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Minutes - 2016 - City Council - 05/31/2016 - Town HallEAGLE CITY COUNCIL Minutes May 31, 2016 The attached verbatim transcription of the May 31, 2016 City Council Meeting (as transcribed by Dawn Smith who was hired by the City) are the Official Minutes of the May 31, 2016 City Council meeting and any previously adopted Minutes are hereby rescinded. Respectfully submitted: .1111111 q CITY CLERK/TREASURER APPROVED: STAN RIDG WAY MAYOR AN AUDIO RECORDING OF THIS MEETING IS AVAILABLE FOR DOWNLOAD AT WWW.CITYOFEAGLE.ORG. Page 1 K:%COUNCIL\MINUTESITemporary Minutes Work AreaXC-05-31-16 OFFICIAL. MINUTES.doc City of Eagle RE: Town Hall Meeting Dated: May 31, 2016 Mayor: Stan Ridgeway JK: Jeff Kunz SB: Stan Bastian NP: Naomi Preston CS: Craig Soelberg BV: Bill Vaughan SB3: Sharon Bergmann MM: Mark McChord (phonetic) SB2: Shelley Brock JS: Janet Sulgrove JR: Judith Robinson LR: Larry Robinson DR: Diane Risell (phonetic) FR: Foad Roghani JK2: Jane Kramer JP: James Pauls LR2: Liz Roberts TJ: Theresa Johnson JR2: Jane Rohling UnkF: Unidentified Female Voice �Unl<M-. Unidentified Male Voice Mayor: And ask the clerk to call the roll. SB3: Kunz? JK: Here. SB3: Bastian? SB: Here. SB3: Preston? NP: Here. SB3: Soelberg? CS: Here. SB3: All present. A forum is present. Mayor: Thank you. Would you, uh, join me for the pledge? [Pledge recited] Mayor: We have some reports from the last Town Hall Meeting where Bill Vaughan is going to report on two issues. One, the hunting issue and the crosswalk issue up on Eagle Road TRANSCRIPT: City of Eagle RE: Town Hall Meeting Dated: May 31, 2016 Page 2 of 2 by the Methodist Church, and I will report on the water issue. BV: Thank you Mayor and Council. One of the items that came up at the last meeting was the concerns with regard to hunting along property along the Boise River just south of Merrill Park. What we have been able to do in the time between then and now is find the City Annexation Ordinances that annexed the property around there so that our City Engineer's Office can draft a new legal description to take in that area. That was probably the biggest challenge because short of having to go out and do a field survey, which is more costly than drawing a legal description from existing legal descriptions found in older ordinances, we had to go to the State Archives Office to find these ordinances, but we did. They will have the legal description finalized around the beginning of June, so here very shortly, and then we will start the annexation process. That process will be a public hearing before the Planning and Zoning Commission, like a typical annexation and rezone, and then come before the City Council. I would anticipate that process being finished by late July or early August. Certainly well in advance of the fall hunting season later in the year, so hopefully that process will take care of that issue. The second item that was raised was we had, I believe it was a student at the last Town Hall Meeting that asked for the City to look into the option of creating a pedestrian crossing on Eagle Road at Ranch Drive for students in that area. We've acknowledged that that crossing is in our ACHD Integrated Five -Year Work Plan for ACHD to evaluate as part of that process. But to accelerate that process we've reached out to ACHD staff and they stated that they did previously look at the intersection, but would do so again. And also encourage the City to get with the school district to find out how they want to handle that crossing in combination with the crossing at Mission Drive further to the south currently, the Mission Drive crossing is staffed by a crossing guard in the morning, and so the question ACHD asked to us is if we are able to place a crossing at the northerly location, Ranch Drive, will they have a crossing guard there? So, our next step is to reach out to the school district to see if they want to provide a letter of support to help bolster the City's request to ACHD for this new location, but also to talk with them about the crossing guard issue, and we're just in the process now of reaching out. Starting with Joe Yochum, he was I believe the interim superintended after Dr. Clark left. And he's been at one of our Development Representative Meetings that we've had in the recent past so hopefully he will be a good connection to facilitate this conversation. And then additionally in talking with Mayor Ridgeway, Council Member Bastian, perhaps you could assist if we need an interfacing with the school district we'll reach out to you on that if we need. So, if there's any questions, that's my update. Thank you. Mayor: And at the last meeting we had a question regarding groundwater levels. I think it was Teri Murrison who raised the issues. So, Ken Acuff of our Water Department provided some research on the Brookwood well that was drilled in 2009. In 2009, it had a level of 29.56 feet below ground level and currently the level is 26.46 feet, so it's up 3 feet in the last 7 years. I think he put the number in here wrong. So, I think that it was 26.46 when it was drilled and now it's 29.56. We only have a measuring system on one of the wells there and we are in the process of upgrading the additional wells so we can have more information later. We do get from the Water Resources Board ground level tests all along and we have pages, and pages, and pages of groundwater level tests, so we can go back for months and look at those, but we don't necessarily have those for all of our wells. And we are in the process of maybe -- the Lexington Hills Homeowner's Association we have one water well there that hasn't operated for oh, 15 or 16 years, maybe even closer to 20 years and we're in the process of working with that homeowner's association to turn that well over to their homeowner's association. If we TRANSCRIPT: City of Eagle RE: Town Hall Meeting Dated: May 31, 2016 Page 3 of 3 do we will cut the pipe so to speak so that that well will not tie into our other wells. One of the reasons we quit using it as the water had a lot of minerals in it and they want to use it for irrigation, so that might work for them with the irrigation, but would not work right now for water use. So, we're in the process with the attorneys looking at that to see what we can do in the future. And with that, we'll go into our regular Town Hall Meeting. And we have a small crowed here tonight so we would ask you to keep your comments to three minutes so that everyone will have a chance to talk. At the end, after everyone's had a chance to say their peace, we might allow additional time. I would like to try to limit the time tonight to an hour and a half, and it looks like with the crowd we might be able to get there. And I'm going to give my wife a hard time because she left her phone on so, I think she just turned it off, so. But anyway, we would like for people to be courteous to listen to everyone. With this small group it would seem like we could actually have a good discussion tonight. I'm going to ask Council President Kunz if he will keep the clock for us and if you don't -- JK: (Inaudible) leaving (inaudible). Mayor: Oh, okay, so he's leaving so maybe -- NP: I will. Mayor: Okay, so Naomi will keep time for us. And I will pass the microphone around, so if, you know, who -- it (inaudible) -- UnkF: There are no flashing lights, so -- Mayor: Okay. UnkF: Red, red, green, yellow. Mayor: Just raise your hand. And before we do that I'd like to ask if any Council Member has anything they'd like to say before we get started? Okay. So, who's first? Oh, don't be so shy. UnkM: (Inaudible). UnkM: Sure. MM: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Appreciate the opportunity to talk to you all this evening. My name is Mark McChord, 2945 First Lane East, Parma 83660. I'm from Texas originally, been around oil and gas for quite a long time, most of my life as a matter of fact. I want to talk to you about some things that I'm hearing being put out by your state and by the oil and gas industry that I want you to consider when you consider writing your ordinance. They're trying to make everybody believe that municipalities have no power. That this is all settled. The state has preempted everything. That is simply false. It's simply false. You have the right to regulate through zoning things like setbacks, noise, sound, lights, things like vapor emissions, truck routes, things of that nature that are going to be important to your community. The reason I'm talking on this is because the industry itself and even your state government is going out of its way to try to make municipalities feel like they're going to be sued for enforcing the very things the state law and your constitution allows you as a city to do. And that is to regulate what goes on in your city TRANSCRIPT: City of Eagle RE: Town Hall Meeting Dated: May 31, 2016 Page 4 of 4 based on what is in the best interest of the public health and safety, the quality of life, the property values, the quality of your community, the things that attract people here to live, the things that attract businesses here to operate here and hire people here. All these things are important to anybody living in an area. They want to have clean air, clean water, clean soil, a quality of life. They don't want the heavy truck traffic that goes with 2,000 or 2,500 trucks coming in and out carrying supplies to a well for every time they frack. So, I want you to keep in mind that you have rights under the law that cannot be taken away from you by IDL, or taken away from you by your legislature unless they're going to amend your State Constitution. And those rights give you the right to regulate those things that are necessary for the protection of your community. You would not allow a (inaudible) business within a 1,000 feet of a home, school, or church. You would not allow a liquor store there. You wouldn't allow a car manufacturing plant or an aircraft plant or a battery plant, or a cement plant or a chemical manufacturing, a pharmaceutical plant being located next to where people live or play. Why would you ever consider letting an industry that is known for explosions, and fires, toxic vapor emissions of carcinogens toxins and neurotoxins that harm people's health and that degrade your property values. I tell you this for a fact that friends of mine have suffered that very problem. One of them lost 77%, (inaudible) and my friend Kim (Inaudible) from (Inaudible) County lost 70% of his house because they allowed the industry to come in and drill next to him, so keep that in mind in putting some covenants that protect your citizens. That is your first responsibility. Ask yourself when you make that decision, how is it going to affect your kids and your grandkids. Thank you. SB2: Does that mean I'm next? Okay, (inaudible) my name is Shelley Brock -- UnkM: Is that mic on? UnkF: (Inaudible). UnkM: (Inaudible). UnkM: (Inaudible) try the (inaudible). UnkM: (Inaudible) that maybe better. UnkM: Check, check. UnkF: Ah. Thank you. SB2: Okay. That's better. Shelley Brock. I live at 8770 West Chaparral Road in Eagle up by Firebird Raceway so we are surrounded by state owned leased land. It's been leased for oil and gas production. Let's see, I have just a few things I'm going to touch on tonight. We just spent all day at the Capital in the Negotiated Room making session for Senate Bill 13-39, which was just passed and they also dealt with a few other laws and we heard some pretty scary things there. Basically, what this amounts to is the industry trying to get everything they can for their side and a few of us citizens they are trying to fight for our safety and protection of our communities. Just a couple things that were brought up, I asked them why we were talking about service protections for state owned land and asked them why the leases are not recorded with the County, so that nobody who lives on any of the 3,300 acres roughly of state owned lane that's been leased in Ada County, most of that here in Eagle, none of them had any clue that the state had leased their TRANSCRIPT: City of Eagle RE: Town Hall Meeting Dated: May 31, 2016 Page 5 of 5 minerals out from under them, and that there's a contract that says that drilling has to start there within five years or they're going to be penalized. So, I brought up that and I was told basically caveat emptor buyer beware, that it's up to them to make sure when they go to buy a piece of property that that hasn't happened. So, they would have to like know that this is going on. And of course we can't get much media coverage and so it's very hard for them to know this. They would have to go and search that out themselves, so there's that. There have been rumors floating around since the legislative session, some of our legislators and other public officials have been telling people that if we don't want drilling on our property we can say no, we don't have to have it. Legislatures have said that publically, called us liars for saying this, so I brought that up today and you need to know that there is a clause in there about surface owners trying to reach a surface agreement with the company, but it says right there, and even if they file an objection it will not delay the owner or operators proposed start of surface disturbing activities. And I made Eric Wilson (phonetic) state unequivocally that they cannot stop them from drilling there, so everyone needs to know that. You need to know also that just a paper that came out just recently, a Duke study, that talks about contamination from wells, and this is conventional wells too, you've heard us talk about fracking. We have no doubt they're going to frack some of these wells, but before they frack them they're going to be doing a lot of conventional drilling and that has its own set of problems and contamination all over this country. And I've made three phone calls to the DEQ in the past week and a half and in the six years since drilling started in Payette County there has been zero regulation of any of the waste, zero. So, is my time is up? Okay. I have some other things to say maybe at the end we can talk some more. Thank you. JS: Hi, I'm Janet Sulgrove. I live at 1116 Lower Bluff Road in Emmett. I've lived there for 38 years and I have to say I'm very upset about this, and I went to the Capital as well today. I have a lot of things I could say, but one of my concerns is I believe you can either have clean air, clean water, or you can have oil and gas, you can't have both. All the research I've done you cannot have both. And when I asked what is my recourse if my water is poisoned and they told me that oil and gas pays me $5,000 and that's only if they don't file bankruptcy. And then I have to call in some of the state agencies that have been appointed by Otter and dig around whatever -- basically I have to go through litigation, hire an attorney, at my expense, you know how that goes, in the meantime I have no water. There is nothing from what happens between the time I lose my water and legal action, which can take years so we have no protection. So, they can just come in and ruin our water, ruin our air, they can file bankruptcy and leave. Thank you. JR: My name is Judith Robinson and I'm from Gem County. I live at 1005 East 3rd Street in Emmett. And I have been doing a lot of research and previous to moving to Emmett I lived in Wyoming. I saw a lot of the oil and gas in Wyoming. I worked for a federal agency there. I saw a lot of the contamination and pollution that was created, and the havoc that was created on some of the small towns in Wyoming. And from my standpoint in Emmett they are working and we've been going to the public meetings with our County Commissioners to try and get an ordinance and ordinance rules that would actually give us some protection as the state has, as Janet said, pretty much removed all of our rights to protection. And health and safety is the number one -- quality of life for everybody. And water is the number one resource that most of the world needs. Clean water. And without clean water and without air that's clean enough to survive, the other things we have our property, our way of life isn't going to mean anything. And I have children, and I have grandchildren and I would like to see the people of Idaho, the commissioners, the county planners, the city, and planning people, and our citizens leave a legacy for our TRANSCRIPT: City of Eagle RE: Town Hall Meeting Dated: May 31, 2016 Page 6 of 6 children and grandchildren that they can move on to different energy resources, renewable energy resources. We don't have to wait till we're right at the brink of what do we do here. We need to protect them so they have a future and they can move forward. And oil and gas is an industry that is in the past. We should be moving away from it not moving more and more toward it. We all use it. We're all guilty of that and we can't just break that habit right away, but by encouraging the development of it and allowing the pollution, and the uncontrolled -- you know, walking over our citizens is not going to encourage moving forward. Thank you. LR: Hello, my name is Larry Robinson and I live at 1005 East 3rd Street in Emmett also. But I did want to come over here and actually I wanted to support the community here because it looks like the same thing is going to be happening to you as it is in Emmett, Idaho. These people are wanting to come in and just literally take over property. And with oil and gas, I mean for the most part there's a glut of this right now and I don't really see the need for it, but for the other part of it I saw a video just yesterday, and this was where they had come in and it was oil and gas, it was over in Australia and the way the guy said it, he said this -- the oil and gas production was one kilometer away from a river. And this one river that this guy had a boat on not unlike the Boise River that's just right here, and they had fractured just like I say what would be a half a mile and there was a gas that he put a match to and the entire river caught on fire in this one section. It's a very scary situation that's something that -- and I realize that we do need oil and gas at the present time, but we have some extremely intelligent people in the world right now. I mean we live in a fish bowl and I mean for the most part if we could do something like with steam -- I mean a renewable water source or sun, anything that could be utilized other than oil and gas we really need to look at it closely. Anyhow, thank you. DR: (Inaudible), but (inaudible). Mayor: We actually need you on (inaudible) -- DR: It's required for recording, okay. All right. My name is Diane Risell. I reside at 8328 North Sunbelt in Boise. I'm new to Idaho and do not own property. I'm not invested in the same way that these folks are, but I am invested in the planet and have real concern for what's going on here in Idaho. I was clueless when I moved here just a few months ago and it was after just randomly reading a newspaper article and became aware that gas and oil has moved into the area, that fracking potentially is an issue, and the land is at risk. And I have spent a lot of time just quietly listening and endeavoring to become educated with regard to what the issues are, and I encourage you folks, this Rule Committee Meeting there's been two of them that have had happened so far. There's going to be more over the summer. The folks that represent gas and oil are paid to do what they're doing and they're very invested, they're very informed and knowledgeable. And they have a strong basis that does influence our lawmakers and the folks who are writing these ordinances and making these rules. And they are in it for profit. And their goals and their endeavors are far different then we who as consumers -- yes, of the planet, but wanting to preserve the waterways, the aquifers, our natural resources, and the environment for our children and our grandchildren. And I really encourage you folks what has to happen in order for real change to take place are people to become invested and becoming aware of what's happening to the State of Idaho. FR: Foad Roghani, 175 South Rosebud Lane, that's my business address. And I sympathize with all of these people about the oil and gas, but I'm going to deviate from that and go to TRANSCRIPT: City of Eagle RE: Town Hall Meeting Dated: May 31, 2016 Page 7 of 7 property tax. I'd like to ask you to seriously consider restoring the levy on property tax back to where it was originally two years ago. As some of you may know we fought that 3% increase, which on the paper is three, but cumulatively substantially more than that for a number of years and we convince the City Council every year that they should not take that. Unfortunately, we had a number of conservative people that listened, such as Mr. Grasser, Shoustarian, Semanko, et cetera, and they realized, and they did not take that increase. Last year I know three of you guys at least were new or more of you, and some of the other ones voted against it, but they took that increase last year and truthfully there was no reason whatsoever to take that increase because the property values are higher, the economy is better, you're getting a lot more money for the City, so I'd really like to ask you please consider reducing that levy on the property tax back to where it originally was and help the citizens that money is going to do a lot more in the hand of citizen for both the taxpayer as well as for the City. JK: Mr. Roghani, I agree with your comments and furthermore I would note that we not only just took the 3% annual increase last year that we could have took, but we also took all of the forgone amount that we had not taken in previous years that was still available. FR: Yeah, you are absolutely right and that's why they said on the paper it was 3%, but in reality it was a lot more, probably more closer than 20%. One of the argument in the City has always been that the City of Eagle has the lowest levy in the state or in the surrounding area. That's not quite true. That's true up to some extent, but it is a little misleading. And what I mean is really two things. The property tax is a function of multiple thing. Only of which is the levy and the other one is property value. The thing is if you compare the levy with other cities such as Meridian you actually have to make a correction to be one to one comparable to the City of Eagle property tax because like in Meridian the city sewer and the fire department -- if you don't mind just give me one more minute -- the city, the fire department those are all part of the same levy. While in Eagle if you look at your tax bill they are separate item in the tax levy. The other thing is if you look at now the value of say $300,000 home with $300,000 home say in Meridian and Eagle, but look at actually the quality of the house. City of Eagle -- and I've been coming to the City meeting for 20 years now -- the City of Eagle traditionally has always been about 15% to 20% higher, the property value, than the surrounding cities. If you actually take that also into consideration, and I have done that, and calculated multiple properties the property tax for a equal quality home, say a 3 -bedroom house with certain feature in City of Eagle is equal or even higher than the same quality of home in Meridian. So what you've been hearing, what the taxpayer has been hearing for the past 20 years at least that I'm aware of really is not a correct state. Mayor: I would like to respond to that just briefly. We did get our preliminary tax figures last week and I haven't been through all of the department budgets, there's two more now, but with the increase in property value if we took 3% this year our levy rate would go down. It would be less than it was last year. It would not go up. And I think what we have to remember is that in Eagle last year we added 4 to 500 houses that need services and if you compare our tax rates to other areas and -- you know, the City here gets to set the budget and the levy and for $100,000 home here our City taxes last year were $104.00. So, the average $500,000 home your Eagle City taxes a little over $500.00, but the residents of Eagle previously voted on fire protection taxes. Fire protection taxes in Eagle are four times as much as our City taxes. So, for that same $100,000 house it's $400.00 for taxes, so if it's a $500,000 house then you're fire protection taxes are $2,000. And then you go on for Ada County taxes, and then for school taxes and if you add all of TRANSCRIPT: City of Eagle RE: Town Hall Meeting Dated: May 31, 2016 Page 8 of 8 those up our taxes are a lot more, but they're also much, much lower than other places. That $100,000 home in Caldwell or Nampa, can't remember the taxes for the City taxes are $1,900 for a $100,000 home. So, you really have to take a close look at everything overall. Some of those things we control, some of those things the voters control because they voted those things in, but we will have full disclosure with the budget. I think our first hearing is next month, but the preliminary information that we got from the Ada County Assessor last week was really interesting. And our City Clerk ran some numbers and if we just added 3% to our budget our levy rate would go down because of the increase in taxable homes that have been built here. I think we had 400 something homes here. But overall what the County Assessor told us is that our property values in Eagle didn't go up as much as the property values in other areas. And part of that is because our property in Eagle on average is worth more than property in other places. So, with the property going on the rolls in other places and the value going up their increase was a little more than ours. So, we'll have full disclosure here in a few weeks and would love for you to engage, but I would really encourage everyone to look at apples and apples, and not apples and oranges when we're looking at the budget. I know I hate to pay taxes too, so. And we have some watchdogs on the -- we have one really good watchdog on the Council and I think he will make sure that we investigate everything, and I'm not saying that to be at all negative because Mr. Kunz really does his homework and he knows what he's doing, and last year I voted for all those property tax increases and Mr. Kunz voted against them, and I think we're still friends, but, you know, we just -- 1 would just ask that we look at everything when we're comparing and compare everything in our budget to other cities. I'll shut up now and you can pass the mic. FR: Can 1 have three minutes to reply to that? Mayor: Yeah, we'll let you come back. FR: Okay. Mayor: We need to pass the mic, okay? FR: I'd be happy to do it because what you say I do not agree with it and I'll tell you why. Mayor: Okay. CS: All right, and I also think it would be productive when you have these kind of -- it's hard for us in a forum like this or, you know, I've heard you state this at our last Town Hall Meeting and this one as well, and I'm interesting in actually doing that apples to apples comparison, but if you could email the City Council what you're talking about because work in the mortgage industry so I see it every day. And I can tell you apples to apples comparison we are the lowest in the valley by far. It's not even close. When I do a house that's $200,000 in Meridian their taxes are roughly 150 bucks a month. When I do that same house in Eagle it's $100 a month. So, I mean I look at 10 houses a month and I would like see what you're talking about in numbers cause it's hard in this kind of a forum for us to evaluate whether that's true or not. And as we make these budget decisions I'm open to listening to those type of arguments. So, if you could do that for us that'd be great. FR: And I come back to it, but quickly a house that is $200,000 in Meridian in City of Eagle you cannot buy the same quality house with $200,000. You have to pay at least $230 to TRANSCRIPT: City of Eagle RE: Town Hall Meeting Dated: May 31, 2016 Page 9 of 9 $240,000 for the same exact house in the City of Eagle. JK: I just want to make an observation that Mayor Ridgeway had mentioned that if we took the 3% increase next year that our property taxes would still go down, did I hear you correctly? Mayor: (Inaudible). JK: And I guess my question -- Mayor: (Inaudible) -- JK: The levy rate would go down and I guess my question is, is I voted against the budget last year and I had some sound reasons for doing so, and I question whether we need to take the 3% at all. So, 1 do not think we should have a built-in assumption this fiscal year coming up that we need to take the 3% even if the budget goes down and I will be asking questions about whether or not there is a strong justification and need to take even some percentage of the 3%. SB: So far I've stayed out of this, but my concern is that we're premature. It's not a question of whether we take the 3% of not. I think it's a question of what are the needs of the City in terms of service to the public. And if we can provide services to the public that are quality and meet the needs of the community then we can do that with X number of dollars. We need to look at that first to determine what level of services do we want, what kind of services will be available to the public, what kind of new things are being proposed if any, and then we would look at the property tax rate and make a decision. But right now I don't think any of us can make a decision because we haven't had that presentation to us. Mayor: Okay. JK2: Hi, Jane Kramer, 238 North Storybook Way in Eagle. I have a question regarding the Plaza Drive extension, which I think is on tap in the next year or two to start. Have any of you had the opportunity to talk to ACHD about the extension going from 2nd Street out to Eagle Road that exists today? I know I asked ACHD about this a couple years ago and they told me it wasn't part of the Plaza Extension Project. But there is so much traffic on that roadway where vehicles are waiting to turn south onto Eagle Road from Plaza, if you get more than four or five cars in that left turn lane the cars wanting to go and turn north onto Eagle Road are blocked. And that roadway really does need to be widened between Albertsons and McDonalds. So, if that hasn't been a part of the conversation with ACHD I'm hoping maybe to put a bug in your brains that maybe you could bring that up, because I would love to see the Hill Road extension be a total success in helping alleviate the traffic in downtown Eagle -- or Plaza excuse me. That's all I had to say. Thank you. UnkM: (Inaudible). JK: Yeah, the Plaza Drive extension from South 2nd Street to East Plaza Drive is slated for construction in the fall of 2017. I'm going to need to check with ACHD, but I believe this issue about congestion around the existing East Plaza Drive Eagle Road extension I believe they're at least aware of it, but let me follow-up as the co -liaison with ACHD and TRANSCRIPT: City of Eagle RE: Town Hall Meeting Dated: May 31, 2016 Page 10 of 10 see if I can get some more specifics around that, okay? JK2: That would be great. I appreciate that. JK: But I believe that concern has been raised with them before but I need to follow-up. Mayor: (Inaudible) they talked about whether to put a roundabout or an improved intersection there. JK: It's a stop sign. Mayor: It's a stop sign, so I think with the stop sign there's at least one turning lane now, but I'm sure they'd have to do some improvements on that intersection. JK2: I would hope so. And it looks like there's space between the roadway and the parking lots for Albertsons and McDonalds. I'm assuming some of that might be right-of-way that exists for ACHD already. If they could just widen the road a tad so two lanes of traffic going west actually can get to where they're trying to by the time the light changes that would be fabulous. Thank you. NP: I'd just like to agree with Jane and it doesn't seem like we would need that much widening done there. It seemed like it could be -- I don't want -- an easy fix, not a major project, but it does back up and there does seem to be a lot of leeway on the McDonalds and the Albertson side. But if we could just get two lanes going west it would make a huge difference, so. JK: And 1 don't want to take away anything from what Miss Kramer is suggesting here, but you may already be aware of this, but the Urban Renewal Agency has three other partners, the Eagle Fire Protection District, the City of Eagle, as well as Eagle 26, LLC and Pacific West Communities as the developer and owner of the Eagle 26 property currently known as the former rodeo grounds. And one of the things that the agency with its partners has done is the City has paid for a traffic impact study otherwise known as a TIS. That TIS is currently at Idaho Department of Transportation for review. If ITD approves a right in, right out access point on the north side of State Highway 44 just across from where the one on the south side went in, there is a possibility that we could get a right in, right out access there and a collector roadway connecting from that access point to the Plaza Drive extension when it is constructed. So, if ITD approves the traffic impact study the partners next move will be to proceed with the engineering design, meaning the engineering design, drawings, and other things for that right in, right out access point and the connecting roadway in hopes of potentially getting it constructed concurrently with the Plaza Drive extension in 2017. That presupposes that -- you know if it was to get approved, all right? JK2: Does anyone else want the microphone? JP: I'm James Pauls from 740 South Silver Bow Avenue in Eagle, 83616. 1 hadn't been prepared to talk about tax levies, but since the topic has been brought up. One effect that's going to happen is the legislature has frozen the homeowner's exemption, and so an increment of tax has got to be measured against the increased values. You guys are going to be bringing in a lot more money because of that freezing and I just hope you consider that when you set your budget. Thank you. TRANSCRIPT: City of Eagle RE: Town Hall Meeting Dated: May 31, 2016 Page 11 of 11 JK: Mr. Pauls, I believe that the Ada County Assessor spoke to us, the homeowner's exemption (inaudible), is that about -- is that correct? UnkM: Yeah, it's going up quite a bit this year so you won't see the impact this year, but you're right for the future that will be a concern because it's going to be frozen at a certain rate. JK: Yeah. And for those of you that may not have heard what the Ada County Assessor had to say and please keep me honest here, but I believe Assessor McQuade indicated that across Ada County the median increase in residential property values was about 7%. Within the City of Eagle the median residential increase in value of a residential property was about 6% so we were only roughly one percentage point behind the median increase versus what occurred in the Ada County in general. Did I quote that correctly? UnkM: Yes, that's correct. LR2: Hello. I'm Liz Roberts. I live at 1351 North Mansfield Place in Eagle. And I just want to say I'm concerned about oil and gas too, and I echo the comments of the folks who spoke before, and really hope you'll work on an ordinance that will protect us, protect our health and safety. Thanks. JR2: I'm Jane Rohling. I live at 582 Palmetto Drive in Eagle, 83616. And I just want to reiterate that I also am very concerned about the oil and gas leasing. Sorry, I missed some of the earlier comments, but one of the things that I would love to share with the City Council that one of the (Inaudible) members emailed to our group was some short videos that I think they're from Colorado, maybe a couple different places, but anyhow they are videos shot by homeowners who have oil or gas wells drilling happening close to their homes. And they were recorded primarily to show what it sounds like 24/7 with the drilling rigs and things running. They are also measuring things like diesel fumes coming from the equipment and I think that would be really good for all of you to see and I don't know the best way to get it to you other than just forward that email if you'd like to take a look at it. They're very short, you know, a minute or two, but they really are eye opening to see what it's like to have that kind of development in a residential area. UnkF: (Inaudible). JK: I'd like to follow-up on something that Mr. Roghani had mentioned and this would actually be a request to the City Treasurer. When the City of Eagle puts its analysis of the proposed budget for next fiscal year together I would specifically request, Mayor Ridgeway and the City Treasurer, that the Excel spreadsheet that is provided include a column that shows what the taxes would be if the levy rate was returned to what it was, a priori, all right. I would like to see those figures broken out as part of the analysis. FR: Well, I could talk about that for a long time because again, I have lots of disagreement with what was said here. I agree with Mr. Bastian the money and the City has to operate and use the taxes in a proper way, and also increase the levy when is absolutely needed. And along that line, between 2006 until 2012 or'13 when the economy was really bad we were able to convince the City Council to basically not increase the taxes, not increase the levy, not take the 3%, because they actually had other mean of operations. And again, I can talk about that long time. The misconception again, is one I'm talking about a $100,000 home. The $100,000 home in Caldwell is not going to cost $100,000 in TRANSCRIPT: City of Eagle RE: Town Hall Meeting Dated: May 31, 2016 Page 12 of 12 Eagle. It's going to be over $200,000. When I look at the tax I look at every single line. I don't look at the bottom-line of what I pay. The other thing you have to consider is I don't even have a home in Eagle, but I got multiple businesses here so for me it's not a matter of $100,000 and $20 more, just a portion for the City of Eagle. For me it's matter of thousands of dollars. But beside that, I just going to change the subject and go to another comment. Here in the past year or so I always seen frequent request for hiring staff at the City Hall and I believe, probably right now we are at the highest staff wise as we have ever been. Again, going back to 2006 and '07 the City basically ended up reducing their staff and it still was operating. Within time, I see the staffing being a business owner and operating multiple companies the first thing comes to my mind, and also by background, I've been working 50 years all over the world. I work as a consultant, I work as an employee, I work as a government employee. I had my own businesses. I hired consultants so I've done all of it. And really one thing I like you to consider is instead of hiring an employee, which is extremely costly when it comes to the government employees particularly because of the benefits involved, look at your other options. Lots of time it's cheaper to hire an consultant and even consultant an hourly basis is substantially higher, Lots of time you could use an employment agency for temporary employees. You could hire somebody for a short period of time as a temporary employment for the City without really having to make that position permanent. So, again, I'm going back you do have here the responsibility to spend the taxpayer money in the wisest possible way. So, anytime it comes to that employment and hiring new staff I hope you consider the consequences. And again, having all that businesses and unfortunately at time have to reducing the staff and let some go, that's the toughest part. That's one of the few times in my life that I cry because it's hard to sit across the table from somebody and tell them you don't have job. So, I hope you don't put yourself, and the City, and everybody else in that position. SB2: Are we back to restarting or? (Inaudible) time, thank you. I just have a couple more quick points (inaudible) -- Mayor: I think, Foad, I have to respond to you. So, the City does hire quite a few services that are contracted out. Our City attorney service is contracted out. The contract is $80,000 a year. Guess how much we paid them last year, $250,000. We contract out our ground services for all of the cutting grass and trimming trees. There are three or four, or five contracts added together it's about $160,000 a year. Above that $160,000 we paid them $97,000 more. So, we are going to rebid that contract this year to see if we can get it back in line and tweak it because it's been amended several times. But, you know, on the face of that you're looking at about $500,000 worth of contracts that's really only about $250,000. And keeping up with our grounds we're mandated to maintain a certain level of parks because the final figures aren't in, but because we gave up 200 acres that we had a dollar a year lease on at the Ada Eagle Sports Complex the latest figures I got is that we owe $1.4 million dollars because we didn't keep up with our required minimum, so that's going to be in this year's budget. We get 10 years to pay it. So, a lot of these things that have happened and when the economy was bad and the previous Councils instead of making the decisions they forced employees to work together and cut their wages, and these people didn't get wages forever. And we have employees who were caught in that and are frozen and we have new employees who have come in that are much higher on the scale. And my goal whether these guys approve it or not, is to correct those wrongs because they're just wrong. And when you add all of those things up in the bottom-line we might need that 3%, but I would like for you to keep an open mind. You know, my goal would to bring the attorney's in-house because I think we can TRANSCRIPT: City of Eagle RE: Town Hall Meeting Dated: May 31, 2016 Page 13 of 13 do it for less money. And I don't know if we'll ever get there, but I worked in a city before where we were there and it seemed to work pretty easy. I can't imagine that we could ever pull our grounds people in because their contractor has tons and tons of grounds workers, but I think we can deal with some issues when we bid out that contract because as you can tell by the figures I gave you there's almost as many extras as there are items in the contract, so we will work hard to tweak this budget and I don't want to be gouged because I pay taxes just like you do. But I think we have a responsibility to correct some of the things that have happened in the past and that is one to treat our employees with respect, try to get them on the salary scales where they should be. Some employees were given half raises; some employees were given full raises. We need to fix it and I ask you guys to support us, and talk to us, and help us work through these issues. We don't have to correct them in one year, but it's just not right. And if we have too many employees then I would be the first one to say we have to lay people off. But to go to five employees and say we can only add four would you guys cut your salaries so we can keep you and oh, by the way we're not going to give you a raise for five years, that's pretty abusive in my book, so I think we need to fix those. FR: (Inaudible) just quick I appreciate what you said and I know your background, and we know you kind of as a friend also, outside here, but that's outside and this is City. And really did not suggest to be unfair or ask anybody to cut salary, or things. And if I guess anything I say I have to also lead by an example. If you go back to one of my businesses we've been operating it for 30 years. I have multiple employees that have been with us over 24 of the 30 years. So, you cannot have very many other companies of our size have the same claim. The other thing is I fully agree with you you have to pay the people a fair wage and a fair benefit, and be fair to everybody, but at the same time we have to look at the entire area, state, city, et cetera. One example is talk to the people at HP and see what they got, and this is a private company, has been around a long time, they pay good wages. Talk to the people that work at HP and see what they received 20 years ago and 25 years ago versus what they receive now and where the cuts are, because basically they were forced to that position. The other thing is I agree with lots of stuff that you said about like the attorneys, but I hope when it comes to that position, and I know you do, I know you're a smart person, but lots of time the people just look at well, you pay me only $10.00 an hour or $20.00 an hour. They really don't realize that $20.00 an hour that I pay somebody by the time you include all the benefits and (inaudible) work you get that person you're paying actually the cost to me is about $45.00 an hour, and we have good people at our business, so you have to look at the entire package. And I can go on and on, and I'd be happy to sit down and discuss all of that detail with you. Now, I work for Morrison-Knudsen 15 years and as part of that I had a group of about almost 45 people under me. Every single year I had to submit a budget and if one month we did not meet the requirement that what I bring in and what goes out you get a notice from one of the vice-presidents that hey, you got to do something, you either have to bring more income or you have to let somebody go. Well, the City's way of income I assume is mostly either the fees or the taxes, which comes from all of us (inaudible) here including all of you guys there. So, you know, that's the options we don't have in the industry, so basically I like to say, I'd like you to -- and I agree with you, I hope you look at the entire package. And of course in the past because of the other problems we had with the City Council and some of the stuff that they push through, that unfortunately ended up costing the City lots of money, which it shouldn't have been included in lots of legal fees. JK: I just want to draw a distinction between what Mayor Ridgeway is saying with respect to making sure that people's salaries are up to date and things like that versus at the last TRANSCRIPT: City of Eagle RE: Town Hall Meeting Dated: May 31, 2016 Page 14 of 14 Council Meeting you know on the Agenda there was an Executive Discussion to consider hiring a potential public employee. I'm not at liberty to discuss what happened in that Executive Session, but I draw a distinction between what Mayor Ridgeway is just, you know, differentiating between making sure that people are paid where they need to be paid and paid fairly, versus an increase in personnel or staff within the City of Eagle, and I think that's an important distinction. CS: Mr. Mayor, I would just request that we move on from this issue. None of us has had a chance to look at the budget and I agree with Stan, we really can't make any of these decisions. I mean we're talking about a philosophical argument here and I'd love to talk philosophy with you, but I don't really think that's -- I'm happy to hear what your opinion is, but, you know, I'd like to be able to address these kind of things in budget meeting where we actually have some numbers in front of us and we can talk specifics on what is needed versus what, you know, we want to spend. NP: I'd just like to add I think this is a good discussion and it's a Town Hall Meeting, and if it's of interest to people I think it's suitable to continue this discussion, so. Mayor: Next. SB2: Okay, well, I'll stick with that topic for just a second, just long enough to say how much are our taxes going to go up here, and how many more City and Ada County people are going to have to be hired when oil and gas actually comes to our neighborhood., supporting emergency services, not to mention all the, you know, health and safety issues that we'll have to be regulating. The National Fire Protection Agency says that the oil and gas industry has the highest fire and exposure rate of any other industry. So, we're going to have pipelines across these plots of land, well, fires, things like that. They happen wherever these guys go so just keep in that in the back of your mind. And I just want to share one sentence that an official from Alta Mesa -- a statement that they made today at the State House. They said, once we start drilling large numbers of wells in sequence we must be allowed to move quickly and nimbly to move our drilling rigs from site to site. So, they are right now putting in laws and rules to allow them to do that and I think a lot of people are in denial here that it could ever happen here, but they have plans to do what they've done in every other state here and it's going to affect us here in Eagle too. I just had a conversation with Rocky Barker of the Statesman last Friday. He said oh, I don't think they're going to drill in Eagle, at least not for a few years and I said well, it might be a few years, Rocky, but that's what we're trying to do right now is put protections in place. Who wants to buy expensive property in Eagle, put your kids in school here, or your grandkids, you know, do improvements to your property knowing that just a few years down the road it's all going to go to crap, you know, and we're going to be egregiously effected by the dangers of this industry, so just keep that in mind. And my last thing is I've talked to you guys before about getting Jim Berlino (phonetic) in here from (Inaudible) to do baseline water testing and I think it's really critical that we do it. didn't hear back from ya on that. I don't know what the Council's thinking is on that. He is willing to come give a short presentation. He said 20 minutes and then the City could ask for a matching grant from USGS so that we could do baseline testing, which we have done in Gem County. Fifty water wells were tested over there. We got a real ly great deal from USGS to do that -- or the people of Emmett did -- Gem County and they are really protected now. It's going to be a deterrent to them drilling right in their neighborhoods we believe. And even if they do if and when there is contamination they're going to be able to litigate it because of this. It's a huge, huge stepping -stone to protecting this TRANSCRIPT: City of Eagle RE: Town Hall Meeting Dated: May 31, 2016 Page 15 of 15 community. So, I'd really like a response from you guys on what we can do toward that end if you're willing to have Jim come and give a talk. You know he's real flexible with his hours. He'll pretty much do it whenever you guys want him to come he'll do it. And it doesn't have to be a commitment to, you know, apply for a grant, but I really think we need to hear what he says. And I like that he made the point that even aside from the potential threat of oil and gas here we really need to do baseline testing here from the standpoint of all the agricultural that's happened in this valley, and, you know, here in Eagle for the last century. All the runoff from farm waste, and chemicals, and herbicides, and things, you know, how many subdivisions are built now right over those farm fields. We really need to test the water from that standpoint alone and we sure as heck need it, you know, from this new threat. So, just like to know what you guys are thinking on that. NP: I for one would like to hear the presentation. UnkM: I don't need the mic, me too. CS: Do we know how much the water quality testing is being done by the City now, (Inaudible)? UnkM: (Inaudible). Mayor: Well, we test our own wells. UnkM: (Inaudible). Mayor: Yes. UnkM: (Inaudible) Southwest District Health (inaudible). SB2: Well, the testing really needs to be by a neutral third party (inaudible). (Inaudible). UnkM: (Inaudible). SB2: (Inaudible) and (inaudible). He's (inaudible) there are a lot of aspects to this that I need to hear too when he comes and gives his presentation. But I do know that Michael Lewis who was here representing USGS and he was given a big promotion and he's in Colorado now. He was the one that said the people of Gem County -- he told the people of Gem County straight to their face at a meeting one day he said you guys don't deserve this. You don't deserve what is about to happen to you with oil and gas here. We're going to protect you. And he got that pushed through to protect them and it is it's going to be a big deal. So, um, I haven't heard the presentation myself. I came on board after they initiated the testing in Gem County, but it sounds like something that we really need to do. SB: Mayor, I believe that we need that kind of a baseline data myself. We may have baseline data from the other testing, but I would like to hear a presentation by the USGS representative. UnkF: (Inaudible) Garden City that tests well water (inaudible) and it's like $20 or $30. (Inaudible) do it all the time (inaudible). (Inaudible) test and do it yourself or they can send someone out (inaudible). TRANSCRIPT: City of Eagie RE: Town Hall Meeting Dated: May 31, 2016 Page 16 of 16 Mayor: I think we probably have room on the next Agenda to see if the gentleman from USGS can come and give us a presentation. If not the upcoming Agenda then we can definitely get it on the next Agenda. Then we'll know what we're dealing with. SB2: Can I just say one last thing. The testing you're talking about is not anywhere near enough for what we need. This is a massive testing. I mean it's sheet, after sheet, after sheet of results. It's a whole hydrocarbon panel, methane testing, it's a whole bunch of different things that I've never even heard of and that's what they have to test for because, you know, thousands of wells have been contaminated through this process with chemicals and stuff, but what you don't know is that even disrupting the water aquifers can just cause naturally occurring radiation to come into the water, it can cause huge, you know, spikes in iron, and things like that that make your water unusable. So there's a whole bunch of the different things they have to test for and it's not 30 bucks to test for it I'm afraid. I wish it was. UnkF: It was for me when I had my well done. (Inaudible). UnkF: How many things did you get tested for for $30? UnkF: A whole spectrum. UnkF: Same here. UnkF: This is (inaudible). UnkF: Cause I get my well tested too and it's like $20 per item, so I don't... UnkF: (Inaudible). UnkF: (Inaudible). Mayor: Unless there's opposition we'll get it on an Agenda and have the presentation. Then we can decide because it is a matching grant, so. UnkM: (Inaudible) Southwest District Health (inaudible). UnkF: (Inaudible). Mayor: Okay. MM: Mr. Mayor, since we're talking about economics let's talk about economics. Right now West Texas Intermediate, the US benchmark oil, is selling for under $50 barrel and this is the highest it's been in six months. The cost to produce that oil is somewhere between $50 and $65 a barrel, so right now oil is losing money. Natural gas right now, today, is selling for just barely over $2.00 a thousand cubic feet. The break-even cost of production on natural gas in the United States is $8 to $9 per thousand cubic feet. So, they're losing more than 75% to 80% of the money they put into producing gas is lost in selling it because the cost of production is so much greater than what the sale price or the market price on the product is. Now, if you want to look at the economics of gas in general, in the state of Idaho Alta Mesa, the only company here trying to drill right now TRANSCRIPT: City of Eagle RE: Town Hall Meeting Dated: May 31, 2016 Page 17 of 17 claims that's there 100 billion cubic feet of recoverable natural gas in the State of Idaho. USGS estimates that amount to be 10 to 15 billion cubic feet so 10 to 15% of what Alta Mesa says. But the industry itself considers a commercially viable gas field to be a minimum of 20 trillion cubic feet, which is 200 times more than Alta Mesa's even estimating is in the State of Idaho. Now, if you allow them to come into your community and drill several things are going to happen. Number one if you look at it on a nationwide basis real estate values are going to deplete by somewhere in the range of 2 1/2 to 14% typically. Some places will have much greater declination in value, but 2 1/2 to 14% seems to be the national average of the devaluation of people's property when they're located close to where oil and gas is. That means your tax base goes down. That means you don't have as much money available to pay for your city services as what you would normally have. So, bringing that industry in when they're not going to be able to produce any profit for themselves is not only going to not produce profit for you, but it's going to cost you money. And to put this in perspective, the quarter ending December 31St the State of Idaho received about $50,000 in natural gas royalty revenue, $50,000. The next quarter it was around -- I think it was $24,000 or something like that for the first quarter of this year. Now, I don't know, call me crazy, but I know in Texas any oil and gas company in Texas would look at $50,000 or $24,000 as chump change about what they'd spend going out for lunch someday. Certainly the state is not going to get rich and the city is certainly not going to get rich if that's the kind of production value that they're going to be bringing into your state. But you are going to have to remediate road damage from 2,000 to 2,500 trucks fracking a well or drilling a well and completing it one time driving up and down your roads. And the amount of money you're going to make in revenue is going to be far less than the cost of one single road repair. So, you have to ask yourself what is the net bottom-line in this thing? I think the economics is a very big picture and I think it's one you really ought to be looking at hard because in the end it is going to hit the taxpaying citizens of Eagle and Ada County really hard if you have to come up out of your own pockets and remediate the damage caused by that industry. Mayor: (Inaudible). TJ: I just can't help myself. Theresa Johnson, 3417 North Croft Way. I've been sitting here listening to most of the talk about (racking kind of taking most of the meeting time. My experience has been... that there's a lot of I don't want to call it fear mongering, but there's a lot of kind of inflating going on and what I want to make sure is that there's facts and there's actual documented facts to backup those facts. I am all for protecting our City. What I'm not for is people showing up at HOA meetings, like what happened to us, that are not part of our HOA and bringing up fracking. And they come long enough to bring up fracking and then they leave. They portray themselves as previous neighbors. personally experienced as a Chair Friends of Beacon Light Road kind of a little bit of harassment on the part of the people that were representing the anti -(racking group. A couple of them kind of got a little aggressive in their comments to me through email. I don't want to feel like I'm against them, so I would appreciate if the City makes sure that they have all of the facts, they have documentation, and I would also appreciate if the people that are part of the organization that sounds like they're trying for something really good to protect our City, to not use scare tactics and bullying with people. I'm sorry if that's not popular, but. UnkF: (Inaudible). TJ: Okay. TRANSCRIPT: City of Eagle RE: Town Hall Meeting Dated: May 31, 2016 Page 18 of 18 UnkF: And I'm sorry (inaudible). Mayor: Actually, I wish you guys would not engage in that kind of discussion. If you'd like to stand up and say something that's fine, but -- TJ: I was going to say if they would like to talk to me afterwards I have no problem with that. I just want to make sure that the City is not just using the emotions that are around this, but as I said taking the documentation and taking documentation from both sides, not just from one side. I am all for protecting our City. Mayor: As a follow-up on that I have been contacted by the Director or the Division of Lands who I think that's this department, and he has asked to come and do a presentation to the City. And they will be allowed to do a presentation at some point, but he hasn't called back recently because they have all these other things going on right now, but we will hear from both sides. And I'm not saying that to be negative towards you guys. I just think that as we make decisions we need to hear from everyone so that people have a good understanding of what's going on. UnkM: (Inaudible). FR: I just want to make one quick comment. (Inaudible). I just want to appreciate truly what you guys are doing and sitting there and putting this Town Meeting back together because a while back where some member of the City Council that did not take it correctly or properly, and anything that was said they took it as personal. I really appreciate all of you guys and truly as I said I've been coming to this City Hall Meeting in Eagle since '95, so that's over 20 years. That's when we started to looking into bringing our first business to City of Eagle. And mainly all of our major businesses are in this City. We love the City. It's a great City. You guys are doing great job. Truthfully, this is probably -- well, not probably, almost definitely one of the best City Council we have. Because as you all know for a number of years we had lots of frictions between the City Council Member and it was to the point that they could not even talk to each other in a civilized manner. That was unfortunate. So, I really appreciate everything you guys doing. You are great. And really the stuff that I bring up and talk about it I just want to make sure the City continues to grow and be the city that it has been for the past few years. UnkM: (Inaudible). UnkF: (Inaudible). Mayor: We have a motion, is there a second? UnkM: I second the motion. Mayor: Then we're adjourned. And I really appreciate you guys coming and being civil. Thank you. City of Eagle Town Hall Meeting May 31, 2016, ends. TRANSCRIPT: City of Eagle RE: Town Hall Meeting Dated: May 31, 2016 Page 19 of 19 CERTIFICATE OF TRANSCRIPTION City of Eagle Re: Town Hall Meeting Dated: May 31, 2016 The undersigned does hereby certify that she accurately transcribed the attached transcript to the best of her ability from the recording of the City of Eagle Town Hall Meeting that was recorded on May 31, 2016. DN rtified this 1 `" ay of June 2016 ID o ments by Dawn , Transcriber TRANSCRIPT: City of Eagle RE: Town Hall Meeting Dated: May 31, 2016 Page 1 of 19