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01-25-2017YELM CITY COUNCIL STUDY SESSION WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 25, 2017 5:00 P.M. Mayor Pro -Tem Wood called the meeting to order at 5:00 p.m 2. Present: Councilmember's: Russ Hendrickson, Tad Stillwell, Joe DePinto, Jennifer Littlefield and EJ Curry. Mayor Pro -tem Tracy Wood presided over the meeting. Molly Carmody arrived at 5:04 pm. Staff present: Tami Merriman, Chad Bedlington, Grant Beck, Todd Stancil and Michael Grayum. 3. 17-114 MOTION MADE BY RUSS HENDRICKSON TO APPROVE THE AGENDA AS PRESENTED. SECONDED BY JENNIFER LITTLEFIELD. MOTION CARRIED. 4 a. Study Session meeting logistics — date, time, meals Councilmember's discussed changing the day of the meeting to Tuesdays instead of Wednesdays and changing the time from 5:00 pm to 6:00 pm, so that the councilmember's would have more time to get to the meeting. The Council consensus is to change the Study Session meetings to the 1St Tuesday of every month and the start time will be 6:00 pm. There was discussion regarding the meals that are provided to the Council and staff during the meeting. The Council consensus is to continue to provide meals during the Study Session. This item will be on the February 14th agenda for action. 4 b. Follow up on water system malfunction in December Chad Bedlington explained the reason the water smelled and tasted like chlorine last month. There were two events that happened, which started at the SW Well 1A Treatment Facility. Around the Thanksgiving holiday the Chlorine Analyzer failed which caused false readings. The accuracy of the readings is important to the SCADA system to alert the person on duty of an alarm. When the system failed it discharged high doses of chlorine in the water system. 600,000 gallons of water were dumped out of the reservoir and flushed the systems that were affected the most. The Department of Health was contacted as part of the protocol. AlertSense was used to notify citizens. The AlertSense system did not work as planned, which resulted in an opportunity for troubleshooting the alerting system. The Chlorine Analyzer has been replaced. The second issue was a pressure and chlorine problem in the water system due to a failure in the power supply on the Program Logic Controller panel (PLC). When the power supply failed it took out 3 PLC's including the chlorine injector pumps, which caused the SCADA system to fail. Staff was notified by an elderly care facility of the low water pressure. Water Operator, Tim Rarick was called out and discovered the water pressure was very low. It took a couple of days to correct the water pressure issue. AlertSense was used to notify the citizens. When the PLC's failed it took out the chlorine injection system which caused one of the injector pumps to continually pump chlorine into a static water system. 1.2 million gallons were flushed out of the system. Some residents were contacted and water samples were taken from their homes to test. The levels of chlorine were higher than what citizens were accustomed to, but that the water is still safe to drink. The problem has been fixed and the water system appears to be working properly. Councilmember Littlefield left the meeting at 5:41 pm 4 c. Comp Plan Update and opportunity for Q & A by Council 1-25-17 Tami Merriman explained that the Goals and Policies of the Comprehensive Plan provide guidance for the City to develop regulations and guidelines to plan into the future with capital improvements. It also supports the City in successfully obtaining grant funding for projects. The Planning Commission did a tremendous amount of work on this document. Community Development Director Grant Beck has done a lot of work on the Comp Plan as well. All responses from the public comment period thus far have been provided to the Council in their packet. Some of the highlights of the Plan are: low impact development and deferring, delaying or amortizing system development charges for water and sewer. Councilmember Carmody asked how often the plan must be reviewed and updated. Tami answered it is a minimum of every eight years currently but you can do it every year. This update took a long time because it was fully formatted. there was a lot of work in the background with Sustainable Thurston Plan. The public hearing will be closed at the February 14th Council meeting and Council can decide to approve the Comp Plan or not at that time. 4 d. Social Media Policy City Administrator Michael Grayum stated staff will be checking into other Social Media Policies and bringing them back to Council for their input. Councilmember DePinto stated that is a great step and would be helpful to see what other cities are doing with their policies. Council consensus is to see what other cities have available. This will be brought back to a Study Session for discussion. 4 e. Legislative Agenda Michael Grayum passed out the Yelm City Council Navigation Chart and stated this document was put together from previous Council retreats. Grant Beck has put a lot of work into the chart. The chart was brought before Council at a Study Session and approved the navigation chart as their synthesis council goals and legislative agenda. Councilmember DePinto would like to see transparency in the budget process by creating a biennial budget. Switching the budget to biennial would have to be done in 2018, since it can only be done in certain years. Councilmember Stillwell would like to bring forward a 5 year strategic plan for forecasting revenues, needs analysis and staffing plans. Michael stated the work on the 5 year plan has started and when the Mayor brings the budget to Council this October, he will also bring forward a strategic plan. Councilmember Carmody would like to hold more Town Hall meetings on a quarterly basis and not have a specific subject for the public to discuss. Some of the topics that Council would like to hold Town Hall meetings on are safety, families, sewer rates and traffic. Council discussed in detailed the 5 year Strategic Plan. What should it include and how do we get there? Michael suggested that Council take a closer look at the Comp Plan goals and ratchet them down. S. Mayors Report - nothing to report 6. Council Initiatives Councilmember Stillwell asked Chad Bedlington for an update on the sidewalk grinding project. Chad stated that the Public Works department will be working on them soon. Chad said that we will be bringing on the seasonal help earlier this year so that more projects will get done. Councilmember DePinto asked for an update on the road that floods on Bald Hills Road. Chad stated it is in the floodplain and it will be a high cost project with environmental issues. Councilmember DePinto stated there is a parking issue at Longmire Park during games. Chad stated it would be an enforcement issue. Grant Beck stated that Longmire Park was never designed to be the Regional Athletics Center. This issue will be brought up at the Stakeholders 1-25-17 meeting for discussion at the next meeting. This issue should come back at a future Study Session for discussion. Councilmember Carmody would like to add the agenda of the Council meetings to streaming video so that citizens can follow along during the Council meeting and power point slides. Councilmember Carmody has been talking to a citizen that has been an accountant for 30 years and she would like to see an external audit for staffing needs inside the City. Michael stated we need someone right now to do the Human Resources (HR) for the City. We have a Clerk that is doing a great job and she is currently doing HR but there is too much for one person to do with no backup. When Janine Schnepf was City Clerk/HR, Lori was her back up. Now Lori has all the duties of both positions and no back up. Councilmember Carmody has been asked by citizens if they can have rain barrels so they are not watering their lawns with City water. Councilmember Wood asked Chief Todd Stancil about the condition of the bridge on Creek Street. Todd stated it is on the Hazardous Mitigation Plan along with the flooding road on Bald Hills. 17-115 MOTION MADE BY RUSS HENDRICKSON TO ADJOURN THE MEETING. SECONDED BY TAD STILLWELL. MOTION CARRIED Adjourn 6:53 p.m. Tracey Wo Mayor Pro -Tem Attest: / xxn Lori Mossman, City Clerk Complete recordings are available on the city website at www.ci.yelm.wa.us. 1-25-17