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HomeMy WebLinkAboutAGENDApacket__10-25-23_0546_536       NOTICE OF MEETING REGULAR MEETING STRATEGIC PLANNING ADVISORY COMMISSION      Chairman Patrick Garman  Vice Chairman Geoff Yazzetta Commissioner Kevin Beck Commissioner Bernie Hoenle Commissioner Jill Keefe VACANT Commissioner Phil Sveum      TIME:4:00 P.M. – REGULAR MEETING WHEN:WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 25, 2023 WHERE:FOUNTAIN HILLS COUNCIL CHAMBERS 16705 E. AVENUE OF THE FOUNTAINS, FOUNTAIN HILLS, AZ Commissioners of the Town of Fountain Hills will attend either in person or by telephone conference call; a quorum of the Town’s Council,  various Commission, Committee or Board members may be in attendance at the Commission meeting. Notice is hereby given that pursuant to A.R.S. §1-602.A.9, subject to certain specified statutory exceptions, parents have a right to consent before the State or any of its political subdivisions make a video or audio recording of a minor child. Meetings of the Commission are audio and/or video recorded and, as a result, proceedings in which children are present may be subject to such recording. Parents, in order to exercise their rights may either file written consent with the Town Clerk to such recording, or take personal action to ensure that their child or children are not present when a recording may be made. If a child is present at the time a recording is made, the Town will assume that the rights afforded parents pursuant to A.R.S. §1-602.A.9 have been waived.    REQUEST TO COMMENT   The public is welcome to participate in Commission meetings. TO SPEAK TO AN AGENDA ITEM, please complete a Request to Comment card, located in the back of the Council Chambers, and hand it to the Executive Assistant prior to discussion of that item, if possible. Include the agenda item on which you wish to comment. Speakers will be allowed three contiguous minutes to address the Commission. Verbal comments should be directed through the Presiding Officer and not to individual Commissioners. TO COMMENT ON AN AGENDA ITEM IN WRITING ONLY, please complete a Request to Comment card, indicating it is a written comment, and check the box on whether you are FOR or AGAINST and agenda item, and hand it to the Executive Assistant prior to discussion, if possible.      Strategic Planning Advisory Commission Meeting of October 25, 2023 1 of 2          1.CALL TO ORDER – Chairman Garman     2.ROLL CALL – Chairman Garman     3.CALL TO THE PUBLIC Pursuant to A.R.S. §38-431.01(H), public comment is permitted (not required) on matters NOT listed on the agenda. Any such comment (i) must be within the jurisdiction of the Commission, and (ii) is subject to reasonable time, place, and manner restrictions. The Commission will not discuss or take legal action on matters raised during Call to the Public unless the matters are properly noticed for discussion and legal action. At the conclusion of the Call to the Public, individual commissioners may (i) respond to criticism, (ii) ask staff to review a matter, or (iii) ask that the matter be placed on a future Commission agenda.     4.REPORTS BY COMMISSIONERS AND TOWN MANAGER     5.CONSIDERATION AND POSSIBLE ACTION: Approval of the minutes of the Regular Meeting of September 27, 2023.       6.UPDATE: from Workgroups.    7.DISCUSSION AND POSSIBLE ACTION: Future Agenda Topics.    8.COMMENTS FROM THE CHAIRMAN     9.NEXT MEETING DATE: Wednesday, November 29, 2023.    10.ADJOURNMENT     CERTIFICATE OF POSTING OF NOTICE The undersigned hereby certifies that a copy of the foregoing notice was duly posted in accordance with the statement filed by the Strategic Planning Advisory Commission with the Town Clerk. Dated this ______ day of October 2023. _____________________________________________  Angela Padgett-Espiritu, Executive Assistant The Town of Fountain Hills endeavors to make all public meetings accessible to persons with disabilities. Please call 480-816-5199 (voice) or 1-800-367-8939 (TDD) 48 hours prior to the meeting to request a reasonable accommodation to participate in the meeting or to obtain agenda information in large print format. Supporting documentation and staff reports furnished the Commission with this agenda are available for review in the Town Manager's Office.    Strategic Planning Advisory Commission Meeting of October 25, 2023 2 of 2 ITEM 4. TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS STAFF REPORT    Meeting Date: 10/25/2023 Meeting Type: Strategic Planning Advisory Commission Agenda Type:                   Submitting Department: Administration Prepared by: Angela Padgett-Espiritu, Executive Assistant to Manager, Mayor/Council Staff Contact Information: Request to Strategic Planning Advisory Commission (Agenda Language):  REPORTS BY COMMISSIONERS AND TOWN MANAGER Staff Summary (Background) Form Review Form Started By: Angela Padgett-Espiritu Started On: 09/25/2023 06:05 PM Final Approval Date: 09/25/2023  ITEM 5. TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS STAFF REPORT    Meeting Date: 10/25/2023 Meeting Type: Strategic Planning Advisory Commission Agenda Type:                   Submitting Department: Administration Prepared by: Angela Padgett-Espiritu, Executive Assistant to Manager, Mayor/Council Staff Contact Information: Request to Strategic Planning Advisory Commission (Agenda Language):  CONSIDERATION AND POSSIBLE ACTION: Approval of the minutes of the Regular Meeting of September 27, 2023.   Staff Summary (Background) The intent of approving meeting minutes is to ensure an accurate account of the discussion and action that took place at the meeting for archival purposes. Approved minutes are placed on the town's website and maintained as permanent records in compliance with state law.   Staff Recommendation(s) Staff recommends approving the minutes of the regular meeting on September 27, 2023. SUGGESTED MOTION MOVE to approve the minutes of the regular meeting on September 27, 2023. Attachments SUMMARY MINUTES AND VERBATIM TRANSCRIPT  Form Review Form Started By: Angela Padgett-Espiritu Started On: 09/25/2023 06:05 PM Final Approval Date: 09/25/2023  TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS MINUTES OF THE REGULAR MEETING OF THE STRATEGIC PLANNING ADVISORY COMMISSION September 27, 2023 1. CALL TO ORDER Vice Chairman Geoff Yazzetta called to order the meeting of the Strategic Planning Advisory Commission at 4:00 p.m. 2. ROLL CALL Members Present: Vice Chairman Geoff Yazzetta; Commissioner Kevin Beck; Commissioner Jill Keefe; Commissioner Bernie Hoenle; Commissioner Phil Sveum Members Absent: Chairman Patrick Garman; Commissioner Cynthia Magazine Staff Present: Interim Town Manager Rachael Goodwin; Development Services Director John Wesley; Chief Financial Officer David Pock; Executive Assistant Angela Padgett-Espiritu 3. CALL TO THE PUBLIC Pursuant to A.R.S. §38-431.01(H), public comment is permitted (not required) on matters NOT listed on the agenda. Any such comment (i) must be within the jurisdiction of the Council, and (ii) is subject to reasonable time, place, and manner restrictions. The Council will not discuss or take legal action on matters raised during Call to the Public unless the matters are properly noticed for discussion and legal action. At the conclusion of the Call to the Public, individual councilmembers may (i) respond to criticism, (ii) ask staff to review a matter, or (iii) ask that the matter be placed on a future Council agenda. No one from the public spoke 4. REPORTS BY COMMISSIONERS AND TOWN MANAGER Interim Town Manager Rachael Goodwin Commissioner Kevin Beck Commissioner Jill Keefe Commissioner Bernie Hoenle Vice Chairman Geoff Yazzetta Commissioner Phil Sveum - Commissioner Beck mentioned putting his Fountain Hills house up for sale but plans to stay on the Commission. - The Commissioner Hoenle/Chairman Garman workgroup gave an update on outreach to nonprofits about collaboration opportunities. They met with the Chamber about nonprofit communication and archiving capabilities. - Commissioner Keefe has been working on the Fountain Hills Leadership Academy. - Commissioner Sveum commented that the new urban garden area looks impressive. 5. CONSIDERATION AND POSSIBLE ACTION: Approval of the minutes of the Regular Meeting of August 23, 2023. MOVED BY Commissioner Kevin Beck to approve the minutes of August 23, 2023, Strategic Planning Advisory Commission Meeting, SECONDED BY Commissioner Phil Sveum. Vote: 5 – 0 passed – Unanimously 6. UPDATE: Fountain Hills 2022 Strategic Plan Implementation. • Chief Financial Officer David Pock • Development Services Director John Wesley Here is a summary of the key points from the attached meeting notes: - Chief Financial Officer David Pock provided updates on the town's financial strategies: - Public meetings have been held to communicate finances to the public. More meetings planned. - A 5-year financial plan was published. Long-term rental tax sunsets in 2025 which will impact budgets. - Short-term rental tracking and permitting is being implemented. Currently around 375 active. - Facility reserve planning is still in progress to fund maintenance and repairs. - Grant writing support has not been engaged yet but may be useful for police/fire grants. - Development Director John Wesley discussed economic development and permit streamlining: - Environmental sustainability plan was completed. - Online permitting system has helped streamline the process. An annual builder’s forum provides feedback. - Efforts are being made to facilitate development projects and improve zoning processes. - Permit process streamlining metrics are not defined but can be revisited in the next strategic plan. - Upcoming builders forum scheduled for November. Input welcome on improving the permit process. - Discussion on zoning approval decisions and whether uses match community goals. 7. UPDATE: from Workgroups. Here is a summary of the key points from the attached meeting notes on work group updates: - Commissioner Beck offered to assist the Hoenle/Garman workgroup with upcoming tasks. - The Yazzetta/Sveum/Keefe workgroup is planning a public workshop for November 5th to gather input on priorities using pairwise comparison. - They are also considering doing a community survey and may collaborate with the other workgroup on this. - Commissioner Beck suggested having a forward plan for each meeting so progress is tracked. - Commissioner Keefe proposed a workshop for the committee to review the current strategic plan and identify areas for improvement. 8. DISCUSSION AND POSSIBLE ACTION: Future Agenda Topics Here is a summary of the key points from the attached meeting notes on proposed future agenda topics: - Regular updates requested on the Dark Sky Discovery Center funding status given the deadline to utilize state funding. - An update was requested on the Town Center specific plan, with interest in taking a deeper dive into amenities and development opportunities there. - The Dark Sky Discovery Center funding status seems to be nearing an important milestone that may require changes or action. Monitoring this was made an explicit request. - The Town Center is an area of ongoing discussion and interest related to the strategic plan. Reviewing the specific plan and development opportunities was requested. - No other future topics were proposed in these notes. 9. COMMENTS FROM THE CHAIRMAN Here is a summary of the key points from the comments on Vice Chairman Yazzetta's agenda item: - Cynthia Magazine has resigned from the Strategic Planning Advisory Commission after serving since around 2019. - Yazzetta read her statement thanking the Commission and highlighting its development under Patrick's leadership. - Yazzetta and the Commission thanked Magazine for her long service and contributions. - The Town Clerk has begun recruitment to backfill Magazine's position. One application received so far. - The vacancy is expected to be filled by the November Commission meeting. - The mayor will recognize Magazine's service at the November 21st council meeting, which the Commission is encouraged to attend. 10. NEXT MEETING DATE: Wednesday, October 25, 2023 11. ADJOURNMENT MOVED BY Commissioner Kevin Beck to adjourn the meeting of the September 27, 2023, Strategic Planning Advisory Commission Meeting, SECONDED BY Commissioner Jill Keefe. Vote: 5 – 0 passed – Unanimously Vice Chairman Geoff Yazzetta adjourned the regular meeting at 5:03 p.m. TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS SEPTEMBER 27, 2023 STRATEGIC PLANNING ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING MINUTES Page 1 of 31 Post-Production File Town of Fountain Hills Strategic Planning Advisory Committee Meeting Minutes September 27, 2023 Transcription Provided By: eScribers, LLC * * * * * Transcription is provided in order to facilitate communication accessibility and may not be a totally verbatim record of the proceedings. * * * * * TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS SEPTEMBER 27, 2023 STRATEGIC PLANNING ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING MINUTES Page 2 of 31 VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Okay. Let's call this meeting to order. Today is the September 27th, 2023, meeting of the Strategic Planning Advisory Commission. Angela, may I have a roll call? PADGETT-ESPIRITU: Yes. Thank you, Vice Chair. Chairman Garman. Vice Chairman Yazzetta. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Here. PADGETT-ESPIRITU: Commissioner Beck. BECK: Here. PADGETT-ESPIRITU: Commissioner Hoenle. HOENLE: Here. PADGETT-ESPIRITU: Commissioner Keefe. KEEFE: Here. PADGETT-ESPIRITU: Commissioner Magazine. And Commissioner Sveum I hope I didn't butcher your last name. Okay. Sorry. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Okay. We have a quorum. Agenda item number 3 is call to the public. Angela, do we have any speaker cards? PADGETT-ESPIRITU: We do not. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: No speaker cards. Moving on to agenda item number 4. Reports by commissioners and town manager. I think I'll start on my right and welcome Interim Town Manager Rachael Goodwin to her first Strategic Planning Advisory Commission meeting. So, take it away. GOODWIN: Thanks for having me. It's exciting. I'm very familiar with back and what you know the function and the role is, but I am excited to be here and hear more directly from you guys and what projects you have going on and where you're working and you're -- but I don't really have an update other than if there's other questions that I can help with. I know we have several presentations tonight from two of our directors here, so I'm looking forward to their update and sharing what the staff has been TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS SEPTEMBER 27, 2023 STRATEGIC PLANNING ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING MINUTES Page 3 of 31 working on. And so -- VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Thank you so much. Commissioner Beck, welcome back. BECK: Oh, I forgot how -- there we go. Hello. Thank you. Two things for me. One, in dealing with the upcoming surveys and so forth that we'll be doing, you know, with the strategic planning, the plan that's coming up, talked to a couple of people and they've recommended considering vision of Fountain Hills that evidently there's no one sharing that right. There's nobody really doing this kind of defunk. But in the past, it was a how do you say a representative of citizens, maybe a little bit far away from the -- or thought to be thought a away a little way from the council. So it wasn't as much the government talking to people, it was actually just the -- well, I guess it'd be a nonprofit or whatever group. And it sounded kind of intriguing. They do have a little money in the budget. And it's just sitting there. So that might be something for us to consider as we go through the surveys. You know, we'll do that but maybe have them do additional, it might -- why not, but -- Commissioner Hoenle: Umm -- BECK: You want to say something? Commissioner Hoenle: Yeah. BECK: Not a good idea? HOENLE: No, I'm just asking -- a comment out of turn here, back on that one since you just mentioned it is we used to have three committee members that were on that group. BECK: Ah. HOENLE: So it was a pretty tight connection. And the discussion isn't as restrictive as being on the government side. So it was more of a citizens and public and business and all that sort of a group. So yeah, it's a nice group. And I think after the last plan, like almost everybody else, they just took a pause. So it's been around a while. BECK: Well, it's intriguing, you know. Anyway, second thing's a little more personal and TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS SEPTEMBER 27, 2023 STRATEGIC PLANNING ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING MINUTES Page 4 of 31 it's kind of strange, but I did want to let you know that we put our house up for sale here in Arizona. We're out on Firerock Estates area there, and backing up Red Mountain. And we love it. But being gone for four months, I got every animal in the world in my backyard, my Ring cameras -- I had mountain lion cubs in my pool swimming, attacking my robot, and tearing it up. And it's just tough. Huge place. And working. And it was great. But now that my wife and I are retired, we're going to downsize. I'm only saying that because I want to make -- if anyone comes by our house, they're going to see a big sign for sale. And it might be tough. And we do have a place in Indiana. And I guess I have not seen my wife so happy in a while to be with the grandkids, so I'd like to continue that. We'll probably be there a lot, but that doesn't mean anything. Probably, we'll downsize. Stay here. I will -- I'm planning to stay on the commission if that's all right. More, I just wanted to let you know so no one's surprised that, you know, the house is for sale and what are you doing type thing. Yeah. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Thank you. BECK: But I will keep you posted. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: That's Commissioner Keefe. KEEFE: Well, that's exciting. Congratulations. BECK: Oh, yeah. I don't want to be a Hoosier but have to find something. KEEFE: I don't have nearly that much excitement to report. In terms of community activity, I've been very heads down working on the Fountain Hills Leadership Academy. It's in it's -- approaching its third week now and things are going very well. It's a great group. And in terms of small business life, we're starting to see, and crossing our fingers, for the return of the snowbird flock. That's it. HOENLE: We had our -- the we is Patrick Garman and myself, had our first meeting on working our little team project on checking with nonprofit groups, met at the chamber with Tammy Bell, and she walked through a lot of the history of her involvement and the chambers involvement with the nonprofit groups. And they touched on several things that are on their web page and that they help businesses with, the GiveSmart application which is great for gathering money and working on silent auctions and things TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS SEPTEMBER 27, 2023 STRATEGIC PLANNING ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING MINUTES Page 5 of 31 like this. And there's other -- plenty other features of it, but I picked up on that one because one of the organizations I belong to needs something like that. Another part was they have a tab for nonprofit groups. And you can click on that and see who's part of the network. And what they want to do is grow the network. So right now, there's only about 20 people using the platform. So, what we need to do is figure out we as the community on how we can encourage communications across the town. And finally, one of the other features that they have is -- they found out when they talked to a lot of these small groups that are around here, they don't have a very good job of archiving their official minutes and stuff. So, they do offer that as a service. I didn't get into any fee structures or anything because right now we're just finding out some of the capabilities. But it was a very interesting conversation. Community Center is going to be next on the horizon. Thanks. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Thank you, Commissioner. I'll save my comments for the end. So, I'll pass the baton to Commissioner Sveum. SVEUM: I don't have anything to report. Just an observation the -- after walking past the new urban garden area for the last several months, it's very impressive. That whole -- just the finishing touches of not just the garden plots themselves, but the artwork around it. The covered area for gatherings. It's just a really very professional, very aesthetically pleasing area. So, whoever was in charge of that, congratulations. It's beautiful. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: That was Jerry Butler on the Dark Sky Discovery Center board, who Kevin and I worked with this morning. SVEUM: Yeah. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Okay. Thank you so much. Agenda item number 5, consideration and possible action, approval of the minutes of the regular meeting of August 23rd, 2023. Do we have any discussion or a motion? BECK: Motion to accept them if there's no discussion. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Do I have a second? SVEUM: So yeah. TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS SEPTEMBER 27, 2023 STRATEGIC PLANNING ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING MINUTES Page 6 of 31 VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Okay. Motion to second. All in favor, say aye. SVEUM: Aye. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Aye. KEEFE: Aye. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Moving on to agenda item number 6, update, Fountain Hills 2022 strategic plan implementation. We have directors, Wesley and Pock. Gentleman, who would like to go first? Director Pock, the floor is yours. POCK: Sorry, John. I got here first. I don't know how the slides got on the screen but -- oh, okay. All right. Good evening, Vice Chair and Commissioners. My name's David Pock, Chief Financial Officer. And we've got a few slides to go through. I think you've received these already. All right. Off to a great start. All right. So, we actually have two supporting tasks. These are all items that I was or am involved with, so two supporting tasks for signature strategy. One, maintaining transparency by communicating the Town's finances to the public. The first of that task is to hold public meetings twice a year, separate from council meetings, to present the Town's finances. So, the way we decided to approach this is to do it by year. So fiscal year '23 actually started way back in April of '22 during the budget season. So, we had our public outreach budget open house at that time, kind of, to layout the budget for fiscal year '23 to the public. Had a good turnout. We had a much better turnout that year than we had in the past. So that was good to see. A lot of good questions. A lot of good interactions. And then as you know fiscal year '23 ended this past July or past June -- June 30th. And we're currently going through our audit process right now. That should be finished up in the next few weeks. So, we'll have final audited numbers that will be available. And we'll have that public outreach or the presentation of those results for fiscal year '23 in November. Any questions on those? TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS SEPTEMBER 27, 2023 STRATEGIC PLANNING ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING MINUTES Page 7 of 31 Okay. And then of course our fiscal year '24, we also had a budget open house. And then we'll have the audit results. So, it's just going to be a cycle. Basically, the beginning of each fiscal year we'll have the budgeting, kind of the plan looking ahead. And then we'll have the review looking back. SVEUM: Who performs your audit? POCK: HeinfeldMeech. They're an outside CPA firm. They do a lot of school districts and local governments. And all of those results get reported to the State Auditor General, so. Okay. So then supporting Task B, conduct a regularly occurring community survey in order to track satisfaction levels with Town services. This isn't directly my area, but since our communications public relations director isn't here tonight, I thought I'd just throw this in here so that you could see it. We did do the survey in December 2021. So right -- the thought was that we would do these every three years. That's going to have to be budgeted for the fiscal year '25. The last time it cost us $18,500. I'm guessing it's probably going to be a little bit more expensive after three years, but that will come up during the budget discussions that are just about to start in a couple months. BECK: Excuse me, sorry. POCK: Yes. BECK: So, when you do the survey, is that by way of mailer or is that by way of talking, or is it both, or -- POCK: I'm thinking that there was mailers and like electronic -- BECK: Yeah. POCK: -- submission. GOODWIN: Yeah. If I recall, it gets mailed to homes, and then there's also a link online so that you can go on and choose to participate. And then they look at both the sets of data individually and then they combine the data as well. So that -- and last time it was a -- and it's all done obviously by a third party. And it's done through statistically valid data sets and information sets so that it does have all the proper backing in terms of validity and things like that. TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS SEPTEMBER 27, 2023 STRATEGIC PLANNING ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING MINUTES Page 8 of 31 POCK: Thanks. SVEUM: Is there a copy of that available? Could you give it to us or send it to us? GOODWIN: Sure. I'm sure Angela can do that. I think it's online. And if it's not, we can certainly get it to you. SVEUM: It's on the website. PADGETT-ESPIRITU: I think it is. SVEUM: Okay. PADGETT-ESPIRITU: But I'll send it to you. POCK: Okay. The second signature strategy that I'm involved with is promoting the long-term financial health and stability of the town. The first task is to produce and publish a five-year financial plan with revenue and expenditure forecasts. These were included in the fiscal year '24, our current budget. I will say that a major part of that plan is the capital project plan. So, we're getting much better at kind of planning ahead, town engineer, public works director identifying projects earlier, planning for them an outlier year. So, if you go into our online budget and look at fiscal year '24, we have a multi-year plan out there. So that's where the bulk of the money is spent each year so that -- focusing on that is a bigger impact. As far as the operating revenue and expenditures, it's not really a lot in our situation that's going to change. A lot of it's driven by economy. If we're expecting a recession. If we've got high inflation, how that affects our sales tax revenues, that sort of thing? So those, you know, are pretty standard. We're not going to be changing a lot from years three, four, and five maybe in that plan. However, I will make this point. So, if you've heard, our long-term residential rental tax is going to be going away starting January 1st, 2025. That was the legislature decision. So that was a little too late to include in our '24 budget, but it will play a part in our fiscal year '25 budget. So big changes like what we see far enough in advance we can make those adjustments so that it would have an impact in that five-year forecast. The other things that could come up with development services; if we're working on a large construction project, let's say for fiscal year '26, it's something that we could throw TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS SEPTEMBER 27, 2023 STRATEGIC PLANNING ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING MINUTES Page 9 of 31 in there as potential TPT revenue and that sort of thing. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: So, what's the expected loss when that long-term rental tax sunsets in 2025? POCK: So currently we collect right around 750,000 a year -- VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Okay. POCK: -- on long-term rental. There's obviously a large amount of those rentals, however, the rate is only 1.6%. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Uh-huh. POCK: So, it's not -- doesn't have quite as much impact, as it -- you know like if we lost short-term rentals. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Uh-huh. POCK: There's a smaller number of those. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Sure. POCK: But the rate that we get is 6.9 percent -- VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Uh-huh. POCK: -- so makes a difference. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Thank you. SVEUM: Have you been tracking the short-term rental market? Because the trends I've seen is there's declining amounts that some feel that perhaps it's post-COVID people are willing to go to a hotel rather than a home or whatever it might be. But I'm just curious if that is -- if that's part of what you're tracking because it is a -- it plays an important role -- POCK: Sure. SVEUM: -- in income that may be declining. POCK: Absolutely. There is. We've actually taken a much more proactive approach since November of last year when the legislature decided that we were allowed to regulate it a little bit more. So, we have been implementing a permitting process. We're getting some revenue from that. But we also have some software solutions that go out and identify different properties that are being used for that. As part of that TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS SEPTEMBER 27, 2023 STRATEGIC PLANNING ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING MINUTES Page 10 of 31 software, it does tell us how many nights -- average nights are being rented, what the average price, and that sort of thing. Since we just started it, we don't have a lot of historical obviously -- SVEUM: Yeah. POCK: -- so let it grow. There has been a lot of national news on short-term rentals. I don't know if you noticed or heard, but New York City basically just banned them effectively just by their requirements that they put into place. So, there's kind of a trend, definitely a trend. It's not making a lot of sense or it's harder to make sense out of investing in properties and just using them in short-term rentals. So that's going to lower some of the demand. And yeah, it's interesting space right now. SVEUM: How do you track that from particular properties? I mean, you're receiving tax payments for 123 Apple Street or whatever it is. And I assume the Airbnb group or some other VRBO is sending those tax payments or does the owner send those? POCK: Yeah. So, starting back in 2017 when the legislature actually put in statute that towns weren't able to regulate or say that you couldn't use it as short-term rentals. Part of that agreement with Airbnb and all those different companies at the time was that they could collect all of those revenues when the reservations made remitted to DLR in a lump sum by jurisdiction, so each city or town has their own lump sum, but it doesn't give us the actual addresses or anything like that of the rentals, so that makes it a little bit more difficult, from my standpoint is it's a little -- it's a -- it is a little easier knowing that those big companies are collecting it and we're not relying on -- SVEUM: Yeah. POCK: -- each individual homeowner to collect it and send it into DLR and do what they're supposed to do so. SVEUM: So there's no list that you follow of properties that are being utilized as short- term rentals? POCK: There is a -- that software that I was talking about -- SVEUM: Yeah. POCK: -- has a list by address and they can match the ads to addresses and that sort of TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS SEPTEMBER 27, 2023 STRATEGIC PLANNING ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING MINUTES Page 11 of 31 thing. It doesn't show the actual TPT revenue on each of those -- BECK: Okay. POCK: -- individually. SVEUM: But are those only if a Airbnb company is -- type company is managing those, or what if it's just Bill and Mary that have a property for a short-term rental? POCK: That could absolutely happen. On the short-term rental, it would be a little bit more difficult just because people do go to those kind of well-known VRBO -- SVEUM: Yeah. POCK: -- Airbnb, HomeAway, you know. There's about 60 different websites that this company, Granicus, looks at and sweeps on a regular basis. If it was just an individual person, and that's probably our largest -- I want to say probably our most susceptible place is a long-term rental like Commissioner Beck being gone eight months out of the year and wants to rent it to his friend, John, down the street. We wouldn't -- that wouldn't be on our radar per se. Long-term rentals that go through like companies like Zillow or you know, we do go look for addresses that way. But yeah, just the one offs, are hard to find. SVEUM: Okay. Thank you. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Based on the data that that software scrapes, how many short-term rentals do we have in Fountain Hills? POCK: So, it actually changes quite a bit. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: So, you can list and delist them pretty easily? POCK: Right. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Yeah. POCK: Right. I think our highest number that we had was from 375, or something like that, at one time. It kind of dips down during -- we're coming into the season where everybody's back. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Sure. POCK: So, they're not renting out their home. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Gotcha. And what's the permit fee? TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS SEPTEMBER 27, 2023 STRATEGIC PLANNING ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING MINUTES Page 12 of 31 POCK: $250 a year. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: And that's annually? POCK: Yes. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Got it. Thank you. POCK: All right. So, we talked about that. Supporting Task B, update the current facilities reserve study to identify lifecycle replacement repair facilities and infrastructure. This, we actually did start with an outside company. It's actually the company -- or the analysts that do our development fee audits. They're Wildan Financial. They started digging into it a little bit. And then we ran into some questions about our capital asset policy. And where this particular facility's reserve fit into that policy, as far as what qualifies as a capital project, what accounts -- or what things should be in regular maintenance and operational expenses each year, or what was maybe a major repair. So, we're addressing that first so that we have a better idea of how this reserve fund will work and what would be included in that. Any questions on that? All right. And then finally, Task C is to utilize the services of an experienced grant researcher and writer. We have not done this yet. We're doing pretty well right now. I put that in there as far as we have about $3.8 million coming in in grants for fiscal year '24. A major portion of that for our sidewalk program. We also still have the 8.4 million from the ARPA funding, the rescue plan that got transferred into streets. But I also wanted to point out, so even though we have that and we're pretty busy taking care of those things right now, we are going to have a lot of opportunities with the fire department once they're brought in. Everybody knows police and fire grants are abundant. So, we've already looked into a few, and Chief Ott is working on some training equipment, you know, that type of thing, so we might be able to use a writer in those situations and keep them pretty busy. So, but as right now, community services and public works are doing a pretty good job getting some money for us so. KEEFE: I'm curious about that one. Is there -- was -- in that supporting task, was there a specific goal or target? This is kind of phrased like an activity metric rather than an TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS SEPTEMBER 27, 2023 STRATEGIC PLANNING ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING MINUTES Page 13 of 31 outcome. Were we seeking to achieve some number? POCK: From what I recall during the discussions, there wasn't any numbers thrown out. I think -- KEEFE: Uh-huh. So -- POCK: -- it was basically -- KEEFE: So, we would declare victory on supporting task C by virtue of engaging a grant writer? KEEFE: The way this is worded, it sounds like the act of engaging the grant writer is the goal rather than -- POCK: Right. KEEFE: -- the work that the grant writer would accomplish. And that doesn't quite sound right, does it? Yeah. Okay. And I did want to go back to strategy 1 supporting task A. Am I -- is that a typo or did we not have two meetings in 2023? POCK: No, we did. KEEFE: Was it supposed to be 4/11 -- POCK: Oh, for fiscal year '23, there's two meetings. But then we've also -- so like I said fiscal year '24, the budget meeting was held in February of '23. So that would actually be in between those dates. KEEFE: Okay. So -- POCK: We would have had -- but I wanted to follow it by a year. So, we have fiscal year to start the budgeting planning process. And then the end what the final results would be. So -- KEEFE: That makes a lot of sense. It really does. It's just the way this is worded, says two public meetings a year. And I'm just asking if that happened. POCK: They did. So fiscal year -- KEEFE: It looks like one meeting happened in 2022 and one is planned to happen in 2023. Am I reading that right? POCK: Yep. So -- KEEFE: So that would be one a year. TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS SEPTEMBER 27, 2023 STRATEGIC PLANNING ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING MINUTES Page 14 of 31 POCK: So -- but there was -- there is fiscal year '24 budget is not showing on here because it was actually held in February of 2023. KEEFE: Oh, okay. POCK: But I wanted to follow it by it made sense to me to follow it by a fiscal year. So, each year takes about 18 months -- KEEFE: Yeah. POCK: -- to complete. And only 12 months of that is actual July through -- KEEFE: That makes sense to me, too. KEEFE: My observation is about the opportunity to clean up the language here and really crisp up how we're phrasing the goals as we're doing the reboot of the plan. POCK: Sure. KEEFE: Yeah. Thank you. POCK: I'm all for clearer -- KEEFE: Yeah. Because -- POCK: -- messaging. KEEFE: -- how you're executing against that that sounds great. POCK: Yeah. KEEFE: That sounds logical. I just would like your supporting task to reflect that. Yeah. Thank you. POCK: All right. I did include on the last page my phone number, e-mail. If anything comes up, if you wake up in the middle of the night, and -- VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Want to talk budgets. POCK: -- you hear about lions swimming in your pool, and you go, hey, wait a second, we need -- yeah, I'm always open for questions, calls, stop by, anything. All right. Chairman. HOENLE: I do have a question and that's on the 8.4 million of ARPA funding transfer to streets. Has anything else been done on a line to take the streets into the future? Since I was on the Streets Committee, I'd like to see if we had any other results. POCK: Town Manager. TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS SEPTEMBER 27, 2023 STRATEGIC PLANNING ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING MINUTES Page 15 of 31 GOODWIN: I'll speak to that. The short answer is we're still waiting on direction. So -- and Bernie, you probably know there was a update given at the end of the council session, so back in June. It was kind of presented as to what the anticipated numbers look like, what the demands might be. There was several options put out there of how we could approach that funding mechanism. And the council would need to sort of steer where that would go. I expect later this fall. And David Pock didn't touch on it, but we're going to be convening in early November to start the kickoff process for the next budget. While that does not qualify as one of our open houses or our public meetings, to Jill's point, it is a staff meeting to say what are the priorities going to be. And that is where I expect we'll have some guidance on next steps for the streets and what they'd like to see. HOENLE: Thank you. GOODWIN: Absolutely. If you don't mind Pock, I was going to actually chime in on two elements. One was the grant piece that you have up there on the screen right now. Just for a little background for this group, there is a -- there's sort of a competing concept or competing theories about our grant process. One is, do you hire someone so they become a staff person? And we potentially link that I think exactly to what you're talking about Jill is, that you know they get paid a percentage of what they bring in or it's tied to some sort of output and outcome. And that's not uncommon for municipalities to have that role. We are just generally a very small municipality and that's a difficult add to our staff. On the flip side, we have a lot of community members that are willing to help us with grant writing. Unfortunately, that becomes challenging when this well-intentioned volunteer doesn't necessarily have the internal workings of access to files, to history, to logins, especially with federal grants where there's a lot of different reporting things that have to happen, they just don't have that means to do that for us. One, anecdotally, we worked with a grant writer to help us do one that was more of a need- TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS SEPTEMBER 27, 2023 STRATEGIC PLANNING ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING MINUTES Page 16 of 31 based, right? So you have to write this really compelling argument of why your need is the greatest, versus other grants where you just need to put in your paperwork, and you need to just jump through the hoops. They weren't -- it was difficult to tell our story and tell that compelling story through the eyes of someone who's not in it on that day-to-day basis. So we have difficulty when we look through both of these lenses as to what is the best way to bring a grant person on board. And so to Pock's point, the staff have taken a lot of that role on. And we've been trying to identify the best way and how would we best do that. And that just really hasn't solidified just yet as to what we should do. KEEFE: Do you think this supporting task makes sense in the plan? GOODWIN: Makes sense. I understand the vision behind it. I understand why it's there because everyone knows grants are a very vital part of supplementing our -- of our revenue. And they also know that our staff is small and has a lot on their plate already. So, I think that the intention behind it of bringing someone into support that was the idea. I think we just didn't flush out the logistics and the true impact of how were we going to do that. Theoretically, it works great. It's the practical side that we're still struggling with a little bit. The other piece of that Pock mentioned our facility reserves. You might hear more about this as we move forward. This is actually something that I and Pock, and as well as our public works staff, have really been focusing on because really what it is is it's the idea of taking care of what we have. And I'll think a lot of us have heard from our community that we have great stuff, and we want to take care of it. No one wants to see it fall into a state of disrepair. No one wants to see it to a point where it's no longer a valuable piece of our community. The facility reserves is really how we do that. It's setting aside money to take care of the anticipated things. We all know roofs need to be replaced. HVAC systems need to be serviced. There's going to be leaks. There's going to be this. You know, it's just the process of taking care of what you have. What we have found is that we have not been putting away enough reserve to take care of those things in an anticipation, in a proactive way. We have some. We just have -- TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS SEPTEMBER 27, 2023 STRATEGIC PLANNING ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING MINUTES Page 17 of 31 again, we have competing interests when it says, hey, we really have a need today, so we've got to take care of this problem, so we end up delaying other things in order to do that. One great example, really, really big, large-scale example is the lake liner. The lake liner, we all know it's coming. At some point that lake liner has to be replaced. It comes with a very, very large price tag. Is it prudent to start putting money away now in anticipation of that, or do we have more imprudent -- more immediate needs that we need to address that keep us from creating that savings and that cushion? It's again that sort of that competing thing. So we're going to be working towards how to better plan for that and then how to work with the council to better set aside those funds so that we can maintain what we have. So you'll probably be hearing more about that. Thanks. Those are my two added -- my adds. Thanks. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: So that's a plan to save rather than through a capital improvement plan to anticipate borrowing for something that extravagant? GOODWIN: Correct. And so and it depends, and I think Pock kind of touched on the idea. Director Pock. Sorry. He just goes by Pock in the office. Director Pock mentioned, and you probably heard him, that there is some definitions and some internal policies that we probably need to clean up that say when is it a capital project versus a savings and maintenance type of thing? What is that threshold? What is going to indicate that? And again, the lake liner is probably in a very extreme example because obviously, it's going to be really difficult to save 11, $12 million to do that project when the time comes. But it's not difficult to set aside $200,000 to replace an irrigation pump system, or a HVAC system at the Community Center, or anticipate painting and, you know, furbishing of our buildings, right? We know those things are coming. You should just plan for them every, you know, whatever it is, seven, eight years. What's probably happening is okay, that eight year gets here and we have other pressing needs so it gets punted to ten years, and then 12 years. And then by the time you get to it, the money you saved is no longer adequate. Prices have escalated another 20 percent and we didn't put that aside. POCK: True. Uh-huh. TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS SEPTEMBER 27, 2023 STRATEGIC PLANNING ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING MINUTES Page 18 of 31 GOODWIN: So, to answer your question hopefully is the idea that we have to come up with some better policies and systems internally so that we stop getting into that habit. And that's what we're working towards. SVEUM: Great. Thank you. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Any other questions, Commissioners? No? Director Pock, thank you so much. Director Wesley. WESLEY: I'm not quite as fancy as Mr. Pock. I don't have a formal presentation for you. I just have a couple of things on the list here. One you're very well aware of, and that's the environmental plan that has been approved by council and posted on the website so that one is done as far as that item went. So, the other thing we'll come back to then is on the priority for targeted collaborative economic development and the retaining existing businesses, item D on that list was identify ways to streamline the building permit process. That's a pretty focused statement there. So a few comments about it. Specifically, we continue to work with our Citizenserve software that we started using almost two years ago now. One of the things that we really liked about that company when we chose them and has proven to be true is they're very flexible and willing to work with us as we see opportunities to improve the system. We send them an e-mail and they get it fixed and use it within sometimes a few hours if not, you know, it's a day or so. So we continue to tweak that system as we get feedback and see where improvements can be made to make sure it's operating as smoothly as it can for us and for our applicants. And we had a staff comment just yesterday that it's so quiet in our area these days because we don't get the developers or citizens coming up to visit us anymore to bring their plans and talk about them because they're able to get it all done online so easily. So I think we've done a big, big job just right there and having a good online system for people to use. With that system, it's also then allowed us to adjust some of our staff responsibilities a little bit. So, our permit techs are able to take some of the more routine items that TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS SEPTEMBER 27, 2023 STRATEGIC PLANNING ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING MINUTES Page 19 of 31 come in that don't require any real plan review and then do some other processes in the system. That relieves that from the building official to have to do. So that frees up his time, so as building projects come in, he can focus his time on the more important building permit reviews. We annually have a -- what we call a -- we've changed the names a little bit, builder, developers, contractors' forum. It used to just be a developers' forum, but we expanded a little bit to try to get a larger group out there. And we hold that -- we were holding it every six months, but I don't know if it we've solved enough issues or people are just too busy. The last couple of times we haven't had a big response. We've gone to now just annually. So our next ones coming up here later in October. That's one of the things we do at each one of those forums is just ask folks to give us feedback on what's not working right in our systems where they're finding snags or problems so that we can then see what we can do to make adjustments to provide better service. And luckily, we don't usually get too many things out of it, but we do usually get at least one or two that come out of that, and so then we work to make adjustments to streamline those processes. So those are the primary things that we are doing to directly work on that specific item. Take a little bit more broadly in terms of what are we doing to assist economic development within the community. The Economic Development Director, and I try to work closely on projects as we identify different needs. For example, we both took a trip out to the former Vue restaurant with the person who now has that is looking to market it to discuss with them how it could be marketed, what they needed from the town to facilitate their efforts to get that back into active use. We're working together to consider how we can address some of the issues in the Town Center area and a possible update to the plan that's in this area or how to prioritize projects here when different people come in downtown or other places with projects. We often meet together with them. We're discussing ways that we can streamline the zoning process and put in place regulations that better facilitate what we want to see happen and make that the easy thing to happen. And so that way we know that projects that we want to TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS SEPTEMBER 27, 2023 STRATEGIC PLANNING ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING MINUTES Page 20 of 31 see happen move forward more quickly. So, things like that kind of outside the specific statement here, we are also trying to work on. That's it for me. KEEFE: Question, do you have performance metrics that you're trying to improve, or when you say ways to streamline the building permit process, how big is that problem and what's the goal? WESLEY: Commissioner, that's a good question and the easy answer is no, we don't have anything specific. We have the statement that's here in the strategic plan. KEEFE: Oh. WESLEY: And so that's -- yeah, it didn't come with any other specifics about it. And so, we don't have any target we are after. We do -- again, we're a small organization. Most of our work is residential. And what commercial we have most of that's tenant improvements, additions, remodels. We don't get very much new commercial development here and so, you know they're -- I guess there hasn't been maybe enough to really try to take it to the next level of specificity and what that might mean. Most tenant improvement remodels happen pretty quick because they're fairly simple anyway. KEEFE: Well, I think we can take that under advisement as we look to -- WESLEY: Sure. KEEFE: -- reboot the plan. I'm sure you and your staff will have thoughts on how to strengthen the language there. SVEUM: It seems like that would be a great conversation with your builder developer community of what can we do better to streamline the process. And by the way, there's things that you can be doing better builder developer to help streamline the process as well. So those -- that give and take is -- and I applaud the fact that you're having these meetings because not one side is 100 percent correct. WESLEY: Absolutely. SVEUM: I mean, I hear as well, you know, it's taking too long. Well, there might be reasons that you're not giving them the information they need to make that determination, right? TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS SEPTEMBER 27, 2023 STRATEGIC PLANNING ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING MINUTES Page 21 of 31 WESLEY: Right. SVEUM: So, I'm sure you've had to go out and ask for additional information, et cetera. So, there might be a way to checklist something like that that can help streamline the process. But there should be feedback from the private parties as well to give you. And then it goes back, say, well, yeah, this is great, but we also need to make sure that if you want this done in a week, we need to have this on day one type of thing. WESLEY: I mean, certain information to perform the review. SVEUM: Yeah. WESLEY: Provide us the information or we can't do it. SVEUM: Yeah. And they have a lot at stake and why waste your time if it's like an incomplete submission. WESLEY: Uh-huh. SVEUM: But obviously they have a lot at stake too because they need to get a hole in the ground. WESLEY: Right. SVEUM: You said that there's another forum coming up, is that an open meeting or -- WESLEY: Yes. It's in the held in this room, 7:30 in the morning. I think is when they usually schedule it for. We had currently targeted it for October 16th. SVEUM: October 16th. WESLEY: But -- SVEUM: But. WESLEY: -- or 17th, excuse me. It's usually the 17th. That's looking like a rather challenging day for several reasons, and we haven't gotten the publicity out yet. We've kind of been a little bit slow on that. So we'll probably going to push it back a week or two. SVEUM: Okay. WESLEY: We haven't set that new date yet. So, but no later than the first week of November. SVEUM: How can we be communicated -- TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS SEPTEMBER 27, 2023 STRATEGIC PLANNING ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING MINUTES Page 22 of 31 WESLEY: I'm sure Angela knows about it. She can send it out to you. SVEUM: Okay. Will you just automatically send those things out or -- PADGETT-ESPIRITU: Yeah. No. I will. Yeah. For this one. SVEUM: Okay. That'd be great. PADGETT-ESPIRITU: Uh-huh. SVEUM: And you don't mind if people attend? WESLEY: Oh, no, not at all. SVEUM: All right. How much input is there regarding zoning of property of -- not necessarily the process, but the determination of what things should be zoned for on specific main arteries in this community? WESLEY: So, Commissioner, I'll approach -- I'll give it -- I'll answer it this way. Then you tell me if I'm answering what you're looking for or not. But it all starts with a general plan. A general plan sets the land use goals in the community. And then the zoning gets adopted to follow that plan. And so, the town had its original plans and the original zones that were laid out in the county and then established, reestablished in the city when it was -- and or when it was incorporated back in 1990. So those zoning districts are there based on that original planning. And then changes to those occur mostly as a property owner looks at what they want to do with the property. And if the existing zoning district doesn't fit their desired use, then they consult with staff and go through that public hearing rezoning process to council. SVEUM: Well, this isn't pointed at you. I'm just curious. But how does a plan of a fence or on a lot on Desert Vista and Saguaro get approved? Like a privacy fence around the property, for garage, I assume for car storage, or whatever. WESLEY: Correct. Yeah. Their goal is to eventually put a building on there also. And so their -- SVEUM: That's a goal. WESLEY: Right. Their plans showed that future building, but they wanted to build it in phases. And this is their first phase. And it complies with the zoning ordinance requirements, so it was allowed to be built. TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS SEPTEMBER 27, 2023 STRATEGIC PLANNING ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING MINUTES Page 23 of 31 SVEUM: How long does that -- how long is that allowed? WESLEY: There's nothing in our rules that would put a time limit on. SVEUM: Is that the highest and best use of that property? I'm just -- and I'm being facetious. WESLEY: No, I totally get it. And so that's one of the challenges we have with zoning and one of the things that we'll be looking at as Amanda (ph.) and I talked about some zoning changes, but that's one of the things when we present zoning changes to council as we say they're asking for this, but once you zoned for that, here's all the possibilities. And so don't -- you won't necessarily get this because this could happen, and that's one of the situations here that was rezoned some years ago from C1 to C3. And C3 allows those open storage kind of uses which maybe isn't really the best use right along the primary arterial. SVEUM: Interesting. Thank you. BECK: So just following the questioning there. You know, I'm thinking how we can help you a little bit too as we're doing our surveys for the strategic plan and we're talking to different groups. I've had the personal experience of working several years ago, you know getting something approved, you know an RV pad and everything and they did a great job for me. But the process on my side, I had no clue. I had no clue. I remember going in there, and in fact, I have everything, and I didn't have the right stuff. And I wasn't really informed on it. So, I mean, if it's something that we can do to help with asking questions to the people we talk to about how they feel, the private owners, or the leaders of the communities on getting improvements, getting building permits, and so forth, and what can be done, maybe that's something we should include in our questioning. I think it would be beneficial. I know most of my neighbors don't have a clue until they do it. WESLEY: Uh-huh. BECK: And then your poor guys have to go and educate them. And maybe there's something that we can find out ahead of time proactively that can help steer that, you TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS SEPTEMBER 27, 2023 STRATEGIC PLANNING ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING MINUTES Page 24 of 31 know, a booklet or whatever rules are needed upfront. WESLEY: That's a good idea. That could be very helpful. BECK: If we can do that. Maybe we should. Thanks. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Any other comments, questions? No. Director Wesley, thank you so much. WESLEY: Okay. You're welcome. Thanks for having me. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Appreciate it. POCK: I got one correction to make before I take off. On the presentation, it had November 29th down for that fiscal year in review. That's actually the 15th. Sorry. Didn't get it changed on that presentation, but just so that you know, I didn't want you to be here on the 29th upset. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Thank you so much. Okay. I'm moving on to agenda item number 7 update from work groups. Bernie, you gave an update at the beginning. Is there anything else you'd like to touch on? Kevin anything? BECK: You know one thing. And I've got to get back up to speed being out. But Bernie, maybe I'll get with you later, you and Patrick. If you're going out to do some things, I can help with that. I know I'm kind of that third player in the group, whatever for the surveys and all. So let me know how I can help. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Thank you. And then my work group is comprised of myself, Commissioners Sveum, and Keefe, and we are putting together the workshop or open house that will identify the, you know, top-level priorities for the next plan. We met and we're going to be hosting this first weekend in November. Off the top of my head, I believe it's Saturday, November 5th. We're going to have a variety of tables set up to gather feedback and then we're also going to have this -- Jill, I'm actually going to let you explain pairwise comparison because this is a really powerful tool that will help us look at the top priorities and then rank them against each other. And I don't think this has been used before and I think it will be a great addition to this plan. So, Jill, I'll let TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS SEPTEMBER 27, 2023 STRATEGIC PLANNING ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING MINUTES Page 25 of 31 you hop in here and -- KEEFE: Sure. Yeah. We have the makings of a, I think, a good workshop approach that'll be open to the public where one can come in and spend either ten minutes or two hours talking through the different pillars and giving their input to stationed listeners, taking notes, and drawing out the dialogue. And it'll culminate at the end with what's -- it's called a pairwise comparison. But what the goal is to get some relative weighting of you if money and resources were no object, we'd love to do everything right. But if we had to make trade-offs, is this relatively more important than this? A little or a lot? And it forces a conscious conversation. And when you do that with many, many participants, you get some very interesting patterns that pop out. So, before everyone'll give their verbal input, but their exit ticket out of the workshop is give us your answers to these questions in the pairwise comparison. We then hope, with that, we can bring back to this broader committee kind of a heat map view of where people's passions were. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Got it. Thank you. And then we're also looking at doing a survey and it seems like both groups independently have come up with this. So, I think we'll want to collaborate together to figure out what the best process is. And Bernie, we might lean on you and your expertise because you did this during the last round with Vision Fountain Hills just to see what synergies we might have, and how we can avoid reinventing the wheel, so we have a streamlined approach. Anything you want to touch on on the previous survey, or if not, that's okay. No? Okay. Kevin, yes. BECK: So have we set, and I should know this. I don't think -- I won't even say have -- we haven't, I know. But the deadline dates or kind of the plan of what we want to do at certain meetings, like for instance next meeting in October -- VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Uh-huh. BECK: -- maybe to have set up where we are with that, with the updates and so forth, maybe we're too soon with that or too early in the process. But that would be helpful TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS SEPTEMBER 27, 2023 STRATEGIC PLANNING ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING MINUTES Page 26 of 31 because I think if we have updates, regular updates, that's great, but we should also have it set up of what we're going to do for the month after. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Uh-huh. BECK: And kind of set the plan each time because then things aren't going to be missed. And it may be ongoing, it may change every month -- VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Uh-huh. BECK: -- but at least we have a plan going forward. And do we have that? I have not seen that yet. We haven't gotten it. Maybe we informally have it. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: My understanding is that we're going to gather as much data as we can -- BECK: Right. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: -- this year and then next year we're going to be synthesizing the plan. BECK: Okay. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: But Patrick has a framework that he's put together. BECK: Yep. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: But having that look forward each subsequent meeting would be good, just so we know like what our specific checkpoints are. So I'll inform him of that so we can incorporate that for the next meeting. KEEFE: That's a good suggestion. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: But yeah, and Jill, anything else you want to add on our team? KEEFE: Not specifically to our workshop plan, but it occurred to me listening to the updates from staff today that we don't have in our framework a time for us to meet and inspect the current plan and identify where we see opportunities to strengthen it. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Sure. KEEFE: I'd propose that we schedule a workshop session for us to walk through the plan in totality and ask and answer some of these questions. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Got it. Thank you. I will jot that down, and I will let Patrick TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS SEPTEMBER 27, 2023 STRATEGIC PLANNING ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING MINUTES Page 27 of 31 know about that so we can figure out the next step there. But it seems like a lot of improvement. I don't want to say there are a lot of these things, but you know there's some minor language tweaks that we can do that will help like specify or enumerate what we want the departments to do with the next plan so we can kind of tighten the bolts there, so to speak. Yeah. KEEFE: Yes. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: You look like you have more to say. KEEFE: I do, but I'm not going to. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Okay. Got it. Thank you. Phil, anything else to add? Okay. Thank you, everyone. Moving on. Next agenda item. Does anyone have any proposed future agenda topics? If you do, I will write them down and let Patrick know because he's the one that schedules these so -- BECK: I guess I have one and it's not really new, but with the Dark Sky Discovery Center, we're kind of at a trigger point of looking where we are with funding versus going forward. Still very positive, but we're at a point now where the funding is going to be gone in a year, at least, the state funding. We have a year to do something. So, we're at a trigger point now to decide how we can get more support, how we can do it, and how we're going to -- or what we're going to do is what we have. So, I think it's probably good for us to have just regular updates at each meeting, maybe start in the next meeting. I'm happy to help if you want to do it too, Jeff. And just keep the people posted because I think it's going to be more visible. And then I just have a feeling it's going to be more visible in the next couple of months because we may get to a do-or-die point. KEEFE: Does that mean you when you say that is the money depleted meaning spent or meaning going to be taken away if not acted upon? BECK: Yeah. Thanks for the clarification. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: So, can I just clarify that the money needs to be like set aside for specific purpose. TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS SEPTEMBER 27, 2023 STRATEGIC PLANNING ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING MINUTES Page 28 of 31 BECK: Right. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: And the board is going to be working through this, but it's something that will be addressed in the coming months. BECK: Yeah. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: But obviously we are making efforts to shore up you know the remainder of the fundraise so we can get the project started. But you know Kevin, you or I can touch on the latest as it goes for the IDSDC moving forward. Yeah. BECK: Yeah. And I think, in addition, that the -- absolutely. And I'm glad you asked because I didn't articulate it very well. I think if the circulation of the funding especially in the state is that get it done. You know, here's the money and you know, tell us with the next June. And who knows if that'd be extended or not, but that kind of puts the onus on all of us to really maybe change up what we're doing with the funding thing. We're so close. We have -- I forget the numbers, but, you know, I think we've got -- I'm going to say correct me if I'm wrong Geoff, but I want to say 20 out of 25 or something like that. Maybe it's a little less. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Yeah, I believe we're at 18 and a half. BECK: Like 14 -- 14 to yeah. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Yeah. 18 and a half. BECK: Yeah. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Yeah. BECK: 18 and a half out of 25. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: But just as far as strategic priorities go, it's good to kind of just keep a pulse on -- BECK: Yeah. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: -- what's going on there. But -- SVEUM: We don't really need a roof, do you? I mean -- BECK: Only parts of it. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Yeah. Yeah. For monsoon season. SVEUM: Cut back 7 million. TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS SEPTEMBER 27, 2023 STRATEGIC PLANNING ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING MINUTES Page 29 of 31 VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Any other comments, Jill? KEEFE: Have we had an update on the Town Center specific plan? VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: I know you have mentioned that before. I don't know where we are on scheduling that. So, I will defer to Patrick at the next meeting. And I will see where we're at. Just jot a note of that as well. So -- SVEUM: I was going to ask the same question. I think a deep dive into the Town Center, the more -- even more expanded -- VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Uh-huh. SVEUM: -- than that with the planning director. I think it'd be valuable because it is a point of question of what other amenities, what -- why are there not -- VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Uh-huh. BECK: -- more amenities? Where could there be more amenities if people are asking about in our workshop or -- VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Uh-huh. BECK: -- just in casual conversation -- VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Sure.-- SVEUM: -- with people? So I think that that's a very important part of this -- VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Uh-huh. SVEUM: -- working as far as this tone is concerned so if that could be kind of arranged, I think that would be a good meeting to really take a deep dive into all of that. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Sure. Yeah. And again, I believe that's in the works. I just don't have the specifics of when that may be scheduled. So we'll get an update on that for the next meeting for sure. So, anyone else? Anything? No. Okay. Moving on agenda item number 9. Comments from the Vice Chairman. So, I believe everyone in the room is aware that Cynthia Magazine has resigned her post here at the Strategic Planning Advisory Commission. She was appointed, was it 2019? Angela? Does anyone know? TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS SEPTEMBER 27, 2023 STRATEGIC PLANNING ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING MINUTES Page 30 of 31 It might have been earlier. I know that she has been on this Commission for some time and just in addition to being a very thoughtful and very pleasant person to work with, she's been a great wealth of knowledge. She's got quite a bit of institutional understanding of what's going on here in town over the years. Obviously, she was, you know, one of the principal architects of the current plan. She did provide a statement that she wanted me to read for all of you, so I will go ahead and read that now. Well, it is with regret that I have chosen to resign my SPAC tenure as a commissioner. The time has come for me to move on. It has been a real pleasure to have had the opportunity to work with some of you on the 2020/2021 plan and to watch the growth and substance and direction of the Commission itself. Patrick's leadership has proven to be a significant milestone in SPAC’s development. His ideas to keep commissioners involved throughout the summer in laying it -- in laying an important foundation for the Town's next strategic plan is both remarkable, and I am sure we'll provide a road map for SPAC's future structure. May your next assignments to meet and listen to our residents prove to be both fun and beneficial in laying the groundwork for the next plan. As volunteers, you are giving of your important time, and you are special for doing that. Go SPAC. And go Fountain Hills. I will miss you but look forward to seeing each of you around town. Former SPAC Commissioner, Cynthia Magazine. So, let's all tip our caps Cynthia for her service on this Commission and to the town. She'll be missed. And with that, I don't have any additional comments other than thank you all for bearing with me as I pitch hit for Patrick this month. Does anyone have any other comments? KEEFE: Do you happen to know, has the selection process began for her backfill? VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: I will turn that over to Angela. PADGETT-ESPIRITU: Me. Yes. Yes. The Town clerk -- well, no, not yet. The Town Clerk has a recruitment out for it. So, I think it ends October the 12th. And then we'll be setting subcommittee interviews. I do know that we did receive one application so far, so spread the word. TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS SEPTEMBER 27, 2023 STRATEGIC PLANNING ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING MINUTES Page 31 of 31 VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Uh-huh. KEEFE: Great. PADGETT-ESPIRITU: If you know anybody, have them contact Linda. I can chime in on Cynthia, is that the mayor will be recognizing her service along with a couple of others at the November 21st meeting. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Wonderful. KEEFE: How nice. Good. PADGETT-ESPIRITU: So, it would be great if you guys could attend and everything. And that's it. And I'll keep you -- I should have more updates at our October 25th meeting as far as where we are with recruiting. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Got it. PADGETT-ESPIRITU: Okay. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: So, we'll expect to have a vacancy for a short while at least. PADGETT-ESPIRITU: Short while. Yeah. We should have it -- hopefully, we'll have it filled by the November meeting. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Okay. PADGETT-ESPIRITU: Yeah. KEEFE: Great. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: Excellent. Good deal. Anything else, anyone? And with that, I think we can go ahead and adjourn the meeting. Thank you all so much. KEEFE: Move to close? VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: We need a motion. KEEFE: No. BECK: I motion to close. KEEFE: I second it. There we go. VICE CHAIRMAN YAZZETTA: All in favor. BECK: And right on time, look at you, man. TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS __________________________ Patrick Garman, Chairman ATTEST AND PREPARED BY: ___________________________________ Angela Padgett-Espiritu, Executive Assistant CERTIFICATION I hereby certify that the foregoing minutes are a true and correct copy of the minutes of the Regular Meeting held by the Strategic Planning Advisory Commission of Fountain Hills in the Town Hall Council Chambers on the 27th day of September 2023. I further certify that the meeting was duly called and that a quorum was present. DATED this 25th Day of October 2023. ___________________________________ Angela Padgett-Espiritu, Executive Assistant ITEM 6. TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS STAFF REPORT    Meeting Date: 10/25/2023 Meeting Type: Strategic Planning Advisory Commission Agenda Type:                   Submitting Department: Administration Prepared by: Request to Strategic Planning Advisory Commission (Agenda Language):  UPDATE: from Workgroups. Staff Summary (Background) SUGGESTED MOTION MOVE to  Form Review Form Started By: Angela Padgett-Espiritu Started On: 09/25/2023 06:05 PM Final Approval Date: 09/25/2023  ITEM 7. TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS STAFF REPORT    Meeting Date: 10/25/2023 Meeting Type: Strategic Planning Advisory Commission Agenda Type:                   Submitting Department: Administration Prepared by: Angela Padgett-Espiritu, Executive Assistant to Manager, Mayor/Council Staff Contact Information: Request to Strategic Planning Advisory Commission (Agenda Language):  DISCUSSION AND POSSIBLE ACTION: Future Agenda Topics. Staff Summary (Background) Form Review Form Started By: Angela Padgett-Espiritu Started On: 09/25/2023 06:05 PM Final Approval Date: 09/25/2023  ITEM 8. TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS STAFF REPORT    Meeting Date: 10/25/2023 Meeting Type: Strategic Planning Advisory Commission Agenda Type:                   Submitting Department: Administration Prepared by: Angela Padgett-Espiritu, Executive Assistant to Manager, Mayor/Council Staff Contact Information: Request to Strategic Planning Advisory Commission (Agenda Language):  COMMENTS FROM THE CHAIRMAN Staff Summary (Background) Form Review Form Started By: Angela Padgett-Espiritu Started On: 09/25/2023 06:05 PM Final Approval Date: 09/25/2023  ITEM 9. TOWN OF FOUNTAIN HILLS STAFF REPORT    Meeting Date: 10/25/2023 Meeting Type: Strategic Planning Advisory Commission Agenda Type:                   Submitting Department: Administration Prepared by: Angela Padgett-Espiritu, Executive Assistant to Manager, Mayor/Council Staff Contact Information: Request to Strategic Planning Advisory Commission (Agenda Language):  NEXT MEETING DATE: Wednesday, November 29, 2023. Staff Summary (Background) The November 29, 2023 meeting will begin at 3:00 p.m. instead of 4:00 p.m. Form Review Form Started By: Angela Padgett-Espiritu Started On: 09/25/2023 06:05 PM Final Approval Date: 09/25/2023