So, this is brief, 3 hours and 45 minutes of meetings.
All the items on the agenda passed with the exception of items:
7 (bus barn), 8 (mattress recycling), 10 (police department accountant), 11 (body camera study shifted to mayor’s office), 13 (AMFS union contract), 15 (Baum development for Garver), 17 (half million in homeless services), 18 (community gardens leadership), 19 (philosophers grove), 20 (purchase of property by East Transfer point), 24 (mayor’s vacation time), 25 (TIF and city loan union encouragement), 27 (Cap Budget adjustments for Engineering Building Addition)
More items than usual. All except items 15, 17 and 25 were taken off the agenda by Alder Verveer and Palm.
New Bus Barn
Larry Palm asked some questions about why this is being moved up and why we are matching the maximum amount 50%, instead of something lower. The answers amounted to, we need a bus barn. And, pessimism about the federal government continuing to fund at the level it had been at. The motion passed unanimously.
Mattress Recycling
The say they did a pilot and it worked. Alders are worried about the mattresses being picked up more often and the issues of some neighborhoods (with renters) being more impacted than others. Staff says that if they had more staff they would pick up more often. There seems to be the consensus that the sticker system didn’t work. Motion passed unanimously.
Police Accountant 2 position
Verveer asks why now and why they don’t wait for the budget process. They say they need it for the training center, but only 1/5 of the job is for the training center. The police apparently only have one staff person trained as an account and have program assistants who assist. They have two Sargents who do bookkeeping and a clerk that does billing. Verveer is worried that this is a result of the new accounting system. They say it is one of the factors, but there are many others. Verveer asks why this is coming out of the contingent reserve and not salary savings. Lots of questions about how they are managing the accounting in the police department. Passes unanimously.
Body Cameras Study moved to Mayor’s Office
DeMarb requested it because there will be no police oversight, which will be in the mayors office. Passes unanimously.
AMFs Union Contract
Verveer has a question for HR, but they left. His questions are about residency. He asks the chief how many people under this contract live in the city? The existing agreement was that they had to live within 15 miles of the state capitol building, now it is 15 miles from the border. 3 of the 10 live in the city, the rest live within 15 miles of the capital Verveer really wants to ask someone besides the chief questions. Mike May asks about the change in the statute and how this works for the police and he hasn’t seen any changes and Verveer wants to know where that contract was. May doesn’t really know any answers to Verveer’s questions, but he will find out by the council meeting. DeMarb asks if there is any urgency. They say no. DeMarb moves referral to get the staff there. Verveer seconds with apologies to people who are being delayed on their back pay. `Palm says they can just get the info at the council and he is unclear about how they decide when to refer and when to get info at the council. DeMarb says this is info the finance committee should have. Motion to refer passes unanimously.
Garver Feedmill Baum Development
Tom Langraf talks about the state historical tax credits and asks them to add language to the resolution about the review date if they are going to go with the secondary proposal. He says end of June or July is when they could no longer be prepared to follow through with their proposal. The process requires 30 days for the state and 30 days for the feds to approve the plans. Baum proposal rehabs the building, but the second project has 3 new buildings and would have to go through the plan process. The speaker says that both projects have to go through the plan process to put tiny houses in a city park. Scott Frank also with the back up proposal speaks. He asks for the same thing, to have enough time to make their project work.
David Wallner was the chair of the selection process. Goes over the history.
Palm asks staff about concerns about the property taxes, there won’t be any changes they will have to pay the taxes as they are. Palm also asks about the replacement of park land. The Garver property and north plat has a deed restriction on them that they cannot use it for anything but park purposes. So, if there is a desire to do something besides a park use, then they have to go through a conversion process and acquire new park land and place the deed restriction on the new park land. They have been trying to find properties that meet the deed restrictions. The Urban Rivers grant was also used and it has to have a water feature on or near it as well. There is money in the parks impact fees to purchase the land, but they might use some stormwater money as well. Staff has concerns about all the projects, several still have to be resolved. Their primary concern is with the microlodges in a city park. The Garver Building becomes commercial space for food production and the staff is confident that will be successful. Based on the proposal they have, the building has a modest return. The microlodges are what makes it attractive to invetors, but its on a city park and they need individual services for utilities and there are planning issues. If this portion doesn’t work, then they have to care for the buildings as the city. It is an untested product in a city property. Palm asks what if they can’t build it. Staff says there will be no ground lease. Verveer asks about replacement park projects, he says it is $320,000 – $900,000 for this cost, is this still accurate and is it for the land and the utilities? Staff says only the parkland used by them, 8 – 9 acres. They found more property than that and they will include more of the north plat in the transaction. (Ugh, this sound complicated, you might want to listen if interested in where the new parkland might be.) Replacement parkland will be key and the alders will see it when they are ready. Verveer has concerns about what the deadlines are for getting work done and why there isn’t one in the resolution. Staff says they will have updates last meeting in May or first meeting in June. Ahrens asks about occupancy projections for the micro lodges and if they fail and who pays for the sewer and water hookups. Staff gave their personal opinion. Verveer asks about the Landmarks meeting update. It passed unanimously tonight. It was unanimous every other place. Ahrens says there are three issues not considered by the ad hoc committee. They did not ask the civic value of the proposal in the RFP, they asked other things but not about the purpose and what we are investing our $2M in. He thinks the other project for seniors is more needed and they should take the social values into consideration. Second he says the issue of the additional cost for the parkland acquisition is important and it is greater for the Baum proposal than others. Ahrens says that at the last meeting they were getting kicked out of the Goodman Center and were still discussing issues. The third point is that our recent experience with Judge Doyle Square and the problems with identifying a single negotiating partner and not getting the best deal. The historic tax credits make a very streamlined process for them. He says he would support an amendment to have dual negotiations done and a report by July 31st. Palm says it is intriguing and there might be some financial potential. He also says that we could spiral out of control and blow the timelines. We’ve already heard we have taxed our staff and he would like them to do some other projects. Palm says that the staff person could be working on priorities. Palm says that the committee voting is a statement about community values. Clausius says we vote this up or down, but the proposal is not a friendly amendment and it will open the process back up. He doesn’t support any amendments. Subeck says the dueling competing process is what the RFP is for. This isn’t like Judge Doyle Square we are clearer here and the Judge Doyle Square project. Marsha Rummel says that with the landbanking projects they had a second back up project and that was a result of staff asking for that leverage and that is why they have a second choice here. She says there is a vision with the Baum project, over 80 people showed up and 79 of 80 spoke in favor of it, no one spoke in favor of the second project. People liked the proposal because of the food production history and was a good use of the north plat and had some urban ag. She says everyone understands the urgency of the historic tax credits. Ahrens says the purpose of the dual negotiations is because of the time pressure and they might end up with nothing if a project falls through. Verveer moves to amend to have a status update to the Board of Estimates by no later than June 8th Board of Estimates meeting. Amendment passes unanimously. Motion passes unanimously.
Half million dollars for Homelessness
I spoke and explained the very odd process we go through, including concerns about how this money was determined. HUD required the agencies that get the money to decide who gets the money. There is no application, no scoring, and ultimately if there is a conflict or money left over the staff just decide. We had 2 meetings where the first one we gave everyone a % increase and then a few agencies were left for a second meeting to discuss how the additional money would be spent. The alders ask lots of questions and the the staff there do their best to answer the questions but they weren’t the staff that know the answers in detail. Pass unanimously.
Community Gardens Leadership Development
Palm asks if this is going to work and if it is working. There was one response to the RFP. CAC was doing it, not Community Ground works is doing it. Passes unanimously.
Philosopher’s Grove
Three speakers in support to answer questions, DMI (lobbyist), BID (lobbyist) and one more person. Mary Carbine is asked about the activities that will be there. They say that they will decide with staff. It is placemaking funds so they will be small to medium scale, participatory and geared towards bringing activity to the area. Could be arts, tai chi, museum events, pop up flea markets, maybe a farmers market one day a week. Passes unanimously.
Buy land by east transfer point and Voit Farm
Palm asks what they are using this for. Matt Mikolajewski says they are buying it to hold on to it until one of the properties next door want to buy it. How is this different than the Ann St. property asks Larry. Why should we consider this when we have said no and there isn’t a city wide look. Mikolajewski says the developer had an option on the property, this is a cost below the appraised value for the site. This is a great strategic property effectively land banking but not using those funds. Palm says development says hasn’t started because the city won’t permit access to it on its own. He’s perplexed, a vacant piece of property doing no harm to the city, unlike Ann St. that had negative consequences. He appreciates we want to save a buck, but I don’t know how this is part of our charter. Why are we tying up $1.5M dollars. Mikolajewski agrees it isn’t harming the city. He says that the property on its own doesn’t work and will need to be combined with one of the properties next door. They can sell it in the future and see a higher and better use in the future. This is one of the few locations in the city where there is significant acreage and it could be a whole new neighborhood. Palm says there is no public use planned? Mikolajewski says at present no. In the future they are working on a plan. Palm says there is no access to this property? The grade is a problem. Clausius asks about the owner to the west, he says that will develop at some point. He says Ann St. wasn’t desirable because it was landlocked, but he supports this. DeMarb asks if there is a plan for this property? Mikolajweski says that they don’t have a neighborhood plan for the area. DeMarb says there are plans that exist where the city doesn’t have money to landbank. This seems counter-intuitive if there is no plan, this land could be acquired by the developer on their own in the future. She says this is an opportunity but no plan. There are plans that exist that need to make opportunities. She thinks Ann St. has a better use, but that also had no plan. The plan had been developed by the alder not the staff. Subeck asks what happens if they don’t do this, what do they lose? Mikolajweski says it will remain vacant and they won’t own it. Subeck says this is just speculation that we will make some money on it. Mikolajewski says most likely not, we would likely just cover our costs, the justification is that by incorporating this property you can have a greater development property and generate more tax revenue. Subeck asks if there is reason to believe it won’t happen on its own. How does us gaining control help, we’re taking it off the tax rolls. What do we gain or are we mitigating a risk. As far as taking it off the tax base it contributes $19,000. The risk is in the future it sits vacant. There is some risk the city would own it and the adjoining property owner decides it doesn’t want it. It does lock in broader long term development potential. This would create a low cost to purchase it. It’s appraised at $1.35 and we would purchase at $1.2. How long would we hold it? A long time, 5 – 10 years. Subeck says if we hit 10 years we’ve eaten up the property taxes. She doesn’t think we would be gaining anything then. Palm asks how big the parcel is? 8 acres. Its not vacant, the bullseye archery building on it? Do we have any intent to lease? No. To we have the rights to access the property through Swiss Colony? Mikolajewski doesn’t know? Palm asks if the Farm is in the city. Mikolajewski says that there is another sliver the city owns. Palm asks about access that is to other land we own. Mikolajewski says city park and stormwater utility land would be accessed by new streets. Palm asks if buying below assessed value depressed the property value around it. He says no. David Ahrens asks who the seller is? Slinde? That’s the broker. There was a HUD loan to develop the property with 150 units of affordable housing and was discouraged by the city because it wasn’t consistent with a plan not yet developed. We are in the 4th decade of trying to figure out what Voit is doing and no one has heard from Swiss Colony. The Slinde thing is the only thing to come along in years. Will something happen in 5 or 10 or 15 years, I don’t know. The interests of the Voit boys are unknown. If Slinde dropped out, why is there concern someone else will come in? The city has been strong about no letting anyone develop here, why do we need to do this? There will not be some interim buyer to do anything because we won’t let them, so why should we buy it. Mikolajewski says this is not something we have to do, its an opportunity to be a player at the table to partner with a developer. Palm says he has over a decade of relations, there have been some crazy things proposed here. The East Isthmus Planning Council tried to do a plan here and it collapsed miserable because you have a property owner that is not engaging and we are speculating here. He supports landbanking. We need to add value, take bad land and turn it good. We have good land here to make it better. He thinks there are a lot of developments that happen next to each other and they are fine. This doesn’t seem logical and he can’t support it. Subeck agrees and points out that this is the same money for police stations and community centers, spending the remaining balance here does put other things in jeopardy. There are other pieces of property like this and we don’t buy it. Palm says that the next president of the council should talk with staff on this. We need a process. Motion is to approve and no one votes for it.
Mayor vacation time
Palm asks how we determine 20 days for first 4 years and 25 for the second. He just wants to understand it. Michael May says it is modeled on Comp Group 21 contracts. May says it doesn’t apply to current accruals, when does it go into affect. Right now there is no carry over. IN other cases they compute it based on how many years you have been with the city. Palm says the first 4 years in office, they would have just completed that and a clock restarts when people leave. May says that the rule would be this is the first 4 year term this applies to. This has to be subsequent consecutive years when they get an increase. Subeck says the mayor doesn’t take vacation and isn’t accountable, how does this work, if we are talking about payouts this could be significant. May says that is pretty accurate the way it works, the mayor gets paid and no one kept track of vacation time and this is a new way of doing it. May says the mayor should just take vacation like anyone else. Subeck asks what other cities do? May doesn’t know. HR isn’t here. Palm asks about a mayor that takes time off and says it isn’t vacation. What if they took 30 days and it was comp time and then kept banking days, would that be permitted. May doesn’t know, there is no person in that role unless head of HR did it and the city attorney would say that they are abusing their power. Palm says that at the end of the day, they can only take 10 days? May says it is 10 days for each year. Palm says there seem to be accounting issues with this. Subeck says unused vacation is a liability, we are assuming that at the end of the term we will be paying more and its a pay increase. Palm asks is it legal? May says that is what he assumed they would ask. May says this is a benefit, not salary. This has the effect of more money to be paid to the mayor, but its no different than the case that went to through the courts on the sheriff’s pay. This is a benefit, not salary. DeMarb says she brought it forward since they have been asked about it for the last few months, timing on this is not great. She is concerned that this is to increase his salary, he did ask for this to be sorted out weeks ago. She says that she brought it forward for discussion. She explains about the accrual and liability. She says the thing that bothers her is there is no accountability on the accrual. No one keeps track of it, unlike any other employee. He concern wasn’t about vacation for an executive. There is transparency issues. Palm says this is $8000 every two years and that is about one year of alder salary. This is raising the benefits of someone who has a salary already. Is there a way to limit this to 10 days maximum. May says you can do that or just not allow it to be carried over. Subeck wants to amend it to have no carry over. Subeck says he is accountable to the voters and the voters only. Vacation is a moot point. She wants no carry over given there is no accountability except with the voters. Palm says that it is $500 a day. The first term it is $20,000 and then second term is $25,000. He says that they would limit the carry over to a specific amount or no carry over, but someone has to make the motion. Subeck moves to eliminate the payout, but allows the carry over. Verveer seconds for discussion purposes. Subeck says that it allows the vacation but eliminates the payout. Verveer says that currently it is paid out for the year. May isn’t sure. Verveer says we have had to find money to pay the payouts. Since this is a benefit not a salary, Verveer asks to refer. He is supposed to be in an important neighborhood meeting. They withdraw the motion and refer.
Proprietary Interest Protection Agreements – i.e. Requiring Unionizing Opportunities in Development Projects getting over $100,000 in TIF or other city loans
Chamber of Commerce sends their lobbyist (Julian Kitchen?), the public policy committee unanimously opposes it. They have several concerns. They city has been working on a “robust economic development toolkit” but this ordinance would be a step backwards and would create barriers to that process. This would impact employers looking to expand, locate and grow in Madison, it would be counterproductive to attracting new employers. This may impact the use of developers use of TIF funds and make it hard to find tenants. This will be at Economic Development on Wednesday, their board won’t meeting til THursday and she thinks they will oppose it as well and they ask for referral.
Peter Rickman, Wisconsin Jobs Now, in support. Policy is framed as minimizing risk due to legal concerns. He says there is a bit of a contradiction in how he would talk about it. This is about prospective workers and that is why workers are not here. He talks about his grandmother coming over on a boat from Poland and being a housekeeper. His mother was a secretary and was in a union and was able to provide for the family. He works with immigrant workers and can see how the effective unionization impacts their lives dramatically.
Subeck asks about how these have played out in other cities. Rickman says these are in effect all over New York, San Fransisco, Portland and many other cities. They are particularly about the hospitality industry since cities give loans and leases. The cities saw that strikes pickets and boycotts impacted their investments. San Fransisco pioneered this. They have been in place in many cities. Philadelphia requires a labor-peace agreement and they don’t care what happens as long as they reach agreement of no pickets, strikes or boycotts. Pittsburg requires a union contract. Ours is a combination. Housekeeping is the major places we see unions being created, retail and fast food is also growing. Subeck asks what actually happens, we put TIF money in, what happens. Rickmann says that City tells the developer to work it out with the workers, its a private contract, the city has basic minimal issues to be worked out and once it is worked out, the city approves the money. Subeck says that we are familiar with PLA or project labor agreements. Is this similar. Yes, but the city takes it up on an ad hoc basis but this is a policy that level the playing field. Subeck expects it to be referred to the next meeting but wanted it on the agenda so she would be here before she leaves. When we have projects before us we talk about family supporting jobs and this is how we get there. She wants the same for PLAs. There will be a sub before it gets to EDC, based on issues raised by staff. First is we have TIF for jobs and that this won’t apply if it is already covered by the TIF policy. She points out the exemptions for multi-tenant development built on a speculative basis. This is only if you know that you have a tenant. The intent is an up front requirement, not a negotiation in the future. She hopes there will be a substitute for EDC, but she wants to hear other concerns. DeMarb asks staff to reach out to other cities and ask how its working. What I’m hearing is it is great, but she wants staff to reach out to other staff to find out if there were stumbling blocks. She asks the city attorney to find out how our ordinance might be different. Clausius says he won’t be here after this meeting and he thinks it would be inappropriate to vote since EDC hasn’t seen it. He wants staff to reach out to the Chamber and make sure their concerns are addressed. DeMarb moves referral. Motion carries.
Amending 2015 Capital Budgets for Sewer, Storm and Landfill for $3.725M for an Engineering Service Building Addition.
Staff says in 2012 they had funds allocated for Emil ST. vehicle storage, they had delays, they have plans now. The delays have cost them money, they have worked on sustainability. The budget amendment is for reauthorizing funds, the second is $430,000 in additional funds (60% Sanitary, 30% Storm, 10% Landfill). They have grown and so has their equipment. They did this all in house except structural and electrical. She talks about the improvements and sustainability features and landscaping and pollinator friendly plants, etc etc etc. (last 7 minutes if you want to watch) Verveer asks why this wasn’t reauthorized in the budget. Rob Phillips says that they thought the project was going to get done before the budget, but they didn’t prioritize their own project. Verveer asks if in October they thought they would get it done in November? No. Verveer asks if they asked the mayor to approve it? No. Verveer asks if the mayor supports it? Phillips doesn’t want to talk for the mayor. Verveer says that it is odd not to have the mayor supporting it. Phillips says that he thinks the mayor is supportive but it was prior to the election and he’ll just let it go at that. Verveer says that in prior years he asked about it. Staff have done memos to piece together where the money is coming from. Verveer says the lions share comes from Sanitary Sewer revenue bonds. They say 60%. Verveer asks if this would displace any other projects in terms of bonding authority. Staff says no. Phillips says the sewer utility borrows every other year. Verveer wants to make sure no other projects are impacted and they assure them they will not be. He asks how much is GO borrowing. $183,900. The bulk is bonds and a small portion from landfill fees. Motion passes.
Clausius moves adjournment.
