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03142013CouncilMinutes CITY OF AMMON CITY COUNTIL MINUTES – WORK SESSION THURSDAY, MARCH 14, 2013 AGENDA: CITY OF AMMON 2135 SOUTH AMMON ROAD CITY COUNCIL AGENDA – WORK SESSION THURSDAY, MARCH 14, 2012 – 4:30 P.M. DISCUSSION ITEMS: 1.Parks Department Sign Presentation 2.Parks Department Idaho Community Forestry Partners Website 3.Water Meter Study 4.Misc. EXECUTIVE SESSION: 1.Personnel Evaluations - Idaho Code 67-2345 (1-b) 2.Real Property Acquisitions - Idaho Code 67-2345 (1-c) 3.Pending Litigation - Idaho Code 67-2345 (1-f) MINUTES City Officials Present: Mayor Steve Fuhriman Councilmember Dana Kirkham Councilmember Rex Thompson Councilmember Brian Powell Councilmember Sean Coletti Councilmember Russell Slack Councilmember Brad Christensen City Clerk/Administrator Ron Folsom Deputy City Clerk Rachael Brown City Treasurer Jennifer Belfield City Engineer Lance Bates Parks Director Ken Knoch Public Works Supervisor Ray Ellis I.T. Director Bruce Patterson City Officials Absent: None DISCUSSION ITEMS: Mayor Fuhriman opened the meeting at 4:33 p.m. at the City building located at 2135 South Ammon Road. 1. Parks Department Sign Presentation: Ken said over the last several years, he has had citizens comment about how long the walking paths are, where all the amenities are, and would like to see the information displayed. Ken said he ordered signs for Petersen Park, Eagle Point Park, and McCowin Park. Ken said he worked with Carol Moore with the City GIS Department and used the information to have the signs made using the information. Councilmember Thompson asked if the signs will need to be re-painted every year. Ken said all the information is in electronic form and can be reprinted when it is needed, however it would be several years before it would be needed. Ken said an Eagle Scout would install the signs as his Eagle Scout project. Councilmember Coletti said he would like to invite businesses and neighbors to adopt a park. Ken said there are seven signs. Ken said when the Eagle Scout installs the signs; he will have a GPS system to install the signs in the correct locations. Councilmember Kirkham said the signs look very nice. Ken explained that he is sending a letter to Mr. Belnap who is charge of the Little League Baseball informing him of when the fees for using the parks are due. Councilmember Powell said the only issue he sees is, they aren’t able to pay the fees until they collect them from the participants. Ken said Babe Ruth pays their fees up front to the City of Idaho Falls ahead of time. Ken explained he needs to order the items needed to prepare the fields and would like to have the fees paid ahead of time. Ron asked if they are 13 Council Minutes 03.14.2013 Page of unable to pay the fees up front, is the Council’s direction for Ken to go ahead and order the red rock for the playing fields. Councilmember Kirkham asked what the cost of the red rock was. Ken said $3,000 to $3,500. Councilmember Thompson said he thought it would be fine to go ahead. 2. Parks Department Idaho Community Forestry Partners Website: Ken explained that he is part of the committee for the Idaho Department of Lands, and about a year and half ago, he got together with Gary Bates who is an assistant forester in the state. They felt the City needed to do something about trees for the community, and put together a website and a brochure. Ken read the brochure.Discussion ensued regarding the benefit of the website and brochure. Ken said they would like to provide a link on the City’s website for citizens to access. Christensen asked Ken if he would make some brochures available in the building department for citizens building a new home. 3. Water Meter Study: Lance said the Council asked staff to provide a random sample of water meter usage. Lance explained he used a list of current customers with meter usage; he split them into valley and larger foothills lots, and was able to use 104 from the valley lots and 110 from the larger lots. Lance explained how he chose the random accounts and the variables he discarded. Lance said the first thing he did was compare the small lots with the large lots, and discovered the average usage was 41,000 gallons, but the median was only 11,000. Lance said the average of the larger lots was 90,000 gallons and the median was 21,000 and the standard deviation was 216,000 which is an average over twelve months with the data points he had available. Lance said of the small lots there was one that went over a million gallons, but of the larger lots there were a lot more that went over the million gallon mark. Councilmember Powell said it appears that the majority of the usage is for yard watering. Lance said yes. Discussion ensued regarding the usage between the small lots and large lots. Councilmember Slack said he has Falls Water and his baseline is 12,000 gallons and when he goes over, he pays money per gallon. Councilmember Kirkham said that is why 10,000 gallons seems to be the normal average that is started with. Lance said when he grafted it out, he went to 20,000 gallons, but the number of lots that went over 20,000 gallons was 6.6 percent of the large lots and 6.8 percent of the small lots. Lance said the largest of the twenty four locations used 1.6 million gallons in February. Lance said some people are going way over. Councilmember Thompson said those are the people that are going to be paying for the extra usage. Councilmember Thompson said what we pay now covers our cost; last year everything we paid covered our costs, so if the City started charging more for water, we could give quite a bit of water away. Councilmember Kirkham said it doesn’t change the fact that people in a town house are subsidizing the person that is using 90,000 gallons. Ron said one of the flaws he sees in the billing system is we assume if a lot is zoned RP, RPA, or RE it is a big lot; and we are assuming that everything that is R-1 and R1-A is not a big lot. We have lots in R-1 that are bigger than any of the lots in Founders Pointe. Ron said there is a flaw in our system that assumes a lot size based on how it is zoned. Ron said he feels the Council could say they are going to charge for X size lots at $40 and then step it up by lot size. Meters are the answer; they detect leaks and they tell us what the average usage is. Councilmember Christensen said this is why he thinks the real important information is going to come when we have the lot sizes. There is such a broad difference in lot size and he wants to know among the lots that are two acres, how much is the differentiation in usage. Lance said the spreadsheet shows the largest usage was on Salmon Street. Discussion ensued regarding the water usage, and conservation education. Ron said the real question staff has today is, the water meter costs are going up, and we would like to know if Ray can order the meters so he can continue installing them. Councilmember Slack said he is on that side of the fence. Councilmember Powell said he is too. Councilmember Kirkham said the City has budgeted for the meters, and she is ok purchasing them. Councilmember Thompson said the City could offer 125,000 gallons usage per month in the summertime and still come out just the way we are, and if you used over that amount then they will have to pay for it. Councilmember Powell said if you add more homes and connections to the system without metering that type of usage, the demand is just going to go up and the City can’t sustain that by drilling more wells. Ray said the City needs to do something about building reserves for water line repairs. Ray displayed a water pipe & valve that came from Teton Street which was installed in the 1950’s and was badly corroded. The Council concurred that Ray should move forward with purchasing the meters. 4. Misc.: Councilmember Powell and Councilmember Coletti presented a Welcome to Ammon videoabout the City’s amenities, and would like it to be uploaded to YouTube. EXECUTIVE SESSION: 23 Council Minutes 03.14.2013 Page of 1. Personnel Evaluations - Idaho Code 67-2345 (1-b) 2. Real Property Acquisitions - Idaho Code 67-2345 (1-c) 3. Pending Litigation - Idaho Code 67-2345 (1-f) Councilmember Kirkham moved to adjourn into executive session pursuant to Idaho Code 67-2345 (1-b). Councilmember Powell seconded. Roll Call Vote: Councilmember Kirkham – Yes, Councilmember Powell – Yes, Councilmember Coletti – Yes, Councilmember Thompson – Yes, Councilmember – Slack Yes, and Councilmember Christensen – Yes. The motion passed. The meeting adjourned at 5:40 p.m. _________________________________________________ Steve Fuhriman, Mayor _______________________________________________ Ron Folsom, City Clerk 33 Council Minutes 03.14.2013 Page of