Good evening. It's now 6 o'clock and I call to order the workshop of the Victoria City Council. We have just one item on our workshop agenda this evening, which is a feasibility study for improvements to 80th Street. Um, talking us through that this evening is our city engineer, Miss Cara Garin. Miss Garin, please. Good evening, mayor, members of the city council. I am just going to kick this off before I hand it over to Amanda. We're both going to present tonight, but she's going to present first. Um, typically we don't bring feasibility studies for street projects to in a workshop format. So, before we start, just wanted to note why we're doing that. Um, we have some pretty unique assessment calculations on this one. um when we went through and applied the city's assessment policy. So before we finalized the feasibility study, I wanted to get some input on the assessment calculations and the different way we could go about calculating it before we finalize it and bring it to the residents for feedback and bring it back to the council for formal approval. So Amanda's going to run you through the project, see if you have any questions about the project. She's going to present the assessments per policy and then I'm going to talk through some options to get some input before we finalize it. >> Very good, Miss Meyer. Welcome. >> Thank you. Good evening, mayor, members of the council. So, as mentioned, the project we're talking about tonight is the 80th Street improvements. Just as a refresher, that's uh the small culde-sac street on the screen before you west of Bavaria, south of 78th, and south of the public works facility. existing conditions of this road. As you can see from the two images, uh that street is in really rough condition. It's um exceeded the life cycle of the roadway. Um this road was historically a gravel road. Um in the late 1990s, the residents on the street banded together and the council um allowed them to privately contract with a contractor to do a batuminous overlay over that gravel road. Since then, the city has done routine maintenance on the street. Um, and there was a feasibility report actually done in 2009 to do a reconstruction on the roadway. But due to that recent sort of recent recent um batuminous overlay, the residents weren't interested in moving forward with that reconstruction at the time. As you can see, like I mentioned, the pavement's in really rough condition. It is a rule section roadway, so no curb and gutter. There are ditches on both sides of the roadway for drainage. Um there's no storm sewer, no water mane. Um and then as I mentioned a couple times, excessive cracking, failing patches. Um so with that, as we went through the feasibility report and came up with the proposed improvements, uh we're looking at a full reconstruction. So removing the batuminous, removing the aggregate base below it, really getting down to that subgrade. Um, and then building that road up to a a city standard street section. So that's the drain tile, the two 2 ft of sand, 8 in of class 5, 3 and 12 in of batuminous curb and gutter. Um, we would remove those ditches along the edge of the pavement that exists today. So there would be some grading necessary along the rightway adjacent to all of these parcels. Um the orange you see on the screen is the proposed storm sewer. So when you put in that curbon gutter, you also need the storm sewer to route the storm uh down. This would head to the west. Um I do want to mention west of the culde-sac that property is owned by Holy Family Catholic High School. Um so easement acquisition would be necessary uh for that storm sewer to be constructed and then have the city be able to maintain that in perpetuity. Um, I do want to mention as we were going through the cost estimating that easement acquisition is not part of the calculations. Also wanted to mention with this area not having city water man uh when you do a full reconstruction that's really the most cost effective time to put in water man since you're already down in that subgrade. Um so we did look at costing out uh water mane and providing services to each of these properties. They are already um served by sanitary sewer. It's not within the roadway. It's in easements um on the rear of the properties with that. So, if council does choose to move forward with the project, there's a proposed schedule on the screen before you. Ultimately, what we're looking at through this fall um would be to uh present the feasibility report, hold the public hearing, approve plan and specs uh early next spring, and then have construction in 2026 with uh completion in the fall of 2026. So, really through that uh 2026 construction season. When we talk about accessible properties, there are nine uh single family residential properties abuing this roadway. Um those are on the screen highlighted in orange. And then you'll see the purple and green on the west side of that culde-sac. The purple is representing a proposed permanent easement, a drainage and utility easement for the city to be able to own and maintain that storm sewer pipe across Holy Family's property. The green is a proposed temporary easement for construction purposes. So, there would need to be um likely some disturbance, some restoration, but ultimately the city would not need that for long-term maintenance of the pipe. When we look at the proposed costs, we did break this out into uh two separate pieces. So, if we just do the street and storm sewer, and I I apologize, I should have mentioned. So, the council did authorize, as Cara mentioned, um our staff to go through and prepare the feasibility report, and that was based off of um the residents signing a petition. So, more than 30% of those residents had signed a petition um asking for council to move forward with um preparing that feasibility report. That petition didn't um specifically mention water main. So, we did start with just total estimated project costs of the street and storm sewer improvements. That's the 775 $775,200. If the project were to move forward and include the water man, it would be an additional $212,000. If the water man was done as a completely separate project, that cost would be a lot higher. When we look at the potential assessments based on the city's policy, just the street and storm sewer at the city's 50% per unit, it's $43,067 for just the street and storm sewer. If the water man is included with the project, that would be an additional $23,556 per property. So, I know that was a lot of information. I'm going to pause there and see if there's any questions on the information I've presented so far. Otherwise, then I'd pass it to Cara to talk through in more detail the assessments. Was this project on our long-term street plan to be constructed? And >> it is. It is currently in the CIP for 2026. >> Okay. Okay. And I'll just add to that that um when we did the feasibility study back in 2009 um when the residents were not in support of moving forward with the project at that time, we ended up moving it into an unplanned column in the capital improvement plan and then started to work it back in probably in the last maybe five years. we started to reprogram it into the CIP. Um, so it actually was has been floating around the last couple of years and now the residents had come forward with a petition even though it was already in our CIP for 2026. They had approached um our public works team saying, "Okay, what do we got to do to get this road improved because it's in such poor condition?" So, they're more interested in the road improvement as opposed to access to city water. >> Correct. To my knowledge, um they weren't asking about city water. Now, we don't know whether they're interested in it or not. That would be something we would gauge through the neighborhood meeting process. >> Okay. Very good. Council, other questions? >> Do we have to purchase an easement in addition to these costs? Yeah. So, um, definitely we've identified through the preliminary feasibility work the need for an outlet for the storm sewer pipe through here. I'd like to propose being able to just chat with Holy Family and hope that they would be willing to donate that easement. It's a piece of property that they don't use. Um, so we haven't currently factored that into the costs. If a project were to move forward, we'd approach them to talk about it. um it's not land that they use. So they historically have been quite neighborly with us. So hoping that that cooperation would continue because it doesn't affect their usability of the land at all. >> So does this tie into the uh storm drainage um project that we had to rebuild a few years ago back there because it had collapsed? You remember that one? There was there was because I remember we kind of >> also I think ran into that when um we had the neighborhood to the north of Holy Family looking to abandon that wetland and drain drainage into that. Does this you contemplate tying into that or is that something you have to look at? >> Do you know where it discharge >> there is? You talk about outlet that was at the north end. >> No, this I remember that we we had a we had a storm drain that was sort of in the Holy Family property that had collapsed and we had to go in and get East Mintz to go fix that. >> Yep. >> And repair that. So my question is is do you contemplate that this is going to tie the drainage of this into that and is that properly sized to take this because we've we've plunked down a lot of water flowing into this area. >> I'm laughing because it turns out Amanda actually worked on that project when she previously worked here. >> Please do tell. >> Oh that's funny. But uh yeah, >> so as part of the project that I think you're referencing, council member, um the city did acquire a temporary access easement from Holy Family uh for that project. There was no need for a permanent easement and those were just granted by Holy Family. There was no money exchanged for the >> Okay. So, but do you contemplate this is going to tie into that? >> The pipes would not tie together, but they do drain to the same basin. >> Okay. Thank you. >> You're welcome. >> Any other questions? >> Well, and then I guess on the on the two parcels at the end here, uh, do they have to is this their property boundary right now? So, there is this space that's running along the end there and really the easement part that we would need from Holy Family. Is that what I'm going to say is approximately 40 ft long? Uh yes, council member. So the the property boundaries for each of the residential are outlined in orange. So there is a portion that is >> Sorry. >> Um Holy Family, stop touching things. >> It's okay. Um so Holy Family does have a a very narrow parcel that abuts 80th Street. Um, you can see so the purple would be permanent easement, the green would be temporary easement, and then there's a little bit of the aerial that you can see that has no color over it. That is still holy family property that um the city would not need anything from them for. >> Okay. But >> does that answer your question? >> No, actually. So, but what what we're seeing here, these are the property boundaries of the parcels on 80th Street as they exist today. So there is this what I'm going to say 20 20 40 maybe five maybe 50 feet of easement or or is that city owned land that lives at the end of the culde-sac going west to Holy Family's property boundary? >> Uh council member that 50 feet is owned by Holy Family. >> Okay. So, Holy Family's got essentially almost the ability to tie in from 80th Street access to this parcel. Is that correct? >> Yes, that is correct. >> Okay. So, that that whole piece is owned by them right to the west edge of the culde-sac. >> Yes, that is correct. >> Thank you, >> Council Member Ivansky. Anything else >> for now? >> No. >> Council member Ray. >> Yeah. Uh back to the cost slide uh feasibil on the feasibility side you said the water main 212,000 I see where you got that in the per unit you you made a comment I believe that if this was done separately it would be a lot higher right is it 2x of that is it do we know >> if we would have to put a water man in after we do a road we'd have to tear up the whole road again >> yeah I mean >> that's correct >> so it' probably be Okay. >> Money well spent I think. >> Okay. Thank you. I just >> so I that now spurs me on to another question with respect to the water vein. So if I understand things and maybe I don't have a clear picture of it. That parcel that we see of holy families that essentially stubs over to the culdeac that could temp effectively be um access to their parcel. Correct. And would they be assessed water main to be able to bring water to 8101 Kili? There's um too big of a wetland complex and um creek running through there. So there would be no value in them extending water man and looping it through there. The city has no need to loop water mane through there. So, we wouldn't propose to do that. And right now, we aren't proposing to assess them for any of these improvements because we didn't identify any benefit to them. Um, if the council views that differently, that you think that there's benefit to this parcel. Um, we didn't see any. I think we should touch base with the planning department to make sure that they wouldn't have the ability to subdivide off this piece of property and sell it for development to make sure that we didn't fail to identify some opportunity that might exist with this parcel that I didn't think of until sitting here right now. >> Yeah. I guess what's driving my questioning is that do we stub out for that and leave the stubs in the culde-sac? Do we stub out, you know, and bring it further down to their to the edge of like um the the people who live on a street and bring that stub right to the end of that property line. Does that benefit them? Is that something that, you know, they could foresee a future need? Because I think if we're going to go forward with this and now is the time to ask the question about should those water mains be brought to that parcel for them. >> These are all currently served by wells. >> Correct. Got it. >> Okay. Council member Refe, you had a question. >> Nope, I'm good. >> You're good. >> Good. Thank you. >> Any other questions? >> I guess I have a quick question for you. as a r a rural section road. Is there an option for the city to put in a street that is not curb and gutter and is not sewered where it would be less expensive for the property owners or is that not something that we're considering? >> Okay. >> Um so typically yes, that would be an option. Um the city does have an alternate standard where we would allow um a circumstance to not have curbon gutter and have a rural section roadway with ditches. Um we need to be sure that you can have an actual constructed ditch. Um, when I take a look at this roadway, while there's some general little bit look of a ditch, um, when we as engineers are describing a roadway with a ditch, it would be much more defined than what I see looking at this roadway. So oftentimes we find that to be more disruptive for folks to come in and construct a rural section roadway with a ditch and put covers under all of the driveways. Um so generally particularly at the feasibility stage that's not something that we would consider because this is the more costly alternative. Um, so it's something we'd consider, but I'm not seeing it as I sit here today as a viable alternative. Typically, we find that to be more disruptive because you end up having to regrade everybody's front yard in order to really get the ditch in. If you recall from past conversations, the part that's the worst for us in the city of Victoria for our roadways is our heavy clay soils. So, the most important thing we have to do is get the water away from the roadway. So, we need to do that either through curbon gutter and storm sewer or a ditch. Um, we've done some things where we've done a hybrid if we can do that to save costs to minimize storm sewer. Those are things we could take a closer look at during the preliminary design to see if there's anything we can do to save cost particularly given the amount of um money we're talking about with these assessments. >> Thank you. Did did the neighborhood you said right they want they mentioned they want the road right we don't know about the water but when they say road do they like do we get the feeling that like they would also like to have the curb and gutter or they just want the road redone type thing like to that I guess point of >> I in my experience people just want a new road and they don't want to pay for it. Can you um I know every project's different and but you know we've had a few of these assessments lately right with Stiger Lake Lane and then uh we had what Rose Street and said those over that like what were the Can you remind us what some of the I mean I know that was just road versus um a lot in a lot of those instances not the um not the um oh never thank you segue >> it's a fantastic I've anticipated Yes. So I just Yes. For comparison's sake to for a reminder. Yes. >> Yeah. So um bringing us to our next slide then. So as a reminder, the city's adop adopted assessment policy does provide for the council to modify and modify is not even the right word. So the policies written where you're calculating the assessment based on assessing 50% of the street and storm sewer costs. Um but you are not you aren't bound by that. um you're bound by state statute and we talked about this extensively with the 2023 project and the Stiger Lake Lane project. The assessments need to be fair and equitable. And when I say fair and equitable, I'm referring to not only across classes of property, so similar types of property in the city, but all of your previous assessments. You've been doing this now since 2003. It's important that you're treating the previous property owners and previous residents of the city consistently and fairly across your policy. Um, but also you have to not exceed the benefit. So talked about this a lot with the Stiger Lake Lane project. The state statute is such that the added the amount of the assessment shouldn't must not be greater than the added value to the property resulting from the improvement. I think we can all agree that reconstructing this roadway is not going to add $43,000 worth of benefit to these properties. So we need to come up with an alternative method for the street and storm sewer calculation in particular for how to assess these properties. So I pulled out some additional points of reference to get some feedback. Um so first I just capped it at 25%. So the reason I picked that capping it at 25% amount is that has to do with how we're going to finance the project. So, if we finance the project with um a particular type of bonding that we're allowed to use with special assessment projects, we have to be assessing 25% of the project cost in order to use a particular type of bonding. So, okay, what does that number get us? That got us to 21,500 per unit. >> Okay. And that's just for the street, >> correct? We're just talking street and storm right now. Thank you. >> Then uh to Council Member Robert's point, what did we assess previously? The 2023 street improvement project was 9,110 per unit. The Stiger Lake lane improvement project was 12,000 per unit. And then if you remember, the council reduced that final assessment at the final assessment hearing to 10,800 per unit. Now, some things I want to point out to the council when you look at the difference between the 2023 street numbers and the Stiger Lake lay number is that those parcel sizes are quite a bit different. So, for reference, the reason why these assessments are coming out so high is that these are really large lots comparatively. So, the average lot size for this 80 street project, they're about 3/4 of an acre um compared to over on the 2023 street project. All of those lots are under a half acre, couple of them are a quarter acre. So, you know, you have a lot more density paying for the street. So, that's why you're seeing that difference. the two residential lots on Stiger Lake Lane were um over a half acre. So when we were coming up with that assessment calculation, the comparative project we were using for that one was the 78th Street project that had more similar lots on it. So um that was that was what we were basing it off of. In addition, if you recall, we did um go through an appeal process for the Stiger Lake Lane project. So, I did take a look at the appraisal that was um prepared for that appeal that the city just recently went through and pulled some information out of that appeal process. and um came up with some information based on what was in there that and again it's not really apples to apples because it's an appraisal of a different property but pulling out some of the um recommendations from that process that they could come up with an appraisal increase in value of um if I applied it based on the values of these parcels to up to $13,000 in increased value as a result of the project. So I I put these out here just to provide you with some ranges. Um there is a so you all could react to that. There's another step we could take that we haven't done in the past. Um we could request a proposal for a special benefit appraisal. So that's a whole another specific study that we could have completed if you're uncomfortable with this level of range that we're talking about in this particular case. um where we would have a um specific specifically general appraisal completed um for this particular project for this particular neighborhood that we could use to help us in help us inform um what to use for an assessment for this project. So, um, it doesn't preclude an appeal from happening, but it helps inform your decision for what to base the assessment off. If you're, you know, not comfortable with, as an example, matching what was done on one of these previous two projects could be an approach you take with the street and storm sewer. I want to keep the water separate. I can tell you why. If you want to talk about the water first before you talk about the street and storm is that or do you want to talk about the street and storm? >> Let's move on to the water. Okay. >> Let's talk about that a little bit and then we can circle back on the street and storm. >> Okay. So, the city's policy is for water to be 100% assessed. We've never deviated for that. And the city council's um previous city's city council's direction has been let the residents decide. The cost is the cost. We shouldn't subsidize extending city water to neighborhoods. Let the residents decide if they want it or not. So that's been the past practice. I don't have any other examples for you about how you would decide to subsidize the extension of city water because we have not previously done that and the council has previously said you either want it or you don't and let the neighborhood decide if they're getting it or not. As I sit here today, I don't know whether they want it or not. So, um my advice for that one would maybe be to let us just get through the neighborhood meeting stop and find out. I don't know. I don't know if we have old wells, new wells. I a new well costs a lot. Um, a $23,000 assessment for water isn't completely out of line when you think about what a new well costs. So, um, water's expensive >> and I think that makes sense in the grants, right? Like that's the easy decision here. Like, let's >> see what the >> see what the neighbors say and >> because we don't know, >> correct? You know, >> and you know, the question about adding adding it after the fact, what you'd be left with having to do because you realistically would not build up dig up the road is you'd have to directionally bore the water man. The risk you run is needing to acquire additional easements because you wouldn't necessarily want to put it on under the road. Would you have to try to fit it on either side of the road with all of our other friends, the endless fiber companies, gas company, electric company? Um or you would bore it under the road and have to pothole into the new road in a neighborhood meeting. We would talk through that with the residents so that they know um what they're agreeing to by not taking the water. you know, essentially if they say we're not interested, I don't envision the council being enthusiastic about coming back and putting it in. But if let's say for some reason you had contaminated wells down the down the way, well then certainly the council would be, I'm sure, supportive of helping getting it in there after the fact. But >> you have do you have an idea of what depth you have to drill a well privately in roughly Victoria to get quality water? >> I don't know the answer to that, but Brady might I can check with him. >> Does it usually last? >> I don't even know the answer to that. I don't live I don't work in wells. Brady probably knows the answer to that, too. So, if we put this water man Okay, so let me start off by saying I think it's the right thing to do is to put this water man in at the time we're doing the road. It makes the most sense. We've got it torn up. Let's not disrupt everybody again. If we make the decision to do that, we automatically will assess whether they hook up or not. Correct. That well, that's your policy. Certainly as a city council, you could make a different policy decision specific to this project, but that is what the adopted policy says. >> I mean, I agree that it's the best time to do it is now, but like she said, right? Like if there's a bunch of new wells there, like they might have no desire to, right? Like they just spent a lot of money on a well. So it's like I think need to wait and see >> what their opinion is. >> And I suspect we're going to see an array. >> Yeah. Y >> so that you know somebody's maybe sitting on a well that they don't know it's dead in a year from now is a possibility and you know if you have to drill 600 ft you're going to have a very expensive well and you may say well I wish I had chosen the city water at 23,000 rather than a well at 28,000 >> because how many of the properties nine again? Yeah. So I mean if it's if it's 90 that's an easy decision. If it's 54, then it's a little bit more, right? Like then it's more difficult, right? Like >> I agree. >> So, >> how are how is council feeling about a special benefit appraisal on the street and storm? >> I was going to ask about that >> and can you talk a little bit more about what that means and the cost of something like that, too? >> Looks like we're kicking it back to Ms. Meyer for this. Um, mayor, members of the council, so what you would do is you would go out for proposals from you would do an RFP uh for a special benefit appraiser. Um, generally for a project like this, I would anticipate um that cost to be probably under $5,000. Um, you could choose the number of properties that you'd like the special benefit appraisal to be completed on. Uh, for a project like this, we could probably just do one property since they are very similar. that appraisal is looking at before the project and after the project only at the land. So buildings or other improvements on the property are not being reviewed as part of the special benefit appraisal. Um what I will say though is if that spe special benefit appraisal is completed that is your cap for the assessment. So as Cara mentioned with um state statute, you cannot assessed more you cannot assess more than uh the special benefit of the property. So if you do that appraisal and you know what the benefit is that a property would see that would be your cap. >> Okay. >> I I feel like that's money well spent on our part. >> I'm supportive of >> taking an abundance of caution with this and >> it is unique >> the investment in a special benefit appraisal. Then like you said, you could always be challenged at appeal, but certainly at appeal having a special benefit appraisal in the lawyer's hands. >> Miss Hardy, >> appeal hearing is quite possibly a better place for us to be sitting. >> Miss Hardy, do you need a formal motion on that? >> Um, consensus is fine. >> Okay, I'm looking around. Is everybody in agreement with >> agreement? I guess my only question with the SBA would be that's not going to come in at $43,000 per property. So, we are going to get something that's substantially less than that. So, by doing the SBA, we are basically saying we're going to charge a lot less. Is that correct? >> Yes, that is correct. >> Well, if your suspicions are correct, yes, but your suspicions could be wrong and it could be $50,000 a month. These are sizable parcels. If this were a blank slate and they were bringing a neighborhood in and a developer were looking at what it would take to create eight lots from a parcel, it might very well be that it's, you know, $50,000 per parcel for street and another 25 for well and all the infrastructure needed to do it. So it's but I think that when we come to a point that this is a defensible position to be at albeit lower what if we lost on appeal and then we've not only assessed spent all the time in appeal and money in appeal and hiring then spending the money on the appraisal at that point in time. We've seen how this picture show ends before. So I think it's prudent for us to go in with this now and and potentially have that be the limiting factor and then then that also we can reconsider the rural road benefit that you originally were talking about >> that I know Cara doesn't like the the idea of ditches but I think she laid it out quite succinctly at the beginning of this people want it they don't want to pay for it and that's clearly not an option here. >> Yeah. All right. So, I'm seeing consensus on uh sending an RFP out for a special benefit appraisal. Uh Cara Man, anything else from you guys today? >> You have what you need from us? >> Yeah, I we um not entirely sure on the time frame for that. So, that could uh cause us to adjust our schedule a little bit, but we think we have time. So, okay. Very good. Council, any further questions, comments on this? All right, seeing no further discussion, um we will entertain a motion to adjurnn. >> Motion to adjurnn. >> Second. >> We have a motion and a second. All in favor signify by saying I. I. >> Any opposed? Motion carries. We'll be back in about two minutes with our regular council meeting.