Prescott Council Green-Lights $886K Fire and Police Pre-Construction Contracts Amid Firestorm Over Site Selection Secrecy and Cost Control

Today is July 14th, 2026. This is the city of Prescuit City Council voting meeting. Before we get started, I'd like to recognize a couple of uh dignitaries that are here today. Uh in the back of the room, we have Arizona State Senator Mark Finchum. Please give us a wave. Thank you for attending. [applause] And we also have our former mayor, Phil Good. Where are you, Phil? All right, there. [applause] Thank you. Okay, roll call, please. Mayor Ring, here. Mayor Prom Freeworth, here.

Councilwoman Frederickson, here. Councilman Gambboji, I am here. Councilman Garing here. Councilman Grady here. Councilman Ruby here. All are present. Next item, announcements. Yes, ma'am. Um, good afternoon. I want to share several upcoming community events, projects, and opportunities for residents to stay informed and get engaged. First, the Watson Lake playground improvements.

Beginning July 13th, the Watson Lake pre playground will be temporarily closed while it receives an exciting upgrade. The rest of the Watson Lake Park will remain open for visitors to enjoy during construction and the city will provide public updates as work progresses. Second, wildfire preparedness and emergency notification. As wildfires season continues, we'd like to remind residents that watch duty is a valuable tool for staying informed about wildfire activity.

but it is not an official emergency notification system. If you want to receive official evacuation notices and other emergency alerts, residents are encouraged to register with Yavapai County's emergency notification system at yavapire.gov/alerts. During an emergency, official alerts will also direct residents to the Genesis app, uh, Protect app for evacuation notices, road closures, shelter locations, and other important information. So, two things you should be signed up for.

Uh, summer movie in the park. Join us uh, Friday the 17th for a evening of family fun at Watson Lake. Gates were supposed to open at 4, but as we all can see, we are having lots of rain. So, my understanding is the event is moving to the Armory. Yeah. Grace Sparks. Okay. So, go to Grace Sparks at 4:00. There's still going to be food trucks outside. There's still going to be free parking and a movie, but it will not be under the stars. It will be under a dry roof.

Um, any other changes will be announced through city social media channels. Uh, regional trail survey. Residents are encouraged to participate in the Yavapai Regional Trail Survey, which is still open through July 31st. The survey will help guide future trail planning through the Quad Cities as well as the greater Yavapai area. Your feedback is important to shape the future. Visit ytrails.net to take the survey. [snorts] Montazuma Rainh harvesting project community meeting.

The city is inviting residents to attend a community meeting on the proposed Monizuma rainwater harvesting project this come uh next th uh Thursday July 30th from 4:30 to 6:30. Um it's near the Air Village uh area south of the city and it's on near the grass lawn located at 302 South Monizuma Street.

The project will add landscaped rainwater basins designed to capture and naturally filter all the storm water before it reaches Granite Creek, helping improve water quality, support native vegetation, and enhance downtown Prescuit. Residents are encouraged to attend, ask questions, and share their feedback. And before I wrap up, I'm going to throw it over to Don, who has a staff announcement. Thank you very much, Mayor Prom.

I wanted to introduce our new economic development director, Steve Praipek. Uh Steve has more than 30 years of economic development experience. We're delighted to have him here. He worked in Phoenix, Chandler, and Glendel before becoming the economic de development director in Peoria where he attracted more than 4 million square feet of retail, 2 million square feet of industrial. Um most recently, again, he's worked public sector, he's worked private sector.

Uh most recently he served as the first uh economic development director in Carefree um with some major redevelopment projects and uh and again helping with tourism and all kinds of different things. He's excited to be here and uh and Steve if you have any other thoughts. Um Mayor Council, I'm really excited to be here and uh and I really thank you for the opportunity to to help push the economic development agenda for the the city of Prescuit. I think there's so much opportunity here.

The staff that we've I've come in to to meet over the last two days I think are fantastic. Really complimentary. A lot of skill set, a lot of energy and uh the leadership here seems to be the same. Um as as well as both uh the the elected leadership and and and the city managements and uh I just think we're in a really good spot to be able to to accomplish a lot of great things.

And so I I feel very confident that we're going to be able to really advance the economic development plan that's been created and uh and create a really nice diverse economy for for Prescuit. So thank you very much. So I guess the question is why did it take you 30 years to figure out Prescuit's better than the Valley? Yeah. [laughter] Have you been married? [laughter] 33 years of marriage.

Yeah, actually my my wife and I was one of one of the things we made the decision that we Prescuit is a place that we want to be. So, uh so we'll be transitioning here o over the next year and we're really excited to be part of the community. You never you really don't get the opportunity in a lot of cases when you work in government a lot of times, especially back in the valley, you don't want to live where you work because then you have to answer all these questions.

but to be in a place where you can actually increase the the the quality of life in a place in a community that you live in. This is the type of community that you want to do that with. And so we're we're both really excited about it. So well, welcome to you and your wife. Thank you. [applause] And um also I I apologize uh I forgot to recognize our uh former Prescuit mayor uh Greg Mangarelli. Where are you Greg? [applause] All right, last announcement. Uh the council meeting schedule.

We want to remind everyone that this is our last regular city council meeting until August 11th. So, while council may not be together at that time, city services will continue as normal. We encourage residents to stay connected to the city through our website and all of our social media channels. And of course, all of us individually are working. You can still send us emails. Um, so, uh, thank you.

We encourage everyone to take advantage of these summer opportunities and stay informed, stay engaged, and pray for rain. Enjoy the rest of your summer. Thank you, Lois. Now, on a more serious note, we will now have a moment of silence to honor the three brave wildland firefighters who lost their lives in the line of duty on June 27th. They were part of the rifle, Colorado heel attack crew. Sydney Watson, age 27, of Alabama, started her career here with the Prescuit National Forest.

Nick Nick Hutcherson, age 27, was from Glendel, Arizona. And also he has an Arizona connection. He worked with the North Kabab National Forest. [snorts] And lastly, Emily Barker, age 38, who was from Michigan. Now, let's please stand as we honor their sacrifice with a moment of silence. Thank you. Please remain standing and father you a sacred heart will lead us in the invocation. Let's begin this invocation by reading a small gospel passage from the gospel of St. Matthew.

The simileies of salt and light. You are the salt of the earth. But if the soul loses its taste with what can it be seasoned, it is no longer good for anything but to be thrown out and tumbled under food. You are the light of the world. A city set on a mountain cannot be hidden. Just so your light may shine before others that they may see your good deeds and glorify your heavenly father. The word of the lord.

These words of Jesus hold profound significance for our roles and leaders within this community and city. Just as salt enhances and preserves the flavor of food, we are called to be the preservers and enhancers of the communal well-being and progress. Our actions, decisions, and policies should reflect this commitment to enrich the lives of those we serve.

Likewise, the light symbolizes our duty to illuminate paths and inspire hope in the darkness, lifting the shadow of injustice, inequality, and division. Therefore, we pray, God of wisdom and love, we ask you to guide our decisions and discussions today. Bless our city and its leaders with the courage and compassion to serve with for a common good. May we represent the hopes and aspirations of all the Prescottians. Help us to build a community that is rooted in justice, compassion, and peace.

We ask this through Christ our God. Amen. Thank you. And now, Mr. Ruby will lead us in the pledge. I aliance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for it stands. One nation under God, indivisible with liberty and justice for all. [clears throat] Next item, presentation to citizens citizens academy graduates. May I have all the citizen academy graduates come join me up here? YAY. [applause] [laughter] Of course. All right.

Um, the citizens of Prescuit uh city of Prescat host hosts the citizens academy to give residents an inside look at their local government and how it affects their daily lives. This opportunity offers a clearer understanding of city services and allows for open communication for people to learn and ask questions. And above all else, the Citizens Academy connects people and helps keep that small town feel that many of us have stayed here or moved here for.

I'd like to thank all of our graduates here today for taking the time to participate in this wonderful program. And thank you all to our involved city staff for once again making this such a successful class. We will now uh present the certificates. So please step forward on this side of me when I call your name to receive your certificate. Oops. I guess I should do that. Okay. First up is Alvin Burki. We will get that to him. Stacy Brown. Oops. Congratulations. Thank you.

[applause] Next up is Patty Brown. Oh, we'll take Okay. And Kim Douglas. Anybody else want to get that to her? [laughter] All right, we will. Um, Peter Frost and Moren Frost. I might as well get the couples together. Thank you, Peter. Thank you very much. You. Thank you. And for you. Thank you very much. Thank you. Congrats. And Brody Green. We love when our local media actually participates along with us, not just reports on us. So, you've seen it from the inside. Congratulations.

Nancy Gribble. Did I say that correctly? Fabulous. Thank you, [applause] Sue Griffin. Yes, that's it. Fabulous. Thank you. Congrats. [applause] Lee Hill, thank you so much. Thank you. Appreciate it. Serpa Lee. All right, Leslie Ninaman. Thank you, [applause] Bob Nto. Fabulous. Thank you, [applause] Christy Patterson. All right, this was a big class. Uh, George Randall. Fabulous. Thank you. [applause] K. Brack Stewart. Thank you, [applause] Michelle Tacif, and Ken Tacif.

[applause] for you and for Oh, no worries. No worries, Ken. There you go. And Joanne Trafoil, Marty Verrier and Brian Weingart. Is that it? Okay. All right. Well, congratulations you all. I hope you had a great time. We always have expectations that we're going to see your names signing up for boards, commission, and committees or maybe running for council next year. So, that would be fabulous. I'm going to ask you all to slide over here a little bit and we'll have a photo taken. All right.

Yeah. Turn your [clears throat] Good graduates. I take several. I think Nope. I can't get one that way. Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you. Congratulations. Thank you. Thank you. Great program. Next, we have a proclamation for the 65th anniversary of the Prescuit Sunrise Lions Club. Hi, good afternoon. It's my honor to present the mayor's proclamation for the 65th anniversary of the Prescuit Sunrise Lions Club. Do we have any representatives from the club right there? I think we do.

[laughter] [applause] Couldn't miss that. Hi. Good to have you here. Thank you. Yeah. Nice to meet you. Hi. Great turnout. I know you all do great work in our community. So, thank you. So, I'm going to read the proclamation here on July 14th, 2026. Whereas the Prescat Sunrise Lions Club has faithfully served the Prescuit community for 65 years, exemplifying the Lions Club international motto of we serve.

And whereas the members of the Prescuit Sunrise Lions Club have dedicated themselves to humanitarian service, vision care, youth programs, and community support throughout their distinguished history. And whereas this milestone anniversary represents a legacy of compassion, leadership, civic pride that has strengthened the fabric of the Prescuit community.

And whereas the city of Prescat is honored to recognize and celebrate the enduring contributions of the Prescuit Sunrise Lions Club and its members past and present. Now therefore, Kathy Rousing, mayor of the city of Prescuit, does hereby proclaim July 14th, 2026 as Prescat Lions Club's 65th anniversary day. We encourage all citizens to join in honoring this outstanding organization for its decades of service and commitment to others.

[applause] I'd just like to thank the city of Prescuit and our community for helping us over the last 65 years. And if you ever want to be a member, we meet at the Waffle Place on Iron Springs Thursday at 7. And everybody's welcome to come and join. So, thank you. Okay. Thank you. and we'll uh we'll gather. [applause] Got to move around that way. [clears throat] Very good. Thank you. [applause] Our next proclamation is the 38th Arizona Cowboy Poets Gathering on August 7th.

Do we have any representatives from Arizona Cowboy Poets here today? Yes, we do. Thank you. Whereas Arizona Cowboy Poets Gathering is continuing with the 38th gathering in Prescat, Arizona. Whereas their purpose is exclusively for the education and literary furtherance of cowboy poetry, music, western heritage, culture and history. Whereas Prescat, Arizona is an iconic western town known for its rich and long history of cowboys, ranchers, and western history.

Raz Prescuit, Arizona was the home of the late Gail Igardner, a true cowboy and known worldwide as one of the greatest of all cowboy poets. Whereas cowboy poets and cowboy musicians bring that legacy to life through their poems and music presented to the public through oral and written poetry, continuing the tradition of artful reflections on life through the eyes of the cowboy. Whereas August 7th, 2026 marks the official opening of the 38th Arizona Cowboy Poets Gathering.

Now therefore, I, Kathy Rousing, mayor of the city of Prescuit, do hereby proclaim August 7th, 2026 as Arizona Cowboy Poets Gathering Day. And I encourage everyone to support the Arizona Cowboy Poets and express our gratitude for their efforts in continuing to highlight Western heritage, cowboy poetry, and cowboy culture. Does anyone want to say a few words? I will, mayor. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor, very, very much. Thank you, Mayor Rooing, Council. Thank you, citizens of Prescuit.

Uh we are honored. Uh we're a committee of 75 plus all volunteers that work and have worked now for 38 years putting on the Arizona Cowboy Poets Gathering. Some of us are here today, our president Jim Jensen, board member Ralph Gerardi, our committee chairman Don Fernwalt, and our sponsor wrangler Greg Ferrell. Uh I myself am Jim Buchanan and I'm probably the oldest guy on the committee at this point with 36 years of service on a committee of absolutely wonderful people in a wonderful community.

Thank you. [applause] And if if I may say one other thing, I'd like to thank the city and the tourism department for the grant which uh will be awarded to us and many local organizations later in this meeting. Thank you. Okay. Thank you, Jim. Let's have a photo. [applause] Thank you so much. Appreciate it. Next item, open call to the public.

City of Prescuit welcomes public engagement and residents may comment and address council regarding matters not included on the posted agenda during the call to the public. Please complete a green speaker card and submit it to the clerk prior to the meeting being convened. Speakers are limited to four minutes and the call to the public will be limited to 40 minutes in total with the following stipulations. Citizens will be limited to addressing council on the same topic only four times in total.

If a topic has been addressed more than five times by different speakers, the mayor may limit future discussion on this topic. Topics of a primarily national concern may be limited at the discretion of the mayor and call of the public shall not be used to address the council on current or pending legal matters by a party or their representative. I have one speaker card at this moment. It's Walter Kosar. See? Okay. How's that? Okay. Mayor, Mayor Prom, council members, thank you.

Uh my name is Walt Kosar. I'm a resident of Granville and Prescuit Valley. Um I was reviewing the water subcommittee meeting uh from about a week ago and specifically um the work going on for the Willow Lake restoration project and I was curious if anybody, you know, as far as restoring water levels in the lake, if anybody had considered um using the treated effluent and putting that into the lake to help restore the water levels.

you have a project right now that will be starting on Route 89 to replace that um effluent line. If you were to use um now would be the time if you were to consider something like that, if you needed to put a branch connector off of that to feed into the lake while you're doing that project, if you were to transfer water treated effluent into the lake because it's surface water, you're not really losing the credits that you might otherwise store underground.

you'd also be helping to restore habitats and have, you know, an immediate impact on the area. So, I think it's something that should be considered if it if it hasn't been to this point. Thank you. Thank you. And um please direct uh city staff to contact Walter and respond to his uh idea. Thank you. No more uh public comments. That's it, mayor. Okay, great. Next item, consent agenda. Yes. Does anyone have anything?

I need to pull item D because I'm associated with one of the groups within item D and will need to recuse myself from any vote on item D. Okay. Thank you. Uh we're going to uh vote on items um A, B, C, E, and F. Do I hear a second? Oh, I want to pull item F. Item F. Okay. Well, we'll exclude item F. So, we're I move that we vote on item A, B, C, and E. Second. Please vote. Passes 70. Mr. Ruby, please. Uh, I will now recuse myself. Excuse yourself.

And when the vote is over on this item, we'll bring you back in. Mayor, I had also indicated that I would like um item D to be pulled. Okay. Thank you. Uh and actually the the reason why I pulled it is that there's a list of I didn't count however many contracts being considered. And when I was looking at the packet, uh, it indicated, uh, organizations and amounts, but nothing to differentiate one from the other.

And I had asked staff, uh, to help me understand why certain amounts were being given to certain organizations and how that came about. And be careful what you ask for cuz several trees have died because I have asked for this. And so now I have an understanding of the um the methodology used to select the individuals to be getting this these amounts and why they are getting the amounts.

But I still asked it to be pulled because I thought it would be of interest to uh the citizens at large as to how these came to be. And I believe uh a very nice staffer has agreed to come uh and tell us about it. Thank you. Hello, Mayor and Council. I'm Mike Kelly, the tourism manager. I'd like to give you an overview of our tourism advisory uh committee um or as we call it TAC and our TAC grant process.

Uh the tourism advisory committee was formed in uh 2009 when the transient uh lodging or bed tax dollars uh were brought under management of the city of Prescuit. Uh in 2017 uh TAC was officially made a standing committee to act uh as an advisory role uh to the mayor and council. Uh TAC committee members advise on matters related to marketing uh promotion and programming. Uh they also participate in the delivery of uh the annual tourism grants.

Uh so for FY27 which is uh July 21st uh 2026 through June June 30th of 27 uh the city of Prescuit allocated 90,000 uh through the bed tax which will be awarded uh to grant funding uh for special events that generate a marketing message with a strong emphasis on marketing outside of 90 miles. Uh these special events much must create a positive economic impact with an emphasis on overnight stays uh the percentage of out of area visitors and direct spending.

[snorts] Uh additionally uh TAC grants are solely available to registered nonprofit organizations uh for events taking place in Prescuit proper. Uh the amount available for any event is $5,000. uh and awards may be distributed on a sliding scale depending upon the number of su uh successful applicants. Uh in this case this year there were uh 28 successful applicants. Um and at least 70 uh 75% of the award must be used as part of the events marketing budget.

So a little kind of chronological order of our grant cycle. Um on March 1st, our grant application opened and every applicant uh could go online through Experience Preskit for that digital application. Few days later on March 5th, um we had a grant meeting um to go over any type of items that any particular applicant might come across, how to apply, questions on what information to put in. So that was on the 5th. Um and it closed April 3rd.

And then on May 13th, our TAC committee um got together for about three or four hours going over each individual grants and scoring individually, you know, based on a, you know, criterium um of three key areas, uh economic impact, strategic marketing efforts, and community benefits. Uh the reviewing committee uh members score each application based on a 100 point scale. Um, for example, in the event uh you receive a 75, you would receive 75% of the max awarded, which would be that 5,000.

So, that's kind of an overview of it. And if you guys had any more questions for anybody, um, could you please explain to the public the source of these funds? Um, they come from uh the occupancy uh the bed tax which is like when people come and u stay in our hotels, right? Yes. three 3% on on those states. And didn't it used to include uh did it include the uh residential tax on uh long-term rentals and apartments? It used to and then it that was uh taken away. Yes, ma'am. That's correct. Okay.

Well, I would just like to um thank all of the nonprofits who work tireously year round to put on these events and the city is more than happy to support them because that's what keeps our community vibrant and uh enhances our quality of life and brings people to uh Prescuit to enjoy our community. So, I just wanted to thank all those uh wonderful nonprofits and we have quite a variety. I was looking at that list and uh it's there's something for everyone. There is. So, uh any other comments?

Thank you. I appreciate that. Absolutely. Um I will move to um accept consent item 9D. Second. Okay. Please vote. passes 6. And could someone retrieve Mr. Ruby, please? He was in the cone of silence. And Mr. Gambboji item F you have some comments. I do. First of all, I want the public to know that I am the council liaison to PBTAC and I was not consulted as to who would be the members. So I have three questions. Who chose the members? Who are they? And what are their credentials? Uh Mr.

Gambboji, we have a subcommittee on appointments that involve uh I'm a member uh Lois Forth is a member and Mary Frederickson and we met and reviewed the applicants. Um they all had uh a list of their qualifications, filled out the application and had references and uh we chose it was kind of a routine thing. Second question was who are they? Who are all the applicants? Who are the people you chose? Uh let's see for the pedestrian bike traffic advisory committee. Uh Jacob Robinson.

Jacob Robinson whose term serves from 424 to 327 I mean 328. Then uh for the tourism advisory committee we we uh chose Katherine Dufort whose term is from April 2025 to March 2028. I'm sorry I'm looking at [laughter] She reissued it. Okay. Thank you. In fact, if they're here, we'd like to recognize them. I guess not, but we'd like to thank them. So, do you have any other comments, Mr. Gambboji? That's all three questions. Okay. Thank you.

I move to approve appointments of members to the PBTAC and Tourism Advisory Committee. Second. passes 61.

Next item, adoption of ordinance 2026-1945, an ordinance of the mayor and council of the city of Prescuit, Yapai County, Arizona, levying upon the assessed valuation of the property within the city of Prescuit subject to taxation a certain sum upon each $100 of valuation sufficient to raise the amount estimated to be required in the annual budget, less the amount estimated to be received from other sources of revenue.

providing funds for the general municipal expenses for the fiscal year ending the 30th day of June, 2027. [clears throat] Madame Mayor, I'd like to pull this item. Thank you. I'm glad you did. I think we need to discuss this. Um, do you have any Would you like to start the conversation, council member? I sure would. I think it's important for the public to know that we passed Proposition 478 which raised sales taxes. Earlier we increased impact fees.

Uh we had a proposal from public works for garbage collective fees where we're currently losing money and I think we should break even. I'm in support of that. I've supported the other three. But this is a council that's running away with spending money. Uh, as according to my estimates, we're going to lose $30 million on 89 because we didn't expand it when we had the opportunity to do that. And we're just hellbent buying everything in open space.

So, this is not the sta this is not to be blamed on the staff. this tax increase should can be blamed behind by the people behind this dis and so I'm not in support of this. Thank you Mr. Gambboji. Um, I would just like to make a few comments. As you heard earlier from our tourism advisory committee, um, staff liaison Mike Kelly, uh, we lost several million dollars last year, uh, thanks to the state legislature that, uh, removed the, uh, bed tax on our, uh, long-term rentals.

And uh the Arizona state legislature continues on down that path and every year they keep telling us that there's less and less money available to us. Even though last year we sent down $123 million to the state of Arizona and we only get approximately $18% of that back. approximately 26 million come back. So, we have to keep looking for everything, every penny that we can raise. And this property tax is uh it's only a um $1 and I believe $188,000 a year.

And on a $500,000 home, the proceeds that would be generated come out to about $225 per property owner. And this is money that will stay in the community and will help out our services, our library, and our parks and wreck. And it will be spent here in the community for the benefit of you, the people of Prescuit. So, um, that's one reason why I support this, uh, this tax. Um, anyone else would like to make a comment? Lois.

Um, I've been thinking long and hard over the last two weeks, um, talking to a lot of members of the public, reading what people are saying. And while I voted yes on this property tax two or 3 weeks ago, that was with a heavy heart. And the more I look ahead with what we're going to be doing with raising um raising our um trash fees, um definitely once in the next few months, maybe even twice in the next few months.

Um and I look at other things that are being considered with changes to uh to all sorts of fees in our fire and and community development area. I am really struggling with I get I get that it's like what the state legislature is doing to cities and towns is really really tough. Um but for me it comes down to uh what we got to have. We got to have a solvent trash system. Um it's its own enterprise fund. So I am um going to be voting no today.

And it's not because I don't think we shouldn't do this. This is a strategy we've been on for several years to chip away at the uh the actions of that our state legislature are taking. But I just think with this year with what's happening with um several things going on in the community and the fees that will be raised, I think for me this is a a nice to have versus a got to have right now. So I wanted to explain my vote. Thank you, Mr. Ruby. Uh, a couple questions probably for Lars.

Is it accurate that a home This is This is only going to be paid by property owners correct? That's correct. Okay. How many people in this room rent? Okay. So, the people who are renting won't have would not have to pay this tax.

it maybe in an indirect way the landlord could pass it on but um definitely it's it's to the property ownerly and for let's say for a million dollar home what is the increase going to equal uh yes councilman so the million-doll home here I'm talking about is a limited property value which is not the same as a market value um that calculation is uh 230 230 $37.40, which is an increase of uh $4.50 over last year.

So $4.50 is the total amount that somebody owning a home that's assessed at a million dollars would have to pay with this. And that's that's if the value stays the same. Now, we know property values go up. Um the maximum allowable is 5%. So that would be $16.37 with that 5% increase. When someone goes out to buy groceries and they pay sales tax, how much money do they have to spend before they pay the equivalent of that $5? Um, sorry, not following the question.

When you get sales tax assessed, when like somebody working in this city goes out and like buys groceries and they're paying sales tax or diapers, like my guess is it's right around 50 bucks and then you've paid the equivalent of $5 for sales tax, right? Yeah. I guess I'm doing math in my head, but $100 of groceries. Um it's the city only tax on groceries, so that's 2.95%. So that would be $2.95 on $100 of groceries. Somebody spending $100 on groceries is going to pay about the same as someone.

I mean, everybody's doing that on a constant basis with sales tax. I mean, I know people who are spending like quite a bit of money every month on groceries and it's hard on them. I don't I'm looking at the property owners of this city and the benefit that it's going to bring to the city. I'd like to see some relief for people who are at the lower end. And the one thing about this tax is that it does not impact people who don't own homes and that is why I'll be voting for it. Uh Mary, thank you.

Uh I I don't remember who it was that I said it said it to. May have been Brody. Uh, I think it ended up in the paper, but nonetheless, uh, I think what I said was sometimes principle needs to bow to reality. And the fact is prices have gone up. It's gone up for all of us. And for the city who might need a new truck or pay their people, none of those are static. Inflation impacts the city just as well as anybody else.

So to the extent that we have a very limited selection of ways that we can raise money, this is one of the few. And the fact that we only look to adjust our tax levy every two years, three years, every three years, we've been increasing to the maximum allowable. That seems pretty prudent in my view.

And I know the example that Lars gave the last time he spoke to us about this on a what would around here be kind of an average price home maybe on the upper level but nonetheless that the increase over the year was 10 bucks. Um and somebody I think the mayor said something like well that's like a a fancy cup of coffee.

and somebody from the um uh audience got up and said, "Yeah, well, not everybody can afford a $10 cup of coffee." And being a frugal, I was going to say cheap person, uh I wouldn't spend 10 bucks for a cup of coffee, but nonetheless, I did the math and looking at it the other way, it's less than three cents a day. I don't know any property owner that is going to crash because their property tax went up three cents a day over the course of a year or $10 over the course of a year.

So, I can appreciate uh Councilman Rubies talking about well some relief pleas to the lower end of the socioeconomic scale, but the fact is they're going to be hit with any kind of property tax increase as well because people who own rentals aren't going to just swallow it. They it will show up in increased rents. As people who rent know, your rent goes up. Um, so I think that's a relatively minor increase. The city faces increasing pressure on cost of goods and the cost of staffing.

Uh, I will vote yes on this. Patrick, I'm actually simply going to echo Mary's comments. I thought that was very well argued. I think uh it is a extremely modest amount and I think it's a prudent step to take because we do have very limited options on addressing the increasing surface costs that we're facing. Mr. Garing, uh just to remind the audience, I was born in Tucson, but I got hauled off to California when I was six years old.

Uh, we sold in California 6 years ago and at that time our property tax was about 8,000 a year. When I moved to a very nice home in in Prescuit, our property taxes dropped to 3,400. Thank you. Do we have any public comment? Madam Mayor, my light slipped. Oh, I'm sorry. I thought maybe you'd forgot to uh I didn't forget. Okay. Okay, more comments, please. Let's take a few minutes and go through some pros and cons. The logic behind the property tax is solid. It's a steady state.

Unlike the sales tax, depending on tourists, it goes up and it goes down. So, there's some rationale to this, but from what I've heard from this council, this is a good example of incrementalism. I lived in Illinois. My property tax was five times what I pay here in Prescuit. Now, why do I bring up Illinois? I bring up Illinois in the in the house I grew up in in New Jersey was 800 square ft and the property tax is five times of what I have here in Arizona at 3500 square ft.

[gasps] The states that have gone down this slippery slope, you know, it's only a few bucks, it's a cup of coffee. Well, the problem with property tax is it keeps growing and people are leaving Illinois and they're leaving New Jersey. I go back to the resident survey of 2023 in the southeast quadrant is where the residents, you in the room, you watching at home and the people that are not watching said that the southeast quadrant is where it's very important and you're doing a bad job.

There are two entries. One is healthcare that I can personally attest to and the other is the economy. Now what you're hearing is more taxes and no emphasis on growing the economy. You know, you can get tax revenue through growth or you can get tax revenue by increasing taxes, but everywhere they've practiced increasing taxes, people have left the state. They're leaving Illinois in droves. Morton Salt has lost left. Boeing has left. Caterpillar has left.

You don't want to go down this slippery slope of property taxes. If you have to raise, if you need money, then raise revenue through growth. Don't do it by taxation or this place will turn into New Jersey. God forbid. Thank you, Ted. Um, any public comment? No, mayor. Okay. Thank you. And then we also might want to attend a few uh board of supervisor uh meetings.

It's already too late for this year, but they're the ones that uh set our uh property tax rates [clears throat] for all the different districts. Um so um I move to adopt consent ordinance item 10A. Second. Please vote. Mayor, yours didn't come through. Yeah, I don't have anything on my screen here to vote on. I'm assuming you're a yes. I'm a yes. Passes 52. Thank you. Next item, liquor license.

Public hearing and consideration for a new series 12 restaurant liquor license application from Lauren Kmer Merritt, applicant for Meg Indian Cuisine, location 220 West Goodwin Street, Sweet One is the uh applicant here. Also, the applicant fees have been paid and the sign has been posted for the required 20 days. staff has reviewed the application and determined their compliance and no public comment have been received and I I take it the applicant's not here to speak not see them. Okay.

I would just like to say this is uh going into the uh firehouse plaza area and um the word me gh is uh Hindu for clouds or monsoon. So, I think it's very appropriate that we approve this uh liquor license. So, I move to close the public hearing. Second. Please vote. Passes 70. And I move to approve liquor license application number 401061 for a new series 12 restaurant liquor license for Meg Indian Cuisine location 220 West Goodwin Street Sweet One. Second. Please vote. Passes 70. Thank you.

Next item, please. Liquor license public hearing consideration for a new series 12 restaurant liquor license application from Jesus Manuel Altimano. Applicant for Filibtos Mexican Food location 555 Miller Valley Road. Is the applicant here? Application fees have been paid. Signs have been posted for required 20 days. Staff has reviewed the application and determined their compliance. No public comment has been received.

And I believe this is going in where the old Kentucky Fried Chicken used to be. I I think this makes us this gives us our 12th Mexican food restaurant, especially all on that on that one part of town on a Miller Valley Road area. [gasps] Um so um I move to close the public hearing. Second, please vote. Passes 70.

And I move to approve recommendation for liquor license application number 397301 for a new series 12 restaurant liquor license for Filibbertos Mexican Food location 555 Miller Valley Road. Second. Second. Please vote. Point of order, Madame Mayor. It's the mayor's job to call for motions, not to make motions. Thank you for your opinion. Passed 70. Congratulations to them all.

Next item, public hearing and discussion and possible action regarding the opening of a public comment period in accordance with resolution number 2023 1862 or adoption of an amendment to resolution number 2023 1862 and revised public comment period and process related to the adoption of the rodeo master plan. Okay. Good afternoon, mayor and councel.

um for as you recall I mean I think most of the information is in the packet um and so I will be brief with presentation and I'll answer any any questions but it the conversation I think really starts with res resolution 20231862 adopted a few years ago to govern the process for you know public comment and input in the approval of a uh master plan zoning and leases at the um at the rodeo fairgrounds.

Um that resolution anticipated that all of those things would be packaged together and come forward through the same sort of process and that that isn't the way that it has worked. Um since January 25, we've set a little bit of a different course from the past where we've said we're going to focus on the master planning first and then we're going to work on zoning after that and then we're going to work on leases after that.

So with a little bit different process, uh it hasn't been completely it hasn't been entirely possible to um comply fully with the resolution as written. Um, additionally with the master planning process, which is is going well, I'm really excited about all the members of that steering committee, all the the time and effort they've put in.

As we've as we get close to the point where we'll be showing final drafts and uh and bringing a plan back to the council for the vote, uh we recognize the importance of public input in that process and and getting as much feedback as we can um as we approach that vote. In the original timeline, there was a 60-day comment period kind of plugged in um prior to the vote that uh the the council could open today. That's one option.

Um, unfortunately, that wouldn't allow the public to see a final draft of the plan uh before um before we start accepting comments, leaving open the possibility that people could comment on maybe different versions that they'd seen and it doesn't fully comply again with the resolution that I mentioned. So, what I'm I'm recommending, what I'm hoping that you'll do today um is that we make a couple of changes.

So one after meeting with the group that helped to draft the original resolution here there is a proposed amendment to that resolution laying out a new process including the 45day comment period um that will lead us into into the vote. It includes a public meeting uh like an open house. It includes a public hearing um and it would get us to a vote in October 13th at that council meeting.

Um so that amendment is one piece and the second part of that um course of action would include opening a 45day public comment period effective August 5th. Um that is the day of the openhouse. That is the day when we should have final drafts of the master plan available for the public. And so everybody will be able to comment on the same plan and with the amendment we'll be able to be in complete compliance with with our own resolution. So that is in in brief what we're proposing here.

Again, there are some options for council to consider if you'd like. Um but with that, I'm happy to answer any questions you may have. So did you say August 5th, not 25th? Correct. So the public comment period would open August 5th. Mhm. And then there would be a public meeting, an open house August 5th, a public hearing August 25th. Okay. And then the final vote on the 13th of October. 13.

Well, this makes sense that we amend it uh because obviously we're putting the cart before the horse here, and it makes no sense to have public comment uh before the uh final draft of the uh master plan. So, uh, thank you for, uh, working with the committee and, uh, getting this, uh, straightened out because we do value our public comment on something as important as this, um, as this rodeo. So, um, any, um, comments from, uh, the staff, Mr. Ruby? Yeah, I think public's not part of the staff.

I'm I'm sorry. Did I say I'm sorry. I'm sorry. from city council. I think it's really important that the public comment comes that as we know and all of you are part of this being able to speak about what happens in this community and how it impacts us is part of the fabric of who we are. So having the public comment period after we have something to comment on seems utterly logical to me and I'm glad that this revision was made. I was surprised that we ended up in this situation.

It felt like there was a really good process at the last study session and it felt like a hiccup. [clears throat] So, I'm glad that it's being addressed. Um, there's something about the word final though that I'm a little concerned about here because it would seem like the public comment would be there to address issues in the plan that's presented.

I hope that there isn't this idea out there that if there's a final plan then that's it and you just get to comment on it and that and your comment doesn't do anything. I think it's important that the comment that we can bring to what is presented on August 5th impacts how it is presented later and voted on. Yeah. It'll still just be addressed. Like it's it's the word final where you hear final and go is that it?

I just kind of want to go your comment should be able to influence the ultimate outcome. Thank you. Uh Mr. Gambboji, as I've said many times before, the rodeo is the crown jewel of Prescuit and the concern I have is every time we say rodeo in this town, this place goes Hatfields and McCoys. So, I'm in support of the August 5th start date with the final version and a 45day comment period.

And I would beg of you, stop finding problems with the rodeo and come to a resolution so we can move on to more important things. Thanks. Okay. Um, do we have any comments from the public? We do. Our first one is Sundrop Carter. Thank you. I was not prepared. How are you all doing today? Good to see you. Um, so I just wanted a my comment is very quick and is actually includes both this agenda item and the next one because they're both rodeo related.

[gasps] Um, and just to encourage council to treat the funding for this rodeo with the same diligence and transparency that you're treating other taxpayer dollars. I have heard several quotes from people saying, "No taxpayer dollars are being used for rodeo improvements." And yet that $15 million is our money. We send, as the mayor and council have mentioned, we send money, quote, send money to the state. This is $15 million of our money that we paid in sales taxes coming back.

Just as um Mayor Prom Fworth has asked that our Prop 478 have transparency on our website with an accounting of exactly how that money is being spent. I would hope council is treating this $15 million with the same diligence. Um we have seen in the master plan that people are concerned about many more things on that property than just the rodeo. They want to see things that are being used year round.

This is our money and this money should be used to sp on things that everyone in the community wants, not just a small number of people and not just a decision made by a couple people on a for whatever criteria they used it for, but the whole community should have input on how this $15 million of our tax dollars is spent. Thank you. Next is Kim Lopez. I think I my pen up here. No, I lost my pen. Sorry, I'll find it. Good afternoon, Mayor Mayor Prom Council.

I'm actually going to be speaking on the second one. So, um, it has to do with the statue. So, I understand that you guys have created a design for the statue that my insurance has to cover on the property. And I have not yet seen this design. So, you guys are voting on something that we have not actually looked at. So, I would like to actually take a look at it and make sure that our insurance company is going to cover it before we do a vote. Thanks, Rosalie Derby.

Um, I'm grateful that we're going to put this 45day thing in place. Um, we put a lot of work into this and I hope that we can keep the culture of what the grounds is put in place for so that we can keep the heritage of that and keep the culture of what it's meant to be there. Thank you. That's all. Mayor Thank you. Um, do I hear a motion? Madame Mayor, I move Excuse [clears throat] me. to that council. Let me see. We don't have a proposed recommended act. Following discussion council 12.

I move to uh option number two, which is the August 5th start date with a 45day uh comment period. Resolution number 2023 1862. Thank you very much. Although it' be a modification it would be 2026 and there's oh amendment right amendment which is now called 2026 1965. Is that the correct? We'll we'll sign it at a later date. Okay. We all know what we're talking about. It's the resolutions in the package. Thank you. Do you have a motion? You did it. I think you just did it. Do I hear a second?

I'll second it. Please vote. Passes 70. Thank you. Next item, please. Presentation, discussion, and possible approval of the revised design and purchase order for installation of the horse statue at the Prescuit Rodeo Grounds. Before before we get started, I would like to say this statue is probably one of my favorite statues in uh in the city of Prescuit. Uh as you remember, it's uh home used to be in front of our old city hall and it was commemorating the hundred years of rodeo.

It was a centennial cowboy horse statue commemorating rodeo from 1888 to 1988. And um I always thought it was installed backwards at our old city hall because it was on a very prominent corner and you would drive by that corner and you couldn't see anything. You know, it was a rearing horse and all you saw was the horse belly. you never saw the cowboy unless you walked up the steps and stood at the front door of the city hall.

So that I think that was an example of no public input and I don't know who made that decision but uh I drove out to the site uh yesterday to look at it and uh it's a very nice site. Um it's got um a lot of uh traffic goes around it. there's a like a road that kind of circles it and we have to be careful that if we place the statute there that cars don't bash into it that it's protected and also uh the way it's uh the rendering there is from Rodeo Drive as you're going up Rodeo Drive.

It's on your right. There's a natural outcropping of boulders there and it's going to be nestled in those boulders. and I think it's going to be done very well. And it's placed horizontal so that you can actually see the work of art. So, I was very happy to um see that.

But I do have a concern and I know you're going to give your presentation, but I just wanted to say my one of my main concerns when I was looking at the proposal done by the architect here is there's no lighting and the rodeo mostly takes place at night and so people are going to be coming and going and the statue will not be lit up and it's going to be seen mostly one week a year basically. uh by most people coming in on Rodeo Drive.

And so I think some solar lights would be uh a good idea to light up that statue so as people are entering the rodeo, they can see the statue. Uh my other suggestion would be a drip irrigation system. I have a zero escape yard and I have to water, you know, I have a drip system, but when you put in fresh plants, even though they're uh low cactus, zero escape plants, needs a couple of years to get going, especially with this drought and through the dry season.

And uh so I would highly recommend a drip system uh for the vegetation around the um the plants. Thank you. So, please Well, thanks, Mayor. You did my presentation for me. [laughter] Uh, good afternoon, mayor and council. So, kind of going into a little more details. So, yeah, that this statue is the one that was at Old City Hall. Um, which ends up going to the rodeo grounds. So, we had an initial concept for the statue. Um, had a variety of plans, different issues with it.

So, speaking with the rodeo, um, a couple things that they wanted to make sure that happened is a, people can't climb on it. Um, b that it's elevated off the roadway and away from the roadway so that if a car hits it, it's not hitting the statue. It's more hitting boulders um, or hitting the foundation or that kind of stuff. So, more protection around it. To touch on the lighting piece and the water piece, so that comes with part of the master plan extending water or power to that.

There are solar lights that would be put in so that it would illuminate it at night. Um, as far as the initial plannings and watering those, it'll be done through a watering tank which will be on site that we'll take care of filling and have those so they can become established and then once they become established, they require less water on that. Um, I did present this plan when it was first drawn up to the manager at the rodeo.

Um, we did a couple tweaks on it and then ultimately came to an agreement with it.

We sent it out to eight different landscape um companies within um the area and basically what we told them is here's a concept um here's what the thought is building it in the boulders trying to use a lot of the natural land also using the natural boulders to protect it so four of those companies responded one of those fours basically declined the installation said we can do the plantings so that doesn't get us too far um and then we had Prescuit Roots Re and Sun's landscaping and then Yavapai landscaping Um all of those bid details were in the packet um with what they're going to do, number of plants and lineal feet of concrete and whatnot that it's going to take.

The project is going to take anywhere. Excuse me. Lois has a comment and Mr. Grady has a comment. Um I'll hold mine until you finish your presentation. I have a question. Same. Okay. Sorry. I'm almost done. So, I was just going to say, so the installation will begin once we get the purchase order issued and is expected to take um probably 60 to 90 days because there's about a 30-day period that the concrete needs to cure before we can mount the statue in it.

And of course, when the statue is bound to the positioning and all that stuff as you see in the picture on the screen, um we'll take note of that. Lois. Um, yes. I much prefer this design, uh, versus the previous concentric circles and stuff. I think this is beautiful. Um, the one thing I didn't see in the bids was, which I actually enjoy seeing in this picture. It was not on our package, in our picture, the the lettering there. Is that metal being installed or is that painted onto the concrete?

What are we looking at? And was that bid with the world's oldest rodeo? So that so the landscape architect added that that was on the second revision. Um which is why we put it up here. It would be metal um lettering. It's not part of the bid. It's something that we would do separate of that once it's completed. Um but that's just an idea if we can put something on that wall. Um Mr. Grady. Yeah. Thank you, Mayor.

So, um, back in February, we approved, uh, a bid by Ridgeline Builders, um, a lump sum bid for 1.5 million that included planting and landscape materials, installing all trees shrubs grasses accent plantings. So, why did we have to go out for a separate bid on the the planting to other landscaping companies? Okay, so thanks for bringing that up.

Um so yes, originally in the original bid with um Ridgeline Builders, we had the bleacher sound system and then it was supposed to be the statue install. The design at that time basically got rejected by um the city. So we went out and came up with this plan. So I've amended the original contract with Ridgeline to remove that money from his original contract. And so that's why we are here today. Thank you.

And um so for the solar lighting and the drip system, is that something that we could install so that the biders don't have to rebid correct the job? Correct. Okay. [clears throat] Thank you. Uh any other uh comments? Let's see. We have uh Jim Garing, Mary Frederickson, and Jay Ruby. Thank you. Uh, I'm just gathering that the actual location is just off Fair Street. Oh, it's just Rodeo Drive. Well, that's not the main entrance. It's going to be going to be okay.

Well, that would raise the other that answers the other question if we're going to be looking at Rodeo Drive via traffic study at some point and whether that should be the main entrance. And I I agree. I think that's a good idea. It's part of our rerouting the circulation, improving the circulation. The road's in pretty uh pretty bad shape. I guess we are going to be planning on uh improving that road sometime soon. Yes. Yeah. Kind of show off our rodeo grounds. Okay. Uh let's see.

We have uh Lois. Yes. Um, I did send some questions ahead of time or comments to Tim um about the bids and I know the staff recommendation was for Roots, but I started looking at the details and comparing Roots versus RNE Suns and I actually prefer um and and prefer RE Sun's plan and design and bid. Um, it's a little bit more money, but you know exactly what you're getting. You know what you're getting in the size of the plants.

You know what you're getting in the um size of uh the length of the walls and other items that were for me if I was um the recipient of this for my own home.

I would much prefer the detailed and the explanation with what we saw with R& um I did ask him if I was allowed um later on to consider something that was not part of the staff recommendation because of the bid process and his answer was yes we are allowed to consider um taking a look at the other options that are there in the package for ourselves. So, um I just wanted to draw everyone's attention to take a look at some of the details and compare them.

And I really think it's so important that this be um you know a a a beautiful appropriate entrance to our um world's oldest rodeo and I love the orientation and I love the new sign you'd add to it. Um and I think it it it is prescuit and it is it is western and I love it. Thank you. I I just might want to chime in. I I agree with Lois. I uh like the uh the re uh brothers, is it re brothers? Ari and sons. Okay.

Uh bid and uh the examples of work on their uh website uh was uh very uh creative and uh very had more of an artistic uh touch to me. Uh, Mary, thank you. Um, just stepping back to the used to be Ridgeline and now it's we're on to making a choice other than Ridgeline. Uh, the um line item in the February acceptance as the 1.5 million got broke down. Um, the Ridgeline line item for the statute was $226,000. Was that including things beyond what these um vendors are bidding on? No, it was not.

That seems like quite a jump from the amounts these people are are quoting which topped out at 109 and Ridgeline was saying 226 for the same work. Little bit of different work. Um [clears throat] yeah, so different design entirely. Um they had when the budget was drawn up with the 15.3 there was an dollar amount earmarked for the statute relocation. Um the quote that they had at the time was around $220,000. Um they put that in as we were combining everything in there.

Um in fact after the award I went back to Ridgeline and said, "Hey, can we get some more quotes and let's see where we're at." And then that's when that concept got um kind of taken off the table. So then everything was amended and the money was pulled back. Okay, great. So that line item on the ridge line for the statute is it's already been pulled it was pulled back a couple months ago. Thank you. And uh Mr. Ruby. Yeah. Um this is responding in part to uh Kimberly Lopez's concern.

This is the city currently owns the statue, right? No, the rodeo owns the statue. The rodeo owns the statue. So it was at city hall. Okay. Got it. Because my question was if it's on our land and it's ours, why would the rodeo have to pay insurance for it? But but it's now I understand better. Okay. Okay. Good. Very good question. I think a lot of people need to get that cleared up because I thought the city owned the statue originally and then found out it was owned by the BFD. Um okay.

Um if uh C Mr. Garing thank you mayor. I just want to remind uh the audience and the council that the consultant on our master plan, our last study session recommended a traffic study. And I don't know how we're going to get one done before August 5th, for instance, and whether we need to have it done.

But if if we're going to look at work on Rodeo Drive and making that the main entrance to the rodeo, uh I'm under the impression the public works has got some sort of a plan line plan in mind for realigning Rodeo Drive. Is is that right? Good afternoon, Mayor and Council. Councilman Garing. Um, as part of the Miller Valley Drive or Miller Valley Road sidewalk project, uh, we're realigning a couple of different um, intersections, if you will, and this is one of them.

So, we did ask them to look at realigning the Rodeo Drive entrance from Miller Valley Road. Um, they're still in the process of that. We have some challenges with that. There's some topographic challenges. There's some property owner challenges. We have overhead electrical lines. Um, but as part of the Miller Valley Road contract, we had some extra monies in there.

So, we asked them to look at potentially realigning Rodeo Drive so that number one, it's more of a 90 degree uh intersection with Miller Valley Road, the rodeo as well as the fair groups in our uh committee meeting discussions with them. They need a wider entrance for the semis to come into the facility. So, the road is very narrow and it comes in at an angle to Miller Valley Road.

So, we're looking at all of those conditions, but we don't have the solution yet, but we are already looking at that um for for the potential realignment of the road. Okay. Thank you. Uh uh my question though regarding that would relate to whether that's going to have an effect on where we ought to put the statue. So, the statue location is quite a bit um it's a pretty good distance from Miller Valley Road.

It's actually kind of at the where the road goes uh up in topography and when it hits the top of the road where the um where the double yellow lines end, that's where the statue will be. So, it's it's not near Miller Valley Road and it's actually in a very wide area where several roads converge. So, it's very well protected there. It's a good place for it. It kind of everything sort of opens up when you hit that top of that road, Rodeo Drive.

It sort of opens up and you can see the rodeo grounds. You can see the parking area. It's very obvious that you've arrived. So, it it's a really good place for the statue and and you can see the the statue, like you said, the you can see the statue from the grand stand and from the rodeo. So, I think that'd be great to have it lit up. It's very near the actual facility where people will be. Yeah. Yeah.

If I can add just quickly as well, in the master planning process, we've looked also at um statue location and it's been consistently in this location with each iteration. So, we're pretty comfortable that that's where it would continue um through the final drafts. Okay. Thank you. Any more Lois? So, a question. Um uh the president of uh PFD raised a question or concern about insurance. Um and then you had mentioned at the beginning you were dealing with the general manager.

Um so, how do we reconcile the concern? The general manager says we're good. Yay. If Jim's happy, then we're happy. Okay. So, I want to touch one more thing. Um, we kind of started on it. So, you had talked about the two different quotes, the lowest. So, our job is to send out the quotes. We send the same thing out to everybody to get the quotes and then obviously recommend the lowest one. We can do exemptions to that. And Lars can talk more on this if I miss the mark here.

Um, if you choose not to go with the lowest one and we have justification for that, a different kind of bid, more details, any of that kind of stuff, we can do that. It's just one more piece of paper I fill out. Yeah. Thank you. You know, because this is a very high-profile uh project and uh we need to make sure we get it right. And uh I, you know, like to thank all of the the biders that submitted their bid.

uh we really appreciate it, but I I just feel that the re sons uh might be a little more uh for $14,000 more, I think it would be well worth to have them add a little more uh artistic uh creativeness that was reflected in their on their uh jobs on their uh website and also in their bid. [cough] Patrick, do you have a comment? So, candidly, not anticipating that, I think some council members like myself may be, you know, reluctant to decide between the the two biders.

I guess my question to the two of you would be, so Roots has identified um the following plants and trees that they're going to be providing. Did you feel that there was more depth in that because we're not asking them to design the the project, we're asking them to basically install according to the specs. May I respond? Yes, Lois. Yeah.

So in my analysis, you know, I was looking at them as if this was my home and what am I what am I seeing because I think it's really important that the quality be good. If you look at both demolition prep and statue and transport installed, R& is actually lower than Roots's bid and it's also more comprehensively outlined in what they're going to do during those two steps. Um, so you know, in total that's a $2,300 difference just um in those two.

But the real difference for me came in both the dollars and the construction quality and clarity um in the construction of the retaining wall, the pedestal footing and the plantings. You ended up with raw concrete finish versus a woodlike concrete finish. So you actually have some interest to the base um that you would see from the road. Um the plantings one was very clear it's going to be 35gallon plants and they outlined them. One didn't give the number nor the size.

Um and then finally with the retaining wall, one was very clear. 75 ft la 2500 PSI concrete um with a concrete footing for um especially important for um both the wall and the and the pedestal. The other one was 0 foot long. I said, "Huh?" 0 foot long um by 4t tall and gravel footing and a rough finish. So when it's all said and done for me, this is, you know, you want to talk about art discussion we had earlier.

Um, this is this is there's there's getting it done and then there's a level of professionalism in doing the job. And for me, you know, the $14,000 difference where we're investing it in plantings and retaining wall is exactly what the public's going to notice. So that's why I was recommending R& Yeah. And u I agree. Um, do we have any public comment? If I have another I have a button pushed here. Oh, I'm sorry. Speak. Thank you, Ted, for bringing that to my attention.

This is a prime example of micromanaging. This is a decision the staff ought to make. But if it's if you don't want the staff to make it, we have two big issues on the agenda for the rest of this meeting. And I don't want to spend any more time on this. I I would after public comment, let's make a a uh a uh proposal and move on. I I disagree. I think 50 years from now, people are going to remember the statue because they're going to be looking at it. Um let's see. Uh Patrick, thank you.

So, um I'm not asking you to debate uh between the mayor and councilman Furworth regarding um the planting itself and the install. I am asking do you feel that in the roots uh submittal that you were getting a similar quality and level of planting based on face value? I don't know that I can answer that. I know looking at re you know exactly what you're getting. You're getting 30 5gallon native cactus yucka plants. The other one just talks about plantings.

So it doesn't talk about volume of plantings. So that being said, again sending out just this proposal, all I sent them was this there, it talks about the plants and stuff. It doesn't go into quantities. So like with re and they took a step further and said, "We're going to do this many. We've got this much space. This is what we can fit in there.

This is what's going to look like." The others may have just looked at it, I don't know, and said, "This is we're just going to put plings in there, but there's no number." Um, so to answer your question, yes, we know exactly what we're getting. Yeah. So, if it's not bid and uh, you know, specific enough, you could end up with, I don't know, one gallon 6-in plants, you know, according to the roots bid. And the re bid is more specific.

And uh I think in this day and age uh you know we just need to look at these bids and see who bid who bid it the best bid it with the most detail because the last thing we want is to have to go go back and spend the money to do it all over again. You know if the plants are too small and aren't specific as to what we want. Uh uh anyone else?

Mary, I guess I would just ask uh if we're thinking about what the staff is thinking other than the dollar amount and going with the low bid amongst these four, is there any other other than the dollar amount, is there anything else that uh drove the staff to picking uh Prescuit Roots over the other ones or was it just the dollar issue? simply the bid process, the dollar issue. I'm comfortable with changing it up.

Yeah, it's like I said, this very high-profile and I I think we need to make sure we get it right and don't have to uh come back and redo it. Uh do we have any uh public comment? We do not, Mayor. Okay. Anybody would like to talk if it hasn't filled out a form, please or forever hold your peace. Okay. Um, ready? Would you like to make a motion, Lois? Thank you. I um recommend approving a purchase order with RN Suns for the 70,000 77, 1113 cents. Second. Please vote. passes 61. Thank you.

Next item, approval of multiple city contracts with core construction, Inc. for construction manager at risk pre-construction services for multiple fire station projects as follows. City contract number 2027-00002 for fire station 76. Number two, city contract number 2027003 for fire station 73. And number three, city contract number 2027004 for fire station 72. Funding in the total amount of $352,743 for all three contracts is budgeted and available through public safety tax initiative funding.

Good afternoon, mayor and council. Tim Sherwood, public works. You get two Tims today. Um, as the clerk mentioned, this is for approval of multiple city contracts for upcoming fire station projects. Uh, station 76 proposed location will be at the northwest corner of Presca Lakes Parkway and Sundog Ranch Road. Station 73 is proposed to be located on the west side of the State Route 89 at the northwest corner of uh the Fippen Roundabout near the Constellation trail head.

And station 72 is an existing station on Sixth Street. And through the uh early part of the assessment, um station 72 will be a full groundup uh reconstruction instead of a remodel. The building's just not sufficient to today's standards to to go any further with that. So, it'll be a groundup rebuild. [snorts] Um Pearlman Architects was awarded the design contract on uh by council on October 14th of 2025. Uh through the early part of this year, we've been moving through the design process.

There's been design meetings ongoing um all through the late winter into the spring. Um as design proc as the design process has gone forward when we neared the 30% design stage we advertised for a Seymar. Um it is the most recommended most often used method of uh construction for uh public safety improvements.

Um myself and the chiefs uh and as well as my project managers attended a public safety conference last year um down in Phoenix and uh based on all the information that we got at the time uh this is the method that is preferred uh uh in the within the industry um projects of this complexity um to do a hard bid is is it would be very difficult.

So again, it's for a construction manager at risk or what we uh the acronym we use is SEMAR for pre-construction services contract or guaranteed maximum price or GMP. Uh it's a qualificationsbased procurement. We advertise for uh requests for statement of qualifications in February. So statement of qualifications were opened on March 5th. Some of the evaluation criteria we used um in the uh RSOQS was experience and qualification of the firm and their personnel. in this uh this type of work.

Understanding the project and a proposed project approach, subcontractor selection processes and previous public safety facilities construction knowledge and experience. City received nine statement of qualifications. Three firms were disqualified because they didn't meet the minimum requirements. So, we reviewed six of the statement of qualifications. A five member select panel was uh put together to evaluate the SOQs. uh the SOQs uh were reviewed.

The three top ranked firms were selected to bring in for an interview and presentation. Uh some of the interview criteria again just a little to get deeper dive with the with those firms were experience and capabilities of constructing fire facilities, observation of existing conditions, looking at the sites that were selected and understanding them. Creative approaches to mitigate any challenges that they could see.

uh project management, scheduling, phasing, identification of issues that need to be considered, approach to planning and construction, and previous SEMAR experience. The review committee ranked and selected core construction as the highest ranked firm out of the three firms we interviewed. Pre-construction scope and fee negotiations were initiated and pre-construction GMP was approved on June 29th. Uh Prescuit Fire and Public Works is recommending award of a contract.

Uh, I'll give you the individual amounts for uh, station 76 in the amount of $114,768, station 73 in the amount of $108,630, and station 72 in the amount of $129,345, which totals out to $352,743. Funding [snorts] for this project is budgeted in FY 1027 in the general fund and the funding source is the dedicated sales tax established by voter approved proposition 478 or the public safety tax initiative. And with that, I would be happy to take any questions you may have.

Well, first of all, I'd like to say that um thank you very much to staff. A lot of work went into this.

Uh I wish we were actually this was actually a study session because um it would have helped to bring us up to speed because the uh agenda there's so much information and we have so many questions because uh like I said this is such a high-profile uh subject and I learned more from the article that uh Chief Holdier put in the paper today uh than I learned from the uh from the packet and this is a I mean it doesn't even mention what the projected you know as a uh you know we have a fiscal responsibility here as the elected body and I've had to kind of fair it out that each one of these stations is going to cost approximately an estimate of $17 million am I right for a total of about 51 million um 46 40 46 and I think that no mention of costs have been uh addressed in any of the uh decisions that are that are made.

So I completely um agree that a lot of effort went into this. There was a project team that consisted of I guess public works and the police chief. Public works has been working closely with both departments. So this is for fire. So we've been working closely with the fire department. They've invol they've been involved in all the design meetings.

um a pretty extensive group that's involved so they can get the uh the items that they desire in their stations both not just you know uh safety aspects and and and uh uh their input because they live in these quarters uh 247. Um so like I said it's been a collaborative effort. Public works has been um our role has been more of managing the contracts and walking them through the processes. Um they're not typically uh doing procurement of this type. So that's where our role comes in.

But the fire department is really the lead on of course um site selection and all the finishes fit and finishes that will go into this process. So and they've been very good at collecting the data as to the necessity of the locations. But our our public has had some uh questions as to the locations especially you know two of them being uh right there on trail heads. Um, but my second comment involves uh page 18 of the contract.

It um says that um the con the city additionally will contract separately with one or more design professionals to provide architect architectural andor engineering design services for the project. Now shouldn't that have been included? Why is that going to be contracted separately? I I don't have that in front of me. So I' I'd have to get read it again and get get clarification for you. I don't have that right in front of me. Yeah, because that's in all the contracts.

And so I was kind of surprised to see that. Um maybe uh Gwen can shed some light on this. So I don't have it right in front of me either, mayor, but I will tell you that I believe what they're referring to is that they are not the design architect for the project. Okay. This is the construction manager at risk. Okay. So, this is a contractor or their professional that we're bringing in to advise us in value engineering. They're going to help us find ways to save money and achieve the same thing.

They're also going to look at the constructibility, in other words, the challenges of the site, right? The challenges of the facility because it's a specialized facility. Um, they're also going to at each phase of the contract give us their estimate. So, they're going to create a cost estimate for us as we hit the milestones of the project. We're still very early.

We're I I know when we did Highway 89, we kind of explained to you that we have a 15% design, then we go to 30, then we go to 60, and then we hit 90, right? So, right now, we're somewhere between 15 and 30% design. Cost estimates are very, very high at that stage of a project. The Seymour is going to be able to look at the plans that the that the architect is drawing and the civil engineer is drawing for the site improvements and look at that to see the things that I just mentioned, right?

Is it constructable? Is there a way we can save money through value engineering? So, they're going to assist the design engineer and the architect in the full development of the plan. At this point, we've been working with the fire department on what they call the programming level of the project, which is what are the things that you need in this station? What's important to you? How much space do you need?

So, we've identified what their needs are, but we haven't nailed that all down yet because we're still only at about the 15 to 30% level of the progress of the design. So these questions that you're asking us, the Seymar is going to assist us in answering those questions for you. This first GMP with them is only for the design phase of the project. It has nothing to do with the construction. It has to do with them assisting us in completing the design in a way that can be bid for construction.

So that's really what's before you today. When they say the that other contracts are not included in their work, that's because they're not the architect and they're not the design engineer, but they will assist those people in completing those tasks. I hope that answers your question. Uh yes, it does. Thank you.

But I would I would like to add that, you know, we're also looking at the the police department and their needs and uh they would like to build a property and evidence center uh warehouse and also a police substation.

And unfortunately the cost for that the the property that they bought on pref Prescott Lakes Parkway is a slope and um they're connected because in order to save money I was going to propose that the design team look at colllocating just the police substation with one of the fire stations to save money cuz as it is the site they picked involves an $8 million expense for just dirt and retaining wall work.

And if we separate the property and evidence uh building from the police substation, which should be not in an industrial area, but the property and evidence could be in a more industrial area. So that was one of my thoughts. Is it too late to save some money and have them look at designing a police substation along to be part of colllocated be part of the fire station either at the uh Fippen roundabout or a block away from where it's currently going to be uh at the Peine Trail? Point of order.

That's not on the agenda. Well, I know, but we have not had a chance to have any comments about this. So, unfortunately, we're having to turn a voting session into a study session. Was that even considered that? Yeah, I mean, I think you can answer the question. the the I I think we're getting to the point where it might be outside the scope of a Seymar approval for fire.

So to the extent that the question is would we be able to save money with the CMR and construction if we colllocated you can answer that question and and then I think if the inquiry doesn't end there we need to put it for another agenda item. Okay. So so could could they be co colllocated? They they could have been had we looked at that option much earlier in the process. The two sites that we are considering are not big enough to have both facilities located on them.

The portion of land that we bought from Yavapai County has an option for the remaining acreage that is that is on that site that the city has first right of refusal on should we [gasps] want to purchase the other half of that lot which may we've spent um several million dollars already um getting to this point buying land hiring design firms that are diligently working at the contract that council approved for them to begin the design of these facilities.

It would be a big step backward uh to try to colllocate them at this time. The the Fippen location is not big enough for the needs of both facilities. It's too small. But the county location on Prescat Lakes Parkway, as I said, it there's uh additional acreage there the city has first right of refusal on. See, we were not privy to that information at all.

And um there were no elected officials kept in the loop uh either on the previous council, the previous mayor, myself, or other council members. And that's why uh we're going to have a discussion at our next uh meeting in August as to how we can get more public input and more input from the uh electeds as this process moves forward. Patrick, I have a question specifically to the three fire stations.

So, um, at what point in the design process will we get the first cost estimate, let's say, to compare that to what we presented to the voters in the Prop 478 package. I believe it's at the full 30, isn't it? Yes, at 30%. We have I did read the scope, but it was a couple of weeks ago. I apologize. I believe it was at the 30% but it is in the scope that's attached in your packet of the work that the Seymar will perform.

There are at least three cost estimates that the Seymar will perform as we proceed through design. So just from your past experience I mean you have the dates for when you expect the whole design process to be done. When do you think we might get those first cost estimates? Do you have the schedule in front of you, Tim? Um I I know that we're we're anticipating like they're they're kind of staggered in design. So we're looking at like a like a March, April, May design. Uh P.

So like we're right coming up on 30% now. So the design will take the rest of the year to do. Um the early part of the design always takes a little bit longer. You know, 60% will be a little bit shorter period. So, it'll probably be another 2 or 3 months and then we'll be moving to 60s and we can come to you with uh with our estimates as we get our as we get our design submittals turned in in our updated uh engineers cost.

In my experience, the first um the first time you see an estimate that doesn't change a whole lot is generally around the 60% mark. if that's helpful. Go, if I can add something to both both of our contracts with architects, both also have uh public meetings or whether it's a study session or open house built into their contracts and we can get those scheduled um as we get a little further along into the late summer, early fall. Uh Lois, uh thank you, mayor.

Uh question that and I'm not sure I see the police chief in the back of the room. Oh, there's Hogar. Please come up. I have a question. I asked this to you online. We um two things we discussed um back in the fall and I can remember Mayor Good was the mayor so I don't remember the date though. Um that we discussed with the Fippen location when we gave authorization to purchase that land. Um we talked about and maybe this is for Joe.

Um, we talked about potentially annexing that land into the city and the council approved the contract to purchase the land and gave direction to follow up on that. So, I'd like to know where are we with with the potential of annexing that. And I think we also talked about the trail head that we also own since it's contiguous to city-owned land. I'm going to kick it to the city attorney. I was really hoping we could talk about this.

Um the answer is we did look at whether we could annex that property and at the time we couldn't without annexing adjacent property meaning prop other property not owned by the city. Uh whether that be the Fippen Museum or other um however and I think we talked about this a little bit but state statutes have changed. which is not in effect yet, but it has been signed by the governor, which changes the requirements for annexation.

If the annexation is done by the city of property owned by the city, so uh it will be a couple of weeks, the statute will be updated and we will be able to annex those two pieces of property without having to worry about annexing adjacent or neighboring properties. And what would be the cost to do that? Mhm. Um I think that it will be nominal.

Uh we may have incur some costs in uh surveying some of the properties if we don't have those already, but I think we probably have all the all of the stuff we already need and we can wave our own fees. Okay. So I that was the direction we gave last time because we thought it was important if we were spending millions and millions of dollars that we have it within the the city limits. So that was my first question.

But the second question, um, we've gotten a ton of public comment regarding, um, just in the last week since everyone heard about this, um, regarding the Sund Dog location and specifically the concern about, um, I wasn't cognizant enough to realize a giant flood coming out of Yavapai Hills washing across that land.

And so I'd like to understand what are your plans so far to be able to mitigate those concerns because if we're going to spend a lot of money, we want to make sure it's not full of mud. Yep. Yep. Absolutely. And actually, you you want to start with that one and I can You betcha. Okay. Just so on the drainage front, um there is currently a waterway that comes through the north side of that parcel there at Sundog and Prescuit Lakes Parkway.

We know it's a major drainage uh thoroughfare and so it's it's in the design and we will be um channelizing that water rather than it sheet flowing across the site. It's going to be channelized to the north side closest to Prescat Lakes Parkway if you will.

um that's already in the preliminary uh plans that we have seen from the engineer of record and again we'll continue to uh refine that as we work with the Seymar and the engineer to to um complete the design of that channel that add a lot of costs to the plan versus what we've put in the budget as a placeholder. So it's planned to be an earn channel not a not a pipe.

So the there are costs with moving dirt, but it's not to the extent that it would be if we were to pipe it an earthn channel cuz I'm not a construction person. Is that from the ground? I understand. But is that going to hold up to a 100red-year flood? Yes. Dashing down the hill. That is the design that we require and that is the design that we will get. Yes. And there are um pipes that run underneath of the Peine Trail.

I don't know if you were here a few years ago, but we had quite a storm and it washed out part of the Peine Trail because the water that came through there was not controlled. Um it was pretty devastating to the trail and so we we had to rebuild it. Um so we'll be we're looking at that whole how you you can't just address the water on your site. You have to it's called pre and postdevelopment. Councilman Garing's familiar with this term.

your the water at the rate that the water comes in and historically has come in is the rate that it must go out. So that's what we'll be mitigating when we do the design for the channel. And yes, there will be some costs involved with that. Um we've spoken with uh Chief Dur here um about that and we have some flood control money districts set aside um for this project to help mitigate the cost of the drainage because the drainage was here before we built.

It's not really a part of the fire station, although we have to mitigate that on the site in order to put the fire station there. So, we're going to use some flood control district monies, but again, we're not really far enough along in the design for me to tell you how we're going to remedy that, but it is on our radar and it's a big thing on our radar that we are addressing. Okay, I'll let Yeah. And I can add on to that as well.

I I think the council session you're referring to is October 28th when we brought the three sites and had the public's discussion regarding that and the due diligence that led us to the site in part was early conversations with us and public works to mitigate that flooding concern.

Um, and exactly what Gwen just uh reported to you, as you recall, we also looked at, for instance, next to the adult center, we looked at property near Watson Lake, and those were either due to response locations or charter restrictions prohibitive. And this was the site that we were able to with that due diligence at that time in that public process settle on. Thank you.

And remind everybody in the public that you were doing those options analysis and it was to reach what goal for public safety? Absolutely.

So it is to reduce response times to an 8 minute 90th percentile total response time hello to hello um with these capital investments you're absolutely so you were looking at I believe three or four locations in total around that heart of what you needed and this is the one that was deemed by and and it was part of a public discussion correct in a council meeting correct so I know there's a lot of people that are surprised to hear it it is at the sundog but this had been a public discussion And I just wanted to make that point.

Um, and they've moved down the road with council input. Yeah. And and to that, we had about four years of analysis in the station locations uh as soon as I got here. I think probably in 2022, we presented to the council at that point and these stations were iteratively chosen with GIS models that were always in a public session.

Now, that being said, I do want to emphasize the public's uh input matters significantly in this case, and you know, even if the the comments come now, we're still welcome to hear them. Uh I'm open to addressing those questions. And of course, if there's perspectives we're not seeing, that's really really important. So, and I'm assuming you're working very closely with Christy Diaz Treyan because of the trail head, the parking.

So, that's all part of the site plan you two are working cooperatively with. Yes.

and she actually had met with our design team with Pearlman as well as with our public works folks and one of the things that we decided was to relocate the trail heads before the station starts so we don't have to take the trail head out of commission and there are some costneutral improvements to those sites including moving for instance the trail head parking closer to the pine trail head actually which will actually have some improvements for recreation services and their end users as well.

Good. And is the parking the same as today or or greater? As far as I understand, it might be a little bit greater. I don't want to go on public record and say that's what it is, but that is the current. It's at least the current as good or better. Good. Thank you. Well, I'll chime in on that. That what we've seen from the early designs, the the kind of the mandate going in was we do not reduce parking spaces on on either parking lot.

So, as the parking lots get reddone, um, and I think any opportunity to increase parking spaces, we'll take full advantage of. Hold your while you're up here. I have a few questions uh about the the staging of the crews as these uh fire stations come online. Uh from what I've heard, you're very creative. For example, the crew at the air stationed at the airport, that station's going to be closed down and as the fire station opens at the Fippen, then they'll be transferred right there.

So, you'll already have that station already staffed. Correct. And uh I assume that's okay with the airport and the FAA to have uh the fire service for the airport close but doesn't have to be right on uh airport property. Yeah. So a few things uh addressing station 73 particularly in the strategic plan that we presented to you in April.

There's a specific goal in there for the airport and us to work collaboratively to ensure that relocation of the structural component, the engine, engine 73 to the Fippen does not impact FAA compliance. Matter of fact, there is FAA funding currently for the mixed ARF and ops facility that'll move that part of our fire suppression capacity closer to the center point of the runway, which is our bogey for the FAA. So, we're going to have improved coverage for the ARF response.

the rest of the response we can by FAA guidelines uh under those regulations bring from outside the airport. So not having the structure engine doesn't directly impact our ability to be compliant both with future uh and current needs on the FAA.

The other component on the staging that you bring up, the biggest uh staging need we're going to have is at station 72 on Sixth Street because that's an existing station with existing firefighters and we're basically putting a fire station right where the current one is at. So, we're going to have to relocate either with temporary trailers and housing. That's going to be the biggest impact. But you're correct.

Station 73 with existing staff will relocate that component to improve response coverage. Station 76, engine 76 is currently in service as a daytime engine. And as we get closer, we'll ask this body for more staff to finalize that so that we can have 24/7 coverage. And the projected uh idea is that they'll then move into that new station 76 at Sund Dog. Um, so they won't be relocated. They're currently working out of our training center.

So you kind of have you already have a crew that's kind of a roving uh crew and so they're kind of homeless. So they'll be going into the Peine Trail. I call it the Peine Trail station. And um so you've got that one taken care of. So that's wonderful. So the the Sixth Street station as it's being built, that crew will be moved into temporary quarters. Do you have any ideas or details uh what's going to happen to them?

As a matter of fact, the contract you're considering today in part will have that diligence uh in the station 72 um considerations. you a lot of times you can get job site trailers that are retrofitted into fire stations that are on site. The site is very constrained so we don't know how that's going to work out.

Um there's also potentially room at the fleet yard uh a little bit further away and our last uh option is to relocate station 72 or the engine to station 71 um and then to use that daytime engine as a roving engine to back fill that gap. Okay. And my last question is uh I had mentioned uh colllocating a police substation.

It would save us a lot of money because uh like I said currently the excavation costs if we have the station and the uh property and evidence uh warehouse together it it's going to cost us a lot of money in the land prep. Right. So, uh I've already heard that uh both the Peine and the um um Fippen Museum Fippen roundabout stations are already too small then so we could look some other place. Yeah.

As as you recall when we were doing the diligence for the sites for instance the roster location as well as the fitman location we even had uh discussed the potential for having library and fire also colllocated to some extent and you're absolutely correct the sites that we ended up that were in the coverage area that would actually do what we wanted it to do with 478 all were too constrained to have the setbacks and the necessary uh components to allow for substantive collocc location.

Uh could we have officer spaces at some of these stations where somebody can come in and do a report late at night? Absolutely. But the scoping of the substation and Chief Bila can talk to that a little bit better is beyond the ability for us to have that type of a collocation.

Now, that being said, I also want to make sure that you understand fire and police get along extraordinarily well here and we have no problem saying, "Hey, if an officer needs to come in and do a report in an office area, that is something that the current sites can, but it doesn't meet the needs of the police department in terms of the substation idea that they're really, you know, looking for." Okay. Thank you. And Mr. Gambboji, you have a comment.

I got a couple questions for the fire chief, but this is another example of micromanaging. I mean, it it's 5:00. We still haven't we got three more issues to resolve. Uh Hogar, um how many different locations did you look at before you settled on these? Including these sites, it was in serious consideration. Seven to eight sites total.

and you had a computer program where you ran simulations and and the key for this that and I think it's important for everybody to understand because you're going to get we're going to hear from the public we're going to hear about aesthetic issues and open space but your focus was primarily on response times and response times means saving human lives. So, as we hear this debate on issues that I believe are off topic, the important thing to remember is our fire chief is doing an excellent job.

I I've been with him as he's run these simulations. This work is very exhaustive and the whole goal is to save human lives. Let's not forget that. [snorts] Holdier, I I have one question. Um, you know, POS and POS are on the uh front page every day now and uh firefighting foam is uh one of the culprits and these stations are uh located uh close to drainages. I mean, Prescuit, you know, we're in a bowl, everything is in a drainage.

Um, is there any way you can uh look into uh uh firefighting foams that are more environmentally friendly that are based on borax or something? Because I know that there's some, you know, I have a little fire extinguisher that's based on something like that. I mean, please bear with me here. I I totally get I can put your mind at ease. First of all, all structural engines in the city of Prescuit and actually beyond do not use PAS containing AF anymore.

The only place we currently have AF foam still in stock is on foam 73 at the airport because it's an FAA requirement. However, because of the PAS requirements, it is being phased out. We can't replace it. So, we're right now getting ready, especially with the new FAA facility. There's also uh scoping for a new truck that wouldn't even run on uh AF or PAS containing uh foam. Um and those alternatives are coming on the market as we speak.

Um but the station at both Peine as well as the new station, the relocated station 73 would not have any type of AF. The other thing is the training center tower that just went in. We also have very strict training requirements. We don't use any kind of foam regardless if it's HF or not. It's just water and we have runoff containment to make sure that Watson Woods in the repairing area isn't negatively impacted by our training center or by the new fire station. Thank you.

I think that was a concern not only of mine but uh also of uh some members of the public. Uh anyone else before we move on? Tim, do you do you have any more comments? No, that that was it. Okay. All right. Thank you. You have any public comment? We do have two. First is Joanne Oers. Hello, Mayor Mayor Prom and Council. I'm Joanna Lurs and I'm speaking on behalf of Save the Dells today. I want to thank you so much for the information that I heard.

I was really concerned that the public um about the public being in the dark about a number of things that I'm still going to mention to you here today. And um I did a thought what I thought was a pretty good job of looking for information about things like trail head placement and um possible um uh location decisions and so forth. And I really couldn't find anything about that. And I know these are issues that the public's been talking about.

I think that a lot of anxiety and stress could have been alleviated with having this information out sooner and and in a in a way that was accessible to most people. Um, a lot of people aren't here right now to hear what's been said. Um, some some will are going to listen to the recording. Some have been online watching, but um, the the the word is not out that some of these concerns have been addressed.

And the list of things that I had to mention today include many that I have been reassured about just now in the last few minutes. And that's really great, but there's many other members of the public, community members who would would not have heard that. So I was really very reassured that there was a a a an effort for public participation.

um not so much for the locations of the fire stations which I see has you know has gone through a vetting process I did not understand or know about before but there are other things that we don't see addressed um I was looking at the contract for the the um contract for the core in company and didn't see certain things that um we think are important so one of my points is that the community engagement has been a absent from this whether it would have been premature or not.

Um just knowing that maybe the public could be reassured that some of these issues were being addressed. So um I did hear something about the knowledge of public um or the the choosing of alternative locations which is something that I saw um was missing from the information that I had access to. I see now that of more about the process of that and I would like to know more. Maybe this would come out in a public meeting later.

Um, also the another item on my list was the information about the fate of the trail head which was very um uh upsetting to many people. What's happening to the peine trail? There was nothing for us to go on about that. So that would be I know maybe again premature. We don't really know how that's going to come around but would be nice to know that there was real thoughtful concern for that.

Um then thank you about the conversation about the PAS that has come up um w with people I know and people have also contacted council about that pollution especially since we know that the [laughter] the the fish in the Watson are now um you know not able to be eaten and we also have these beautiful bald eagles that we have so much love for that could be affected by continued pollution in the lake.

Also, I wanted to mention [clears throat] something that hadn't come up, and this is the recognition of the Watson and Willow Lake ecosystem as an important bird area. This ties right into our economic development to have it to have that bird area be disrupted by whatever is going to be planned out there.

This really needs to be concern a concern and to be addressed and to be thoughtfully um considered because if this again we have birders that come here and spend a lot of money um in our town and they come to see those migrating birds and water birds.

And also something I hadn't heard addressed was the amplified stress for the animals at the Humane Society, which is a a it's hard to hear them there when you're at the peine barking and, you know, being maybe stressed out from their situation as a whole, but the fire um station presence and the sirens would be even harder on them. I don't know if that's been considered to have some respect for those animals there.

So, I I am I'm going to close by saying I really think it's important to get the information out to the people about these things that I just mentioned. I see that um Brody's not here anymore. So, um it's not going to be in the paper tomorrow, but how can that be broadcast so people can be reassured? Thank you very much. Thank you, Joanne. Next is Walt Anderson. Well, good afternoon, mayor, council, city staff, and members of the public who are interested in this. Um, oh, sorry.

Yes, I am a little tall. Well, I appreciate hearing some of the new information too that we didn't have before. Like Joanne, we worked on our comments separately, even though we have many similar concerns. And uh I really have a lot of concerns about station 76 at that intersection of the Peine Trail and next to Watson Woods. And I just think there hasn't been enough sufficient uh public participation in that in the choice of those sites.

None of us of course would want to endanger human lives, but the site selection process could have been much more uh public involvement and I think that would have helped us all feel a lot better about it. I I'd like to say that I've been part of a organized efforts to create a Willow Lake management plan. I'm on the steering committee and all four of the working groups and it's a tremendous u process.

This uh coordinated by Southwest Decision Resources, the consultants, they've done a terrific job. They brought together city staff with others whose combined expertise and participation have been a model in how to work collaboratively and proactively to find solutions that have positive benefits to a broad range of constituencies.

So I really want to commend the city for that particular process for the will lake management plan and it feels like we haven't had anything similar in this situation here which has kind of left us in the dark and we're just getting some information now and it's it seems to be a bit too late.

So, I think some of the public may feel that they've been dismissed and unheard just as they were when some previous city councils failed the public by prioritizing roads over acquiring open space as was promised. We know that didn't end up well in terms of the public recognition of the city council and of the staff at that particular time. It has changed much to the benefit of our community since then and I commend all of you for that sort of thing.

But it's something we need to watch because public uh perception is very important. Well, it's been mentioned that the both of these sites u at the constellation trails or fippen and at uh the pivine trail uh kind of impinge upon our open space which the public is very involved in and Watson Woods being an important bird area which is a significant designation and Watson Woods is pretty amazing. We turned up and the city I'll com commend them on that.

They turned an industrial site into a riparian preserve that's beloved by the public, but I would hate to see anything to jeopardize that particular thing. So, the Grenadell's Preservation Foundation generously created a much more visitor-friendly access point with a steel wall visually blocking the ugly industrial site next to it and putting up an attractive welcoming sign. And we wonder what would happen to that investment. We simply have not been told. And so this is part of our problem.

We don't know what's going on. The flash flood was mentioned. That's a significant concern. Mitigating that, I think, could be a very, very big expense. And I would hate to see a uh station like that threatened by something as significant as a flash flood. Mother nature bats last. So anyway, there are economic consequences to be uh considered here that exceed those economic costs of building a station.

and some of those things and some of that of course is the engine that tourism drives along the Peine Trail. It's our most important trail. So, we have models of good public engagement, but I haven't seen it here. It seems like the analysis was focused narrowly on the station itself and not on the bigger picture.

So I ask everybody here to look at the bigger picture as much as possible to share that information with the public more widely and consider other sites that might be less controversial and perhaps a better deal financially too. I worry a little bit that these sites are so small that they can't be expanded in the future if the need should persist and uh the um uh the size would inhibit that. So costs are not limited to fire protection alone. So think holistically. Thank you. Thank you, Walt.

That's all. Any other comment from um council members? Jay? Yeah, I remember the October 28th session [snorts] and I do remember Eric Moore pointing out that often recreation areas have had building or development put in right next to them and that is to the detriment of the of those areas. But I also remember that there is an urgency to getting these fire stations put up. And I think it's important to remember we are not in the lowest tier of insurance right now.

And getting these fire stations put in is going to help lower everyone's insurance. We're not talking a pristine area. And I think we need to protect our pristine areas. I'm curious and this is a question in agreeing to this Seymar. How much leeway is there on planning after this point Gwen? or is it like once we agree to a Seymar, there's no more deviation? So, Councilman Ruby, um the Seymar, again, the Seymar, this Seymar GMP is only for the design phase.

So, if the city decides to discontinue this design or do something different, then we have the extent of this contract that we're obligated to meet. Um it's not until we decide to move to the construction phase that you know that's a different GMP with hopefully the same semar because that's why we bring them in at this phase.

So it really the extent of your risk is what you we're asking you to approve today is for preconstruction design services for the Seymar meaning some of the considerations that have been brought up at council at council [laughter] um can be considered as we go forward. We are taking notes. Got it. We will we will try to address the things that are coming up in this meeting that will come up in the public meeting. There will be a public open house.

We'll will attempt to address those concerns as well. So that's why the Seymar is along with us as we proceed through the project. We're very early in the project. We have a good ways to go and we can continue to incorporate comments and uh requests and things like that as we can into the design of the of the sites. So, we're very early on still. This is like just kind of a procedural step to move it forward.

We need the professional expertise of the Seymar to continue the design and address some of these concerns that we've heard. Cost only being one of those things. Okay. Thank you, Gwen. If I can add to that too, as we move through design, there there needs to be opportunities where we we bring what the work that's been done so far to the council. The council is able to weigh in on different options. you know, we might want to do A, B, or C. And so, we need council to be able to to weigh in.

Those are also opportunities for the public to weigh in, to get updates on where we are, to see what the options are, to weigh in on what one they think might be best, and and that needs to be built into our process so that the council is involved, so that the public's involved, and as we get to the end, as we get to construction, um, we've been working as as a staff, we read a book recently about projects that talks about, um, you don't want to think fast and act slow, right?

Where you just just have an idea and then you start and it takes forever and you go over budget and you go over. You want to think slow and act fast. You want to be prepared. You want to know all the details. You want to make sure all the all the ducks are right there in a row. And then you go to construction because once you go to construction, that's when it starts to get very expensive very quickly.

And so having as much public process um as we can and council involvement leading up to um leading up to construction will help us to make sure that when we actually build something, it's something that the community is happy with. Thank you. Uh I'd just like to comment um this is unpre unprecedented. I don't know of any communities that are building three fire stations at the same time and I think uh we're going to do a very good uh job at it.

I just want to comment uh you know we talk about fire but you know a large part of the fire department is uh EMS emergency medical services medical services and having a fire station strategically located next to Willow Lake. They've had uh had to rescue people in kayaks that have been caught in uh the monsoon storms. Uh they're out on the trails. Uh rescuing people that are lost or have broken bones.

So, I think being strategically located uh next to the lake and the trail I think is definitely a uh a big asset. Um and they're going to do it cost-effectively, too. uh from the numbers that I've seen, you know, their land acquisition is out of three stations, they only had to buy land for what was it 200,000 and uh that's a pretty good deal. And uh the crews are all uh up and running, ready to go, trained. So, I think it's going to be a very smooth transition.

So, I I commend uh Holdier and his team uh for uh all their hard work, and we're moving along. swiftly. Mr. Gambboji, Councilman Ruby mentioned Eric Moore back in October 28th, was it? I want the public to realize that Eric Moore voted in favor of this. So, if there's no other council comment, I'd like to make a motion. Go ahead. Can I make this in one or do I have to make it in three, Joe? You can make it in one if you'd like.

I move to approve city contract number 2026-00002 2027-003 and contract number 2027-004 second please vote passes 70 next item Approval of city contract number 2027-005 with Wilman Construction for construction manager at risk pre-construction services for the police substation and property evidence project in the amount of $534,042. Funding is budgeted and available through the public safety tax initiative funding. Good afternoon, Mayor and Council. Tim Sherwood public works.

Again, um a lot of what I'm going to talk about I talked about previously with the fire station is very similar. Um but I'll give you some of the uh the differences. So again, it's approval of a uh construction manager at risk contract for construction of the police substation and property evidence facility. Uh staff evaluated seven sites for this new multifunctional facility.

The city purchased a 7 and a half acre parcel from FPI County at the northwest corner of Prescal Lakes Parkway and Storm Ranch Parkway. Um the location was based on police response times, proximity to the Avapai County Justice Facility and uh and it met adequate size for the department's needs now and into the future. Uh purchase of the property was approved by the county board of supervisors and ordinance number 2025-906 was adopted by council on October 14th of 2025.

Arrington Watkins was also awarded design services contract on October 14th of 2025. They have been working through the programming and schematic design um through uh since that happened. And as we're approaching 30% design, it's time to bring a construction manager on at risk on board. Again, we advertised uh concurrently with the fire stations. Uh advertised in February of 26. Uh SOQ's were opened uh on March 5th of 2026.

Um pretty much all the same evaluation criteria were used for both uh um both SOQs. City received seven statement of qualifications. All seven uh submitted were uh qualified. Uh five member uh select review committee was chosen. Evaluation process consisted of reviewing the SOQs and the three top ranked firms were selected for interviews on May 29th 29 uh 2026.

Um after the interviews the review committee rank and selected Wilming Construction pre-construction scope and fee negotiations were initiated and the pre-construction GMP was approved on June 29th of 2026. Uh Prescuit Police Department and public works is recommending award of a contract to Wilming Construction in the amount of $534,42.

Funding for the project is budgeted in FY27 in the general fund and funding source is a dedicated sales tax established by voter approved Proposition 478, the public safety tax initiative. And again, we can open it up to questions. Thank you.

Um, there's no question in my mind that we do need a new police and evidence facility and uh and we do need a a substation, but during the um budget process when we were looking at all the expenditures for next year, I we just happened to find out um it wasn't discussed that the property that was bought on um President Lakes Parkway for 1.5 million.

Uh we knew it had a slope, but we did not know the extent of the cost of the land excavation, the site prep, which is going to be $8 million for taking basically taking down the hill and putting up retaining walls. And so we're going to we just approved uh our a change to our land development code to protect our hillsides.

And then we're going to turn around and do this major excavation very expensive excavation cost that I don't think is necessary if we would just separate because you have two different uses. You have the property and evidence and then you have the police substation. Police substations should go in neighborhoods in areas where there's potential for crime. Uh have more public access.

A property and evidence doesn't really need to have public access and it can go out on a flat piece of property that we already own out by the airport and the wastewater treatment plant and where the uh FedEx uh facility is. And I noticed none of that that property was not uh even looked at from what I could tell. So, you know, we're we're trying to be fiscal conservatives here and if we can save $8 million in uh excavation, I say let's take a step back and look.

Um, I called uh I talked to the uh emailed uh Mesa because they just did a new property and evidence facility and um Mesa's 10 times the size of Prescuit. They're half a million people and their pro property and evidence facility is about 32,000 square feet. How big is this one going to be? The combination of the building, the substation and the property evidence facility is over 40,000. the property. Just the property and evidence.

I don't know that I've got a breakdown of what property and evidence of that building and substation will be total. So, you were talking about 40,000 for a police station and a property and evidence facility because um they built their just property and evidence with this basically a giant uh warehouse and I see it's going to be a metal building which I think is a great idea. Um they built theirs for $750 a square foot. Um their construction cost was about 20,000 I mean 20 million.

Um and then it was uh 23 million if you include uh furniture fixtures and equipment. So I think there's a lot of room for cost cutting here. And we need to take a step back and be a little more creative. And I think we could save a lot of money if we separated these two facilities. They don't have to be related. And if you need a firing range, you can put it out in this this warehouse and uh put in the uh the labs. The lab doesn't have to be, you know, next to the public or anything.

It can be anywhere. So, [snorts] I think we need to uh be creative, put on our thinking caps, and um look at being more cost-effective and the property that we already bought for 1.5 million. You know, we could resell that and put it to a higher and better use for uh like a neighborhood oriented business or something that would produce uh jobs and uh some taxes. So anyway, that's that's just some of my um my opinion. I think this still needs uh a lot of uh a lot of work.

I I have some questions on the uh contract, too, but I'll let other people uh speak. Anyone else have some comments? No speakers? Is um the button's pushed. Oh, is it? Oh, there it Okay, you just came up. Thank you, Ted. Got it. If you drive out there, you've already seen that they've cut slope in that location. And since we have the court there and we have, yeah, the the the jail and the court there.

It makes it convenient for someone who's who's going who is released from court to go pick up his stuff at the retention center. Once again, we're I I got to ask the question, why do we have staff if if they come to us with a recommendation and we redesign it? This is a fine location for where it is. You're talking about $8 million to cut the slope.

But Tim, tell me, if we put this on Roser Road between uh the Raleigh Simmons Center and the location for the Greek Orthodox Church, what would excavation cost be there? I don't think you'd see a significant savings there. There's there's quite a bit of slope at that location as well. Um as well as some significant drainage uh matters that we'd have to deal with. Um we've had a couple projects over my time with the city just to mitigate drainage um in that corridor.

So, it's it's not it's not as flat and level as maybe you might think. Um, if you look at it from an aerial, there's uh quite a bit of earth to move to to make that site uh viable. And if I may add um to your comment, Mayor. Well, wait a minute. Okay. I'm sorry. Go ahead. Give just give me a number. Well, and if I can real quick, uh um so it's not 8 million versus zero. No, sir. If I could 8 million versus whatever it cost to excavate in some other location, you're probably 2 to4 million.

Um, and part of this process like we're talking about, you know, when we talk about the earthwork and the $8 million you mentioned, um, these are very early preliminary numbers. Somebody looking at a site, maybe looking at topography, we received the 30% design estimate and that number has already been reduced down to $4.5 million as far as retaining walls go.

So, like I said, at the 30% when we start getting further into design, costs start coming down because it's a deeper analysis done into the site itself. So the the $8 million that was on the kind of the high-end early we're just looking at the site has already been reduced down into 30% estimate from the engineer is down to $4.5 million. I know that's still a lot of money. I understand that.

But like I said, as we move through design, um opportunities, especially with the Seymour on board, opportunities are created to find ways to save money. Well, I would I would like to say that none of these locations that that you're talking about um I don't know what why he's bringing up the the Greek Orthodox Church. Um well, because you're talking as if it's $8 million versus 0 million. It's $8 million versus how much to excavate in any other lot you pick.

I was I was going to suggest that the police substation, we look at the cost of a police substation uh on the property that we already own uh next to the adult center on the uh east side of the adult center. We need to look at that because this is a big decision. And we also need to look at relocate building the property and evidence building on a level piece of ground that's easy build, not on the trying to take down the side of a hill to put an impound lot on and uh a giant warehouse.

I mean, why didn't we look at the property we already own out by the airport next to the FedEx Center and the wastewater treatment plant? We already own that. As again, as [clears throat] I mentioned very early on in my in presentation, we analyzed seven sites and I can let the chief or Brian Sparks elaborate on the sites that were looked at and evaluated before landing on this one.

Again, as public works, we are working with the police department to to manage their their projects for them, but the ultimate the ultimate decision is going to be the the police departments and what meets how it meets their needs, right? Um today, not just today, but in the future. Yeah. And I completely agree 100%. I support our police and all the facilities that they need to uh function at a high level. But I still think we need to do a lot more options analysis. This is a big decision.

There's a lot of money involved. I mean, it's a $50 million project just for this one facility, whereas the fire department's building three for the same amount. And I don't understand why we didn't look at separating one facility from the other because they don't really have to be uh located together. So, uh, if Mr. Brambillo would like to, uh, would like to speak, our, uh, new interim, uh, police chief. Thank you. Good afternoon, Mayor, Mayor Prom, and council.

Thank you, John Brambilla, deputy chief until Sunday. Interim chief come Sunday. But, um, excellent questions and it is a huge project and this is probably in the lifetime of our police department, probably the only time we'll have something this large. The last time we built a station was 1991. I was a senior in high school that year. I worked for parks and wreck. I actually went over there to help clear that lot where that station is. It served us extremely well.

Uh we've outgrown it um as the the city has grown, as our department has grown. We have definitely outgrown that station which facilitated a lot of the conversations um around the public safety sales tax. And so we did we had a lot of discussions and you bring up excellent points about colllocating.

Um Chief Dura did a lot of research as Councilman Gambboji um already talked about that he had specific needs for where his stations needed to be and if we could colllocate with those to meet the same needs that we have for our response times. We we looked at those possibilities. They were a little bit different.

his his his needs are very different than our needs as far as where his stations are cuz most of the time they're they're responding from their stations where we're responding sometimes from our station but sometimes we're out in the public obviously we're driving around being proactive. So we did look at those possibilities and that's why um we thought taking the original plan that that we presented to the public where there was essentially three different projects.

There was a standalone property and evidence building which we absolutely need. Uh those that have seen our property and evidence facility, it's it's full. The other facility we use is at the rodeo grounds. I don't think it fits into the master plan. I I didn't see it up there. So, and during the rodeo, we can't even get to it. Um and that's where we store a lot of evidence and property, large pieces that it's very inconvenient. And then we have the the uh vehicle impound lot at Heritage Park.

So looking at where we needed to be to reduce response times, where we could create efficiencies for the things that our patrol officers do, looking at how we could be more efficient from the property and evidence standpoint. Um when we evaluated with with Brian Spark's assistance seven different locations throughout the city, um that's the one that we landed on because it hit all of those key points that we were looking for.

The location um it gives us um efficiencies because we're right next to the jail. We're right next to the juvenile justice center. We're right next to the Humane Society where we do a lot of business with our animal control and we're just down the street from uh our police range. So, looking at moving the majority of our operations out of the downtown building and maintaining that as a headquarters, administration would stay there.

Records would stay there because it's convenient for the public to be downtown to get records and not have to drive all the way out to Prescat Lakes Parkway. detectives uh for the fact that the courts are located in the downtown. There is a court like um Mr. Gambboji talked about there at the jail as well. And then community services, our bicycle officers, we need to keep them downtown.

Uh but moving the bulk of our operations, which is about 70% of our personnel to this new facility, which would then house patrol, traffic safety, animal control, and our canine units, as well as property and evidence. And you asked a great question about the square footage. We are we are at like the schematic design. So we don't have we have overall square footage. The individual square footage for those areas is still being moved around.

We just got our first look at what it could look like just a few weeks ago. So we actually have a schematic design of what the building could look like and what spaces are. We're also building for the future. So that site gives us that ability that we're looking at not 10 years but 30 years. What does that look like for us? And it gives us expansion where we're at on that site.

So the location creating the efficiencies, consolidating all those police functions and property and evidence does need to be colllocated because officers have to go there to get evidence to take to court. Also, citizens need to go to that location to obtain their property that we have because it's really two functions. Property, which is sometimes found property, things that we're holding for safekeeping, somebody that's in jail and we're holding on to their belongings for them.

So, we have that side of it where the public does need to have access to that and it should be convenient for them to come to get their things. The other side of that is the evidence side and the officers do need to bring it in to the station. And again, if we're looking at efficiencies, if we have the substation in one location and the property in the in the other location, like on the other side of town, we're spending a lot of drive time back and forth.

So, looking at creating those efficiencies for us and consolidating everything. I know parking in the downtown is not an issue here, but it's an issue, right? Once city hall moved out, we lost two parking lots for our staff. So, we're down to one parking lot, which has about 35 spaces. We're parking, our employees are parking on the street. Those spots are for our visitors and our residents, and we're we have no place to park. So, this alleviates a lot of that.

It frees up a lot of parking in the downtown area and gives us a better place. Security, it's a great location for the security of that facility. So, we took all those things into consideration. Um, is that site a challenge to build on? Yes. And we've we've had those discussions with our design team and with the Seymar, even though they're not on board yet, they've already been talking with us and Gwen did an excellent job of explaining it.

It we're going through a process and that's why some of this information is just now coming forward because that's where we are in the process. Like literally, we didn't see a design concept until just a few weeks ago. It's all just programming and needs and how big is this space and what do we need for the future and making sure we do it right so that we don't have to do it again.

The only other thing we would, you know, like like Chief Dura talked about, yes, those substations that you mentioned, but those typically are very small, maybe an office where we have computers that officers can stop in. We used to have a lot. Um, when I started 27 years ago, we had a substation at the fries on Fair Street. We had a substation out at the airport. We had various substations. But as property has become very valuable, we were kicked out of all those places.

So, we're we have no other substations. We have the main station downtown and this would be another station with the bulk of our operations moving to that station. So, I hope that clears up some of the questions, but if you have others, please let me know. Does anyone else have any comments? Mr. Ruby, when when you were looking at all your needs and assessing them and looking at the kind of your optimal space? Was cost consideration part of that conversation? And if so, how?

And thank you for that, Councilman Ruby. I appreciate it. Yes, obviously we know that the the the tax revenue is going to be a certain amount. Um, as Gwen stated early on, the estimates coming in were were high, but as this team has worked together, um, just bringing the Seymar into the conversations, they're already doing a lot of that value engineering. So, yes, we're we're very concerned about what that overall cost looks like.

In the last two years, construction costs have gone through the roof. um that Mesa facility, we we talked with them. We toured that facility. Um Tim mentioned the station design conference and 2025. We attended the station design conference which is a an entire conference dedicated to building police and fire departments. And we listen to um different stories and projects. And after every single one I'm like, that's a great project. How much did that cost?

and they would tell you and I go, "How much would it cost now?" And it's almost double in a lot of the cases. So, we did a lot of our our due diligence to look at the different facilities to tour them. We toured Glendale's new property and evidence facility, uh, Mesa's, and and we we feel like we've done a really thorough job of looking at what our needs are and understanding that there is some constraints on budget. Okay, Mary, thank you.

Uh, I appreciated the the grid that was part of our packet noting out the considerations of the seven sites that were uh evaluated and I was um very strongly online with the choice that was made. If you looked at the grid from residential compatibility all the way down, it's all no problem. Excellent.

I like the the synergy involved with having the police station, the evidence, and and all those other elements that are going into it right across the street from the county's justice center, the youth court, the youth detention, the jail. Uh I hadn't even been thinking about the interaction between the police department and the humane society. and of course the gun range at the end um down by the transfer station.

Uh and really the lack of not having it around residential is a big factor for me. So, between not having any interaction with people's as they're living their lives out in their residence, uh, and the quick dash to go into our city court, uh, the county court downtown site is going to be perfect. are the topography is a mess as far as how we're looking at it now.

But I appreciate the Seamar the idea that the Seymar can bring value to the um the construction choices that are still to be made and the numbers we have now are not necessarily the numbers we're going to have in the future. I suppose there's always chance that they could go up, but but from the Seamar's perspective, from what I understand, their goal is to bring value to the choices made and numbers will slide down as as some choices and some adjustments to the plans. Yes. Uh can be made.

Um I'm all on board with the site you guys selected. Not perfect, but certainly amongst the sites that have been considered, I'm on board with that. Um, I guess my only other thing is, and again, kind of comments made earlier, I don't know that we're here to study andor vote on site selection. We're here for the Seymar, which I think is a clear choice of thumbs up for that. Thank you, Ted. I have a question for the interim police chief.

The mayor's trying to make a point that we ought to build this next to the fire station. As much as we love Hogar, and I look on him as a brother, if I understand your presentation, there's more synergies putting it where it is, not just with the the JV and the and the courthouse and the jail, but also its relative proximity to your office right here. Is that true? there there's more synergies to be had where it is than loc colllocating with the a fire station. Correct.

If [laughter] uh you know Councilwoman Frederickson pointed out that the the matrix that Brian put together for us, if you look at one of those, it talks about proximity to our downtown station, which this unlike the fire department, we have been housed in one building for a long time. That separation is going to take some doing on our part. When I say our part, the the command staff to maintain the culture that we have, the communication that we have.

So, there are some challenges, but keeping it close to downtown makes it simple for myself to go there, Lieutenant Cassoon, whoever it might be to keep us close enough together. But we also get out of the downtown area. Um, like specifically like last weekend during the parade, we're we're trapped down there. So from a strategic standpoint, that's again that site checks that box for us. Thank you. You're welcome, Lois. This has been helpful. Um, honestly, the most helpful thing.

um not only you explaining the operations and why, but hearing that you've already cut almost $4 million out of the project from earth work cuz I have to say I was coming in with no way am I going to improve $8 million for moving dirt. Um that's a lot of taxpayers money. So, you've made me more uh comfortable with your recommendation and um the only thing I would ask because you're I think you're hearing it from several of us. Eventually, Holar is going to have yet another station up north.

Please consider in the scope of that other station your need to have some substation up north that you do find a place that's colllocated that we find some synergies down the road because it'll be brownfield and it'll be flat and I think you're hearing from the council we would like to be very efficient with taxpayers money. So um that's all I have to say. Excellent excellent point mayor prom.

Um, and that would, you know, as we look at airport expansion and we look at TSA requirements for us to be there, right now we're under, if they call with an emergency, we're under a 10-minute window. We get tested on that. It's if you're leaving from downtown Prescuit to the airport, even running lights and siren, it's close, right? So, we do like and I and I know Chief Duro will be happy to house us. They'll probably put a wall to separate us from them, but that's okay.

Um, but there will be that need out there um as the north continues to expand and if we see TSA requirements change that we have to be at every flight because right now we don't, but that could come at any point. So, it would make a lot of sense and he and I have talked about that. So, it will make a lot of sense for us to colllocate. So, so I'm hearing it's an excellent location. And there just happens to be a mountain on it. Yes, Mayor.

Unfortunately, Prescuit is short on flat areas, but yes, other than that, it did meet a lot of the needs that we have. Mr. Ruby, is there any scenario in which separating the evidence center and the other needs, if that did create a cost savings, is that something that you could feasibly consider? Yeah, Councilman Ruby, excellent point.

Again, we're so early in the design that if if we do see that we could separate and and it saves it saves money and it and it doesn't impact efficiencies uh to the point that it's it's become inefficient, we could definitely still look at those options, but keeping it collocated, it it is important. People that do show up to retrieve their property sometimes are are not real happy.

Um, so having it in a facility where there are officers that can respond is is important for our civilian staff to make sure that they're safe. So that that was the other big factor we took into consideration that we don't want to isolate them to where if something did happen, we don't have anybody there to to keep them safe. Um, let me just make this suggestion.

Um when you make the big cut in the hill and make the scar, can you terrace it so that it can be landscaped and uh prevent all the storm runoff? Because we haven't been doing that. uh as you come into the entrance of our town when AOT did the interchange there, they just took out that hill and they didn't step it back or terrace it and it just it's just an ugly scar that Yes, ma'am. It's been sitting there for I don't know how many years.

Nothing's growing on it and it's right at the entrance to our community. Whereas if they had taken a few minutes to just think about it and terraced it a little bit and stuff would have started growing there. To to our city manager's point, at some point when we can show you options, we we have some renderings that we can show of how we're terracing and tearing that off to account for a lot of that. Uh it would be wonderful to have everything flat, but we know that that's not possible.

So, that's one of the the main things that we've had our design team, our architects, and our civil engineers working on that um for that very reason. And so, when we when we get those renderings um to the point where they're good for for you all to see, we'll we're happy to bring them forward so you can take a look at the I I know again I give Chief Hogar Dura a lot of credit like he has big foam boards of the potential and I think you commented once on the different styles.

So, we're a little behind them in the process, but when we get to that point, we'll do the same thing. So, you can kind of see the different options that we have. And what's the plan for the dirt? Where is it going to be sold or I'm going to let Tim fill fill in a ravine or some dirt going there? There could be some some efficiencies with what they need for their sites versus what we have on our site. So, and again, just like chief said, there's there's going to be multiple options.

We'll see how things progress in the schedule. Um there's a need for dirt at 76. Um that site needs to come up a little bit. There's a need for dirt at 73. So the dirt could be hauled to that location. If the Seymar has a big project they need to haul dirt to, we could see some economy there. If they have a project where they need to haul dirt to do a fill another site. Um so there's there's multiple options.

It can just depend on our contractor um who's there at the time and like I said, there could be multiple options and and see where where where it lands. that there are needs around the area for dirt and um we'll we'll we'll move it as as efficiently as we possibly can. Well, hopefully there's more dirt than rock. I [laughter] no problem. You can use the rock for the retaining walls. Okay. Are we about done here? Do I hear a motion? Madame Mayor, I'd like to make a motion.

I move to approve city contract 2027-00 5. Second, please vote. Passes 70. Thank you all very much. Appreciate it.

Next item, adoption of resolution number 2026-1996 and ordinance number 2026-1952 ordinance of the mayor and council of the city of Prescuit Yavapai County, Arizona amending the city of Prescuit city code chapter 2-1 public works department section 2-1-8 utilities division provision of water to the areas outside of the city limits rules and regulations by adopting ing the public record document entitled revisions to city of prescat city code chapter 2-1 public works department section 2-1-8 utilities division provision of water to areas outside of city limits rules and regulations great job Tori thank you good evening mayor mayor prom council uh Chelsea Walton community development director here to introduce an item that council asked us to bring back during the May 12 meeting So, a very brief recap.

Uh, currently, city code allows service of city water outside city limits for one single family dwelling unit on a parcel of land provided it is connected to both city water main and a city sewer main.

So, city staff, the issues um around bringing this item originally uh is that city staff received numerous inquiries from water uh for water service for parcels outside city limits which are adjacent to city water lines, but nearly all are not close enough to feasibly connect to an existing sewer line.

Um, [snorts] additionally, policy has changed throughout throughout the years on water service outside city limits, and these areas have existing water lines that service other existing homes, but there is no water service agreement in place. Um, additionally, some properties have had water boxes installed at their property line, and these neighborhoods are within the city's water service area.

So, at the March 3rd, 2026 water issue subcommittee meeting, staff received direction to forward a proposed code revision to council. At the May 12 meeting of council, staff presented uh you all with a list of five alternatives and staff was subsequently directed to bring back a code revision that applies to only an eligible definitive list of parcels. So, uh, resolution on the resolution on page 474 of your packet contains that definitive list of the 53 parcels in question.

And the ordinance on page 469 of your packet contains the verbiage of the proposed code change that would allow these particular parcels to connect to city water. Uh, we've gone over this several times. I know it's late in the evening, so that concludes my presentation, but I'm available if you have any questions. Thank you, Chelsea. And I want to thank you and city staff, Brian Ruiz, Water Resources, and Legal, uh, for all their all their hard work. This is a a problem. These are old lots.

They're out in the county. Um, paperwork was lost. Things weren't recorded. But to me, it's obvious that the there's the intent that city water was supposed to be uh supplied to these lots. If you look at Vista Del Sierra, they've got the water box right at the property line. They have a water mane right out in the street and all the neighbors are hooked up. And uh we didn't help with our new water policy by change we moved the goalposts. So, these good people of the county are in limbo.

And I was first made aware of it when uh Supervisor Chris Coupio contacted me and said, "Hey, uh can you help me out?" And [clears throat] so we uh swung into action and I think we have uh we've got a list. This is kind of a oneanddone thing. It's not going to set up precedents or anything. So, uh, I, uh, I support this, uh, [clears throat] 100%. Uh, are Mayor, may I address a few of the questions that came up? Yes, I was going to ask. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you.

So, as you mentioned, it was the 2022 water policy that sort of created this requirement to connect to sewer. And this policy is still important to council. So the intent is not to loosen that requirement, but to address those specific properties that had in in indications of an intent to serve by the city. And so water was available at the time, but for whatever reason, these properties didn't connect.

And so one of the questions or directions that was brought up in our last meeting was how do we make sure there's no slippery slope that this just opens up for many properties to come through. And so we address that primarily through the specific list of the 53 parcels and that's in the resolution.

And then secondarily by placing into the actual ordinance the kind of exhaustive or comprehensive review that we had did or that we had done to make sure that we are only capturing those properties that had an indication of an intent to serve. Um a couple there's three other things that was brought up at the time of our last meeting that I want to address. One was to make sure that uh if there's any wells on the properties that those be abandoned and we included that in there.

Um that in terms of water conservation that there be a prohibition on turf uh grass turf at those properties which we included in in the ordinance. And then finally there was a question about a inlua fee uh for these properties where since they weren't connecting to sewer that we would charge an inlu fee. And looking at that, we felt like we were not able to do that, especially as it applies to the specific 53 parcels.

I think that's something we could do in general, but it would have to be applied in a blanket matter across all properties that receive city water, but are not on city sewer. And we didn't think that this was the appropriate vehicle for doing that. So, that's how we tried to address the concerns brought up. And and like Chelsea mentioned, I think we did that. Thank you, Joe. Uh, Mr. Gambboji, kudos to city staff and our attorney. Um, I think this is a very rational process.

Many of us have been out to the site. It makes all the sense to the world and it clears the decks. So, uh, it's after 6:00. Unless we have any resident input, I think we ought to limit the blowing and make a motion. Um, I think we have a comment from Mr. Ruby. I just want to blow V8. [laughter] Go ahead. [laughter] I didn't know that was a word. No, I mean I I think the principle, this is one of those cases where principle and practice is really important to look at.

The principle that we have of making sure all new development that is annexed into the city has sewer for wastewater recharge is really important. I kind of broke down the numbers. I know that some of us had requested the numbers. We never really got them, but I went up there. I broke down the numbers. We'd have recovered like 200 acre feet over 20 years at best. And the cost for putting sewer in is just extraordinary.

So for those of you out there who are very concerned about this, this is a smart financial move and it helps these folks out. Is my bloiating done, Ted? That was very well done. You're among the masters. Yes, sensei. Well, what's a few more minutes? Um, shall we take some public comment? We just have one from Arthur Klene. Thank you. Good evening. Now, I'm on the board with Mr. Delero and you pretty well covered everything.

I just wanted to point out that the uh some of the lots that were sold, some of the lots that were sold were uh nobody built on them yet. They're going to be worthless if they don't get the water rights. That's about it. I appreciate your time. Thank you. And Mr. Shingle Decker is traveling so he couldn't be here but I do have a letter from Alan Marchion. I would just like to read a few of his comments.

Um there is zero cost to the city and there are 10 lots in phase two that uh were denied connection because a water service agreement couldn't be located. It was must have been lost or not recorded. This doesn't mean that it didn't exist. Um, when phase 2 was developed, the developer oversized the water man and put in a water pumping station built to city requirements and it was handed over to the city.

And like as we all know, uh, phase two, they all have existing taps on the water main and water boxes. So there's obviously a clear intent by the city to provide water and at least two two lot owners have already been negatively financially impacted by the denial of water. So um I think that uh we just need to do the right thing here. So do I hear a motion? Madam Mayor, I'd like to make a motion. Uh but I have a point of order.

Joseph, can I make can you make a motion on a resolution and an ordinance together? Yes, sir. You can. Therefore, I move to adopt resolution number 2026- and move to adopt ordinance number 2026-1 1952. Second, please vote. passes 70. Thank you. Thank you everyone for hanging in uh with us for another recordbreaking uh [laughter] but we will be taking our summer break as Lois had noted. We'll see you back here at August 11th. I know I did it. [laughter]