Regular Meeting - 6/4/2024 6:30:00 PM

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good evening welcome to the June 4th
2024 Gilbert Town council meeting I will
call this meeting to order and we will
start with an invocation by vice mayor
Anderson thank
you our Father in heaven we are so
grateful for the opportunity to be
gathered together this evening we're
thankful as
members of this council members of the
public who are here to participate in
discussing the matters of importance to
this great town we pray that thy spirit
will be here that we will feel inspired
in the things that we say and do and
that we will be comforting to one
another we will be understanding
and be mindful of the means to find a
way to build this community and continue
to be uh
an excellent place for our families and
for uh those who visit
to feel of our strength we pray that
that will help us to always be mindful
of thee and the help that we receive
from thee and we pray
for uh those who are seeking thee at all
times that they may
be touched by thy Spirit again we thank
thee for this time time together we pray
for the inspiration that will we needed
to make these decisions and to work with
one another and we say this in the name
of Jesus Christ amen amen vice mayor it
looks like you're also um leading the
Pledge of Allegiance yes you'll stand
and join me in the
pledge I pledge allegiance to the flag
of the United States of America and to
the Republic for which it stands one
nation under God indivisible with li
Justice for
All town clerk sh um sheli Herrera could
you please call the role mayor Bridget
Peterson here vice mayor Scott Anderson
here council member Chuck Bon Giovani
here council member Bobby Buckley here
council member young
Kowski here council member Kathy tilki
here and council member Jim torguson a
quorum is present thank you chalii
moving on we have no presentations and
proclamations for this evening which is
really unusual we'll move right into our
public hearing we have five items on our
public hearing agenda this evening are
there any items that the council would
like to have pulled off of the public
hearing agenda I'll open the public
hearing seeing none I would accept I
will close the public hearing and ask
for a motion to accept items 1 through
five
mayor I'll make a motion to accept items
1 through
five I have a motion by council member
tilki seconded by council member Buckley
please
vote motion passes
70 moving on to
our next ption of our agenda so I need
to recess our regular meeting and
convene in a special meeting we have
three items that will be discussing
number six is elections consider
adoption of resolution number
4477 item seven is the budget and and
ordinance number 20 2904 with the tax
lby for FY 2025 and item eight is the
budget starting with item six does
anybody request or require a
presentation on that or would someone
like to make a
motion mayor um could we have just a
very quick presentation so that the
public would understand what this
election's for thank you sure thank
you see Kelly F approaching the podium
good evening
Kelly good evening mayor and Council
I'll just give a brief uh presentation
on this I know we had another public
hearing uh a couple weeks ago on this
topic
perfect so this is on uh related to the
state imp poost expenditure limit which
are rules from the 1970s and 80s in the
Arizona Constitution there are two
questions that will likely be on the
ballot uh depending on the vote that
Council does tonight one of them is a
permanent base adjustment and one of
them is a capital projects accumulation
fund voters will decide on both
questions they can approve both it is
not an either or
option um with the state imposed
expenditure limit the state has rules
that put a limit on the amount that the
town can spend each year it is not
related to the amount of revenues that
we have it is based off of what our
budget was in fiscal year 1980 and then
it increases every year based on
inflation and population it does not
change for changes in service if the
town puts in a water plant instead of
Wells adds libraries adds Parks any of
that is not calculated into the
expenditure limitation calculation that
the state has so uh Gilbert's
expenditure limitation uh is calculated
and then we have to report back every
year what that is as you're aware
Gilbert has changed substantially since
1998 which is when voters last approved
a change a permanent base adjustment to
the state expenditure limitation um
we've added fire stations Wastewater
Water Treatment Plant Public Safety
buildings uh environmental compliance
pools libraries lots of things have
changed since
1998 with the permanent basement
adjustment that's being requested it
would change that base calculation
number up by $1.5 million uh and then
you can see on the graph here how that
would be compared to now if if the
fiscal 24 limitation uh had the change
that's requested in place Gilbert would
still be at the bottom we would have a
per capita expenditure limit of about
$3,200
citizen right above Glendale but still
bottom of the list compared to all of
the other communities in the valley so
this change is not a dramatic change
compared to what other cities are doing
around the
valley it is also not a tax increase it
will make no difference in the revenues
that Gilbert has uh or those are
different decisions that the council
would have to make this is a simply a
limit on expenditures
themselves the second question on the
ballot and this is what the public
hearing tonight uh was about uh is a
capital projects accumulation fund it
allows for expenditures on capital
projects to not count against the
expenditure limit uh if you cash fund
projects if the Town cash funds projects
that cash counts against the expenditure
limit uh a way around that is that
projects can be financed through Bond
funding and then the bond Finance
projects don't count against the
expenditure limit but then you have to
pay interest and financing costs
associated with the bonds so
it's less effective with taxpayer
dollars but it is an option if the town
goes over the state imposed expenditure
limit there are heavy penalties uh the
state can withhold our state shared
income tax revenues and divide them out
to all of the other cities and towns not
including Gilbert uh with the amount of
money that the town gets from our state
shared revenues it could be a penalty up
to about $60 million per year so a very
large amount that we would like to avoid
some quick myth MythBusters to make sure
that we are very clear these questions
are not tax increases they will not
change Gilbert's revenues at all Gilbert
will still be required to maintain a
balanced budget and we cannot spend
money that we don't have we can only
spend money that we do have these
questions also have nothing to do with
the federal debt ceiling um in case
you've heard any of those rumors
completely separate
issues timeline uh Council approved the
permanent base adjustment to go to the
voters on the May 7th meeting there are
the two public hearings required for
this item uh May 21st and then today and
now vote Council needs to take a vote on
whether to have this item go to the
ballot for voters to be able to decide
on at the November 5th
election we would like voters to be as
educated as possible on these odd rules
from the 70s um so there is information
on our website
gilbertaz.gov ballot guide for voters to
get more information we will continue to
do public Outreach um with that
educational material and it will be a
very long ballot coming up and so we do
encourage everybody to make sure to look
towards the end of the ballot to find
these two important questions for
Gilbert and fill them in as they feel
best with that are there any
questions I love the graphic I'm sorry I
was laughing at that because we have
been told that it's going to be a 30 or4
Page Long ballot for the general
election in November so we're not making
fun we're just trying to be a be
realistic about it any comments or
questions for
Kelly seeing none thank you Kelly we
appreciate
it would anyone like to make a
motion make sure you turn on your there
you go thank you um I would like to make
the motion on item six elections to
consider adoption of resolution number
47 4477 proposing a capital project
accumulation fund exemption to the
expenditure limitation prescribed by
article nine thank you article 9 section
20 of the Constitution of Arizona be
submitted to the voters of the town of
Gilbert at the general election on
November 5th 2024 I'll second that I
have a motion by council member Buckley
seconded by council member Giovani
please
vote and the motion passes 70 moving on
to item seven budget discussion on
ordinance number 2904 this is the
setting of the secondary property tax
levy for FY 2025 at 33 million excuse me
33 billion no million million 275
million doar period
any comments or questions I know I had
to look at the decimals on the any would
anyone like to hear from Kelly a short
presentation from Kelly Kelly can you
please make a short presentation on the
tax
levy very good for informational
purposes thank you mayor council would
it be all right if I did a presentation
on budget and tax
together I think that would be great
perfect thank you
all right this is the night we do our
final budget
adoption uh Gilbert continues to be a
best-in-class city with lots of
accolades uh across all of the different
sectors that we work with um and we
continue to do our zerob base uh
budgeting where we look at a third of
the town every year make sure that we
dial in those numbers to what they need
to provide those services with inflation
the last couple of years we've actually
had to add money to the budgets um
because it's been a very tough couple of
years our budget process is long it
takes about a year to go through we kick
it off in September we have lots of
input from the Departments Financial
Retreat Town manager reviews the budget
and then we have study sessions with
Council preliminary budget adoption was
in May and then today is our final
budget adoption in
June there are 46 just over 46
recommended positions in the recommended
budget that's before you and your
packets earlier have had details on
business case for each of those
positions the largest part of our budget
is the capital Improvement projects it
is about $ 1.6 billion worth of all of
the spending that we do is that
investment in capital projects the
largest areas are our street
improvements and our water system
improvements we've bonded in both of
those areas uh to help with the projects
that are needed
there if we look at carry forward versus
new about $1.2 billion of the budget or
carry forward project so projects we've
already started and are working on and
will continue to work on because these
are large projects they take more than
one year to complete and then about
$500,000 of additional projects are
added for new projects this year we have
Incorporated the changes that were
requested by council at the preliminary
budget adoption um which is the South
Gilbert rec center was moved out to
fiscal 29 and then the Gilbert pool was
reduced to a $30 million um budget and
was included in years 6 through 10 you
won't see any changes in the final
budget number because both of these
projects are out into the future years
for planning purposes so the number
Remains the Same um for the fiscal 25
budget fiscal 24 versus 25 there's about
$300 million worth of difference there
the majority of that is on that bottom
line the capital projects which is about
$225 million of that
difference for property tax that's
needed uh the levy is 300 or 33 ,
275,000 uh and that does maintain the 98
Cent rate that we have had for this will
be the second year uh and that will
provide the money that's needed for The
Debt Service payments the county was
involved with a class action law suit
and has to make refunds on behalf of the
Town related to that lawsuit about $1.5
million so our fund balance will
actually go down in this Fund in order
to make all of the payments that are
needed for next year the refunds were a
bit higher than we had initially in
anticipated um but this tax rate will
allow us to make all of the things that
we need um plus the fund
balance the Milestones that we have um
May 7th was our study session and the
levy for property tax then we had our
preliminary budget and CIP review on May
21st this is the final step in the
adoption process which is final budget
adoption final CIP adoption and the
final tax levy adoption any questions
thank you Kelly any questions or
comments
this is item seven and item eight that
we're discussing this
evening seeing none would anyone like to
make a motion on item number
seven I'd like a to make a motion on
item number seven budget to consider
hearing and consider adoption of
ordinance number
2904 setting the secondary property tax
levy for fiscal year 2025 at 33,2
75,000 can I have a second second I have
a motion by council member Buckley
seconded by council member Koski please
vote motion passes 70 item eight
budget any comments questions concerns
that you'd like to
discuss on the the
budget I'd like to make a motion to
accept budget item 8 with a resolution
as presented on the dis and I will read
the
resolution whereas ARS
9-2320 one provides the Town Council by
ordinance or resolution prescrib a s to
be paid to the mayor and council members
of the town of for performance of
elected off official duties and whereas
the town whereas the Gilbert Municipal
Code section 1-39 provides that the
compensation for elected officers of the
Town shall be fixed by resolution of the
Town Council provided said compensation
may not be increased or decreased
accepting conformance with the
provisions of the Arizona Constitution
Article 4 part 2 Section 17 and whereas
the Town Council approved resolution
3963 on April 5th 2018 setting the
compensation for the mayor of 43,000 631
per year and council members at
$2,122 per year which amounts have not
changed since they were approved in 2018
and whereas the Town Council believes it
to be in the best interest of the
community to maintain Market
competitiveness to attract qualified
individuals for elected positions within
Gilbert and whereas the Town Council
desires the just compensation of the
mayor and council members as provided
herein in conformance with the Arizona
constitutional Article 4 part 2 Section
17 and where is to continue to ensure
Market competitiveness and the
attraction of of qualified individuals
for elected positions within Gilbert a
modification to the compensation
received by the mayor and council
members is warranted that takes both
into account changes in the market and
meets the requirements of the Arizona
Constitution State law and town C now
there therefore be it resolved by the
common Council the town of Gilbert
section one effective beginning the
first town employee pay period occurring
after the date of the first town council
meeting in January
2025 the annual salary of the office of
Mayor will be adjusted to
6927 554 per year and the annual salary
of the office of council members shall
be adjusted to
and in any odd-numbered year in which a
council member will commence a new term
of office section three beginning in 20
the year 2028 and every four years
thereafter the annual salary of the
office of Mayor shall be adjusted to 1.3
times the salary of the lowest paid
full-time Sal employee at the Town
effective at the beginning of the First
full Town employee pay period occurring
after the date of the first town council
meeting in January in any odd numbered
year in which the mayor will commence a
new term of office four all resolutions
and endorse and ordinances and parts of
resolutions and ordinances in conflict
with provisions of this resolution are
hereby repealed section five if any
section subsection sentence Clause
phrase or portion of this resolution is
for any reason held to be invalid or
unconstitutional by the decision of any
Court of competent jurisdiction such
decision shall not affect the validity
of the remaining portions
thereof mayor yes I think
you need a second before we can discuss
I just want to ensure that we have a
chance to discuss this before we go
right to the vote yeah we need an
opportunity to discuss this so was
somebody planning on making a
second I'll second
that um so whenever you're ready mayor
I'm ready to have a conversation please
thank
you first um for the public I just want
you to know this is the first time I've
seen this sitting in front of me today
uh and the first I've heard of these
numbers and so um I'm a little bit at a
loss uh by this um so I I think i' like
to have a conversation especially as
it's tied to the entire budget um so a
couple of my comments first and foremost
is that this
um I want to start by saying that this
Council this seven members sitting here
today are the most active Council that
I've seen in the 30 years that I've been
coming to these meetings as far
as attending so many meetings during the
week and into the night to learn
everything there is to learn and I think
um you can see the progress of that by
some of the votes that we've been able
to make on even the tax levy this year
that they they're very committed so I
don't ever want to take away from the
amount of time that's put into this
position
um it it can be a full-time job there's
no doubt it's up to each of us how much
time we want to put into it and I have U
no doubt put a full-time effort into
this
um saying that though this
position is paid um School boards aren't
paid they a lot of other different
positions in our community that aren't
paid so um it this is not a
position that this is a career this is
not your salary that's going to make
sure that you can make a living and um
so I'm a little uncomfortable kind of
moving in that direction but
um I was involved in this community for
over 30 years actively involved in my
role as the chamber and I made the
decision knowing that myself that I am
going to put full-time into and no
matter what I do even on a volunteer
basis that's what I will do and I knew I
couldn't do that and hold hold a
fulltime job I knew it I couldn't put
what I needed to do that so I waited
until I retired for that very reason so
that I knew that I had time some people
on this Council I know have fulltime
jobs or they own their own business and
it is a detriment to them I understand
all of that but I think that we all
understood that going in so that
shouldn't have been a surprise the
salary
um I know that any time this has come up
in the past anybody up on this Das has
been almost crucified for having a
conversation about raising our taxes how
dare us so the fact that it's coming
forward is is a surprise to me um and
it's not that I don't believe we should
look at compensation and we should be
looking at this long term um but it's
not why we're here
and I think the timing of this is very
unfortunate
because this Council has had to make
horribly hard
decisions that impact our everyday
citizens when it comes to the rate that
we're having to charge um because we
have to cover our cost and I think it is
a very bad look for us to ask our
residents to dig in their
pockets to help us pay for basic
Services that's what we're asking them
to pay for it's the basic services that
we provide while we give ourselves the
raise so I'm having a little problem
putting my arms around this because this
is the first time I've seen it so here's
here's the open transparent
conversations that everybody wants us to
have and it's right here I
believe
that if we feel this is
important um CU I'm a no but I will tell
you I am trying to to find is there a
compromise in this in any way years ago
the C
IL um remove the ability for the council
to receive what is called CPI or its
inflation index every year and that I
could agree to coming back that there
should be an increase as it c as cost a
living I don't have a problem with that
and we could do that right
away if no matter which way you Dice it
no matter which side of the argument you
are on
tonight there's questions about are we
voting in a raise for ourselves and we
are I'm not going to be here so it
doesn't bother me one way or the other I
mean from a financial standpoint it's
not going to impact me one way or the
other however if we are truly
wanting to make this not about us
individually then I would consider
consider that
we change this ordinance or this
resolution so that it would
say
increases would go not the CPI CPI could
go in right away that the increases to
the salary that are recommended would go
into effect in January
2027 which is after the not this
election the next election there won't
be anybody up here most likely that
would benefit from that could be but
chances aren't nobody on this dis would
benefit from that increase if we're
really looking at that argument about
voting ourselves aace so um I'm not
comfortable I'd rather not even vote on
this today if you're making me vote on
it this is where I am um and I I'll
probably have more to say after I hear
from others thank you you thank you
council member tilky um for me it's it's
really a philosophical difference are we
here to provide a service to our
community which is what I feel that I am
here to do it it's not about the salary
it's never been about the salary when I
started in this community as a volunteer
on the Planning Commission I served 14
years as a volunteer
attending typically two meetings a month
from 2000 to 20 0 6 completely unpaid as
a volunteer and those meetings were 5 at
6:00 at night till midnight 1:00 in the
morning that was a volunteer when I
decided to run for Council like council
member tilky mentioned I knew where I
was in life my daughter had graduated
high school it wasn't about the pay I
knew what the work was going to be and
it was never about what the pay was
going to be ever
and we've had council members that have
sat here on this dis with me that have
said you shouldn't get paid anything and
I disagree with that but I do feel that
it needs to be kept in check and in this
community it is about serving the
community in the way that you choose to
serve and it's the first thing that I
typically talk to people about is you
give to the position what you choose to
give to the position and what you have
available to give to the position
[Music]
um I I wish shocked when I saw this
resolution ended to the end added to the
end of our budget packet at 5:30 last
night if I have to vote no on our budget
this year because of this
resolution that's going to really just
break my heart I I don't think it's fair
to the public the way that this was
added to our packet it wasn't done as an
addendum it was just added as two
additional pages to our packet like I
said at 5:30 last night as a resolution
it should have been put on separately we
should have had time to put this out as
notice to the community so that we can
be completely transparent and give
people the opportunity to come in and
speak about whether or not they think
the mayor and councel should be getting
raises um we removed the automatic
increase back in 2018 and we lowered the
council pay back to what it had been
previously and left the mayor's pay
where it was because it was agreed that
and I was a council member at the time
it was agreed that the mayor's job
really is a full-time job and I will
tell you I work probably 40 to 60 hours
a week in this position and I'm very
lucky that I have a very good husband at
home that we go without so that I can do
this position I drive a 10-year-old car
we live in a very modest home I do not
splurge on things and I still choose not
to take the insurance under the town
because I don't want to cost the town
more I don't want to cost the taxpayers
more I pay a lot of my own travel
because I choose to do that because I
see this as a service from my heart and
soul to this community and not as a job
this should never be viewed to anybody
as a job that you're looking at it as an
hourly wage and like council member
tilki said I won't be here in January so
whatever happens and goes into effect
isn't going to affect me but it will
affect the majority of the people
sitting up here we have literally just
increased water fees and garbage fees
for our residents where we increasing
our system development fees for our
development Community this is not the
appropriate time to be having this
conversation in my opinion and in this
budget we've included an increase in
travel for mayor and councel the other
thing because I just saw these numbers
just now as the council member read them
to
us this doesn't consider the
compensation that we receive as mayor
and councel there's other things that
are added on to actual pay and salary
there is retirement that the town is
responsible to pay there are Insurance
fees that the town is responsible to pay
on top of that we get a car allowance
for 300 or 600 miles a month on top of
that so even though my salary is
$43,000 I'm getting an extra $4,800 a
year for the car allowance there's
retirement that the town has to pay on
my behalf like I said I choose not to
take the health benefit so I actually
pay have to pay my husband's company a
fine of $100 a month because I choose
not to take them but the benefits
package total for the mayor is like
$80,000 a year we need to take the full
compensation and benefits package into
consideration before we have the
conversation about what the salary is it
needs to be the whole picture and not
just the
$2,122 and the
43,000 I don't even know what I make $
43,6 31 and if I have to vote no on the
budget tonight I will for the first time
ever because this re resolution was put
in with 24 hours notice and we weren't
given an opportunity to discuss and look
at all of the other options and
compensation along with it this is a
much bigger discussion than two pages
added to the end of our budget in my
opinion and it is not transparent to our
community that for the past two and a
half years we've been hearing
transparency is the number one thing
that everybody wants to hear and I'm not
seeing that here council member
Koski thank you for your comment um I am
open to having this discussion but I I
don't like how
this was brought about sitting down here
at the desk having a resolution that had
blank spaces which were just filled in
when council member tus read those
numbers it's very um it doesn't give us
enough time to look at options or
consider other items so Council Tuson
could you explain how those numbers came
about that you presented today tonight
most certainly because I had been there
was a consensus to try and understand
what councils across the valley had been
making and someone had convinced someone
on staff there wasn't a consensus i' had
been pushing for numbers for months
after one of our last uh Retreats most
certainly council member Anderson
council member Bon Giovani distinctly
remember asking for this we never got it
so what I had done is I had uh finally
gotten with someone on staff we found
what the uh the most
comparable uh
communities uh the the three above us
and three below us and took averages and
then we also looked at the lowest paid
full-time staff member who has those
same benefits that that we do and we
looked at it those numbers were very
similar but in thinking about it it
would be better since Phoenix and goody
year and all these these places are
looking at increases this year and some
of them are asking for very substantial
ones rather than leave it to every two
years to adjust which we do for salaries
all the time by benchmarking to tie it
to the lowest paid employee in the town
right rather than make it a true career
position you make you tie it to the
lowest but it it it allows the pool of
possible candidates to open up too many
candidates when they realize the time to
put in to do it right is not 10 hours a
week it's not as several of you have
said that you watched in the past people
not even read their packets that some of
them would read it on the dis they put
so little time in and we need to make
sure we have people that that will
dedicate time that don't have uh either
wealth their own business or uh a spouse
willing to help uh we need those people
to be able to run and not be so elitist
in the way we're handling it this will
certainly work most most against me of
everyone here since I will be the one to
take the bullet I am asking to do
something that in that widens the pool
of people if I ran they would be running
against me I'm actually inviting
competition by doing this I'm opening
this up so the average person in Gilbert
can consider doing this without
completely harming their home you have a
median salary of $104,000 a year it's
not like we're trying to be career
people and say give us 104 a year but to
tie us to the lowest seems much more
prudent than tying tying us to people
such as in Tucson they tried to get
$144,000 a year for counsil that was in
insane there's no service in that that's
that's that's a career uh but to open
the pool where people and we've all
heard it I can't afford to do it and
Kathy to what you said well you waited
till you were retired you're retired or
you're rich or someone's paying your way
that's not fair mayor you said if it
wasn't for a gracious husband who's
obviously he's a smart Breadwinner he
does very well you couldn't afford a
one-bedroom apartment in this town
that isn't the message we need to be
sending to candidates it's not the
message for anyone to hear and when we
look at this and if we look at it in a
year as what the Benchmark is The
Benchmark is going to be much higher
than it is today to tie it to the lowest
paid employee is absolutely the most
prudent way to do this I will be the
most crucified of all of us over this
there's no chance I won't be crucified
for this there's plenty of service I
don't want to get into the dollars I
lose I it's not my point I did agree to
a salary I looked at it and of course as
we said in Retreats no one told you the
time to do it right and the people that
were sitting there that wanted to knock
this down and do it for free as you said
were people that weren't even reading
the packets or they had were in support
they had businesses supporting them
doing the work during the day the first
half of their day one of them told me
free lunch they did all their counsel
work and then they actually worked their
job from 1 to 5 that isn't what we
should we relying on we need people an
electrician that can take off uh do 20
hours at night and take off 20 in the
day and not go bankrupt doing it and
that's quite the the numbers we look at
this from you know we're in our our our
50s or 60s and we're thinking wow these
are huge numbers they're not our lowest
paid staff member is is that number that
5 3,288 88 a month that's our low lowest
paid staff member these aren't
tremendously large numbers they're large
numbers in context when you're thinking
I work for $2.5 an hour in 1979 because
I
did we're looking at these things
through the wrong lens we're need to
look through this is how do we get more
people to run better people to run more
engaged people to run more diverse
people to run and it is the only way can
we can do it and we not we need not to
be high enough to be an incentive to run
but it can't be so low that is a
disincentive to run and we heard too
many candidates and people we've talked
to that interested in running they look
at the actual
responsibilities it's not worth it to
them Council M Tuson thanks for your
comments
um I think you have some good points but
I'm not comfortable making a vote on
this exact piece of paper at this moment
or having this full
discussion you have tied it in with the
budget the budget can't be raised at
this point so this would have to come
out of contingency funds I would propose
that we table
the full discussion and conversation
about the resolution to a meeting later
this year and have a vote no later than
November um on a final resolution after
we've had time to digest look at data
pull
information and look at a couple of
different
options um as council member tilky
suggested more of a CPI
versus as you propose tying it to the
lowest paid full-time employee I believe
the mayor in in this position will
always work full-time it is a lot of
hours that that
position um has to spend I don't agree
that a council member they can work
full-time but there are some that
haven't and don't I believe this entire
Council Works their butt off and spends
a lot of time on all of our issues so
I'm not talking about anyone on this Das
but there's a risk that in the future
there could be someone put in elected to
office that wouldn't spend as much time
and that would be wasteful as well
so I I want to have more information and
a more robust conversation but not at
tonight's meeting um are you comfortable
with tabling this to a future meeting
knowing that we can still use
contingency funds in the budget if we
approve it tonight no because it's been
tanked and worked around so many times
and there's been so much misinformation
passed through that I want to proceed
with it now today is the day I want to
do this Chuck you look like you want to
say
something vice mayor is before me if he
wants to speak first no I was just going
to tell the mayor that I do have a
communic from citizen on this item I
don't know if you want to hear from them
if they're here this is um special
meeting I'm assuming it works like
public meeting that we can take comments
I didn't get that card so I didn't know
that it's on this topic yeah it's on
this topic yeah we would like to um
invite the public Down May mayor
Peterson um just real quick it sounds
like the card was filled out incorrectly
but we do have a pending motion just as
a reminder there's a pending motion
before the council I think the council
need needs to do something with that
pending motion and then you can resume
that conversation but the problem with
doing something with the pending motion
is it's a budget because somebody jumped
in and made a motion on the budget
including these two pages that some of
us just don't want to move forward
and so I struggle with what to do with
that I I don't agree that we should have
had this resolution at the end of the
budget discussion and I I think this has
put us in a really difficult position
and not voting on it tonight is not
going to change anything nothing can go
into effect until at least January of
2025 it's still going to have to use
contingency funds no matter what because
you can't increase tonight's budget
because we already had the preliminary
budget vote so not voting on these two
pages tonight will not change anything
until January at the
soonest and so I agree with council
member Kowski
I move to amend the motion to remove the
resolution from item
8 with the motion being to approve the
budget as it stands
alone and I would need a
second I'll second I have a motion by
council member kosi seconded by Council
memberi to move and approve item number
eight budget removing the resolution
please
vote I need toor you you can cancel
can't you can you cancel um is it too
late for me to have my opinion on this
or yeah he didn't even get to speak he
didn't get to speak because well because
we have a speaker and we wanted to move
forward with the budget vote and not the
resolution can you clear that before can
you
clear thank
you can we clarify what we're voting on
then I just did I'm sorry I just did
that would be just on the budget
approving the budget removing the
resolution from the budget vote would
just be the budget itself as presented
so would we have a discussion on the
resolution at all we can discuss that
and we have somebody that would like to
speak on it too so that's why we were
pulling it out separately this
is okay mayor if I can can jump in so
there was the pending motion was
approval of the budget with the
resolution council member Kowski moved
to amend there was a second so what the
council's voting on is to amend the
original motion to take out the
resolution so the only motion that would
be pending if this one were to pass
would be approval of the budget so you
vote here if this passes then you would
have to vote again to vote on the
amended motion which would be approval
of the budget
without the resolution V again to have
discussion on it I think the mayor you
can still have that discussion on the
resolution because this item is still
out there we have to so we have to do
two correct the first one on the
amendment that council member Kowski
just made which is to remove the
resolution from the motion of the budget
and then you would vote again on the
amended original motion or the original
motion as amended by this this amended
thank you I hate a
amendments so this motion would be to
remove the resolution from the original
motion that was to vote for the budget
so we're just voting on removing the
resolution from the
motion please vote that was a motion in
a second
already that's a 52 vote passes to
remove the resolution from the motion
that was originally stated so we have a
motion on the floor to pass the budget
would anyone like to comment just on the
budget motion that was made I forgot who
made the motion on the
budget oh the original motion was
council member torguson right which his
his motion is with the resolution but
that's gone now that's gone now so now
it's just on the motion correct you
would be voting right now on the amended
motion which was just which is just the
P passing of the budget just the passing
of the
budget I think we're just voting because
we already have a motion in a second we
just need to vote you need to vote again
that's correct please can you clear the
again voting on the amended motion which
is passage of the budget
only which is a motion to approve the
budget please
vote the budget passes
61 now we can go back to a discussion on
the two-page resolution which again I
don't know how we discussed when it
wasn't actually on our agenda for the
public but um council member I mean vice
mayor Anderson would you like to invite
the person down that asked to speak on
this item
certainly Rod
Suave the
name don't see him here he did write
something on the back of this and asked
it to be read if they had to leave so
I'll read it very
quickly he says not sure why it has
taken one and a half years to advance
this discussion our elected members are
grossly underpaid and I believe it
impacts the diversity of members having
only retired or millionaires is not the
true University of our
town or
reti yes council member tki mayor um I
think as many of us mention in
councilman B javanni I know you want to
say something um I would um I I I think
this this is worthy of having a
conversation that wasn't the concern I
had I think it was just not having an
opportunity to look at this um and look
at the different options um I I would
like to give a date certain for us to
have that conversation it would help if
we could do it in a study session first
so we can work it all out so we're not
doing it up here on the dis in the
future but um I'm open to a suggestion
on the date thank you thank you council
member
banavani thank you um
you know I I I look at this and yes it
is a honor to
serve but who can
serve I mean let's take a look at the
current Council we have the rich the
retired and I represent the
beautiful I met seven years
ago um I couldn't afford to be on this
Council seven years ago probably would
have done
a good job seven years ago but I
couldn't afford to
run and that shouldn't stop someone from
wanting to run for
office
um if I decide not to run in two
years I want to be replaced by a school
teacher I want to be replaced by a
single
mom I don't want someone not to be able
to run because they can't afford to get
a babysitter
the only thing that
guarantees us from being up
here is having the pay so low that no
one else can afford the average citizen
couldn't afford to be here in the last
year and a half I met some incredible
citizens and many of them are sitting in
this room right now and it would be an
honor to sit with them on this Council
but they can't
run it cost me
$35,000 to run for this seat
if I run again maybe it'll cost me
$45,000 to run for this
seat and I don't want to shut out
people just because they they can't
afford to
run um this isn't about
us a pay raise is not going to affect my
life at all but it's about the guy who
sits here or the girl sits in my seat
when I leave so we can have a better
representative
of of the community what's our age 34
years something like that um there's a
young guy running for Chandler I love it
I think that's great that he's really
young and he's running for Chandler hats
off to him and gosh I hope he wins but
we can't do that here we can't do it
here because if you're a brand new
person now I know I ran as a complete
nobody but I had the finances to run a
complete nobody can't really do that
right now because they can't get funded
by developers or anyone else to help
them in their
campaign we're missing out on a lot of
good potential candidates when we ran
for our four seats here we had 10 people
running against all 10 people in total
running 10 who won those of us who own
businesses won those who didn't who
those who didn't win they were working
for other people they couldn't afford to
take a job we had we had a was the
two-day Financial Retreat and by the way
in that Financial Retreat we did talk
about this so we cannot say that this
was thrown at the last second it was
talked about four of us said we want to
have discussions on it and somehow it
got
buried mayor I'm speaking right now
please the asking for more cost for us
for
training some of us want to be better
some of us want to go to these
conferences not to sit and drink but to
learn from other Council people to learn
from other Mayors to learn from other
state representatives we want to be
better at our jobs I'm sorry if other
councils didn't want to do that I'm
sorry if other councils didn't want to
open up their packet they sat down here
that's not my
problem I'm committed to this just like
everyone up here is and I'm proud of
everyone up here for the time that we
commit for this job because it's a job
it's an honor to serve but the honor
shouldn't just be for the
elite I'm able to come up here now
because I sold my company to private
Equity I could afford to be a nobody
throw money in and and tell people how I
felt about things to win this
seat but I can tell you that four out of
five people sitting here right now that
do an incredible job can't do that they
can't there's no way they can do that
it's not fair it's not to me it's it's
not
democracy you know and if you want to
keep the elite up here then keep us at
$21,000 because no one else can can sit
up here I'm pretty passionate about this
because this wasn't transparent I mean
this was transparent it just got bar
buried it got buried somehow the story
went to we had we didn't have four of us
saying that we wanted to talk about this
four of us wanted to talk about
this and we couldn't bring it up until
this last second
here
um it's an honor to be up here and you
know the amount of pay is he going to
keep me up here or not keep me up here
it's not me it's not about me
and I don't believe it's about anyone
sitting up here but it's about those who
follow us because we have a
responsibility for the people who follow
us and we have a responsibility for the
people in this town to have the best
candidates up here and that means paying
the position so they can afford to take
days off they can afford to miss
vacations they can afford to hire a
babysitter to come to a meeting because
folks I'm telling you there's a lot of
meetings
and if I didn't own a very well-off
company I couldn't be sitting up here
cuz I couldn't afford to come to those
meetings now you can get by and not go
to those
meetings you can do it I've seen it done
before you wouldn't be a really good
council member but you can get by and I
don't think that this town deserves us
to just to get by I think this town
deserves us to all do our very best and
I guess Forest pump that's I'm going to
say about
that I don't know who is
next C vice mayor Anderson thank you
mayor um I I'm one of the the signatures
on that uh piece of paper you all
received and I still do feel strongly in
the resolution I'm patient enough to
know that we need to may need to discuss
it some more but I want that to happen
sooner rather than later
um I agree with council member banani
that this has been around for a
while and I'm willing to discuss the the
things that council member tilki or
council member Kowski have talked about
I think that's important that we air
that out and we talk about it but again
I'll reiterate sooner rather than later
I'm willing to be patient with
that um I agree with um what's been
mentioned by the council members that
right now the pool of candidates
for Council are either the independently
wealthy um the independent business
owners
and I'm affectionately referred to in
the social media as the cryp keeper so I
guess cryp keepers are part of the group
too the those who are
retired that's who serves for the most
part on the council we need
to get to the point where there are
others who will as council member bani
said that they're willing to put their
names in for
consideration as are has always been the
the purpose of Representative de
democracy is to have everybody
represented and um I want to
see um that we and Gilbert uh are making
that available to those who want to do
this uh so I am willing that's why I
voted and we can't work without a budget
we have to have a budget so we need to
have that budget but th this needs to be
discussed sooner rather than later and
I'd say whatever we want to date certain
make it
soon thank
you council member torguson were you
next or did you leave your mic on uh I
don't know if I was next I'm I don't
have to be next it's go ahead the last
two Mayors left this position
for better paying positions John Lewis
and Jen
Daniels several Council and people left
years ago to run or one was appointed to
assessor took the job and as he admitted
to me yes overpay another one became the
justice of the peace left early because
he saw an opening for the pay uh and of
course you left to be uh to be
mayor uh to watch
to realize that you see people that you
think would be great that just can't do
that and as we sit up here the youngest
of us being young the rest of us in our
mid- late 50s on
up uh businessmen retired people uh this
isn't uh it's not a
crosssection of this
town when you compare it and you
Benchmark it to any other community it
is woefully inadequate it's
disrespectful and I think that that's
picked up by a lot of people they look
at some people look at you like you're
an idiot to serve Why would you put up
with that uh I want people that want to
be that idiot I want people that go okay
it's enough for me to give up my a
little bit of my freedom my time my
money I I maybe I'm not whole but I'm
not cut in half uh certainly nobody's
going to make uh Elon Musk hole if he
provides 30 40 or 50 hours a week but
when we're talking you couldn't get uh
the average server couldn't afford to
take the time off to do this and when
you know if you were to approach the
mayor as a full-time position without a
spouse supporting you you couldn't live
in
Gilbert that's not an appropriate number
and it doesn't speak well of the office
and it does need to be handled
uh I'm sorry it had to come to a point
where uh I interjected this as
forcefully as I did but I didn't
appreciate how things kept getting
turned when four people and there was a
consensus to discuss this and then they
were someone in staff was dissuaded from
that and the things behind the scenes
and the lack of discussion and we've
talked about this before and it's not
gone anywhere we have to talk about it
now
and it needs to be handled the we have
four people running for uh Council seats
I don't know if there are there's two of
them that your absolute favorites and
you're happy to I would like to have
seen 10 but I know that the people that
could do it I'm concerned about one of
them not having the time because they
don't own their business I know a couple
of them are
retired uh so I don't know how we're
progressing and making sure that we're
representing the people the town is
having proper representation when we
continue to kick this can down and I for
one was willing to take the bullet
because I am going to be seen as the bad
guy and I'm more than willing to take
that bullet but sooner or later it has
to be dealt with not everyone can afford
to serve but nobody's talking about
career money here nobody up here's
looking to make this a career and serve
on Council for 30 years uh
and some in the past certainly they
served a long time some people 14 16
years they had a retirement program for
them State retirement program that's not
something that we have anymore thank God
uh but we have to address this and I we
can't talk about it individually because
we've I've talked to Chuck I've talked
to Scott now I can't talk to anybody
else so to say we're kicking it down the
curb to talk about it
where where is that going to make a
difference that's my where does that
make a difference we're in public as
transparent as possible we've called
everything out where can we be more
transparent behind the scenes and
breaking open meeting law is that what
we're going to do
now I'm sorry are you finished for now
council member
tilki thank you mayor um I'd like to
wrap this conversation up with
um direction to bring this um topic back
in a study session format uh the last
meeting in August can I interrupt you
for one second point of order council
member Council I know I don't you can
see her mic from I'm sorry I was just
going to interrupt council member
council member tilky and let her know
that council member Buckley would like
to speak and she hasn't said anything
yet so oh did you call me I thought you
called me I did call you I'm sorry but I
didn't know you were going to move right
into a recommendation I thought you were
going to comment and so I wanted to give
council member Buckley the opportunity
to speak all right thank you counc
member Bley okay I I haven't I did not
see the resolution or anything but I I
agree with Scott um in that you know I
don't know I'm I'm kind of at a loss for
words on this on this whole thing but I
I do agree with Jim I agree with Chuck
and uh I also I'm in agreement with
Scott and young that perhaps this should
be done at a different time and place
and and do we do that as a study session
again and is that going to be necessary
again to go through all this is my
thought
there we we did have a study session on
this topic all of the items that were
around mayor and Council for costs and
everything at one study session and I
think council member tilki had
recommended bringing it back to or
council member K I can't remember one of
them said bring it back to a study
session
because we've been handed numbers
tonight or read numbers tonight that we
had no idea about and I think a couple
of us have mentioned compensation so
what's does that look like together and
do we want to sit here at the dis and do
that probably not it's better to do it
at a study session so that we can come
to a consensus for a full filled out
resolution to come to us to vote for on
this di during a regular meeting right
well I I have another is Rob here is is
is he here that he could give a
presentation where where these numbers
came from and but do we want to get into
that much detail tonight if we're going
to just move this forward because I
think we're we've discussed it to the
point where some of us are to the point
of just moving it forward I don't I
don't think it I did not appreciate the
process that it went through and I would
like to move this forward to a future
date so that we can bring it back and
I'm fine I've always been fine with
having the conversation I've been
waiting for the conversation I had
slides with the clerk's office last
meeting thinking we were going to have
this conversation but it never came up
and so I'm fine with having the
conversation it doesn't have to be
tonight if it's going to come out of
contingency any to AFF till January so
we're not in a rush to pass this can be
passed at any time between now and
December and still goes into effect in
January or the future that council
member tilki was discussing I'm just
laying it all so well I I think for
transparency since we're this far into
this that if Rob could go ahead so we
all have that information and and let us
know you know all the research you've
done on this and where these numbers
come from and how you came about them I
think Rob emailed all of that
information to us tonight too
yeah mayor and Council you did receive
an email with that information tonight
so um the vast majority of the
information was in that email was from
the uh November Retreat when when we
discussed it there was a presentation
that covered like several different um
areas I guess Council related areas and
one of those was a discussion about
about salaries um so so it's really just
information we collected from the region
and then um did kind of average that out
based on you know what the what
collectively the average among the
cities looks like and how that compares
to to Gilbert mayor and Council
salaries okay so so those numbers that
council member torguson gave earlier
that they come from that information
that you had is yeah the one thing um we
also
included top seven population cities in
Arizona and what that average looked
like would be the one thing that was
added um with with the most recent
numbers that that he
shared okay all right thank you very
much now I apologize council member Toki
thank you mayor
um I I just want everybody on this dis
to know that I understand the passion I
understand the reasoning for why you're
wanting to bring this forward I can only
personally apologize if there
was a thought that this was coming
forward in a different format at a
different time I wasn't aware of that so
um I wasn't involved in squelching this
by any means but um just um I think I I
hope that we can find a
way within open meeting laws to have
conversations when we feel something not
coming forward when it should be coming
forward I hope we can find that way so
that we're not surprised in the future I
think that's what I am hopeful for this
is an important topic everything that
you all have talked about the reasonings
why all of that is very very important I
I would just like time to have a a
conversation where we have all that
information in front of us so I'm asking
for cuz I don't think I can make a
motion on this I think it will just be
Direction
to um staff that we bring back all of
the this resolution with backup
documentation and maybe reach out to us
for other options that we would be
thinking about to come forward in a
study session the last meeting in August
which would allow us to vote in
September on a resolution and I think um
when you're looking at timing for people
to consider running in the next election
that gives them plenty have time to know
what what would be happening or not so
um I'd like to kind of move this on if
that's
agreeable mayor yes council member
Kowski I I thank you council member
tilki I just wanted to add that as
direction to staff information that I'd
like to see in that further
discussion is um one or two more options
on how the salary would change over time
currently it's benchmarked to the lowest
paid full-time salaried employee of the
town and i' like to see a couple other
options I think that would give me
enough information and data along with
the information already provided um to
have that
discussion May if I may um to include
the CPI and what that index would do to
salaries if that was included that would
be helpful
also full compensation I want to see
Benefits full compensation that includes
retirement Insurance anything that would
be considered your full benefits if we
go to our own um Total Rewards page or
whatever it's called on the system it
shows us a full outline of what our
benefits are and we're not talking about
those and I really think that it's
important to pull it all together so
that we see what we're talking about in
full and it as far as elections go this
isn't going to affect the people that
are running this year council member
tilki just mentioned it'll it'll
potentially affect people in the future
running
but politics and elections have changed
so much over the past four six eight
years when I ran for Council the first
time it cost me
$7,000 and then the second time I ran it
was $10,000 when I ran for mayor in 2020
it was $63,000 and the other two people
were that ran spent 106 and 125
um you see a difference in running for
office today than you saw years ago and
to run well you probably have to have a
couple of screws loose first of all
because it's not the easiest thing to do
and I say that with all affection for
everybody sitting up here but um I have
seen all kinds of different people serve
on this dis as council members private
business people young people
stay-at-home moms single women um
people that worked for their own
businesses people that worked for family
businesses people that worked for big
businesses it's been a it has run the
gamut over the years and it I have not
seen it have an effect on the people
that have run here like is being is
being discussed I've had one person say
to me over the past year that they
didn't think they could afford to to run
for Council because the pay was so low
but that's not rampant it's not what I'm
hearing over and over again vice mayor
Anderson you have your mic on yes thank
you mayor
um I'm I I realize that we can't do
anything later this month and we don't
meet in July but I'd like the first
meeting in August I want this sooner
rather than
later I was going to I was going to say
two weeks I was going to say June 18th
but um I don't know I'm fine with June
18th we have all the slides and all of
the information I just didn't I didn't
like not having the information to sit
here and look at and digest between last
night and tonight and I don't think we
have all of the information I think it
needs more council member bovani yeah
I'd like to for staff include the
um um since council member tus wanted to
link it to the lowest paid full-time
employee um I'd like to see their
compensation also health care and all
that kind of stuff uh same as the the
Mayers were question for us please thank
you
council member
Buckley um I I just wanted to mention
that even though they there is
additional package and benefits not all
of us take those and use those um I I
don't take you know I don't use the
insurance the they do have a retirement
that we can you know that we contribute
to but um not
everybody uses all of the benefits that
are available and I just wanted to bring
that
up council member torison yeah the
intent with the uh tiing it to the
lowest paid uh employee is that that
number generally will receive some sort
of CPI some sort of cost of living
adjustment but it's it should never go
rampant whereas I've seen like I said I
saw Tucson trying to give themselves
$144,000 a year year uh which is just
such a huge amount of money that it is a
it's an attraction it's crazy money uh
and I wanted to keep it humble and I
thought attaching ourselves to the
lowest paid employee was much more
humble than what will happen and from
what Patrick and if he wishes to chime
in said he had heard some communities
talking about very large increases that
are being proposed with their councils I
didn't want this to go rampant I wanted
to keep it in a much more humble lowkey
place that it's not uh it's not going to
be affected by large fluctuations of
people that may selfs serve that may uh
feel that 144,000 is is appropriate
which I find completely inappropriate uh
and I didn't want to be subject to that
in that sense I thought the humility of
saying I'm the lowest paid salaried
person here was much more effective and
made more sense especially since that
person can't probably afford to live in
Gilbert either and Patrick is there
anything that you can say about what you
had heard in that
meeting mayor council member Tason yes
uh city manager Jeff Barton of Phoenix U
mentioned that Phoenix will be bringing
something to the ballot this fall as
they required by Charter to their voters
um I'm going to phone a friend and ask
Rob
um bore if he has those actual numbers
I've got a general bark bark idea but I
want to make sure we're accurate on that
and
correct so mayor and Council yeah City
of Phoenix has a a citizen commission
that makes
recommendations um about Council mayor
and council salary increases and I know
the percentage but I'll have to find the
actual number but I know it equated to
uh an 18% increase for mayor and a 25%
increase for uh
councel so if you give me just one
second I apologize
uh so the numbers ended up being so the
current mayor salary I believe is 88,000
and that would go up to
13840 and the current council salary is
61,63 and that would go up to 77,000 if
approved thanks Rob Phoenix is the fifth
largest city in the country
right may I believe that's correct yeah
the largest city in the state of Arizona
and the fifth largest just in the
country I believe and um I was shocked
to know that the mayor only made
$888,000 for that City the the council
members districts are the size of
gilberton population I believe or close
to so each district is about the size of
the town they win their elections with
under 10,000 votes and that's really sad
but I just wanted to say because I don't
want Tom BL to put in the paper that I
am rich or retired because I am neither
rich nor retired and don't want my
husband getting wind that I'm retired
cuz I have not retired yet and um I
don't have a sugar daddy either um and I
know that that was brought up today too
and the the reason that I use the
mayor's pay wouldn't be able to afford
to pay the rent in the town of Gilbert
is because we so often hear from our
residents that every apartment unit in
Gilbert is Section 8 and the rent in
Gilbert is not affordable if the mayor's
salary of $43,000 isn't enough to afford
an apartment in Gilbert that's the only
reason that I use that you need to make
probably 48 to $50,000 to rent an
apartment in Gilbert right now um but
that's why I use that comparison not
saying that it's because this job
doesn't pay enough but because we hear
so often that every apartment is Section
8 and that's just not the case and so we
will be moving this on to June 18th to
come back date certain continued um vice
mayor did you have something else no I
was just going to try and get us to that
point Thank let's go to June 18th June
18th follow up thank you we will adjourn
the special meeting and reconvene our
regular meeting moving to our consent
calendar vice mayor yes mayor we don't
have any requests to pull anything so I
would move that we approve items 9
through 31 on the consent calendar I'll
second at that I'm sorry real quick
before you vote I apologize so you want
it on for June 18th study for further
discussion do you want anything
agendized for the June 18th council
meeting so I would do both I would put
it on the study session and agendize it
to the meeting because we've talked
about it at length this evening and then
that night we could firm everything up
and um potentially vote on it that night
thanks Patrick for the clarification um
my email must not have gone through I do
want to have a quick discussion on
26 26 sorry
consent so approve items nine 231 with
the exception of item
26 can I get a second to approve items n
okay thank you I have a motion by vice
mayor Anderson seconded by council
member Buckley please
vote on uh oh I was a yes on
that I can go ahead and redo it really
quick
please
revote fat fingered that one maybe fat
finger motion passes 70 so item 26
26 sorry yeah sorry um somebody walking
down I thought was no sorry our town
attorney Chris Payne had to leave so
Elena kez is joining us as Town attorney
from this point forward
tonight okay
so I should I suppose ask uh in in
number 26 with the hsip I wanted to see
a couple things a how that relates back
to the federal government because of the
state's requirements and reporting that
and the other part would be if it is
have we really considered how prudent it
is to narrow that turn lane at higgle
and guad Lupe when it it might not be
helping the final situation does any can
anybody give me information on
that can't see that far and it's so dark
over there oh I still can't see my
glasses are filthy
sorry oh it's Yao hi Yao
turning the mic on there we go good
evening mayor council members um we have
Aaron pinkleton online he's able to
speak on those two questions regarding
item number 26 so give me a second and
then see if he can kind of log in okay
he's at home right now
is Aaron on
WebEx I'm
assuming for
my apologies he's call we're going to
call him on teams right now so please
stay with
us good afternoon mayor or evening mayor
and Council can you hear me yes Aaron
thank you yeah sorry I almost T in
person I was like well didn't seem like
it didn't expect the question tonight
sorry about that um so to clarify the
question said there was two questions
one of them was how this pertains to the
federal guidelines um with this being
hsip is administered by ADOT and so ADOT
would um handles all the make sure we're
in alignment with the
federal requirements and guidelines um
I'm not sure if that's if there's
something different in particular you're
wondering about that counciler toron
yeah you like to clarify your question I
was wondering if it tied us into any
other Federal programs regarding Traffic
Safety uh that kind of thing uh was
there anything else that we'd be
responsible for back to the federal
government by not performing what they
consider properly on our end of that
deal no um the way it works is during
the application process we show that the
the purpose of the project is adhering
to certain safety improvements and is um
um through a competitive process based
off the the different safety this is the
safety improvements and the impact of
those
improvements um
therefore adhering to those requirements
that a bro the broad requirement of
improving safety um we could dive into
the actual description of the hsip but
in to summarize it it's for the overall
Improvement of safety in adherence to
the um
and John Blake the document that ad
references but the instance the
safety safety and purposes all right and
you're sure this does not uh tie back to
other Federal programs like sa safe
streets for all that kind of
thing this is not an entir no this is a
standalone um it's a federal the hsip is
a
federal um Grant thing that each state
has their own funding that to
administer locally so this is the
Arizona hsip so they manage it by
themselves is not tied back to any other
F larger federal grants as far as the
requirements um it's a standalone okay I
appreciate that and do you have
information on as I believe we're we're
altering some turn Lanes is that
correct um I I'm trying to remember so
the turn lanes are ones that it's it's
improvements as per the direction in the
um the project themselves in the
two um CIP
projects and those turn Lanes it's based
off of uh safety analysises and traffic
volumes we've looked at um I
believe the one you're referring to it's
going to a dual left scenario based on
the traffic existing traffic volumes all
right and that and you don't feel the
narrowing of the the turn Lanes is uh
you think it's acceptable that the the
speed and the and the uh the use of that
area the actual traffic use it's not
we're not pushing our luck sorry I'm
looking say narrowing the turn Lanes
well aren't we narrowing the turn Lanes
by a foot I
think are we narrowing turn lane or are
we narrowing the median in the turn lane
yeah I'm not I'm not totally sure Aon
Aaron is it the situation where're we're
narrowing the median in the turn lane to
that new system that we're using maybe
yeah so we're yeah so there's I guess
there's there's a couple different
projects and so going off the top of my
mind um we're adding a right turn lane
and we are modifying the left turns so
we have a more positive off offset that
way when you're you can see past the
oncoming left vehicle okay that I think
I understand now I just wanted to
clarify that cuz it didn't come across
as completely clear to me initially I
appreciate we're we're not changing if
we yeah we wouldn't be changing the the
width of the lanes unless we were adding
an additional Lane um and in that case
still we' adhere to our standard drawing
our standard details for Lane wids got
it all right I appreciate your time
sir counc turers just to clarify that
your first point of of Grants typically
the grants are specific for whether it's
air quality or safety it doesn't then
affect other grants or other larger um
Federal projects so it's very specific
as far as what we need to do as far as
if it's a safety issue then it gets
vetted out through ad do and mag as far
as the safety aspects of it and then the
second part is that um if you look at a
lot of our intersection that are in the
north part of the of of our town it it
was designed earlier so a lot of times
our design criteria has change over time
and based on volume there is offset
issues where if you look it straight
ahead there's other traffic across from
you making a left turn that you can't
see the other one so that's why we're
phasing a lot of these intersection
Improvement using hsip funds understood
thank
you I'd like to make a motion to accept
item 26 the grant as written for
resolution number
4483 I have a motion can I have a second
second I have a motion by council member
tus and seconded by council member
Buckley please
vote motion passes
70 that concludes thank you Aaron
concludes our consent agenda moving on
to our administrative items we have a
boards and commissions discussion that
we need to have and um actually I'm
going to request that we recess the
council meeting and take us up into an
exact session we don't need staff
because this is a boarding commission
issue that we just need to go up and
discuss I'm looking right at our staff
and attorneys um so I'd like to recess
our meeting while we go up into exec
session
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I'll go ahead and bring this meeting
back to order next on our agenda is item
number 32 boards and commissions
consider appointment to the community
engagement task force I'll turn it over
to council member
tilky thank you mayor um I'd like to
make a motion to appoint the following
members to the community engagement task
force of focusing on teen
violence um their terms will begin June
4th 2024 and ending after advising is
completed on the assigned projects and
issues if no other task are assigned by
the
council the task force members names
Natasha Ash Mark Beasley Justin
Dena
Lao
Lisa hatlin sorry Lisa can't say your
middle yeah Angela Rogers Katie Walter
Kelly
Westerberg uh Brandon braidman is at R
Owen foro is Ren and Max Udall is our
teen reps and
Courtney salmon and
NAA auu
wama are our Al alternate members along
with Andrew Lewis and Isabelle Bryce as
our mayac alternate me
Members I'll second
that have a motion by council member
tilki seconded by council member Bon
Giovani please
vote motion passes
70 thank you mayor um just as uh
information only we have um worked with
various members of our um community and
had advisory members to the teen
violence task force uh representing
Gilbert Public Schools is
Susan gadina Higley Unified School
District James Walker Chandler Unified
School District Mark H Sant Charter
Shane
Stucky um American Leadership Academy
Dan
provan Gilbert Christian School Holly
Garza from our Police Department Levi
Leba and from mayak is Andrew Lewis and
Isabelle Bryce you'll notice that the uh
in their role they will serve as
alternates if some of our teens don't
attend so I wanted to make sure you had
the information of the entire task force
and our advisory members our first
meeting will be on June 10th and uh to
begin the we have to go through all the
rules and regulations of serving on a a
task force and so that'll be the
majority of that meeting and bringing
introducing everybody we'll start our
work in August um as a reminder um we've
started to put some of our agenda items
together um it is our intent to come
back um monthly so if we could make sure
that that's an item on the agenda for me
to give a report out or if you feel it's
best just to do that during Council
reports just tell me which way you want
to do that um just to give the public an
update on the different types of things
that we're doing um also uh a reminder
to our Council liaison
um for our school districts uh we have
you slated for September 16th to come in
and talk about how those conversations
are going just as a reminder for you and
the public because it's been a long time
since we had that
conversation um I know that you meet
individually with the school districts
but hoping that maybe you could pull a
meeting all together with the three of
you in the three districts to talk about
how we can expand our role together
and how we can um meet uh on a regular
basis so that as issues come up we can
get ahead of those and that's kind of
the premise for that meeting and if
there's anything that comes out of that
to present to our task force to consider
so um Patrick I'm going to ask if um
your staff could work with me and um get
information out to the council liaison
so they know exactly uh what what we're
you know asking them to do and and um
giving the date of September 16th so
happy to work with you on that okay
thank you thank you mayor I'm I'm I'm
very excited if I could just say that um
this was a very hard decision to get
down to the number of people that we
appointed based on the numbers that we
had put out there I continue to be
amazed um especially as we look at
Community issues and we ask our um
residents to come forward the caliber of
people in this
community the expertise that they can
bring in so many different um levels of
of things that are going on but their
willingness to help and I I'm just so
thankful for everybody who stepped up
and
hopefully others will want to continue
to be involved um I'm I'm happy that we
are moving very quickly I think faster
than any other city I'm not sure but I I
I I it is our intent to take this very
seriously and to bring um good feedback
back to the council thank you so I'm
going to make the recommendation that we
add Community engagement task force to
every agenda under administrative items
like we did with the subcommittee just
because that gives us the opportunity to
actually to discuss what's going with
the community engagement Task Force if
we leave it to the end when council
member tilki does her report out then
all you can do is report out and so this
way it'll leave it open for us to
actually ask you questions offer
feedback anything that might come up did
you get thank you cheli I see a head nod
over there thank you cheli for that um
and I yeah I just want to reiterate
the when you're looking at two nights of
interviews we were here what 4:30 to
7:30 two nights in a row and I'm so
sorry cuz you were ill but so you had to
be virtual I'm sorry I I hope you don't
mind me mentioning that but um I know
that makes it harder on you when you're
virtual but when you're looking at two
nights of interviews for 3 hours of 11
or 12 or 13 people each night it it's
daunting right I think at best when you
think about having to come and sit and
interview every 15 minutes a new person
but um I really enjoyed it the the
people that we got to meet and the
people that we got to talk to and you're
right the caliber of people and I would
say our teens were the best they were
weren't they not amazing young men and
um just to have that opportunity to sit
and talk to those people for those 15
minutes each person was just um really
just a pleasure so thank you to
everybody that applied and you know we
can't take everyone unfortunately but we
got it down to a really great group
moving on to item did anybody have any
other comments thank you um moving on to
item 33 Council administ ation consider
adoption of resolution number 4484
designating the chief fiscal officer to
submit the FY 2024 2025 expenditure
limit report does anybody need a
presentation or discussion on
this seeing none would someone like to
make a motion to adopt resolution number
4484 I make a motion I have a motion by
council member Buckley second seconded
by vice mayor Anderson please vote
motion passes 70 moving on to item 34
policy number 20
23-3 consider approval of revisions to
council policy number 20 23- 03
regarding the code of conduct would
anybody like a presentation on this it
was pretty
straightforward any comments
questions somebody like to make a motion
mayor I'll make a motion to approve um
item 34 and for the public it it was
just changing an one item in there
instead of it being called point of
privilege it's called point of order
that's the only change that was
made second I have a motion by council
member tky seconded by council member
Buckley please
vote one
more passes 7 thank you moving on to
Communications from citizens um vice
mayor before I turn it over to you I
wanted to just make a statement about
our parking garage safety enhancements
as always we appreciate the continued
feedback and participation of our
community members in supporting
Gilbert's safety and community
livability and I have an update
regarding the safety efforts in
Gilbert's garages in the Heritage
District um as some of you may not know
Gilbert Heritage District receives
approximately 5.5 million visits from an
estimated 1.6 million visitors each year
due to its robust offerings to families
teens and adults to effectively serve
this Dynamic population over the past
several years the Gart police department
has deployed seven bike Patrol officers
and a sergeant assigned exclusively
Patrol to patrol the Heritage District
supported by one to three Patrol
officers who Patrol the beat that
includes the
district the town of Gilbert has already
been in the process of completing an
upgrade to the existing security cameras
at the two Heritage District parking
garages and I know someone had spoken on
these a few weeks ago and we had them
checked no wires were cut everything was
safe everything was working but the
upgrades that we have coming will
improve the video quality from low
resolution to high traffic resolution we
are able to report that the heway garage
upgrade is nearly complete and the Ash
Street Garage upgrade will be completed
very shortly thereafter it is important
to note that the security
cameras in both Heritage District park
garages are and have been operational in
response to increased youth related
activity in the Downtown parking garages
the Gilbert Police Department developed
an additional proactive detail of two
additional Patrol officers specifically
assigned to the two garages between the
hours of 8:00 p.m. and 2: a.m. every
Friday and Saturday to effectively
maintain this additional level of
Staffing it was necessary to pull from
existing Patrol units in the area which
is not a sustainable long-term solution
therefore Gilbert staff has formed a
working group to research and evaluate
additional potential opportunities for
further safety enhancements tonight the
council is able to share that staff is
bringing forward at the June 18th 2024
council meeting an agenda item to
implement additional on-site security at
the garage during Peak evening hours
this additional presence of private
uniformed security during Peak evening
hours will assist with ensuring the
garages remain a safe place for all
visitors to use in addition active
monitoring of the downtown garage
cameras will occur during the town's
regular business hours again we thank
our community members for their input
and engagement and we will continue to
evaluate any additional safety
enhancements vice
mayor thank you mayor the Gilbert toown
Council values citizen comments and
input anyone wishing to speak before the
council must fill out a request to speak
card for each item they wish to speak on
and submit it to the town clerk or place
it in the been provided prior to the
start of the meeting the communications
from citizens portion on the agenda
provide citizens an opportunity to
identify the town coun to the Town
Council matters of Interest or concern
related to town government under the
provisions of the Arizona open meeting
law the Town Council has prohibited from
responding to issues that have not been
properly noticed therefore the Town
Council may only listen to citizens who
wish to address them and at the
conclusion of the open call to the to
public response is limited to individual
members of the council responding to
criticism made by those who have
addressed the public body asking staff
to review a matter or asking that a
matter be put on a future
agenda while we understand and
appreciate the passion our community
members bring to these sessions we must
remind everyone that clapping during the
meeting is not acceptable this practice
can disrupt the flow of discussion
potentially intimidate others and
detract from the respectful atmosphere
we strive to
maintain the town asks that when your
name is called you come forward to the
podium state your name and place of
residence and then begin speaking for
your allotted time our first Speaker
tonight is Kristen
mandley excuse me ma'am it would be this
Podium over here podum thank you sorry
hi my name is Kristen mandley and I'm a
resident in Morrison Ranch in Gilbert
Arizona I am a business owner and a m
mom of two beautiful children and um I'm
coming before the council today to state
that um and and say thank you for
allowing me to take two minutes and
speaking on behalf of the East mle East
Valley Mom's demand action I became
involved with moms when a family member
was shot in a school shooting um and now
we live with the effects of gun violence
in our family um with everything that's
going on in our community it's something
that everything everybody should be
aware of and address the situation um
all of June is gun violence prevention
month and it should be at the top of
everyone's agenda to prevent gun
violence in our community um as it is
the number one cause of death of teens
and children in
America um I will read part of a
proclamation that was emailed to the
council um without a response and so I
thought that it might be important to
bring it to your attention um with
everything that's going on in our
community um the proclamation declares
that the first Friday of June to be um
National Gun Violence Awareness Day in
the Town Council in honor um and
remember in remembrance of all victims
and survivors of gun violence um and to
declare that um we as a town and a
country must do more to end this public
health Health crisis um whereas every
day more than 120 Americans are killed
by gun violence and more than 200 are
shot and wounded on an average of more
than
44,4 gun deaths each year whereas
Americans are 26 more times likely to
die by gun violence and homicide than
other people in high income countries
and um Arizona has um
1,290 gun deaths every year with the
rate of 7.2 deaths per 100,000 people a
crisis that cost the state
15.9 billion each year um of which um
232.000 is paid by taxpayers and Arizona
has the 18th highest rate of gun death
in the
US um protecting Public Safety and
communities that we serve um should be
the mayor's um highest um um
responsibility and um gun violence
prevention is more important than ever
as we see in increase in fire um arm
homicides and suicides non-fatal
shootings across the country
um we would love to continue this
conversation to protect our children so
they can grow up in a safe Community our
community and morson ranch is not safe
we witness every weekend what is going
on and it's disturbing and so I would
like to um know what the next steps
would be um and would love to meet with
um the board and a later
date thank you thank
you next is Scott Meyers who has cont
donated his time to Bridget Vega
good evening the first comment will be
read on behalf of Katie mcferson however
I do want to share an audio clip from
Gilbert chamber criticism that comes
with the the office but the U I count
for instance I'd say right now what
we've been doing the subcommittee work
on teen violence i' count that as
success because we've been able to take
a very rowdy crowd that has serious
issues and I have to hand it to them
that they were very U sincere about it
but uh I feel like they have come around
now to the point that they feel like
they've been listened to uh they're not
uh and to me that success in the town
when I can talk to a constituent they
they say they understand where we're
coming from or they
say so with that Rowdy was a cheer I did
in high School loved it it's also what
our vice mayor called concerned parents
and citizens that came forward to
address brutal attacks that split open
schools children using and dilling
Fentanyl and cocaine in our schools and
community and holding an arsenal of
weapons and ski mask on porches what has
transpired in our town is a deep seated
Mental Health crisis under all the rage
and under all the rage and violence you
have young men in deep crisis as of
today Chief so ber is unwilling to name
the goons only a group of violent young
adults it is as if it didn't even happen
proximity matters and the continual lack
of plans to mitigate risk and the lack
ofical approach to brutality to innocent
young women and men signals a more
serious kind of concern it is being byst
standards and by standards allowing
violence and bullying to flourish it
validates the behavior why are we not
concerned about the root cause of all of
this instead of blaming parents and
taxpayers for being approximate
appropriately horrified young men with
grievances access to firearms and
escalating Behavior continue to signal
for help in the cities and towns
Nationwide yaldi Oxford and Parkland to
name a few I will once again sound the
alarm I am unwilling to whistle by the
graveyard I've done what I can as a mom
to support our community I wish you had
too
and then this should roll over I think
mine goes next mayor and Council so if
we can add the three more minutes mayor
and Council Chief and Banger you don't
get to look the other way on this issue
innocent children have died and been
brutally assaulted on your watch two
weeks ago a child fell off the rooftop
of Gilbert garage and died yet crickets
because of town of Gilbert's
approach it made it clear that a
19-year-old was under the influence so
what it's not your problem instead of
saying condolences to the teenagers
family how did we get here what safety
measures do we have in place in this
town mayor Chuck Banger suberg when will
people start being ticketed so you will
see change versus just telling them to
leave as the officers have continued to
do so we need you as leadership to step
up to be proactive yet your leadership
continues to perpetuate and inflict harm
on the community by not taking a clear
stand against team violence Chief let's
make this clear a gang is a gang Gilbert
goons is a gang that has inflicted harm
across the East Valley and Gilbert you
have a gang problem do you not want to
say Gilbert goons are gang because it
would affect the real estate which it
should never be profit over people we
demand accountability this is our second
Community public request as the families
have requested multiple times Gilbert
releases the records of Tristan Keener
and Connor Jarnigan as they were both
brutally assaulted by gilbertt goons
Chief and gang or the gang unit we ask
for press conferences to come back to
discuss what your plans are for the
summer especially all the goons have
been released and there are so many more
who continue to cause further vandalism
and harm to the community yet no one's
been arrested or accountable held
accountable as a community we want K9
unit a K9 dog to be added to surface the
garages along with paid parking as we
personally spent months downtown at the
garages we demand an external
investigation as the public has a right
to know that one of the internal affairs
of Investigations were completed and not
taken serious as stated there was no VI
no evidence of violation or policy or
administrative law the allegations were
found that the complaint was closed
mayor and counsel and chief I find it
disturbing as a mother and a community
advocate that as a town I've watched
count you've watched countless video
videos and pictures of an officer
backtack nights same pattern engaged for
legal purposes what appeared based on my
opinion and observation to have a powwow
with three alleged miners leaned in an
officer's car taking selfies questional
be questionable behavior for over 30
minutes at the rooftop and then went
down to the alley behind Culinary
Dropout after calling him out about
education hour being over meanwhile
teenagers were loing smoking weed and
under drinking openly but that's also
the same officer who told
us that other calls had to be taken in
his beat we didn't know what he does and
then it doesn't stop there he would get
out of his vehicle just before curfew to
say bye to them we have a duty to
protect the innocent and Gilbert you
have blood on your hands to the youth
I'm sorry we're here for you you are
enough your voice matters we see you we
hear you we stand by you please continue
to keep the Lord family and all of the
youth in your prayers rise up
Gilbert and we printed all the pictures
out for you thank
you next is uh Don Edwards and Crystal's
donated her time to him so he'll have
six
minutes good evening Madame mayor Mr
vice mayor and esteemed council members
my name is Don Edwards and I was
recently forced to retire from from the
fire department after being retaliated
against for filing a complaint I'm here
tonight to continue my effort to shine a
light on the people who are currently in
charge of your fire department and the
culture they have developed some things
to keep in mind about the incident I'm
going to talk about this was in 2021 at
the height of covid and Staffing our
fire trucks was a nightmare at also at
that time we had somewhere between 8 and
10 people off the truck due to injury
and lastly
uh this involves BC Barton the same
supervisor who told me I deserve to be
attacked at a fire station by a three
Center on Wednesday May 5th 2021 my crew
was one of four crews that was to
participate in high-rise training being
run for that quarter my crew was singled
out from every other crew in my
Battalion and I know this because I
spoke to every other captain in my
Battalion and was not switched out to
participate in any other stations during
that
training during my second time through
the exact same Evolution I felt a twinge
in my knee I told the engineer who was
monitoring monitoring that part of the
drill he's the $200,000 engineer that I
was going to skip the simulated
high-rise climb and meet them inside to
go over the actual training part of
training this is where the previous
information becomes relevant between the
staffing issues and the amount of guys
off the truck our employee Wellness
division recently put out a directive to
be more aware of injuries they
specifically mentioned listening to your
body during PT and training those two
things combine with the fact that people
have always been able to skip portions
of training due to nagging injuries led
me to believe there would be no issues I
was wrong Balan Chief Barton had asked
assistant chief Gerard to come out of
his office and come down to the training
ground where they both talked to me I
explained to them what happened and that
I had only skipped a grand total of
three flights of stairs on my second
time through this
Evolution the following day a Thursday I
worked 24 hours of OT the days of the
week matter on Friday the 7th BC Barton
came to my station that delivered a
typewritten letter not a form not a
supervisor's report of injury a typed up
letter it was typed up because there was
no policy that was violated and
therefore no form everyone who works for
the town of Gilbert knows there's a form
for everything and the fact that there
was no form again leads into the fact
that there was no policy violation the
letter stated that quote he was
concerned with my ability to perform the
physical functions of my job what wasn't
in the letter was the fact that he
called me a derogatory term for a
woman's genitals that rhymes with wussy
he didn't give me this later this letter
after the training exercise when I would
have been able to contact the person he
designated for me to contact I was
allowed to work the last 20 hours of
that shift he also didn't give me that
letter the next day when I was a when I
would have been able to contact the
design when I was scheduled to work 24
hours of overtime on one of those fire
trucks that we had a hard time Staffing
was it because of that fact that we
couldn't staff our trucks
uh what he did do was he waited 44 hours
after being so concerned about my
ability to work that I had to go to a
doctor a cost that the town incurred to
send me to Ed where uh I I had to burn
48 Hours of sick time because by now it
was Friday and my next shift was Sunday
and as you know the office person alen
Gilbert worked 410 or off Fridays so I
had to end up burning 48 Hours of sick
time come Monday I was on a conference
call with the HR person who was
designated who by the way again no
surprise is no longer with the town
because we run through HR Personnel like
a hot knife through butter uh BC
schwitzer from the EMP employee Wellness
Division and my union rep everyone on
everybody on that call was uncertain how
to proceed because none of them had ever
seen something like this needless to say
I was cleared within 10 minutes of
seeing the doctor I cannot stress to you
how odd this was if you were to talk to
anyone who was involved with training as
part of the Training Division they will
tell you since the beginning of time
time immemorial people have been allowed
to skip certain parts of training due to
nagging injuries but unfortunately for
me I was not part of the training Cadre
the guys we talked about before as I
stated before if you're not part of this
particular click you will be treated
differently you will lose out on
promotions and overtime opportunities
and you may just see your career
derailed as always I thank you for the
opportunity to allow me to speak tonight
and again I ask you to speak to your
firefighters don't just take my word for
it you'll probably hear a pretty similar
story and I'll see you guys in two weeks
thank
you thank you Don
Carissa
Arthur thank you for your time tonight I
want to address the parking garage
situation again and just to explain why
your security situation is not going to
work I don't know that any of you guys
have been down in the garage during the
day or at night because when you have
kids that are out for the summer that
place has been a hangout and so when
you're looking at Staffing in that
garage only peak times that means your
Thursday your Friday and your Saturday
which has been tendency has had a
tendency to be your peak times the kid
fell off the garage at 11:00 at night on
a Monday night that was not a peak hour
whatsoever and so go back to the
officers unfortunately what's happening
is that your bike Patrol I don't know if
you're aware of this but we have brought
it in we have seen them multiple times
standing around so to go back a week and
a half ago my friend and I went to
downtown gilberg for dinner my friend's
husband is also an officer and uh we she
went to go drop me off in the parking
lot just south of Joe's this was 9:00 at
night on a Friday night there were at
least 8 to 10 officers all standing in a
road just talking they weren't in a
huddle discussing any sort of law
enforcement they were standing straight
in a row and as soon as they saw me they
turned around and they took off and they
all left and I explained to the
lieutenant that I spoke with this looks
really suspicious because it looks like
your officers aren't doing anything so
you're paying to staff Patrol officers
who are doing their jobs at the top of
the garage while your bike officers are
standing on the ground not patrolling
your city these are the same officers
that were standing at Whiskey Row
talking for over an hour in front of
there with the bouncers going on some of
the very same officers your sergeant was
in the middle of this group so I don't
know how there's going to become a
resolution to this unless things start
getting cracked down on it is really
important that our kids have a safe
place here and when we have we've seen
the things that we have with the
In-N-Out the um sorry the cars going in
and out of the garage we know that
they're being notified when officers are
coming up and down they're going to
figure out a different way to work
around this and especially when they
figure out what your security Staffing
is like I recently visited a different
garage here in Gilbert and it's a it is
a private garage but there wasn't one
issue at night with any teenagers
sitting up in the garage and and that
garage had much more capability for
people to hide in and so why there's
such a draw to this garage I don't know
but it has been an issue for a while and
you need to do something more and that
push for us is that there be paid
parking and allow your patrons to get it
validated when they go to a business
because the kids who are up here hanging
out they're not going to want to pay for
parking if you do that thank
you thank you Dan Reynolds
good evening mayor and Council um my
name is Dan Reynolds I'm a longtime
resident of Gilbert and a former
employee I want to talk to you guys
tonight about my relationship with some
of you um some of you I just met uh
tonight for the first time um some I've
never met um but I want to I want to do
this because I want to explain
something um um mayor Peterson I've
known you for I'm going to guess over 15
years 20 years I've been very supportive
I've voted for you um I think when the
people were trying to OU you early on in
your career I was still very supportive
and didn't agree with it um vice mayor
Anderson um for people who don't know he
worked for the Town 35 years ago 30
years ago um I've known you since then
always thought the world of you gotten
along very well with you um never had a
problem I hope you feel the same way um
councilwoman tilky I knew you before you
were actually a tilky um and uh I've
always had a good relationship with you
I've known your husband when he worked
for the town the reason I'm saying
this is because I don't have an axe to
grind I'm not here to start trouble
um and I want people to understand that
some of you other folks I can't U wait
to to get to know you a little better so
I can explain some of the stuff that
I've been coming up here to to uh share
with
you so I'm going to give you a phrase
and I don't want you to get upset and I
don't want you to think I'm aiming at
you but I call it ad admonishing The
Sinner and I'm not saying you're Sinners
please don't get upset with that
but um um this this phrase is kind of
lets me explain this is to help me
understand or help you understand the
info that we've brought forward it's how
we can be honest with you guys and even
if it's not easy it's it's to help us
from making mistakes and holding people
in this town accountable that's what I
mean by that hopefully you understand
that makes sense um I think it was last
council meeting mayor you you you were
upset with I I think me you were you
were looking my Direction and I'm going
to paraphrase this but you said
something to the effect of if you can't
come here and say something nice maybe
you shouldn't say something at all um I
I get what you were saying because town
of Gilbert's getting hammered with all
kinds of bad things being
said so my thoughts are
this we need to address the problem i'
I've brought information to you folks
and and maybe you don't have maybe
you're not obligated to reach out to me
but I know you can find me if you want
to cuz there's things that are going on
in this town that we have information on
I think you guys should know about
it
um Bob Dylan wrote a
song and it says you got to serve
somebody that's why why we elected you
folks is is to serve the citizens and
and I believe I need to serve you guys
too it's not a oneway street I get
that um I'll I'll wrap it
up um please don't get upset when I
bring you this information look into
what we're saying what I'm saying and
make your own judgment based on the
information I'm giving you and you do
some research and find out I don't want
you to think I'm lying because I'm not
there's things that are going on in this
town by some of our leadership people
that need to be
addressed so I'm going to leave you with
this if our founding fathers and the
citizens didn't speak up for the truth
and the freedoms that we have
today we'd probably all be speaking with
a British accent and I don't think we
want that so I want to say I appreciate
your time and um let your conscience be
your guide thank you very much thank you
Dan Stacy lavl
hi good evening so I'd like to address
um and recap the statement that the
mayor read at the end of the
communications from citizens at the Town
council meeting two weeks ago it was a
pre-written statement may be meant to
make those of us speaking up look like
the bad guys for invoking our first
amendment rights or maybe to try to
discredit us either way I'd like to
thank Steve Dan and Don and the rest of
you for continuing to speak up since you
pre-wrote that statement mayor it tells
me you knew that we were coming to speak
each week and that in itself is a win I
look forward to your closing statement
again tonight my guess is that it will
sound a lot like the one from two weeks
ago which I'm about to
discuss you stated you were quote
concerned with potential Damage Done to
Gilbert's name heart and town
organization by continued efforts of a
few to highlight allegations opinions
and false claims quote first of all yes
we are a few there would probably be
more but many of them are protecting
their jobs and identity so we the few
will continue to try to write the wrongs
you refuse to
address also let me remind you that we
have the proof behind everything we
discuss therefore you are inflicting
potential damage by insinuating that our
claims are allegations opinions and
false we have all the proof in forms of
foyer requests remember I'm sure you're
all familiar continued efforts to
highlight me and my fellow speakers as
other than honest and true is defamation
of character another quote the spoken
word has the capacity to inflict damage
unquote you know what else has the
capacity to inflict damage continuing to
pretend nothing is wrong continuing to
ignore the issues and refusing to
address them headon continuing to be a
part of the problem and not part of the
solution also has the capacity to
inflict
damage the next quote this community is
facing pressing issues unquote you're
absolutely right so instead of trying to
protect protect management at the
expense of citizens and employees how
about you hold them
accountable next quote I respect and
welcome any and all efforts and energies
that work to bring us together as a
community not those that divide us end
quote I appreciate that you respect the
time and energy that we put into
speaking thank you because we are here
to unite the community not divide it
we're here to bring the community
together by speaking truth exposing lies
and most importantly we're here to try
to light a fire under benath you to do
the hard work that needs to be
done last quote I challenge us to be
better humans to each other end quote I
accept your challenge as I think there's
always room for kindness and
encouragement and in return I challenge
you to end your mayoral term on a high
note making the citizens proud to have
elected a mayor that doesn't just follow
but asks hard questions makes tough
decisions and protects everyone's rights
whether you agree with them or not thank
you thank you Steve
Laval good evening mayor and
Council uh if you've been watching the
news you've seen uh the supposed Dr
fouchi speak and uh we all
know they pushed a bunch of lies on us
Co lies vaccine lies it's not a vaccine
it's a clot shot more people are getting
harmed physically by that shot and uh we
know that government the federal
government the state government and our
local government are the ones pushing
the Miss and disinformation at us the
people and we the people are standing up
to it so therefore we get the resistance
from our government who's supposed to
represent us
okay along with mainstream media media
and the office of digital government
that misinformation got pushed and
pushed and pushed and the people who
resisted it like my fire engineer and
spoke the truth well they got pink slips
get on of town you got to
leave so you guys keep reporting back to
a a document you call it a third party
okay it's called Pierce Coleman Patrick
hired them with contract with the town
it's not a third party it's contract
with the town that document I have
continually shot holes in and all you
guys say is it's just it exonerates you
but you never address any of the holes I
shoot I've sent you some of the
documents you continue to say it
exonerates you that document does not
exonerate you that document is full of
lies not misinformation they're lies you
guys are lying it's called lying before
we ever had misinformation we had
lying okay BLM you were supporting BLM
you did support BLM the town supported
BLM the police chief supported BLM he
took a knee for them so here's the deal
I'm going to give you guys an
opportunity Chief soberg Rob Dugen
Patrick maner
councel officer taros and officer
shandler gave their lives in this
community and there's a lot of police
officers giv their lives across this
country for their communities so I'm
going to I'm going to offer you guys an
opportunity to come up here and take a
knee with me for officer Shu Handler and
officer taros
thank
you to the officers in this room first
of all ma'am thank you very much for
that I appreciate your support for the
officers in this room that's your
leadership that's your management those
are the ones that have your
back okay don't forget that
You' done good I can't see you from up
there I thought you left
children
what doing I can
feel I just what I everything