City of Bloomington, Indiana City Council, 20 Mar 2019

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From YouTube: Bloomington City Council March 20, 2019

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Agenda, Regular Session Memo, Packet : https://bloomington.in.gov/onboard/meetingFiles/download?meetingFile_id=4391

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I'll call to order this bloomington common council regular session meeting for wednesday.

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March 20th 2019 well the clerk. Please call the roll.

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Rollo here rollin here since here.

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Stir bomb sandburg here. thank you.. Thank you.

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Here's the agenda summation for this evening. If you'd like an agenda, you can find the beside clerk bolton.

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Will have approval for minutes of january 30th 2019 special session and then we'll have approval of minutes.

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Considered for march 6 2019 regular session.

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We'll have reports from council members, the mayor and city offices and I understand tonight.

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Don elliott and jim sprung, who are with clarion and associates, will be giving a status report on the upcoming.

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City, cities, unified development, ordinance, the you do and we will have council committee reports.. We reserve 20 minutes for the public.

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To speak on items not on our agenda, then we'll go to appointments to boards and commissions.

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And then we have one item for legislation for second reading and resolutions.. That is ordinance 1907.

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Amending title 15 of the bloomington municipal code entitled vehicles and traffic.

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Regarding updating permissible towing and storage fees for authorized towing services and it received a committee recommendation of do pass.

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5:03 we have no legislation for first reading and then we'll have an additional time for public comments of 20 minutes. At the end of our meeting.

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Before we go to council and then we will adjourn.

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So with that,, let's move on to approval of minutes.

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Minutes from january 30th 2019 as.

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Amended there were a few typographical errors that I communicated to the clerk earlier today, very good.. Thank you.

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Okay,, it's been moved and seconded any other additions or corrections to the minutes other than what we've been told?.

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Seeing none all in favor., say aye.

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Any opposed those minutes are accepted.

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Mr. chair,, I move approval of the minutes of march 6 2009 teen regular session.

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It's been moved and seconded any additions or corrections for those minutes.

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Okay,, seeing none all in favor., say aye aye any opposed to approval.

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Those minutes are approved as well: okay, we'll go to council member reports and I'll begin on my left with council member sandberg.. I.

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Hold in my hand, a work that council members serve on, and I can be very proud of. This is a very preliminary draft of.

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The bloomington, affordable living committee report.

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This has been years in the making with respect to our study of local data.

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Our discussions with low income individuals, who are.

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Struggling mightily in our community, the title of this is working hard, falling behind.

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This study that council, member baum and I initiated and and.

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Former council member mayor also joined us.

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We started out looking at affordable housing because we felt that was a very critical need. We've been discussing it for decades.

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But as we started to unpack the issue of affordable housing,, we realized that there's more to it than that.

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It has to do with the wages in this community.

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It has to do with the cost of transportation, the cost of food, the cost of health care and the cost of child care.

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So we expanded the purview of this report and that's why it's taken a while us to gather information to.

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Take a look at all of those areas and.

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Again, I took a pto from my job at spea today,.

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For a variety of reasons, but picking up this report. I've been glued to it and fascinated by it.

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To remind us of the hard work, that's led up all the interviewing all the cooperation from all the experts in our community that are.

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Knowledgeable about health care and child care and local food service, and so while this is a no means ready to release to the public, it is here.

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It is substantive, it is exciting and I'm really thrilled to have it in my hands.

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Because I think it's going to be extremely informative to all of us moving forward into the next term.. Thank you.

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Thank you, councilmember sandberg, councilmember, esther bomb. You have a comment.

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Yeah, the american dream of owning a home is not dead.

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There was a recent survey of blending millennials working in san francisco and.

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74% of them wanted a home where they could raise children.. They didn't plan to live there more than five or ten more years.

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There this generations, just like every other generation they want homes.

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People like to live in a lower density.

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Sometimes the planners think they have better ideas than what people actually want.

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But we just were talking to lynn cohen.

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And he said we just lost a business because there they found that there wasn't going to be enough housing in the community for their workers and their building in greene county.

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So we have a lot of work to do, but we also have to be a little humble about.

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What people actually want?

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and we want to make sure they can find a home and own a home if possible,.

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Sometimes we think we more know more than what people actually really need and really want and a home is.

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Home is a goal, and a home is where you live, and a home is where you operate in your community from.

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And thinking that everybody is gonna, be a renter and should live in ever smaller buildings.

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That's a very depressing future and I think we can do better than that.. Thank you.

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Thank you, councilmember simms,.

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Thank you first thing: I'd like to do is welcome back our colleague.

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Councilmember boland we've missed you glad to be back.

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And I'll be brief, the next thing I'd like to speak about.

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Kind of coattails on what councilmember starbomb was talking about this evening.. We will hear a brief.

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Or I understand brief report from our consultants, clarion and associates having to do with the updating of our.

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Unified development ordinance or you do.

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We have had public meetings, there have been some participation.. I think.

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They have learned some things that they will continue to work on.

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I know we've heard some things that we know we'll be working on.

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I just wanted tonight all folks that are listening and everyone sitting here.

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Please continue to participate in this process.

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This will guide our growth for the next couple of decades and.

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There's a lot of discussion to be had about this on the future and how we want to see bloomington, develop and grow so and.

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Thank you,, mr. president,. That's all I have this evening.

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Thank you mr. rowland.

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Thank you.. I appreciate the news from my colleagues sandberg and sturb.

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It provides context for the story that I want to tell.

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My father died a month ago at the age of 89.

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Despite his advanced age., it was unexpected.

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He was running errands on a tuesday afternoon when he suffered heart failure., not far from his home in lake county.

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As a result., I've had a hard time caring about any here.

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I know some of my colleagues have in derned endured their own parental losses and I marvel at how they or anyone.

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Manages to find the will to continue. I mean only to explain my absence these weeks, but there's a little bloomington story that I've never told anyone that didn't make sense to me until now.

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Sitting here in these chambers, having returned to resume my duties.

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But wondering whether I cared about them anymore enough to resume them.

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It helps to know for this story that my parents are from a very different world, both.

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My father's and my mother's first language was greek.

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It helps to know that despite his family origins in greece, my father grew up on the banks of the blue nile.

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That it was his dool, greek and sudanese citizenship.

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That was the key to him being able to immigrate with my mother permanently to the us.

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It helps to know that indiana was the place where he was able to begin practice, medicine and.

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Gary was the place in indiana that welcomed his specialty and.

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That's how I came to be born for their months after he began his practice.

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My parents loved, among other things, european classical music, and so it was a plus that there was a symphony orchestra in lake county.

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And an hour away was the lyric opera which their country, woman, maria callas, had helped launch a decade before I.

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Remember my first experience there an 11 year old in a scratchy stiff sunday suit.

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Watching lata viata before they had super titles and wondering what the hell everyone was screeching about a.

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Lot of people come to bloomington from northwest indiana, including several of our former elected colleagues council members.

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Bannock and satterfield former mayor. kruzan,, it's an agreeable enough place to live lake county.

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Usually, people like us come to bloomington to go to college and we just stay for those of us from the region.

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This place is far enough away to effectively be another world.

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My folks had visited here often enough over the years that they knew something about this community,, but they never spent much time here.

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And so it surprised me that one day, sometime around the turn of the millennium.

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Before my parents had grandchildren, when their other children were living all over the country when they were able-bodied and had not yet.

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Anticipated the cruel vagaries of health that would prevent them from enjoying their old age.

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My mother took me aside and said you know steven if your father dies, for. I think I would like to come live with you in bloomington, a.

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Few months later., my father, took me aside. When I was visiting, he said,, you know stephen. If your mother dies first,, I think bloomington might be a nice place to live.

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Neither of them ever knew that the other had said the same thing to me in confidence.. I.

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Remember marveling about this at the time well before my career in this chamber and wondering what to make of it.

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I've always hated civic exceptionalism.. I hate when people brag about.

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America, when local civic boosters, want to proclaim themselves a world-class city., they're, probably just wishful thinking,.

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If they have to say it,, they probably aren't now the meaning of that little story has become clear to me. If you just.

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Let the place be, you won't need to brag about it for it to be noticed from far away by people who otherwise might never.

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Have come across it, my mom is too frail to relocate now or to enjoy the many benefits of bloomington,, but in my father's memory next month,.

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I'll be attending the bernstein mass at the musical arts center.

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I want to thank everyone, who's been so kind to my family and me during this difficult time.

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I am glad to be back home.. Thank you.

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Thank you, councilmember valen, councilmember, ruff, councilmember, chopra,.

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Yes,, just briefly, I wanted to mention that I'm eating a jimmy john's sandwich and some diet coke up here today.

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I did order it at.

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5:55, so that I can eat it in the back room prior to the meeting.

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But you all saw me step out for a moment and.

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You probably figured out that jimmy john's wasn't not freaky fast today and.

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I just want to let you know that I tried not to be eating up here.. I really did.

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I'm looking forward to a great meeting. thank you.

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Thank you, councilmember piedmont, smith,.

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First of all, kudos to my colleague, councilmember bolin, for.

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Speaking about his parents., I lost my parents a few years ago, and I don't think I could have.

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Spoken that eloquently without bawling so soon after so I thank you for sharing that with us.. That was very meaningful story.

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I wanted to just.

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Let people know that we had a very successful women's history month luncheon today.

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I'm sure a lot of people were there themselves.

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It was a full room at the convention center, great hall, as it usually is, and.

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The the keynote speaker was just fantastic and just you know made everybody feel like they had accomplished nothing because she has accomplished so much.

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Her name was joyce angeloni, and she's general secretary of the men, american friends service committee.

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Which I didn't really know a lot about, and she told us a little bit about it.

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It's, of course, a quaker group,, but it works throughout the world.

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To bring peace and justice to communities and and most importantly,.

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It you know,, it doesn't impose leadership from outside on.

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Communities, for example, in the middle east, in africa in other parts of the world.

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It hires people from those communities who can best understand the problems that are going on there and best work with the local.

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Society to to address those problems, so I was very impressed by that and then, of course, the woman of the years mary get see this year who's. My old?.

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University children's choir director fabulous woman even before her retirement. She.

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Would have earned this award in my in my book,, but since she retired about 10 years ago,, she has done.

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Amazing work with people in members of our community who are in jail and their families, and especially a reading program.

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We're people who are in jail can read and record themselves reading children's books.

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And those recordings can then be sent home to the children to listen to.

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Also, a support system for families that are taking care of the children of people who are in jail.

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And it's just really.

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Important work because that's part of our community- that's often marginalized and kind of blamed for their own problems.

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Whereas,, you know it's often circumstantial so and then finally, the the volunteers of the community justice and mediation center.

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One the toby stroud lifetime contribution award. This was kind of a collective award this year there.

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Dozens of volunteer volunteer women who work for c jam to.

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Help people throughout bloomington in monroe county.

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We resolve problems peacefully through discussions through just bringing them to the table and finding common ground, and that's that's very admirable work.

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So I want to thank everybody who was involved with the luncheon, the commission, on the status of women.

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It was the main commission that works on it and all the sponsors, because it was, it was a great event today.. Thank you.

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Thank you for that report. I have an announcement and then a brief report.

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My announcement is that this sunday,, which is march 24th of 4:00 p.m,.

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Anthony we're of the friends committee on national legislation.

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Will be here from washington dc speaking at the uu church, and title of the talk is the myth of usable nuclear weapons.. This is a very important talk.

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Organized by bloomington, bloomington peace, action coalition.

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And it comes in an opportune time because the bulletin of atomic scientists just made an announcement a few weeks ago.

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Declaring that we're at the closest point of nuclear armageddon since the cold war, since the worst.

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Points of the cold war were at two minutes to midnight and virtually no one knows about that.. So this is a good chance to.

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To be educated about it, and hopefully get citizens activated to tell our representatives to pull us away from the brink.

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So my report is, is about it pertains to a letter that we wrote the council sent.

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To the brownstone district ranger at the hoosier national forest.

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Michelle had dhwani back in december and it concerned.

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A proposed clear cut in the lake monroe watershed and.

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The letter asks for an extension for comments because they allowed only 30 days and.

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Many of the announcements, apparently they were sent out by email, were sent into junk mail.

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Essentially- and we also requested a meeting with the officials and of the hoosier national forest, because we have.

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Obviously, an interest in the lake monroe.

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Water quality,, so we received a letter back.

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Recently and they declined to extend the comment period and.

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I won't read the letter, but they maintained that there had been sufficient time for public comment and they also.

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Declined to meet with us at least that for now.

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So it turns out a friend told me this: that.

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This friday is un world water day,, which is a day to advocate for.

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Sustainable freshwater resources around the world, because it's something that we're running short on and.

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Lake monroe is our only water source., it's our only water supply., it's compromised already, because it has.

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Toxic elgyn algal blooms.. We spend a tremendous amount of.

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Resources and money to purify the water.. What we need to do is concentrate on the watershed.

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To make sure that that lake is clean for recreation, for drinking water, for fishing and so forth,.

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Recreation, so I think- and it also comes as it turns out.

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Council is aware of this, but last week in brown county. there was a huge error that was committed near yellow wood,, which was a.

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Logging effort that logged at least 80 acres,, but maybe 20.

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When only an acre was meant to be logged?.

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By the brown county parks and recreation department., so they hired a logging for him to come in and- and it was a scenic, overlook.

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Which isn't so scenic anymore, on state road, 135?.

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So mistakes can be made. This has a huge consequence in brown. County. people are angry and.

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So my point is that it really is important for us to meet with state and federal officials to open up lines of communication.

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Have good communication about what's happening within our watershed and.

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It's imperative that we reset this relationship and.

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Go forward, hopefully with a memorandum of understanding about how our watershed is, is.

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Utilized and being forests, and so we did at the conclusion of the letter from michael.

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Chavez who's the forest supervisor for the hoosier national forest.

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He did end the letter by saying I thank you for your interest in the hoosier national forest and look forward to further.

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Dialogue in the future on this and other topics of interest on your public lands.

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So I take that as an invitation that we can continue and.

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So let's do so.

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All right with that concluding.

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Councilmember comment, we'll go to the mayor and city offices.

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Miss porter. oh, we did, we did we miss public.. I'm sorry.

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No, no, that's correct, order., I'm sorry.. We have to wait for public, so we'll go to mayor and city offices.

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Thank you., miss porter.

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Good evening., I'm terry porter, director of planning and transportation for the city and tonight.. We have a progress report for you.

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On our unified development, ordinance.

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On our unified development, ordinance update project play hello.

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Justice, yours is on now. Ours are.

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There we go. thank good.

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Well, planning and transportation has been spearheading the project with the assistance of clary, honest and associates, who are here this evening to speak with you as.

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You know,, we began our efforts to update the you do in february, 2018.

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Shortly after the adoption of the new comprehensive plan., that plan had not been updated since.

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2002 and the accompanying unified development ordinance.

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Regulations had not had a complete review and update since.

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2007, it's my understanding that it's considered a best practice for a community to update their.

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Ordinances soon after they adopt a new comprehensive plan,.

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But that many communities are too worn out after the comp plan update process to immediately tackle updating their codes.

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However,, we felt that was very important for our ordinances to align with the new comprehensive plan which serves as the guidebook and.

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Sets the direction for our built environment into the future.

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The comp plan challenges us to address and meet some major goals for bloomington.

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Particularly as they relate to affordable housing.

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Sustainability, climate change, the protection of neighborhood character and that's just to name a few.

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Since we began the you do update process more than a year ago., we have held more than 60.

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Stakeholder and public meetings and more than 400 comments on the draft have been received and published online.

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We will continue to encourage citizen input through the end of april when we hope to then prepare the.

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Document into a final draft to send before the plan commission and then on to you, the council.

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That being said, we understand that the you do will not be perfect right out of the box.

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We see the you do as a document in a three-ring binder. We can that can be adjusted as necessary.

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It's intended to be a living document that will be assessed and revisited.

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This is the sixth visit to bloomington by don eliot principal from clarion and his.

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Associate jim spung and I'll ask them now to come forward and give you an update on where we are in the process.

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What we can expect for next steps moving forward and to answer your questions.. Thank you.

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Thank you very much. I'm don eliot with principal with clarion associates.

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We're a national land use consulting firm that does this type of work.

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We work with communities all over the united states when they decide that their new plan deserves an update to the.

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Regulations and incentives that make it happen or don't make it happen.

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And so that's what I do for a living and we're very grateful to have been chosen for this work.

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This is my mother's hometown and she is very proud that I get to work in her hometown.

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So that's pretty good again for a woman of 88.. I.

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Would like to give you a very brief update of where we are.

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Several of you, many of you have been in meetings that we have held, and you know some of these issues, but.

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I have about 10 slides.

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I want to go quickly to hit the highlights and then tell you what.

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We've been hearing so that you are brief before the phone starts ringing or maybe it's already started ringing.

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But we'll try to keep it very short to give you plenty of time to ask questions about what this is why this is.

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Proposed the way it is,, I would only reiterate this is a draft.

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We are paid, my firm is paid to work with stakeholders and citizens and you and the planning commission over a period of time to.

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Get to the start of the democratic process to get something good enough to say this is worth the time of the planning commission. This.

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Is the it's now been refined at the point where the public can comment on this?.

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Intelligently because this looks to be a balancing of different interests. and that's what the you do is the comp plan is a.

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Balancing of competing good ideas, and you try to figure out how to make many of them happen.

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They can't all happen in the same place. At the same time,.

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So a lot of what the comp plan does is balancing competing.

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Good values and that's what the you do does to how what part of them, and how do you balance these tensions between what?.

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Very well-meaning, business owners and citizens and stakeholders and nonprofits and service agencies want to have happen.. So let's go quickly.

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Why are we doing it?? The main reason is implement the comp plan. The themes that have come up over and over again is.

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We need more, affordable housing., we need more sustainable development.

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We need to get a handle on the student housing pressures on bloomington's, affordable housing, stock.

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We need to resolve that tension in a way that is better than what you have today.

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It should be more user friendly and it should allow developers and builders to have a more predictable process.

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I have yet to have any client say: please make my approval process more unpredictable and longer.. I just don't that doesn't happen.

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So,, how do you, how do you do this efficiently?, we are here.. We did some initial orientation and assessment of what needed to be fixed.

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We prepared the draft in three parts and those were three of our visits.. Let's talk about potential districts.

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You can't see it under my arrow, then development standards.

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Then the process then put it all together, try to respond to as many comments as possible.

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There are fifteen hundred and fifteen footnotes in this document right now to.

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Show who commented and what we changed and why we changed it. Those will come out at the end.

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But that's where we are step four. We are listening comments for the next six weeks till april 30th.

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Then we put an adoption draft. That does not mean it's done. As I said earlier,.

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That means it is ready to have public testimony as to what we got.

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Right and what we got wrong and you'll see that there are several documents that go along with that.

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So what are the key changes? A few of these we've reorganized all of the content into seven chapters?.

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The districts are laid out in a two-page spread. What you see on the right, a conceptual drawing a purpose statement.

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Dimensional's main things about how tall can the building be.? How big can it be, how far back from the property lines?.

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Does it have to be? We have suggested for new zone districts that you don't have now,. That would help.

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Create or induce the types of development that your comp plan says you want in many cases.

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We have reduced the minimum lot sizes necessary for new development that has to do is sustainable, walkable, more efficient development pattern.

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Your minimum lot sizes in some cases, are a half an acre just to get going in there in the mixed use or the multifamily.

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Zones,, that's really high for a city of this size.

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So we have reduced it to try to open up new opportunities for more efficient development.

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We have taken out in many cases the dwelling unit per acre limits, which act as an artificial cap.

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On the housing that can go in a building that you said was not too big.

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So if the zone building is owned, ordinance says three-story. Building is okay here, as long as you keep x percent of the site undeveloped and you have y landscaping and z parking.

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You have numbers in there that keep the number of units in that building.

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Very artificially low and when that happens, they have to make up that.

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Fewer units by charging more for each unit in order to develop so that is being removed and say, let's focus on the size and.

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The scale of the buildings, we have a lot of tools to do that and then you spend a lot of time on peds and we are trying to narrow that by providing more.

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Districts and standards that can allow more development to go through without the negotiated pud.

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Second slide on this is simply urban. Agriculture came up several times your food, local food.

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Producers and advocates have been very effective and saying we want to have the ability to do community gardens.

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Locally grown food in many zone districts and by the way, we'd, also like to be able to sell that those vegetables from those sites.. We have made that readily available.

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You'll remember that, 16 months ago you imposed an interim ordinance which cut the heights of buildings downtown.

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And we said we would reconsider that in this process. In this.

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Draft the student housing I'll talk about that in a minute student housing remains a story below where it was a year and a half ago.

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The rest of them do not. We can talk about that.

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There is a new minor site plan process that says, for the sake of efficiency and predictability,.

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Some development proposals are big enough.. They go to a hearing before planning and zoning.

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We're talking about site plans, not rezoning sri's owings.. You will always see but site plans.

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Does it comply with the ordinance?

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the prevailing practice around the country in crew and increasing practice is to say big ones that require.

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Judgment, go to the planning and planning commission smaller ones where the only question is. Do they comply with the code?.

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Through an administrative site plan and we have set that system up a minor site plan process, finally,.

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There's a minor modification process that allows staff to very.

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Different standards, a setback or an open space standard, several others by five or ten percent. Sometimes fifteen percent, because.

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That site is unusual. and what you're trying to do is come is right for the the area.. It is in the same scale.

J

It's the use, it should be allowed it, so it's intended to be allowed, but there's something about the shape or the terrain or the constraints or the easements. On your lot.

J

Which mean that it misses by some of the we've listed all the different things, there's several of them that staff could approve with five or ten percent.

J

Without going some of them, if it's a really small lot, twenty five percent might be a foot.

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Literally 25 percent adjustment might be a foot, so there are things like that and that so those are allowed to be done without.

J

Sending people through a variance variance, is a hardship standard.

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Yes, you could make them do that most cities around the country say, listen.

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If it's in this realm, the we have decided, this is enough judgment that we can give a cause.

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It is not created by the property owners actions and it is also created by the site.

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They have a site that has got a unit unusual situation, which needs to be adjusted.

J

We would prefer not to send them to a quasi-legislative for hearing for off for a parkings,, but one parking space or for a foot of setback.. So that's in there, too.

J

Student housing has gotten a lot of attention.. This has been perhaps the word most often spoken.

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Although it may be in a tie with affordable housing,.

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We have that the draft says the way to separate and get at both the student housing problems and the affordable housing is to treat them differently.

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Clearly define them., so we've had several stakeholder meetings on this issue.

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Basically, the draft says if you are building anything with four or five bedrooms or a.

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Building with more than a third of the units with three or more bedrooms., you are student housing.

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It is extremely likely that is being built for rental to students and it is likely to buy occupied by students.

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There are not a lot of families who occupy five bedroom apartments, and so it draws a line.

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The reason it draws a line and in other types ones, twos threes up to 1/3 fries- are treated as just multifamily housing.

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Student housing is regulated more strictly multi-family housing that is different than that is regulated more leniently, to induce people to build more.

J

Workforce type housing, the type of housing that is not being explicitly designed for students, so you can see the definition.

J

If you are a student housing project,, you have lower height limits than other multi-family.. You have maximum floorplate, meaning.

J

How big can the footprint be?

J

in in different zone, districts, obviously,, the smaller districts, have narrower footprints.

J

They need to be 300 feet from each other and there's sometimes need conditional use approval.

J

It's a system that says we are going to define student housing and regulate it much more.

J

Significantly than we are multifamily. now., the exception is this: we are proposing a new multi.

J

Excuse me, mixed-use student housing, zoning and in that district you would be able to go higher. You would not be subject to the maximum floorplate.

J

You would not be subject to the spacing and we have talked with staff about the fact that we don't think it's a pipe dream.

J

There are logical places in bloomington where that could happen.

J

One of the issues we have struggled with mightily is that if you're, not careful, the student housing demand forces its way into single-family neighborhoods., we haven't had any fans for that.

J

So far, so,, where is it gonna go??

J

We have been reminded., it was supposed to go. Downtown. well,, it's gone downtown.

J

And now there's a feeling that we don't want all of it downtown which leads to the question. Then: where will it go?.

J

And we do believe this will help and I can answer questions about it.

J

But that's the short answer is student housing separated by multi-family student housing, regulated strictly, except in one zone.

J

Where it would be allowed to be bigger and have and be near the campus and be those near the stadium basically is work.

J

That's not a decision, but when the comp plan says key corridors stadium, the comp plan gives you guidance.

J

On where bloomington says it would like more student housing to go, and this is designed to be, I.

J

Imposed there wherever you, as the policy makers, decide it should be in the future. I'll talk more about that in a minute.

J

Affordable housing.. The next thing is this definition. We found a lot of things in the you do that appeared to be.

J

Trying to discourage student housing that had an unintended impact of discouraging all multi-family housing.

J

That doesn't help whether whether you want to live in a single-family house or not.

J

Some people have to live in a foreign multi-family and the point was by discouraging.

J

That the some of the efforts that were to discourage student housing.

J

We think had the effect of also discouraging the types of work force, housing that you need to have.

J

So the new definition helps there's a new r for the district proposed.

J

That would allow smaller single-family detached lot sizes than you currently allow.. It's a forty two hundred square foot minimum.

J

We've had many discussions about how many communities that are under affordable housing pressure and want to open up new opportunities.

J

For single-family detached housing are allowing smaller lots than that and that lot that number may go down.

J

It's not proposed to be mapped when the you do is adopted, but we are having discussions. Is forty two hundred.

J

Small enough to actually induce people to build single-family homes. that might be more affordable.

J

There are minimum lot sizes I talked about earlier for multi-family. That will make it easier to build that.

J

We have removed these dwelling unit per acre limits.. I got ahead of myself there. now. I have to at the bottom.

J

There are asterisk because I'm going to come back to them in addition to trying to separate the multifamily student housing from multifamily workforce housing.

J

Which is never perfect, because no one can prevent a student from renting an apartment.

J

But you can discourage the things that are aimed or deliberately at them.

J

We have said part of the issue is allowing a wider diversity of housing in the lower density, neighborhoods.

J

In we, the draft says duplexes triplexes and four plexus would be allowed in corner lots in these districts.

J

I put an asterisk because I want to come back and talk about it more and I'm sorry for the fonts, because it's gotten over my.

J

Last point,, but the last point also has a red asterisk.

J

Accessory dwelling units are proposed to be allowed without conditional use approval and we're proposing to remove the 300 foot spacing.

J

We have been criticized for this on the basis that council already wrestled this alligator to the ground and we decided what we wanted to do.

J

Why are you doing this again? and the answer was we were told you write a lot of codes around the country. If you think we should be doing something different.

J

Advise it and if council wants to stick with what they did, they'll do stick with what they do.

J

But we are finding that more and more places that were very strict on accessory dwelling units.

J

Initially are loosening up on it because they're, just not seeing the issues arise, that they thought were going to arise.

J

That has a red asterisk.. I want to talk to you about more about that in about two slides., so.

J

Neighborhood transitions is another key thing that we have put in here: basically,, no matter how high you can build a building in different districts. If you are within 50 feet of.

J

A low-density residential district, your maximum height, is the same maximum height as that residential district. Your setback from that property line is.

J

Also, the same as it would be on the residential side of the property if they have to be x feet from the property line., you need to be x.

J

Oh, but I don't need to I'm in a commercial district, no, you're still going to be further back to give them some breathing room in the next 50 feet.

J

You can go one-story higher and after that you can go.

J

To whatever the maximum height of that district is, this has been warmly received by the neighborhoods, as you might imagine,.

J

It is something that is included in most new ordinances.

J

Just to say, there are lots of times when the places that need to grow or want to grow per. Your comp plan are.

J

Adjacent to lower density, single-family neighborhoods- and this gives them some confidence that they can that the city can approve.

J

Larger and different uses without having that fear that they're gonna be right next to their single-family home or if they are they're gonna, be.

J

Shorter and smaller and further away, affordable housing. The last two I want to talk about, I think, are the incentives. We have been asked to rethink the incentives which are very.

J

They're, I would say working only awkwardly now, because they take a lot of negotiation and horse-trading to get them.

J

Our experience firmly around the country is, if you want.

J

Builders to take the bait and do what you want them to do. you make it easy to do. That. you make it objective.

J

I have done x, I get y and that that looms a lot of time from the process and uncertainty from the process.

J

We actually find that negotiated systems are tougher because the builders come in asking far more.

J

Because they know they're gonna event whittled down in the process and they actually would prefer something that says in return for x.. I.

J

Get why? the draft says if you restrict at least 20% of your multifamily units to less than 100 percent of 120 percent of the average.

J

Media tamera area median income- you can earn one floor of additional space if you do ten percent of it below 80 percent,, which is a tough cross. Subsidy.

J

It's hard to build half an housing for 80 percent ami and the other 10%, so you're still doing 20?.

J

But some of it is a deep subsidy, some of it's a moderate subsidy.

J

You can gain two additional floors, and it's not available for student housing. Now.

J

We have had a lot of talk and I think that I'm not speaking out of turn to say the mayor would like to figure.

J

Out a way to and since student housing to help solve the affordable housing problem that way, and so we're still considering it.

J

It is not available in the areas.. I just showed you.

J

Oh, I get two more floors, not if you're in that hundred feet. You don't because you're gonna have to step it down.

J

It's not a get-out-of-jail-free card with it. With regard to the adjacent neighborhoods.

J

And finally, if you have less than 50 units in this project and you're sending 20% on the side, you are going to do administrative.

J

Review not a hearing at an earlier draft., we had a higher number than that. people said it's too high.

J

We cut it down.. This has to do with minor and major things.

J

I, if you looked at the, I can tell you that in general.

J

If you have more than 30 dwelling units, you go to a hearing if it's affordable, housing, deed, restricted. This proposes that you can get.

J

Up to 50- and you don't go to a hearing- you're still gonna need parking, landscaping, lighting.

J

Everything that you have to do with the building, but it ups the amount of units you can put in without going through a hearing.. I know that.

J

Bloomington and many towns are very used to having hearings on many many things.

J

I will tell you that the numbers we have talked about are important parking height.

J

Setback open space things like that are very important to housing, economics.

J

When I talk to affordable housing builders- and I say what is the one thing you could give first of all, I say.

J

What is it good incentive? They say? Well, you guys always give 5 or 10% incentives. I'm. I can't do it.

J

That's not enough incentive for me to do affordable housing.. It's got to be big.

J

That's why we haven't won in a two-story impose.. It has to be big to get their attention.

J

But before that they will say, the number one thing you can do for me is to not make me go through a hearing. Every.

J

Time, that is the number one thing you can do to promote. Affordable housing is not make it a public.

J

Negotiation to be very honest, very candid, because you'll get some people who opposes just because they don't want fordable housing. It.

J

Pours gas on a difficult discussion, and so that's, I'm honest.. So that's where we're doing on affordable housing in sustainable development.

J

We've been asked and again, we've tried to make it more objective.. There are two ways to earn it.

J

There are seven specific sustainability things you can do in your property.

J

If you choose five of them, you get an additional floor of development or.

J

If you choose, you can go through a lead or a green building challenge or a livable building challenge.

J

We name them in there or a comparable rating system by a third party and if they certify you as hitting different levels, you get an extra floor.

J

You can't do two floors., you do a or b., and this is deliberate to try to provide more.

J

Opportunity for people to earn building height through affordable housing than through sustainability, yet sustainability is very important.

J

But I'll be one of the reasons we didn't put more here is.

J

That we have tried to build a lot of that stuff into the you. Do baseline and.

J

Frankly, bloomington already does in its current, you do and more.

J

So in the new you do many of the sustainability things that other cities offer a reward for. So it's hard to say we're gonna reward you with more space when, in fact, you.

J

Are requiring it and you have taken those actions already.. So that's the second opportunity.

J

What, if I do both what, if I do, a sustainable building and.

J

Affordable housing and the answer is: if you're piling them up, you can do it another floor.

J

But it can only be half as big as the floor below.

J

I don't have a picture of this, but so the answer is gee. This sounds like a lot of plate.

J

How much more could I do answer is if you do affordable housing, you did get one. If you do deep, affordable.

J

Too, if you do all of them, together, you get two and a half.. I will say that I hope that happens.

J

But deep, affordable cross subsidies are difficult to do so,. I don't think it's gonna happen.

J

So that's the steno last thing.. I want to point this out.. We have a binder here and it is a draft.

J

I will repeat what terri said: it's a draft that we are bringing forward and explaining because we want.

J

People to tell us what's wrong and I'm about to show you a slide where they've told us. You got that wrong and.

J

You we want to draw you into the tensions that are behind those things.

J

So we'll do it, but I want to tell you that out of these 300 pages, the discussion has focused on about 5 to 10 pages.

J

So there was a lot of this that is not being questioned as either. Nobody who said it's less user-friendly.

J

Nobody has said, I don't think it's sustainable enough. I will now tell you the four topics where we'd love to just get your thoughts.

J

In addition to whatever else you want to tell us and here's what people are talking about during our visits.

J

Student housing, dormitory and size replacements, the definition and the tools I gave to you.

J

In a prior slide and what we've done to be honest,.

J

I think the reaction from the neighborhood's has been pretty good.. They have not complained about it.. The builders think they're strict.

J

They think that they are pretty strict and that they particularly don't like the spacing.

J

Requirements but I don't want to speak for them. They haven't had a long time to look at it and either have the neighbors and that's why there's another six weeks to look at it.

J

But there there are pushback on that. We've had you know.

J

Gee,, I guess you don't want any more student housing and the answer was well.

J

You can do a lot of housing and rent it to students.

J

We are being strict on four to five bedrooms, and the question is have been too strict on four to five bedrooms.

J

I explained the second one: this multi, this student housing zone district tree.

J

You can do bigger ones and not spread them out and have collar heights and not be subject the floor. Plate.

J

There is skepticism that the city will map that for very honest. there's skepticism.. It looks great. thank you. matter of fact.. No one has.

J

Objected to the new zone district, the logic behind if you're gonna tell us where it doesn't exist,.

J

Then, where you don't want, it then tell us where you do want it?.

J

There is skepticism that it will be a nice chapter written in here,, but it will never hit the zoning map of.

J

Bloomington there is skepticism over that and the ideas, if you shut down here and you don't open up there, I.

J

Have a heart time getting in where you're going with this third, this issue- and these are the two asterisks I gave you.

J

Duplexes triplexes and four corner four plexes on corner lots and the core neighborhoods has gotten a lot of pushback from the neighbors.

J

We don't have to do this., we couldn't whittle it back.. We could whittle the number of bedrooms.

J

We could hit all the number of units. here's the issue.

J

The issue is that, if you kind of say single-family zone districts should only ever have single-family homes.

J

That is between 50 and 70 percent of the land in every community in this community, and it is a large part of the housing.

J

That's going to be there ten years from now, 20 years from now, most communities that have this discussion say we need to find ways to 11 the edges or the middle, with that with more.

J

Opportunities to house more people now that's gotten to be around a very weak reception in bloomington.

J

But- and I this is still under discussion, what part of this would work or what part of not so there's a tension.

J

Single-Family should just be single-family and there's a very serious dasar gyu man that's been made, which is.

J

Even though you mean well- and it might not be the worst thing in the world to have a duplex or a triplex on the corner of my neighborhood.

J

I can point to many neighborhoods around america who have always had them and others who have them now and.

J

Think it's fine.. They do not feel ruined by this at all.

J

That's not the issue.. The issue is, do you then feed the the land value? Does everybody with a corner lock then think whoa.

J

I shouldn't even consider selling this to somebody for a house.. I got a four-plex a potential four-plex here now.

J

I'm talking big dollars. and what does that?

J

unintentionally due to the affordability and the erosion, and that is a strong argument, because your student housing market is so strong. The ax.

J

Pressures to maximize property value are so strong that, frankly,.

J

We are still thinking about whether that is the right thing to do, or what version of it.

J

Would be acceptable and we'd like we just want you to know about that., I'm being very candid.. It's gotten a very.

J

Unfriendly reception for most of the neighborhood so far.

J

Finally- and some have said actually, I would think you could allow them in some other way,, but not on corners.

J

I don't even think the corners are a good idea., so finally accessory dwelling units, as I've said before there are worries about that.

J

The real worry is that there'll be too many of em in a neighborhood.

J

We have we have said, I can't tell you neighbor cities that are repealing their accessory dwelling unit requirements.

J

Most of them are trying to allow more of them because it is not a bad way.. It's good.

J

Not only for people like me who have a son who finished college, but he hasn't got a job yet and he's living with me or a mother-in-law.

J

But we're also finding it used by people who live and moderate and low income areas who think if they could create a rental unit.

J

Student or non student, and it would help them, pay the mortgage and keep in there or young families that can't afford the house without.

J

An adu, but with the atu they could afford the house because of the rental unit, allows them to buy it.. So.

J

Once again, you asked us to tell us your opinion.: those are our opinions.

J

We do know that you've already decided, and you may not want to revisit that. I have only one slide here. Next steps.

J

This is a draft., I think, we've said it several times.

J

We welcome your comments. we've been out here. Six times. we'll be out here again.

J

And and as long as you want to have us come, but the we have.

J

Posted this on the web, we have said it's available for coming til april 30th.

J

The conversion map will be posted soon.

J

The conversion map says, if you are called x before you're gonna, be called y after and.

J

That is not gonna change, lot lines or zoning lines.. It is going. Excuse me, zoning district boundaries.

J

It's a one-to-one conversion.. It will not have the new zoning districts on it.

J

We have recommended that to you, because if we have a conversion map, it'll be posted and people be able to look.

J

Okay, they call me r3. Where is our three? I see oh,, it's actually the same thing as what I got now and same boundaries is where I have now.

J

But it'll help people understand. We recommend that you do that, because that keeps the public thinking about. Is this the right?.

J

Rulebook are these the right setbacks are the right height?.

J

So the right incentives do we have the tool kit. We need?.

J

Because the moment we try to roll in boundary changes on a zoning map into this discussion.

J

Nobody looks at the book they're all focused on the map and the disc of are these. The right rules gets all tangled up with?.

J

Do I want to move that lot, that zoning district line?, and so we recommend you do it in two stages?.

J

We're gonna post that we're going to then have revised it to have an adoption draft and that one and make further changes and that one will be ready for planning. Commission.

J

We do recommend- I think most of you know by now that the city, when this comes into effect.

J

Then go through a second remapping to apply the new zone districts and to consider what?.

J

Other changes are needed in order to implement the comp plan.

J

If you want to do em together, you can, but it usually extends the process a long time, because it's very hard to have a.

J

Debate about the map and the debate about the text at the same time., it gets very confusing.

J

And so that's our recommendation, but in the next month it'll be comments on this and the preparation of an adoption draft and the beginning of the process of officially.

J

Considering it as a proposal., thank you very much.

A

Thank you., mr. elliott are the questions from council?.

A

Trying to keep them brief if we could come I'm following.

G

Presentation, it's very interesting., I'm glad to see the progress looking forward to seeing it after in the summertime peer.

G

We heard in the debate over the pud at century village in the far east side of town from neighborhoods, who claimed that.

G

Analogy, did they not want the student housing there?, but that there would be no need for student housing that iu is going to be leveling off.? They tried to cite.

G

Current enrollment data and.

G

Projected or element data to say that in this coming decade., I you effectively b-flat.

G

Do we even need to create a student housing area if that's true?.

J

We've heard the same data,, I will tell you. I've heard that data in.

J

Bloomington more than I've heard of it in the other council.- I don't believe it., I'm just saying that.

J

I think one of the things what my friend my response is: twofold. hey,. If that's true, then dividing out the four and five bedrooms.

J

I'm saying you can't do it shouldn't be a problem at all, because in fact there should be declining demand for that going down the road.

J

I'm not sure I believe it one of the trump cards that bloomington and columbia, missouri and state college,, pennsylvania and ball state.

J

I grew up near muncie. Have is the car the university.

J

It's an enormous economic engine and it may be that the demographics are flattening out.

J

I am not at all convinced that enrollment is going to fall as a result of that.. I really have great con.

J

Think about the global economy think about what education means to being a player in the global economy.

J

The idea it may be that there are fewer freshmen, ten and fifteen years from now.

J

I doubt that there are going to be fewer students at the university of indiana. five ten years.

J

It may be more graduate students that maybe other people who are doing things.. Thank you.

J

Okay, the bigger question I have- and this is important to me- is that.

G

The whole argument, I'm not sure where the idea for a student housing zone came from.

G

But I find it to be objectionable to the extreme my residents, my constituents, our students.

G

How are they not equal citizens of bloomington?? Why do we segregate them?.

G

Why are we proposing that they be separated a different place of ly, creating?.

G

Co, creating a larger campus with indiana university.. That's a very good question.

J

And I think it has to do with names and perhaps my failure to explain it very well.

J

The proposal is not to limit where students can have housing in any question.

J

It may have been more accurate to, instead of calling it the student housing zone.

J

Call it the four and five bedroom and a lot of three bedroom whose own, because that's what it regulates. is that very.

J

Multiple bed of four and five things that are deliberately built for students. It.

J

Opens up opportunities for multi-family housing in smaller, smaller areas and student housing as well.

J

And those are allowed, students can rent in any of those things.

J

Why should we allow any more for in five bedroom units if the only.

G

People who use them are students, let them live in three bedroom or smaller.

G

Why should we even allow it at all the the pushback we've gotten? Is that, despite the debate over it?.

J

There is still a market for it and it is still more efficient to build four and five bedroom student housing than.

J

Three and two and three and two and one houses. I understand., thank you.

J

Other questions.

A

Sorry, yvonne that, thank you other questions, counsel.

A

Okay, seeing none. thank you very much., your status report, one comes. mr. baumann.

E

Yeah,, I was just looking at the coroner's and if you did corners in my neighborhood.

E

You would affect 33% of the of the housing stock, so you're gonna take 33% of the housing stock and up zone at radically.

E

That's a bad idea: it's gonna make the costs for individual homebuyers explode and it's gonna make the people that live next to those which is.

E

Everybody else in the neighborhood, because you got two houses on an alley: two houses an alley, so everybody lives next to one of those they're on the corners.

E

Are you cutting corners with ali's?.

J

No, I just come: I'm surprised at the house house.

J

You've been very eloquent throughout this process and in.

J

Stating the reasons why you think any form of duplex, triplex and four-plex is a bad idea in those areas.

J

I need to be honest, we have other people who have said in these earrings.. I think it's a good idea and that's why.

J

I just I was here when that zoning went in and it was a.

E

Commitment to the neighbors who and the people who bought in the neighborhood and they banked on it, they built on it.. They.

E

Invested on it and changing it under their feet., I.

E

See as a betrayal to people who invested in a neighborhood that needed people to invest in was all rental.

E

By the way, and was deteriorating because of the rental properties, so to go negative and go backwards.

E

I certainly don't want to see that.

A

Come summer fallin. you have a brief question.

G

You mentioned the rid briefly.. I didn't see it afterwards. At the beginning, you mentioned., I think, what the reduction in the use of peds.

G

Can you speak briefly about how will peds change under this new you do?.

J

Yes, beauties, unfortunately, are used a lot in this city and we think that's true for two reasons: a.

J

You've gotten used to negotiating and b. the ordinance doesn't make sense internally.

J

There's an awful lot of it that if I was a builder, I'd, look at those numbers., I can't make it work.

J

I got to talk about a pud. I can't I can't make that lotta size and that coverage work, that just it's not an all modern.. I can't build things.

J

So the bottom line is beauties, take a long time to negotiate.

J

And they also the the hidden part of it, usually by the time you get done, people are happy and they say good. We like.

J

That they get out of date, very quickly, or if they're not, they usually have to be amended.

J

Repeatedly as the market changes and therefore the part that a lot of the public doesn't see, they're engaged in the first part.

J

They don't see that after it's adopted., it takes an enormous amount of staff time to do it.

J

And even though it's got the merit of flexibility, I can keep amending it from the point of view of people who've already bought into it.. It's lack of predictability.

J

They told me it would be x, now. they've amended it again. now, they've amended it again. no, they've amended it again.. So.

J

Essentially, all over the country. I've been told to stop saying that, because bloomington is unique and everyone.

J

You know you are, but the point is oh, I don't have any client saying. I would like to do more peds. All of them say if we're gonna rewrite the rule book.

J

Let's figure out, which is own districts, which standards which incentives are the way we want to do business and.

J

Limit the amount of time we have to spend to not only negotiate these things, but then.

J

Administer them for a long long time in the future, because they're very.

J

Labor-Intensive and inefficient.

G

Let's follow up in other cities where their peds were in use.

G

Does this kind of work tend to reduce young people's use of them substantially?.

J

Substantially, the other part I didn't mention is to make sure that what you're asking for and the price of admission to the negotiation game.

J

Includes what you really want so part of it is.

J

If you want to come in and negotiate your own deal in bloomington, maybe it clearly needs to say we would like to see the following kinds of amenities: either greener buildings, greener development or.

J

We would like to see more some level of affordability.

J

You can't use this to get out of the affordability and we are going to list the things you need to do. You don't do.

J

Those things I don't want to be mean, but we're really not interested in engaging in the lengthy.

J

Negotiation to get you out of the things that really matter to the city., so very good.. Thank you.

A

Without any other questions, questions. okay. thank you.. Mr. elliott.

J

It's very helpful to us thanks.

J

Thank you,. Thank you.

A

And now we will go to council committee reports. Are there any.

A

Seeing none. we'll go to the public now.

A

So we have 20 minutes and.

A

We have one member of the public to ok about 5 minutes each.

K

Thank you. ok, hold on to your seats. This is going to be a compliment, a heartfelt one, an expression of appreciation of the extended family of toby, strong.

K

To the city council for proclaiming two weeks ago,.

K

And comeon to toby and the naming of south washington street between 2nd and 3rd, toby strong way.

K

I'm bob arnold for the record, the companion, dance partner and husband of toby for the 30 year period, during which she was the executive.

K

Director of middle way, house.. I particularly want to thank beginning with andy roth, who.

K

When I mentioned the street naming to him a couple of months ago said it's going to take the initiative to.

K

Claim meconium and then dave rolo joined with andy and taking the steps to get the proclamation.

K

Declare two weeks ago., I regret not being able to attend the meeting,, but I heard the.

K

Wfh be broadcast and the people who talked they've read the.

K

Encomium, you spoke also dave and he spoke about toby and susan spoke about toby and if I miss you in some name.

K

I want to thank you as well.. I also want to thank over here, who did some fine.

K

Editing of the material provided by middle-way house and also made sure that the proclamation.

K

Was in conformity with city council.

K

Guidelines so muchas gracias when a bra so.

K

Many thanks and a big hug to you all.

K

Thank you, mister enough.. It was an honor to know toby.

A

Please step up to the microphone and state your name,. Please.

L

Hi,, my name is daniel bingham.

L

I'd like to make a somewhat belated response to the mayor's state of the city. speech.

L

Sorry, for being so bladed., I had somewhat of a family emergency that took me out of commission for several weeks.

L

I very much appreciated that mayor hamilton made.

L

Sustainability such a big piece of his speech, and that his words at least.

L

Seemed to recognize how important it is that we respond to climate change in the next 10 years, 20 years, 30 years.

L

However,, I was deeply disappointed in the action. he proposed, following those words, a.

L

Task force to study creating a natural gas digester from our waste falls far far short of what we need to be doing.

L

Waste solid waste, in particular represents only about 3% of our emissions. I dug through and found.

L

Our 2016 emissions inventory that we did so that we can work with more.

L

Numbers that are more specific to us.. I've been going through that and actually generating.

L

Emissions targets for us based on the ipcc's cuts,, and I would love to present those to council.

L

Preferably before the garage vote, because they are extremely relevant to the decision on the garage and to all following decisions.

L

I've asked president rallo for time to do that, and I don't know if I'll be granted.

L

If not, I'll do my best to do it through public comment on the digester.

L

Natural gas is not so much more efficient in our bus fleet that we can really afford to be using it.. It's.

L

Depending on the studies, you look at it's at best about 22%, more efficient in greenhouse gases than diesel.

L

Some studies actually find that it is less efficient than diesel, depending on the conditions and the engine.

L

Newer diesel engines are a lot more efficient and the gains you get from using natural foot gas over diesel get a lot smaller.

L

It is a lot cleaner and particulate emissions. That's where its primary advantage over diesel is given that we need to cut emissions.

L

By 45% in ten years and get to zero in 30 years.

L

We need to be looking at electric buses or hydrogen buses, not.

L

Natural gas buses, if the digester takes materials, if we're gonna be setting up.

L

Compost, collection infrastructure in order to collect food waste from the city to feed into this digester. If that takes.

L

Compost that could have her food that could have been composted and fully sequestered.

L

Feeds it into that gesture to turn it into natural gas, which then gets combusted into an emitting as an emitting fuel.

L

There's actually a chance that this digester could increase our emissions at best.. It's gonna be small cuts.

L

If we're gonna be creating a task force to look at climate, the task force shouldn't be at a specific idea that.

L

You know seems shooting from the hip to be something that might work.. It should be a.

L

Comprehensive review of everything we're doing all our emissions and how we can make cuts to those to hit the ipcc's targets.

L

That's what we need to be doing right now, I'm doing a individuals who hasn't happens to have a physics degrees first pass at that.

L

But we need, you know the expertise of the city, government, people who have full-time jobs and the full.

L

You know full access to the research and the resources.

L

The resources of the city to be doing that research so that we can be making decisions on the basis of.

L

Here our emissions here, where we can make cuts here, are the things we can impact.

L

Just from a high-level point of view,.

L

56% of average american emissions, 28% grid, 17%, individual cars and trucks. 11% is natural gas combustion for home heating. That's 56 percent.. We could impact through an instable policy.

L

We need to be doing that.

L

If the mayor doesn't do this, then the city council needs to step up to do it. I.

L

Don't know what tools the city council has to direct the city government to do that. Research.

L

But if we're making decisions without an awareness of where our emissions are, where we can cut them, thinking about how to cut them and without an awareness of the goals.

L

We need to hit then we're gonna be making decisions that come back and bite us in the rear-end.

L

Like potentially building a parking garage that, based on the idea that it will be filled with cars, that will pay for the slots.

L

That doesn't end up getting filled because people stopped driving when gas goes up to $10 a gallon or $15 a gallon and could because.

L

It's getting carbon priced, we need to be thinking of everything we do. We need to be thinking of it through this lens.

L

A

Thank you. mr. bingham., and by the way, I replied to you to try to coordinate timing for you. Other comment from the public.

A

Okay, seeing none., we will now go to.

A

Appointments, the boards and commissions are there any.

A

Seeing none we will go to legislation for second reading and resolutions.

G

Mr. chair,, I move the ordinance 19:07 be introduced and read by title and synopsis only.

A

It's been moved and seconded ordinance, 19:07, be introduced and read by the clerk by title and snaps. Only all in favor., please., say aye aye any opposed.

A

With a clerk, please read.

B

His ordinance 19:07 amending title 15 of the bloomington municipal code.

B

Regarding updating permissible towing and storage fees for authorized towing services, plus you.

B

The synopsis is as follows: ordinance 1907, updates the maximum fees of authorizing.

B

Maximum authorized towing services may charge when performing city initiated toes.

B

At present, the city permits a maximum towing fee of 55 dollars for daytime towing.

B

$65 for nighttime, towing, $25 for dollying or $10 or $15 per days, storage.

B

Depending on whether or not the vehicles wrecked and a $15.00 per night retrieval charge,.

B

These maximum permissible fees have remained unchanged since.

B

2001 and therefore have fallen out of line with the maximum permissible fees utilized by all other government agencies in monroe county.

B

Ordinance 1907 updates and simplifies permissible maximum towing fees by authorizing a.

B

$125 based towing fee, regardless of the time the tows initiated, maintaining the existing $25 fee and updating permissible storage fees to.

B

$25 per day, regardless of whether or not the towed vehicle is wrecked, your due pass recommendation was seven zero, zero.

A

Thank you clerk. Mr. chair,, I move that ordinance 19:07 be adopted.

A

M

So members, michael rooker city attorney for the city of bloomington.

M

Ordinance 1907 proposes an update to the maximum permissible fees that may be charged when the city initiates of tow.

M

Have I done this again as opposed just come closer.

C

M

Thank you. I'll try to get I'll get this right eventually at some point.. I've done this enough. I should know by now,, but.

M

Anyways, 1907 updates the maximum permissible towing fees that the city's authorized towing partners may charge for city initiated toes.

M

At present, the city partners, with four companies to handle city initiated tows from the right-of-way and from other city facilities.

M

Those partners are auto mobile, towing., rick's, towing, ken's, westside, towing and hawkins towing.

M

Representatives from the tow companies are with with us here tonight, if you have questions for them later on.

M

I think it's important at the beginning here to distinguish between.

M

Public tows and private tows, and we've talked a little bit about this in the past.

M

This maximum rate covers only public toes., so that means toes that are initiated by the city of bloomington.

M

Private tows,, which are tows from private property., for example, from apartment, complex lots or restaurant lots.

M

Those aren't covered by these caps., so this covers only public tows.

M

But what this ordinance does do is it increases the maximum rates that may be charged by the city's telling partners.

M

Last year the city's towing partners reached out and pointed out to us that our fees appeared to be out of line.

M

With those fees that are permitted by other public agencies in monroe county.

M

As you can see from the chart on your screen after we dug into it a little bit, we discovered that that was in fact.

M

The case the base fee that is permitted for a public tow.

M

By monroe county by indiana university by the indiana state police and by the town of elet's, ville is one hundred and twenty five dollars.

M

The city of bloomington's fees right now are capped at fifty five dollars for a daytime tow and sixty five dollars for a nighttime tow.

M

Ordinance 1907 proposes an increase to bring it into line with the other public agencies to bring it to one hundred and twenty-five dollars.

M

Similarly, ordinance 1907 proposes increasing the per day storage fee to twenty-five dollars, as you can see,.

M

The current fees are $10 for operable vehicles and.

M

$15 for wrecked vehicles- again,, that's quite out of line with the other public agencies in monroe county.

M

Ordinance 1907 also eliminates the night retrieval charge.

M

To simplify the ordinance so that it's a to simplify the fee structure so that it's a little bit more.

M

Digestible for members of the public and easier for our towing partners to administer.

M

It's important for the city to to keep the maximum permissible rates that our partners may charge fair.

M

We value the relationships that we have with our towing partners and we also.

M

We also want to make sure that they can pay their employees a fair wage.

M

And that they can provide them with appropriate safety equipment and proper towing equipment.

M

You know,, I don't want to minimize what ordinance 1907 does any fee increases a fee increase, but really in many ways. This is just a housekeeping provision.

M

It's important for the city to periodically examine all of the fees that exist in the city code, and this is just another another one.

M

Of those fees., this one had clearly growing grown stale., so we're asking the city council to update it tonight.

M

Thank you for your time in consideration., I'm happy to answer any questions, and so our folks from the towing companies.

A

Thank you. mr. roker.. Are there questions from counsel?

A

mr. simms? Thank you.

F

And I want to thank you for the presentation and the comments that we got from some of our operators a couple weeks ago.

F

I think, and it's true that us.

F

Considering the the cap fee will.

F

May ensure that the safety has been met and maintained that we get fair wages for our operators,. But my question is with the cab.

F

Does that mean that the charge of the.

F

The maximum charge of 125 dollars will be charged every time or is there a.

F

Variation built in can there be a tow where it'll be 75 bucks for an example?.

F

Is that such a thing?, I mean I don't I'm asking because I don't know and I'm not advocating one way or the other at this point,, but.

M

Legally, the ordinance only sets a cap.

L

Certainly,, you could ask members from the industry how frequently people don't charge at the cap,, but.

M

Legally, that one of them can respond if they won't or when they come up here,, but it is it 125. Every time.

N

Again,, my name is ken parrish, with ken's westside services, towing, here,, bloomington,.

N

I represent in the four companies here tonight and here to answer any questions that you guys might have.

N

Customer sam's, you asked about what are the rates that would be or could be? yeah.

N

What they're asking about the the maximum tow rate?

N

There is a little hidden stuff in there that may not, and I'm here to be honest with you to tell you exactly what it is.

N

The the tophi itself is for us to attach to the vehicle and tow it back to our yard from the scene.

N

There are specialty equipment, a lot of times, that's needed and used on scene at times.

N

That need that need to be added to that. A lot of times would be maybe some winching fees to recover a vehicle out of a ditch or.

N

To recover it back onto its wheels., so you'll have some winching or labor time to make that happen.

N

Those usually range anywhere from 25 to.

N

$125 on their own and when I say that in certain areas in bloomington, the city.

N

Kind of goes on the outskirts. there's some deep ravines culverts.

N

Ditches so and so forth, it takes a little bit of labor on our end to get those out of those ditches and ravines to be able to tow.

N

The rates we're talking about tonight is just simply the hub and tow away.

N

Another additional fee that may be tacked on top of that would be dollies and if you guys are familiar with that.

N

Dollies is another tool that we have on our trucks that.

N

I'd probably say 75% of vehicles that we tow in today's industry are all-wheel drive or four-wheel drive.

N

You can't just hook one side of it and tow it into town, because it'll do damage to.

N

You know all kinds of driveline issues with it because they have to be off off the ground.

N

We can't always send a flatbed truck, as you guys have seen the roll. The roll off tread, roll back trucks.

N

Whatever, where you just roll it up and then all four tires are sustained off the ground of gone.

N

A lot of times is because the recovery efforts on those certain trucks are limited.. We can't reach certain vehicles.. The wire rope is shorter.

N

It has less pulling power to do certain towing and recovery efforts., so we have to also have a tow truck versus a rollback.

N

Okay., so on a tow truck,, we have a tool called dollies that we build on it.

N

We mount it underneath the back view or whichever end. we hook. This end.

N

We have to apply the dollars to the other end, to pick the vehicle up about three inches off the ground.

N

So they don't roll and they actually roll on a set of tires that we mount the underneath. It.

N

I'm pretty confident that all four of our companies we charge about 25 bucks.

N

To allow for that labor and it takes about 30 well.

N

Let me just say different people. As far as experience can take anywhere from 10 minutes to 30 minutes to hook up the dollars.

N

Also depends on how much damage there is to the vehicle whether the tires are flat been busted broke.

N

Sometimes it takes a little more effort to make that happen.

N

Also, another charge is what we call skates to educate you that a little bit on a flatbed vehicle, the wrecker, that we pull.

N

Again during accidents of this sort.

N

We have very helpful firemen police departments and so on so forth,, okay.

N

Unbeknownst to them at times someone will get in an accident.. They will help get this individual into an ambulance, send them on their way.

N

They will try to get some personal items for these people their purse, their wallet their.

N

Keys to the car when they take those keys to the car, I can no longer, and neither can any of us get this vehicle into neutral to roll it up onto the bed.

N

Okay,, so it's locked into gear again.

N

It's not our job to determine how crashed how damaged whether this vehicle is totaled.. That's not our job.

N

Our job is to tow it back to our facility, in the same condition in which we received it not to create more damage to.

N

It which will ensure more damage to or cost it to, the person.

N

So we have what they call skates and they're, basically really strong and slick.

N

Slide pads that we take a sledgehammer and drive underneath the tires.

N

To allow the vehicle to slide across the asphalt and up onto our bed.

N

Without doing damage to the drive lines of these vehicles over tariff tires or tear up anything else. okay,, so we charge an extra additional.

N

$25 we try to keep it even with the dollars. no different than that.. There used to slide the vehicle onto the bid.

N

They're also used to slide the vehicle off of our bed, so we can unload it once we get back to our storage facility.

N

Trying to think any other additional fees that may be there.

N

Am I missing anything gentlemen? Pardon.

N

Oil dry and clean it we do charge for cleanup generally most accidents.. We have to put the road back in the same condition.

N

That was before the accident. Again. we've got debris.

N

Car pieces, all kinds of oil coolant so and so forth.

N

Generally and typically a nice rounded number again is 25. We try to keep this number consistent for everything.

N

For one we're trying to relay this to the police department as well. they're, trying to keep record of all of this.

N

If it's not a major accident,, we've got minor cleanup.. We try to keep it around $25 at minimum.

N

Again,, this is another fee that may or may not be on the list.

N

But as a respect to all of you and the public, we try to keep a minimal fee to it.

N

You're, probably not going to see a $250 cleanup bill on a simple accident for the simple fact that.

N

Those are major, catastrophic accidents we're going to bring in crews.. We don't normally have an oil spill down the highway because of two small cars.

N

That's going to consist of you know, guys and 800 lb bags of oil dry and.

N

Cleanup crews and hazmat, and all that stuff. we're we're addressing small and minor incidents. we're also addressing.

N

Toe ins, as for as I don't know how to explain it, but duis.

N

Proofing proper of insurance., this is the kind of things that bloomington police department is.

N

Trying to keep our rates capped and, at a certain rate, I.

N

Know also that.

N

If the bloomington police department doesn't send an actual towing sheet for this.

N

If it's not justified by them to tow it in on their own,, they don't. Our rates technically are not regulated.

N

If it's just a fender bender accident, technically these rates don't apply to what the city government allows.. They just simply call the companies on par like ourselves.

N

That are also going to have a conscience and not try to take care of these, be there take advantage of these certain people that.

N

Being said, that's why I am very.

N

Extremely happy that we have four towing companies, that's on this rotation for bloomington police department, currently that are able to get along.

N

We have conversations together., we talk about our rates.. We try to keep everything the same.

N

That way, whatever I do concerning the bloomington police department, they do as well.

N

These are conversations that believe it or not happen, quite often for the simple fact that.

N

We appreciate the fact that the time that you guys will take to us to listen to what we want to get our rates to.

N

Back to where we can actually make a living, we can also pay a rate to an employee, that's worth being out there and.

N

Justify their time in their effort at that time., we don't want to be accused of taking advantage of the public as well.

N

So we kind of have a little integrity in which we want to keep with you, people as well.

N

With that being said,, is there anything any questions that you guys may have?.

A

Thank you for that information.. I think we have another question.. Mr. simms, our councilmember simms were you?. Thank you.

A

Did that answer? yes., okay, councilmember ruff is next.

O

Question I think, for mr. rooker.

O

We met last year, I think in tom start begin talking about the.

O

Some of the issues related to private towing that have that have come up and.

O

Some people refer to some of the incidents involved as predatory towing. We talked about the issues that we might want to address eventually, as a city.

O

Things like private tours not taking not taking credit cards, volunteen cash.

O

Making it difficult to retrieve vehicles because I'm having hours of x those kinds of issues we discussed, is there any.

O

Kind of overlap at all between those issues we were discussing about working towards a city ordinance, maybe modeling it on.

O

Indianapolis, what they did recently and this.

O

Tolling distance city initiated towing, you know,, I think the short answer to that question is no,. I think you're right.

M

There are some cities around indiana that that regulate they have what we call predatory, towing, ordinances.

M

Columbus indianapolis being a couple of prominent examples. The bloomington does not at this time.

M

But you know the I hate to be totally blunt in front of all these folks, but the remedy for the city when we run into our towing.

M

Contractors who aren't handling their obligations appropriately or we're getting reports from the public that they're doing inappropriate things.

M

Our remedy is to sever ties with those companies to say you're no longer on the towing rotation.

M

We're cancelling our contract and you're not going to be part of you're, not gonna, be one of our towing partners anymore,. You know.

M

Unfortunately, we have had to do a couple of times, but that's the solution we use when we have our towing partners who aren't living up to their end of the obligations that are imposed in our contracts and by.

M

By the city, council and.

O

And so thank you for that response., so they you know,, I really felt like they were separate. That's one reason.

O

I'm I didn't yet pursue this further, that we should clean up our city.

O

Side of things before we move on and and deal with.

O

Anything we might do on the private, towing side,, but my question.

O

Related but but different is so, the payment is the city ever involved in in any of the the payments. The.

O

Costs that are associated with one of these city initiated tows.

O

For example, the general from gentleman from ken's mentioned to clean up right well,.

O

When that is billed what, if we know what, if a person's position is, I shouldn't been charged for that that.

O

That little bit of cleanup from a minor accident or something. where's, that tacked on to the city ever involved in the actual exchange?.

O

Or transaction at all. yeah.

M

As well, the general answer is that we are not. We do sometimes get contacted by members of the public who have.

M

Want to mention a particular situation that they've had and in those situations lots of times.

M

We'll review it with the police department. and with the towing company that was involved to make sure that everything was done appropriately.

M

But, generally speaking, the answer is no.

N

As far as the cleanup and some of these extra fees and charges.

N

Please understand there are. There are a lot of folks that we deal with who?.

N

This vehicle is their only mode of transportation. They have know whether they also have very low income.

N

Okay, they do not have insurance.

N

Unfortunately, they don't have the means to contact anyone.

N

These maximum rates are set simply to keep us. Who are honest more honest, so we don't try to gouge them.

N

So also that we don't do the predatory, towing and some of the issues and problems that I know every one of you have heard and talked and dealt about.

N

With the private, towing and predatory towing, the four of us, that's on your list., do not do that type of towing.

N

There's a lot of reasons why I'd rather not get into it at this time that we don't okay,.

N

We have the choice as business owners to charge less.

N

If we choose to, if someone comes in to us and says listen,, that's my only car.

N

I know it's cleanup fee and the tow fee and this and that I promise you for me to try to take the title to that car dispose of that car.. It actually cost me more money.

N

To try to dispose of that car and take that car from this individual cost me money. I.

N

Would rather take a lower payment or whatever form I can get from them and allow them to have their car back as to me, have to go through the paperwork.

N

To try to dispose of said vehicle because most of the time- and I mean this and no disrespect any people.

N

They don't even have the title of the car, they don't have the means to it.. They don't know where it's at it was gifted to them. Their mom bought it their dad bought. It.

N

They can't come up with it and plainly they're not going to and.

N

They're gonna be very belligerent and angry with me because I towed it in and because I had this astronomical fee.

N

Which, in fact, is just enough for us to just try to get by.

N

We've already talked about the reasons why we want the rates changed.

N

It is our choice at that time, depending on the situation, whether or not we allow them to have that at a cheaper rate.. I.

N

Know standing here in front of you- and I know every one of these guys here has also been on an accident scene.

N

To where I have some coming up to me, a young mother, single mother or.

N

A single individual doing whatever and go man.. How much is it gonna cost from you just told my car back to my house?.

N

And we tell them this is how much it is.. This is our rates, whether it's a bloomington police department or whether it's for indiana state,, beltsville,.

N

Whoever and we say $125 and they're gone all my gosh.. I don't have that.

N

What do you have? I?

N

mean? I got $60 to my name.. Where do you live?.

N

I'm probably gonna take it to their house for 60 bucks. If that's what they got.

N

Because I promise you for us to go through paperwork and follow the guidelines that the state puts and forth in front of us to acquire.

N

Disposal liens to get rid of the car that we don't home, that's been abandoned in our lot.

N

To acquire all this information and the time that takes 60 to 90 days for us to acquire that we now have to make room.

N

In our lot for these cars, it's cheaper, simpler and easier for everyone to let them have their car back and move on our way.

N

Going about the next one., they give us $60 generally.

N

I would probably just give that to my driver and I will wipe it away.

N

That's just how I do business and more than likely, if you pulled each one of these guys up here,.

N

They're going to tell you that's exactly what happens with their a lot as well.

N

Okay, these rates and we're asking for you tonight are just to simply keep us honest.

N

No different than the other departments and everybody else. does it keeps everybody honest?.

N

You guys have already seen on the private towing how.

N

The rate fees are astronomical, the fees in which they ask these people to pay this out of hand, and I.

N

Am very excited to see that you guys are going to address this at a later time.

N

And I think you have a gentleman right here. that is.

N

Very eager to get in that with you, if you guys ever want an opinion or anything. you're welcome to call me.. I.

N

Will give you that any other questions, thank you.

A

Yeah,, thank you so much for your information.. Thank you very much for that explanation.

A

Council members, you know for all those reasons, wouldn't you also confess that you might let her take that back because you're, a pretty nice guy.

E

Well,, I was just gonna, ask I know by experience,. You also tell people to park illegally.

E

Feather what that park illegally? Isn't that part of the towing process, too.

E

I perkily know you tow people who park you leave parking legally. yes.. I had that experience, not long ago.. Yes,.

N

Conversation, if an officer deems that it's parked illegally,, not my opinion.

N

That is probably that's. That's what I wanted to know that you're always called by an officer.

E

Yes, and then you don't and then we tell it that's correct.. That's.

N

Thank you. yep.. Thank you. Other questions,, okay,.

A

Seeing none. we'll go to the public, an ordinance.

A

1907, if there's any public comment step out.

A

Seeing no public comments we'll come back to council for final comment and a recommendation.

A

Come summer sandberg.

D

This week we got to hear about the important work that you do and the safety issues and that you're actually now kind of considered first responders.

D

And I found that to be educational and interesting. I was grateful to get that background, and tonight we hear that you often are called on to ask as.

D

Social workers- and so I'm also equally informed by that it kind of sparks some other thoughts about again low-income individuals who find themselves in difficult situations, and you know,.

D

I think looking at working harder and.

D

Falling behind these are, these are tough calls that you all have to make you have to make your livings.

D

But then there are some people out there that are that, are they have it pretty tough.

D

And so I appreciate your empathy and your your kindness with respect to those those situations. so, thank you. I'll, be in support.

A

Thank you. Other county council comment, councilmember sampson.

F

Thank you.- and I too wanted to thank everyone for their comments.

F

The reason I asked a question earlier.

F

And let's just face it,, I mean many of us up here, we're pretty well blessed. You need to talk my car.

F

I'm going to call triple-a or somebody else and we're just going to get it done.

F

Many people in our community do not have that luxury and I think, from our standpoint, from a progressive.

F

Policy standpoint that we have to look deeper than that, and I am satisfied with the answers that we've talked about and we have for a couple weeks and I appreciate it.

F

But that was the genesis of my questions.

F

We can do certain things,, but they have to be right for.

F

As many as we can so, thank you very much and I will support this as well.. Thank you. Other council comment.

A

I'll just say thank you. mr. roker for bringing forward this.

A

Housekeeping measures, and thank you all for your patience. this evening, was a bit longer than we anticipated.

A

So with that, with someone like to make the call the question.

A

Okay, the questions be called and second, it will.

A

The clerk please call the roll. yes. councilman burress., yes,.

B

Chopra, yes, piedmon smith., yes, rallo., yes, bolon.

B

Simms yes. mr. baum. yes, sandburg. yes. thank you.. Thank you.

A

The ordinate ordinance 1907 is adopted, 8 0.. Thank you very much.

B

There was zero.

A

Pardon me seven: seven zero., I'm sorry., I forgot. we're missing two: seven: zero adobe.

A

And by the way,, the committee recommendation last time was seven: zero. Zero wasn't five zero three and it was a mistake.

A

All right. there is no legislation for first reading.

A

We have time for additional public comment for those who haven't spoken. okay?.

A

Now we'll go to council schedule.

A

Mr. chairman, we have a word session potentially.

P

Q

Think will generally generate a lot of interest and that's the regulation of.

Q

Shared used, scooters and the other has to do with appropriation of funds that were buried last year,. So first, do you want to.

A

So vance, I think, so. okay looks like we've got at least four people.

A

Pretty good, so that will be noon friday. The 22nd in this room.

A

Anything else, mr. sherman.

A

All in favor of a journey I were adjourned.