Springfield City Council — June 27, 2022

0:05 In a microphone down here so you can hear me. Uh I'm Steve Moe, president Springfield City Council and I will be handling the meeting tonight. And first thing I'm going to open the work session and ask staff to do the roll call. Mayor Van Gordon. Councilor Pitts. Here. Councilor Moe. Here. Councilor Roddy. Here. Councilor Steer. Here. Councilor Woodrow. And Councilor Pishioneri. Okay, first item. First item tonight is a proposed Eugene Water and Electric Board Willamette River Water Treatment Plant in Glenwood. Karen Kelly and staff members from EWEB are here for the staff report.

0:52 Yeah, good evening councilors. My name's Rod Price. I'm the assistant general manager at EWEB and I've got Karen Kelly with me here as the chief operations officer and over here is Wally McAuliff. He's our engineering supervisor. Uh thanks again for allowing us some time to speak with you about this project. Uh Commissioner John Brown would like to have been here and he gives his regards, but he came up with a positive COVID test and decided not to spread it around. So we thank him for that. Uh we're really here tonight to share some of our plans and get some support for our planned second water source to serve our customers in our connected community. The objectives really are four uh the council to learn about EWEB's second source project and to continue fostering

1:38 our long-term relationship with the city of Springfield. We're also looking for feedback on the siting of the treatment plant in the Glenwood area and to understand the council's interest in the overall project process. For the agenda, we have a pretty well scripted little slideshow here. Uh we want to stay on time and make sure we've got plenty of time for Q&A. So, I'm going to go over some basics. Karen's going to talk about the project in specific, and then we'll all be available to answer questions at the end. So, as you probably recognize, the map pictured here is the city of Springfield area featuring EWEB, SUB, and Rainbow Water facilities. Karen's going to talk a little bit more about our EWEB, SUB, and Rainbow

2:23 partnerships, but I wanted to let the council know before we started that besides Eugene, EWEB is also a wholesale water supplier to our other water districts and communities such as River Road, Santa Clara, Veneta, and Goshen. Also, like the city of Springfield, EWEB provides services that are critical to our community's health, safety, economy, and quality of life. We share common values around delivering services with fiscal responsibility, leveraging partnerships to accomplish our mission, and focusing on maintaining and improving our infrastructures. As you've probably hearing from current events, our Lane County community faces common water supply challenges. Earthquakes, floods, wildfire, climate change, aging infrastructure, increasing

3:08 water demand, algae blooms, just to name a few. If one of our community water services is interrupted, its customers continue to need clean, safe drinking water. You may note from the map that EWEB has only one treatment plant, which is sourced from the McKenzie and is located in the Hayden Bridge area. In fact, EWEB is the only water utility of its size to have a single source of drinking water. So, to meet EWEB's basic drinking water needs and increase our system resiliency, EWEB needs a backup treatment plant of about 19 million gallons a day, or mgd as as it's typically referred to. So, our resiliency plans include investing about 90 million dollars in a new treatment plant that will be sourced from the

3:53 Willamette River. We're currently planning uh and in the plant in the the Glenwood area and so that's to the lower left of the the map there. We're also leveraging our partnerships by investing in our interties with Rainbow and SUB water systems to bring the transfer capacity up between all systems from to about 10 to 20 mgd. As you can see on the map from the purple boxes, our EWEB, Rainbow, and SUB water systems are interconnected, but these connections currently have very limited capabilities. So, part of our strategic focus is also on improving our interconnection capabilities with our partners. These intertie investments are required on all sides including EWEB's planned invested 3

4:39 million dollars. For more on our utility partnerships and our proposed Glenwood treatment plant, I'm going to turn it over to Karen. Good evening, counselors. Karen Kelly, Chief Operations Officer for EWEB. Thank you again for having us. So, um utilities working together is not a new thing. I think we've been working together quite nicely all along. The picture on the right is from 1953 and it depicts EWEB working with Rainbow Water District on a project and the picture on the left shows SUB and Rainbow working together along with EWEB who's not pictured on our intertie minutes. And just a few more examples of how EWEB has worked with other utilities uh include mutual aid. So, in 2018, we did

5:26 send a water distribution trailer up to the city of Salem. If you recall, they had a harmful algae algal bloom um where they had a do not drink order up in the in the capital and we did assist there. Also, last summer we provided extra water to the city of Veneta so they could forego their chlorine supplies to those in need and we did work on ways to share our chlorine with others. Although um folks did not need it, we do generate our own chlorine, so we were EWEB not affected by that. We also participate and help lead different planning sessions around among the utilities. In fact, we have one tomorrow that includes Lane County where we're going to pretend that we've had a do not drink order at EWEB, which is always good and does involve others. We do share information and training. We

6:13 do work with EWEB and sorry, with SUB and Rainbow regularly. We meet as a group, talk about our capital planning and other things, talk about you know, shortages on on trained staff, work with the American Water Works Association. We also partner in the Oregon Water and Wastewater Response Network. So, a lot of information sharing there. I mentioned the infrastructure planning capital improvement plans, sharing information there. We recently worked with SUB on some property consolidation in Glenwood. And you'll hear a little bit about that tonight. And we worked with Willamette Lane as they worked on their bike path. We've allowed to um pass along our transmission lines. So, just a few examples for you.

7:03 So, on to the heart of the project. EWEB is proposing to build a state-of-the-art 16 million gallon water treatment plant on EWEB on property in Glenwood. Using the Willamette River just downstream of the Coast Fork and Middle Fork confluence. The plant will be designed to current seismic standards, meaning that it would be back online within 24 hours after an earthquake. The picture to the right is a rendering of the plant from the preliminary design from I-5 looking south. The proposed plant would provide regional benefits, not only by providing another source of supply to our interties, but also for the future in preserving water rights and the potential for a future collaboration on a possible regional supply. The plant would also provide local benefits and we see this as developing a difficult property with steep slopes

7:48 that has underlying basalt and no services currently. We see it as providing an increasing presence on the property, limiting unapproved property use, and providing secure, stable property ownership and maintenance. And we're also interested in providing a welcoming entrance to the south end of Glenwood. We want to be a good neighbor. I think we've proven our ability to be a good neighbor in the past and we'd like to work with the city to figure out how to make that area welcoming while keeping our presence as a water plant inconspicuous. So, you might be asking yourself why Glenwood? Why do we want to build here? First off, the proposed intake site is

8:33 providing water as far upstream that our current water rights allow and the further upstream you go, the better the quality of water. So, we're seeking to get as far upstream as possible. The proposed plant is located between the river and EWEB's distribution system and for us this means less transmission pipe and avoiding river and highway crossings. Numerous properties were considered as shown on the map on the left. Options were narrowed down based on the reasons above in 2015. The property was acquired following development issues meetings with the city of Springfield in which many city staff were involved. The site chosen is preferred to EWEB because it provides space. Space needed for less expensive treatment processes and space to allow maximum flexibility

9:18 for future plant expansion that could again possibly include a metro area regional supply. The map on the right shows our EWEB on property in green, tax lot 700, that is our preferred plant location. It also shows an alternate site owned by SUB in purple, which include tax lots 1,000 and 1,100. The alternate site is under consideration because it could consolidate utility presence in Glenwood. While technically possible, it has a number of drawbacks in that the space is more limited, requiring more complex treatment processes, which are also more expensive, and there are constraints in property access and constraints on possible future expansion opportunities.

10:03 This location would also result in truck traffic in a tighter area. So, next steps. We're currently working through uh steps one and three one through three right now. We want to understand the interests of stakeholders and partners, including the City of Springfield, SUB, Rainbow Water District, and others. We want to work with the City of Springfield to select the appropriate location for the treatment plant, and we're also currently working on the facilities to complete amendments to the public facilities plan, which will include the project and related facilities. The cities of Eugene and Springfield, as well as SUB and EWEB, are all involved in this plan update. After steps one and two are completed, we would like to schedule and hold

10:48 development issues meetings for the project, confirm the various land use actions and permits required, then move through the land use and permitting process to allow design and construction to proceed. Thank you, Karen. Uh this concludes our formal portion of the presentation. As Karen described, EWEB's currently in the permitting and land planning process, in which the City Council plays a part in. We are really here to garner the support for this project and the preferred location in Glenwood, but mainly we really want to understand how you would like to be involved in the process. So, with that, we're here to

11:34 answer questions. Um thanks for the presentation. Um so, I um I heard that um EWEB is currently running a 19 million gallon deficit right now. Is that correct? Did I Did I misunderstand that? I would say we're not running a deficit. This plant um that would be if we lose our primary supply on the McKenzie River, that would meet our minimum required supply. Okay. All right. Um so, what I what I what I also heard, and you know, I might be wrong about this, too. Um I heard that there was a plan for a water the water treatment plant would

12:20 process 16 million gallons. Is that a day? Yeah. Okay. That's a day, and it's kind of a staging. It's expandable. And so, what I what I'm sort of hearing is that is sort of the quid pro quo for the uh for the water treatment plant would be transferring some of the water rights to EWEB from from Springfield. Is that correct? No, those the water rights are EWEB's water rights on the They're already They're already EWEB's water rights. Um so, would there be any kind of um transfer? I I guess one of one of the questions that I wanted to uh just get clear in my mind. I know when the uh

13:06 when SUB wants to increase its supply, it typically um drills for new wells. Um had there been any thought given to that um to address a potential deficit for uh for Eugene? Yes, actually in early 2000s, um Um, we um EWEB went down. That was our our first one of our first alternatives for a secondary um, supply and we uh, started a well field in North Eugene, but during that testing, there were some interferences with the wells from with uh, Rainbow Water District and Springfield Utility Board. And so we shifted back to a surface water supply. Shifted back. Okay. Um,

13:54 so um, if you So you you shifted to a surface supply because it's um, I I I I didn't catch the reason. Was it uh, is it more practical? We we could not get an adequate um, ground water supply to meet our needs. Okay. All right. Um, let me see. I I guess my my main question is, so this um, this water treatment plant would only be treating water that EWEB already has rights to. Is that correct? That's That's correct. Okay. And so there's no uh, there there

14:42 there would be no transfer of water rights as a result of this uh, of this water treatment plant going through whatsoever. No. And furthermore, it's it's um, again, the the plan is not about growth or or cap- it's about redundancy. And so the our water rights are written so that anything we take out of the Willamette gets subtracted from our total that we can take out of the the the McKenzie. So it's kind of a a holistic view on our water rights. Okay. So why I mean, I guess another thing that I I just wanted to figure out is why um, why place it up as far upstream as you are. I know both of these sites are

15:27 going to be in the Glenwood area. I mean, could they be Could Could this treatment plant also be placed downstream? I mean, would that Would that be a possibility? It just um the the most cost-effective and efficient way to do it, you know, is basically we have a place to to bring water out of the river, which was kind of step based on the best of water quality. Uh-huh. Then we have the our systems over here and you know, somewhere along that line between this point and this point, we were looking Those are the proper locations we look for a plant. Anything outside of those lines would it's more piping or, you know, more river more highway crossings, river crossings and that. So

16:12 Would there be a need go downstream, but Okay. There weren't um properties available that um we could acquire at that time. Would there be a need as a result of this project to build any pipes in the uh Glenwood area? And would it possibly run into some properties that are already previously owned in in the area? Well, we have an existing pipeline through Glenwood. You know, EWEB used to serve Glenwood historically. We transferred it to some I'm not even sure what year, but we have a pipeline through Glenwood and eventually that pipeline will be upsized. And And you anticipate alignment. Yeah, you anticipate that pipeline will be sufficient to It'll be increased in size, but in the

16:58 same location. That's It's within city right-of-way. Okay. That's all I got right now. All yours, Counselor Mello. Thank you. Thank you and thank you for the presentation. Um I am don't know what I don't know. So as I'm listening to it and I'm thinking about it, it's like you already own the property. It definitely looks like, you know, it's a it's a closer proximity to the river in terms of that. Um my concerns or my questions or my whatevers are really around um traffic cuz you did mention that in terms of like trucks and things. I'm like, I don't know what kind of trucks it takes or what's happening. Um and it's already kind of a um a thoroughfare that's used

17:43 for trucks and things like that. But I'm just wondering about the increase in that. And I also don't know enough to know like what kind of chemicals are used and and is that going to affect folks who live around there? Are they going to Are there going to be things that have smells or things that possibly leak or things like that? Um so, those are uh just really a couple of things that I'm wondering about. Yeah, on the term traffic, it's a couple of semis a week that will be coming through. So, depends on your perspective whether that's a lot or a little. Um but we were concerned about that moving through the alternate site. Mhm. restricted in size than it were at our preferred site. And for the chemicals, they are you know, well, the spills would have to be contained, but as far

18:30 as the use of those chemicals at the treatment plant, they are properly contained. There won't be any smells. Um there won't be a concern like in the old days when you had chlorine gas. That was a a major concern for public safety. We will not have that. We'll be making our chlorine again like we do at our current plant. Okay. Great. Thank you. I also would add to that I think uh obviously during construction, there's uh quite a bit of truck traffic, but uh during normal operation, at the very most, it's two people. Damien, you have a question? Hi. Uh so, I have two fairly quick questions, I think. So, my first one is uh if this was to come to fruition at any point in the process or even after it's completed,

19:15 will there be increased opportunities for employment of Springfield residents or Glenwood residents? And two, what if while you're doing some construction, you come across some type of indigenous relics? What would be the protocol and what would need to happen? You know, as far as the employment of um obviously you know, frankly the the biggest employment um effect would be during construction of the facilities itself. Um as far as once it's in operation and long-term, um there'll be a few a few staff and hired um licensed operators and those could

20:01 come from anywhere. As far as um relics on site, uh we've already done a few kind of heritage surveys of the site. We would follow all um state permitting requirements related to those as far as how it affects construction um similar to wetlands delineations and things like that. So. There is a historical site up there that I've been trying to find the history on for a long time. It's pre-1940. Is that the little brick Yep. building at the at the top? It's not just the building, it's what's around it. If you ever notice and I've looked at that, looked at that, tried to figure it out and and I'm still help I hope you help me figure it out. And uh uh

20:46 I grew up in Glenwood. I used to wander these hills a lot. So, I know them pretty well. The uh chemical noise on generation building, that's interesting. I did not realize that we did that or you did that. Yeah, we have well, this plant the um would be very well state of the art. So, it'll have it ozone, which we don't use disinfectant. Um, we use chlorine. We generate our own chlorine and Anyway, you bought this property I don't know how long ago and uh in the I pulled out the Glenwood original Glenwood refinement plan and we had it designated as parks and open spaces cuz it's very hard to put anything in there, develop a

21:31 streets or anything. So, um you're coming along with something like this to make use out out of it might be a might be a good idea in the long run. Uh other questions? Oh, I didn't really have a question, but is there anything else that you need from I mean we we were sort of just kind of throwing out our questions and stuff. So, I'm wondering if there's anything specific other than just us all sharing what we're thinking about and what our concerns are and I I do have one question. Um, you know, the the questions that I'm seeing that we're that we're being asked to answer, it seems like

22:17 what what if we were to say this project was not acceptable to the city. I think EWEB would still retain the rights to build this thing, right? You wouldn't? Well, we um we want a partnership with the the city of Springfield cuz you know, um there's very um we'll be complying with all the land use requirements and development requirements and to build at this site, there are some amendments to the Glenwood refinement plan and the Springfield development code primarily to allow I think they're they allow a two and a half million gallon per day treatment plant, but we're larger than that. You're you're asking for 16. Yeah.

23:03 So, there's those code amendments are are required, so. You know, I I I apologize for not being better prepared tonight. I I would kind of like before I before I sign off on it, I just like to check into what exactly the amendments to the Glenwood refinement plan are um before I sign off on it, but I mean, if that's if that's acceptable to council. And when I looked at the original refinement plan, so I was looking amendments I was looking what we had originally thought it might be in the in the future and our parks and open spaces and now this is possible use. And then I think also without my mention subs uh the tax lot over there, that's going to be a transformer station.

23:49 Okay. Yes, so so I hope I think you guys are getting along. It'll be You have been set together. They are the you know, when we um we have been before the city council well I don't think rather care much. I was I was here. And um and in 2016 and and we kind of laid out the um all the requirements, what what was was needed at that time as far as the amendments. So should be on record. Remember 2016. I I have a question for our city manager. Um do was the were the proposed changes to the

24:35 Glenwood refinement plan in the packet? I I looked for them. I didn't No, they were not. I I can get we can get those to council. That'd be great. Thank you. I think you want to know that we might consider before they might do that. Anyway, it's it's in the community's in best interest for something like this and uh nice for Springfield to be a part of it. And it's very important as I'm a Glenwooder. I really want to see something happen up there that would be an asset to the community and help it. You've been talking about that. That's pretty important. And uh I see the proximity to pulling water out of the river there. So close. We've got

25:20 the railroad tracks. Well, I think you're going to do it another way, but the old Highway 99 to there. Railroad uh And uh as far as truck I'm sorry, getting away from the microphone. As far as truck traffic is concerned, I would imagine the interchange off I-5 would be most used for that. And uh may not be a whole lot of traffic through Glenwood, that's my guess. Yeah, I I doubt anything would come much through Glenwood at all. Um You said approximately two a day, right? Yeah. Couple of week. A couple of week. Couple of week. There'd be more like uh Yeah. normal-size car traffic, you know, just for people working there, but

26:05 employees just I employees see about two big trucks a minute come through there. So Yeah, it's travel that way. Any other questions at this time? I know All right now. We'll have a lot more as time goes on here, but this is an interest- very interesting proposal. And uh Well, thank you very much. We appreciate the time and uh Amy, do you have any more? I sort of miss you. There you are. You put your hand up if you have another question, that'd be fine. Okay. Yeah. That's it. Thank you. All right. Thank you. Thank you. The next item. The next item is city pro tem judges evaluation. Jaime Hurtado and Nathan

26:50 Bell are here for the Staff Report. Sorry Nathan, I cut out so I might Can you hear me okay? Yes Shane, you're ready to go. Okay, perfect. Thank you. The change as I went from audience to presenter cut out part of what you were saying. So So good evening Council, my name is Shane Hurts. I'm the HR Director at the City of Springfield. Just as a additional information, I'm currently in Austin, Texas and we're experiencing a very entertaining or unique weather pattern right now. So there is a possibility

27:35 that I could lose power and if so Nate Nate Beller will help me with the rest should I be able to unable to continue. So we are here today to seek guidance or acceptance of a proposed change to the Municipal Court Judge performance evaluations that we have done historically. Just as a short background, the Presiding Judge as well as the Pro Tem Judges report directly to Council similar to the City Manager and the and the City Attorney. The evaluation process that we've utilized for the Judges is a fairly new process. I think we've done three evaluations at least in my tenure here at the City. And during the last go around during the 2021 evaluations which typically began or

28:21 kick off in the summer months and include in the fall we received the feedback both from the Municipal Judge, the Presiding Judge as well as the Pro Tem Judges some concerns regarding the way the process was rolled out and the way it was presented and there was an ask for us to go back and look and review the manner in which that we do the evaluations. So the or myself, the HR Department as well as Nathan Beller and the finance and judiciary committee met on a couple of occasions to review possible changes to the process. Um some of the background details to the evaluation and some of the concerns that were brought to our attention um I've probably broken down into three pieces, which is one it's new and it's was needing to be looked at and refined.

29:08 Uh two there wasn't really what I would call a formal evaluation. It was essentially a 360 survey sent out to both attorneys, court staff, police officers, or anybody that was really connected with the with the court process. Uh and what it was missing um was one just kind of a review and a filter of the information that was being presented to make sure that it was accurately capturing uh what I would call repeat or re- repeated events uh versus just individual opinions. Uh and three there and probably one of the most important parts of it is it didn't include an actual uh completed evaluation that council completed and did. Uh rather council was just presented with information and then had a short session with the judges on a on

29:53 a regular basis. Um so what we did is we went back and we took a look at the process and um recognized a couple of opportunities uh to make sure that we had a had a good and efficient process. And so one of them and I'm going to start with the presiding judge process. Uh so the within the presiding judge uh and within your AIS was a packet that was titled or attachment that was titled uh judge evaluation template uh which included uh an instructional sheets, uh the actual presiding or draft presiding judge performance evaluation, uh a self-evaluation template, and a and a 360 evaluation. So with the presiding judge, what we're wanting to do is to adopt a process that is very similar to the process that is currently used for both the city manager and the city attorney. Uh which is uh creates a

30:40 vehicle or pathway for council to um get real and actual information that will be helpful for them to complete an evaluation for an employee that reports directly to them. Recognizing that the presiding judge of the that out of the pro tem judges don't have as much regular interactions with the mayor council as does the city manager when compared to the city manager or the city attorney. So, what we've outlined is the front page of that attachment includes ways and mechanisms for council to get their hands on information or to be able to engage with the judge. In this case, we're talking about the presiding judge. In addition to that, we would still continue the 360 feedback

31:26 with a modified form, which is part of the attachment, and include a self-evaluation template. What we would do is we do the process as we've historically done it, which is to collect that information during the summer months, and then in the fall when council returns from summer break, send a completed packet, which is a would be a summarized 360 feedback, the self-evaluation from the presiding judge, and then send you the template for the evaluation with the additional ways that you can collect additional information, which would be going and visiting the court and observing proceedings, to talk with the court supervisor, or to contact and have direct conversations with the presiding judge, and then provide council enough time to complete the following packet

32:11 on the presiding judge, and then that information would be submitted to human resources, where it would be summarized and then finalized in a regular session the way we've done it in prior years. So, I just presented a lot of information really fast. So, I'm going to pause for a second to see if you have any questions regarding the presiding judge, and then I'll switch to the pro tem judge. Hi Shame, it's Leonard. Um, I when it when it comes to the presiding judge, I feel kind of like counselor Roddy. I don't know what I don't know. Um, I I would very much value a field trip um that would include all of the council just to watch the presiding judge in action. I mean, it you

32:57 it's not that I would mind interviewing the judge in in in person, but I I I don't think there's anything there's any substitute for watching a judicial temperament like watching them in action. And if it would be possible, I mean, I would I would gladly take the day off just to watch watch the judge. Uh, you know, I I think it in in order to do our due diligence on this, we would actually have to see a session. I mean, I I I think that there would be a you know, there would be a value in talking to them uh talking to the judge is um in person, but I I would much prefer to see Springfield court in session at some

33:42 point. Have you met the judge yet? I I have not. Went in there one day just asked a question. Next thing I knew I was back in his chambers. I haven't seen him in action, but but I I promised I wouldn't I have not. Well, you're still a free man, so that's that's a good thing. Corey. Um, I First of all, yes, I'd have gone and visited him and and watched court in session. It was fairly early in the pandemic, so it was very interesting to see how we were making a judge adjustments with that. Um, so this I might be jumping the gun a little bit because I just have a little comment on the um the performance evaluation, so I can hold on that when we get to that, but I also just wanted to take a minute

34:28 to say I do remember the process last year and know that those issues came up, and so I appreciate that we're taking it seriously and trying to look at it and figure out how to make this sort of a less traumatic and more useful process. So, I just appreciate that. Damian. Yeah, I mean to be honest, I mean, yeah, it'd be cool to watch him in action, but I mean, I don't really have that flexibility a lot of times that that some other people might have just kind of where I'm at in my career. And so, uh I don't know if that would ever be an option for me and and to be honest, I I'm not sure I'm willing to take off of work to do something like that. Just I don't really have that that flexibility to do so. You know, I mean,

35:13 I guess depending on depending on time, but I do agree that that is the only way to do an evaluation. Uh though it might be tough for some of us because everything else is going to be based off of second hand information and I think that's kind of unfair. Uh and so, I I don't know like talk to other people to do an official evaluation. I mean, that can be a part of it, but I I just think that we need to kind of think about the the availability of council whoever to actually go and two, those other three, those will never be good enough uh

35:58 litmus tests to see how well the judge is doing. Uh yeah, I just want to respond to Counselor Stare. In terms of organizing the entire council, that could be a little challenging. However, five days a week at 10:00 a.m. and 1:00 p.m., you have the opportunity to attend court. And what's more is we now have a virtual component. So, you don't have to necessarily attend physically, you can do it from um the convenience of your home or office uh virtually. And I can get you more information to help facilitate that. That would be That would be much appreciated. Yeah, if you could send me a virtual link, I'll gladly uh gladly take advantage.

36:48 So, now and and Counselor Farah um as well as Counselor Pets. So, the the front page of that attachment, the intent of that was really to provide different vehicles or mechanisms that council could elect or choose to do in order to get additional information if they wanted information in addition to what would be provided in both the 360 and the self-evaluation. Uh but one of the factors I could add um maybe potentially um talking to with regards to the court supervisors maybe a contact for them to be able to contact the court supervisor to uh coordinate or confirm when either the presiding judge or a particular pro tem judge would be in session or in hearing. Um just so they have additional resources to help them complete the evaluation. And then Counselor Roddy, I didn't have a a formal spot to talk about the

37:34 specific content of the evaluation, but I could either do that now if you would prefer or wait till the very end after I talk about the pro tem judges. Um well, I'll just jump in now if that's okay with you. Yeah, that's fine with me. Um I just wanted to and I appreciate it cuz I read through all the things that you're you know, to be considered in that, but on number 19, um there's sort of this overall evaluation and in there you use the word professionalism. Um and I imagine that within every industry and every sort of job, people have this sort of assumed understanding of what professionalism, but it's also I think as you know, it's become a really challenging word in terms of, you know, what are we are upholding and you know, sort of tied into these kind of

38:20 perpetuations of white supremacy and and this this code that some people get and some people don't. So, I don't know if there's a way to sort of get at what it is you're asking about that that's clear because I you know, right below it is like compassion and caring and things like that. So, that's that really just the word professionalism. I'm like, how do you unpack that to make that um sort of fit where you're going with this. Yes, and I I appreciate that feedback and we'll take a look at that question before we formalize the document um to change the wording to be a little bit more specific to what we're trying to tackle here. I think the intent of that was really um more about the way the person is managing the court proceedings. Uh and so um we'll play with that and come up with something that's a little bit more

39:06 precise. Thank you. Now, our purpose is just to make comments on the template. Yeah, so my the purpose is currently the purpose is comment for for the template. The the bigger picture that I'm asking is kind of the general acceptance of a pretty sizable change to the current process for completing the evaluations and whether council is receptive to the suggested changes that we're looking at. I'm a yes. I'm yeah. Yeah, yes here. Okay. I'm good. Okay, so Damian, Damian, how do you feel? How do you think? Um I mean I think it's fine. I just

39:51 I'm glad that there are multiple ways and now that I know that it's virtual, I think that will be a lot more feasible for me, but it should never be you know, recommended that we actually visit the site cuz that's just not always feasible especially nowadays. And so, yeah, I mean, if the virtual element exists, then I mean, that is makes it a lot more possible. So, yeah, I'm okay with it. Anything else you'd like from us? Yes, I have a part two of that counselor so so yes and and just so many about the counselor pits. Yeah, the intense is just to provide as many source options that would give the counselor comfort in the evaluation that they're completing. With that in mind though, we also recognize one of the struggles that exist with the pro tem judges is really

40:37 the infrequent and irregular work schedules that they do. And even though these particular individuals report and are employees of council one of the suggested or what the suggested change that we have in this process is really to delegate the drafting of the evaluation which would be the basically the traditional evaluation template. But really the drafting of that evaluation to hand that off from council and give that to the presiding judge and then allow the presiding judge to finalize the draft of that evaluation for council to review. The process would still allow council the opportunity to meet with the pro tem judges but it would take off what is currently three evaluations for them three pro tems that we have. It

41:22 would take that responsibility off of your hands and just delegating it to the presiding judge. Ciani I I would I mean since this is online I'm I'm guessing it's a zoom link that that we're going to be looking at. Since that's available I'd like to take a look at the pro tems as well. I mean I don't I don't see any reason to just put stuff stuff all of this off onto the presiding judge. I mean ultimately the presiding judge should be given some should be given some input on this for sure. But if it's if it's all right I mean I think this would be more more in the lines of just making sure that all of

42:09 the all of the pro tems are maintaining some sort of minimal standards of decorum, which I'm sure they are. Sure, and then the primary reason that we were suggesting the change wasn't specifically to reduce the workload off of council, although we recognize that that's that is considerable, but the the primary driver for that was the feedback that we were currently getting because of the reporting to council and because of it becoming a public information wasn't being well received and wasn't being There wasn't a filtered mechanism for that information to be looked at um to determine what as I said earlier that there was some repeated events versus a one-time events. And so what we were

42:54 trying to do was create a process that the presiding judge could review the feedback and provide their own summary, but if that's not what council's wanting, we can continue with the same process that they're currently currently proposing for the for the presiding judge. If if the rest of council is comfortable with confining our evaluation to the presiding judge, then I'm okay with it. Correct. I think I think I'm hearing that we still get to see it, right? We're still getting to get to see it for the the pro tems. We're just not going to be asked to do an evaluation like we're going to be asked to do for the presiding judge. Is that right, Chain? That's correct. I'm hearing that right. Okay. Um cuz I at first was like thinking back to last year and thinking I appreciated at least getting to have that once a year sort of

43:40 touch point conversation with those judges. Um so I still appreciate that. Um and if I'm remembering correctly, that happened in executive session, too. So it wasn't like a a public thing, right? So it it's we we schedule it to happen in an executive session, but the judges have the right if they wanted it to be in a regular session, they have the right to request that. That just historically has not happened. Okay. Does that make sense, Leonard? What are you saying? Yeah. Okay. Ansty. Uh thank you, counselor. I would just uh like to suggest as far as um as you're considering the evaluation form, I noticed under the communication section um that it specifically identified the

44:27 police department and the city attorney's office. Um I'd like to make a suggestion that you just uh make it a little bit more generic and just say city departments because there are more than more departments than that that that that this uh department interfaces with. Thank you. Everybody, how do they feel about that? Well, and so the suggestion is to sort of place this evaluation under the umbrella of the evaluations that we're doing just in in general of the of the city attorney and uh of everybody else under the city. No, I No, I was recommending that um just It was just a a a more of a housekeeping issue for the

45:14 form. Um the municipal court um works with primarily with the police department and the city attorney's office, but it also works with the finance department, also works with the city manager's office. So, if you just right now the uh evaluation form uh rates communication specifically with only the police department and city attorney's office. And I think maybe that could have some unintended consequences. He wants to open it up possibly. I got I get that. I think you know, and and generally in my my rationale behind that is because I'm really trying to work, you know, foster teamwork within the city with all of our departments and you know, reduce silos as much as possible. So, um you know, we I want to make sure that we're all communicating well with with other

46:01 um at all times. Sure. Corey, Damian? I I don't have a problem with that. Anything else you need? No, I appreciate uh that you're here tonight. All right. Um then uh we're going to go ahead next year. Uh I will adjourn the meeting and advise everybody that the next meeting will be an executive session starting at 6:30 on a new Zoom link.