Council raises 2027 utility rates 9.5% for a typical home, OKs housing in commercial buildings

Good evening. Welcome to the Orting City Council meeting for September 30th, 2026. My name is Scott Drennen. I'm the Mayor of the City of Orting, and I will be chairing this meeting of the Orting City Council. Meeting participation is both in person and virtual. For Councilmembers participating through virtual attendance, please ensure you are attending from a private place, free of interruptions or distractions. This meeting is being held in person and through the platform Zoom. A link for the virtual participation can be found on the agenda or on the City's website. We'll start this meeting with the Pledge of Allegiance, led by Councilmember Dale Reed.

Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Madam Clerk, may we have the roll, please?

Councilmember Torres.

Present.

Councilmember Williams.

Present.

Councilmember Tracy.

Present.

Deputy Mayor Sproul.

Present.

Councilmember Holland.

Present.

Councilmember Hogan.

Present.

Councilmember Reed.

Present.

Roll is complete. We have a quorum.

Thank you.

This portion of the meeting will have no motions made by Council and will serve as it for information and discussion only. Information will be presented to Council and to better understand not only current events and activities in the cities, but to preview future potential agenda bills to be voted on at a later date in a Council meeting. Council will have discussion following each presentation by staff and the opportunity to ask questions of the presenter. I will initially call on each Councilmember or questions and subsequent questions by raising of their hand and waiting for the Chair to acknowledge. Audience members will not be able to participate in this portion of the meeting. Council discussion will be followed by action items moving the agenda bill to return to the Committee of Whole, move forward to the next study session for further discussion, move forward to the next regular meeting on the consent agenda or stand-alone, or modify tonight's evening agenda to entertain a motion this evening in the regular meeting. Okay, this meeting's discussions will begin with AB 26109, SCADA telemetry master plan, as presented by Parametrics representative this evening. If you'd like to present.

My name is Glenn Barkas, I'm a senior electrical designer for Parametrics, and we submitted the SCADA master plan, and I believe, Mayor, you brought it to Council a month ago, approximately?

Yeah.

So, has everyone had a chance to review it? And I'm here to answer any questions that Council may have. The overarching plan of the SCADA master plan is to go through all your systems, water, wastewater, stormwater, wastewater treatment plant, pump stations, all of it. It is very old. It is very tired in the sense of the word. Some of it's 20-plus years old. Some of it's probably 30-plus years old. And it really is in dire need of being replaced. The master plan is to put forth a plan for the future. Some of that may be new equipment. Some of it is communication pathways. And it is a big project in the sense of the word. It's going to take a lot of time to replace it in the future. The SCADA master plan doesn't replace it. It creates the plan moving forward for what the future brings, whether it be satellite communication, fiber,

radio,

cellular, all of the above. A perfect example is the wastewater treatment plant. I've been working with parametrics for 22 years, and it's the same PLC for Grammar Logic Controller today that was there when I started 22 years ago with parametrics. It really should be considered to be upgraded. And that's just the start of it. So that's what this does. It is parametrics, a team of probably four or five staff members who will take your system apart from one end to the other and come up with a plan moving forward. We will give you options. We will interview staff. We will interview managers. And we will make a plan moving forward. And hopefully, you know, in the next four to five years, we have new infrastructure within the city with regards to your water, wastewater and stormwater infrastructure.

Thank you.

Council, do you have any questions? Council Member Reed?

Did you say the last time it was updated?

It depends.

Yeah, it depends on what it is. The newest stuff off the top of my head is well four. And that was put in 2011, 2012. I think after that is prior to that was well three pieces of it get done, but not all of it. The biggest problem at the moment is communication. It is on very what I call legacy radios.

It's all serial,

you know, good old nine pin, you know, mouse plug. And it's very slow.

It's very archaic.

And because of that, we have issues at times passing data between sites because of it.

So you guys were the ones that installed the system that's existing, correct?

Yeah, over the last decades.

So parts of this proposal you put together here is a little boilerplate that you've given us?

I don't know if I'd call it boilerplate in the sense of the word.

The city will provide available system documents prior to assessments, systems and plans and diagrams to update.

Parametrics is requested.

You guys should have everything we've got.

We have an awful lot of it, but I can tell you that I am not here every day. You guys bring in other vendors that I don't know what they're doing. And I have a tendency to find out after the fact that an electrician was here, replaced a VFD that I knew nothing about.

I guess what I'm saying is it should be pretty close to what you've got.

It is probably fairly close.

It should be less time than normal to...

I would say that's a fair assessment, but what I will say, we can't just gut it and put in and replace it on Tuesday. Right, I understand that. So, there's going to have to be decisions made whether we reuse the existing cabinets, whether we put new cabinets next door. That's where the planning comes in.

But you're not wrong.

I'm just saying as far as the city providing you with information, you should have more than we have.

Yeah, maybe, maybe not, but again...

Because you guys have the information together, you've had several people change hands and forgotten and have no idea where you guys hopefully kept paperwork since you've been upgrading and updating everything that's happening.

Yeah, I guess from your definition of boilerplate, you're not wrong.

That's just,

you know, if we don't have it, we're going to ask.

Hopefully somebody does.

So, is the price to be flexible, or is it fixed at the amount that you guys said?

It is a not-to-exceed price, and so if we can do it faster than what we have here on paper, we will, and we won't charge you for the difference. It is not a lump sum.

Okay. Thank you.

Great. Any other questions of Council? Council Member Williams.

A couple. Well,

did I not see this kind of come through like last November, December for about $267,000? Am I wrong on that? Did we go up another $30,000?

I think it did come through a couple of times, and maybe JC, who I see is on television, who might be able to answer that.

I didn't capture all of it what you said, Glenn, but yeah, it has come through a couple times. Our rates have gone up a little bit in compliance with our contracts, so we've updated contract rates accordingly to reflect that. So, it did come through. I don't remember what the exact value was, but, you know, every year through the on-call agreement we have with the city, the contract allows us to submit updated rates, and these rates reflect that.

Okay.

So, then, the last time you were here, Glenn, you spoke of a couple different softwares, Aviva and Ignition. And so, in this plan, are you going to do an accurate comparison of these two softwares and actually implement these softwares into the plan so we know exactly what each one costs?

That is my intent. There is a new player in the general Puget Sound area called Ignition. I mentioned it the last time.

Yes.

It is my understanding, and it's only that. I have not run this to ground, but it is my understanding from a year over year, maintenance support for the software is less expensive than Aviva, but I will put an asterisk next to that. It is very expensive to change platforms. It would be like going from Microsoft and everything you do in Microsoft to an Apple. They're not the same. And so, regardless of which way we go, if you were to jump, I'll call it jump ship, and go to a different software package, it will be a rewrite. That is the one upside of not changing Aviva. Now, I'm not going to say your graphics are the prettiest ever in the Aviva application because some of that stuff is, like I said, from pre-2004. But the infrastructure there is for Aviva. If we change, there is no upgrade one-button click to make it look like Ignition.

Well, there's still no upgrade one-button click, even with Aviva.

That's a true statement.

You're talking about you've got dinosaur equipment. You're basically going to be rewriting it anyway. And I've done a little bit of research, and it looks like the Ignition is more of an open protocol, which sometimes can be a little more robust and also can give you better equipment selections. What I would like to see, and probably part of this contract and everything, is a possibility of having representatives from both software companies come in and not only have a presentation to staff but also to the council so we can see where we're headed and make a decision. I don't want to see this plan go down one road without exploring the other option.

Next,

when this plan is finalized, will we have a detailed point list, very descriptive, and also a sequence of operation which, kind of what Council Member Reed says, I feel we should already have one in text. You say we don't.

So you do have O&M manuals for all the sites. It's just the pieces that have changed over the last decade that may or may not be in there. And I know for a fact there's stuff on the water side that's not there due to build-out that's happened and so forth. I know what it is. Britton, your head water operator, knows what it is, and him and I are always bouncing ideas. The system changes quite often. You wouldn't think it would, but it does. Due to seasonal, a new development comes online, whatever the case may be. A system goes down, we have to make changes to, you know, like when well one went down earlier this year, we had to make changes. So it's that stuff that we'll need to document, and we will make that list accordingly. We will have to do that in order to get this master plan to the degree that I would like to see it be, that, you know, you have whatever it is, 50 flow meters out there in the system. Even these nine are legacy, these nine are fairly new. We will have to document that. Otherwise, it's not worth doing this plan.

Well, not only that, but a sequence of operation.

So,

well, one's the primary. If the reservoir goes down, well, two comes on. I want to see a complete sequence of operation in text in five, ten pages, whatever it is, for each of these systems from A to Z, so we can sit there and read it and see how it's supposed to work. So staff can read it, how it's supposed to work. So when the contractors come in to do it, they know what they're doing for programming.

We can pull that together from your O&Ms and add the pieces that are missing.

And in this telemetry, are we also putting security into any of these buildings or the reservoirs or anything like that?

You have security today, like intrusion alarms and that kind of stuff today. If you're talking cameras, that will be very dependent on the communication we can gather, whether or not we're doing fiber or whatever. Cameras are very load-intensive on communication pathways. I mean, it is brutal what they take. I would recommend if we, I mean, my preference, hands down, is fiber. If you guys can get fiber from point A to point B throughout the city, that is hands down the best, and I would recommend cameras today. But again, we don't know if we can get there.

Well, that brings me to my next question. When you're doing this plan, and you say we have three or four choices of networks, I would like to see everything about those choices.

Costs, if it's available.

I mean, not, well, maybe we could do this, or maybe we could do this. I want to know that, yes, we can do fiber, or no, we're going to have to do Starlink or whatever. But we need to know how available it is, how much it's going to cost us, and what kind of performance it's done.

Yep, understood.

And that's one of the reasons this is an eight-month ordeal to get this pulled together.

And then the last thing is because Parametrics is so involved with these systems right now, I would expect that when the sequence of operation and the point lists are written, they should be dead nuts on. There shouldn't be any question marks left. I mean, everybody should know. It should be in black and white. We shouldn't see any change orders or anything. And, yes, I know you're not going to be able to do it completely at once, but integration happens all the time, and there's interfaces, and there's ways to work around it, but there's no reason this system can't be brought on board with the latest technology and start putting the equipment onto it.

Understood.

And that's what I would expect in the master plan. I would expect it to be contract-ready with all the questions answered.

Understood. Thank you.

Councilman Torres.

My question is, we have a public works director, and years ago it was his responsibility to come to the city council and say we need to upgrade Kansas Avenue storm water sewer. So how much is he in the loop with all of this that needs to be done, and how much knowledge does he have about all the infrastructure that you guys are saying needs to be upgraded?

Would you like to take that question?

He's the new guy, so I honestly don't know.

As far as I'll answer the last question first, as far as my knowledge, I've been involved in setting up telemetry systems throughout multiple different water and wastewater facilities for the last 25 years, and I've been involved in both building them and helping coordinate and set up contracts. So as far as specifically what I know about our system, exactly, I have not had in the month I've been here to dig into everything, but I fully am on board with what Council Member Williams is talking about, about presenting and defining exactly what it is we're looking for. Everything's going to have pros and cons within whoever you go with. We weigh those pros and cons based on all the variables, right? Connectivity, how much can we get security involved? I know there's other discussions about security on sites that may or may not include telemetry over anything above an intrusion alarm. Maybe that's what we're looking for, and then we have a separate security system that would actually be camera-oriented. It doesn't necessarily have to be tied together to that degree. But I look forward to the opportunity to working with parametrics, and JC's been a big help. So I hope to be very involved in everything we're building and be able to present to you and answer questions that any of you have going forward with where we're headed in this direction.

So if this sewer line right here on this road needs to be replaced, does your crew come in here and camera that or say, hey, this sewer line needs to be upgraded? Is that what you guys do?

Well, it's a different question from what we're talking about here, but absolutely. Any assessment of any of our aging infrastructure, or infrastructure that's new for that matter, our staff, the public works team, it's our responsibility to find out that information.

For these guys? Absolutely.

And that's whether we're doing a large capital improvement project like Kansas Street, the more that staff can go out and do potholing, do investigative camera work, jetting, any of those assessments that we're supposed to be doing on a routine basis anyway. So hopefully you would have a time lapse. And the last time we cameraed this, it looked like this. We noticed that it would tell the story for you. But absolutely, we would... Currently, we don't have a setup where we could go out and we don't have a truck that you would see from Michael's or some of these other contractors that could come out and just spend weeks driving up and down and logging everything. But we absolutely have the ability, both budget-wise and expertise-wise, to contract it out if it's a larger camera-type work. If it's just this street, absolutely, we can get it done and we'll have people there to know what we're looking for, get a report that is universal, using the universal language of sewer TVing, and get that information. Yes, 100%.

All right, thank you.

Thank you, Council Member Crecy.

Did I hear you say that this project is eight months long?

Eight months long.

Under assumptions in the paperwork, it says project duration is four months.

It's four months for the initial section and then the last month's another four. It's two four months.

So the deliverables?

The actual deliverables and tech memo.

Okay.

So I guess I don't mean to put words in your guys' mouth, and I'm not saying it's going to fail tomorrow. But I'm concerned enough, or I should say we are concerned enough, that the plan needs to get put in place now before we end up in that scenario where we have a catastrophic and then we're, you know, playing catch-up, trying to fix it in a hurry.

That's my concern.

That's what keeps me up at night. So I have, you know, we have a bunch of spare parts, but we only have so many. And then we're back to buying stuff off eBay, which none of us want to do.

Yeah. So.

Council Member Reed.

Is there a,

between the, I said there's two or three systems you're looking at?

So, yes.

So water, wastewater, and then obviously you have a few stormwater pump stations.

For the plant department. Pardon?

Manufacturers of the systems.

It's pretty, I'll use the term open source.

That's the wrong word.

Hands down in the Puget Sound, the PLCs are Rockwell, Allen Bradley. Back in right, I don't know, 2021, previous public works director did an audit of several municipalities and cities within the Puget Sound. And hands down, it was Rockwell. There were one or two one-offs. There was a couple Siemens. There was a couple Automation Direct. But hands down, it's Rockwell. And the same with Aviva. It's hands down today, Aviva and the Puget Sound. If we were standing in Portland, it'd be ignition. That's just what they picked. I don't know why, but that's what they're using down there. And we're slowly starting to see ignition move into the Puget Sound.

Is there a big price difference between the different systems?

I honestly don't know. I have a feeling now, I will admit, I know for a fact, because of what ignition was doing

on pricing,

Aviva adjusted their pricing.

So I guess what I'm asking, is it like Cadillac and Volkswagen or Cadillac and Hyundai?

So from the PLC perspective, I would say Rockwell is about as expensive as it gets.

Okay.

You know, Allen Bradley. That being said, I could get 100 guys with one phone call who could work on them, program them. Everybody in the Puget Sound uses them.

Support's really good.

So I guess the next thing I'm looking at is budget. Do we know before you design a whole system for us and we say, no, we can't afford that. So would it be helpful if you had a budget first before you start digging into stuff like that? Or is that not something that we would do, Mayor?

That would be a tough one because, you know, in my mind, it's going to cost what it's going to cost. You know, if we got to replace all the PLCs, that's a fixed price. Granted, we could maybe use a different one, but there's always trade-offs.

I guess kind of what I'm getting at now is I don't want it to be like the wastewater treatment facility where all of a sudden somebody said, we need this and we need this. And then we get the price and you spent $800,000 on the system, drawing it up, and we can't afford it.

Sure.

So before we start designing a whole system, some kind of guesstimate, budget guesstimate of what it's going to cost, and we can even afford to start going there or not. I think that's, I mean, we can want the best of everything, but we may not have the funds to do that, being honest.

Okay, thank you.

So I see that we have our other engineer, J.C. Hungerford, has his hand up. Would you like to comment, J.C.?

Yeah, a couple of responses that I want to provide to Council here. First, Council Member Williams, you had asked the price that we had submitted the budget back in February 2025. It was $284,760 was what was presented to the Public Works Director back then. So not, you know, we're at $292 now, so a slight increase due to those rates. And then Council Member Reed, I wanted to address a question that you just had or comment. You know, working with the city and helping develop the CIP, when we're presenting that later tonight, you know, we have a good understanding of what the city has budgeted for. And I think there's various ways to tackle these improvements. There's going to be certainly some immediate needs that come out of it, and the CIPs reflect those. In addition to that, you know, we're setting the standard for projects moving forward. And as the city plans for and designs capital projects for, say, you're upgrading well one, just as an example, this standard would be applied for that future upgrade and built into that capital project. So this isn't – I don't foresee it being a tear everything apart and then replace everything in one massive capital project. It's going to allow you to phase that into your projects, so you build consistency into each site moving forward as well.

So that's a good answer. That was one of my next questions was, since you personally are around here so much, you probably have a pretty good idea what the budget is.

Yeah, yeah.

And you do write a lot of – help us with a lot of grants and stuff, which is very helpful.

Yeah.

Glenn and I talk daily, so obviously through this project we'll continue doing so and make sure we are in lockstep with budget expectations for the city and what's in the CIP.

Thank you. Thank you. Appreciate it.

Council Member Williams.

Yeah,

getting back to what Council Member Reed said about, you know, kind of having a budget, I think that it would be advantageous to hear from both Aviva and Ignition kind of towards the beginning of this to see – especially Ignition, because my understanding, it's open protocol, and see what they have to say about bringing it on board and being able to patch into the old equipment as an interim. And then the other thing is, you spoke of Allen Bradley and Siemens. Siemens is pretty good gear. They're all over the world. I worked up on the Cowlitz Falls Dam, and that equipment came from Siemens in Europe. I worked right with Germans and French installing it. And, you know, dams are pretty important pieces of equipment, too, and it's pretty robust. So, if Siemens is quite a bit cheaper than Allen Bradley, then I think we should, you know, investigate that, because we don't got a big pot of gold here.

Understood. Okay, thank you.

I'd like to give the other council members an opportunity to ask questions. It's time by Deputy Mayor Sproul.

No, I'm good. Thank you.

Okay, Council Member Hogan.

I'm fine. Thanks. Thanks.

Okay, Council Member Holland.

I'm good, thank you. Okay, thank you.

Any other – Council Member Therese.

So, this $292,000 is for the overall study that you're going to prepare for us?

Yes, and the plan, hopefully moving forward, whatever is decided on.

So, as you go along, will we get an itemized cost of all the things that are getting done?

That is the plan. Okay. All right. Thank you. Mm-hmm. Okay, thank you.

Any other questions from Council before we close?

Okay.

Okay, seeing none, I thank you for the presentation this evening.

Thank you.

Are we going to bring this back to –

That's the next question, yeah. So, what's Council's wishes to go forward with this, to move it to the next – Council meeting is a stand-alone. Next study session. For more discussion.

Council meeting on the 14th.

Stand-alone. Yeah, we can do that. Okay.

Yeah, I think just in case there's something else that comes up. Okay. Absolutely.

Okay. Great.

Thank you. So, Madam Clerk, next meeting, stand-alone. Okay, next item up on our study session this evening is Stormwater Maintenance Supervisor, presented by Human Resources Director, Shana Pencilman.

Pencilman. Good evening.

So, we are requesting to revise the existing Stormwater Supervisor position to a Stormwater and Maintenance Supervisor position. The Stormwater Supervisor role has been vacant for several months, providing an opportunity to evaluate the Department's organizational structure and align supervisory responsibilities with the operational needs of the Public Works Department. This proposed change would expand the current responsibilities of the Stormwater Supervisor classification to include first-line supervision and oversight of both Stormwater and Maintenance staff. The change consolidates related field operations under one supervisory position and establishes clear lines of authority, accountability, and reporting within the Public Works Department. The Stormwater and Maintenance Supervisor would be responsible for coordinating and overseeing the daily activities of both work groups, assigning and monitoring workloads, addressing operational issues, ensuring compliance with applicable standards and procedures, and providing direct supervision and support to staff. The position would also provide an additional level of operational leadership that supports the Public Works Director and other department management in effectively managing day-to-day operations. In recognition of the expanded scope and increased supervisory responsibilities and broader operational oversight of the position, we're proposing a 12% increase to the existing wage range. The adjustment reflects the additional responsibilities assigned to the position and supports a greater internal compensation parity among the supervisory positions within Public Works.

The

stormwater supervisor position has been vacant for several months. As a result of that vacancy, the increased personnel costs associated with filling the role at a higher wage range for the remainder of 26 will be offset by the salary savings realized during the vacancy period, which results in a minimal net budget impact in 2026. And then I have also included the proposed job description for that storm and maintenance provisor role.

Thank you.

Any questions from Council? Councilman Tracy.

So, just to clarify this, there's already a person in the one position, and we're going to add responsibilities to that person?

No.

Or we're creating a whole new person, a whole new position?

It is creating a new role, but it would be in replacement of the stormwater supervisor. The stormwater supervisor resigned in June of this year, and we've not filled that position. So, this would be creating a new role to replace that. So, it would oversee both groups, the maintenance and the stormwater, because the storm is currently two operators, and then the maintenance has the four.

My next question is, probably not for you. I don't know who it would be for, but if we're well into the, I mean, it's coming up in the agenda down here for the assessing the public works department about hiring somebody. And we're talking about hiring somebody into public works when we're right in the middle of, or getting pretty close to getting somebody hired to give us an assessment, whether we need people or need to, I mean, we don't know until we see this assessment by this company, whether we need to hire people or we need to lay people off.

I don't know.

I would think that's why we're doing the assessment. And, to me, it seems like we're kind of jumping ahead here, hiring somebody new when we may be assessing and have to let them go. I don't know what everything's going on down at public works, so I don't know how crucial this position is at this time.

So, if I can answer some of that, then I'll also include our public works director to talk a little bit about it. But, as Ms. Ponsolin presented, was there's currently a supervisor position in stormwater, and in maintenance there isn't a supervisor. They have a lead. And so, the thought was that we wanted to get supervision over the maintenance group to improve the effectiveness of that group as well as the stormwater group and give that supervisor who is supervising two people an additional span of control or a span of responsibility over a larger work group because those two groups work hand-in-hand frequently in supporting each other. And it really makes sense to actually have a supervisor in that role to ensure that that work is being performed for us, for the city and everything. I think that there's kind of a gap right now that exists at a certain level. So, if I could ask our director to comment at his level, because he's seeing it at the employee level, what's happening.

Yeah, currently, in years past, the reporting requirements for the NPDES or your storm system that reports back to the state of Washington, has the reporting process was much different than it has morphed into. And obviously, stormwater and runoff and all those things, the waters of the state and all those things have become quite a priority in Olympia, and those things have changed. It's my understanding, and again, I'm pretty new here, but without someone who is qualified and certified and has the experience to actually do that reporting, it's nowhere near the cookie-cutter reporting that it used to be. It almost used to be where you could follow what last year's report was, and just about anybody within the Public Works and Stormwater Department could probably figure it out pretty easily. It's much more in-depth, and it's much more difficult and requires, much like water and sewer does, you have to have someone certified and working knowledge of all the new changes that have come through the state for reporting. For reporting, that is, I believe, what Mayor was talking about.

So you mentioned that there is a supervisor in one position already.

Yep. Yeah, there's no.

Well, no, the person has left. We haven't filled that position. It's been vacant for four or five months since June. This would be replaced in that position, but it would be giving that position more responsibility to oversee the two groups.

The two groups.

Right now there's nobody that's supervising those two groups.

Well, we're supervising them.

I mean, what I get your question? Yes. And if I could... We're running all over the city. Yeah, yeah.

I don't want to give that impression. What I can say is, regarding the timing and the other things that you addressed, and I'm not going to dispute that. What I can say, though, with pretty good confidence, is that this position, even through the assessment, is going to end up being a position that is of need. And regardless of whether or not they encompass maintenance, which, through some discussions, it makes sense. To kind of incorporate those groups together. And some of the things we're working on moving forward, I'm working on as a group we're working on for 27, is to start implementing more written official programs for maintenance, and that's all through all departments. Maintenance, stormwater, water, and sewer. Incorporating that in with leadership and with someone who has the reporting ability. It actually, it's a much better way to communicate from where I sit. So that we can implement those programs, and there's one line of communication to make sure that those things get handled. Which is, a lot of cities are set up that way. Someone to directly report back to myself or Glenn, and we can make sure that those particular groups are working on what they need to. And currently it's two folks, and they're doing a great job, but we're heading into the rainy season, and they've already got the storm ponds and all the other things they're doing. So I can't see an organizational assessment that doesn't recognize the loss of position in June as well as the need for that leadership,

if that answers your question.

Yeah, I mean, I just think we're going ahead of the assessment is my thing. But obviously you think that through the assessment that that position would survive. Maybe other positions won't.

Yeah, and if I can add to maybe a little bit of the sense of urgency is what the director pointed out, is that it is a permit compliance position. And so we have driving needs where we need to stay in compliance. And so that's why we bumped this up faster than that, because we need the person to actually sign off on the permits. And we need that body, I don't understand that body, but that person with the proper licensing to do that job. And if we're going to fill that position, we wanted to do it in the most effective way that we could and where we saw the gaps, and we saw this as an opportunity to combine the two together and, like you said, give more of a direct line of accountable leadership.

So in June we had, or in May, we had two supervisors?

No.

One for storm and one for...

Maintenance currently is a lead position. It's not a full supervisor position. So we would retain the maintenance lead.

And the supervisor would be over the lead.

And then the supervisor would be over the lead, yes, sir.

In an actual supervisory role that is defined within our organization as well as all of our organizational structure, much like water and wastewater. We have very specific leads that it's their responsibility for water to report back to the Department of Health Office of Drinking Water. His certification number is on the paperwork. Same with wastewater. This would bring stormwater into that compliance, but also give an actual supervisor title over maintenance as well instead of a lead.

And I think with that singular supervisor line of chain of command, they go through seasonal demands. And, like I mentioned, it's frequently where maintenance will be working hand in hand with stormwater, let's say, in mowing some of the different storm retention ponds, getting the system back up to compliance. So it made sense to have that supervisor over that whole body, that work group that does that work, to allow for the movement of individuals to kind of help complement the work groups. Councilmember Williams?

So

how many personnel are in maintenance?

Four currently.

So the supervisor would be above six total?

Correct.

And then if the assessment came back and said that that's great, that works good, but there's no need for a lead anymore, would we do away with the lead?

I hope not.

Supervisor couldn't take care of that?

Our lead's a pretty good hand. Well, I mean, I guess, again, I can't speak to the timing of what's happening, right? Because some of this stuff was, you know, it's in motion, right? However, I don't anticipate that happening.

Okay.

If that makes any sense to you.

Yeah.

I don't anticipate that being the answer back from our organizational assessment.

We'll see. Okay.

But I don't anticipate them saying, you've got more staff than you need.

Okay.

Probably the opposite if I had to wager on it. But I'm not much of a betting man.

All righty. Thanks. Okay. Thank you.

Councilmember Torres.

So, I'm trying to understand the stormwater crew, that's all they work on. So, if they need more help, does the sewer crew come in to help them?

It depends what they need more help. It depends what they need help with. And I hate to be vague with you. The stormwater system throughout, obviously, is much like water as far as the depth and where it's located within the streets and off streets. And then you have your storm system, the ponds themselves that have to be maintained.

Right.

If there's some TV work, our storm department does have cameras that don't go into the sewer, because they have to be clean, that can do some TV work. If they get into some digging work or something that requires help, it would depend on where it is. Most likely, our maintenance team is kind of the fill-in for everybody. So, those four folks that are in maintenance, it's my understanding in reviewing some of the old documentation, they float around. They help wastewater when wastewater needs it.

They help water. They help streets.

They're working on the cemetery.

They're helping storm.

So, they float more than anything, but it would really depend on what it is. If what they need help with isn't necessarily sewers, cup of tea, then maybe it's water that would help them. If they're punching a hole in the street, going to dig down, see what we got, checking for leaks, looking for infiltration. A lot of times, it's a phone call that somebody, they saw somebody dumping something in the storm grate that they're not supposed to. And then there's a follow-up in that regard.

So, is there a supervisor for the sewer department and a supervisor for the water department?

Yes, sir.

So, there's three supervisors right now.

Is that correct?

There are two supervisors right now.

Okay.

Water and sewer.

Water and sewer, and now there's going to be a third one?

We had one in storm.

Okay.

And he resigned in June, and then we never filled it. And so, as a way to sort of bring it all under the same umbrella a little closer, make it a line title as well as pay and responsibility now that it is a reporting, rather than do that for storm and only have them overseeing two additional employees, it makes sense to wrap maintenance in there as well. And now those three supervisors are commensurate across the board with each other.

All right. Thank you. Yeah. Thank you.

Deputy Mayor Sproul.

I'll try and make this brief. So, now we're up to basically three leads running this department. So, we've got water, stormwater maintenance. So, if this guy left in June, why have we waited three to four months to replace him if he's so important?

What we were doing, part of it was the assessment.

The assessment, exactly.

Part of it was the assessment. And then, also, we had the turnover in the director as we were recruiting a new director before we filled that position to give that opportunity to the new director to be able to weigh in and help build his staff or his or her staff as they see fit. And so, now that we have a new director in place, he's had an opportunity to kind of assess our staffing from his point of view. It makes sense to move forward with hiring the person. But we're in a transition at the other level. And we want to also make sure that we hired the best person and right-sized the work body for him as well.

Okay.

The budget doesn't work. The numbers are, if somebody could explain those numbers, because I'm not coming up with the same numbers. So, you've got an unexpected balance of $59,942 because somebody left in June. So, that left that balance. You're anticipating a cost of $132,000. So, that four-quarter cost would be $33,140 out of the original $119,000 budget, which there was $59,000 left. I come up with $26,802. So, I'm just saying that those numbers just don't work. I'm kind of in agreeance with Council Member Tracy that I would prefer to defer this until after our Public Works Org assessment. We're increasing to 12%. I don't know how that increase was established other than just saying that he's doing more work. But how did you arrive at 12%?

It was for parity with the other supervisors. With the water supervisors.

We don't have any other supervisors. We only have leads.

No, we have two supervisors that are for the water and for wastewater.

So, now we're going to end up with the third supervisor?

No, we always had three. This is replacing a position that was vacated that was a supervisor spied.

But this guy's supposed to oversee the other three?

No, no, no, no. They would be, you have one, a supervisor for water.

Okay.

Then you have a supervisor for water recovery. Now then, you don't have a supervisor for maintenance. And we had a supervisor for stormwater. So, rather than create two supervisor positions, with the span of employees, it made more sense to have one supervisor overseeing it.

So, we've got six employees and three supervisors?

No, no.

There are six employees in that work group.

Just in that work group.

The other supervisors have employees in their work groups.

Okay.

So, this supervisor would be overseeing six people.

So, how many total, how many total,

Corey, are under you? How many heads? 20.

17 at this time?

17.

We have four water.

And you've got three?

We have four water.

And you want three supervisors?

Four employees in water, that includes the supervisor. Four employees in wastewater, that includes their supervisor. We have four in maintenance, that does not have a supervisor, they have a lead. We have two in stormwater. And then I have other administrative staff, GIS, Glenn, who is my superintendent, Laura, who is the administrative assistant, and then Ella, who is up front at the permit tech.

So, basically 17 divided by three, because there's three supervisors.

Correct, plus my director.

So, we're talking about each supervisor, supervises basically, due to the quick math,

six people.

If you want to round it up, water has four total.

Yeah, I mean, I'm just using general numbers, but we need three supervisors to monitor 17 people.

Well, that I can't speak to, and I think our organizational assessment will speak.

Exactly.

But what I can tell you, now, let's defer this until that assessment.

And that's perfectly okay, too. But what I want to state is that the reason why there are supervisors in each one of those departments has nothing to do with employees. It has to do with the reporting requirements to the state for each individual one of those. And so, whether you had 15 employees in each department, you would still only have one supervisor whose name is on the dotted line, who is the direct report to the state in each one of those categories.

Do each one of those have to be a different person?

No.

Well, if you have one person that has that high of a certificate.

No, by the RCW, the person that signs that form, does it have to have a different signature for stormwater, water, or...

Depends on if they're certified to the level that they need to be. If you're cross-certified, if you find somebody that is a water distribution manager... Have anybody cross-certified? WDM4 and a wastewater treatment 4 or 3 and a NPDES...

Do we have anybody that fits that bill?

No. No, sir.

That would be, in my, it's been my experience, that person would probably be a director. It takes a long time to do that. And there's not, depending on the size of the city, you wouldn't typically have someone that has rose to the ranks of the specialty that drinking water is to be a WDM 3 or 4. And also, subsequently, at the exact same time, have just the hours and years it would take to do the same in a water treatment facility. Two completely different avenues of work.

All right. Thank you. I've just seen them.

Councilman Reed.

Wait. Oh, I'm sorry. Councilman... Oh,

I didn't see your hand come up.

I don't. Okay. All right. Thank you.

Councilman Rogen.

So,

this was a group decision with Public Works and the CA, right?

It's been a conversation developing prior to Corey joining us, just trying to put together options for what's best for our Public Works Department and weighing various potential options.

Yeah, it sounds feasible to me. I don't want to wait until we do our analysis.

I mean,

if we need to, I doubt that we're going to cut people loose. They're going to tell us we probably need more, is my opinion. And wastewater is going to be critical here in another couple weeks. So, I don't want to wait to get a wastewater supervisor. And I'm sorry.

Storm.

So, I slip.

Okay.

So, storm, storm dude, person, him or her, them, okay? But, and then, so then, maintenance, whenever they float around, wherever they go, the money comes out of whoever's budget is using them, other than their regular maintenance budget.

Correct? For the most part, you're correct.

And just to kind of close the loop on something, and I don't want to sidetrack it, it's, if you look throughout the structure of a lot of cities within the state of Washington, stormwater is almost always, I don't know if somebody's going to correct me, but it's very common for stormwater and streets to live together, right? And I'm familiar with that. We're not, we don't have 30,000 people here, so it's a little different. So, maintenance is the title for a group of folks that encompasses streets,

parks,

various maintenance, cemetery, trails, all the different things. So, while it may sound a little untraditional to say maintenance and stormwater supervisors, it really is encompassing streets, which is a large portion, and again, that is part of our plan going forward is to bring before you guys a much more robust streets program where you can start seeing some street improvements that traditionally may or may not have been part of what we're doing. And so, just the streets and stormwater alone, I think it's imperative that those two bodies are definitely supervised by a single person. So, some of the nomenclature and titles we're using may seem a little funny, but okay.

Okay, thank you.

Yeah, no, I totally agree.

So, we'll need to start wrapping up here. We'll take a five-minute break. One last question, Council Member Reed.

I know I talked to you yesterday about it, but listening to everybody talk, and I hear a lot of confusion. If we had a tree, just like a family tree, that showed the structure of how the city was built with the employees, where they stand, who they're under, who's in charge, and names, and it could go somewhere where only, you know, the people in the city can look at it, or it could be a public deal. But I think it would be extremely helpful.

Yeah, I think that the...

I created one and provided it.

Yeah.

And so, the plan would be, as we come forward with the budget, you'll have that full org chart for all city staff to look at. I think there are some opportunities, like you had mentioned. I think, Mayor Sproul, the question is, do we hire new, or do we look at re-orging from within? Is there a need for new people? So, we have some questions out there. Councilman Williams?

I just want to know, are we at a point where we need to move this forward, or...

I mean, what's the solution to the council?

That's up to the council, yeah, with what council would like to do. We wanted to present this to you. I think that, you know, the position could be created, whether we fill it or not, that's the next step. But this is creating a position. And so, you could choose to create the position and then not fill it.

You could,

I mean, not in this meeting, but it's the council members' wishes, if you'd like to pass it on to another committee meeting, to have some time to digest the information, talk about it, and come back. I think we have some plans right now that are in place to continue operation with the way that we're currently running. So, I think it's not urgent, urgent for us to do this this evening.

So, it's not urgent?

There's no reports that need to be filed with the certified personnel?

It's not urgent to the level that if we don't move this forward immediately, we're in big trouble. But it is urgent when you blend the time frames of potentially the organizational study taking us into the new year and before we even get our report back to determine where we lay in that, we will have passed the window to report. Those two deadlines will overlap and we'll have to come up with another avenue to get the report in. Probably pay somebody to do it.

Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, that's the workaround. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Okay.

Are we bringing it back to the 10-14 as a standalone?

What are we bringing it back as? As creating that position or filling that position? I think that position has to be created first.

It has to be created.

We're out of time, so that's why I'm saying just bring it back.

Okay.

So, we bring it back as a study session? Because we've got a study session on the 14th.

Sure. Okay. Sounds good. Okay. Great. Thank you, Council.

With that said, the only other answer we have are we're at a roundtable, so we will go ahead and close the study session.

Oh, I'm sorry.

We had the assessment, organizational assessment.

We had a report out on that.

I'm sorry. Okay.

I'll go ahead and I'll report out. I'll report out on that. Say in the report out, we can move that as an agenda item into the council meeting if I'll add that later on. And we'll close out our study session for this evening. Take a five minute break and then return and start the new business.

I'll

begin the business meeting for the city council this evening. This portion of the meeting will allow council to make motions on agenda items. Council discussions may follow once a motion is entertained. Audience members will have the opportunity to make public comment on items that are not on the agenda or may request to provide comment on the agenda item prior to a motion or prior to a vote of council. Council, do we have any additions or modifications that council has presented this evening?

I do.

I have two. One, I want to pull AB 26-95 OMC 1-6-1 from the consent agenda and make that as new business item E. And I want to move AB 2667 Public Works Organization Assessment to new business as item D.

I'll

turn to you when we get to that point in the agenda.

So, okay. Can you mark that? Yeah, it'd be great. Thank you.

Okay, so just to verify item E.

Item D.

D is AB 2667, which is the item we didn't cover, the Public Works Organization Assessment.

And

then item E is AB 2695, which is the OMC 1-6-1 Council Meeting Times.

1-6-1 Council Meeting Meeting Times.

Thank you.

Okay, we'll move on to public comments this evening. This is an opportunity for the public to make comments on council about any matter of city business that is not on the agenda this evening.

Madam Clerk,

I see we have written comments this evening. First person to present a public comment is Tracy Miller, and I will read in the public comment rules. Is Tracy Miller available?

Okay.

If you wouldn't mind, come up to the podium, please. Okay, so please begin by giving us your name and general location of your residence. If you ask a question of the council, the council rules don't allow for back and forth dialogue. This means that they will respond in silence. If action is requested, the chair will refer, myself, will refer the matter to the appropriate administrative staff member to get back with you on that to give you more, maybe answer your questions that you bring forward. If you'd like to be contacted, please suggest yes on the contact information on the sign-up sheet. You will be given three minutes to speak and five minutes if you're speaking on behalf of an organization. At the end of your time, you will hear an alarm, and please use that alarm notification to finish your thoughts in a sentence or two at the most. And you may begin.

Thank you. Thank you.

My name is Tracy Miller, and I'm here tonight regarding the Orting Manor. And first of all, I want to just make it clear that I'm not asking the city to shut down a wedding venue or a business in the city. I am not imposed to it in any way, shape, or form. I'm just asking for a reasonable balance between a commercial business operating its venue and the neighboring residents being able to peacefully enjoy their homes. I have a few Orting Municipal Codes that I jotted down. I was supposed to be off today. I was going to make copies of them.

I had to work.

So I didn't make copies of them for you, but Chapter 5-8 of the Orting Municipal Code deals specifically with noise control. The city's own stated policy in Section 5-8-1 recognizes both interests. It discusses promoting commerce while also protecting residents' use and enjoyment of their own property, sleep, and repose, and the quality of that environment. And that's what I'm asking to be enforced. I'm going to go off of this a little bit because I don't have those municipal codes printed off for you. So, like, Section 5-8-5-B-4 addresses certain amplifiers and loudspeakers originating for business property and states that the amplification covered by that subsection should not be audible beyond the perimeter of the business property, which is kind of difficult for them.

I understand that.

I mean, at the same time, maybe there's a, you know, the standard does, or does the DJ or entertainment music from a commercial business, should it be able to be heard around the whole block? I sit in my house on nights that they have weddings with my AirPods on noise canceling in my living room with my TV up to try to block the music. I shouldn't have to do that in my own home. Yes, they pay taxes. I also pay taxes on my home. And it's just my dogs won't even go outside when they have the music going. It's my house. It's two houses over.

It sits up.

And it looks directly into their backyard. So the speakers that they have sitting right there, there's nothing between. So it just kind of, it might as well be in my backyard.

Um,

they did have somebody come over and talk to me and I told her, we sat on my back deck because I wanted her to hear the music. And I, I told her I have tinnitus in both ears and the bass is really painful. And I told her that. And then the next time they had a wedding, what got amplified?

The bass.

And I, I kind of feel like, you know, they took what I told them and used it against me.

Um,

I, I, I, I don't want to say I'm just one resident saying that, but I don't have permission to give other names. So, you know, there is other people around me that feel the same way. And this is important to me because this is my home. When I'm on my property, I should be able to sit outside or open my windows, watch my television,

have a conversation, conversation,

or just enjoy my property without having to yell over music in my own backyard.

Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Miller.

Um, or I'm at the three minute mark for you, uh, but we will have somebody get back with you to talk in more depth, uh, with you and, and look for some solutions.

Okay.

And I will get these printed out and drop them off at the office.

Okay. Thank you. Thank you.

Madam clerk, do we have anybody who is online that wishes to speak this evening?

No, ma'am. Okay. Thank you.

Any, uh, written submissions?

Uh, not for this portion of the meeting.

Okay. Thank you. Okay. Moving on.

Our first item of business this evening is we'll be opening with public hearings. So I will be doing a slightly different format and, uh, you have little patience with me. I will be following a little bit of, uh, uh, uh, legal coaching here as we go through this process to open up a public hearing. And so this, our first public hearing this evening is AB 26 dash 106 house bill 1757, amending OMC title 13. The purpose of the purpose of tonight's public hearing is to receive public testimony on and to consider adoption of ordinance number 26, 26, 1167 titled an ordinance of the city of awarding Washington, um, awarding Washington,

um,

awarding, uh, awarding, uh, awarding, uh, awarding municipal code, creating a new section 13 dash 5 dash 10 of the awarding municipal code, providing for severely severability,

uh,

legislation authorizations and establishing an effective date. Notice of this hearing was posted and published on September 17th, 2026, the Washington state department of commerce granted expedited review of the, of the proposed amendment on the August 5th, 2026 under submittal ID 2626 S dash 14093, which satisfied, satisfied the city's state agency notice requirement under RCW 36.70 a.106. The ordinance planning commission held its own public hearing on September 3rd, 2026 and recommended council adoption of the ordinance. The city council set tonight as a public hearing date as it, as its committee of whole meeting of September 26, excuse me, September 16th, 2026 record of this hearing, uh, consists of agenda bill 26 dash one Oh six and the following four exhibits exhibit a house bill 1757. Chapter two Oh three laws of 2025 exhibit B ordinance number 2026 dash 1167 exhibit C notice of intent to adopt and the department of commerce approval of the expedited review dated August 5th, 2026, uh, exhibit B notice of public hearing posted September 17th,

2026.

Miss part, Mr. Trenkel, please enter agenda bill 26 dash one Oh six and exhibits a through D into the record of this hearing.

I will. Thank you, ma'am parents

of parents of parents of fairness and conflict of interest disclosure. This is a legislative hearing on a development regulation of a citywide general applicability is not just, it is not a quasi judicial. So the appearance of fairness doctorate chapter 42 point 36 RCW does not restrict ex part a communications on this matter. In the interest of transparency, I will nevertheless ask each council member to disclose on record any financial or property interest that could affect that could be affected by this ordinance in a matter distinct from a public generally, uh, distinct from the public generally and any other matter that could, that could rise to a reasonable question about his or her ability to consider the ordinance impartially starting to my left council member Therese. Do you have any disclosures that would prevent you from voting on this evening?

Nope. Nope.

Council member Williams.

Okay.

Council member Tracy. Deputy Mayor Spurl.

No.

Council member Holland.

No.

Council member Hogan.

None.

Council member Reed.

I'm not sure I plan to apply for a, for a home to be built for the back of my property

eventually.

I'm not sure if that works into this bill or not.

Okay.

So that you're, you're applying, you're going to be building a home potentially in the future on your, on your property. I'll ask our, uh, city attorney.

It could be an ADU.

Um, I don't think that that would, uh, affect council member Reed's impartiality, but the public would be invited at the end of this to make a challenge. And if council member Reed is concerned in any way, shape or form, he can voluntarily, uh, recuse.

Okay.

Do you wish to recuse?

Uh, he said I get to wait till the end of the deal.

Okay. Okay. Thank you. Okay.

Uh, I have no disclosures to disclose. Are there any council members of the public or of, of the public who wish to challenge this participation of any council member on, on this record?

Okay. Seeing none. Okay.

So now would be the time of council member Reed wishes to recuse, or if any, if the council as a whole wishes to challenge his, uh, impartiality, now would be the time to do it.

Um,

but if, if council member Reed believes he can remain impartial, despite this disclosure, uh, he, that is up to him and the council, whether he can participate.

I'm sure I can be impartial.

Seeing none. We'll move on.

So hearing rules, procedures, and, and order of the speakers. I will now explain how tonight's hearing will proceed so that the record is clean and every

speaker is heard.

Order of proceeding,

proceedings,

staff presentation by Kim Gunderson, planning consultant with Mahoney Planning LLC for the Orting Community Development Department, including the planning commission's September 3rd, 2026 recommendation. Planner Kim Gunderson, is she online, uh,

presently? I'm here, mayor. Okay.

So this would be the time for you to present the, uh, agenda bill as prepared?

Yeah. Yeah. Happy to do so.

Thank you very much for the introduction and gave a lot of important background and context and council member Reed, the, um, the matter tonight is for the conversion of, uh, non-residential, uh, existing non-residential spaces to residential. So your construction of a new, uh, residential ADU, um, I, I don't think, uh, should be problematic

for you. Uh,

uh, uh, as the mayor has indicated, this is, uh, uh, uh, public hearing on the council's consideration of adopting ordinance 2026-1167, which would implement house bill 1757. Uh, house bill 1757 governs those conversions of non-residential spaces to residential spaces, uh, and it is a requirement, um, within the law that, uh, all cities planning within the growth management act, uh, adopt development regulations, um, by ordinance that implement

this house bill.

So that's what we're here to accomplish tonight. Uh, the mayor has given good, um, good background and context for the project. He's indicated that we've properly noticed this public hearing and that we've properly noticed under our state obligations, uh, the, uh, intent, uh, to adopt this ordinance to the department of commerce.

Um,

both of those notices resulted in no public comments having been received by the city on the proposed ordinance tonight. Uh, the ordinance was also presented at the most recent city or, uh, committee of the whole meeting on the 16th of September. Um, and there have been no changes made to the ordinance since council was, was last presented with the ordinance at that meeting. Uh, the, uh, the majority of the content that's included, uh, as a part of ordinance 2026-1167 that will change title 13 is the creation of a new chapter. Um, and that's the new chapter 13, 510, which would, um, effectively almost entirely implement verbatim the house bill, um, which in general, uh, aims to be able to ease the conversion of non-residential spaces to residential spaces, um, with one noteworthy caveat. Uh, and if the council looks onto page, uh, 38 of their packets, you'll see under subsection six, uh, that one of the things that the statute did was to be able to say that, uh, there couldn't be any prohibition of housing units in any specific part of a building, except on the ground floor, commercial or retail, uh, structure that is along a major pedestrian corridor, uh, and the, uh, statute did not provide any, any definition to, uh, major pedestrian corridor. And so as a part of the work that was committed to between myself and the planning commission, we added definition to that term to be able to, uh, ensure that there is some, um, protection and insulation in place within the, uh, wording sort of, you know, um, main downtown core to be able to use those spaces for, uh, general commercial purposes rather than residential purposes. Uh, and so we defined that term, major pedestrian corridor as those public streets and roads bordering or confined within the area bound by bridge street, Southeast Varner Avenue, Northeast

Uh,

and so what that does is allows the city to be able to, uh, to regulate or, or limit or prohibit, uh, any sort of commercial ground space, um, in that, in that bound area from being able to be converted to residential use again, um, just in the protection, uh, and interest of being able to maintain that commercial activity within those ground floor spaces. Uh, otherwise, uh, as the mayor has indicated, this underwent a public hearing with the planning commission on September 3rd and did receive a recommendation for council's, uh, adoption of this ordinance at that meeting or at that hearing. Um, and so we are here tonight to be able to seek council's motion to be able to adopt ordinance 2026, 1167. If you look at the last page of the agenda bill, which is on page 27 of, uh, the agenda packet, you'll see a recommended motion for council's consideration, and I can address any questions from the council.

I thank you, Ms. Mahoney.

Do we have any clarifying questions from council members and staff?

Okay.

I'm going to open this to public testimony. Uh, these are the rules of decorum. All comment comments must be directed to the chair, not to the speakers or the audience. Please refrain from applause, booing demonstrations or signs held above shoulder height. Personal attacks, profanity and threats are not permitted and will be ruled out of order. Please silence all mobile devices. Remote participation on zoom. Please keep yourselves muted unless you are called to speak. Public comment procedures. Any person wishing to speak in the council chambers must complete a speaker sign up and available at the entrance, uh, and with the clerk. If you have not signed up and wish to, to speak, please do so now. Participants on zoom who wish to speak should use the raise your hand feature. The clerk will unmute speakers in the order their hands are raised after the in-person list has

been exhausted.

When your name is called, please state your full name and address for the record and indicate whether you are speaking in favor, in opposition, or with questions or neutral comments. Each speaker will be allowed three minutes, a designated spokesperson for a group of three or more ordering residents are present, uh, who are, who are present and yield their time may be allowed

up to six minutes.

The published, the published noticed invited written comments by email to Kim Gunderson at

K Mahon. Please

keep your testimony focused on Ordinance 2026-1167 and the proposed amendments to OMC 13-3-7. OMC-5-10 and OMC-13-6-7. Testimony that addresses site-specific projects or applications unrelated to this ordinance will be ruled out of order. Order of speakers. Speakers who signed up in advance with the clerk in the order received. Speakers who signed up at the door tonight in the order received. And remote participation by Zoom called by the clerk in the order their hands are raised. Any remaining speakers recognized by the chair? Are there any questions from those present about the procedures I have just described? Okay, seeing none.

Very well.

I now open the public hearing to Ordinance-2026-1167 at 6.36 p.m. Clerk, please take note of the record of the time.

Looks

like I got a little bit out of order. We had Kim Planner and Kim Gunderson already speak.

All right.

We'll open this now to public comment. We will now receive public testimony. As a reminder, three minutes per speaker. State your full name, address for record, and please combine your comments to the ordinance.

Mr. Chanko,

please state for the record whether any written comments have been received by 3 p.m.

No written comments.

No written comments.

Do we have anybody in the public that wishes to speak this evening to this ordinance?

Mayor, the attorney has the standard.

Okay. Mr. Lloyd?

Real briefly, Mayor, you should stay for the record and have Ms. Gunderson. She does not need to repeat everything she said, but she should ask that all of her previously made comments be made part of the record, and you as the chair should need to accept that.

Okay. Thank you.

Ms. Gunderson, is that your desire?

Yes. Yes, it is, Mayor. Okay.

I accept your comments as presented. Your presentation is presented.

Okay.

Anybody in the public wish to speak now for this public hearing?

Okay. CNN.

Do we have any written, we said no written comments? Is there anybody online that wishes to speak towards?

No, ma'am. No? Okay.

So this concludes the in-person speaker list for Mr. Chanko. Are there any participants in Zoom? We've already covered that. Is there anyone else present in the chambers or on Zoom who wishes to speak on ordinance 2026-1167 and who has not yet been heard? I will ask three times. Anyone else? Anyone else who wishes to speak?

Okay. Seeing none.

Final call.

Anyone? Seeing none.

Ms. Gunderson, do you wish to respond to any? There's no questions brought forward, so you don't need to respond to anything. See no further speakers in the chambers or on Zoom with the written comment deadline having passed at 3 p.m. I now close the public hearing on ordinance 2026-1167 at 6.38 p.m., September 30, 2026. Council members, we now move to council deliberation on ordinance 2026. Council members, you may direct questions to staff or to the city attorney, and I will recognize you members in turn. Council member Therese? Council member Therese? Council member Williams?

None.

Council member Tracy?

None.

Deputy Mayor Sproul?

None.

Council member Holland?

None.

Council member Hogan?

Are we still in hearing mode?

No, hearings have been closed.

Can I make a motion?

That's the next, but you can.

Yes.

I'd like to adopt ordinance number 2026-1167, ordinance of the City of Ording, Washington, modifying regulations for existing buildings used for residential purposes, amending section 13-3-3 and 13-6-7 of the Ording Municipal Code, creating a new section 13-5-10 of the Ording Municipal Code, providing for a severe ability, legislative authorization, and establishing an effective date.

True.

Motion made by Council member Hogan, seconded by Deputy Mayor Sproul. Comments or discussion from Council? Council member Hogan?

No, I'd just like to thank...

our

committees, the Planning Commission, and Mrs. Gunderson for all the hard work on this. It took quite some time, and I appreciate it.

Thank you. Okay.

Deputy Mayor Sproul?

I second what Council member Hogan said.

Thank you.

Any other comments from Council? Council member Reed?

I

should have brought my questions up a lot earlier than I am, but the basic purpose of this vote is to let housing go into our commercial area? Is that basically the whole thing?

Yeah, you've got it.

Right now, it's already in allowed use. It's just the state has passed statutory language that we're required to adopt into our municipal code that would ease that conversion. And so, you know, things like requiring energy code compliance for existing residents. If a new residence is converted within a non-residential area, that's something that we can't do. We can't require a change of use permit. We can't require design review. It's just they kind of cull a lot of the, you know, red tape or regulation around the use of those spaces and the conversion of those spaces to try and, you know, motivate more housing opportunity within existing non-residential spaces.

My view, it sounds like it's kind of being pushed down our throats a little bit here. So the city can't require any ADRs of these people either. If they're building a residence in a commercial area, they don't have to apply to the same standards as anybody else.

That's right.

Now, an ADR is typically not something that's required for residential development unless it amounts to multifamily residential development. But otherwise, yes, you're correct. And, yes, this is something that can feel, you know, quite forced because it is written into the statute that cities have no option other than to adopt an ordinance that implements this statute.

I guess that's where it sounds to me like it's being pushed on us.

So I

was going down the list of things here, prohibit addition of housing units, any specific part of the building except the ground floor. So it has to be on the second floor. So with the ADRs we have,

the

second floor doesn't have to follow those ADRs, correct?

Right, yeah.

So if there was, like, a two-story non-residential space and the upstairs wanted to be converted into residential space, then the city could not require that converted space to undergo ADR review with the Planning Commission.

Does that seem okay to you?

Well, if they were only converting the interior of the space and they weren't doing anything to the exterior, then they wouldn't, you know, typically be exposed to that process anyways. If they were, if a part of their project were to be able to adjust how the exterior of the site looks, then I think that, you know, in theory it could create a bit of an incongruence in the architectural design of the building. There's some argument that the owner or the tenants of the structure wouldn't care for that kind of incongruence and so would design something appealing.

So the parking's another thing. We're short in parking on our commercial areas already. Now we're going to add houses on top of them where they are required to have additional parking?

No, the second, under Section B2, it says that one thing that the city can't do is impose parking requirements on the addition of dwelling units within an existing building.

So where are they going to park?

It

would be either in existing off-site or, I'm sorry, off-street private parking within the lot or on the street.

This doesn't sound like a good idea to me.

Anyway, thank you. Thank you.

Any other comments of council?

Okay. See you then. So we'll go to vote.

Madam Clerk, will you do a roll call vote?

Council Member Torres?

Yay.

Council Member Williams?

Nay.

Council Member Tracy?

Yes.

Deputy Mayor Sproul?

Yes.

Council Member Holland?

Yes.

Council Member Hogan?

Yes.

Council Member Reed?

No.

The motion carries by a vote of five in favor and two opposed. Ordinance number 2026-1167 is adopted.

Thank you, Madam Clerk. So closing record statements for the record. Summarize the actions this evening. The council opened a duly noticed public hearing on ordinance number 2026-1167 at 635 p.m. The council received Agenda Bill 26-106 with exhibits A through D into the record together with staff presentation and the Planning Commission's September 3rd, 2026 recommendation. The council received zero oral comments and zero written comments from the members of the public. The council closed the public hearing at 638 p.m., deliberated on the record and adopted ordinance number 2026-1167 by roll call of a vote of six yea to one nay.

Five to two.

Five to two. I'm sorry.

The full record of this hearing-agenda bill exhibits A through D, any written comments received by 3 p.m. deadline, and the audio-video recordings will be maintained by Ms. Turchenko in accordance with the city's records retention schedule and the Washington Public Records Act, Chapter 45-0.56 RCW. The public hearing-agenda bill exhibits A through D, any written-agenda bill exhibits A through D, any written-agenda bill, and the public hearing on ordinance 2026-1167 is concluded. The council will now proceed to the council will now proceed to the next item on the agenda, and the time is 648 p.m.

Okay, thank you.

On the agenda this evening, we have shows a second public hearing, but Mr. Lloyd, our state attorney, are we required to open this for a public hearing?

No, that's a good question. There would be procedural requirements if you were adjusting your solid waste rates.

You're not.

So, this does not need to be handled with the same type of rigorous and strict procedures as we just went through with AB 26-106. You absolutely will need to deliberate on and accept public comment on this matter, but you don't need to go through the acceptance of testimony, noting the time of the record, and all that stuff.

That is not necessary.

You can treat this like a normal agenda item if you would like. Or you can go through that procedure all over again.

Okay.

I think I'll treat it like a regular agenda item.

Okay. Thank you.

I appreciate the clarification on this. I just would like to speak to the public for just a moment. This is a difficult thing for council and myself to do and staff. It's resetting our utility rates to meet our level of service that we're expected to provide for the public. It's extremely important because your utility rates protect and maintain the invested resources that we have in our infrastructure. And it's extremely critical that we keep pace with the current needs of our utilities and with our structures. In the long run, minor increases will result in much larger savings and protection of our reliable resources as we have. So this evening, what we have before us is the adoption of projected utility rates. And this has come after quite a bit of deliberation, multiple meetings with council members going over different options, different finance options of how can we best keep pace with utility rates that are affordable for our citizens. We've compared what we have for projected capital projects and how can we actually spread those capital projects in a way that keeps pace yet still doesn't impact the citizens as much in rates as possible. Very difficult. I think we started this looking at approximately $120 million in just a few years. And now we've spread this over the course of 10-plus years to make our upgrades to keep these rates in line and keep our systems up to speed. So this evening for AB, excuse

me,

I've got to get down here quick, AB 2679-107, our utility rates. We'll have a first presentation by our city engineer, JC Hunkerford, to talk about the types of projects that will be funded through the utility rates and the needs for them. And then following that, we'll have a presentation from Raftilis that did the rate study that came to the final numbers that were proposed in this evening. And then we will allow for public comment to present to council prior to a motion on this going forward. So I'll defer to engineer, JC Hunkerford.

Thank you, Mayor. Just a review of the CIP.

We've gone through this presentation a few times, both at the council meeting and through a workshop. But highlighting the capital improvement plans that were provided to Raftilis and resulting in the rates that they will be presenting here shortly. So we'll be going through the water, sewer, and storm utilities individually.

And

so total capital program up to 2045 for water and sewer and storm to 2046 results in $60 million in improvements for the water system, about $102 million for the sewer system, and $29 million for the storm system. So breaking down the water system in sort of category, you can see here a breakdown of planning, source improvements, storage improvements, O&M, and a large investment in the distribution systems where we see the greatest need at 41%.

These

are just a couple photos of existing water system, both on the drinking water well source and storage reservoirs for the city. So I broke down the CIPs into timeframes being immediate projects, which would be 2026 to 2028, more near-term projects, and then longer-term, which are further out. And I'll go into more detail here as we work through the presentation. But 26 to 28 on the water system, something we talked about earlier in the study session, is skate upgrades. So that includes that skate and telemetry master plan and started to implement some of those recommended improvements. The CIP reflects $685,000 in investment in that. We've got some river AC main replacement at about $750,000. The SR-162 fish passage project, which we've talked about a few times at Council and is also on the agenda this evening for consideration agreement with WSDOT. WSDOT, ongoing construction right now on Kansas Street, and then White Hawk Boulevard, that bypass project includes about $1.5 million in waterline improvements as well. Near-term projects is something that I bookended around 2029 to 2031. Well-2, which was one of the photos you saw on the first slide there on the water system, it's an important source to the city that's currently disconnected due to various reasons. It's aged and has poor water quality, but we see it as an important redundancy source for the city to provide fire flow as well as redundancy if one of your sources happens to go offline. A $6.8 million investment in that system. Additional state investments at $700,000 during this time frame. AC water main replacements is budgeted at $380,000. Those aren't location-specific, but as we've done your water system plan, we've identified various areas where there's old AC water main as well as restrictions within the water system.

Longer-term,

Harman Springs Phase 2 at $2.1 million. Windgate Springs Reservoir Seismic Analysis and Improvements at $600,000. Well, one seismic retrofit at $1.8 million. You see here kind of a redundant project here of seismic retrofits. So seismic codes are continually updated, and your storage reservoirs need to be assessed and be improved to meet current seismic codes. If we do have a major seismic event, make sure they're resilient to that and maintain your level of service. Various valve replacements throughout the system. Those not only provide redundancy and routing, looping of your system to improve reliability, but provide some operational flexibility if we have a main break or there's a seismic event. It allows operations staff to go out and control the water, close the broken mains, and reroute it through the system so we can maintain service to the residents. Various AC water main replacements at $1.5 million. The Windgate main replacement and SR-162 main replacement combined at about $11 million. So that's the water main that starts essentially at city limits going towards South Prairie and all the way out to the Windgate source and storage reservoir. It's age, and as well, it needs to be replaced for your WSDOT franchise utility agreement. And lastly, one out there long-term, something the city has considered for quite some time now is an emergency inner tie with the city of Tacoma. That would just provide some redundancy to the system, you know, if there's a seismic event, if you have a pressure drop, that type of thing. The reason the cost of that is so high at $2.3 million is they operate at a much lower pressure zone near the city than the city maintains their system. So it will require a booster station as well.

Over

to stormwater, looking at 20% investment at O&M and 80% at capital improvements. So a couple photos of your existing stormwater system. These are outfalls into the Puyallup River that were constructed some years ago, both the Kansas Street outfall as well as outfalls installed as part of the Wolf levee upgrades. So a lot of your stormwater improvements run concurrent with roadway projects. When we do a roadway project, there's an investment in the stormwater system. So Whitehawk Boulevard talked about that briefly a minute ago, but there's major stormwater infrastructure associated with that. Budget on that is $2 million. Rainier Meadows, stormwater retrofit at $900,000. Kansas Street, which is ongoing right now at $661,000. So future capital improvements, just to improve conveyance system, we see bottlenecks within the model where we can improve local flooding. Includes Bridge Street, Kansas Street East, and then Whitesill Street.

Near-term projects.

Next, we've shown the need for an outfall near the high school at $1.1 million. Additional improvements along Calistoga Street East, Ammons Lane, and then Corrin Avenue Northwest. Lastly, longer term, additional improvements on Corrin Avenue Southeast at $1.8 million. And then additional culverts and outfalls on the Carbon River side of the city at $1.3 million. So a lot of these are just noted deficiencies as we've been working with the city on the stormwater master plan, running models to minimize local and in-city flooding. As a lot of you are aware, the city's between two levees, and it tends to trap the water kind of like a pond structure. So doing our best to convey that water off the streets and out into the river. Combined, I kind of went over this, but this looks at overall investment in a near-term, immediate, near-term, and long-term basis. Your investment right now in the immediates is about $27 million or 14%. Near-term, 22% at $42 million. And long-term projects at about $122 million. That's a lot of information. I'm happy to take any questions, or if we want to hold those for the end after a rough, tell us.

Either way, I'll be around.

Thank you, Mr. Unkeford. One item for the Council before we take questions on this. I did add, following our meetings regarding the rates, we've had some work that's been identified that's an urgent need for upgrades for the lagoon system that we wanted to have available monies to ensure that we could make adequate repairs to the lagoon to extend our life for a longer period of time. So that was a portion, that was the money that's presented to make repairs by Mr. Unkeford. So that was included in the rate study. So when you see the numbers this evening with RAPTILIS, that'll include all of the numbers that would include the restoration for the facility as well. So it didn't make a large shift, but I just wanted to let you know that that money was there for a full restoration of the lagoon if we choose to go that route. So questions, Council Member Reed?

Questions for JC. Have you made any allowances for getting the stormwater from the city into the rivers since the rivers continually go in higher every year because they're not dredging the river? Are we going to have to pump the water out of the city into the rivers?

Best we can, that'll be in the detailed design of those outfalls. So there's a few outfalls in the CIP. I do understand that, you know, like you said, there's... Aggregation of the river channels. And at some point, maybe looking at modifications to the levees. The county owns and operates the levees. So that's outside the city's CIP. And hopefully not someday. But, you know, pump stations is certainly a consideration as well.

Thank you.

Other questions from Council?

Council?

Okay. Seeing none, we'll move on to a presentation from Raftelis to present the rate study of what we are proposed to adopt this evening.

Great. Good evening, Mayor, members of Council. My name is Jennifer Tavancis. I'm the Vice President with Raftelis. And my team has been working with the city on a comprehensive utility rate study. I will go ahead and share my screen. Can you all see that all right?

Fantastic. Fantastic.

So tonight we will walk through the financial plans for your three utility, water utility enterprises, water, wastewater, and stormwater. We will share our rate recommendations and present updated general facilities charges. Tonight's presentation has a number of goals. We want to give you a clear picture of each enterprise's needs. Building upon the presentation we just saw, walk through those long-range financial plans that we developed in coordination with the city and with parametrics, and then review projected rates, and as I mentioned, those updated facilities charges.

This

rate study does have two primary objectives. On the financial plan side, we developed comprehensive 10-year cash flow models and evaluated the rate design for all three utilities. There are a number of pressures. There are a number of pressures that are shaping the city's financial outlook here. A significant capital infrastructure program, which we just reviewed. Existing and projected debt and managing debt service obligations and coverage requirements, rising operating costs, and, of course, affordability is kind of front and center as we keep customer impacts at the front of the conversation when talking about rates.

As

a quick refresher, as a quick refresher, enterprise funds are different from the city's general fund. They operate like a business, so services are funded by the fees charged to customers for the services that they use. Each fund can pay for O&M capital, debt service, contributions to reserves for that utility, meaning that they must be, you know, financially self-sustaining. The rate study process, just kind of at a glance here, follows four major steps. Go ahead and skip to the end here. So we started by establishing the city's financial plan and rate setting policies. From there, we built out the financial plan itself, which evaluates the capital program and projects the cash flow needs for financial sufficiency. The third step is a cost of service and rate design analysis, so allocating the costs across customer classes and calculating specific rates. And the final step is adoption, which includes tonight's hearing or presentation and the formal rate ordinance. So tonight we have, or at this point, we have completed steps one through three, and that's what we're bringing you tonight. A number of factors drive the financial plan projections. There are, of course, inflationary pressures on both operating costs and the cost of capital projects. We are considering cash reserve requirements, borrowing terms and costs, baseline water sales and wastewater flows, and then the level and timing of capital investment, excuse me, which really sort of drives the need here.

Throughout

this presentation, I will kind of cover these topics, water, wastewater, and then stormwater. So we'll sort of cycle through them, but I think it helps build the overall picture to present it this way. Just to give you the context, the backdrop for where the water utility is now, on the left, we can see the revenue sources. For the water utility, where primary revenue, of course, is from those residential and commercial charges supplemented by general facility charges and some miscellaneous revenue sources. What it is spent on is system operations and maintenance in the form of personnel and supplies. Debt service on existing infrastructure represents a relatively small amount, and capital investment is the remaining portion. So this gives you kind of a baseline for how those funds in and out compare today. For wastewater, the system follows a similar pattern. Rate revenue funds, operations, maintenance, and the debt service on existing treatment infrastructure. Wastewater system has a larger capital program ahead of it, as we just saw, which is reflected in the revenue adjustment we'll be discussing shortly. The enterprise begins 2026 with about $12 million in cash. So it's got the strongest starting position of the three utilities. And then the Stormwater Enterprise Fund is the smallest of the three, but it faces proportionally more significant financial pressures. Revenue today covers operations, and the fund has about $3.3 million in cash.

All right.

So I will go through the capital plan element quickly because we just got a great primer on what all is included here. The water capital program totals about $55.2 million over this period that we're looking at, so it's not the entire period that was just presented. This reflects the infrastructure investments needed to maintain a reliable water system and serve a growing community. As you can see, and as discussed, these project costs are spread over a 10-year period, and debt financing is planned to help smooth out the impact of some of these costs. In the first five years, we have assumed the city will accomplish approximately 70% of the planned capital program. So to be clear about what that means is that the financial plan assumes that not all of this capital will be completed and not all of it will be funded. So that is an intentional choice to sort of balance out the rate impact and to give the city an opportunity to ramp up its capital delivery and move towards sort of a more robust, proactive program. On the wastewater side, we're looking at $86.3 million over this period of time. The full program is planned for accomplishment over the 10-year period, so all of these costs are factored in. Given the magnitude of the utility, we'll have to rely on a combination of public works board loans in the near term and bond issuances in later years to fund the program.

And

then for stormwater, this capital plan totals $13.3 million escalated over this period of time. Stormwater infrastructure is often overlooked, but here it is especially important due to the city's flood risk profile. So it does carry those public safety implications in addition to the sort of regulatory compliance obligations as well. This plan averages about a million a year beginning in 2027, and it ramps up capital accomplishment gradually, reaching 100% after five years. And we'll see the kind of the impact of that in just a moment. So the capital plans are really the backdrop here. And if I can get this to play, I will just do a primer to introduce the concept of revenue required from rates. So the sort of the total revenue that the utility needs to cover, all of its obligations, operations, capital, debt, service, reserves, offset by other revenue streams, such as income from investments. The gap between what the utility currently collects under existing rates and what it needs to collect is sort of what drives the magnitude and the timing of recommended rate adjustments.

For water,

current revenues, which you can see in this green line here, are sufficient to cover operation and maintenance costs in the short term. There's a small margin that could support some capital investment without rate changes, but that margin is very thin, and it quickly erodes once you factor in the full capital program. So this chart kind of establishes a baseline. We're not starting in a terrible position, but the capital needs ahead do require additional revenue to grow and then keep pace. And this shows that same chart with the capital needs sort of layered on top, and you can see that the existing revenue falls pretty far short of what's needed. And current revenues meet only 57% of the requirement. The recommended water financial plan, as you can see on the right here, does call for 9.5% annual rate revenue adjustments each year from FYI, I'm sorry, from 2027 through 2036. The plan also includes debt issuance time to align with some of the major capital investments, so approximately $6 million in 2027, $5 million in 2029, and then additional issuances in later years. This capital accomplishment is held at 70% in the first six years, I believe, and it ramps up to 100% further out in the future. And then, as noted here, since we are considering debt issuance, we have factored in coverage ratios that stay above 1.2 for senior debt.

And

then, finally, the storm drain financial plan, this graph, again, is comparing the current revenue to the existing operating and maintenance costs. In this case, the current revenue is not sufficient to cover even the O&M costs moving forward. For that reason, the capital accomplishment rate starts low here, again, to balance out rate adjustments and what we can reasonably accomplish with additional revenue. So the stormwater plan calls for 20% annual rate revenue adjustments in the near term, stepping down to 18% by 2030. And then, moderating further to 5% and then 3% further into the planning period. A small bond of about $2 million is planned in 2030. And the accomplishment rate, it does start small, but it ramps up to 100% by 2031.

All right.

So those last few slides talked about the rate revenue adjustments. And now we can kind of get into the specifics of the rates. Before doing so, though, I will describe how the rate revenue is structured for the water utility. So part of the revenue comes from fixed charges, meter-based charges, which are the same every month. If you have the same size meter, assuming you don't switch your meter, they're consistent month over month. The other part of the charge is associated with the volume of water used, so a volumetric charge or usage-based charge.

Here,

52% of revenue is recovered from the fixed portion of rates, and 48% is recovered from the variable portion of rates. We have kept that split into the—we've maintained that split as modeling future rates. So that is a feature of the current rate design that we are keeping. There are—there is a tweak that we would make to the structure of the meter charge, the fixed charge here. Currently, 1-inch and 1.5-inch meters are charged the same amount monthly, and then 2-inch through 4-inch meters are also grouped together, even though each size can handle a different safe operating flow. And that's generally the basis for metered—sorry, meter charges. So the proposed structure reflects the operating capacity of each meter size and differentiates between all of those sizes. At the moment, the practical impact is limited. Only 1.5-inch-meter customers would see a change compared to the current grouping. There are no retail 3-inch or 4-inch meters, but this change would kind of set the stage for a more equitable and robust process moving forward. And then this slide shows the current and proposed meter charges under this new approach that I just kind of described. Because we're splitting out the 1.5-inch meters from the 1-inch class, there is a little bit of a different shift in the relative cost across the different meter sizes.

For wastewater,

there's a similar, it's similar in that there are fixed and variable components, but the relative cost recovery from those two is pretty different. So as you can see here, the fixed component is 96% of revenues. The variable component is 4% of revenues, and we, again, maintain this allocation. There are two adjustments recommended to the wastewater rates. The first is to remove the snowbird rate class. There is only one customer in that class, and it creates sort of an administrative complexity that isn't warranted for one customer. So that customer would move to the standard inside residential rate. Second, we're recommending adjusting the outside city multiplier from 1.27 to 1.3, so just a little increase there, which better reflects the cost of serving customers outside the city, and it's consistent with common practice. This table shows the fixed monthly rate for each customer class before and after the proposed adjustment for most inside city customers. The increase is just under $5 a month, consistent with that 7% adjustment. The snowbird class would, of course, see a different change because they are kind of changing categories. And then the outside city customers see a slightly higher increase, both because their rates start higher and also because the proportion is – the multiplier is being increased a bit.

The

volumetric rate for wastewater, again, reflects the 7% overall adjustment. Outside city customers are charged 1.3 times the inside rate, and the high-strength commercial class carries a higher rate that reflects the additional treatment costs that those flows impose on the system. So, these differentials are cost-based and consistent with industry standard practices. The bill comparison chart, again, here shows 2027 proposed rates against current rates by usage level. The impacts here are very proportional since we're retaining that fixed variable split and the bulk of the structure.

So,

these are inside city domestic and then inside city high-strength, a similar set of impacts, but starting from a higher rate point simply because of the high-strength character of these customers.

And

then last but not least, the stormwater rate is a bit simpler. It's a charge per ERU, equivalent residential unit. And so, for a typical single-family residential customer, the ERU represents 2,500 square feet of impervious, and that rate is 2,760. So, the proposed rate is 3,312, so an increase of $5.52 per ERU. This is the first-year impact, that 20-year adjustment that I mentioned a few slides ago and required by the financial plan. Customers, of course, will be thinking sort of collectively about the impact across all of these utilities. So, this is the combined picture, what a typical single-family residential customer will pay across all three utilities under proposed rates as compared to their current bill. This overall represents a 9.5% increase over current rates.

Just

for sort of transparency and completeness, I do want to share the five-year schedule of fixed water charges. So, these are the fixed charges. After an initial adjustment to the structure in 2027, the rest of the adjustments are steady year over year with 9.5% increases.

The

variable charges work similarly, so 9.5% increases kind of across the board from 2027 on. For the wastewater rates, the schedule shows an overall adjustment of 7% for 2027. Again, since the structure is being slightly adjusted, there's a bit of variability in where those changes fall, and then 7% increases for the remainder of the period there. The outside city customers and the low-income adjustments carry consistently across time as well.

And

then stormwater rates, we just saw the 2060 to 3312 adjustment. This plan mirrors that set of adjustments that we looked at previously, starting with 20% and ramping down from there. Again, these larger kind of near-term increases, they're front-loaded on purpose to close the revenue gap and fund at least some of the deferred stormwater capital.

All right.

There is one sort of bonus to the water rates recommendations. There's an existing provision for construction and hydrant meter charges, which we recommend updating to better align with the actual costs and the rest of the rate schedule. So currently, there's a $33 a month flat charge to rent a hydrant meter, and that monthly charge includes 300 cubic feet of water use. And then if there's water use on top of that, it gets billed at $2.16 per 100 cubic feet.

Thank you so much. Thank you.

The proposed approach, which is on the right-hand side of the screen, is to tie that monthly charge back to the 3-inch meter rate and include only the first 100 cubic feet of water. So just like the rest of the volumetric rate structure. And then the rates that we recommend applying to that volumetric usage would align with the Tier 3 residential rate. So that highest tier rate. Because temporary construction meters are large meters that create a peaking load, the structure is more sort of cost reflective and equitable to other rate payers. And you can see, sorry, it's blocked in my screen, but the resultant proposed rates are at the bottom of the screen here.

All

right. I know this is a long presentation, but I do want to cover the general facilities charges, which are an important piece of the puzzle. We saw their sort of contribution to overall revenues at the outset of this presentation. It's just a piece of the pie, but it's a piece that we have to get right. So there are some requirements around how they can be calculated, and we have recommended some adjustments that reflect those requirements. Let's start with what they are, though. General facilities charges, or GFCs, are one-time fees paid at the time of a new connection or when an existing customer upsizes their meter. They apply to all three utilities, and the purpose is to essentially kind of reimburse existing rate payers through the system for the capacity they've already paid and built into the system and to fund growth-related expansions going forward. Washington state law does require that residential GFCs be calculated on a standardized per-square-foot, per-bedroom, or per-fixture basis. We have used per-square-foot, and we'll see that in the upcoming slides here.

This

slide describes the sort of industry methodologies for calculating GFCs. There are three approaches. The buy-in method is sort of backward-looking, recovering the cost of existing capacity that's being made available and used by new customers. The incremental method is forward-looking, and it accounts for new facilities needed to serve growth into the future. And then a hybrid methodology, excuse me, sort of uses both of those approaches to say, you know, maybe there is some existing capacity in the system, but we also have to fund some growth-related projects to accommodate the development that we're anticipating. For Orting, we used the blended hybrid approach there that considers both the existing capacity available and future growth needs. I know this slide is a lot to look at, but I think it's important that we kind of step through the process a little bit here. So first, considering sort of the buy-in component, this captures the value of the existing systems available to serve new growth. So original costs, interest on that amount, cash on hand, those are assets that can be used to fund projects, less GFCs collected, and outstanding debt principal.

Together,

those represent the total investment new customers should contribute when connecting to the system. So those amounts are calculated for water, wastewater, and stormwater. And you'll see for stormwater, there is not a growth element of the calculation. It is just the buy-in component. So those total values have to be, those are kind of the numerator in this equation here, and we're looking to figure out the denominator. So for water, the unit that is considered is the equivalent meter, which is set equal to a three-quarter-inch meter, the most common for residential customers. For wastewater, the unit is 200 gallons per day, which is called an equivalent residential unit, not to be confused with the other equivalent residential unit for stormwater. And then stormwater is the same equivalent residential unit that is used for billing the typical monthly fee. So these sort of unit definitions help us establish how many units exist in the current system and how many may be added through growth and relate the impact of residential customers to the impact of other types of development. So we can then translate the total cost and the total units to a cost per unit. And for residential customers, sorry, residential development, as I mentioned, we're looking at the cost per square foot, which is the acceptable, standardized way to calculate these charges across the board for those residential customers.

Okay.

That is all I've got for now. I know that was quite a lot, but I'm happy to address any questions that you all may have.

Thank you, Jennifer.

Before I open up for questions, could you just give a summary of the exact dollar amount, of the dollar amount, or I should say the average dollar amount, that citizens could expect for a change in their water, wastewater, storm, and a totalized amount in their monthly bill that they would expect to see on the average based on our study today?

Absolutely.

Yes, and I will actually share it too, just so everybody can get one more visual. So with that adjustment to the water-fixed charge for a three-quarter-inch meter, volumetric charges for a typical 800-cubic-foot usage customer, the wastewater charge and the stormwater charge, this customer's bill is adjusting from $163.51 to $178.90, and that is a 9.5% increase overall.

Okay. Thank you. Okay.

I will open it up now to questions from council of our presenter or staff. Any questions from council?

Council,

I'll open it up to the audience if they have questions that they would like to have answered at this time or comments.

Okay.

I'll entertain a motion from council. We have two motions this evening. One of them is for the first one is for the rate adjustment. So I'll entertain a motion for the...

There was one written.

Oh, there was one. Oh, okay. Thank you.

Could you read that into the record?

Yes. Dear city officials,

I'm writing to express my strong concern regarding any proposed increase to utility rates and fees. Many residents in our community are already struggling with the rising costs of living, and additional utility increases would place an even greater burden on families, seniors living on fixed incomes, and individuals with limited financial flexibility. Washington State continues to experience increasing house costs, food price, insurance premiums, and other essential living expenses. For many households, including mine, utility bills have become a significant financial strain. Further increases will disproportionately impact those who already are working hard to make ends meet and those who have little room in their budget to absorb additional costs. I respectfully ask the council to consider alternative solutions before raising rates on residents. Instead of placing additional financial pressure on the public, I encourage city leadership to explore responsible cost-saving measures, operational efficiencies, and other innovative approaches that can help meet budgetary needs while protecting the citizens you serve. The residents of this community depend on your leadership to make decisions that balance financial responsibility with compassion. Please do not overwhelm an already overwhelmed public. I urge you to prioritize affordability and seek opportunities to reduce costs rather than increase the financial burden on local households. Thank you for your time and consideration and commitment to serving your community. I respectfully ask that you reject any proposal that would further increase utility costs for residents and instead pursue solutions that support the financial will of people who call the city home. Sincerely, Heidi Ober, Orting, Washington, Brisbane.

Thank you. I appreciate it. Okay.

I'll entertain a motion for number AB Bill 2026-28 with water utility.

To adopt resolution number 2026-28, adopting updated utility rates for the water, sewer, and stormwater utility for calendar year 2027.

Do I hear a second? Motion made by Council Member Hogan, seconded by Deputy Mayor Sproul. Council Member Hogan, we'll start with you on comments.

Well, you know, my comment is we've got to maintain our facilities, and we did stop increasing our charges during COVID, and it stayed that way, and Council elected not to do anything until we got the new rate study. So that's made it a challenge for us all. And then also, originally, when we got our first rate study, it was like hundreds of percents, wasn't it?

That's true.

Wastewater was at $25 increase versus a $5.

So, I mean, I think we're trying to do our due diligence and maintain our facilities. So that's where I'm at.

Thank you.

Thank you, Council Member Hogan. Deputy Mayor Sproul.

I agree with Council Member Hogan. We're trying to do the best thing that we can for the city. We're trying to reduce the rates. Just like the person wrote, a lot of people are on fixed incomes. I think the dollar figure everyone was looking at is $15.39, is what the monthly increase would be from today to next year. So even $15 is much, but we need to maintain our existing facility and upgrade that so that we can continue to get fresh water and flush the toilet and everything else that we need to do around here.

Thank you.

Open up to questions or comments from other Council members. Council Member Williams.

Yeah, this is a tough one. If it were 9.5% for one year, that's one thing. But 9.5% year after year after year, I don't know, really, if the public can sustain it. Yeah, we need it, but I

don't know.

I don't like it.

I mean,

as it compounds year after year after year, when you get five years down the road, it's really going to hurt. So I don't know that I'm in favor of this.

Thank you.

Council Member Torres.

The rate of inflation is at 3.5%. And they're asking for 9.5%. I was elected to keep the spending down here in Orte. So as a fiscal conservative, I can't support 9.5%. I will give you 4.5% max. That will be by my recommendation to the council. 4.5% and no more.

Thank you.

Other comments from council? Council Member Reid.

I

agree with Councilman Hogan that had we not, because of COVID, stopped raising or keeping pace with the economy and changing the rates in the previous four or five years, we would have been a lot closer. And it's compounded because of that.

But

unless we can get somebody just to donate some money to the city to keep all the rates down, I don't see another option. There's somebody has to pay, and we're all receiving the benefits of what's going on. So I think we have to go forward.

Thank you.

I didn't see Council Member Holland. Did he have a hand up?

You're playing catch-up right now, so I agree with Councilman. It's sorry that we have to do catch-up.

Thank you.

Deputy Mayor Spraw.

When I moved to the city some 20 years ago, I noticed my water bill changing year after year, and I actually built a spreadsheet that goes back 20 years. And to Council Member Williams, that utility bill went up 6% every year. All those changes went up 6% accumulative every year. We're doing the exact same thing that it's been doing for the last 20 years, only this time we're going at a 9.5 instead of a 6.

Yeah, that's 50% more.

But that's, you mentioned that that 9.5 accumulative, we've been doing 6.

So, and... We missed the last 5 years.

And as it was pointed out, we stopped at some certain point. So we're playing catch-up.

Deputy Mayor, Council Member Tracy.

Yeah, I, um, this thing was hard from the get-go, uh, going through this.

Um,

all these things add up to the same thing, that, uh, we ignored it for a while. Uh, we let it go from COVID. Five, if we'd have kept it to 6%, uh, for those five years, we wouldn't be in this fix that we're in now. We could probably continue at 6. But at some point, we have to make up for the last 5, 6 years that we haven't done it. I, I'm one of the fixed-income people that live here, as probably a bunch of us are here. Um, I don't want to see the thing go up.

Um,

and I know a lot of people don't, uh, in the city don't want to see it go up. But, uh, the infrastructure has to be maintained. And, uh, it's, uh, it's unfortunate that that infrastructure has the price of all the stuff that goes into that. The pumps, all that kind of stuff is gone. It's crazy how the prices have changed.

Um,

so I, I don't like doing this. But, uh, if we want to maintain what we've got, uh, we've got to bite the bullet at some point.

Thank you.

Any other comments from Council or vote? I'd only would like to add, uh, one more item, which is, um, if, if you look at, uh, from a historical perspective, I can go back to, to my time when we didn't have our treatment plant. And in 1993, we had, we had no, we had an antiquated lagoon system as our only process. And we had limited wells and springs. And, uh, we, we had to build them from a new. And at that time, my, my total utility rate was, I think some of you might be able to correct me on this, was around $12 a month in the early 1990s.

And, uh,

but the cost of construction to build a whole new plant was, was tremendous. And, uh, we stepped up as a city and we did that, you know, to, uh, to protect the environment and to provide for a future growth within our city. Today, we're at that same unique 30 years later. We're at that same position where we're having to rebuild these facilities that, um, that have lived their life and we need to upgrade them. Um, and it's, it's a turning point. And I, I applaud all of you for getting this rate study done and then doing an in-depth look at the, the future planning for capital projects. Because the longer we wait, the longer those, the more those costs are going to go up. And we have so much infrastructure that we need to, to renew and reinvest in that it's really a difficult thing. So as this council member Reed pointed out, we had delay, delayed work that is a result of increases as a result of, uh,

a pandemic.

And we have an aging infrastructure. So it really made it really difficult. And I, I think that all of you did the best that we can to be responsible with those increases.

So, uh,

uh, council member Williams. Yeah, I just want to, um, give my opinion on a couple of things. One, I do believe the previous administration neglected, especially in the wastewater treatment plant, neglected the proper maintenance. We have pumps that haven't been working for a couple of years and they just kicked the can down the road. And now we're, uh, we're getting stuck with the hardships. And the other thing is during COVID, we got $4 million from the government and council member Moore and I wanted to take $2 million of that $4 million and put it into the water system.

And, um,

but instead we built a bridge across the highway.

Thank you.

I, yeah, I appreciate this. Um, I, I have to answer to that.

Um,

those funds that came in had, had restrictions on, on how they could be spent.

And I, I believe, um,

our finance director, Mortar, were, were those funds able to be spent on, on the utilities?

Uh, no, they're not, um, the, the, uh, enterprise funds all have to be self-supporting. So, excuse me, those funds are federal funds that were specifically for, to be used in our, our general fund or for other purposes. But the enterprise funds cannot take funds unless they're taking a loan from our other funds, like our general fund.

Okay. Sorry. Yeah.

So, yeah, that, I agree with you. That would have been a great use of the funds, but I think it had too many, the restrictions wouldn't let it.

It would be done. It's always a workaround. Yeah. Yeah. I'm sorry. Okay.

All of that said, uh, let's, uh, we have a motion on the floor by Council Member Hogan. A second by Deputy Mayor Sproul. All those, all those in favor?

Mayor, point of order. Uh, did you ask for comments from the citizens?

Um, yes. Did you?

I put it out of order with that.

Okay. Okay. Yeah. Thank you.

So, this, this is for the, the motion on the floor.

Yes.

All those in favor?

Aye. All those in favor? Okay.

So, uh, let's do a roll call vote.

Council Member Torres?

No.

Council Member Williams?

No.

Council Member Tracy?

Yes.

Uh, Deputy Mayor Sproul.

Yes.

Council Member Holland?

Yes.

Council Member Hogan?

Yes.

Council Member Reed?

Yes. Thank you, Madam Clerk.

Next motion I'll entertain is for 2026-29 for general facility rates.

To adopt the resolution number 2026-29, a resolution of the City of Orting, Washington, relating to the general facility charges and setting charges for 2027.

Motion made by Council Member Hogan, seconded by Council Member Tracy. Do you have a comment from a Council?

Uh, it's, you know, I think it's fair, the, the way they, we, we, we're setting up our GFCs. So, I mean, it's, you know, and we're at that point now where we're not seeing a mass amount of GFCs coming into our coffers now.

So,

um, I think this will work.

Okay. Thank you.

Council Member Tracy?

No, this is long overdue if you ask me.

Okay.

They should have been a lot higher a long time ago.

Okay.

Any other questions from Council, comments from Council? Council Member Reed?

We basically have one development left that's going in right now. Do they pay their GFCs already or do they pay them when they get a final?

I wish our planner was still online, but I believe that they play their GFCs up front.

Yeah, they're already locked in. Yeah, they're locked in. Yeah.

So, I can verify that for you and get back, but, uh.

This is basically, basically only going to affect anybody who's adding on to their house.

Yep. Future GFCs. Yeah.

New, uh, new construction coming in.

Yeah. Okay.

Anybody in the audience wish to comment?

Okay.

Seeing, uh, seeing none.

No comments. Council? Okay. All those in favor? Aye. All those opposed?

Motion passes.

Okay. Moving on to the, moving

on to the consent agenda. Claims voucher list dated September 30th, 2026. Council on the amount of $1,142,980.36, which includes voucher number 59099 through 59191 and electronic fund transfers in the, in the amount of $4,083. For a ground total of $1,147,063 and 48 cents. Payroll voucher, payroll electronic deposit transmissions in the amount of $241,355 and 64 cents. For the period covering September 1st through 15th,

2026.

We had item C pulled from the agenda. Moving on to item D, AB 26, 110, awarding business associations, trunk or treat sponsorship. Item E, meeting minutes, council meetings, council meetings, September 9th, 2026. Do you have any questions from council?

Move to approve consent agenda as prepared.

Second.

Motion made by council member Williams. Seconded by council member Therese.

Mayor.

Sorry to interrupt, but if the motion is to approve the consent agenda as prepared, that would still include item C, which has been pulled. So, if I may suggest, the motion should be to approve the consent agenda items A, B, D, and E as prepared.

I would like to edit my motion. I move to approve the consent agenda A, B, D, and E as prepared.

Thank you. Second. Okay. Motion.

Amended motion made by council member Williams. Seconded by council member Therese. Any comments from council? Council member Williams.

None here. Therese? Nope. Nope. Okay. Council members?

Council member Reed?

I might not have been paying attention, but I missed what C was, that we're not.

It's, we've removed the council meeting times.

Okay.

Yeah, and it's a standalone item this evening.

Thank you. Okay, thank you. Okay. All those in favor? Aye. All those opposed?

Motion passes. Okay, new business. AB 26101, Washington State Department of Transportation construction agreement for AC water main replacement. I will have our City Director, Public Works Director, Corey Davison, report out on it and available for questions.

Good evening. Thank you.

I believe this is piggybacking on the presentation that we had on September 9th by WashDot. They came in and did a PowerPoint for Council and explained the project, but I'll just give you a brief overview here. The overall WashDot project description is that Card and Roush Creeks both replace their undersized culverts that are barriers to fish passage with fish passable structures in compliance with Federal Culvert and Junction, and Oroville Roundabout provide safety and mobility improvements. These projects, including the City of Orting water main replacement, are bundled together to minimize construction impacts to public and minimize risk to construction schedule and save costs. More importantly, on the water main side, which is what we're responsible for, the work includes the abandonment and some removal of the existing 8-inch asbestos concrete pipe, approximately 240 lineal feet each for two runs of an 8-inch temporary DI water main, daylighting along SR-162 for the installation of the proposed structures, both Card and Roush. By others, of course, approximately 1,500 lineal feet of 12-inch DI water main near the intersection of SR-162 and Oroville Road, which is where the proposed roundabout we built by others, and towards the east along SR-162 will attach to the Card Creek structure. Approximately 375 lineal feet of an 8-inch DI water main along 162 will attach to the Roush Creek structure. The work also includes five near-side service connections, five far-side service connections,

four hydrants,

two air vacs or air and vacuum release assemblies, and two sampling stations. The water main is mostly located on the east side of SR-162 with crossings at those locations. A brief construction timeline is that WashDot will advertise in November of this year, 2026, and award the contract hopefully in December. The Card and Roush Creek portion, you'll remember, the construction is scheduled to start in late spring of 2027 and continue until the fall of 2027. Then that same contractor will transition into Oroville roundabout construction, anticipating in the spring of 28, concluding in the summer of 28. I included some attachments here to refresh your memory, and I'm happy to answer any questions you might have at this time.

Okay.

Questions from a council?

By Deputy Marist Rall.

So I'd say we had an amount budget of $1.2 million, and this is going to cost $1.591. So it's about $369,349 extra. That doesn't bother me too much, but I didn't see anywhere in here where we have like a 10% contingency like we do on others. So if we approve this at the 1.591, that's like firm. There's no risk that we're going to go over that, or do we need to pull back and put a 10% contingency fund on this?

I think that would be for engineer J.C. Hunterford, that question. How does the contingency work with this project, J.C.?

And I think Linnea is on the call as well. She's been working with Washington more closely on it. But what you have in your packet there, I believe you're looking at the opinion of probable construction costs, Councilmember Sprawl, of $1.591. We haven't bid the project yet. That's just an estimate of the cost at this point. We'll have to go through the public bidding process, receive bids, and then obviously reflect that in your budget accordingly. Let's see here. You don't see any contingency carried into the bottom line, but that's at final design.

We don't carry that.

That would be in your budgeting process. Linnea, I don't know if there's anything you wanted to add to that or not.

Yes. So kind of different format for the WSDOT estimate going forward in the contract agreement is kind of the, let's say, minimum that includes WSDOT's inspection percentage and kind of construction costs that we have built into that. On top of that, we have a separate total estimate that's included in the CIP and budgeted in that for the two years, the 2027 and 2028 construction duration. And that is totaled at the $2 million. So that includes the additional contingency that is typically shown on our engineering cost estimate. And so due to that 10% contingency, it compounds WSDOT's amount. And so the $2 million, again, is within that CIP that was presented earlier. So this is the kind of bare bones without the contingency estimate for this project. Thank you.

And if I could just add quickly, what I've found through working with Linnea and JT, but specifically Linnea, as going through this contract document, which is what we're asking for, is that you approve us to sign it and get the ball rolling with WSDOT. It's a construction utility agreement that was provided. What I have found, and it may help with some future questions that council may have, some of this is a little bit of a different world because it's WSDOT and we're following their lead. And there's many benefits to the city by piggybacking. But there's also some differences, like you're mentioning. And we have asked for some corrections, and we've worked with Linnea as well as WSDOT and had a real good working relationship. But I've brought up some very specific questions as well, that it's a little bit different than if we were to go out to bid and do this project ourself. It's kind of how it is. The water mains have to be moved anyways, whether we like it or not. We either do it ourselves or it's kind of that deal. And they're not real hard-lined about it, but just so you understand that there are some things that would look different than one of our normal CIP projects.

Yeah, I think my concern is, you know, in the motion, it says in an amount not to exceed $1,591,284. And then eight months from now, somebody's going to come back and go, oh, yeah, that was wrong, and now we actually need 2.5, and, you know, all of a sudden. And what's going to happen is exactly like with the bridge and everything else, every other project around here, we have to pass this now. There is no debate.

There is no nothing.

We just have to do it. And that's what I'm afraid of is we're getting low-balled here, and eight months from now, they're going to come back. Somebody's going to come back and go, oh, yeah, that estimate was, like, way wrong, and we're going to be on the hook for it.

Understood. And,

again, I would defer to our, I think our engineer of record provided the estimate, so they would be able to comment on how accurate they feel it is or how close.

Yeah.

Yeah, I can reply to that. And Lene, if you have anything specific to this project,

but,

you know, we do our very best on estimates to reach out to vendors, get relevant pricing. We look at WSDOT bid tabs. They publish bid tabs for unit price items for a similar project scale. And as we get better quantities, as we develop the design to a further level of design, as we're getting closer to final design, we have a better idea of quantities. And that variability in our estimates starts to shrink. That being said, you know, it's always a variable bidding climate. And we're hopeful that we get a competitive bid on this. It's a large project, and you get a lot of bidders, which tends to bring that bid price down on a unit item basis. So, you know, I hear you, Council Member Sprawl. It's hard to say what bidders are going to come in. And that's an important part of public bidding, low bid in Washington. And there's not really a way around it. We work with the information we have. We provide it, and they bid it.

So,

Linnea, I don't know if there's anything you want to add there, or if not.

I think that says it. Just knowing that our CIP estimate, including the contingency, is the higher value. So, kind of built in, in addition to the baseline cost, working with WSDOT and those assumptions.

I'd just like to say that, I think for you, Mayor, I'm not sure I would take that $1.5 million and put it into the budget. I wouldn't use that as gospel.

Well,

you know, we're going to be doing the budget here next week. So, I'm glad to hear that it's in the CIP as $2 million. But it's got to go into our budget, and so I'm just hoping we're not using these figures, because I think they're going to go somewhere north of there.

Thank you.

Councilman Tracy?

Why did we go with the lower amount, not with the 2.1 or whatever, with the contingency and everything? In this agenda bill, why didn't we go with the higher end?

That's a good question.

So, boy, I'm trying to piece it together, because we've floated these numbers around, and the numbers are not in concrete just yet. But I don't know if you'd like to touch on that, Linnea, again, on these numbers that we've had now. They're still early preliminary numbers?

Yes, to some extent. I will say the intent with this is part of the WSDOT contract agreement for construction agreement with the city. So, kind of the highlight is that partnership during construction, yes, it has the total with it. So, the construction amount, you see at the bottom of that, it's a percentage of the construction total of each of those line items. And so, that's the baseline of WSDOT and how they present their percentages and their totals that they assume the city will reimburse WSDOT for, since they'll be running the administration for the water main portion.

So, when this goes forward, will Council be, when this is going out to bid, so will Council have an opportunity again, once they have a hard number, to make the vote, accepting the bidder, the low bidder in the process?

Yeah, that's a good point as well. Like we said, this is just an estimate, so there's no contractor yet. And so, we don't know an actual true low bidder, if it'll be, you know, kind of the lowest bid, even blowing this out of the water, or really going under as well. So, a lot of that, this is just an estimate alongside the contract with WSDOT. And so,

the motion this evening, then, would be authorizing the authorization to go out to bid for the project, and then they will adopt the scope of work and cost at that time, when the bid's been accepted?

JC? Somewhat.

You know, they're running the contracting process, so we're not, it is, like Linnea said, it's our contract with WSDOT, and outlines the terms and conditions of our relationship with WSDOT. And I know the city attorneys reviewed it in depth as well. But, you know, it is committing our partnership that we're going to reimburse them, because they hold the contract with the general contractor, and the city is responsible for paying your portion as they go through the delivery and construction of this project.

Okay.

So, one last question here. What they would be voting on this evening is to authorize the DOT to go forward with the process without a dollar amount?

The idea of what we're voting on is to approve staff to sign the agreement, the seven-page construction utility agreement, and all that it entails. There are some numbers in there that do not talk about the contingency, but there are some numbers in there that talk about cost increases as we go forward through the project. Anything that exceeds 25 percent, then it follows the normal contract. We get to negotiate that. I think what we're asking for is to, this is the first step. WSDOT won't sign this until we sign this. And so, the intent was to provide the information so that everyone could have a look at it and read it and go through it. Also, the bid tab that's in the back, and not to get into parametrics business, but this is where I've spent the majority of my time reviewing this stuff, as though it was a normal construction contract. When you get into the weeds of every individual line item, some of those line items are dictated to us by WSDOT how they'll be. Either they're a lump sum or a lineal foot or they're per ton or they've dictated how that structure will be. And so, based on how those individual line items are identified and paid is how parametrics has then identified each individual dollar amount, and at the end of it, you end up with the 1.5. So, there are variables in there.

But again,

my point was, why didn't we go to that higher amount? We're already discussing 2 point something million. Is there because of these other things? And I'm with Deputy Mayor Sproul with this. We're going into our budget, and to budget 1.5, and then somewhere down the road, it goes to 2 point whatever. Now we've got a mess. It would be better for us to try to budget in 2.1 now if that doesn't hold us to that price. In other words, if WSDOT comes back and says it's 1.75 million, okay, we can reduce what we authorize to be spent, the 2 million. So, it brings the price down. We have extra funds if we can find those funds to do that.

What we do in the budget and this contract are two separate, so we could actually do that, what you're saying.

Right.

Within the actual budget. Well, that's why I thought I would have rather seen 2.1 or whatever that number was.

Agreed.

In here, rather than the 1.5, and guess what? It might go to 2.1 because of the budget process.

I understand entirely.

I think perhaps, and again, I don't want to speak for parametrics, but I think perhaps when they do these construction takeoffs based on engineering estimates, you're right, it would make sense, but I don't think they build in the contingencies within the engineer's estimate for different reasons. Budgetary, I totally understand exactly what you're saying, and I think that it's been my experience with a project very similar to this with WSDOT, that their side of this contract is going to make ours look very, very small. So, the contractor that's even going to bid this job, not that our work is small, but in relation, it's going to be a very large construction contract. And so, if our portion comes back astronomically high, I think we have recourse at that time. We don't have to, correct me if I'm wrong, Linnea, if it comes back double what we've estimated, we're not contractually bound to accept that bid, correct?

Let's say, JC, you have comments.

Well, I have my hand up to answer a couple of questions ago with regard to the amount. So, the amount is an estimated agreement amount, and that is solely based on the engineer's estimate and the markup as shown in the scrolling back and forth here.

So,

bear with me for a second here. There's prescribed markup by WSDOT, and that's shown clearly on page 163 of 197 of your PDF. So, engineers estimate, including sales tax, at $1,191,010. And then there's 20% WSDOT plus 11.34% WSDOT markup on top of it, which gives you your $1,591,284, which is reflected in the agreement. That is estimated, and like the mayor said, your budget process is something completely separate, and I would recommend budgeting a contingency in there. It's reflected in the CIP, and I would anticipate that, you know, as we see this project delivered, we budgeted accordingly over the span of years that they will be constructing. As far as acceptance to bids, I'm trying to find here, and Attorney Lloyd, I'm not sure if you have any feedback on if the city were to break this agreement with WSDOT.

If we were to break the agreement, I am not going to comment on that in public session. That's a discussion for executive session.

Okay.

Deputy Mayor Sproul?

So, what was the actual figure that's used in the CIP?

Let's see here. I think it's like $2 million.

Yeah, $2 million. It was $2 million. Okay.

So, we should go to $2 million to $1,000 per hour.

Exactly.

So, when somebody makes this motion, the not to exceed should be $2 million, because that is what we just based our utility rates on, and that's what should go into the budget,

that $2 million.

Yeah, and I believe...

And that brings this thing full circle.

Yeah, I believe that's what's in the preliminary budget currently.

So, okay. Great. I'd ask for a motion. Okay.

I'll entertain a motion at this time.

Make a motion to authorize the Public Works Director to enter into a utility construction agreement with Washington State Department of Transportation for the SR-162 Orting Vicinity Roundabout and Fish Passage Project in the amount not to exceed $2 million.

Second.

I believe you need to make it to the mayor to enter into an agreement.

I thought we were going to go with one name.

No, mayor. Yes. It can be...

As long as council directly authorizes the Public Works Director, he can sign the agreement.

Okay. Thank you. Okay.

Any further discussion? Councilmember Reed?

I think we should stick with the original number, but we should change it in our budget. I don't think we want to authorize them to go higher on

the contract.

They're only asking for $1,590,000. We should go ahead with that. And in our budget for the city, we should go with $2,200,000 to cover the overage.

We don't want to just give them money ahead of time. They're not asking for it.

We're talking two different things. We're talking about our city's budget and what they're asking for.

So we... So are you...

That's why the attorney did not want the same thing. This is all...

This is all out there. We're talking money.

We shouldn't be talking money.

Personally, I would rather budget the $2 million than the $1.591. And then if it turns out to be $1.591, we get $310,000 back or whatever.

I think we're talking two different things to budget versus what they're proposing.

I know, but I'm saying if we budget it, $2 million, Washed Out's probably going to raise the price.

I don't know.

I don't know what they're going to...

Nobody seems to know. Yeah. Mayor, if I may. Okay. Attorney of the White.

Please do not give me that promotion to Deputy Mayor. I think Deputy Mayor Sproul is doing a fine job and I don't want it. If you authorize the Public Works Director to sign the contract as prepared,

you are all... There is...

The provision that everyone's asking about is what happens when there's a change in the price. In the contract in Section 4, it states that as long as there's an increase within 25%, then that is previously authorized. So by authorizing to sign the agreement as prepared, it actually satisfies everyone's concerns. It satisfies Council Member Reed's concern that we're not budgeting more money than we need to, but you're also already authorizing this contingency if it wills. If there is a change, an increase in the cost more than 25%, then there has to be an adjustment to Exhibit B, which is the spreadsheet and the estimate that was prepared by Linnea. So that has to happen separately if the costs go up by more than 25%. That clause is already built into the contract. And then to that point, if there is that much of a change, the state has to come to us and get the consent of,

in the language of the contract,

the utility, which is the city of wording. There has to be a separate acceptance of that.

So for what it's worth,

my recommendation, if Council wants to move forward with WASDOT, is to adopt the agreement as prepared, and then you can handle contingencies at a later date.

Deputy Mayor Sproul, do you wish to withdraw your motion?

I wish to withdraw my motion.

Do I hear a second on that?

I second it. Okay.

All those in favor on the withdrawal of the motion?

Aye. Aye.

I'll entertain a new motion.

I so move.

Council Member Torres.

Do we approve WASDOT destruction agreement as prepared?

Second. Okay.

Motion made by Council Member Torres, seconded by Deputy Mayor Sproul.

It should be,

sorry to interrupt again, Mayor, but it should be to authorize the public works director to execute the WASDOT contract as prepared.

Authorize the public works director,

Corey Davison. Good. To execute. Done. To enter into. What's that? Yeah. To finish your sentence.

To approve the WASDOT construction agreement as written.

Oh, no. Okay.

To authorize the public works director to enter into a utility construction agreement with Washington State Department of Transportation for the SR162 Ordinary and Vicinity Roundabout and the Fist Passage Project in the amount of not to exceed 1.591-284.

Good? No. All right. Second.

I have a motion made by Council Member Torres, seconded by Council Member Reed. I just would like to make a comment. In all my time,

I have never,

in no disrespect, I have never seen a contract of this size be given to a staff member. It is always the mayor that is ultimately responsible. It is always the mayor

that is responsible

if there is a failure in the project. It is always the major mayor

at the end of the day that is responsible.

And that is the person who is elected by the citizens of this city. That is why I felt that a mayor

should be the one

who enters into the contract. Whatever the contract is

should be the one representing the city going forward.

You can vote to pass it to a staff member,

but then what? What happens the next time we have something? You decide to pass it to another staff member. The citizens of this community

elected a mayor and that's who

they hold responsible. I know it's legal. You can do this. That's okay.

But I take my responsibility

seriously. And if there's a problem with this, they're going to come to Scott Drennan. They're not going to go

looking for another staff member to say this person is responsible for it. That's why I questioned it. Councilman Reed?

I'd like to withdraw my second. Let's fix it. There's nothing to fix. Yeah, there is.

Have them both sign it.

Councilman Reed,

are you asking to change the motion to redesignate who the signatory would be?

Yes. Okay.

So there can be a motion to amend.

Okay.

Motion to amend the identity of the signatory

to be the mayor. And that would be the motion.

And then there'd

need to be a second.

Council would need

to vote, excuse me, on the motion to amend. It's getting late.

And then if the motion to amend passes, then council would be voting on the amended motion. So if that is

the desire of Councilmember Reed,

the motion should be moved to amend to change

the signatory

of the contract

to the mayor. of the mayor. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

I move to amend the change of signatory of the contract to the mayor.

Second.

So now, Mayor, the motion on the table is the motion to amend, and then Councilmember Reed is the proponent of the motion, so he gets to speak first in favor of the motion.

Councilmember Reed?

I'm in favor of the motion. I totally didn't pick up on that, and I agree that that's the way it should be. And I don't see that the director is going to be hurt by it, and that's the way it should be. I didn't even think of it, so that's all I've got to say.

Councilmember Williams?

I agree. We should keep it consistent. Like you say, you're a cop, you're the one they're going to come beat up on, so it should be your signature.

I know when they beat up on.

So, thank you.

That being said, have you already read up on the whole thing already, too?

I'm sure you have. Yeah.

Deputy Mayor Sproul?

I just, this was presented to Council the way it is, and from what I understand from our policies and procedures, this should have gone to the Mayor's office before it was publicized to Council, and I'm just wondering why the Mayor didn't pick up on this before.

Yeah, I didn't pick up on it.

Exactly. Yeah, you're right.

Any other comments or questions?

No. Yeah.

Councilmember Hogan?

This is, I don't want to change it. I want to see staff assume some responsibility here. Obviously, he's in the know right now and has worked with our engineers on this. I think it's very clear.

I, you know,

I don't, I want, I want staff to be taking more responsibility on some of these projects.

Councilman Reed?

I do believe that was what happened on the last time we got messed up on this. I don't think we should put that responsibility on the staff to make those decisions. They come and talk to the Mayor and get it straight, get it worked out, but I'll

just use the example.

So, the previous director of public works told parametrics to go ahead, and parametrics went ahead and built us a plan for a sweet treatment plant that we couldn't afford.

I don't believe it was parametrics.

Correction. Wilson Engineer. Wilson Engineer.

Anyway, the decision was made without the Mayor. Maybe it was because the Mayor wasn't here at the time, over the previous four months, the last four months of the last year. I think we're doing the right thing. We've got a motion on the floor, I think.

Yeah, motion on the floor.

In a second. All those in favor? Aye. Aye.

Okay, a motion on the floor to amend.

Passes. Wait a minute. You didn't say oppose. Oh, I'm sorry. Okay. Okay. All those opposed? Aye.

If I could just, and I don't want to get involved in your discussion whatsoever, and you're right, I'm okay either way. I just want to clarify something, and I apologize.

Yeah.

This was my first agenda bill here for the City of Orting.

Yeah. Okay?

There's been a miscommunication, and I'm not going to get into the weeds on it. I just want to be transparent. I wrote the agenda bill. I did not write the motion. So this went up to other staff who was helping assist with time frame to get this ready to go, because I didn't know the specific language of how we do motions here. It was very different where I was before. And so I was being helped out by not writing the language of the motion. It was never the intention at all, and it was probably, and I'm sure it's a miscommunication that it came across with my name or my title in there. That was not the intention whatsoever. So a little bit of miscommunication with staff, definitely not the intent, and I'm 100% okay with either one. And it's perfectly fine. I just wanted to clarify.

Thank you. Customer Trey?

Yeah, I appreciate that, because I, you know, I'm just reading the motion and just doing what I think I'm supposed to be doing. Not trying to offend the mayor. So, but, yeah, it's right. I mean, he should be the signatory.

100% and that's perfectly okay and fine. Just wanted to clarify that that wasn't part of it.

Good clarification. Thank you. Mayor? Yes, sir.

Just for Parliamentary right now, it would be important to restate now what the amended motion is. It is the motion, the amended motion is to, if you want, I can state it, but it is your job as a chair. The amended motion is to authorize the mayor to execute the WSDOT contract that's in the packet.

Or he voted on that.

No, the vote was, no, the original motion was to authorize the public works director. Council Member Reed, your motion was to change that signatory to be the mayor. So you changed the motion.

Okay.

And that's what your motion did. That motion passed. So now the amended motion is now to actually give the okay on the WSDOT contract. So that is the restated motion. Danielle, I will help you later to get the minutes right.

I promise. Thank you, John. All right.

I see Deputy Mayor Sproul.

Nope.

Is there anybody wanting to? I don't, we don't have the motion made or seconded.

Is that correct?

No, the motion, the motion has been made and seconded. The original motion has now been amended.

Okay.

It is on the table to authorize the mayor to sign this contract.

That is on the table. Fantastic. Well, let's get this to a vote.

I'd like to make a motion to have the mayor sign the contract with the Department of Transportation.

It's already on the table.

All we have to do is vote.

All right. Okay. All those in favor? Aye. All. All those opposed? Nay.

Motion passes.

Thank you.

Oh, my gosh.

It's okay. All right. There you guys.

Next item on our agenda this evening is AB Bill 2697, Water Resource Facility, Headworks Upgrades. I'm listed as the presenter of this. I think we've seen this presented to us multiple times by our engineering, myself, Public Works Director, to upgrade our water recovery facility, the Headworks, the on-site pump station, and to upgrade our control laboratory facilities. We have Engineer Hungerford here.

Thank you, Mayor.

Yeah, as the mayor stated, we've gone through this a couple times, well, at the committee poll a few weeks ago. So the high-level scope of this project is to provide design services for improving the headworks at the wastewater treatment plant, in which we provide redundancy as well as update the screening and pumping equipment there, design and rehab the on-site pump station, provide monitoring wells for the treatment plant, as well as the laboratory expansion for staff offices and storage, as well as just additional space for the lab itself. And then, lastly, associated controls upgrades with that. So the project, in accordance with the ecology requirements, will require us to do a design report and then submit the design in accordance with the design report to ecology for review before we go out to bid. So it has an aggressive schedule due to the funding timelines and the loan that the city has with Department of Commerce. But I've already started outreach to vendors, as well as Department of Ecology, just talked through this approach with them. So I think that's it at a quick, high-level. I'll have to be answering questions if there are any.

Thank you. Any questions?

Councilman Reed.

Again, so it doesn't go like it went last time, the understanding was what is the approximate cost going to be on this portion of the project?

As far as the design portion or the construction?

Construction.

So that we're not asking for you to build something that's going to cost $130 million and give us a plan for it that we can't use.

Yeah, your CIP reflects between $10 million and $11 million for this project. I don't think it's going to quite cost that much. But, you know, as we get into 30% design, select some equipment. It's something that we're going to do early on in the project. I think we'll get a good handle on that. But we certainly understand the design or the budget limitations on the CIP for the city. So I would not make any recommendations that would exceed that, what's reflected in your rates that you just passed either.

So the high end of what you think the construction budget is going to be is what?

It's shown us $11 million for all these improvements in your...

$11 million or less to do what you're telling us, to remodel the building where they do all the testing, redo the headworks, and to redo the pond, not counting the liner?

Not the pond.

That's not included in this. It's the on-site pump station, which allows the liquid from the pond to be re-pumped back to the headworks. The pump station's not operational as designed right now. So this does not include lagoon improvements as part of this scope work.

So it's the pump, the dual headworks, and the laboratory?

Laboratory, and then electrical and controls associated with those facilities as well.

Okay.

Deputy Mayor Spraw.

Make a motion to approve the Water Resource Recovery Facility Headworks Improvement Project Scope and Budget in the amount not to exceed $898,790.

Second.

Motion made by Deputy Mayor Spraw. Seconded by Council Member Crecy. Comments from Deputy Mayor Spraw.

Yeah, I think this is, again, something that we need to do. It's in our CIP. We just passed the rate study, the fees to pay for this in the long run. So it's something that we need to do.

Thank you.

Deputy Mayor Spraw.

I think it's important if we move this right away, we've got funds that are sitting out there that we could lose if we don't get this going. And it's essential to get those funds, so we need to move it forward.

Thank you.

Any other comments from Council?

Okay. Seeing none. All those in favor? Aye. All those opposed? Okay. Motion passes. Thank you. Okay.

Next item on our agenda this evening is AB Bill 26-105, Pierce County, Radio Fees and Use Agreement. This is presented by Police Chief Devin Korbelik.

Good afternoon, Council. I do not have any additional to add to this item, but this agenda bill, essentially, Pierce County has asked us to pay $42,000 in radio connection fees to use their radio system. In years past, it has been our understanding and has been related to me that it's been the Council's understanding that all of those fees were supposed to be included in the Prop 1 initiative from 2012, which was meant to pay for a single-wide county radio system and to consolidate 9-1-1 communication centers. The consolidation of the centers has happened. Pierce County is now saying that they are no longer receiving those funds as those funds are going directly to South Sound 9-1-1. And so they're asking us to pay $42,000 a year in order for us to use our radios on their network. I believe during our last meeting, we wanted this item to go forward because I believe you wanted to allow Dan to weigh in on this since this is his first year with us not paying this bill. In years past, we have not paid this bill, and essentially, that's where we're currently at right now.

Okay. Deputy Mayor Sproul, questions?

I have a question for the city attorney. Can we go on to Agenda Bill D-AB-2667?

26? Say that number again?

Yeah, we moved that from our study session down. It doesn't reflect in here, but that was one of the...

Oh, 2667. Right.

Okay. As I understood it, the 2667 was simply an informational discussion and that there was no council action being requested.

What I'm asking is we make no motion or do anything with AB-26105 that the chief is up here asking about, and we just move on.

It sounds that the way this agenda bill is being presented, it was simply for information so the council can discuss it, which you would need to do in an open public meeting. But if council doesn't want to discuss it, yes, you can simply move on. There's... I don't know if there's anything that council wants to do with this item.

Okay. Councilman?

I don't know if I'm answering your question, though, Deputy Mayor. I'm sorry.

I... you did. I did? Okay.

In a roundabout, yes, you did. Thank you.

Okay, good. Sometimes it takes me an hour to do it, but I'll get around to it. Thanks.

All right. Thank you. Councilmember Hogan.

Well, I'd like to hear what our attorney thinks about the $42,000. Can he speak to that in an open public meeting?

I...

Candidly, Councilmember Hogan, I am not up to speed on this agenda item. I'd be shooting from the hip.

Okay. That... Chief... If... If...

If we want to... If you want a more detailed analysis, I would suggest kicking this over to October 14th. And then I'll be more prepared. I wasn't... I didn't know that this was going to come up.

All right. Well, yeah.

Maybe you could get with... Maybe Chief will contact you and draw the picture.

Okay. Thank you. Okay.

Any other comments from council?

Council? Thanks, Chief. Sorry. Okay.

Hearing none, I'm moving on. I guess that would be the appropriate action in this case.

Okay. Next item.

Very much, we can move it on to 14th.

That'll happen through an agenda. Just like we just went... We don't have to vote on it or anything.

Okay. It's just information. Okay. Okay.

So, moving on down, we had two items that were pulled this evening. One was from the study session and one from the consent agenda. AB Bill 2667, organizational assessment. I was just going to update that the process has been extended out to allow for time for the top candidates to present accounts to the ad hoc committee. And so, we're expecting to hopefully be back with information for a vote by October 30th.

Is that correct, Clerk? Chair Cheka?

That's all that I had to share with that.

I got a question, which I was going to bring up if we did it. The pricing that we have in there isn't quite accurate that I see projected because of the five I saw, none of them came close to that.

Correct.

That's an oversight on my part. When this agenda bill was initially brought to council back in May, that was the estimated

range. Right.

After receiving the proposals and narrowing it down to five, a more accurate range would be about $30,000 to $60,000.

Yeah.

That's what we're looking at right now.

Maybe $40,000 to $60,000 or $45,000 to $60,000.

On average, they land between like $40,000 and $50,000.

Well, the five I looked at. Okay.

I think we need to have that corrected in that agenda bill if we're going to do something with it, especially coming into budget.

Absolutely. Everything.

Bringing this back when we provide our next update or decision, I'll make sure that that's

more accurate. Thank you. Okay. Moving on. Item E.

AB 2695. OMC 1-6-1. Council meeting times. Questions from council?

Okay. Yeah.

I had this pulled out of the consent agenda, and I think our city clerk caught this too. Had we approved this, she would have gone and put this in the newspaper. We would be executing this next week, and this gives her no time to prepare for a meeting next

Wednesday.

So what she has and what she's provided here is that we would start this new schedule in November, and then that way everyone's got a chance to get ready for the new times and us having four meetings every month. And that's why I pulled it from the agenda, and that's why I pulled it from the agenda, just so that we all in agreement that it starts in November, and then we can go ahead.

Okay. Okay.

A question from Cosmo Williams.

Well, or I got some to discuss, but I mean...

Okay. Okay.

So let's go ahead, and if there are no more questions, I'll open a motion.

Aye. Do you have a question? Okay.

So, Deputy Mayor Sprague, do you have a motion?

Make a motion to adapt ordinance number 2026-1168, amending Orting Municipal Code 1-6-1, pertaining to location of meetings and virtual meetings.

Do

you need to put the commencement time on there, the November?

Does that have to be included? Deputy Mayor?

So, sorry to do, we got to do another Robert's Rules gymnastics meet here. So, there should be a motion first as second, and then there'll be a need to be a motion to amend the effective date, and I'll, I can walk everyone through that.

Okay.

If I'm not done speaking, can I just add that to the end here? Nobody, nobody has seconded it.

Then you can continue the motion and add on to it with an effective date of October 30, 2026.

With an effective date of October 30, 2026.

Second.

A motion made by Deputy Mayor Sproul and completed two minutes later. Seconded by Council Member Reed. All those in favor?

Aye.

I didn't open for discussion.

I'm sorry. Are you good? Okay. Discussion.

Any items for discussion before we make the vote? Council Member Williams?

Well, when I first brought this up, what wasn't, I didn't think was working very good for us was the two o'clock start time. So, we've added another day. We put the Committee of Whole down at nine o'clock, but now we've moved the study session to the same third Wednesday that the Committee of Whole meeting was originally at, at two o'clock. Now, is there a reason why we can't have both those at nine o'clock, the first and third?

I'll leave that for Council.

It's for you.

Are you asking to amend the motion?

Sure.

I move to amend the motion to change the study session from 2 p.m. to 9 a.m. on the third Wednesday of tomorrow.

A motion to amend by Council Member Williams. Is there a second on the motion?

Two.

Motion made by Council Member Williams, seconded by Council Member Hogan. Any other further discussion for Council?

The

only vote now is whether to adopt Council Member Williams' proposed amendment to change subsection B to 9 a.m. rather than 2 p.m. This is not to approve the ordinance at all. It's just to accept that change.

Yeah.

And the discussion would be to accept the change?

Whether or not, yeah, whether or not to accept the change to subsection B from 2 p.m. to 9 a.m.

Okay. So, so, oh, go ahead, Council Member Tracy.

So, was the reason it was a 2 have something to do with staff or something? Or what, why was that 2 put in there? I don't know.

That's why. Yeah.

I mean, is 9 fine with staff?

It wasn't proposed by, it wasn't proposed by myself or staff.

I think when we had talked about it, it was 9 for one week and then the people that couldn't be here at 9, so basically our constituents, that maybe 2 o'clock would be something more that they could. So, I think that's why originally we split that was one meeting we'd do in the morning because staff is here.

I just wanted to make sure it wasn't because of staff or something. So, if we change it, it messes them all up.

That's all I just want to say. I think staff is still in consideration that they would still be here at 2.

Yeah.

And that, you know, it wouldn't be like 6 o'clock or 5 o'clock.

So, okay.

So, we have a motion to amend on the floor. All those in favor?

All those opposed?

Council Member Holland?

You went to bed. Went to bed. Okay. I said I was. Sorry. He's still here. I woke him up. Yeah. Okay.

Motion to amend passes.

So, now the motion, yeah, there is a motion on the floor to adopt the ordinance.

As amended.

A motion on the floor to pass the motion as amended. All those in favor?

Aye. All right. All those opposed? Motion passes. Thank you.

Mr. Attorney, do we have any items for an executive session this evening?

Candidly, Mayor, there are some things we can talk about, but at the same time, it's also 9 p.m. The items that we, I guess, I would look to you and the city administrator, whether you think the things that we discussed earlier can wait until the 14th.

That's a tough one.

We do have, I think, something that's pretty urgent to maybe keep them informed with.

We can be fairly short.

Then, Mayor, I would recommend that you announce executive session to discuss with legal counsel potential litigation, and then note the time. And we can wrap this up in 15 minutes. I'll be succinct.

Okay. Okay. We'll enter

into executive session for potential legal litigation at 9.01 to return at 9.16.

Am I going to send me a link?

Yeah, I'm going to send a link right now, Council Member Holland, Danielle, I will send you one as well.

Would it be easier if I just put you in a breakout room?

If you put us in a breakout room, that would work as well.

Okay.