Phoenix and so she has hopped off. Council member Spence, in light of inviting everyone to uh an interesting event tonight at 7 o'clock at Procknell Auditorium, there's a renowned Native American woman, writer who is giving a lecture. Her name, the lecturer, and author is Robin Wall Kimmerer. Her most recent publication is Serviceberry, which I highly recommend. So, I I appreciate council getting out early enough to go to hear her speak at 7:00.

It's it's an open invitation and I think it promises to be a very enlightening discussion. Thank you. I'm heading over there right now. Thank you. Um, today was the unveiling of the Arizona Bioscience Road Map at NAU and it was a um, great event and exciting to hear how the different regions in Arizona already are working together and can work together.

Uh, even more on Saturday the 13th at 6 PM at the Cookanino Center for the Arts is Flagstaff Takes the stage and this is where um all the theater companies are coming together to stage previews of next year's season and I will keep mentioning this until the time is here. the Flagstaff Festival of Science. Uh I just helped to deliver hundreds of passports to local schools and organizations and I only did a couple of them.

So volunteers were out all over Flag Staff um handing out thousands of these passports and flyers for the Flagstaff Festival of Science. It's their 36th year and it's September 19th through 28th. All the events are free and um it's definitely worth checking out. Deputy city managers, u mayor and council, I just wanted to follow up on council member Matthews um discussion on the the visit by Senator Rogers today.

Um, so the that IGA will be coming to council on October 7th and it's a it's an IGA where ADOT is going to transfer the funds to the city. It they were included in um the state budget, this past budget. Um, Senator Rogers also committed in that meeting today to support the request for a bill that um to fund the weight the West 66 improvements which I know many of you are involved with Metro Plan and Kate Mley was on that visit today as well. So, um, so that's also very good news as well.

So, just wanted to pass that on. Thank you. My quick plug is next week is the employee barbecue. Wednesday, September 17th from 11 to 1:30. So, I hope if you're available, you'll head out to Thorp Park. We'll see you there. Thank you. All right. Well, seeing nothing else, um this meeting is adjourned.