- Good evening, everyone. I'd like to call to order the most wonderful thing that you can imagine doing
- on a Wednesday Which is this March 25th? 2026 regular session of the Bloomington Common Council Will
- our honorable clerk, please read the roll or call the roll rather than read it Councilmember Flaherty air
- Sasberg here Piedmont Smith Zulek present sorry here daily I'm here Rallo here rough here and Rosenberger here
- Thank you. Fantastic. Thank you. The agendas are posted on the wall. And there's also a handful of copies
- there if you'd like one in your hand. But tonight's agenda includes approval of minutes from the September
- 24 committee of the whole meeting, reports from council members, city offices, boards and commissions,
- and council committees. We have an appointment recommendation and second reading on ordinance 2026.06.
- and then two resolutions. There are no items for first reading this evening. Let us move on then to
- the minutes for approval. Is there a motion? Oh, yes. I move to approve the minutes for September 24th,
- 2025 Committee of the Whole. Second. Thank you. There's a motion and a second. Any amendments to those
- minutes? Ah, you disappeared. Oh, they're back. OK.
- Seeing none, will the clerk please call the roll. Council member Flaherty? Yes. Stossberg?
- Yes. Piedmont-Smith? Yes. Zulek? Yes. Asari? Yes. Daly? Yes. Rallo? Yes. Ruff? Yes. Rosenberger? Yes.
- We've lost visual. Now they're there. Now they're there, OK.
- Okay. All right. Thank you very much. Those minutes have been approved. Okay. We'll now move on to a
- time of reports and we will start with reports from council members. Does anyone have a report? Council
- member Stasberg.
- I think that this is now the right time to call attention to my draft priorities memo that was in the
- packet addendum that got sent out today. If you recall a couple weeks ago in the deliberation session,
- I said that I would use our conversation from that night and the follow-up survey results in terms of
- everybody getting assigned those hundred points to allocate between those outcomes. And then I drafted a memo.
- I will say that I definitely feel like this is quite a draft, and there were a few things after I sent
- it in to be included in the packet that I went, hmm, I think that there's a few things that I wanted
- to amend, so I want to kind of bring us through that first. I hope everybody's kind of looking at it.
- In the second paragraph,
- I guess it's just the second full sentence specific interest. So you guys wanted me to specifically
- call out existing plans and how important it was to all of us that we like follow through on our existing
- plans. And so that is the paragraph about that. And I wasn't sure if there needed to be some expansion
- in the final draft around the interest in
- Safe Streets for All plan climate action plan transportation plan Wasn't sure if the comprehensive plan
- should go in there because the comprehensive plan is kind of a different type of plan But I wanted to
- make sure to bring that up to make sure that nobody had Comment on that and Similarly When I Then
- Put the list of things I wasn't sure if anybody wanted any specific expansion underneath those categories
- Highlighting kind of the different specific things that might have gotten mentioned during that conversation
- So if anything if there's anything that anybody wants in there, please let me know and then I specifically
- wanted to call out under number one so it did raise the maintenance of city assets was the
- was the highest ranking thing in the consolidated ranking, but I changed that to maintenance and enhancement
- of city assets because we did have that conversation that we don't just wanna maintain, but we actually
- wanna make some things better. And so I wanted to make sure that that reframing was acceptable to the
- group. I also wanted to make sure that down on number six, that was, I can't remember what it was, it
- was the economy one, it was the vibrant economy one,
- and thank you to those of you who had suggestions. There were maybe three folks that had different
- suggestions and I tried to kind of combine those to categorize number six as inclusive and strong local
- economy, able to stay resilient and adaptable. So wanted to make sure that that worked out. And then
- I had also gotten feedback from Council Member Piedmont-Smith who was unable
- Because of illness to make that meeting a couple weeks ago about number seven Bloomington residents
- have options other than uniformed officers for nonviolent issues whether that wanted to be reframed
- and Then the the last thing actually two more things in terms of my own like wow, this was a drafty
- draft I put a couple examples in the last paragraph that I have written about budget presentations right
- in terms of
- I said the maintenance of city assets and intersection redesign as two examples of how things could
- fit into priority areas. I wanted to make sure that everybody was okay with the examples that I used
- or if there are other examples you would prefer. And then I realized that it really needs a closing
- paragraph and I need to put a closer in and I knew I at least wanted to close highlighting the dates
- of the meetings that we had had these discussions just so that if anybody wanted to go back to some
- of those source discussions that was
- all here in the memo. And those are my comments about it. So that was kind of a lot of information.
- So feedback for me about how y'all want it to be changed so that then next week we can have a final
- draft that we can vote on. Thank you so much, Council Member Stossberg, and thank you for the work both
- in leading the committee and putting this together. At this moment, any comments from council members
- to Council Member Stossberg? Council Member Pumas-Smith.
- I did as council member Stossberg mentioned I did have a concern about item number seven which says
- Bloomington residents have options other than uniformed officers for nonviolent issues under public
- safety. We since we already do have options other than uniformed officers for nonviolent issues we have
- police social workers we have stride. I'm wondering what the council's priority is here. Is it.
- to continue the police social worker programs as they are to increase financial support for stride to
- create city positions outside of the police department that can serve as community responders. Some
- combination of the above. I'd just like to get more clarity and I personally would like to see creation
- of city positions outside the police department that can serve as community responders. But I don't
- know if others agree with me.
- I would agree with that take councilmember Piedmont Smith Anyone else have comments at this point I
- had councilor Ralla just to say that I want to thank Councilman sasper for her excellent work at the
- synthesis of what council desires in terms of budget and Distilling things down Regarding policing I
- I mean, I've always maintained, I think it's important to have non-uniform police personnel, but also
- having the required number of sworn officers in order to interact with the public, be able to have the
- ability to be on neighborhood beats and be accessible to people, I think was reflected in the consultant report.
- Some years ago that that was an important aspect in terms of integrating the police into the in public
- safety into the community And it's been proven to work. So I hope that that is That's my reflection
- on on on councilmember Piedmont Smith's position on that Thanks so much. I'm other other councilman
- stuff. I just want some
- some clarity on what councilmember Zulek and Piedmont Smith said in terms of clarity on this. So you
- would like this to be clarified to basically have community responders outside of the department?
- Councilmember Zulek, is that what you said as well? Yes, and or just an expansion of the programs that
- are already available. Programs already available. And to councilmember Rallo's point,
- The fully staffing the department was actually an outcome that got voted on early on in this process.
- And I can't remember how many points it got off the top of my head, but it didn't rise to the priority
- level, which is why it's not reflected in here. But that's certainly one of those pieces of this closing
- paragraph that I need to write. Here are all the things that we talked about. Here is the full ranking
- of data where individuals might have had different priorities, but this is really supposed to be
- The thing where all of us are good with all these things. So I hope that that makes sense as to why
- that specific thing is not Consolidated into the letter. Absolutely. I I understand fully and there
- there are a lot of You know, there's a diversity of opinion about you know, obviously the city has a
- lot of needs and I and the administration has been very diligently committed to
- Hiring new officers and you know, I'm satisfied that that is already a priority And so we're well on
- our way and so we can think outside the box in terms of other types of Public safety and policing and
- so forth as well. So I have I have no quibbles with that. I appreciate you asking so Alternative wording
- here. What if we say that
- Bloomington residents have additional options other than uniformed police officers for nonviolent issues.
- So it's saying additional. So. Doesn't say what form the additional options will take that would be
- left open. Just adding the word additional in there. And I added the word police because uniformed officers
- just to clarify what that means but it's probably not necessary.
- Any other comments? Folks online, any comments? Okay. Thank you. I'll just add one, maybe two small
- things. Again, thank you so much for putting this together. I think really emphasizing the fact that
- this is a prioritized list. I think we say that at the beginning, but I just think making it a little
- bit very clear because
- both we forget things and the office of the mayor wasn't at every single one of these deliberations
- sessions. And then the second I think was the way that we framed it at the beginning.
- while we're talking about city plans, that's where we got all of these outcomes. And so our sort of
- guiding principle is let's do the plans that we already have and where there are none, we're interested
- in helping to develop those. But each of these outcomes are things that actually come from city plans
- and then that we've prioritized. So I just think that being clear at the beginning about sort of the
- process that got us there would be helpful.
- Only thing with that is I'm I would have to go through I'm not sure that all of these the ones that
- rose to the top did come from city plans because the list we started with from Councilman repeat Mott
- Smith all came from city plans, but then we added them ourselves and We we made some suggestions for
- wording but but the whole bunch Did we really yeah interesting? Yeah goals in December and then through
- the surveys interesting and in February and I'm not sure
- the top of my head which ones rose to the top and I could look yeah and maybe they they did I don't
- think so though could for example making homelessness brief rare and non-repeating is not something
- that's in one of those official city plans yeah though it is I mean it's the heading home plan essentially
- which we've supported
- But it's yeah, but I can certainly Expand that idea that this is a ranked list And and draw that out
- to make sure that there's extra clarity there. Excellent. Thank you so much customer Stasberg and everybody
- else please send emails to customer Stasberg between now and next week moving on any other councilmember
- reports comes from people Smith
- Just note we have five more minutes. Yes. I wanted to highlight that the waste reduction district of
- Monroe County is accepting grant applications for projects that that have innovative ways to reduce
- waste either through reduction of materials reuse or recycling programs especially those that can serve
- as models for other communities and institutions in Monroe County.
- Proposals may include but are not limited to projects related to newer expanded recycling programs food
- waste diversion in this initiatives environmental education programs Waste related public outreach
- initiatives and recycled content purchasing initiatives So those grants are available for nonprofits
- for civic organizations and businesses Throughout Monroe County and that deadline is May 17th and you can find
- More information at waste reduction district dot com. The second thing I just wanted to mention in the
- context of our budget priorities it was noted that we don't have a public safety plan as a community
- and I've been working on scheduling a
- deliberation session that would bring the public into first of all define public safety and then move
- on to a second session where we would talk about how the city can what our goals are for public safety
- and how the city can work towards those goals. And I know we've had some scheduling problems. I think
- that those should be subsequent sessions one after another.
- So I just want to throw out there that if we're not able to schedule those subsequent sessions this
- spring we could possibly do so in September and October. So stay tuned for more information about a
- way to help us in our quest to have a public safety plan. Thank you.
- Thank you so much. OK, we now move to reports from city offices and boards and commissions. And today
- we have three presentations. We will start with a presentation from our parks and rec director Tim Street.
- Sir, take it away.
- Good evening, Council, Tim Street, Director of Bloomington Parks and Recreation. Thanks for taking some
- time to hear from me this evening. I infrequently get to be in front of you, so it is nice to be here
- and just give a general update on our master plan efforts. I know last time I was in front of you,
- I believe, was budget hearings, and I referenced a lot about our master plan work that was underway.
- Since then, we've done a lot more work on our master plan and just wanted to share some results as we
- near completion of our master plan this evening.
- So this is an outline of what we have been doing with our master plan So starting really late last spring
- and into the summer. We worked a lot on community input through focus groups We had some really wonderful
- engagement across the community in our various focus groups a community questionnaire that got more
- than I think 1200 responses when we put it out at places like the farmers market and different community
- events and
- And then just various other one-on-one engagement through events, things like that, driving people to
- the master plan website to get engagement and good community feedback. In the fall, actually late in
- the fall, in November, December, we conducted our statistically valid community survey through Acuity.
- We were able to get to the sample size that we needed. Thankfully, it took a little bit of extra incentives
- and efforts to get things out through the US mail, which,
- proven to be unreliably slow, but we navigated that. And we had a full financial analysis done through
- the consultant as well for our 2024 finances to look at things like pricing and cost recovery goals
- and things like that. And just to give us another outside perspective of how we're doing.
- In the winter, what we've been working on right now is data and engagement review, reviewing all of
- this information that's come in. We received our community survey results about a month ago. We've been
- looking at those. Part of why I'm here tonight is I just wanted to share a little snapshot of what we
- heard. And we've been working to draft our goals and actions.
- And as we move into spring right now, it is the first week of spring officially, we are working on finalizing
- our goals, actions, and adoption of a plan. So that plan will go to the Board of Park Commissioners
- at their April 16th meeting. We plan to present the plan and our strategic actions to them then. Not
- adopt it in the same meeting, that would be a lot to take in, but we hope by the May meeting we're ready
- to answer any questions, deal with any feedback, and adopt our master plan for the next five years.
- And just as a general reminder, having a master plan is really an absolute must for a Parks and Rec
- Department. It makes you one for accreditation, for our ongoing accreditation efforts, it's required,
- and it is a required part of getting any kind of grant through the state as well. So we really have
- invested a lot in this process to hear from the community, and it means a lot for us in terms of planning
- our efforts moving forward.
- Entire survey results are like 80 pages of graphs and things like that. I'm not going to go through
- all of that tonight. I know you have other things to get to. So I'm going to give you just a high level
- overview of some of the key points and takeaways we're looking at. We had 405 residents respond completed
- in November and December. The sample was then weighted by Acuity with their expertise in being
- statisticians, I suppose, to match US Census targets for Bloomington and key demographics. And overall,
- the margin of error was less than 5%, so we're really happy that this is a representative sample of
- Bloomington and we can draw conclusions from it to pair with our other qualitative community feedback
- that we've been working on. A few key findings, just wanna hit a few high-level things.
- We're very gratified that our overall esteem ratings in the community are very favorable. Over 90% of
- people are very supportive of what Parks and Rec is doing and what we offer for quality of
- life in Bloomington. We wanna keep it that way. That is part of why we master plan. 78% found positive
- value in tax support of parks, programs, and facilities. The most used self-reported facilities that
- we see are the B-Lines, which are Brian Park,
- Griffey Lake Nature Preserve and the rail trail. Not really any big surprises in what we see as most
- used. We also have access to place or AI data to sort of look at cell phone usage and draw conclusions
- about where people are going and honestly where they're not going to and where some areas might
- be underutilized and have opportunity. As general demand and interest that we see from our residents,
- number one, this is consistent, we see this a lot, trails.
- 75% weighted said trails were a priority for them Open space and natural areas was next at 61% park
- and trail amenities was next at 60% Coming in as the next highest rated two items were swimming pool
- and pickleball at 38% and 28% The pickleball demand is real. It is here to stay Flipping over to more
- of the event programmatic side of things
- We see that the farmers market is the most in demand program that we offer, followed by outdoor concerts
- and natural resources education. What's interesting about these top demanded areas is if you take a
- look at the full survey results, we're putting out a press release sometime in the next week or two
- that's gonna have a link to a lot more data if you wanna dive into it. All of those high demand things,
- the top three in both programs, facilities, trails and in, excuse me, parks, facilities and trails and
- in programs.
- all have high demand but they all rate as having quality supply as well. So residents really want those
- things and they feel like they are being provided those things. So then we're able to look at those
- next level things like swimming pool and pickle ball to evaluate those for future investments. 47% of
- our residents, half of our residents used park event or program throughout the year.
- When we asked folks what they would rate as their top facility for investment to be improved, Bryant
- Park Pool was the number one rated of the options, but of course none was also coming in at 24%. So
- we're sensitive to the fact that it's an expensive time to be living anywhere in the United States and
- we wanna make really good judicious decisions with our investments to serve the greatest good for the
- community. Interestingly, you know,
- Key facilities rated between 68% support, despite that, which was Mills Pool to 78% at Brian Pool favorably
- for investment, but of course we recognize there's no dollar amount tied to that in a survey and it's
- sort of just a, do you feel like you would like to support this with an investment? So we know there's
- more work to be done there, but this gives us really key insights into, comparatively especially, how
- our facilities and programs rank with the community.
- I'm totally happy to share these are the four draft goals that we are taking forward to the park board
- We've been pretty deliberative about these and talked about these a lot So the the four areas where
- you're going to be focusing on for the next five years number one, of course making meaningful community
- impacts Parks and Rec is here to provide opportunities for health connection and resilience in the community
- Those will continue to be our priorities how we have to do that right now is we have to do that by critically
- investing in what we have and
- We've enjoyed a great period of of new things and new growth in our focus as I've discussed with the
- council before and at budget hearings Is very much on how do we take care of what we have? How do we
- keep our old pools our old facilities in good shape for future generations of people who live in Bloomington?
- That ties right into number three. We have to be financially sustainable
- That includes a long look at our cost recovery goals, our cost recovery strategy, where and how are
- we subsidizing programs, are we making sure we're subsidizing the things that do the greatest general
- good for the public. And lastly,
- what was critical to doing all of those three things is we have to have a strong and connected staff.
- So that is our fourth goal. So just wanted to give that brief update and happy to answer any questions
- if you'd like. Otherwise, as I mentioned, the full survey results, there's a 20 page version which I
- recommend looking at unless you really want to get into it and look at the 80 page version, which I'm
- happy to supply, but we'll be releasing that with the press release sometime here in the next week or two.
- Thank you so very much, Director Street, both for everything that you do and for the presentation. Are
- there questions or comments? Please, Councilor Mbrella. Thank you. Thank you, Director Street. Director
- Renison about 15 years ago said that pickleball was the future, and it's proven to be the case. But
- besides pickleball and that kind of recreation, which is important, I'm concerned about Griffey.
- The ecological integrity of Griffey First of all, we do we continue doing Yearly hunts, is that correct?
- And do we continue doing plant census? In other words, do we? Do we deploy I can remember ecologic or
- some firm to correct ecologic census and density and plant stature and things like that to make sure
- that the understory was responding to the
- relieving of Herbivory, is that happening? It is okay terrific. I'd like to see I Hopeful I know that
- there's a legacy effect of high deer density But I'm hoping that you know the under stories rebounding
- which is important And I wondered about something else. Oh Regarding the ecological integrity of Griffey,
- there's a controlled burn that's happening It's a concern of some people
- and You know, I'm favorable to these because of course, you know, they they happen in nature and it's
- important could you could you describe the purpose and You know the prospects for these things and the
- turns that are happening
- So briefly, what we saw in the community survey was the number two thing that people ranked as being
- in demand, being supported, is protection of existing natural resources. So clearly, it continues to
- be a priority for our residents that we invest in and we take care of our existing natural resources,
- be that the 1,300 acres of Griffey or the small nature preserves that we have in other places, the small
- stands, the habitat, the connectivity of habitat, the native plants, all of the work that we do with that.
- In terms of Griffey specifically, yes, we continue to do the deer hunt. I believe we're in year nine
- of the deer hunt. We have made a very intentional decision to continue the research that we've been
- doing there because we feel like this is important and ongoing to see what the effects are year over
- year and rule out any variations of weather and drought that we have year over year to really get a
- good trend line to see how effective the Griffey deer hunt is going.
- I think it's important work that we're doing. I think we're leading the way on it Honestly with some
- different parks and rec departments particularly in the state So it's important that we continue to
- do the research to back up why we're doing it Similarly the the controlled burn that the prescribed
- fire I should say rather is a similar effort to combat mesification in the forest and targets beach
- maple forest stands which are
- Overgrowing and overtaking our oak hickory forest, which is more climate resilience, which is also under
- threat from the deer over browse So it's all interrelated The deer the controlled burn actually happened
- yesterday and was a success. We had a great Prescribed fire out there. It went well, and we want to
- continue to research and look at the effects of those on the natural resource And removal of Invasive
- non non natives. Mm-hmm. That's going
- Okay, and a and a happy Consequence of reducing your density is of course people who use the park are
- not going to be subjected to hide your height tick density So then I can I hope so yes ticks Yes,
- thank you, thank you great great customer sasberg I just wanted to follow up on the survey
- Just because I mean you had four hundred and five residents complete the survey out of more than eighty
- thousand residents So can you just talk about how that is? still like statistically significant and
- That sort of thing especially because that's that's a number that's out there now, right to making sure
- that That everybody I cannot talk about I took statistics in college, but I don't remember a lot. I
- We worked with a professional survey firm who looked at Bloomington, who looked at the census information,
- who looked at the population, the resident outcomes, everything like that, and came up with a number,
- as statisticians do, that they said, we need this many randomized samples to be a statistically valid
- survey, and to get the error of margin that they said, which is less than 5%. So while more respondents
- would have continued
- to decrease the error below that 5%, we still feel pretty confident statistically that this is a really
- good valid survey for us to look at. I really wanted the quantitative part of it to look at to pair
- with the qualitative feedback that we were getting from community focus groups and things like that.
- So I think we're not just making decisions on the survey alone, but pairing it with everything else
- that we've heard from the community through focus groups, through talking to people at the farmers market,
- the outreach work we've done as part of the master plan process. Okay. Thank you. So those 405 survey
- respondents don't include all of the other outreach that you did last year. Great. Thanks. Thank you.
- Any other questions online. All right. Seeing none. Thank you. We now have a presentation from the Human
- Rights Commission who's here. I see many of you.
- Good evening. My name is Emma Williams and I'm the chair of the Bloomington Monroe County Human Rights
- Commission I've been on the Commission for about three years Recent nomination to the chair. So and
- I'm going to present the annual report from 2025 So the Commission is composed of seven members appointed
- by the Monroe County Commissioners the Bloomington City Council and the mayor and our work is primarily guided by
- responsibilities, which is the enforcement of the human rights ordinance and educating community members
- about their rights and the responsibilities that are applicable to them under human rights laws.
- So in 2025, the commission investigated 18 cases alleging discrimination.
- Each of these cases reflects an individual or a family seeking fairness under our local ordinance And
- our role is to essentially ensure that those claims are reviewed carefully and impartially in addition
- to formal Investigations we responded to 83 inquiries and complaints and these often involve individuals
- seeking guidance about their rights and whether their situation falls within our jurisdiction and
- We work to make sure that they're pointed in the right place and given the correct resources for their
- situation at hand if we're not able to help them. Beyond enforcement we also remain active in community
- outreach because we want to touch as many people as possible so they understand what
- we as a community can do to help them if they are facing discrimination. So we tabled at several different
- events, Pride Fest, the ADA anniversary celebration, and La Fiesta del Antonio. And these are just important
- ways for us to connect directly with the residents and increase awareness so they know exactly who to
- come to if they have an issue.
- We also hosted our annual art and essay contest for students in grades kindergarten through sixth grade.
- So this year's theme was, how does diversity make our community stronger? And it encouraged students
- from a really young age to engage with ideas of inclusion and respect for all community members. Looking
- ahead, our strategic goals in 2026 reflect our past work.
- We want to really focus on continuity of what we've been doing and the growth of the commission. So
- we'll continue to review and respond to all inquiries and investigate all discrimination cases within
- our jurisdiction and clubbing those into the correct parties if it falls outside of our jurisdiction.
- We also plan to expand our educational efforts by attending
- informational events and increasing outreach through publications and presentations. We often have different
- members of the community and community organizations come in and educate us about what they do.
- So that way, we have a lot of weapons at our resource. If we can't particularly help someone, we can
- guide them to local resources as well as state resources that can help. And we also want to identify
- new opportunities to support and protect people who are most at risk
- discrimination in the community So yeah at its core the Commission it the work is about ensuring access
- to information Processes and the protections guaranteed under local laws We're really grateful for the
- continued support of the council and advancing our work and we invite everyone to
- Attend our meetings which are held on the third Monday of each month 5 p.m. Here in City Hall usually
- the hooker room or via zoom and Thank you for your time and commitment to protecting the rights and
- dignity of everyone here in Bloomington and the county beyond and I am happy to answer questions and
- Michael is really happy to answer questions Thank you so much any questions colleagues Councilman Piedmont Smith
- Given the nationwide attacks on trans rights. Have you seen an uptick in the number of? Discrimination
- complaints from the LGBTQ plus community From what I engaged Yes a little bit. I wouldn't I mean Michael
- could answer more to that. I think Because we we have such a like a
- We have such wide variety of cases, and each commissioner works on a individual case. It's hard for
- me to gauge exactly what comes in until the end with the annual report. So, Michael, have you seen an
- uptick? Yeah, I'm Michael Shermans from the Community Family Resources Department here at the city and
- the liaison for the Human Rights Commission.
- Yeah, there's definitely been an uptick in the amount of People in the LGBTQ plus community who have
- come forward with issues And probably an overall increase not a large because it's not a large percentage
- anyway of trans cases as well So there there is some more concern about that area and we continue to
- try to address it in the same way that we always do Thank you, thank you, I'm glad people have this
- resource councilmember daily
- Thank you for that answer kind of in that same vein it can you identify anything maybe proactively that
- we as a council can be doing to help you guys or help the You know marginalized members of our community
- who are coming forward with more And I'm putting you on the spot trying to think of a solution right
- there But but have you guys been able to identify anything that we could be doing to help? I think our
- Commission members are made up of a broad variety of community members with various interests
- and backgrounds. And so they might all have very specific things that they could give you. I think,
- genuinely, the best thing to be doing right now is encouraging the members of the community, specifically
- those most marginalized, that you are listening and you will do what you can in your power to, you know,
- listen with empathy and assist. I know right now there's a lot of pressure for local governments nationwide
- with sort of the administration coming down from both state levels and national levels and the threats
- that kind of loom over everyone's head. It's definitely in the back of everyone's mind. So I think just
- ensuring different groups
- Being open and available to their thoughts and their feelings and ensuring that whatever you can do
- within your power You are willing to give it a shot But I'll add that For nine years running we've received
- a hundred score of a hundred on the human rights campaign thing But you've all probably been aware of and
- And one of the things that we've always not got any extra points on, because you try to get more than
- 100, is the actual not having an LGBTQ plus center for Bloomington. We have one on that campus, but
- the community doesn't have one. And behind the scenes, we've been trying to help
- Support that as much as possible with people and that's on its way. So I would say one of the ways you
- could probably support it is Get in contact with those people and tell them that you're behind them
- because they're they're on their way towards getting that center in place It's called the front door
- I'm very excited about that. Actually. Yeah, I think that's fantastic. Thank you for those answers.
- Thank you so much Councilmember Stossberg For the sake of the community listening, can you kind of walk?
- through if somebody feels like they have need because they have been discriminated against in some way,
- what should they do in order to get in contact with you? And if they are concerned about being retaliated
- against, how do you deal with that kind of fear?
- talk to people all the time, try to make sure that we have a safe space for them to be able to tell
- what their issues, let them know that it's confidential that what we're doing, we will keep it to whoever
- has to do it if we have an investigating commissioner. We give them opportunity to spell out their timeline
- of what happened, who was involved, what it was, try to gather all of the information of what the actual
- complaint is, and then give them the option to be able to try to work with the respondent
- or bring it as a formal complaint and get an investigating commissioner involved. So we work with them
- the best we can to try to ensure that they're going to be safe in this process. When it goes to respondent,
- the complaint is made clear that retaliation is not acceptable. And that's sort of the general process.
- It's a little bit longer than when we describe it to a complaint, but that's the upshot. Right,
- but I mean, do they call you? Do they email?
- Yeah, well, it comes in every way. So we see your emails. We have a form that's up on the web, so an
- initial intake form that you can be able to do. We get phone calls all of the time. Other people will
- pass it along. I get texts. It happens pretty much every way. And we accept anything that anybody wants
- to do. Thank you.
- Thank you all so much. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for your service to the city and just residents.
- Thank you We now have a presentation from the Commission on Hispanic and Latin affairs welcome Okay,
- thank you so much I'm a tiny one Okay, thank you for having me here. Um
- I'm Claudia. I'm in the commission for two years now and recently named the chair of the commission.
- So we are so happy to be here. Um, our mission is to identify, understand and address the issues that
- impact Hispanic and Latin residents while actively promoting access, reducing barriers and straightening
- civic participation.
- It's also important to recognize that Hispanic and Latin residents represent approximately 10% of the
- Bloomington population, and we are committed to ensure that their voices are heard and reflected in
- the life of our city. In practice, this means we work to deeply understand community experience to elevate
- those voices and to help translate them into thoughtful and collaborative solutions.
- We aim to strain connections between resident and local government, ensuring that communication is not
- only accessible, but also culturally responsive and grounded in trust. And at the heart of our work
- is a deep commitment to recognize and celebrate the contribution of Hispanic and Latin residents, which
- are essential to the strength and vitality of our community. I also want to acknowledge the work of
- the commitment
- and commitment of our commissions who contribute to make this work possible. And I would especially
- like to recognize our liaison Jimena Martinez, whose leadership and dedication has been instrumental
- in helping us reach where we are today, especially in times like this for us. In terms of our 2025 key
- achievements,
- Our work focus on three key areas, expanding access to resources, training partnerships, and fostering
- a strong sense of belonging across the community. In terms of access, we provide resources
- through educational initiative, including Spanish languages workshop, focus on mental health, and parenting.
- We also support families navigating FAFSA process in collaboration with IU La Casa Latino Cultural Center
- and El Centro Comunal Latino helping families overcome language barriers and better access financial
- aid for college. In term of partnership, one key initiative was the Mental Health Community Forum where
- we brought together 10 local organizations and providers. This allow us to identify barriers such as
- language access, stigma, and fear while beginning
- to strengthen networking and referral pathways across organizations. We connect with MCSE to better
- understand factors affecting student attendance and well-being with the goal of training communication
- with families. And in terms of belonging, we focus on creating trusted spaces where families feel comfortable
- engaging, asking questions, and accessing information in environments where they feel safe and welcomed.
- These include partners
- participating in community events, connecting with residents through Spanish language radio, and creating
- opportunity for more direct and meaningful engagement. For example, during the La Fiesta del Otoño,
- a long-standing community and family research tradition celebrating Hispanic Heritage Month, we hosted
- an outreach booth to share information about city resources and connect with residents in welcoming
- environment. This is an opportunity to celebrate our community
- its culture, its contribution and presence in Bloomington. And we warmly invite you to join us this
- year. Looking ahead for 2026, our work will continue to focus on amplifying the voice of Hispanic and
- Latin residents and strengthening connections between the community and local institutions.
- We will prioritize improving access to information and services, particularly by reducing language barriers
- and expanding cultural responsive communications. We also aim to deepen partnership with schools, community
- organization, and service providers so we can better understand community needs and response in a more
- coordinated way. We will launch the Latino Recognition Award with our new focus on community center's
- value, honoring individuals and organizations whose
- leadership and service strengths, and uplifted Bloomington Hispanic and Latin community. And most important,
- we want to continue to celebrate our community and its valuable contribution to Bloomington rooted in
- hard work, strong family values, and deep sense of community. Ultimately, our goal is not only to respond
- to immediate needs that we absolutely have, but also to contribute to long-term improvement that expands
- opportunities, strength access, and support dignity for all.
- More than welcome to have any response. Thank you so much. Muchas gracias. Questions? Comments? Councilmember
- Puma-Smith. Yes. Thank you so much for your presentation and all your great work in the community. I
- just want to state for the record that I think it's shameful that our federal government has created
- a climate of fear for this population rather than recognizing and celebrating the contributions of Hispanic
- and Latina communities.
- to our culture, society, and economy. And it's also horrible that the Indiana General Assembly has preempted
- local government's right to protect our communities by requiring us to collaborate with ICE, an agency
- that has acted in blatant violation of civil and legal rights, especially those of Hispanic, Latine,
- and other communities of color throughout the US. I support you, and I think I can speak for us all
- that we support the communities that you represent and appreciate your hard work
- Here in Bloomington Councilmember Daley Thank you for that presentation and also for all the work that
- that the whole Commission does I know that this past year you guys had some tricky obstacles and barriers
- and trying to continue, you know to operate with some normalcy and I think you guys
- did a fantastic job and I'm really impressed with all of the hard work and commitment from the commission.
- How can we as a council and also even as a community be supporting the commission better? I appreciate
- so much this question. I would encourage the council to intentional consider Hispanic and Latin community
- across all the city strategies.
- from Parkinson's recreation to housing and public services to include and strengthen the language barriers
- that we have, for example, and make more accessible in language, for example, or actually ensuring services
- are also culturally responsive. It's also important to continue for us to celebrate our culture. So
- be part of that. We invite you and we welcome you.
- to our Fiesta del Otoño and to help us to change a narrative that are around our community because
- we strongly think that our community and multiculturality help and make this city a better place. So
- you're more than welcome to be in all our activities and to join us. So, yeah. Thank you. Thank you so much.
- Okay. Thank you so much for your time. Thank you for being here We now move on to a time of public comment
- for things that are not on the agenda I'm sorry. We have a council committee report. I'm sorry. So before
- that we have two council committee reports I think we start with Councilmember Rosenberger has as a
- report. Thank you so much Take it away
- Okay, thanks. That ended so abruptly. Let me just get, I need to get it. I'm just going to wing it for
- the start. Okay, so this is the new, the old sidewalk committee, the new pedestrian safety committee.
- So welcome to the pedestrian safety committee. We met in December and talked through our past
- our past recommended and funded projects that we did in 2025 or even 2024 that are still ongoing like
- North Jefferson Street. And we talked with staff about how we want this committee to move forward. So
- because we have the transportation plan and the safe streets for all plan, what's so funny?
- We can't see you, but they can, we just can't. You're over there, not over there. Oh, I'm sorry. I see
- myself on the screen. It's not you, it's not you, it's not you. There, you're back. Okay, and so what
- we really looked at this year is how the money, the $500,000 that council gets from the alternative
- transportation fund, ATF, can be kind of the most efficiently used and
- also a little bit like the most nimbly used, I would say. And so this has kind of always been something
- that gets discussed at these meetings that like, how much does this committee want to like weigh in
- on every specific project that might get done or do we want to give staff the flexibility to kind of
- pick and choose projects as the year progresses? So last year we had three,
- three projects that were kind of finished up or still ongoing this year. And then another committee
- member might want to speak to those. And then we still gave a big chunk as flexible funding to work
- in coordination with public works. So mostly when they were doing street repaving, planning staff would
- see that opportunity as like increasing or putting in new bump outs.
- bike lanes and things of that sort. So we felt like that went really well last year. And so this year
- really is a pretty similar funding allocation and recommendation. There is the funding for the North
- Jefferson Street sidewalk build out. And I think this is our third year on it and it will be completed.
- So that's just East of Eigenman.
- where that is. It's like a big student area and there wasn't a sidewalk. So that is, I think,
- really lovely. And so we looked at the criteria that we used last year and these are safe streets for
- all projects. And then we kind of so almost like extended the reach that it's not just public works
- projects, but it can also be in conjunction with utilities or other city departments or other safe streets
- for all projects. And then because this was a little more
- Widely cast than normal we asked for a check-in mid-year from planning staff. So Probably Hank Duncan
- will be giving us a mid-year report when we're back from recess sometime in July That's what I have
- Thank you so much any questions for the for the committee Cuz Marella, well, it's more of it I think
- there was a question raised by councilmember Rosa
- Rosenberg Rosenberg, sorry Excuse me Spaced out about whether council input or plant planners are the
- appropriate means by which we discern the needs of the community and I think a combination of them are
- important because you know having been on the sidewalk committee for years and
- There is the the lived experience needs of residents You know of where you know what the needs are in
- their neighborhood that I think is invaluable, you know that may be overlooked by planners as much as
- I respect of course the planners sort of 30,000 foot view and You know, so I think that you know, the
- combination is is an important way to Prioritize needs and I recognize the needs list is very long
- Thank you. Apologies, Council Member Rosemar. For some reason. Other... Go ahead, Council Member. That
- wasn't a question, right? It was just a... Reflect on, do you share that view? Or are you thinking,
- I mean, you were proposing maybe turning it all over to the planning staff? Is that your perspective?
- That is the perspective of the committee for the most part, yes. I'm just one of the votes, one of four.
- And yes, the breakdown now that I have my document up is 60,000 to finish that construction of North
- Jefferson and then 435 for right of way acquisition, design and construction under the safe streets
- priority projects. And then 5,000 for change orders because that sometimes happens where engineering
- has to ask for special permission and now they kind of don't. I like that.
- I think this is my sixth year on the committee and maybe my fifth year or fourth year as chair. And
- every year we do have this council member Rallo question, which I appreciate. And I think it is like
- for me, the transportation plan and the safe streets for all plan has taken into account what people
- in neighborhoods want and need because of all the public engagement in those plans.
- So that's my take on it. I would be happy for other committee members to weigh in on their take on that
- as well. Council Member Stasberg. I have a question. In the
- I guess it's 2025 update table. It has the fee lane and law lane intersection improvement that looks
- like maybe it was $40,000 in like design kind of planning stuff. Do you know where that is or was that
- brought up at all in discussion in terms of where that's laying in any kind of priority list? Because
- often I guess I've felt like with the
- with this committee's allocations, like you mentioned North Jefferson, it's like the third year in terms
- of progressing on and continuing to devote some funds as budgeting allows to the same projects. So do
- you know if that fee lane, law lane intersection is maybe going to be going to use some of that $435,000
- this year? Was that talked about?
- It is one of the optional, like the project is on the table and I forget what IU owns, but it's very
- IU dependent because they own part of the property around there. I think it was a consideration last
- year, but you can see we did not, or yeah, we did not spend any money on it last year. And instead,
- I think we looked at that bus stop up the street. That was a problem with Briscoe where
- students were crossing without just wildly crossing the street sort of because the bus stopped on the
- opposite side and then they had to get across. So I think some money got spent on that. And then so
- Hank Duncan did have the fee lane, law lane as an example of a project that will be looked at this year.
- So I guess I don't know that it's like that there is a priority list, but I know it's an option if that
- is helpful. Yeah, that is helpful. Thanks.
- Thank you last chance questions comments There's all right. Thank you so much to the committee for that
- rapport. Okay councilman Stossberg We're clerkless I didn't notice so we I think we have to do into
- can we operate a meeting clerkless Okay, so We there's there we are
- Sorry, I had a notice I had a notice that we had become clickless Well, we have to vote to approve so
- I'll make a motion please I'll move to Prove the sidewalk. Sorry the pedestrian safety committee funding
- recommendations for 2026 Second, there's a motion in a second. Will the clerk please call the roll? I
- Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes.
- Excellent that that that those recommendations carry Thank you so much to the hard work of the committee
- and as always and thank you councilman burrows embargo for chairing that committee so diligently year
- after year Okay, but now for for sake of time. Hopefully we'll move on to the hiring committee memo
- Hopefully all of you had the chance to read the memo So happy as a committee to take any questions about
- it And if none we can directly move to the two motions proposed in the memo
- Councilman Sasberg, I think the only Okay, so I've actually I have two questions about the job description
- One is job grade was highlighted and it was still a 12. Is that actually staying at 12? That will be
- determined by the normal processes. Okay, so it hasn't gone through that yet Correct. Okay, great. And
- then the second thing that I wanted to Bring up is under the exercised rights. I think that it is a
- kind of a change, it's in consultation with the council president and consistent with human resources.
- Basically, it sounds like the council president is then sharing supervisory authority over council staff
- with this, I can't remember what we've called this role, the council attorney and director of common
- council office, and I'm not sure that I'm comfortable with that.
- in terms of actually sharing the supervisory authority with a single council member, just because I,
- I mean, the attorney is the one who's in the office all the time with those people, and it's one thing
- to consult. I mean, the language that was in there before was to just, when it comes to discipline and
- firing, it was, where is it, to confer.
- with the president, which doesn't give the president any power. That was the intention of that word,
- confer, anyway, at the time, was to not give the president any actual power, but just to allow the attorney
- to talk to somebody specific about that kind of procedure, but not necessarily anything else related
- to staffing. So I don't love that we've then given power to a single council member to supervise staff.
- Thank you. So I think as the committee, I mean, our committee respond if you feel otherwise, but the
- word consultation is a synonym for confer to us. I don't think we saw this in any different way. So
- we're happy to change it to confer. I don't think it makes a big difference. I guess I would want to
- look up that definition. Let's just change it to confer. I'll do that for a second. We can just change
- it to confer. I don't think any objection, but we'll just change it to confer.
- We'll just say in conference or we'll just say conferring. Yeah in conference or yeah Something like
- that as long as the intention is that the council attorney gets to make all of these decisions And the
- council president is just like there. Yes, correct And that is exactly what we tried to capture. So
- yeah that thank you for the thank you for that Yeah, so as long as that's kind of clear in whatever
- language that was my only concern. Thanks Any other comments or questions By councilman rel
- Well, I just wanted to thank the committee chair and president. I'm sorry for his His work the proposed
- draft changes to the job description that the committee reviewed and that is before us tonight It required
- a lot of work and I appreciate You know your your your take on it so Any other comments or questions
- councilmember Rosenberger Thanks
- The job grade 12. So what is the process exactly? Like I'm guessing you all as the committee kind of
- wrote it so that it does appear to be more of a director position probably in line with like department
- heads and then how do we get it changed if not now? Like does HR review it now? Because I think it would
- be so great to hire into a different pay range.
- Yeah, so the next process will work with HR to actually get it reviewed before posted. Oh, cool. Okay,
- great. There's no guarantee that it would change, but we have a process for that to happen. And we have
- written it with that in mind. Any other questions? And thank you so much for that, Council
- Member Rosenberger. Just one last one. Yes, sir. When will it be posted? I'm clear. I don't know. As
- soon as possible. As soon as possible. With post-haste.
- Not that there's a sense of urgency. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. It'll go faster than this meeting
- is going. I promise. I cannot I cannot keep that promise. Okay. Council members look I move that the
- council approves this job description. Okay. There's a motion and a second to approve the job description
- here. We have to will the clerk please call the roll.
- Yes. I'm sorry. I didn't capture who the second was. Thank you. Councilmember Piedmont Smith. Yes. Zulick.
- Yes. Sorry. Yes. Daily. Yes. Rallo. Yes. Ruff. Yes. Rosenberger. Yes. Clarity. Yes. Stossburg. Yes.
- Thank you.
- And then there's a second request from the committee in the memo if if anybody would like to move for
- that, that'd be great I move to authorize the hiring committee to identify and contract in coordination
- with appropriate city processes with external vendors professional service providers or temporary legal
- counsel as necessary to ensure Uninterrupted functioning of the council office and to support recruitment
- efforts second as much in a second any discussion. I
- Councilmember Piedmont Smith and Stossberg I would just ask that it it say and or temporary legal counsel
- so that we can engage with external vendors professional service providers and or temporary legal counsel
- Is that you take that as a friendly amendment? Councilmember daily I'm sorry. I was trying to send this
- over to the clerk and I didn't hear what the I Knew you that we we we say
- And or temporary legal counsel as necessary so that we could do both and not just one or the other I
- think that's that's how it was written Okay, I'm sorry. I apologize. I misspoke. It should say and or
- I just am wondering how
- this is gonna work in terms of how, if we contract with an attorney, how their time is gonna be prioritized
- in terms of, I mean, for example, yesterday in the CCP meeting, there were like three things that were
- like, oh, I guess we're gonna have to consult with this about an, with an external person, and so is
- that something that y'all have been able to talk about yet, or?
- we've started at least to speak in broad terms about it. I mean, it's gonna be something we're gonna
- have to feel out a bit. I mean, it's new territory here, but the goal is how do you get the actual legal
- expertise that we need and minimizing the cost to the city. So, I mean, that's the framework that we'll
- have to operate under, what that looks like in practice. We've talked, for example, we threw out the
- idea that if you had an external council,
- Could be something like every council member gets a 30 minute consultation a week or something like
- that, you know, to talk about legislation, you know, something like that. And then that they're at our
- meeting, you know, it could be something, you know, some some framework like that. So, you know, obviously
- thinking about fairness and accessibility and equal accessibility and those type of things. But yeah,
- I mean, it's a new territory. So we'll have to see. OK, thanks. OK, any other discussion points, please,
- Councilman Rallo.
- Well, just to say I want to express gratitude to Clerk Nicole Bolden for and her staff for all the help
- given to the council In this interim while we were staff council the council office and apart from that
- just generally speaking because it's been profound and really important and has kept us going so Yep
- Any other discussion here
- Okay, seeing none or online. Are you all okay with this? Okay, clerk, will you please kindly call the
- roll? Yes, sorry. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Rosenberger. Yes. Flaherty. Yes. Stossburg. Yes. And
- Piedmont Smith. Yes.
- Woohoo, fantastic guys, we did it. Okay, if you're a Dune fan, that concludes Dune part one. And so
- the crescendo of Dune part one though, the after bit is that we have a time now of public comment. This
- is for anything that is not on the agenda. There'll be time of public comment for the things on the
- agenda on each agenda item. So if you have a public comment, please come to the mic. Remember to sign
- in. If you'd like to say your name or alias, and if you're online,
- The same we will alternate between people online and in the room starting with them here in the room.
- Take it away. Mr. MG Hey, good evening council. Mr. President. This is Christopher MG senior director
- of government and community relations with your Greater Bloomington Chamber of Commerce tonight I just
- want to highlight a couple upcoming opportunities
- These are all open to the community and free you do not have to be a chamber member And I'd be remiss
- if I didn't start with our wonderful partnership with the city who luckily most of them are here tonight
- I can thank them personally that will be doing zing train systems for supporting staff at the Bloomington
- Convention Center That's Wednesday April 1st from 8 a.m. To 4 p.m. We have 139 already registered we
- can have about 20 more. This is a
- award-winning workshop designed for business owners, managers, and HR professionals. Participants will
- gain practical tools around hiring, training, performance management systems with a focus on building
- stronger teams, improving retention, and addressing workplace challenges proactively. And then we have
- some great volunteer opportunities. Michael Sherma's
- being one of my great volunteers at the Success School's Reality Store, that's the foundation wing,
- feel-good wing of the chamber. What is the Success School and what is the Reality Store? Well, we do
- career and financial literacy at the Success School, and the Reality Store is a hands-on literacy simulation
- where junior high students take the role of a 28-year-old, kids, marriages, divorce, and they navigate
- life, budgeting around housing, transportation,
- food and more and we will have volunteers play key role in connecting them with that real life experience
- at different booths. So we'll be starting that first a week from Friday, April 3rd at Jackson Creek
- Middle School. We have two shifts, a morning and an afternoon. And then we'll be finishing up our fourth
- round Friday, May 8th at Tri North.
- middle school, so we'd love to see you volunteer for that. If you have not, it is really a lot of fun
- interacting with junior high students and them realizing how much children cost, how much they are actually
- causing budget woes within their own household. And then on Tuesday, April 21st, we're gonna be back
- actually with Elect Connect at the Waldron Center. This is our candidate election event. We'll be focusing
- on the Democratic
- primary from Monroe County Commissioner featuring the county council members Trent Deckard and David
- Henry. Should be a wonderful way to network with them ahead of time and then see a moderated debate
- with former John Fernandez. That starts at four o'clock and will end before six p.m. I thank you for
- your time tonight and I hope everybody brought a lunch. Thank you. Is there anyone online?
- Wonderful. Here back in the room. Take it away. Hello, my name is Matt Caldy. I'm here just to kind
- of remind the community, anyone watching in Bloomington or in the Bloomington area, that the Environmental
- Commission's Eco Heroes Art Contest is open for submissions. So we're looking for any artistic submissions
- from ages pre-K all the way up to adult. We've had 2D art, 3D art, performance art, essays,
- digital media, all kinds of creative stuff. Our theme this year is Our Nature at Night. So we're hoping
- to get a lot of nocturnal themed, all the things that happen after sunset. Let's see. The submissions
- are due by April 7th. They can be turned in here at City Hall during business hours. Or if it is a digital
- submission, contestants can email environment at bloomington.in.gov.
- the The presentation will be a part of the Earth Day event at switch yard park on April 18th So that's
- where people will be able to pick up their submissions or get prizes Looking forward to a whole bunch
- of submissions. So tell your friends. Thank you Thank you. Anybody else like to give comment?
- Hi, my name is Christopher. I've been a citizen of Bloomington my whole life. Happy spring also. I have
- a simple idea. How about as a city, we grow our own food? And I know what a lot of you are thinking.
- It's infeasible, lands too expensive, et cetera. But I think we could come up with a way, grants,
- fundraising, volunteers,
- to grow our own food as a city, even if it's just 10% to start. I've personally done gardening my whole
- life, and I really enjoy it. I believe gardening's great for health and wellness, and it can be therapeutic.
- There's a story, an old story in Genesis. When God kicked out Adam and Eve, he stationed a cherubim
- to guard the Garden of Eden.
- Now, I don't know what your beliefs are, religious or whatnot, and I don't know where we would fall
- on that timeline, but I do know we can grow our own food, and that's my simple suggestion. Thank you
- for your time. Thank you so much. Any other comments? All right, is there any, come ahead, anybody online
- in the meantime? No, there's not. Okay, fantastic.
- Good evening, council. Thank you for your time. My name is Brianna. I'm a social work student at Indiana
- University, and I'm here tonight as part of my social welfare policy and practices advocacy assignment.
- While I am here for a class, this topic is deeply personal to me. I speak to you today as an adult survivor
- of children of hoarding disorder.
- My own upbringing in a hoarded home led to a period of homelessness in this town and has had a lasting
- impact on my mental health and socioeconomic status. I wasn't brave enough as a child to escape that
- environment, so I have chosen to use my education to advocate for those who are still trapped. Hoarding
- disorder is a DSM-5 recognized condition that leads to extreme functional impairment, often exceeding
- chronic pain or diabetes.
- For children, it is associated with high levels of family strain, isolation, and long-term trauma. Currently,
- these children are often invisible in our legal and social systems. My long-term goal is to request
- a state amendment to Title 31 to specifically recognize hoarding related hazards as child neglect, ensuring
- these families receive necessary mental health referrals and treatment.
- As I begin this journey, I am asking for your guidance. Could you direct me to appropriate city resources
- such as housing and neighborhood development to better understand how Bloomington currently supports
- families in these complex environments? Thank you for your time and for hearing my story. Thank you
- for sharing it.
- Hello, my remarks are based on an essay that was written by the famous writer, Jason Hickel. There's
- nothing democratic about capitalism. Yes, we get elected leaders every few years, even if we acknowledge
- that this process is often corrupt and inadequate, but when it comes to the economy, the system that
- affects our everyday lives and determines the shape and direction of our society, generally not even
- a pretense of democracy is allowed to enter.
- Under capitalism, production is controlled overwhelmingly by investable assets. Investors determine
- what to produce, how to use our collective labor and our planet's resources, and what to do with the
- surplus we generate. The primary purpose of production and surplus investment is not to meet human needs,
- achieve social progress, or to realize democratically ratified objectives. The purpose is to maximize
- and accumulate profit and power
- That is the overriding goal. These decisions are made in the narrow interests of the capitalist class.
- The workers, the people actually doing the production, rarely get any voice at all. This arrangement
- is completely undemocratic. In fact, it is literally plutocracy. And when you govern a system like this
- that leads to perverse outcomes, we end up with massive overproduction of things like fossil fuels,
- SUVs, and mansions.
- We get chronic under production of necessary things like renewable energy public transit and affordable
- housing Because these are left less profitable to capital or not profitable at all The result is that
- despite having extraordinary productive capacity with extremely high levels of output to the point of
- blowing past planetary boundaries We nonetheless fail to ensure that ensure that everyone has access
- to basic goods and services and
- A critic may retort that capitalism is democratic because every person gets to vote with their dollars.
- According to this argument, consumers determine the direction of the economy, which serves everyone's
- needs in the most efficient way possible, but this argument does not hold water. The dollars of ordinary
- people do not equal votes because we cannot buy the things that are not being produced.
- We may want renewable energy, affordable housing, longer lasting products, public transit, and regenerative
- agriculture, but these things are usually not produced because capital does not consider it profitable
- enough to do so. Demand is a necessary but insufficient condition. It is profitability, not demand,
- that determines investment. Capital determines production, and we only get to vote among the things
- that capital is willing to produce.
- None of this is inevitable. We can and should extend the principles of democracy into our economy And
- so I strongly encourage Bloomington to make that a priority Thank you. Thank you. All right, and that
- concludes our time of public comment Appointments to boards and commissions. I believe we have one is
- there a motion? Please councilman P much Beth. Yes, I move
- Appoint carry champion to seat c1 on the Historic Preservation Commission second there's a motion in
- the second any discussion councilmember Stasberg, I just have a question because seats c2 and c3 are
- also currently vacant and C1 like has a carryover right now. So is that a specific recommendation?
- It is. Okay. Thank you. I
- Any other questions or comments? Seeing none, will the clerk please call the roll on this appointment?
- Council Member Asari? Yes. Daly? Yes. Rallo? Yes. Ruff? Yes. Rosenberger? Yes. Flaherty? Yes. Stosberg? Yes.
- Yes. Zulek? Yes. Thank you. Oh, the TV is about to turn off again. Thanks, Michael. OK, we are now moving
- on to legislation for second readings. No? What are we missing? Apologies. Oh, you have another one?
- Well, we have a removal request. OK, go for it.
- Drew Heron also on the Historic Preservation Commission has been not responsive and has missed the last
- three meetings and has not responded to either emails from the chair and the staff liaison. So at this
- point in time, I move that we remove Drew Heron from the Historic Preservation Commission. Second. Motion
- to second. Any discussion? Councilmember Piedmont-Smith.
- I think in the past when somebody has when we've taken action to remove somebody from a commission,
- we vote to to send that person a final notice that they will be removed unless they respond and attend
- a meeting. And then if they don't respond to that, then we remove them. I think noting also the clerk
- who is our memory says that that is the case. But thoughts, though, that we just
- changed the legislation on how people can be removed from boards and commissions. And one of the things
- that's specified there is not showing up now. I think that we could go with our president or we could
- do it this way. I don't think it's written anywhere that we have to give the person another chance after
- they've already reached out. I did just get a message from Deputy Clerk Crossley that said that that
- is correct. And she can do that tomorrow if that's how we'd like to go as well. It's a you made the
- motion. So your choice.
- I will withdraw my motion and I move that the council sends one final letter to Drew Heron pending or
- I guess not pending prior to his removal from the HPC Second there's a motion in the second any other
- discussion All right clerk. Will you please call the roll? Yes, can be just a second. I want to capture
- that. Thank you. I
- Okay. Um council member Daley. Yes. Rallo. Yes. Ruff. Yes. Rosenberger. Yes. Flaherty. Yes. Stasburg.
- Yes. Piedmont Smith. Yes. Zulek. Yes. Sorry. Yes. Thank you. That also carries. Are there any other
- boards and board and commission appointments?
- Okay, thank you so much. Moving on to legislation for second readings. Are there any motions? I move
- that ordinance 2026-06 be introduced and read by the clerk by title and synopsis only. Second. There's
- a motion in the second. Clerk, will you please call the roll? Yes, ordinance 2020. Oh, geez.
- Sorry, I jumped ahead of myself, even though I heard what she said. Council Member Rollo? Yes. Ruff?
- Yes. Rosenberger? Yes. Flaherty? Council Member Flaherty? Yes. Thank you. Stasberg? Yes. Piedmont-Smith?
- Yes. Zulek?
- Sorry. Yes and daily. Yes, that motion carries nine. Oh will the Honorable Kirk, please read Yes Ordinance
- 2026 stash 06 to amend the city of Bloomington zoning maps by rezoning a 6.3 acre property from residential
- urban lot are for
- and residential multifamily are in within the transform redevelopment overlay, TRO, to plan unit development,
- PUD, and to approve a district ordinance and preliminary plan. The synopsis is as follows. This ordinance
- amends the zoning of the property from residential urban lot and residential multifamily within the
- transform redevelopment overlay to plan unit development. Thank you very much. Go ahead. I move that
- ordinance 2026-06 be adopted.
- Second.
- Okay, just a brief note before we do, unless there's any dissent on this, I'd like to structure it this
- way that we'll hear a initial presentation by the petitioner, namely the Office of the Mayor, have time
- for any pending questions. There's already been questions asked and those have been posted in our packet
- and online. Then we have a series of reasonable conditions I'd like to go over
- each of those individually in the following fashion. The person who's proposed it or the people who
- proposed it can just say a few words. I think they're all very straightforward. Any questions that you
- might have for them, a response from the petitioner, and then we will vote for individual reasonable
- conditions. And after that, we'll have a period of public comment. Question there is whether we want to vote
- have public comment first really I think but is any any dissent or Thoughts on on the question of placement
- of public comment comes more Stossberg, please Shouldn't we have public comment on all the reasonable
- conditions? I It's I mean, it's it's it's up. It's up to the council I think that I think that one way
- we could do it is here all the reasonable conditions have Have the discussion about them have public
- comment completely so people can comment on them sort of as a whole and then vote and
- I think I might be a bit of smoother. I think that when we've done it before, when we did it for summit
- last year, I think each reasonable condition got individual public comment. Yeah. If that's what everybody
- would like, is that any people online, are you okay with that? Councilmember Flaherty. Okay.
- Okay. Councilmember P. Moskvich.
- Yes, I think it would be more clear if we went through the entire process for each reasonable condition.
- Okay, fine. So if there's no objections to that, that's how we'll proceed, yes? Okay, fantastic. Council
- Member Flaherty, please. I did anticipate for the sake of efficiency the possibility of combining several
- of mine that are related for kind of
- at least joint discussion and possibly joint vote, if that's the mind of the council on it, or if people
- want to have different opinions about different ones, even though they're related, we could vote on
- them separately. And those would be to pair six and seven, which are about sustainability, and to pair
- eight, nine, 10, and 11, which are all about dimensional standards with sidewalks, tree plots, and alleys,
- and they are kind of intersectional. So I thought it would make sense
- those jointly and so that's Exactly following what councilmember Piedmont Smith just mentioned, but
- I think in those particular cases that that may make sense And if it's okay with my colleagues we could
- proceed that way and can you just repeat councilmember Flaherty so six and seven and and then eight
- through eight through Twelve eleven eight through eleven. Well separate. Yeah, okay Thank you
- And then the other thing that I that I'd forgotten to note is I think of the reasonable conditions Four
- and five might be in conflict with each other Or do we think that they could both or do they both exist
- in the same space? Councilman Zulik. Well, I don't know if they're in direct conflict with each other,
- but because they're both under the permanent affordability Reasonable condition topic it might be worth
- discussing them simultaneously. I
- Okay, any other comments? Okay, seeing none. With that, we have, you know, the main event. Will the
- Office of the Mayor take it away, y'all? Should we start by saying, yay, Hopewell? I think so. You know,
- we have been in this process, sorry, Carrie Thompson, Mayor.
- We've been in this process for a while now, and you're gonna hear some more details tonight about Hopewell,
- but I think I will spend my time mostly on the principles behind Hopewell and the changes that are being
- suggested at this point. Although we are happy to answer questions about any of the PUD, it should be
- said that our
- The real representative of the petitioner, Ali Thurman, is not able to come to this meeting tonight.
- And we knew that ahead of time when this was scheduled. So some of you have told me that Hopewell is
- a once in a lifetime opportunity for this community. And while this is an important project, it should
- not be the only time that we get to do housing right.
- This is also only the first part of a much larger neighborhood. We have an opportunity today and an
- obligation into the future to set a clear path for what housing in Bloomington can be. And
- just as importantly, how we lead together to make that happen. So I'm encouraging us to set a standard
- for how we show up as community leaders in this work.
- instead of as politicians in this instance. I want to take this chance to live into a simple truth.
- Party politics doesn't matter. Individual credit for who does what also doesn't matter. What builds
- housing and what improves community is the decision to work together in good faith with great planning
- for the common good.
- While we have President Trump leading our country and once again setting a national political rhetoric
- based on who is in and who is out, and thereby creating contentious conversations across the globe,
- we are in a moment to do things very differently in Bloomington. We don't need to be politicians standing
- against one another. We can be community leaders standing with one another
- to get a project started that the community has been asking for, providing input on, and planning since
- 2017. And I appreciate this council's participation in several important steps along that process. I
- know that there are many possibilities of the impact that we can make when we create housing. When we
- have a project like Hopewell,
- we are prone to see an opportunity to live into a kind of housing utopia. Perfectly adorable units,
- dwellings that are walkable to all of our resources, affordable to anyone, no matter your income level,
- the best climate ratings, the biggest sidewalks, the widest lanes, but the fact of the matter is that
- we can do exceedingly well at one or maybe two of those things.
- and the rest of that catalog of desires that we have on any given project, we must choose to prioritize
- where we want to have a clear impact, where we want to be best at something. Some other things may be
- less than ideal. Otherwise, we will miss the mark on all of them. There is no housing utopia. When we
- seek to build homes
- for everyone, one home that would serve anyone, we won't be able to be anything for anyone. We will
- miss the mark on any impact at all. Hopewell South is simply phase one. It is not Hopewell in its entirety,
- and we have picked two specific goals to focus on. Be affordable at market rate,
- to as many people as possible at the lowest income possible. And attainable to many more of our residents.
- And be a neighborhood that makes the most of walkability. It is an idyllic walking distance to all of
- the resources of family or individual needs. The design presented to you tonight does an exceedingly
- good job of meeting those two goals. We also meet climate goals and
- will commit to exceeding the base level in at least one other area. And while it won't be a panacea
- of all of the city's comprehensive goals in one package, it has hit the mark on those two goals exceedingly
- well. And we still do very well on the others.
- These are attractive homes of modest size on modest lots. They have the ability to be built by local
- builders with mortgages offered by local lenders. The question in front of you tonight is whether to
- approve or deny the PUD, which was certified unanimously by the Plan Commission. That is the only question.
- This is not my project. This is not council's project. This is and has been
- our community's project. A project that the community has been co-creating since 2017 and it has received
- perhaps more input than any other single housing development in our city's history. More than that,
- this is our opportunity to show our community the way politics should work. Where we come together around
- a project and make it as good as it can be together.
- focusing on impact that we truly want to have. For too long, politicians have been categorized as sausage
- makers. And by the time the sausage is made, no one actually got the impact that they were looking for.
- We are a single party city, and this should not make it harder. This should make us more capable. It
- means we have the ability and the responsibility to deliver.
- And it means we have an opportunity to dispel the myth that we can't get things done because we can't
- find a pathway to true prioritization. We want everything all the time. I've had conversations with
- many of you over the past many months about this particular project. And in January, we had a full council
- input session prior to taking the project to plan commission. We've taken your input and incorporated
- it into what you see tonight.
- And while there are some other ideas now on the table, I want to be clear that when any developer gets
- to this stage in a development, requirements or conditions that demand a change in the map or the design
- are costly to implement, not only due to the likely loss of lots, but due to the professional costs
- associated with making the changes and the natural domino effect that they cause. It's important that
- we as leaders understand that those costs
- are not absorbed by the developer. They are passed on to the homeowner. In this way, we ourselves have
- an opportunity to keep housing more affordable by offering our input and potential requirements before
- plans are drawn in their final form and by making decisions in a timely way to avoid any unnecessary
- inflationary costs.
- The housing utopia mindset says make them affordable, walkable, widest sidewalks, large tree plots,
- perfect stormwater, highest energy certifications, and no cost escalation over time. No single project
- can hit all of these simultaneously. There are trade-offs, and we need a vision that we can actually
- deliver on. And I believe that you have that in front of you today.
- At the end of the day, we will be judged not on whether this project was perfect, but on whether we
- move this community forward in a meaningful way. And as leaders, we will be judged on our ability to
- work together to meet the needs of our community in this moment. That is the standard I am asking us
- to meet tonight. I have asked Margie Rice to cover in one package the
- reasonable conditions and the legal view on all of them so that you all have that legal background before
- you move into discussion on the actual conditions. Margie? A little shorter than Carrie. Margie Rice,
- Corporation Counsel.
- As Carrie said, I'm going to try to be brief because you have a memo already from me in your packet.
- We really do appreciate the point. We're here tonight.
- being in front of you, seeking approval of this PUD, which was adopted unanimously. Approving a zoning
- map is a legislative act, and you're the legislative body. So that is clear in Indiana law. It is governed
- consistently across our state by specific provisions of the Indiana code, and there's a little case
- law that is helpful. Indiana law has made it clear that a legislative body in Indiana must either reject
- or adopt in its entirety as certified
- A pud ordinance that it has been adopted by a plan commission Amendments to a pud which have that has
- been adopted and certified are not an option at this stage of the legal process that's true for any
- legislative body in Indiana and These are not my words. I'm going to be quoting from the Court of Appeals
- The General Assembly intended that the local legislative body have no power to unilaterally amend a
- recommended proposal
- to change a zone map. Now while it's true that reasonable conditions may be imposed by a legislative
- body it's important to remember tonight that reasonable conditions are not amendments to a PD and reasonable
- commitments are provisions that are rationally related to a legitimate governmental interest but they
- can't alter or amend the PD that was adopted and certified. So things that would
- Change the text or exhibits That the plan commission already approved or off-limits. So one point I
- want to emphasize because I've heard it about summit is that People are saying well, how did we meant?
- Okay, sorry Yeah is I've heard people say well, how did how did summit get changed? And I don't think
- someone got changed. I think what happened was that the owner of
- the petitioner agreed to certain amendment or certain conditions which is allowable. So it's it's allowable
- for the owner to to agree to certain conditions which in that case is what they did. But remember that
- council initiated amendments are not the same thing. So with that in mind I have reviewed the 13 proposals
- offered by the council and there are several of those that are
- consistent with the PUD and are actually just clarifications. And let me get to that. So there are there
- are a handful though that are attempts to go back in time and go back to the pre planned commission
- stage and amend the beauty. So
- So that the council is clear on what the city's position is the legal analysis up front before we get
- into the details I want to make sure that you guys have this in mind. So the four proposals marked as
- conditions 1 2 5 and 6 clarify and are consistent with the PUD as certified. They are not amendments
- to the PUD.
- They I think the record tonight the public record should reflect that those proposals are already
- incorporated into the PUD and the petitioner has no objection to those proposals which are one two five
- and six. They are again just clarifications and I won't go over those in detail since you know what
- they are and they're going to talk about them soon. The next the nine proposals though that are marked
- as conditions three four
- and 7 through 13 actually contradict the current PD language or exhibits or make amendments to what
- the plan commission approved. And so those would be considered under state law and case law as impermissible
- attempts to amend the PD that the plan commission already certified. The last one 13 is a little different.
- It's not an impermissible.
- Attempt to amend the PUD necessarily But it is It's a problem with state law. So state law has said
- and we Mentioned earlier today that you know, the General Assembly likes to say what local units of
- government can't do And there are often some of the ideas that we like Locally, but they have said that
- an owner occupied short-term rental property is
- That if it's not owner occupied Then the local unit of government is prohibited from interpreting and
- enforcing its zoning regulations in a manner that is intended or has the effect of prohibiting
- Or unreasonably restricting short-term rentals of property. So again, there's a there's a clause that
- says that you essentially can't
- ban owner occupied short term rentals and for the non owner occupied short term rentals it says that
- you cannot interpret or enforce your zoning regulations in a manner that is intended or has the effect
- of prohibiting or unreasonably restricting them. So I think that's off limits because of state law.
- So we'll get into these details as you go through one one one by one happy to answer any questions that
- go forward. Looking forward to this opportunity to work with you to get this PUD approved and to move forward.
- So, thank you. Thank you so much, Council Rice. Questions for either the mayor or for Attorney Rice.
- Starting with Council Member Stossberg. Thank you. And then Flaherty. Just to kind of clarify what you
- just shared.
- You think that one two five and six are consistent as is so it doesn't really matter on those whether
- the petitioner agrees with counsel or not They're okay. And so they have to be done but three four and
- seven through thirteen if Council wanted those done but the but the petitioner didn't agree then we
- would not be able to do them So so furthermore, I mean
- Have you discussed with the petitioner? Are they unwilling to do three four and seven through thirteen?
- Yes, I think that those are already the plan Commission has already adopted plans that are different
- than what is proposed tonight and the petitioner
- Intends to move forward with what was presented to the Plan Commission. So the RDC has already voted
- to To move that proposal forward and And that's what the RDC has approved and what the petitioner has
- brought forward so so yeah, okay Councilman Flaherty Thank you
- So first, just a question of clarification. Nobody's proposing to formally amend the ordinance, but
- you're suggesting that reasonable conditions that, in your opinion, are tantamount to some type of amendment
- are disallowed by Indiana law. Is that correct? It is most clearly a case that is
- sort of most clearly on point is this case Misty Woods out of Crown Point. And there's not frankly a
- lot of case law on this issue because it doesn't frankly come up or it's not litigated. I did run my
- questions past a couple of other attorneys just because I always wanna make sure I'm not missing something.
- Dave Schilling is a local county attorney
- does Monroe County Planning Commission stuff. He was the Brown County Planning Commission attorney.
- He argued the story in case in front of the Supreme Court. And that's a case that has a lot of conversation
- about conditions and commitments. And I also ran this past Bob Clutter, who I was, when I was president
- of the Municipal Lawyers Association, he was on the board with me. He's a land use attorney. And we've, we've,
- contract with him to get legal advice when we need a second opinion and and they both agree that if
- a reasonable condition is is something that Sort of for example in the story in case it was it was limiting
- noise beyond a certain point things that like
- public nuisances, things that governments are interested in. If it's a rationally related condition,
- you can put it on there. But if it's an attempt to go backwards and say, I don't like what the plan
- commission did, I want it to be different than what the petitioner submitted and the plan commission
- approved, that's an actual amendment. And council can't initiate those sorts of amendments at this stage.
- When it comes to a zone map,
- Approval it is again what the Court of Appeals said local units were prohibited by the General Assembly
- from doing anything other than rejecting or adopting as certified this ordinance Thank you for clarifying
- and I guess so over the past decade the council has
- past reasonable conditions and past ordinances for planned unity developments, including ordinances
- 16-20, 16-24, 17-08, 19-23, 20-01, 24-07, all of which have reasonable conditions that do the things
- that say we're not allowed to do. Those were all passed under the legal guidance of a variety of council
- attorneys, including Dan Sherman, Stephen Lucas, Ash Kulak.
- And I guess it feels like the current legal position you're taking is counter to the legal guidance
- that the council has been acting under for a decade. And so I'm not confident that it's correct. And
- so that's just my question is, how are you reconciling that and
- Do you have anything else to say, I guess, in light of that? Sure. I haven't gone back and looked at
- every one of those petitions, so I don't know whether those were cases where the property owner agreed
- to those things. I also don't know whether Dan Sherman and the other attorneys, certainly Dan Sherman,
- I don't know if the 2007 case that was the Misty Woods case was
- He was still here in 2007. So I don't know what they read. I don't know whether they looked at the same
- cases I looked at. I don't know what homework they did. But I can tell you I'm confident in my legal
- opinion. And again, without looking back, my guess is the property owners might have agreed in order
- to get it through the process. But I can tell you that,
- It's very clear from, you know, the statutes and the case law that the General Assembly took away the
- authority from the local legislative body to do anything other than approve or reject at this stage
- of the process. Okay. I have one more question. Is that okay, Council President? Please, please continue.
- So you you mentioned the city of Crown Point versus Misty with properties case, which I read in full
- the opinion of the Court of Appeals Thank you for referencing that in your memo In that case I read
- the sentence that you quoted and In the subsequent discussion and analysis from the Court of Appeals
- what they're talking about is and was an amendment to Remove r2 zoning
- from a PUD. The council in that case did not like that the R2 zoning included duplexes. They wanted
- it to be R1 zoning and what was happening at the time was that Misty Woods properties did not want to
- face rejection of the proposal and so the council initiated a change to remove R2 zoning and
- Misty woods did not object and then the the ordinance as amended was passed The court says misty woods
- failure to object cannot be considered mere silence acquiescence or inactivity Because it engaged the
- council on the subject of amending the proposal was something more agreeable to the council And so in
- other words by not withdrawing the petition when it was changed by the council the court is saying that
- is functional agreement and
- And so although the council did not have the statutory authority to amend the proposed ordinance to
- change zoning maps on its own Misty woods certainly had the power to amend or withdraw its own request
- and Let's see misty woods effectively amended his petition by telling the council that our wand was
- acceptable and not withdrawing the petition both by its statements and its actions and
- The court then says the council as legislative body with ultimate authority to enact or reject a proposed
- ordinance has the authority to act on this amended ordinance without sending it back to the Planning
- Commission which has a merely advisory role in the rezoning process. We conclude therefore there can
- be no factual dispute as to whether the council had a rational basis for passing the ordinance as amended
- and therefore the trial court erred in granting summary of judgment to Mr. DeWoods denying summary of
- judgment to the city. So my reading of that case is actually standing for the
- principle that is counter to the argument you're making. Or maybe it's consistent with it. And I'd like
- to clarify that. And the way it would be consistent with it is you've said a few times now, if the petitioner
- agrees to the change, then it's OK. And it feels to me like you're sort of suggesting that that would
- be an agreement that the mayor and the petitioner here would come and say, yes, we want to do these
- reasonable conditions.
- is saying, no, that's not exactly right. If we pass a reasonable condition, even if it's not something
- you prefer, because it's not something you brought, nevertheless, if we move forward and you find that
- acceptable, the alternative being to withdraw the petition, that that is functional agreement and is
- acceptable under Indiana law. I think we're on the same page. I think you and I are on the same page.
- I think in Misty Woods, they agreed. And I think they didn't object.
- into the record and said these are the ones we agree with these are the ones we don't agree with so
- essentially Those that I've put on said the record should reflect. We think these are actual impermissible
- amendments to the PUD Because they are they are to the ordinance because they are Go ahead Well, they're
- only impermissible if you disagree which the council passes a reasonable condition, let's say seven
- and you disagree, I suppose you could withdraw the petition, but if you agree to move forward after
- the council passes reasonable condition number seven, then you've agreed. That's what happened with
- the Misty Woods case. Misty Woods didn't voluntarily want to give up the R2 zoning. That was the proposal
- they developed. They wanted to have the R2 zoning, but when the council said, no, that's not good for
- us, you know, we're going to change it to R1 only,
- Misty woods assented so that was the agreement then after the council decided I think the record was
- different if you I've read the brief that was filed There's also you can get the brief that was filed
- by Misty woods attorney Which the the Court of Appeals pretty much adopted their record, you know their
- findings in fact I think it was a very different factual record than what is here. I think that that
- property owner was silent and
- Um, we're not, you know, we didn't have this kind of presentation and this kind of conversation we're
- having. And so, you know, it might be, it might be helpful to read the, you know, and I can send you
- the link, but the brief that was written, um, again, it's we're operating under six Oh eight section.
- And so I just, it is, it is the choices, the options, and this was emphasized in that brief. The options
- are reject or adopt.
- The General Assembly took away the option for council initiated amendments Now again, this isn't unique
- to Bloomington this across the state of Indiana and so and it's a it's a function of what the General
- Assembly decided to do so your beef may be with the General Assembly not me but but you know, I do think
- that in this case we've reached agreement with
- As as mayor Thompson said we made many amendments prior to getting to this point At the plan commission
- there was Councilmember Stossberg had asked for some changes those were made We've we have Modified
- this and what is before you now was approved by the Redevelopment Commission that is
- A body that voted on this so I don't have the authority to change that that RDC voted to forward this
- and so Well, the RDC voted to forward it to the plan Commission and then the plan Commission adopted
- and certified it but the redevelopment what you're seeing is what the redevelopment Commission ultimately
- said go forward with and so I I think
- I think councilmember Flaherty, I think you and I are on the same page. I think that what may be missing
- is the level of detail that was had at the meeting. Um, and that's not reflected in the court of appeals
- case, but there are some details in the brief that are helped. We're, we're insightful. Thank you. Can
- I ask if we passed reasonable condition seven, for instance, and the mayor did not withdraw the RDC
- did not withdraw the petition. And we then passed the ordinance.
- Do you agree that reasonable condition seven would then apply? So I'm looking at your question. So do
- your hypothetical is you pass seven and we don't withdraw the petition. I don't think so because I'm
- on record tonight as saying we think that's an impermissible amendment. And I don't think that council
- has the ability to amend
- Under state law I think you would be violating home rule because you're doing something that the council
- doesn't have the authority to do. So I think factually we're different. I'm on record as saying these
- are the ones we think are consistent with the PUD and the other ones we think are actually amendments.
- They're not reasonable conditions. There are amendments which the council is not allowed to do. Thanks
- for sharing that perspective.
- Dana Kerr, I am assistant city attorney. And I just wanted to add that when the court said that when
- the county indicated that it would approve a zone change from A1 to R1 only, but not necessarily zone
- change from R1 and R2, Misty Woods effectively amended his petition by telling the council that R1 was
- acceptable
- both by its statements at the February meeting and its actions in not attending the March meeting. So
- there was a positive affirmation by Misty Woods that they would accept that amendment. Here, there is
- no positive affirmation that the RDC would accept any amendment. So therefore, there's not an ability
- during this meeting to make an amendment to the PUD in my legal opinion as well. Thank you. Yes. Who
- is the actual petitioner here? Isn't it the RDC? Because that's the owner of this property.
- Is that correct? So for the people online, they're saying yes. Yes. There is a nod from our corporation council.
- So how can you. Sorry without due respect Corporation Council Rice how can you speak for the RDC if
- they are not here to say yes we would agree to this condition or no we would not agree to it. Right.
- So under state law Corporation Council the second class city represents the city.
- and all of the boards and commissions within the city. So I'm the legal representative for the redevelopment
- commission and I provide the legal advice for the redevelopment commission. And this is they have submitted
- and asked for this ordinance that the plan or that the plan commission unanimously adopted and certified
- to be here before you. So I don't understand your concern. I mean I am the
- Corporation Council, head of the law department, represent the RDC. Yes, but they have not spoken about
- the reasonable conditions. They have not had an opportunity to say, yes, we would actually accept this
- reasonable condition. Legal has had conversations. So we believe that we're representing them and giving
- you advice that is consistent with what they want to move forward.
- So you have spoken with them since did since Friday when these reasons we have talked with individual
- members of the redevelopment Commission Thank You Councilor Stossberg My name was invoked as part of
- that So I would just like to clarify that there were no changes made by councilmember Stossberg between
- the plan Commission meeting and it coming to council
- a reasonable condition from the Plan Commission number 11 said that petitioner needed to work with me
- to clarify language and the number of incorrect citations Etc, etc that were in the original document
- from the Plan Commission But there were no actual changes made especially as there was just a whole
- legal debate over which one of these reasonable conditions actually constitute changes and I was a very
- specific and deliberate with the petitioner and the
- Consultant who is unable to be here this evening to make sure that when we were looking at things there
- were no actual changes made from what the Impression was that the plan Commission got so I first want
- to say that but secondly, I guess I'm just wondering Related to the conversation that we're on right
- now. So Corporation counselor council Rice just said that you know, she's spoken with individual members
- of the RDC but if we do say
- As a body appear tonight pass a reasonable condition that is one of those ones that she said would actually
- be an amendment Is it possible to bring that back to the RDC to ask them? officially as a body if they
- would accept that as part of getting this past Apologize I will let Corporation Council Pat come back
- to that. I just wanted to To make sure that it was understood that are you answering my question right now?
- Was answering the difference between the reasonable condition which this council can impose without?
- The RDC approving that's not what I'm asking about right now, though Turn it back to the corporation
- So I I want to be clear about the process so
- The reasonable conditions that have been proposed are not consistent with what we discussed with the
- Redevelopment Commission. So did I go over all 13 of these with the Redevelopment Commission members?
- No. Have we talked to the Redevelopment Commission members about this PUD and the petition that is before
- you? Yes. They voted on this before it went to the plan commission.
- Though a lawyer can look at the reasonable conditions and make a legal determination whether it's consistent
- with the ordinance as it was certified or it's not consistent. So what I'm giving you is my legal opinion
- based on state law and case law. So if something that you consider to be an amendment is passed by this body
- It needs to then could it I'm saying could it in the possibility go back to the Redevelopment Commission
- specifically and have them approve the IP ID or whichever with that condition on it. I like a process
- question. I think this is similar to my answer to Councilmember Flaherty's question. I think the council
- would be amending a PUD
- They, in many cases, and we can get into these when we get into, if you want to go over them individually,
- or I can tell you now, my analysis about each one, but it, you would be, you are allowed to operate
- within the confines of state law under Home Rule. You can do things, anything that you need to do in
- your area, in your local area, as long as it doesn't,
- Contradict or conflict with state law when you do when you contradict or conflicts with state law You're
- outside the boundaries of home rule and I think if you amended the PUD tonight Which I think those nine
- are amendments. I think you'd be operating outside the bounds of law And I think that would be impermissible.
- I so I so my my answer is I I don't think
- Procedurally that's not on the table today procedurally amending and I don't think those are reasonable
- conditions. I think there are amendments which is not permissible. It's not within the authority of
- the local legislative body tonight to do that.
- I would really like to actually get the question answered, though, because earlier it was like, well,
- if the petitioner agrees to something that could be considered an amendment, it's OK. So what I'm saying
- is, can we bring something specific to the RDC and say, will you agree with this amendment? And so what
- you're telling me is no. It seems just a really long way to say no. The RDC, because I said the RDC
- wanted what has been
- Proposed and adopted by the Plan Commission to be here before you they already made the decision that
- what they want is Is in front of you it was and at that Plan Commission stage when it was adopted and
- approved That's what the redevelopment Commission wanted to to be here And if there's a question between
- it passing or failing depending on a reasonable condition Would the RDC rather have it fail or would
- they rather consider an amendment?
- And I'm telling you tonight that I think your option is to adopt or reject it. That is what I'm telling
- you. Tonight, procedurally, where we're at is to reject it or adopt it now. Or postpone it. I don't
- know if anybody else on the same team. Can't we postpone it to get an answer from the RDC about whether
- they would accept any certain amendment? I think they've given the answer. OK. I think the answer is
- clear that what they want to be approved
- is is in front of you and we the the four Reasonable conditions I've put into the record I want the
- record to reflect that we think those are consistent with what the plan Commission approved and the
- author the other Proposals, I'm going to call them because I don't think the reasonable conditions the
- other proposals go outside of
- They're going back to the pre-plan Commission and amending what the redevelopment Commission wanted
- approved Councilmember rather rather. Oh, yeah Corporation council race I had a question regarding just
- to unpack you said that you Spoke to RDC members individually just to be clear not individually about
- these 13 but we have talked about
- This PUD as it was going through the phase in a formal meeting they approve this in a formal meeting
- they approved the Proposal going forward in a way you talk to him about these reasonable conditions
- not individually. No But you talked to him at all about the read these reasonable conditions No, because
- they're so so the reasonable conditions and I'm giving you my legal let me just finish So how do you
- know that they would accept?
- You said one two five and six but not three four seven through thirteen because it's I'm giving you
- my legal analysis of what is a reasonable condition and what is an amendment and so what they they gave
- you a proposal that's what they wanted and and my legal analysis is that there are four that are consistent
- with what the Redevelopment Commission voted on and there are
- Nine that are inconsistent and would amount to an amendment. So I see but they haven't consented this
- is your interpretation of what their interpretation or what their interpretation of these are That's
- what you're maintaining. I'm giving they're not lawyers. They're they're they're petitioners and they
- submitted the petition and so
- So I'm giving you a legal analysis. They wouldn't have a legal opinion on this. So I'm giving you my
- legal analysis about what is a reasonable condition and what is an amendment. Okay, but we're invoking
- the RDC and the members and what they would accept or not. And you are interpreting what they would
- accept or not. I'm telling you. No, I don't think that's correct. No, I don't think it's correct. I
- just want to be clear. What I think is going on is that
- The boards and commissions speak through their minutes of public meetings. That's how they act. So even
- if I had talked to individual members about these 13 conditions, it wouldn't matter unless they were
- in a public meeting as a body voting on it. Because boards, just like you, you have to be in a public
- meeting voting on something. One of you can't say what the redevelopment commission would or would not
- do. And so what the redevelopment commission already spoke, what they wanted
- Go to the plan commission and what they want you to approve is before you tonight. I'm here as a lawyer
- after reading the law and reading the case law and saying this Procedurally, what are you allowed to
- do at this stage? Procedurally you are allowed to adopt or reject just case law on it Misty Woods the
- best case on that Okay, so but we can't say for certain whether they would accept one two five or six.
- That's your interpretation
- Because they haven't been consulted. But you said they were consulted. I said that they were consulted.
- That's why I said when I came right back up here, it said, I want to be very clear about what I said,
- because I can see it's about Piedmont Smith saying. Specifically, what did you consult them about?
- The PUD. No, but none of these reasonable conditions. That's what I said that. I said I didn't, because
- they spoke through their minutes of their meeting when they approved the PUD.
- Okay, so they've already said on its face what they want you to prove because you have an ordinance
- in front of you that has that in there now. It's it's in front of you for adoption or rejection. Right.
- This is what you maintain, yes. That's correct. I want to hear, I see Council Member Rosenberger has
- ... Can I ask one clarifying question? Yeah. What is the or else here? What is the what? What's the
- result? Let's say if council were to pass number seven,
- Your is your what what happens thereafter? Are you saying that you will withdraw the petition and and
- then we start from the beginning or Do you sue us like what what what what happens? Well in a typical
- world what would happen is and and I of course at that stage would have to have a meeting with
- the Redevelopment Commission who is the petitioner and they would have to have either an executive session
- or public hearing
- But I can tell you that if this were a private developer and you took action that was outside the bounds
- of law, they would file what's called a declaratory judgment with the circuit court and ask for your
- decision, which they would deem arbitrary and capricious to be held impermissible under state law because
- it was outside the bounds of home rule.
- Thank you. And then one follow-up, just building on many of the questions that were asked, do you maintain
- that though things may not be reasonable conditions, that they can be accepted by agreement? If the
- Redevelopment Commission, but again, I don't know that procedurally, that would be, you have two options,
- approve as certified.
- or reject yes so as certified is as you know look at the language and the exhibits that are in the ordinance
- and and improve that or reject that as certified before you thank you so seven just so and
- And we can talk about it. I just wanted to make sure I understood the boundaries. We had Councilmember
- Rosenberger had her hand up. Then we'll go back to Councilmember Flaherty, then Councilmember Piedmont-Smith,
- then back to you, Councilmember Arallo. Hi, thanks. My notes are like standard, a little scribbled.
- OK, I mean, I want to back up a little bit because when we don't really, when we think maybe we don't
- know how to do something, the first thing we do is consult the law, right?
- Okay, so Indiana law 36, 7, 4, 15, 12, the power of a legislative body to adopt or amend an ordinance.
- When adopting or amending a PUD district ordinance, the legislative body of a unit may do the following.
- There are three things. We can do any of the three of them. And the first one is impose reasonable conditions
- on a proposed planned unit development. So when we're sitting here tonight saying the only thing we
- can do is approve or deny.
- That is not what state code says. So that we can talk about reasonable conditions, council can pass
- reasonable conditions and the petitioner can agree on those reasonable conditions. Then if things are
- still a little murky, we're gonna look at case law, okay? So like the case law to me says a reasonable
- condition was put out there to change zoning from a two to a one and the petitioner agreed
- in the PUD was passed, okay? That's another way to do it. The third way, if you're still kind of murky,
- is to look at past practices. So as Councilmember Flaherty said, there were at least six different PUDs
- in the last decade where reasonable conditions were imposed, petitioner agreed to them, and the PUD
- was passed. Another thing to do is to consult outside council
- I spoke for an hour with a former class 2 city council attorney who said that a city council may impose
- reasonable conditions as they see fit that anything can happen with a reasonable condition. I mean we
- could say every lot needs to have chickens like that's what a reasonable condition is. So I think what
- sounds confusing to me right now is that
- It sounds like if the petitioner is in favor of one of our reasonable conditions, they're calling it
- a reasonable condition. But if they are not in favor, they're calling it an amendment, which I think
- we all agree we cannot make amendments. But the thing is, a reasonable condition according to history,
- according to 36.7.4.15.12 of Indiana code is open-ended. I think tonight,
- We do have other options. We could send it back to the RC. We can postpone until April 1st. I think
- it would be really great if City Council also got some formal attorney eyes on this because I don't
- think this is how it's done. I don't think this is what the law or case law or former practices are
- saying. Thanks.
- If council members I'm gonna say I think I think there's a little bit of now and I really appreciate
- all of argument I think they're very very clear, but I think that we're Building off of the same argument
- So and many of these are will be covered in their specificity when we go over each of the reasonable
- conditions So unless unless there's dissent I would I would prefer that we could we move on to talking
- about each of the each of the reasonable conditions I think I think is councilmember Flaherty, please I
- Yeah, I had more questions for Council Rice. I don't need to ask those necessarily. But what it seems
- like is that we actually have, at least my opinion is we have a dispute over the legality of the reasonable
- conditions. I would say that Corporation Council's remarks over the last 20 minutes are directly counter to
- every experience I've had with the PUD and working with four different counsel attorneys. It's also
- directly counter past practice over the last decade, at least, and directly counter to corporation counsel
- legal opinion in many prior PUD instances. So how we deal with that, because we have a corporation counsel
- representing the RDC, although the RDC hasn't actually taken a formal position on any of these reasonable
- conditions.
- So we have Corporation Council representing the RDC in that way, saying these aren't allowed. I disagree
- with that. How do we actually move productively forward on these tonight since we have a legal dispute?
- Please. I just want to make a clarification that from my understanding in the past PUDs,
- there have been requested reasonable conditions that while they may not have met the mark for a reasonable
- condition, the petitioner agreed to them. So even if they were amendments, the petitioner agreed to
- them. That is how these significant things get amended. They can be drafted as reasonable conditions,
- but if they don't meet the mark of the law,
- as a reasonable condition, the only way to get them in legally is to get the petitioner to agree to
- them. I wanna back up to a 20,000 foot view as well. The combination of these reasonable conditions
- will create a financial situation where we will not be able to, they will contradict each other.
- So especially the affordability pieces will no longer be in play and so if we were to agree to all of
- these We would then be missing the mark on affordability. And so we then are in a catch-22 So even if
- we were to say we will agree to a hundred percent of these We could not then build this out so
- We're in a, we now, and that's the problem with amending it after it goes to plan commission, especially
- the sidewalk and lane changes, things like that. That's gonna change the lot layout and the number of
- lots that we have and thereby the affordability and it will cost us design money, also impacting
- affordability. Thank you, Mark Thompson.
- Okay, I'm gonna, I'm gonna have us, unless there's a substantive question that's different than the
- questions that have been asked. Councilman Morello? Well, I mean, what I wanna say is that this is a
- dispute of what constitutes a reasonable condition, correct? I wanna set the context here for going
- forward on this. And I want to just say to the council that we have a 90-day period from the certification
- day, which is February 13th,
- So we have time in order to settle a dispute of interpreting our legal authority. I find that the, I
- disagree that most of these, it looks like all of them really are within, which should be interpreted
- as reasonable. Why? Because they happen to follow our UDO. And so if we can't expect the UDO to be followed by
- The city that owns the property that's developing this project It is precedent-setting because it won't
- be reflected in I think a private developer coming forward and trying to follow our EDO so I would just
- say that I think it's important. I think it's important enough that we Consider postponing and consults
- a neutral arbiter Contract someone who can make a decision about our legal authority and
- settle this matter so that we can go forward because we seem to be at a point of Can we even interpret
- should we even go forward on these if they're if we're being told that? It's gonna sink the project,
- right? So I would like to keep have everyone keep that in mind. Thanks. I
- All right, with that, let's move on to actually talking about these individually, because it will give
- an opportunity both for public comment and for a response directly on maybe what the effects of passing
- them are. So the first one that we have here is by Councilmember Stosberg around use tables. Go ahead.
- I move reasonable condition number one. Second. All right, and it's been moved and seconded.
- So reasonable condition number one, by the way the synopsis I combined my reasonable conditions one
- and two and when they got separated the synopsis on one Didn't quite get amended correctly. So just
- FYI reasonable condition number one Requires an updated allowed use table to reflect the stated project goals I
- Questioned that I asked about that at the first reading and I'm trying to find my tab that says where
- the use table is And I am failing to find my thing but specifically it is being This whole PD is being
- targeted as a residential area and the the use table
- allows a bunch of things that are not residential to be put in. Art galleries, community centers, crops
- and pasturage, amenity centers, recreation, various commercial uses, and so just kind of looking at
- that a little bit closely, and that is something that we mentioned earlier, that that condition that
- came from the Planning Commission had me
- clarifying this a little bit and one of the things that got clarified was the actual use table that
- went in and once the use table went in it was like oh my gosh like why are all of these uses allowed
- here in this two block area and in the conversation with the petitioner it was like yeah but we can't
- change that right now.
- To go to the point that I made earlier. We can't actually change the use table at this point and so
- that's why I wanted that in as reasonable condition number one and furthermore I think that there is
- a line in my reasonable condition that says as permitted under state law because I think there's some
- group home stuff that because some group homes include protected classes that have to be allowed in
- any residential area, so that's why there's that line in the
- The reasonable condition if anybody has any questions, let me know. Thanks any questions for councilmember
- Stossberg Seeing none petitioner has already responded I think to this but anything else you'd like
- to add to number one Thank you very much We're clerkless so give us a moment and we can continue I
- Councilmember Stasberg has introduced reasonable condition one. I think we've already heard the response
- from the responder so Public comment. Thank you. I forgot Went on long. Okay. Anybody would like to
- comment on reasonable condition one which is a proposed condition to update the allowed use table to
- reflect the stated project goals and a rational phasing plan So anybody who'd like to make comment on that?
- Not the phasing plan. I'm sorry Anybody online no, there's not okay, we'll come back to council Will
- the clerk please call the roll on voting for Or I mean, I don't do we need to do we need to do we need
- to now motion to adopt it? How does that work? We vote fantastic. You already moved good. Okay, so will
- a clerk please call the roll on reasonable condition one and
- Yes, Councilmember Ruff. Yes. Wrong space. Rosenberger? Yes. Flaherty? Yes. Stossberg? Yes. Piedmont-Smith?
- Yes. Zulek? Yes. Asari? Yes. Daly? Yes. Rallo? Yes. Thank you. All right. Next motion, Councilmember
- Stossberg.
- Thank you, I'm gonna move reasonable condition number two go ahead
- So reasonable condition number two asks for a rational phasing plan. A rational phasing plan is one
- of those things that's required as part of a PUD process if there are phases. And the petitioner on
- page 84 of our packet today has a phasing plan that is literally just an image and doesn't really tell
- us anything. And so I'm requesting a rational phasing plan to be submitted to the final plan to include
- a short description of each phase and
- Requiring that phase one includes the construction of the interior road shared green space pedestrian
- improvements and utility infrastructure including stormwater management facilities There is also a sort
- of similar reasonable condition That came from the Plan Commission. I'm hoping that I can find that
- exactly right That Also asks for a phasing plan
- But that one asked for a very specific phasing plan about the stormwater utilities and all of those
- kinds of details So my reasonable condition I think is a little bit different in terms of it Just being
- more of a general like how are you going to develop this because the image that's included is just not
- It doesn't really tell us anything. Thank you so much questions for council member Stossberg Okay, seeing
- none petition response
- Yes, we agreed to provide a phasing plan. The reason that there was no phasing plan included with this
- is because typically,
- a neighborhood where you would require a phasing plan, you would have several segments of roads and
- then houses being built, et cetera, et cetera. All the roads are going in at the same time, which is
- usually the concern of Plan Commission is when's the public infrastructure going to be built out and
- turned over. So that's all in a single phase. We're happy to write that down and approve it as a phasing plan.
- Thank you so much. Um, is there any public comment on the phasing plan? condition I Just want to note
- that that's all written down in the Q&A that we provided for council as well. Thank you Public comment
- none anyone on the line. What's your comment? All right, will the clerk please call the roll on reasonable
- condition to Councilmember Rosenberger Yes clarity
- Yes, Stasberg. Yes, Piedmont Smith. Yes, Zulek. Yes. Sorry. Yes, Daly. Oh, sorry. Rallo. Yes. Ruff.
- Yes. Thank you very much. Mr. President. Yep. May I suggest that we consider the reasonable conditions
- five and six?
- because those we seem to be in agreement with the administration and I'm considering offering a motion
- to postpone for clarification of the The other reasonable conditions in terms of their of our legal
- authority So is the motion to combine five and six Or you hear them separately but in that order five
- six, yeah, I
- Anybody you motion to introduce it? I'm happy to hear it Please I think reasonable condition number
- three which was submitted by me Can be dispensed with very quickly without introducing it, but I would
- like to at least have the opportunity The mayor made a very concerted effort to reach out to me and
- explain why this was unnecessary and redundant and I I agree with
- Her persuasive points that she made to me and I would like Just for the sake of having on the record
- to him the public Understand why I'm not moving forward with this if I would ask that someone from the
- administration just say Just like will explain to me. This isn't really needed Is that okay So that
- reasonable condition speaks to the ad use
- being located on the same lot as an owner occupied home. And because all of the ADUs in this neighborhood
- are on owner occupied lots already, it's just sort of a redundant, it's already in there. So I just
- wanted to clarify with Council Member Ruff in a phone call that
- That was our intention. And that's how this is being created. Thank you. All right, any motions? Council
- member or president, sorry. Oh, please, thank you. I didn't see your hand. Go ahead, council member.
- Maybe a point of information. I think, first, procedurally, I'm sympathetic to the idea of postponing
- on other regional conditions. I don't know how we can
- move forward on those in good faith when we don't have, when we have contradictory legal advice from
- what we've received as legal advice consistently over time. Um, and, and so there's that, but with regard
- to hearing five and six tonight, uh, or not, I thought number five and number four, um, are both involved
- in permanent affordability and maybe have some conflict with another or another. So I don't know if
- it makes sense to hear five tonight, even though the administration agrees with that one, if we aren't
- also going to hear number four tonight.
- Can I clarify, is that, am I understanding it correctly that four and five actually are mutually exclusive,
- so to speak? That's how I understood them myself. So, I mean, I think that's a fair point. Okay. And
- number six, I'm the sponsor of, while we could hear it quickly now, I'm agnostic if we feel like we
- need to postpone on the others.
- Here to hear motions, Council Member Stossberg.
- Could be really instrumental to have a discussion about the affordability question right now Even if
- we're I don't know if we have to move a reasonable condition for that and whether councilmember Flaherty
- might want to do six first and we consider the affordability angle because At least from my perspective
- that is a really big deal and I also want to point out that there is kind of an updated reasonable condition
- number four that was in the packet addendum that went out today and so I want to make sure that the
- public and council members realize that there is a
- and updated reasonable condition number four. Absolutely, happy to hear any motions, everyone. Whatever
- you'd like. I'll have a reasonable condition number six, then. Second. All right, motion and a second,
- the reasonable condition six. Council Member Flaherty. Yep, okay. So reasonable condition number six
- says all buildings must use either electricity or on-site renewable energy services for all significant
- energy needs.
- including for space heating, water heating, and cooking. The rationale is that this is consistent with
- what our climate action plan calls for. Specifically, action EB4-A-2 suggests that we should be using
- planned unit developments as an optional development choice that a landowner can make to ensure opt-in
- building electrification, which is
- the only viable scalable path for building decarbonization consistent with our net zero greenhouse gas
- emissions goal for community-wide emissions. So I'm happy to answer questions about that. Questions
- for Councilmember Flaherty. Seeing none, petition or response, any additional comment? Seeing none,
- public comment on condition number six.
- Anyone online. No nobody online. Please we have someone in council chambers. Thank you. I would just
- like to make a note. Is it this one.
- Sarah Wolford, I'm the housing solutions director at habitat for humanity and Renewable energy is also
- something that we certainly consider on some of the smaller units There's not currently a mechanical
- closet which I think can be Taken care of with a tankless water heater, but there are a lot of issues
- with electric
- Entirely electric on-demand water heaters. So perhaps if we move forward with all electric there could
- just be a note Or make a provision on the plans for a mechanical closet Any other public comment anyone
- online No comment online. Okay. Excellent. So will the clerk please call the roll on the reasonable
- condition six
- It's councilmember Flaherty. Yes. Stasberg. Yes. Piedmont Smith. Yes. Zulek. Yes. Sorry. Yes. Daily.
- Yes. Rallo. Yes. Rough. Yes. Rosenberger. Yes. Thank you. Oh sorry that passes a reasonable condition
- six. I move reasonable condition five. Go ahead.
- Is there a second Second all right motion in a second, please go ahead Thank you. So this is actually
- in line with a resolution that I will be bringing forward later that directs the Housing and Neighborhood
- Development Department to develop a framework for long-term housing affordability specifically in regard
- to home ownership and it includes an expectation of
- guidelines set forth by the administration which should include tools such as set silent second mortgages
- and or write a first refusal and The administration will report the full and final affordability structure
- to the council prior to the first home sale Happy to answer any questions Any questions for councilman
- Zulek a council member Stasberg I guess one of the things that that's uh, I want to bring up here with regard to
- the affordability question at this stage. First of all, your reasonable condition specifically says
- the units designed as permanently affordable, which means only the 15% of units that is originally stated
- in the PUD language, like just to be clear that the UDO itself, under qualifying standards, requires
- 15% of total dwelling units to be permanently income limited in the original qualification So those
- are the 15% that you're talking about, right? Yes, and that and that that 15% are the only units that
- are going to be affordable permanently affordable that is correct and the Strategies outlined in the
- synopsis would be how we keep it permanently affordable Okay I also would like to point out that
- That section it says that they must be permanently income limited through a deed restriction Unless
- the city otherwise adjusts or releases this requirement. So you're suggesting that we should adjust
- and release that requirement Sorry, can you this isn't this is in section 20 0 2 0 4 0 be Three of the
- UDO and just to make a note on this as well as
- that If if the planning department had responded in a timely way to my original request regarding AMI
- adjustments that there would be a PUD requirement Insisting that 15% be not below 120 percent AMI but
- below 90 percent AMI and That's not what's in here because they got it under the old restrictions because
- there was a delay on the administrative side before we could actually put new new
- AMI restrictions in the place but but I mean By by saying they're gonna do it with the silent second
- mortgage and those other things we are then adjusting and releasing part of that requirement Any other
- questions for customer Zulik response from from the office of the mayor I'm sorry didn't see I
- Didn't understand what councilmember Stossberg's point which I understood her point. That's a good point
- But how did that relate to this reasonable condition? Could she clarify that? Thank you because the
- reasonable condition says the units designated as permanently affordable So I'm clarifying which units
- are being designated as permanently affordable So it's this fifteen percent of units that are permanently
- affordable under a hundred and twenty percent of AMI which is the
- Previous requirement because of a delay on administration's behalf to Respond to a resolution from council
- in a timely way so in my mind that's kind of reinforcing a few other things is that So I was just clarifying
- that that's the 15% of units that or that's the those are the units that we're talking about in the
- reasonable condition Thank you
- Council member Flaherty. Thank you. So I mentioned a moment ago, I guess my read of reasonable conditions
- four and five is that they are mutually exclusive or inconsistent with one another. So both could not
- pass. Is that your understanding as well, council members elected if we pass reasonable condition five,
- we cannot pass reasonable condition four because it would be in direct conflict with it. I think that
- would be up to an attorney.
- Council member Rosenberger. I could clarify on why I think they're contradictory if that's helpful,
- but I can also do that via comment. So that doesn't need to be now, I suppose. But yeah, thank you.
- Thank you. Council member Rosenberger. If I, I mean, I can weigh in on that question since RC4, I helped
- draft it. Is that okay or tell me to wait? Go ahead.
- I think the way they read they are different. RC5 talks about 15% being permanently affordable at 120%
- AMI with different types of tools, silent second mortgage, right of first refusal. RC4 talks about 50%
- permanently affordable with 15% being at 90% AMI, which is the updated UDO
- PUD rule. And it talks about ground leases and deed restrictions or other shared equity models. So I
- do think they're different in terms of percentages of AMI and percentage of a permanent affordability
- and mechanisms to get that done. Thank you, Councilmember Rosenberger. Response. Thank you.
- Thank you Margie Rice Corporation Council. I agree with council member Flaherty that four and five are
- they conflict with each other. And just for the record I want to be sure that it's clear that that we
- believe reasonable condition five offered by council members Zulek.
- makes no change to the exhibits or modifies the PUD. It clarifies what is already existing in the PUD,
- which is that the administration will develop affordability guidelines and will report the full and
- final affordability structure to the council prior to the home sale. So I do agree with Council Member
- Flaherty and the petitioner
- Supports or agrees with thinking it's a reasonable condition number five Thank you councilmember Zulik,
- thank you. Oh My gosh what I was about to say just completely left my head. So All right with
- that councilmember Okay response then councilman Stosberg
- I'm sorry. I know that Corporation Council already provided a response, but I just wanted to clarify
- that That my read of this reasonable condition in order to to qualify as reasonable condition. It is
- just a clarification however, that is the minimum of affordability that we would be providing is that
- 15% and this particular reasonable condition
- provides some tools that are alternative to what is, what has conventionally been the deed restriction.
- Those deed restrictions in an ownership model prevent it from being marketable on a traditional mortgage.
- And so would really, they would prevent them from being sold. Thank you.
- All right. I'm councillor Sasberg. Then we'll go to public comment. I have another question because
- like part of my Like close reading of this in the last couple weeks has been this understanding that
- we're actually making an exception to what our PUD requirements say in the UDO
- with using these tools for affordability. So my question is perhaps for Council Member Zulik, because
- I have this question on the resolution that is later as well, or perhaps for the petitioner, is what
- kind of data or research have you done that shows that these methods actually work in real life in municipalities?
- appreciate that, you know the and I and I have like I I respect our Department head for hand but there
- is nothing in this packet that Tells me or shows me. Oh, this was done in this municipality And this
- is how it worked out this this works like this and this is how it works out it just feels like word
- of mouth at this point and so I
- would really appreciate having some actual data. So Council Member Zulek, have you read anything? Is
- there a specific municipality that you can point to that uses these tools effectively? I will let Director
- Killian-Hanson answer that in general, but the majority of the work that I've done has been speaking
- with community members around Bloomington in different fields that
- tangentially relate to Hopewell and and what building a house looks like and so I have not done that
- research, but I've Spoken to a lot of different community members and that's how we've come up with
- some of these opportunities Thank you so much Anna Killian Hansen director of housing and neighborhood
- development I
- First of all, I would like to say that what we're considering right now is land use. It is not affordability.
- And the reason is because we cannot develop the affordability framework completely without knowing what's
- getting approved. Everybody's adding different conditions that increase costs. So how do you commit
- to affordability not knowing what the overall cost is? The RDC has not voted on the affordability mechanism yet.
- One thing I want to draw attention to, thanks to our friends at the South Central Indiana Mortgage Brokers
- Association, they facilitated a meeting with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which I had last week, and
- they actually have a staff member that is dedicated to helping municipalities facilitate some of these
- alternative methods of affordability. And they have offered to vet
- And work with us to make sure that any structure that we put in place is pre certified and complies
- with Fannie and Freddie secondary mortgage market approvals. So that is something that's going to continue
- to be ongoing. Is it ready tonight? No, we don't know what the final cost is.
- I am curious if anybody took a look at my memo in the packet, which addresses many of these things.
- If we're talking about 50% of the units being affordable, in fact, if you look at what we're providing,
- we have more than 50% that are below 120% AMI. So we are agreeing to comply with what the UDO says,
- which it was 15%.
- At a hundred and twenty percent AMI it is not some sneaky way to manipulate or get around What you guys
- have put in place subsequent to that but we are agreeing to comply with what the UDO said Thank you
- director, okay Please that counts my prima Smith I think the the sticking point is the permanent affordability
- In that per the UDO proposed PUD zoning district that is relying on affordable housing as meeting the
- requirements has to income restrict at least 10 percent more of the dwelling units at or below the income
- levels required to earn a tier one or tier two incentive. So that would be.
- 15% plus 10%, that'd be 25% permanently affordable, or the income restricting the same number of dwelling
- units, so 15%, but limiting incomes to at least 10% lower AMI. So that would be 15% of units at 110%
- AMI. These are for the permanently affordable units. I think that's the sticking point.
- The ordinance actually says 15% at 100% AMI. Thank you. Right. With that, we'll move to public comment.
- Any public comment on, I've lost my place, any public comment on condition five?
- This is on permanent affordability, please Good evening, I'm Ryan Langley I am the branch manager for
- Rudolph mortgage here in Bloomington As well as a former County Council elected official Having some
- flashbacks of some late-night budget discussions with mr. McKinn back here So
- Here to speak specifically About the impact that deed restrictions can have on financing options for
- local homebuyers Something that we know a great deal about To be clear I understand appreciate the goal
- behind the affordability measures We all want more families in this community to have access to homeownership
- But some of the deed restriction structures being discussed or implemented can create unintended consequences
- in our mortgage market and
- Most single single-family mortgage loans today are ultimately sold to Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac as already
- mentioned Those agencies do not prohibit affordable housing programs outright The issue is when deed
- restrictions go so far that they limit the resale the cap appreciation or permanently restrict the future
- buyer pool based on their income At that point the property becomes a less marketable as collateral
- Lending standpoint the question becomes very simple if a borrower defaults can that home be sold on
- the open market at market value If the answer is no many lenders will not make that loan in the first
- place Because the risk is too high and the loan may not meet the secondary market conditions That means
- for fewer financing options for buyers less competition among lenders and in many cases higher borrowing
- cost or denied loan access altogether and
- And the people most affected are often the very people these policies are intended to help Single-family
- and multifamily housing also do not function the same way in the financing world treating them the same
- way May work in policy language But not in the secondary market permanent AMI based restrictions on
- single-family homes are especially difficult Because they strength the future buyer pool and reduce
- marketability There's also a larger issue
- Homeownership remains one of the main ways families build equity and long-term wealth how it's called
- homeownership a pillar of wealth building and Census data continues to show that major wealth gap between
- those that own and those that rent When we permanently limit resale value of appreciation We work against
- one of the most important benefits of owning the home So my request would be that we would work with
- local lenders like us and
- gather more of our input before finalizing that policy. If a buyer cannot finance the home, the home
- is not truly affordable. It is simply unavailable. Thank you.
- My name is Ryan still I work with Summit Hill Community Development Corporation. We have a land trust
- in town and we Utilize a few of these different restrictions you guys are talking about My only encouragement
- here would be to not limit the restriction to a specific one different styles work better with the different
- groups of people and with different markets, right and
- Go with a blanket deed restriction might limit the amount of lenders you have But if you leave it open
- then you can discuss with local lenders what they might specifically want or might work for the area
- Thank you Hello, my name is Sarah Wolford I'm with how Habitat for Humanity. I'm the housing solutions
- director and
- I just wanted to make a note that Habitat for Humanity of Monroe County used to use deed restrictions
- until we realized that this placed a
- burden on the families that we served. So in my time at Habitat for Humanity, we switched to primarily
- using silent second mortgages and first right of refusals. And so when Stossberg asked about communities
- where these things have been utilized, I just wanted to draw attention that they are being utilized
- effectively in our community.
- Right now and the last 40 houses That I've worked on with Habitat for Humanity have all utilized these
- other kind of alternative rather than deed restrictions so The other thing I wanted to highlight is
- first right of refusal makes it sound as if these things can only be utilized once for the first occupant,
- but if the city
- Chooses to purchase that home back it then is a restriction that again goes on to that home So as long
- as the city continues to choose to purchase the home back that is something that will not just work
- for the first Occupant of the home, but something that is continuously utilized Thank you Next commenter
- I Paul Russo again I
- Gosh in response to a written question by councilmember Flaherty about affordable housing the Planning
- Department responded as follows in your packet the language and the incentive sections section of the
- UDO states that housing units must be income restricted permanently Unless the requirement is otherwise
- adjusted or forfeited by the city With this PUD we are building an adjustment to the length of time
- for the affordability period and
- for single family residents. The language in the UDO allows for an adjustment to the length of time
- for that affordability, end quote. It seems to me that what this is saying is that the new housing will
- not be permanently affordable. And I'm just wondering if people are so interested in this because they
- see it as a plum investment opportunity. Because they're gonna be buying below market and then
- It's going to appreciate and then they're going to be able to sell it at market rate. I would say it
- doesn't have to be this way. The city owns the land. How often does that happen? We have a golden opportunity
- it seems to me to maintain public ownership and thereby shield at least some of our housing from the
- speculative ravages of the capitalist marketplace.
- So I strongly suspect that there are skilled employees with hand and Bloomington Housing Authority who
- would be able to manage such an undertaking. I'm also recalling that if you get your mortgage calculator
- out and if you have a 30-year mortgage at 5% interest, over the life of the loan, you're gonna be paying
- 53% of your payments are going to interest.
- If you have a 1% mortgage, it's non-profit, it'll be 14%. So think about where our wealth is going in
- this community. We own the land here. It's a golden opportunity. Thank you. Thank you. Next commenter
- in the room. Thank you again, Mr. President. This is Chris Jeremie from the Greater Bloomington Chamber
- of Commerce. I just want to point out that I appreciate
- first three speakers tonight working within mortgages, working within affordability that provided me
- some input, some information on knowledge that I don't know. Sometimes we forget that we should know
- what we don't know. I think Ms. Walford's comments from Habitat seem to support Council Member Zulek's
- amendment. So it's important that we're listening to these comments on people who know what they're
- talking about. We're dealing with clients and mortgages every day. Thank you for your time, appreciate it.
- Thank you next comment or Hi, I'm Blake music president Rob mortgage work Brian I Came here to kind
- of maybe echo what he was trying to say, but I've learned some things this afternoon that I think are
- more easily addressed that could solve the overarching issues here in the you know city
- surrounding County that I think we're trying to Solve a problem by fixing or sorry trying to solve a
- problem. It doesn't exist That's caused by something that's a much larger scale of a problem I learned
- about this this afternoon at a dinner that the city of Bloomington has a moratorium on subdivision and
- Really what it comes down to at a macro level is that there's just a supply issue, which then causes
- affordability problems. With our company, we're all over the state, we're all over Michigan, Ohio, Kentucky,
- and where we find the greatest affordability issues are where there's the largest amount of restrictive
- policy put in place by local government,
- and then it turns into how do we manufacture a solution for a problem that's created by other policy?
- And so I feel like we all end up kind of chasing our tail by ignoring the initial, you know, snowball
- starting to roll down the hill that ends up where we are today. So I think that is something obviously
- outside the scope of this discussion, but I think that it is something, you know, very worth considering where
- Rather than putting these really complex restrictive things in place. We could look at the root cause
- of the issue Like I learned also today that you know Beezer homes who? Builds generally affordable homes
- has left town just because they were tired and abandoned the final phase of a development they were
- doing because they were just tired of the red tape and the and the fights that got into with with the
- city, so I don't have a solution suggest per se for those things, but I think that
- looking at the root cause of the problem that we're trying to solve is probably a more effective and
- long-term solution than inventing problems to a, or sorry, inventing solutions to something that are
- largely not related to the problem, the cause of the problem, sorry. Thanks. Thank you. Next commenter.
- Is there anybody online while the comment is coming? There's no comments online, okay? If you do wanna
- comment online, just raise the hand function.
- Good evening. My name is Aaron comfort II and I am a longtime resident of the McDowell Gardens neighborhood
- I want to thank the council and the administration for all the work they've put into the PUD that we
- have today and I'd also like to thank the council and the administration for engaging so much with the
- community on this project more generally I
- I've been meeting with a group of residents in McDowell Gardens about the Hopewell South development
- and I wanted to relay what we've been talking about because it may be of interest to the council and
- to the administration. I met with a group of about 10 residents, long-term residents mostly, of McDowell
- Gardens last week and we reviewed the most recent plans published about the Hopewell South development.
- We also reviewed the catalog of pre-approved designs supplied by what was Flintlock Lab and is now called
- something else. And one thing that we were excited about in McDowell Gardens was the low-rise apartment
- building pre-approved design called the Faulkner. It is a 12 unit. Each one of them is a one bedroom.
- And it is a 12 unit low-rise apartment building and when we were looking at the plan it appeared that
- There were two lots or that there were there was an allocation that there would be two of these now
- I'm not sure to what degree that is final. They're on 1st Street and we the residents the ten of us
- all were kind of talking this over and we thought that more of that would be a good thing and
- Now how does this relate to permanent affordability? part of it has to do with density and I encourage
- the council and the administration to consider what it would mean to add a Just another apartment or
- two like that that would Help a lot of people move into that area who otherwise may not be able to and
- then as it relates to permanent affordability
- That was the other center of the conversation I had with residents where our primary concern was not
- with regulation but with no regulation, was with speculation. And right now there is not a lot of regulation
- on the real estate market. And so what we were in favor of, what we as residents are in favor of was
- regulating actually more
- That there would be more opportunity for permanent affordability. So I was glad to see that introduced.
- Thank you very much Any other comments anyone online No comments online. Okay. Thank you very much coming
- back to council Any other comments? All right. We'll put this to a council member Stossberg I just want
- to say that I'm not supportive of this reasonable condition. I mean partly because I mean I'm co-sponsoring
- Updated reasonable condition number four and these two are not really aligned with each other but also
- I I Really appreciate the folks who commented and said like yeah, we do have experience with this but
- that's the kind of like neutral sort of Documentation that should be in our packet
- honestly, like we shouldn't have to rely on hopefully somebody from the public comes who's actually
- used this and We should be able to see that data and we haven't actually seen that data and I appreciate
- that the the director of Hand put in a memo that it's true, but there was also no, you know, no
- Reference to where she got heard information that I saw so I I want a little bit more information about
- that before putting that in but secondly, I think that only having 15 percent of permanently affordable
- units is not enough and It actually does say in our UDO in section, let's see 2006 oh seven oh four e
- PUDs also have to meet additional requirements and the claim here is that they're meeting the additional
- requirement of income restricting at least 10% more of the dwelling units at or below income levels
- or Restricting the same number of dwelling units required to earn the tier one or tier two but limiting the
- Incomes further down so either more units or lower incomes and I appreciate that they're saying, you
- know in this that like 50% of units are kind of going to be naturally affordable, right because they're
- small and so they they're going like well we meet that right, but These should be permanently affordable
- units that extra 10% should be permanently affordable and this reasonable condition
- says no, that's okay, just the 15% being permanently affordable and we can just kind of like wave and
- adjust that requirement for these other units. They don't need to be permanently affordable and that
- is something that reasonable condition four does ensure that it's not just the first 15 but it's also
- the extra which once again are required as part of like
- additional sort of PUD hoop to jump through and that's where you know comes into play this whole are
- we talking about land use or are we talking about affordability but when we are up here deciding whether
- or not to approve a PUD a very special request for land use our UDO tells us to consider affordability
- therefore it is our job to consider affordability not just land use
- And so that is what I contend, and that is why I'm gonna support reasonable condition number four and
- not reasonable condition number five. And I also want to note that in the updated reasonable condition
- number four, there is an addendum added about it doesn't just have to be deed restrictions, it doesn't
- just have to be the land leases, but that there can be other things that you just have to bring back
- to council basically and say, here's the proof of how it works, this is how we're actually gonna do it.
- and I don't feel good about approving the concept of a plan right now. Thank you. Thank you so much.
- Councilmember Flaherty. Thank you. First of all, just thank you to Councilmember Zulek for bringing
- this reasonable condition. I think aspects of it, I, well, yeah, let me speak to, I guess, first, just
- affirming that I agree with Councilmember Stosberg that affordability is absolutely part of the PUD process.
- in the UDO as part of the process. And in particular, we actually are being asked to deviate from what
- the UDO says. So just without question, factually, this is part of our decision-making and wanted to
- clarify any ambiguity on that. We're not only considering land use, but substantively, I appreciate
- what Council Member Zulek's reasonable condition is getting at. I think I am open to
- flexibility on permanent affordability and exactly how we achieve that. I think I take very seriously
- the concerns we've heard and the experiences we've heard from folks. I also know there's lots of cities
- across the country that have longer running experience with permanent affordability and ownership models
- than we do and that there's a variety of mechanisms to accomplish it and that we could probably learn
- from them as well because this can be done successfully. I don't doubt that because lots of places are doing it.
- The question is, what's the best mechanism? I am uncomfortable with the fact that we don't know what
- the mechanism is going to be. I think, I know we're not discussing reasonable condition four right now,
- but I think that reasonable condition does preserve flexibility as well. But unlike this reasonable
- condition, which is just sort of leave it to the administration to report to us later, I think reasonable
- condition four, by contrast, would actually, it names two mechanisms and if a third
- flexible option is proposed, it would just require approval by the council, which I think is reasonable,
- since we don't know what the mechanism is yet. I also do want to talk briefly about the fact that what's
- proposed as permanently affordable deviates from what the UDO requires, because the UDO requires matching
- the incentives level, 15%, and then doing more, either 10% more permanently affordable or reducing the
- AMI level.
- Mr. Rousseau mentioned this in his comments. It's on page 122 and 123 of the packet. For anybody who
- wants to look, I asked a question to clarify, and the administration said, well, look, we can adjust
- those PUD requirements from the UDO if forfeited by the city. In this case, specifically the city council,
- because we're the approval entity. And they said, within this PUD, we're building in an adjustment to
- the length of time for the affordability period for single-family residences, specifically to one-time
- affordability.
- And quote, the language in the UDO allows for an adjustment to the length of time for that affordability.
- And I think the argument being made is that if we approve the PUD, we have agreed. We have agreed to
- that adjustment that brings it to below the levels required by the UDO normally. And I just realized
- how great of an irony that is, that we may not like doing less permanently affordable, but if we pass
- the ordinance, we've agreed to it.
- that there's echoes of that in reasonable conditions. And that if a petitioner doesn't withdraw the
- petition and a council passes reasonable conditions, then they have agreed to them when we pass the
- ordinance. Again, that's the legal interpretation and guidance we've had and used for the better part
- of a decade without incident. So just recognizing that. And I think because the conflict between reasonable
- condition five
- or I'm not able to support five. But again, I do appreciate the sentiment and what's trying
- to be accomplished. And I think reasonable condition four does also preserve flexibility in a way that
- is broadly consistent with the aims, at least in my opinion, with the aims that reasonable condition
- five has. So thank you. Thank you so much. All right. With that then, will the clerk please call the
- roll on reasonable condition five?
- Yes, councilmember Stasberg. No Piedmont Smith. No Zulik. Yes. I'm sorry. Yes Daley. Yes Rallo. No Ruff.
- No Rosenberger. No clarity That motion fails
- 6-3 Through six. Sorry. Mr. President. Yes, I would like to move That we postponed consideration of
- ordinance twenty twenty six oh six until our April 1st meeting Okay for the reason that Well, just to explain
- Because it seems to me that proceeding on three reasonable conditions three four seven through thirteen
- is And of the opinion of corporate council tantamount to rejection of the petition And so we we have
- conflicting legal judgment from the sponsors of the reasonable conditions And I think that we need resolution
- of that before we can proceed to
- consideration because I want to listen to them and make a decision based upon the merits and not on
- Whether it disqualifies the an entire petition going forward. So That's my reason. Thank you. Councilmember
- Rallo other discussion councilmember Zulek
- Thank you. Earlier today, I heard someone say that we've been discussing Hopewell since 2017. So on
- January 1st of 2017, I was 14 years old. Since then, I turned 16. I graduated high school.
- I turned 18. I graduated college. I turned 21. I ran for office and won. Almost 10 years later,
- I'm 23. I'm this council's vice president. And our city still has a housing crisis.
- Out of the nine of us up here, I am the only one who does not own property. All of my eight colleagues
- do, and my generation has no hope of following in their footsteps if we continue to let perfect prevent
- good. So the people of this city deserve results, and that is why I will be voting against postponement.
- Thank you, Council Member Zulek. Council Member Stasberg. I'm in favor of postponing right now, and
- I just want to say something about the
- Philosophical approach to this and I appreciate what council members just said and I appreciate that
- we're in a housing crisis and I appreciate that We've been talking about this too long. What I disagree
- with is that I don't think that it's better to do something than I mean It's not better if it's if it's
- not good it is not better if it's not good and
- And I am not convinced that it's good enough yet. I'm very concerned about this affordability issue.
- And one of the philosophical, and I really don't appreciate the little comments that are coming from
- the corner right now either. I think it shows a lack of respect. But I think that it also shows a real
- difference in philosophy around affordability that I have with this petition.
- During the presentation last week during it like within this packet. There's this real emphasis on building
- equity About not wanting to limit the amount of equity that individual homebuyers can earn When they
- purchase one of these properties so that 50% that they're saying is like affordable
- the first time but might not be affordable the second time, well that is okay seemingly based on the
- petition and based on the presentations that I've heard because those people that purchase those properties
- are going to have built equity and built wealth and now they're going to be at an upper echelon of economy
- and they deserve that. And I'm not saying that they deserve that, but I am saying that it should not
- City government's use of resources to make sure that a few people get to gain lots of equity In a home
- that they bought cheaply I think that it should be our responsibility to ensure that there is a much
- as much affordability as possible for as many people as possible and we should not be in the business
- as a city and
- Trying to make sure that somebody goes, you know five paces up this up the economic scale Instead we
- should really be trying to make sure everybody can at least get one or two up right or as many people
- as possible Can get their needs met and that's why I think that we need greater permanent affordability
- right now and hopeful and that's what this delay is about right now it is about whether or not this
- property that the city owns is
- is going to have houses on it that are going to be permanently affordable into the future for generations
- of Bloomington residents, not just a few who happen to buy right now. And so that is why I am supportive
- of this delay so that we can straighten this out and figure out how we can get the most permanent
- affordability, the most affordability for the greatest number
- Bloomington residents. Thank you. Thank you councilmember Stossberg. I guess clerk Bolden just to clarify
- councilmember Rallo did you can you repeat your motion for me really quickly? Sure, I move to postpone
- consideration of ordinance 2026 06 until April 1st regular session Any further comment
- Was it just a repetition or was there? I just wanted to clarify, I misheard his motion, so I thought
- he was saying till April 6th and that threw me a bit. Okay, thank you. Council Member Flaherty.
- Thank you. I support the motion to postpone because we can't move forward in a productive way on the
- remaining reasonable conditions when we have new legal guidance from the Corporation Council that contradicts
- the legal guidance we've been following for a decade.
- And I guess I'd just like to clarify now if we'll have a decision to make if we have contradictory legal
- guidance and how we want to handle that. But I just want to be clear, I can't support this PUD as it
- stands right now because it has substandard transportation infrastructure, in particular for pedestrians
- in a way that I'm very confident we would not accept from another petitioner. It doesn't meet
- the sustainability incentives section of the UDO, which I believe is needed and actually saves money
- long-term, yes, incremental,
- upfront cost increases, saving substantially on utility bills over time for generations. And it does
- not meet EVO requirements on permanent affordability. And to be clear, yes, since 2017, it's now 2026,
- the council taking some of its 90-day window to make sure we get this right within the purview or authority
- is not the cause of delay.
- and we shouldn't let anyone think that it is. I know the mayor's press release a few weeks ago tried
- to pin a two week delay on the council as a source of housing affordability problems. I think that was
- in poor form because it's just not accurate. So, I just wanted to clarify that we really do need to
- resolve this reasonable conditions issue and that without the ability to consider them in the same way
- we always have, I will not be supporting the PUD.
- Thank You counselor Flaherty councilmember daily I'm not loan for making long speeches up here and I'm
- not gonna break that Expectation tonight. I'm not in favor of postponing tonight for many of the reasons
- that councilmember Zulik said but also just The longer we delay the the more issues we find the more
- we nitpick and try to get to perfect and
- I agree. This is a really big opportunity and we want to get it right But I also agree that the longer
- we delay the more problematic It's probably going to be for all of us in the long run and the more expensive
- the project is going to be which is going to create Even more debate and greater hardship on
- the affordability issue. So those are my thoughts and why I do not think we should delay Daily
- I'm councilmember Allah
- Yeah, just to say that I want to focus on points of agreement. I think that there are some very wonderful
- things about this petition. I'm disappointed that, and I agree with my colleagues, that these reasonable
- conditions have been something that we have done in the past, and I think that this is somewhat
- precedent-setting if we surrender that. Unfortunately, it comes at a time when we don't have
- Council attorney to refer to so we have to get outside council. I'm hoping But I agree with the mayor
- that I want affordability For as many residents as possible, but that means temporarily right if we
- can maintain permanent affordability Then we're going to maximize the number of people that can live
- in an affordable dwelling and other communities have done it but we've waited for this for over two years and
- And so these arguments that council is the one that's holding it up and that we need to move on this
- I'm baffled by it The council is not responsible for that. The council has only had this for a couple
- of weeks. So I you know, maybe this is meant to as a means of some kind of coercion to Move quickly,
- but I think that we have waited for this and therefore it's important and therefore we should be careful
- because this is something
- And by the way, if we can't live up to the spirit of the UDO, then how can we possibly expect private
- developers to do it if we don't set the example? We own that property. We should be able to offer it,
- it seems to me. And so I'm interested in the arguments of these reasonable conditions, and I'm looking
- forward to hearing them, hopefully. Bye. Thank you. Thank you so much. Councilmember Piedmont-Smith.
- Yes, first of all, I want to go back to the common ground that I think all of us share. We want to use
- this city land to benefit the community to the greatest extent possible. This is a very unusual situation.
- The city owns the land. We don't have any bonds to pay back. We own it outright.
- Given that we just have some different opinions on what is the best community use that we can get here.
- I think we can get more permanently affordable units here. And I know that the mayor I've spoken with
- her said that the 15 percent is a minimum and that they would really like to get more 30 percent or
- so permanently affordable. And that's wonderful. And I hope that
- That succeeds but if it's not in the PewDie then there's no legal commitment Now this idea that this
- has been talked to death since 2017 is a bit Exaggerated the city didn't even own the property until
- 2018 The hospital was still there until the end of 2021 Demolition took a whole year. I mean, let's
- not exaggerate here
- And yes, I agree, we were involved early in the process since last fall, since Flintlock was hired and
- did a study and all this. But at that time, we had no reason to believe that our transportation plan
- would not be followed, that our permanent affordability requirements in the UDO for PUDs would not be
- met, and that our decades-long practice of adding reasonable conditions to PUD approvals
- would be considered illegal. So don't put this on us. With all due respect, we are asserting our prerogative
- and our legal right to try to make this project even better. So I'm opposed to voting on this tonight.
- I don't feel comfortable doing that because of the legal questions that have been raised.
- I would eventually like to vote on this, but I think we need more time. I mean, vote for this, but I
- think we need more time. Thank you. Council Member Rosenberger. Thank you. I want to touch on a couple
- of points that other council members have not yet, and I think it is mostly about reasonable condition
- four. I mean, I support postponing this right now.
- I would like to say a lot of council members tonight in their closing remarks have talked about needing
- more permanent affordability in this PUD and that the UDO does require either 15% plus an extra
- 10 permanently affordable or lowering the AMI 10% on that 15%. Many folks I think said they don't wanna
- deviate from that part of the UDO. I really appreciate the administration saying that
- they plan to make more affordable, permanently affordable in this PUD. But I would agree with council
- member Piedmont Smith that then we needed to be part of this PUD. And I think that this postponement
- for me is to figure out the legality of reasonable conditions. So I think in this week, we need to hire
- an attorney that works in local government and regulatory law to
- take a look at this for us. I also, though, think this gives us an opportunity to, I don't know, potentially
- work with the administration on reasonable condition number four. I think, you know, I was the scribe
- for that, but there were six council members who weighed in on it and edited and made changes
- and suggestions. So I think it's very real that we want a written
- commitment to more permanent affordability, and I think that would just go a long way. I emailed this
- reasonable condition individually to everyone in an email, and whoever responded to me, I responded
- back, and that is, just so you know, that's how it got done, individual conversations with my colleagues.
- Thank you. Thank you. Any other comments? I'll just make one brief one here that
- Thank you all for for your work in patience and and you all know sort of the the place from which You
- know my sort of starting point in all of this is that I am fully convinced that That we are all trying
- to do what's best for the city in our at least as we are persuaded I'm a little concerned that that we're not
- I think that some of our conversations today have not been tied to the appropriate antithesis. Namely,
- I think that if the question on the table was whether we pass certain reasonable conditions, whether
- the petitioner would withdraw, I don't know if that changes, for example, how we would judge each of
- these petitions. So what I'm saying is we're having a conversation
- right now about whether or not we can pass reasonable conditions. But had the conversation been simply
- that, hey, if you do reasonable condition four, we're stopping it, would we have all said,
- Well, stop it then or would we have had a different, you know more productive conversation? And so I'm
- just a little concerned that and the reason why I don't want to postpone is because I don't think yet
- in this in this motion to postpone that we've heard from the petitioner about You know what the implications
- of postponement may be I don't I don't think that
- that we've discussed things in the way that would allow us to weigh things equally, so I think that
- at the moment we're basically just having somewhat of a theoretical conversation about things that we
- value, and I think that that's really important. I do think that all of those values matter a lot, but
- I also think that
- you know, we're talking about a block within a larger unit as a sort of model for us to do other things.
- And so I don't know if we came up, I think, outside of Councilmember Flaherty's comment with a clear,
- you know, without this, I cannot support type of statement. And so I just,
- Wonder if we could not postpone so that we could have a little bit of that conversation also note that
- we haven't had public comment after making people sit until 10, which is also not our precedent the
- last thing that I'll say is you know, I do think that this this question of Of whether or not we can
- do reasonable conditions shows very clearly why we need our why we need our own lawyer but but also
- You know a again sort of like what we're attaching on to You know, there is this conversation about
- well There are certain things that whether or not they be reasonable whether or not be the appropriate
- conditions that they could be agreements But again, we didn't give space to have that conversation
- necessarily and I think that that's also a little bit a little bit concerning so I mean
- My first point, please. Let's not postpone but My my I guess my second give some evidence for maybe
- why we should but you know alas that that is My best best hopes at trying to convince us otherwise Okay
- with no more time for comments will the clerk please call the roll on the motion to postpone until April
- 1st Councilmember Piedmont Smith
- Yes. Zulek. No. Asari. No. Daly. No. Rallo. Yes. Yes. Rosenberger. Yes. Flaherty. Yes. Stasberg. Yes.
- All right. That motion carries six three. That'll be postponed until April 1st.
- Which is our next meeting next Wednesday All right moving on. Are there any motions? I Move that resolution
- 2026-05 be introduced and read by the clerk by title and synopsis only second There's a motion in a
- second Yeah, please call the roll Councilmember Zulek, yes, I'm sorry
- No. Daily? Yes. Rollo? Yes. Ruff? Yes. Rosenbacher? Oh, okay. Clarity? Yes. Stossberg? Yes. Piedmont-Smith?
- Yes. Thank you.
- Sorry, sorry that that motion carries. It was my I was supposed to know it's fine. I move that Yeah,
- sorry. I move that resolution 2026. Oh five be Moved adopted second Sorry, there's a motion and a second
- it's Yeah, go ahead councilmember because we're very sorry not to be adopted to be
- Sorry, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. This was my my fault. I was I was distracted but there was a motion in
- the second it passed 7-1 clerk Will you please read by title and synopsis? Okay Resolution 2026-05 a
- resolution to initiate a proposal to amend title 20 the unified development order ordinance of
- of the Bloomington Municipal Code in order to improve sustainability and housing affordability. The
- synopsis is as follows. This resolution, sponsored by Council Member Flaherty, directs the Planning
- Commission to prepare amendments to the Unified Development Ordinance regarding, one, a reduction of
- minimum lot widths, lot areas, and building setback requirements to better align with Bloomington's
- historic form and character, and, two, sustainability incentives and plan unit development requirements
- for building electrification, and
- Three, the elimination of minimum parking requirements to facilitate housing development and reduce
- housing costs. That is all. Thank you. Now I move that resolution 2026-05 be adopted. Second. All right,
- Council Member Flaherty had taken away. Thank you. I recognize it is 10-10. I wanted to, so we've introduced
- the resolution, which is great.
- And I guess I would be interested in what my colleagues think. Maybe their votes to introduce were a
- signal that they want to move forward. But I guess if folks felt otherwise and actually wanted to postpone
- on this to a future meeting, I'm supportive of that. So I didn't want to rush into it headlong. So actually,
- if it's not out of order by President Saree, does it make sense to actually ask folks that question?
- Or do you want me to just present? I can do that too.
- That's a perfect question. So colleagues, are you OK? If you wanted to make a motion, I suppose, then
- it could be a question. Does anybody want to make a motion so that we can discuss this question? I move
- to postpone, I don't remember the number, the ordinance, the resolution being discussed. 2026.05.
- 2026 05 I think we need to postpone to a date. Yes, and I Would move to postpone to April 1st resolution
- 2026 05 second Okay, there's a motion to second any discussion Please councilmember Stossberg. Why exactly
- would we postpone? I'm confused late We voted to move it forward to introduce. I'm well, I'm okay with
- just going forward of the presentation I don't feel like I need to postpone it on this right now. Thanks
- I'm also okay with postponement. I Don't think that we need to introduce resolution 20 2606 either I
- think that both of these were coming were intended to come after we vote on Hopewell So that would be
- my reasoning for postponing both of them but open to either pretty neutral I'm agnostic
- Council member Flaherty. I'd also be happy to present and you know, at any point we could choose to
- postpone to a second reading if we basically just like, feel like people need, like I've had at least
- one colleague tell me that their time was primarily taken up by preparation for the Hopewell PUD, the
- previous ordinance and would perhaps like more time on the resolution. I do think it stands alone while
- it made sense to come
- at the same time as and in conjunction with the Hopewell South PUD, in my opinion, for reasons I can
- share. It does stand alone and we could at least have the presentation, but that may be postponed. I
- think I'm anticipating we will ultimately need to postpone because I don't know if everybody will be
- ready for final action. Thank you so much, Councilmember Flaherty. We're just trying to fix the screens
- again, I'm sorry.
- Oh, I have my hand up. Okay. Yeah. Thank you. Because we couldn't, I actually could not see you. So
- thank you for saying that. Yeah, that's what I thought. I would say, I think I agree with council member
- Zulik. I think they, I anticipated them all getting discussed together. I also think is it possible
- to do a presentation and then postpone? Yes.
- Yeah, I mean, you'd have to withdraw the motion. Yeah, we'd have to withdraw the motion and then we
- can, yeah. Now we can see you. I would like to withdraw my motion. Okay, the motion's been withdrawn.
- Okay, unless there's other motions, Councilmember Flaherty, take it away. Okay, sounds good. Thank you.
- So there is a presentation for this, which maybe staff that are supporting the Zoom portion can share.
- It's also in the packet with
- Yeah, I'll get into that momentarily. So while I corrected the ordinance number on the title slide of
- the presentation, I did not correct it on subsequent slides, so forgive the typo. I guess high level,
- I just want, beyond the synopsis that the clerk read, I wanted to share the high level context before
- getting to the presentation itself. So first, just a logistical note, this is,
- 98% consistent with the resolution 2025-05 that I had developed previously. That was developed actually
- starting way back in 2023 with Director Robinson at the time, and then in conjunction with Director
- Hittle throughout 2024 in a series of meetings about all of the substantive things in this resolution.
- As you'll note, they are also mirrored, all of them, I believe, more or less, except for the sustainability
- piece, in the Hopewell PUD. And so that's why I thought it was a good time to talk about it, because
- maybe we were in a new place with respect to recognizing that these are important solutions to advance
- housing attainability, affordability, and availability in Bloomington. I think,
- There was a quote actually from Director Killian Hanson in the HOPE OPD materials that said, this model
- creates affordability through design, not only regulation, the goal is not to ration affordability,
- it's to produce it. And I think that's actually, it's really well put. I think with respect to this
- resolution, that's the goal. These are systems level changes that are relatively minor and incremental,
- and they are aimed at providing systems level solutions because they would apply throughout residential
- Bloomington. So with that,
- Just a summary at the high level. Next slide. Just to remind on process here, this resolution would
- initiate a 90-day process for the planning commission with planning and transportation staff support,
- no doubt, and maybe other staff support to recommend amendments to the UDO. So this resolution does
- not itself create policy change. It directs a process to propose policy changes that this council would
- ultimately consider and vote on based on the recommendation of the planning commission.
- So again, as was covered in the synopsis, this involves basically some shifts to minimum lot areas and
- lot widths, as well as potential changes to things that would be logical to change in conjunction with
- that. It would add building electrification requirements to the sustainable development incentives,
- as well as make clear that PUD proposals need to follow those and eliminate minimum parking requirements.
- Next slide. So as far as process, again,
- forget the 2025 references that really should say 2026. This is the statutory tool that we have by state
- code to direct policy changes. So when we think there should be a change to the UDO, this is the process
- we follow. Of course, there's also a process in which staff can initiate UDO changes. They also do that.
- We've done both regularly for a long time, including during this term of council. So that was just a
- few examples. As far as exactly what would happen,
- This resolution gives a general policy direction, but it's not the policy itself that does need to be
- developed. I would intend or hope to work with the administration, specifically planning and transportation
- staff, to ensure alignment as that is developed. And then again, it would go through the planning commission
- to the city council, but the planning commission and city council meetings or process would entail public
- engagement and comment.
- But we can certainly add additional public input on particular topics if we wanted to along the way.
- So getting into the meat of it, we can go to the next slide. So the first section is about minimum lot
- areas and lot widths and proposes to reduce them in R1, R2, R3, and R4 zoning districts broadly to match
- the historical development patterns we have.
- Uh, and so I'll get into a few actual examples of that looking at maps, but we have lots of, um, uh,
- non-compliant lots right now. And, uh, actually allowing us to develop consistent with this historical
- development patterns would open up a lot of development opportunities for small scale modest homes that
- are going to be better at achieving market rate affordability, uh, just like, uh, the models, uh, for
- the Hopewell South PUD are showing. So, um,
- Again, the rationale is to add some gentle density with all the benefits that come with it, greater
- affordability from modest home sizes, modest lot sizes, useless energy. When you have a smaller home,
- when we're looking at infill, people are closer to amenities, reducing transportation needs and possibly
- costs if they need fewer vehicles. So these are all good things, things that our goals support.
- And so again, we have lots of nonconforming lots, especially in R3 and R4, maybe a little less so in
- R2 and R1,
- there's only a handful of lots total. So good form-based zoning would not generally set these kinds
- of things. They might set maximum lot widths, but not have these like minimum lot sizes like we have.
- And while we don't have a form-based code, we have some form-based elements. And I think we could still
- add some of those to our current UDO and make meaningful progress. Again, section two, I'm kind of handling
- both here at the same time, section one and two.
- also invite consideration of potential changes that need to follow from minimum lot size and lot width.
- So if you're allowing now, say, a 2,500 square foot lot, the setbacks that we have for, say, R4 may
- not make sense anymore. And so those may be worth taking a look at. Same thing with the impervious surface
- coverage maximums, the lot frontage requirements. We may want to consider things like
- If you front on an improved alley, for instance, that is good enough because you could build an ADU
- there. Why not a small scale home? And also the subdivision standards themselves, which would relate
- to this. There are likely, again, lots of, definitely hundreds, probably thousands of legal preexisting
- nonconforming lots. And that doesn't make a ton of sense either. Why don't we have zoning code that
- actually reflects what we have?
- So next slide, please. This is just a look at the R3 zoning district dimensional standards by way of
- to illustrate by example. So 5,000 square foot minimum lot area and a 50 foot minimum lot width. Most
- of our older gridded neighborhoods are R3 zone. And you see the setbacks there as well, the build two
- lines and the various setbacks, including 25 feet rear setback, for instance, which
- would probably be a problem if we had smaller lots. So next slide, please. This is a screenshot of a
- small section of Prospect Hill, which is a neighborhood I've lived in. Actually, 509 there on Howe Street
- I lived in in 2013 and 14. And I still live nearby. So I'm very familiar with these streets. And if
- you look in particular, I'd like to direct your attention to between Howe and Smith,
- House Street and Smith Avenue, those couple of blocks. And so the next slide we zoom in, so that was
- kind of for context. Now we see just what we've got side by side. So you've got in the red lot sizes
- that range from six to 8,000 square feet. So those comply with the, you know, they're conforming with
- the 5,000 square foot minimum lot area and the 50 foot minimum lot width. Then if you look to the right
- across that alley, you've got four homes on House Street and Smith Avenue.
- that are nonconforming lots. They're in the range of 2,000 to 4,000 square feet. They're all single-family
- homes, and they're smaller, obviously, because of the smaller lot. And this is a little bit of a unique
- property because we've got one street backing up to another. That doesn't always happen.
- But it does happen some, and again, if we look at frontage options like Alley's, I think that that'll
- also expand options. So that's an example of some non-conforming lots. And then the third example there
- in the yellow is actually a home with an ADU. And so if we made a change that allowed, say, either there's
- no lot minimum or if there's a lot minimum that's more like 1,500 square feet or 2,000 square feet,
- what could happen is any of those owners at 600, 606, 612 in their big red circle,
- They could choose, if they wanted to, to subdivide their lot, sell it to somebody, develop it themselves,
- whatever they wanna do, have another small home on another small lot. And that's three new modestly
- priced market rate, relatively affordable homes in Bloomington that aren't allowed today. We see that
- from the blue circle, what's possible historically. And then the yellow example too, I think in that
- case, the ADU might've been added in a familial context,
- it illustrates again that we can build something there now that's an ADU, but we can't do it as a separate
- unit. And I think we've had, you know, some success with the ADUs, but it's been very slow and very
- incremental. And the reasons for that are many, you know, we have a restriction that might affect land
- alienability with ownership, but I think more to the point, it's probably financing. Like if that's
- going to cost you $150, $200,000 to build, you're going to really want that ADU. And if instead,
- you don't have to finance it because you're subdividing your lot and simply selling it to somebody.
- It's just a wildly different prospect. And so next slide, please. I have one other example, drawing
- on the South Dunn Street and unit development and looking at a few things here. And so again,
- this is a PUD. So it didn't follow the district dimensional standards in the UDO, but it's got its own.
- but it is surrounded by R3 zoning in South End of Bryant Park. And the lot areas kind of range from
- about 3,000 to 5,000 square feet, depending. And the lot widths are about 30 to 50 feet. Again, all
- of those are not allowed in the R3 zoning or the R4 zoning, I don't believe. And they have smaller setbacks.
- It works very well. If folks have not been down that street, I encourage you to check it out.
- It's maybe worked so well, it's a victim of its own success and it's not very affordable. Also the homes
- aren't necessarily the most modestly sized with the exception of some of the ones that are pre-existing.
- So the ones actually that front on Driscoll and Grimes in those circles on the right, you see 524, 505,
- 506, those are pre-existing homes that I believe that are on those corners.
- But that also has the upshot of making some of those lots even smaller. So 1201 and 1205 in the green
- circle are quite a bit smaller, for instance, and 1301 in the blue circle. And those ones, relative
- to their neighbors, are a little bit more affordable. So I still wouldn't call the South Sudan Street
- development very affordable anymore. But again, it illustrates just adding housing supply through
- gentle increases in density, infill that matches the historical development patterns of our neighborhoods.
- And that's really all I have to kind of about the rationale piece on lot width and minimums, sorry,
- lot widths and lot size minimums. Next section takes us to a, sorry, the next slide takes us to a different
- substantive section, which would be around building electrification. So I mentioned this when we talked
- about reasonable condition
- Sorry, next slide, please. When we talked about reasonable condition six in the previous ordinance,
- I talked about our climate action plan, actually EB4A2, and just how our community goals of decarbonization
- require widespread building electrification. That's the path we're on. It's the only consistent path
- with our climate goals.
- Blue states have recognized this and have plans to do so. We don't have the ability to mandate these
- kind of things, but we can use incentives just like we do with affordability and sustainability incentives
- currently to encourage it. It's price competitive on the development side, so we're not driving up costs
- on the front end. And we've seen large PUDs, like the Trinitas PUD, developed off of Arlington and the
- Summit PUD doing either entirely electric or close to it.
- And when you're using efficient equipment and pairing with building efficiency, which is part of the
- current sustainable development incentives, you also are ensuring that the operating costs, the utility
- bills are going to be affordable. So this would add a requirement that for options one or two in the
- sustainable development incentives, we would include building electrification as a requirement.
- And some benefits, I guess, in terms of indoor air quality and health outcomes. There's been a lot of
- increased attention in recent years about the health hazard of fossil fuel appliances inside the home
- as a major driver of childhood asthma, for instance, and other chemicals and pollutants in the home
- that can cause respiratory problems and other issues. And so again, I referenced those voluntary recent
- examples that demonstrate its viability.
- And the next slide is kind of related, which is about planned unit development district standards.
- Then again, the climate action plan specifically calls out that PUDs should require, that we should
- seek to require electrification through PUDs. And the proposed change is that we would update the PUD
- district standards to require alignment with the, sorry, there's a typo here. We could scratch affordable
- housing section on that, at the top of that slide in a prior draft of this,
- resolution there was a section on affordable housing incentives, but this is only sustainable development
- incentives and it would just make sure that PUD districts, PUDs have to comply with them. The current
- PUD qualifying standards on sustainability are quite vague and really not consistent with our climate
- action plan. So looking to improve that. And I think that's it on that slide.
- The next slide is the last kind of third bucket of substantive change here. And that would be to eliminate
- minimum parking requirements citywide. And so minimum parking mandates often prevent housing from being
- built. And so if you can't fit it on the lot, because you're looking at a small scale lot development,
- you might not be able to build it at all. They tend to exacerbate sprawl and can increase housing costs.
- Not a clarification. This does not propose changing maximum parking allowed. So this is more of a market
- structure than the people building the homes can decide what their target market is, whether they need
- parking or not, and whether or not there's available parking, for instance, on street. Or if they're
- like, we're eating next to a transit stop or in a walkable area that doesn't need it.
- And so we wouldn't affect what somebody is allowed to build. Everybody would be allowed to build what
- they're allowed to build now. We would just stop requiring people to build parking when they don't want
- to or when they can't in order to make the project work. So let's see. I just have a quote here from
- Incremental Development Alliance.
- which there was a training I saw in which the expert that was presenting and course instructor was just
- instructing folks, small scale developers, like we're trying to encourage here in Bloomington how to
- develop noting that parking requirements will kill your project faster than anything else. So just citing
- those folks as experts on this issue. It undermines choice. We have over 4,000 households in Bloomington
- do not have vehicles requiring that
- all, virtually all housing has a place for vehicles, adds cost for a lot of folks who don't need it.
- Also, 44% of Bloomington households are single-person households. A good local example of all this is
- the bicycle apartments. I don't know if they're actually called that anymore, but there are a couple
- of multifamily buildings on the southwest corner of 4th and Rodgers, right next to the IFL, across from
- the Centerpoint building. There's no parking on site.
- They've long been some of the more affordable market rental options in a walkable location in downtown
- Bloomington. They've been quite successful. And so it's a really good example of this. So again, this
- is broadly supported by urban planning, parking and economics, and urban sustainability policy experts.
- I do have some examples of lots of cities around the country that have been doing this.
- by no means be the first. And so here are a handful of them, including South Bend, I think is the only
- other Indiana city so far. Lots of college towns you can see in there, Charlottesville, Corvallis,
- Gainesville, Cambridge, you know, Burlington, I suppose, Ashland, Oregon and Bend are a little bit that
- way. So lots of peer cities. And
- you know, so this is not something new. And I guess I really wanted to be clear that this is not only
- widely accepted as good policy, but it's actually been adopted by a lot of places too. And give me closing
- thoughts in the next slide. Actually, one more thing on parking, which is the resolution
- includes also a call for if there are other text changes that need to happen or changes to programs,
- we should consider those. So I talked to a few colleagues about this, you know, previously, for instance,
- we have neighborhood parking zones in some sections of the city. Most of those neighborhood zones are
- actually like very underparked, like there's tons of vacant space and we wouldn't anticipate any impacts
- there. There are a couple of zones that are more fully parked and we might have to consider
- you know, the possibility of changes in those zones. Things we could look at are whether, you know,
- a modest increase in price makes sense, whether or not we should stop doing annual visitor passes and
- going towards more of a system of like, you can get 30 visitor day passes, you know, if you live in
- the district, as opposed to just giving out optionally two passes for very low cost. And so, you know,
- there's some things that we need to follow. And again, that's, as I emphasized at the beginning of my
- presentation, that's really what the,
- policy development stages about. This is just saying, look, directionally, this is something we want
- to look at. We'd like to consider a proposal and the details of the policy really has to be developed.
- So closing thoughts are really just that, you know, the broad goals here are to increase housing development
- at a modest, more affordable scale, reduce climate pollution, enhance resilience and improve the overall
- social, economic and environmental sustainability of our built environment.
- all consistent with the existing character of Bloomington. So this is consistent with the affordability
- changes proposed by the administration in its Hopewell South PUD, I guess proposed by the RDC actually
- in its Hopewell South PUD. And I'm sure you all recognize that. This was informed by direct extensive
- collaboration with city staff and multiple departments and across two administrations and also informed
- by our comprehensive and climate action plans.
- and input from the public policy advocates and policy experts. I've talked to lots of constituents about
- this and also really appreciated the several sessions we had last year, further discussing tools and
- options for affordability with members of the community. And so just finally reiterating, this resolution
- is a step. It's the statutorily required action to initiate policy proposals consistent with those plans.
- And it mirrors the process we've used recently for other UDO change proposals that the council was interested
- in moving forward.
- opportunities and requirements for additional outreach, engagement and collaboration remain. And we
- will make the final decision later. And I'll just say if you have a discomfort with some aspect of this,
- I will hold no grudges if you vote yes on the resolution and vote no on some aspect of a proposal that
- comes in the future. That's what it's for. And so that I think is my full presentation. I am happy to
- answer any questions or if we want to wrap up and
- Discussion for a future meeting. That's great, too. Thank you Thank you so much councilman Flaherty
- and particularly for putting so much effort and and time into that and the presentation Thank you so
- much questions motions Please councilman Rallo, yes, I found that very informative. Thank you. I'd like
- to move that resolution 20 2605 be postponed
- for consideration to until April 1st Okay, there's a motion in a second any discussion Yes, it comes
- with people I guess I don't see any reason why we can't Vote on it tonight. I don't think it would take
- very long. Thank you Councilmember Stasberg, I'm prepared to support this tonight. Thanks. I
- I've the reason I'm offering the motion is that I I honestly I support some aspects of this But I can't
- fully support all of it and my attention has been primarily on Hopewell So I'm afraid I won't support
- it, but I I find a lot of the aspects of it very positive. So That's Yeah, I could potentially
- Be supportive of it. I like a lot about it, but I like if like councilman Barallo said just haven't
- I really had a lot of time to To think about some aspects of it. So I I'd rather wait rather than have
- to vote. No just because I'm not Haven't had time to really get totally squared with it yet The councilor
- Flaherty Thank you, I would support postponing I appreciate that there's a lot we've been working on
- and dealing with and resolutions we we often consider
- You have less time because, well, we changed our rules around first reading for ordinances, but I recognize
- this went out five days ago in its current form. And I have no problem postponing and would like to
- give my, I would recommend we give the colleagues who would like more time that more that additional time.
- Thank you so much. I'll just make a point, especially if it seems that we're gonna postpone. There were
- a couple of questions raised by a resident, particularly noting that there's a change in Indiana code
- around timelines, so that passed in July, changing the timelines for, and so this has the old language
- of 90 days, so I think maybe considering amendment there, but then,
- This the city resident also said brought brought up the question and I'd love again. This is another
- example of why we need a lawyer Just any lawyer in the room, but would oh, I guess we have lawyers in
- the room, but virtually but the person also raised the question of whether when we make these type of
- Resolutions whether we should actually direct the exact amendments that we want to see or whether the
- sort of broad Direction, you know is the appropriate?
- So things for us to discuss should we postpone. And I've had a little bit of a conversation with Margie
- Rice about that. And she seems to share both of those opinions. But she, again, didn't have time to
- be here or present it in that way.
- So yeah, so so just just something if we do postpone something that we probably should engage in so
- well as I said that Margie walked in but hey Anyway, so if we don't if we postponed we might want to
- think about that. All right any other comments All right. So there's a motion in a second to postpone.
- Will the clerk please call the roll? Councilmember sorry Motion to postpone. Yes Daily yes
- Rollo. Yes. Yes. Rosenberger. Yes. Clarity. Yes. Stasberg as requested by the sponsor. Yes.
- Piedmont Smith. Yes. Zulek. Yes. That motion carries 9 0. That's postponed until April 1st. Any motions.
- Well I'd like to vote at 10 30.
- It's root because we need a roll call vote to introduce anyway Yeah to know that that just requires
- a two-thirds majority to introduce anything after 1030. Thank you Okay any motions All right, we'll
- now move to a time of additional public comment if there are no motions
- This is a time to comment on things that were not on the agenda. However, if anybody would move, I would
- very much appreciate it if you allowed folks to comment on things that they might have sat here all
- night to comment on and have not got a chance to do so. We do have a Zoom person with his hand raised.
- Tremendous. We'll get to them in a second. Are there any motions in the room? Councilmember Zulek. I
- move to suspend the rules and allow this time for general public comment to include anything that was
- on the agenda given that
- Public comment was not allowed second. There's a motion in a second Clerk, can you please call the roll
- on the on the motion to suspend the rules? Clarification first, can we say Can we have a friendly amendment
- on your motion? To include if it was not already offered for public comment because there was some reasonable
- conditions for example. Yeah, sure I will amend my
- Motion to exclude anything that was already offered public comment for a reasonable condition. Yes.
- Thank you. All right. And we'll look for please call. Call the roll a moment capturing the motion. Council
- member. That didn't work.
- Councilmember daily. Yes. Yes. This is a precedent setting. Yes. It's true. Rosenberger Councilmember
- Rosenberger we can't hear you.
- Okay, she knows I'm gonna move ahead and we'll come back to you if we can count. I mean, yes,
- I got it. Okay. Sorry Okay. Yes, I'm sorry. I'm very sorry Councilmember Flaherty Yes Stasberg Yes,
- and I think that we've had this motion recently. So I don't think that's not Smith Oh, yes Zulek Yes,
- I'm sorry. Yes
- Okay, that carries nine. Oh So it's now time of public comment. You can comment on anything Other than
- reasonable conditions. Is there anybody who would like to make public comment? The person on zoom That
- person has taken his hand down. That's unfortunate Are there any other public commenters? All right
- Seeing none
- Last chance online. All right, we'll move to matters of council schedule. We'll be meeting on April
- 1st, everyone. So there was a chance that we wouldn't, but we will be. Any other things, though? Meetings
- coming up? Yes? Fiscal committee meeting Friday morning at 830. Oof. Hiring committee is meeting on
- Thursday. Then we default to the Thursday meeting because we were going to meet on Wednesday, but alas.
- Next Thursday.
- Yes correct. Any other comments for council schedule. All right. With that count this meeting adjourned.