City Council | Regular Meeting and Work Study Session - December 4, 2024

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the December 4th 2024 city council
regular meeting to order and uh also we
have a work study in our program today
city clerk Ben Lane please conduct the
roll call thank you mayor mayor David
Ortega present vice mayor Barry Graham
council members tamy caputi here Tom
Durham here Betty janick here Kathy
Littlefield here and Salange Whitehead
here city manager Jim Thompson here City
attorney Sher Scott here City Treasurer
Sony Andrews here acting se Lake CL here
and the clerk is present thank you mayor
thank you we have uh Scottdale police
Sergeant Brian heiner as well as
detective um Tyler nce and
firefighter um Logan darling should
anyone need assistance uh let's begin
with the Pledge of Allegiance I'll call
on uh councilman very uh vice mayor
Grant be my honor thank you mayor I
pledge allegiance to the flag United
States
of
stand
andice at this time I would like to uh
draw our attention to the ongoing Wars
in foreign countries Ries as they fight
for their freedom and democracy please
keep in mind our military serving at
home and abroad and uh reflect on their
safety so let's uh pause and a time of
reflection
thank
you during tonight's meeting the council
may make a motion to recess into
executive session to obtain legal advice
on any applicable item on the agenda if
authorized by the council the executive
session would be held immediately and
would not be open to the public uh the
public meeting would then resume
following the executive session also per
our Council rules of procedure citizens
attending City Council meetings shall
observe the same rules of of order and
decorum applicable to members of the
council and City staff unauthorized
remarks or demonstrations from the
audience such as Applause uh and other
um distractions would just delay the
meeting so we ask you to please adhere
to uh courtesy Additionally the council
recently updated our Council rules uh
prohibiting use of electronic
communications uh other than uh those
that we use for our city council um
materials finally uh we will go into
public comment public comment is
reserved for Scottdale Citizens Business
owners Andor Property Owners to comment
on non- agendized items that are within
the council's jurisdiction advocacy for
or against a uh candidate or a measure
is uh not permitted according to state
law and is therefore deemed to be not uh
in order no official Council action can
be taken on public comment and the
speakers are limited to 3 minutes all
you have to do is check in with our
Clerk and I I would then call you
forward U at this time we have one
speaker so I will open public comment
our speaker is Steve Sutton uh thank you
sir
Orga
council at chel dog park the city of
Scottdale has in multiple locations
several types of rules and regulations
signs listing prohibitive
behaviors these are certainly necessary
for establishing what are prohibited
behaviors and the consequences of
engaging in them but they are not very
effective in preventing prohibited
behaviors this is why frequent users of
the dog park cooperated in designing a
new type of sign that may increase the
effectiveness of preventing prohibited
behaviors these are unlike the city's
rather small signs that are long lists
printed in a small font that very few
people read and if they do poorly
remember the new sign is called a dog
park etiquette sign and was the subject
of one of the petitions submitted to the
council these dog park etiquette signs
are designed to convey a very simple
primary message Mage and a more
elaborate uh secondary
message these signs are meant to be imp
placed in the middle of the fence
segregating the passive dog area and
active dog
area to ensure that the message can be
read from almost anywhere within an area
the size of the font road necessitates
that the sign be approximately 3/4 the
size of one of the 6 tall by 7ot wide
fence
panels the extraordinary size of these
signs is not just to enable leg ility at
Great distance it is also intended to
assist dog park users in communicating
with others the sign provides something
a group of users can point to when
politely informing another user they
need to be more attentive in controlling
their dog's
Behavior the inattention of dog owners
is often the precursor to not just
conflict between dogs but more
dangerously conflict between dog
owners dog owners attempting to protect
their dog from multiple incidents of
another dog's inappropriate behavior
have been Bur verbally and physically
assaulted this typically happens when
the inattentive owner of the offending
dog suddenly sees their dog being yelled
at or physically
restrained while Mayhem and murder have
not occurred there have been a few
incidents that did provoke fear they
could
occur these dog park etiquette signs are
step in the right direction to help dog
park users in communicating about and
self-regulating misbehavior before it
escalates to dangerous Behavior their
effectiveness cannot be predicted but
they certainly will not cause the
current rules and regulation signs to be
less effective it is time to try
something new to see if it is
helpful thank you for your time and
consideration thank you sir with that we
will close a public comment next we will
move on to our consent agenda items uh
partic in particular they're listed as 1
through
19 um and these items have full uh
digital um records as well as uh have
been posted for some time uh do any
council members have any questions on
any of the consent agenda items uh if so
you could U raise that at this
time uh seeing none therefore I'm open
to a motion uh sorry I will call on
councilwoman Littlefield she is remote
did you have any question
Council on consent agenda
items okay hearing none um I would then
um uh recognize councilwoman whad I move
to approve U consent agenda items 1
through nine second second thank you we
have a motion in a second please record
your
vote and calling on Council woman
Littlefield for consent agenda items the
motion to approve them items
1-9 we will try to get back to
councilwoman Littlefield at this point
uh the motion passes six U with one uh
yet to be heard from councilwoman
Littlefield is remote next we will move
to our regular agenda items we have
three agenda items uh 20 uh through 23
and um I would like to remind everyone
that again we U may have uh people
coming up to speak and um if for any
reason we can uh maintain our uh
courtesy we really appreciate that and
things will move along smoothly uh at
this point uh we're going to proceed
with item 20 marado Village minor
General plan Amendment and resoning that
is is case one GP 2024 and case one ZN
2024 Jeff Barnes is our principal
planner and making the presentation
thank you so
much good evening mayor Ortega vice
mayor Graham members of the city council
I'm Jeff Barnes with the city's planning
department giving you the combined
presentation tonight for Marcato
Village this site uh is located in the
yellow highlighted area on the screen
here uh generally along the east side of
92nd Street uh south of Shea Boulevard
um it is surrounded by uh other
commercial centers um office uses uh and
the honor Health uh Medical
Campus uh moving a little bit closer in
you can see this site has existing uh
buildings on a portion of it uh those
are intended to be removed uh as part of
the proposed development uh
Redevelopment uh for this
site the actions before you tonight um
are uh a resolution uh for the minor
General plan Amendment uh from the uh
current commercial designation uh on two
acres of the 6.64 Acre Site going to
mixed use neighborhoods to to match uh
the designation of the rest of the site
um an ordinance for zoning District map
Amendment uh from Coop PCD uh to PUD PCD
on two acres of the 6.64 Acre Site uh to
match up with the existing PUD PCD on
the rest of the site and then a
resolution for the development plan that
accompanies those
requests so I talked about uh the
general plan Amendment portion of this
site was
previously uh amended to be uh mixed use
neighborhoods from the commercial
District through a
2013 uh General plan and Zoning action
um this proposal uh seeks to change the
additional two acres uh that are still
uh the commercial designation at the
East End of the site to mixed use
neighborhoods uh to complete the site in
the same uh General plan designation
along with aligning to the um PUD zoning
designation um that is being
requested so much like the the general
plan part of the site was zoned PUD in
that 2013 action uh from what was C3 PCD
before uh so it's the
CCD portion of the site that's being
requested uh tonight to PUD PCD uh to to
match and then a new development plan
over the entirety uh of of the site
boundary uh this site is also located in
the sheay character area in the uh the
location
shown so uh not running through these
but just putting them up uh to remind
you both the PCD and PUD have findings
uh laid out in the zoning ordinance
those have been
evaluated through the review process
addressed uh through the Nar The
applicant's Narrative and uh staff's uh
report to you but just a reminder that
those findings do exist and have been
reviewed in there um working through
some of the details of the development
plan um the site plan included in there
accounts for as I mentioned uh removing
the existing buildings and and
redeveloping this site uh the site plan
proposal does Main maintain and enhance
existing uh driveway connections out to
92nd Street um also proposes uh to
signalize the intersection at cois and
92nd uh maintains existing cross access
connections uh with the commercial
center to the north and accounts for
providing a future capability of cross
access to the development site to the
east uh so that uh that project is if it
redevelops may utilize the signalized
intersection as a another method of
Ingress and egress for that site uh the
building proposal uh uh wraps around an
internalized parking garage but also
provides uh surface level parking uh the
shaded areas on this Northern portion of
the building uh account for uh live work
units and co-work space uh that is
access ible through interior and
exterior doors um and out to that
surface level adjacent
parking the elevation drawings here a
little bit hard to read in this format
so I'll jump into the renderings which
kind of tell a little bit better story
about the building um The Proposal
includes a twostory building height
along 92nd Street uh stepping back then
to a three-story height for the rest of
the building um and then a a rooftop
amenity space uh in what is essentially
the center of the building over top of
the parking garage uh centralized there
that is that additional element you can
see popping
up uh moving over to then what would be
looking at sort of the north elevation
or the north side of the building from
92nd Street is that where those live
work and co-work units um are located
with the access uh out to the adjacent
parking uh surface parking there and
that shared Drive AIS through the
site uh and then the last rendering here
uh looking back towards 92nd Street from
the northeast corner of the
building uh I talked a little bit about
vehicular circulation but also accounted
for in the development plan is
pedestrian uh circulation in the green
uh lines shown on the graph traffic here
uh which maintain several existing
access connections to the commercial
center to the north as well as the other
properties that surround and notably
providing at that signalized
intersection uh connection across 92nd
Street that feeds over to the uh the
green belt and the the bike path system
through
there uh talked about access so I'll
skip quickly through this one um getting
into to uh fire emergency access um
there was some discussion at uh Planning
Commission around this so I wanted to
take a a slide or two here to to just
touch on um emergency access this uh
development plan accounts for uh
creating a shared uh emergency access
shared fire lanane um on the adjacent
property within an existing Public
Access easement uh on that site um the
uh access requirements uh for emergency
vehicles require looping through the
site and so uh for this project and uh
if there's to be a project uh developed
on the adjacent site uh typically that
would be an expectation and what we had
seen in uh previous iterations of
development applications on both of
those sites is the likely potential for
parallel fire Lanes uh one on on each
side of that property boundary uh which
has led to this idea of sharing that
through the existing easement and so
that's what's represented uh on the plan
here um just a little bit uh extra
context again as it came up uh at the
Planning Commission discussion um that
existing Public Access easement that I
mentioned on the neighboring property is
actually the orange highlighted area
represented um on the on the screen here
it is a blank kit Public Access that
covers a good portion of that site um
and this proposal is utilizing uh just
the very edge of that uh for that um
shared fire
lane uh one more element of access uh
the shopping center to the North had um
wanted to make sure through this process
that they were still going to be able to
maneuver their delivery trucks uh along
the back Drive aisle uh as they do today
from the Sprouts down through this site
and so the applicant team put together a
a visual for that that confirms truck
movements will still be accommodated
even for the largest uh delivery
vehicles uh open space uh the Pud uh
requirements uh specify a minimum 10%
open space uh the development plan here
is uh coming in with almost 29 % uh open
space for the uh for the development
site here generally shaded in the green
areas on the
screen and then a conceptual landscape
plan accompanying that is also included
in the development
plan and then I had talked about those
live work and co-work uh spaces the
development plan accounts for a uh a
blown up floor plan that outlines sort
of the uh quad of units uh in each of
those with both the interior and
exterior access component to u to
benefit their functionality for their
intended
purpose covered probably a lot of this
so I'll just highlight uh real quickly
here that um this case you may recall
came back came before you in uh in
November and was continued at the
applicant's request U to work through
some uh some additional details part of
what they worked through and and is here
before you tonight as a change is
they've dropped the unit count in the
development plan from 255 units to 235
units um that is accompanied uh by a uh
proposal to uh establish these as um a
for rent style unit the applicant team
will probably tell you more about that
but just giving you some of the context
of the um the unit count and then the
density drop uh as it pertains to um to
the numbers that you would have seen
before and you're you're seeing
now um I mentioned the continuance but
prior to that uh we did uh take this
before the development review board as
as it is PUD zoning um they are um
requested to provide a recommendation on
the development plan which they did
provide a recommendation of approval uh
and the Planning Commission provided a
recommendation of approval as well
well so that wraps up staff's
presentation with just a quick reminder
of the three action points tonight um as
I mentioned the applicant team is here
and ready to present to you um so unless
you had any immediate questions for me
I'm happy to turn it over to
them well thank you at this point we
will go to the applicant in their
presentation
mayor members of city council Kurt Jones
with Tiffany and Bosco we're at 2525
East Camelback Road in Phoenix
85016 uh tonight here representing the
caliber company with the CEO Chris
laugher and his uh Team also with us is
Paul Basher our traffic consultant and
Mike Edwards our architect um I fast
forwarded to slide 20 I have a 50 slide
presentation that I don't want to go
through this evening because I think
Jeff did a great job of kind of going
through the semantics of The Proposal
what I want to do is just highlight some
of the key points and the changes that
have occurred um with this case I want
to thank you guys for uh continuance on
November 12th that allowed us to work
with stakeholders uh and our development
team to figure out uh what exactly this
case wanted to be um we heard early on
in this process that four sale units
would be acceptable by a lot of the
stakeholders and Outreach we we received
with that we uh consulted with a
condominium developer to kind of see if
the development plan that you've seen
and were shown by the by staff that's in
your packet uh could be uh retrofitted
from the apartment proposal to
Condominiums and it was uh it is
something that can be done and that is
representative in our unit count uh
decrease um we are restricting and the
development plan was Rewritten to uh
allow for only four sale units on the
property so anybody that reads this
development plan is reading it as as
such there's no one that can construe
that this case could be used for
apartments uh again the reduction in in
units uh and this Outreach allowed us to
reach out to some of the stakeholders
between November and now uh we received
a letter of support from cogs uh with
regards to this change uh we received
verbal and email um support based on uh
the change that we made uh I have 13
slides on the general plan that I think
are pertinent to this case but I'm going
to kind of just summarize them for you
uh we we this proposal meets almost
every component of the general plan and
if you need something to go to sleep
tonight you can read my narrative but
basically it's it's a majority of uh of
the of the general plan that we meet
with regards to land use the housing
element the connectivity element uh the
sheay area plan which was lightly
touched on by
Jeff um the which the the Sha area
element is a decades old document that
basically says along Shea Boulevard in
that cross-hatched area um that a
variety of housing opportunities should
be utilized along that uh Corridor
without jeopardizing single family
residential zoning which we're not doing
here um also it it's the property is
within an activity center in the general
plan the property is within the urban
neighborhoods designation which has a
multitude of references to multif Family
Apartments and Tow houses uh in the
general plan to make up those components
of those uh General plan
elements uh the development plan
accommodates now condos and for sale
units only um there are no amended
development standards in our PUD request
so there's no need for me to ask the
blessing of the city council for an
encroachment here or a variance there on
any of the development standards um with
this
request uh we have support from a lot of
the adjacent businesses um most keenly
is the Sprouts uh Center and
their operations and Jeff went through
the truck travel uh
component with the cross access easement
but they also believe that this uh this
use will be beneficial to their business
uh as with the small businesses
throughout the area we uh spoke to the
hospital there in support of the case
their board doesn't take official um
actions on land use cases but they did
tell us that they are in much support of
this traffic signal just like the
traffic signal they have over on 92nd
Street um they are very much in support
of us creating a traffic signal on the
east side of their
campus with regards to walkability I
think I've read one of the cogs letters
to one of the multif family cases
recently and I think they said that this
use would put butts in restaurant seats
uh and I think that that's what we'll be
doing here with regards to all the
restaurants that surround this property
um will create the walkability to all
the uh surrounding businesses and
employers um what in this change to the
four sale component what it does is
create a starter housing uh opportunity
for folks it creates uh an opportunity
for folks who want to live and own
something in an urban uh neighborhood uh
it creates a retirement opportunity for
folks that want to move from their uh
nearby single family residence to some
this type of uh living engagement also
we have eight live work units that I
think provide a create create a new
opportunity for living in this in this
type of environment um since the
pandemic living and working at home it
seems to be a uh a way to to to operate
and and then they're directly adjacent
to the uh the green belt directly
adjacent to their uh shopping and their
areas to um uh to
work with regards to traffic um I have
several slides on traffic we can get
into that if you have specific questions
but I think what we the description of
the Cross access easements we're
providing for not only the truck traffic
for Sprouts um but for also the U
property to our East it's an unknown
development at this point uh it's not
like most developers to provide an a
free full free full access point for an
unknown development at this point I
don't believe it's going to be any more
residential so it's a it would be a
commercial use through the through our
residential portion but what it does I
think is it takes future traffic for
whatever develop stor East it takes the
truck traffic that has to come South
currently around the the two buildings
that Jeff described are going to be
removed they have to go back up to sha
because they come out to a driveway on
92nd Street that's a t
um what our access does is actually
takes future development uh traffic from
the development to our East and traffic
from the commercial center out to our
traffic signal on 92nd Street and allows
them to utilize other underutilized
roadways in this
area uh the the iteration that you see
in front of you is a three-story
proposal we have a twostory step up from
92nd Street those were shown in the
graphics uh that Jeff showed you uh we
worked uh tremendously with the mcom
Property Owners Association on that
design uh they we have their approval
and um there was a four story component
in some of the previous proposals this
entire development is three stories uh
at this
point water usage I have several uh
slides on water usage but there's been a
lot of comments with regards to this
case on some of the stakeholders that
don't want the apartments and they've
always said well just build office um
and so we did an analysis based on the
square footage of office and water usage
the proposed office and that would be to
our East in this vacant lot and the
proposed residential units and they're
approximately the same with our
reduction in units with this latest
proposal will probably be less usage uh
for water and all the infrastructure is
in and the city's water department uh
says that the uh usage is uh sufficient
we're going to comply with all the
city's Green Building Codes as part of
this proposal um we're at almost 30%
open space um I challenge the architect
to find every bit of open space and
there's still some that are not counted
um but they're approximately 30% open
space where only 10% is required and
finally I just want to go to the public
Outreach slides uh on this
case and so we met with and and have
approval from the McCormack Ranch prop
Owners Association we are uh within
mccormic Ranch the business portion of
that uh they've signed a letter and of
approval they requested that elevated
design for more landscaping and the
stepping of the building along 9 Second
Street and we're doing that that
vehicular connection to the east of that
unknown development was a key component
of their approval and we're complying
with it Scott Ranch Property Owners
Association which is to our East um
they're over here basically uh in this
area east of 92nd Street sorry east of
96th Street south of Shay uh their board
was very appreciative and we met with
them twice um they have a sort of a
Switzerland uh recommendation which is
they like the uh uh the cross access but
they just gave us a neutral
recommendation uh this graphic shows you
everybody we notified there isn't one
single family home that we touch uh the
closest single family home that we uh
that we received on the on your packet
with regards to um stakeholder Outreach
and email would be this neighborhood
here it's just off of 96th Street let me
get my arrow here it's approximately
this location here um that person looks
out onto their street here and then if
they go out to 96 Street they look out
into um single story and two-story
Medical Office Buildings our development
is still over a quarter mile away uh it
won't meet any their sight
lines this just gives you sort of a
summary of all of our Outreach um and
again scottd Ranch uh was supportive in
in meeting with them we met with a local
group of residents which I think I
explained to you in our continuance
meeting that's where we heard basically
uh if you just took this project and and
went back and made it for sale we'd all
be in favor of it um and so that's what
we're doing with this request this
evening with that I have a whole bunch
of benefits that I've sort of gone
through already um they're on the screen
if you have any questions I'd be happy
to answer them but then I'll just
complete my presentation at this
point well thank you at this point we
will um move on to public comment there
are two uh requests to speak one is Lee
kulie and then Ryan AA
mayor Ortega vice mayor Graham council
members my name is Lee kulie I live at
101 42 East fla Drive about Franklin
right in 100th Street three miles from
the Marcato Del Rancho shopping center
which I frequent quite often you'll find
me at Chompy Sprouts McDonald's don't
tell my wife and like you I've been
following this project for many many
years H as a matter of fact I did a
dissertation on it back in May vice
mayor Graham canc member members Janik
and Durham were there my presentation
included some examples of how an earlier
proposal aligned with the voter approved
General plan 2035 just one quick example
in the character and culture section
land use policy 3.2 quote seeks to
integrate housing primarily in mixed use
neighborhoods to support a job slh
housing balance end quote the Marcato
project checks that box and as an added
bonus approving this proposal would
actually double the square footage
adoped an Adaptive re text amendment 3
ta 2024 which could offset some of the
concerns of the Arizona legislature just
saying that aside and most importantly
if honor Health Shay employees are good
enough to be our doctors and our nurses
then by golly they're good enough to be
our neighbors I encourage you to improve
the marato village minor General plan
Amendment and resoning request thank
you thank you Ryan AA
my name's Ryan aita 8682 East turquoise
Avenue I also live a couple uh miles
away from the site my kids go to cois
and Laguna um I'm just following up I'll
keep it short since I also sent out an
email as well um for me when I look at
the project I think that the keys are
walkability when I was driving by on the
way to lagona today I can visualize a
single um or married uh doctor nurse
stff staff member at the hospital being
able to have the walkability and sure
walkability sounds great but let's think
about what's there right now you have
Italiano um you have Starbucks you have
Sprouts obviously creating the
walkability of that true live live work
play for those people is is huge um
living across the highway obviously we
have the big 4,000 foot homes um those
don't fit the demographic of a single or
married um Hospital uh employee or staff
member so I just want you to consider
that as well um other piece of just
demographic information is as I was
looking around there are zero
residential units um adjacent to the
hospital on any side so this would be
the only one there and it seems to me
like that would be a good fit thank
you thank you if U Kurt Jones wants to
uh that would conclude the um uh public
testimony so I will therefore close a
public comment uh in case uh any uh if
you'd like to make any additional
remarks or if there are any questions uh
from C I see council member Durham wish
speak go
ahead thank you mayor um I I've
supported this project in the past I
will be again tonight I'm a little
disappointed that it didn't stay
Apartments I I think Apartments might
have been a better use but um I I
understand the the condo configuration
is has been created to satisfy the
objections of uh some neighbors so um
we've had a lot of conversation on this
project
over uh what do citizens want and what's
best for
Citizens and actually we have a a plan
to follow that um solves that question
um the mayor last night talked quite a
bit about the various failures to pass a
general plan but one of the things that
this council did early uh in its um term
was to get a general plan passed and we
were successful in doing that uh there
were over 1,000 people involved in
creating that plan over a 2-year period
through workshops questionnaires and
other means and then it was uh ratified
by the citizens and so in my view that
General plan
determines what the citizens want to see
in Scottdale and and I feel obligated to
follow it and I've tried to follow it
very carefully uh when I've been on the
council and in my view this plan meets
the General plan uh more than almost any
project we've voted on o over the last
four years um and some of the key things
in the in the general plan are to
revitalize blighted areas and this does
that uh this area is been in bad shape
for many years and this will Redi
Revitalize that area redevelop it and uh
create something new um and next the
general plan says we need a variety of
housing options and this does that and
next it's says we need housing within
walking distance of employment and
services and this one really really I
think is the main uh highlight to this
plan it's across the street from one of
our biggest employers uh in the past
we've had nurses come here and speak in
favor of the plan and and talk about how
it'd be useful to be able to live across
the street from the hospital um so it's
within walk walking distance of a huge
employer and it's within walking
distance of sprouts and Starbucks and
restaurants and Chompies and Barnes and
Noble and Portillo so uh it's a place
where you could almost live without a
car and I suspect there will be some
people in the age of uber Uber and LT uh
who would be able to live here without a
car um next it says we need housing to
accommodate Workforce and lower income
levels uh with a switch to condos it may
not meet that objective as much but at
least it's as Mr Jones said it's more
entrylevel
housing um uh of the type that might
attract those type of people um and it
provides for higher density in your
employment areas so um there's nothing
in the general plan which prohibits this
and to the contrary um it provides for
apartments and higher density housing as
necessary so this passes all the tests
in the general plan
um contrary to the rumors that were
spread earlier uh Sprouts is not going
to go away it's going to stay there all
the other amenities in the shopping
center to the north are going to stay
there and there's no multifam housing in
this immedia area I I think you've said
there's 5 miles away I haven't measured
it but um certainly there's nothing
that's very close
um and I have looked at all the
arguments against the plan and I I I
find that most of them uh I don't think
hold water uh one of my favorite
arguments against the plan is that it
would interfere with
wildli and uh I don't know what Wildlife
it's going to interfere with um I other
than the people who may be living in the
uh in the dilapidated building um it's
not close to
neighborhoods um it's not going to block
anybody's view uh there are already
bigger buildings on our health in
particular in this area um and I think
the one complaint that I've heard that
is one that needs to be seriously
considered is the traffic um I heard a
lot of complaints about collisions so I
looked up the traffic data and at at the
risk of um contradicting uh what Mr
malenko might say about it uh as best I
can understand it um this is not a
dangerous area in terms of
collisions uh the intersection
collisions at Shay in 92nd and
96th are not near the top of the list
and in fact the collisions in those
areas have been declining for the last
last few years um the collisions on
sheay are also lower than might be
expected they're around 27th to 30th uh
on the list of collision hotspots and
kind of ironically uh they're one notch
above 68 Street um which we were told
was so safe that nothing needed to be
done there um
so I I I've I drive this area pretty
regularly
um I go to Barnes and nobl and Chompies
and and uh the bagel store and quite a
few other places in this area and those
two or three blocks between the 101 and
and 96 or so are not fun it's probably
the toughest Drive in Scottdale but um
it doesn't take that long to get through
it and this spot is not going to remain
undeveloped uh some of the alternative
uses would bring more traffic
uh than this I agree with the traffic
studies that uh indicate this is a
workable um a four-story building I
think indicated uh the traffic studies
indicate it would double the traffic of
the Merc Merado project so
um especially considering that this
project is walkable to a variety of
services and employment centers uh I I
think the track is um is going to be
lovable I understand it's it's a
challenge but uh I I think it's U
suitable for the area so I'll be
supporting the project thank you thank
you I show councilwoman Janik
councilwoman Whitehead and then
councilwoman caputi thank you mayor
um I concur with everything that uh
council member Durham has said I know
that for several years there has been
very vocal opposition to it what I like
is that you have responded to that
opposition you have neutralized the
opposition um I'm very impressed with
that by the way I I have not been able
to do that so
um I appreciate that it is ownership I
think that will be a big advantage and
at some point in time in the future it
would be interesting to look back and
say 30% of the ownership are people who
work in the area work at the hospital
just in general I think that would be
good information as Council goes forward
as we try to make these decisions um is
the idea that it's close to a work
center uh that it's walkable um is that
an idea that the community has grasped
so I wish you well with that I wish the
community well because if we got Walkers
we don't have to worry quite as much
about traffic so I will be supporting
this thank you
councilwoman Whitehead and then
councilwoman kutti so I have a question
for the CEO Chris ller and I have a
question for staff I'll start with Steph
uh with this project there's that fourth
floor gy well it does it you can get up
there Chris I'll get to you in a minute
um is the igcc the uh commercial Green
Building Codes automatically uh a
requirement I know they agreed to it but
is that part of this or does it need to
be added as an amendment
mayor Orga um councilwoman Whitehead uh
I don't know the building code side of
it with certainty but my understanding
is our recent uh Green Building
amendments uh from earlier this year
would require that so that we don't need
to specifically stipulate it and I want
to thank the applicant for already
stating that um they plan to you know go
abide by those but okay great uh
question for oh do you want to answer
that as well thank you mayor and
councilwoman Whitehead uh the the
stipulations I think specify and I'm
trying to find them really quickly here
there's a stipulation specific to
um the igcc here it's stipulation number
11 on page two of three of the uh
stipulations and it's it basically says
International green construction code
final construction plan shall
demonstrate compliance with
it okay I appreciate that as long as up
there you the traffic the truck traffic
can you just briefly describe how the
truck traffic works now versus how it'll
work when this is completed yeah thank
you for putting that graphic up so this
graphic is a graphic of of of the green
being folks walking and the black which
is hard to see are the vehicular
movements through the site um right now
a truck that delivers to choies or to uh
Sprouts comes in off of like almost like
a an a service Drive way down the back
and the the docks are facing south so
they have to pass the dock then back
into the dock and then they're facing
south still when they're done um there's
no room to turn around in the back of
those buildings and they go directly
south in and around the existing
buildings out to 92nd Street that 92nd
Street driveway at the South End is a te
driveway it can only go north um back on
92nd Street so what we're providing is
the trucks to now come through our site
to the intersection full full
intersection allows them to head uh
South to the to the fries if they're Del
delivering food the fries down at 90th
Street or or anywhere they don't have to
go back to sha so we're improving that
access point okay great okay I'll move
on to Mr laugher so you know one of the
things that I think a lot of us and a
lot of the residents have been
frustrated with um over the years is
that we're not seeing many Condominiums
built and so I'm very pleased that um
that your team has decided to turn these
into Condominiums can you tell tell me
uh the difference between is there a
cost difference building Condominiums
versus uh Apartments sure uh mayor and
councilwoman Whitehead I we we spent a
lot of time between our last meeting and
today to try to work our way through
that um I think we've got most of it
sorted out um there is about a roughly
20% increase in the construction cost um
but there's also an increase
corresponding increase in the quality of
the units so um I think from a housing
standpoint it'll be a product that the
city of Scottdale will be proud of um
and we uh we're hoping to uh to get it
approved okay thank you that was my only
question so and I want to thank my
colleagues and especially councilman
Durham who just really went through the
general plan and the objectives that we
have and our voters have approved and
how this project meets those objectives
um this project has been difficult for a
number of reasons that um aren
necessarily this team's fault you happen
to be uh adjacent almost adjacent to two
of our largest HOAs and across the way
is uh one of our oldest large lot
communities this Cactus quor so uh
whereas we always get objections for any
development I think this one had a much
more intensive scrutiny because and in
fact all that the ho the two HOA
communities and Cactus quarters are all
kind of mature communities and so this
felt like a big change um the the
objections were um obviously traffic and
councilman Duram mentioned this really
from the 101 East to 90th Street happens
to be one of our most um congested areas
and um
so this current version of the project
and I want to stress this project has
changed dramatically I mean dramatically
is almost an understatement to um to
address the issues that so many in our
community had so um from the traffic
perspective we do have this much needed
traffic light which will get pedestrians
and cars safely across 92nd Street it's
not that busy but boy I would not be
jaywalking that street and also pulls
the truck South to the 101 versus
hitting them onto sheay onto our most
congested little segment so I think
that's really good we just were not
getting in the 2010s and even recently
we were not getting condominium projects
and we know that and as you pointed out
you do get a better product and we do
have a lot of young professionals that
want to own they don't want to just rent
and we do have an abundance of uh
apartments in the pipeline so um that
was a you know that was a big hit to to
you all's ability to profit but it was a
huge investment in our community and I
know that Mr laugher lives nearby has
too many of us um there was the priority
of lower Heights we as councilwoman
Janik often says we're not the kind of
council that likes to set new precedents
when it comes to Heights and in fact
this Council lowered Heights in the
downtown area so that four story was a
precedent we weren't excited exed about
and we also really value our street
views and so uh We've we have this this
particular Council has really adhered to
uh good setback step backs and you guys
have provided that we have a three-story
product with two stories on the main um
roadway um High design standards
adhering to our green building codes
that is super because that means less
Urban heat far less water usage and far
more trees it's going to be
beautiful um there's and of course I
think it's important for the you know
our residents to understand that we are
under threat of a lawsuit by the state
from the state legislature for um not
adhering in in their position right now
that we're not adhering to a recently
passed law that would require us to take
vacant buildings this is a vacant
blighted building that has been vacant
for 10 plus years and allowing it by
right to be apartments and so if that if
they were to pursue and we were and they
prevailed uh by right the site would be
Apartments could be designated as
apartments and then we the city council
lose our ability to negotiate all these
great benefits that that bring a product
that raises the value of our community
so with all of that I just have nothing
but good things to and again I loved how
councilwoman Janik said I mean what
we've come what we've come here tonight
to see is very very little opposition
there's always opposition but a lot of
and I've spent the day on the phone with
various people people that did oppose
this and oppos it for reasons that were
of valid concern supporting it or at
least recogniz ing this is this will be
developed and this is probably a fine
use and so I'm also going to support it
thank
you councilwoman
caputi we do love to talk up here uh
first I just want to thank everyone this
has been an unbelievably long process
we've been working on this for years um
but this is how we make projects better
this council's been working on the
project I think the entire four years
we've been up here which is why we're
making the decision tonight because we
are very familiar with it so as we've
seen uh not all projects get approved
but all projects do get improved through
this rigorous process that we go through
that's our job up here this project has
been improving for years responding to
every concern that everyone has brought
forward this is an incredibly
challenging location I don't think that
that could be stressed enough the
existing buildings here and the vacant
parcel have been that way vacant and
shuttered for 15 years
the existing is commercial and Retail
have failed here so that is not an
option the site is between our two major
employers it's next to a shopping center
it has freeway access and most of it is
already zoned for mixed use multif
family they're only asking for the tiny
portion to match the
rest um it's located in an urban
character type it allows for higher
density residential and it's the only
proposed multif family Within miles and
again it's for sale condos at this point
this is not an apartment project anymore
as we've mentioned it satisfies all the
goals of our general plan it's only
three stories it's less than what's
allowed under the current zoning it is
not in a neighborhood the developers
paying for the traffic light which we
need either
way uh most of the worries that we've
heard I think have been about traffic
but as we've seen this proposal is going
to generate far less traffic than any
alternate um
use and the one thing I also want to
stress that people seem to always forget
is that this is private property
something is going to get built here and
what gets built by right is most likely
going to be far worse this is the
perfect location for lowrise multif
family and as we always ask ourselves if
not this what uh councilwoman Whitehead
pointed out and I'm going to say this
again the state just passed an Adaptive
reuse law in response to this exact
scenario of this poor project that's
been trying to get past for the last two
three four years uh the law is going to
allow residential by right where
commercial has failed this is the
textbook example this area is currently
inside a loophole that more than likely
will be closed in the next session and
at that point the owner can come back
and develop by right without coming
before our Council and our hands will be
tied so I know there are people who
don't want multif family in this
location again it's no it's not
apartments anymore we're looking at
condos um but our fear is that the
alternative is going to be far worse and
we are trying to make sure we get an
excellent project in this location again
a location that has been vacant for 15
years so um last night on Council we
unanimously approved a multif family
project that was all apartments and I
listened to the meeting again today and
I took some notes and and everyone on
the Das gave the same reasons they liked
that it was only three stories they
liked that the units had been reduced
they liked that it was under uh overp
parked that it didn't disturb any nearby
single family neighborhoods and that it
protected retail that nearby residents
rely on I was in my head chuckling
because this project is the exact same
scenario and if you could approve a
project with those reasons then it makes
no sense to me why we would not approve
this project tonight and I am in support
thank
you thank you um I'll go next and then
vice mayor Graham and I will call on uh
councilwoman Littlefield um I just want
to make sure you're there perhaps I
should let you speak yes I am there okay
so uh right after me how does that sound
okay thank you um you know all of the
findings uh have been stated for our
action uh action
tonight as a land use uh from a land use
perspective Transportation circulation
and I just want to cover two areas uh in
particular uh
context and uh really a a business model
and um context is covered in our general
plan uh promoting uh several of the
aspects we talked about walkability uh
access and uh good balance for the
vicinity but I do want to talk about
context as well having to do with
actually three months ago I was at uh
the grand opening for the Italiano
Restaurant and it's right at the uh
North uh end of the uh Sprouts uh uh
Center and there's a multi-million
dollar uh uh Chef Joy did a wonderful
job and it's a tremendous tremendous uh
um investment in the U in the center and
it he's going to be very successful
there um also just minutes ago uh we
approved a liquor license for a uh a
business it's an Asian restaurant uh nii
nio B Asian restaurant so they just that
was uh item number two on our agenda
today so things are moving in terms of
having some investment in those
adjoining properties but the biggest one
I want to point out is that honor Health
again the largest employer in
Scottdale uh um made major expansion to
their maternity Wards they added a lot
of surgical uh expansion with their
surgical Suites and they have a case
coming before Dr board uh it's case I
think
26d uh and it will be a u parking garage
for 460
spaces okay those 466 spaces take care
of both employees and the expansion of
our their health care services I have to
believe that that that includes you know
when you you run an operation 24 hours a
day uh at a hospital that's that's
probably a 100 jobs at least in that uh
in that expansion so that's the context
that we're we're dealing with as we uh
uh look look at this from a um a
leadership role uh generally speaking
generally speaking um housing is a down
zoning a down zoning from a commercial
use okay uh if it's industrial it's
harder to you can't really uh uh that's
considered an up zoning if if zoning
went from residential to to uh uh
commercial or uh PUD that would be an up
zoning so so uh generally speaking uh
again if it were an apartment I I kind
of consider that more of a commercial
use but when it's an owned uh property
then that's that has a different
category in my mind there's different uh
pride of ownership there's a a
sustainability factor for energy water
and um you know uh buy and in the
community so it makes sense to um uh
to approve this project U I believe that
it it is uh an important part of the
puzzle uh I there was comment about the
uh the actions taken by the legislature
and um I would just want to remind
everyone that one of the worst Clauses
in that uh action uh adaptive reuse is
that they do not have to go to Dr board
it's specifically stated that way how do
you like that you could do quanset Huts
they could do anything they wanted they
could do geodesic it's it's it's really
shameful that they attacked our ability
to refine you know uh and and have a
good product and really raise the
expectation that Scottdale has now I
haven't been on Dr board for the last
four years because I'm the mayor and and
it's just Council people but I do have a
suggestion uh as you move forward uh
with this project uh the the building
where you have the parking garage uh uh
access on the North side and and the uh
the backside it has a different
articulation with sort of uh uh nodules
I I think you should just change either
the texture the color for that other
block on the east side so it looks more
like two buildings two separate
buildings uh I think that would help
help uh with the uh um the the again in
the context rather than a long building
with the uh with the same uh color
railing and so forth uh with that uh I
see councilwoman Littlefield will speak
and then vice mayor Graham and we'll
take a motion uh at some point
councilwoman
Littlefield thank you mayor um I
originally was not going to approve this
because I didn't like a number of
different things about it but all of the
things I didn't like have been fixed so
I have changed my vote tonight and I
will be approving this thank
you thank you uh vice mayor
Graham thank you mayor just a few
questions for Jeff
Barnes um the so there's a deed
restriction that's saying it's
condominium is that
correct Mayorga vice mayor Graham uh the
uh the applicant team did record a
private deal
restriction uh to that effect uh we are
not a regulating party for that but they
did uh record that and provide I believe
a copy of that uh earlier so we we
wouldn't enforce that like say that we
approved this and they went through with
it and they decided that condos weren't
working and they they could switch it
back to Apartments we wouldn't enforce
that
correct I don't know uh that I can
provide the full legal answer to that
maybe Sher Scott thank you
Jeff um mayor and vice mayor that's
correct the city would not be enforcing
the private deed
restriction so if they if we approved it
on the promise they promised that it's
there's a deed restriction and they
decided that it wasn't working out like
a neighbor or somebody who would have to
argue they were grieved would have to
file a lawsuit basically is that correct
yes I I I think that's fair to put it
that way why didn't we don't we normally
something like that were you know
because we normally put development
agreements where we can actually enforce
these things did we consider a
development agreement and what was the
reason maybe Jeff um why we didn't
consider that for the condominiums for
enforcement with
that vice mayor Graham uh a development
agreement was generally discussed
uh my understanding from that discussion
is that we still had concerns that the
function of the development agreement
would uh be um in in conflict with the
thing it's trying to regulate being that
that deed
restriction so if they um they build it
and then
um they revert it to Apartments there's
really nothing we can
do um mayor vice mayor
Graham that's correct we wouldn't have
been able to um solve this problem with
the development agreement either um so
and that is why they opted for a private
deed restriction to put that restriction
on the property themselves and so yes
the city would not be a regulatory
entity that would seek to enforce that
private deed restriction if something
were to happen that we found was in
violation of it that would be left up to
the private property owners um thank you
Jeff what are the average unit sizes for
for this um project or average square
foot average square foot per unit I I
may uh have to defer to the applicant on
that since they've been working uh
fairly recently through the the
adjustments um there may be a better
answer from Mr
Jones hi Kurt yes Mr Jones excuse me
mayor um council member Graham so there
there's some unit sizes on the site plan
we're working through those right now um
there's probably going to be more two
bedroom and maybe even some three
bedrooms in there which probably will
lower our unit count in the end um just
because when you switch from apartments
and you go to sell something it's it's
harder to sell a small a smaller box I
guess uh and so that probably our unit
account's actually going to get to
decrease more as we do an analysis uh
through the Dr
process um that's what I was thinking
about because you guys talked about you
know construction quality and you know
condos and how it's different with that
and adjustments that were made um I just
kind of looking it up I mean what I see
is average apartment size 650 to 900
square F feet average condo size you
know more than a th000 square feet are
you think are you going to be able to
you think it's going to be higher I
believe the square footages per unit are
going to be a lot
higher okay you think it will but you're
not sure at this point we have not
interiorly designed this site yet so
that's what we're going to go through in
the Dr
process okay
um you know this project I uh I'm not
comfortable with
um with um the lack of enforceability
for you know
conversion um oh and one other question
maybe I can ask Jeff is there any uh
prohibition on short-term
rals I'm not sure that there would be
anything from the city standpoint in
that these would be dwelling units um
the applicant may also be able to
address whether they're intending
through their own operational
regulations to to do that which would
probably fall better in in their court
but zo you're saying you're not aware of
any prohibition so in theory somebody a
single LLC could own all the units and
shortterm own of the whole
thing to my knowledge yeah okay well
okay well I'm not comfortable with that
either and you know this area we know
but this area is traffic um this area is
unlike any area in the city and that
it's congestion for traffic is uniquely
um high and uh those things just give me
pause for concern
and uh that's where I'll leave it thank
you okay councilwoman caputi and then
councilwoman Littlefield uh sorry whad
excuse me I have to admit I'm a little
bit shocked that councilman Graham wants
the city to overreach to that extent
into the free market and into a private
development agreement and a private
business but um I respect your uh
comments of course I would like to make
a motion to approve the Marcato Village
minor General plan Amendment and
resoning adopt resolution number 13 2 43
approving a minor General plan Amendment
to the Scottsdale General plan 2035
future land use map from commercial to
mix use neighborhoods on two acres of a
6.64 Acre Site adopt ordinance number
4648 approving a zoning District map
Amendment from commercial office planned
Community District to planned unit
development planned Community District
zoning on two acres of the overall 6.64
Acre Site with a development plan on the
entire 6.64 Acres of the overall site
for a mixed use development including
235 dwelling units and
13,142 square feet of co-work and live
workk area adopt resolution number 13244
declaring the document titled Marcato
Village Development plan to be a public
record
second okay we have a motion and a
second uh councilman why did did you I
did want you know we cannot
uh tie the private party's hands um and
I think I'd like to give the applicant
so when an applicant files a deed
restriction or um you know this type of
thing and the applicant is in a public
meeting stating that they are planning
to build a condominium project I think
it is unprofessional but understandable
we always want to we don't want to be
duped but I would like the applicant to
speak to that
um suggestion that they are not going to
perform what was been what has been
promised
today mayor and councilman
Whitehead caliber is a Scottdale
headquartered company they're going to
be here for the long run um everyone in
this applicant team is from Scottdale
we're we put on the record this evening
that we're going to be doing a
condominium project we filed a deed
restriction that specifically states
were going to do so and the development
plan was updated um a week or so ago and
is in your record and that's what the
motion is for that demonstrates that it
says for sale
only thank you for that clarification
one other thing I I believe the state
law on short-term rentals does does not
permit this Council to require um that
type of um condition and this unlike
apartment uh community unities that come
forward often the uh developer does put
a restriction on short-term rentals but
this is a first sale product and these
are people who are buying these condos
so we would be literally telling the 235
owners what they can do which would be a
bit of you know government overreach
however the HOA could in fact decide
that they don't want short-term rentals
that would be the appropriate way to
handle that thank you so much thank
you okay no one else uh wishing to speak
um I would just conclude by saying this
project is where the jobs are it's also
where uh it's very walkable and that's
uh draws me to uh approve this uh uh
please record your
vote Kathy Littlefield
yes okay so the motion carries 6 to one
with vice mayor Graham
desenti um at this point we will go
thank you very much good luck with your
project um and stay tuned um next we
will go to um item uh number 21 actually
21 and 22 will be heard at uh and
presented together uh they uh the
subject is the Fairmont Scottdale
Princess Hotel it's a ground lease
agreement there is an amendment for that
ground lease that's item uh number 22
and then uh item number um 21 is the
Fairmont Scottdale uh Hotel Master Plan
update which is also uh TI they're tied
together and we have our presenter
excuse me Meredith atisso senior planner
thank you Mayorga thank you vice mayor
and council members I'm mayor Tessier
with the planning department the case
before you tonight is 5zn 2015 number
two Fairmont Princess Hotel Master Plan
update the subject site is located just
south of the East Princess Boulevard
with surrounding uses that include state
land to the north you have a holiday um
Hotel and Residences to the East Golf
Course to the South as well as senior
living and um offices to the
West this site is Zone Central Business
Plan Community District which does
support business services such as
restaurants
retail and hotel
uses today the applicants requesting to
amend the previous approved development
plan as well as amended development
standards to accommodate a new 10,000
squ foot restaurant a 35,000 square foot
Conference Center a 155 room hotel as
well as a new rotisserie some of the
site improvements include a new Dell
Lane along East Princess Boulevard as
well as some internal circulation and
most of all a underground parking garage
underneath the new hotel room overall
these site improvements and um new um
scope of work will require a 44% parking
reduction request and approval from city
council just trying to get to the next
slide there we go this um request also
requires an amendment to the previous
approved Amendment um excuse me
development stand standards this
includes an increase in the building
height from 36 ft to 48 ft specifically
to the guest Wing they also updating the
development standards to the parking and
open space requirements to mimic today's
um current code and lastly they're
updating their parking lot and parking
lot landscape Islands to accommodate
special events and that will occur only
in the Palamino parking lot
spaces so that concludes staff's
presentation the applicant Jordan has
prepared a full presentation for you and
of course we're here subsequent to our
presentation for any questions thank
you okay thank you for the tip uh mayor
vice mayor members of the council for
your records I'm Jordan rose with rose
Law Group and thank you for having us
tonight you know Jack Miller the vice
president general manager of the
princess thanks Jack for being here and
Don Leonard and John Davis from light to
house partners um we also have Matt
Cesar from one of the architecture firms
and Michael Colin from another
architect's firm um Jennifer Hall the
senior planner Paul Basha from Summit
land the traffic engineer and George
Finn from my office who's been dealing
with um uh the development agreement and
your attorneys um I'm just going to have
a brief presentation I know we've all
talked about the princess for several
years and we're really excited to be
able to present the final um princess uh
to you tonight
they
are all right Nar give me another hint
now
Okay
no
Okay so the resort as you know is 36
years old and we want to just update it
to remain competitive in the marketplace
which is is a competitive Marketplace um
so the 10,000 foot conference room
expansion also has a 25,000 U square
foot ballroom and I'm going to show you
how that lays out so you all have been
in the Palamino Conference Center before
and you can see this area in yellow will
be the new conference space with the new
ballroom and there will be some
attachment between these so they can all
work together and this new event lawn
which will really allow for Gathering um
indoor outdoor space and um we hope it's
it's it looks like this it's it's
absolutely um going to be
beautiful and Jack is very excited about
it too so you can see his enthusiasm
there um the connection with the old
conference room will um be very helpful
to to how they function um we're also
going to replace the current event tent
with a new guest Wing which is 155 rooms
with 56 underground parking spaces and
you can see the new guest Wing here um
with the underground parking you also I
believe received a letter in support
from the across the street neighbor HOA
today the Maravilla um homeowners um and
uh I think that they have been very
active with us for the last two years in
meeting and some other neighbors have
too and very supportive um probably one
of the reasons they they have a great
relationship with the princess and have
for years but also I suppose they
probably don't mind the fact that the
tent will be gone and then the structure
will be there which is sort of of a
noise buffer um and in addition to that
you can see there's there's there's
gated communities all around this so we
haven't had parking issues in um any of
the past um we also received a letter
from Crownpoint in support the
homeowners association and I think you
saw that in your packet today um we're
recommending the parking report
recommends 1,00 spaces and we're overp
parking that by
1855 and so here's a rendition of the
new guest Wing the architecture is very
similar and thank you Mary Orga over the
last um couple years you've had some
really great suggestions that our
architects who are sitting here have
implemented and we appreciate that and
your leadership on that um the
architecture is very similar to the
current architecture at the at the
princess um and then the thing I'm most
excited about because I really enjoy
Scottsdale's restaurant scene is the new
dining experience along princess Drive
um a really renowned Chef Michael me is
going to do a farm totable Farmhouse
kitchen dining experience and here's
some Renditions of this new Italian
restaurant facing princess Boulevard
that hopefully we can all enjoy in the
near
future and you can see there's a indoor
outdoor element to that too or maybe you
can't but there is yes there you
go and then the rotisserie coffee house
is really an internal to the site um uh
application you can see it's near the
pool and um internal to the site so we
don't expect for outside traffic there
unless there's people who walk by that
want to come into the hotel um but it's
really a cool kind of a floating uh
glass structure um and again we thank
you for your your comments on on the
design of that
structure so I would answer any
questions um and I know that um the
princess has had a strong relationship
with the city for many many decades and
hopes to continue that for many many
more and would invite you all to and I
know many of you have already been there
to CH Christmas at the princess um which
is taking place right now thank you okay
at at this point I do do want to note
that a um city engineer is here as well
and she's part of the presentation for
item
22 uh in terms of the lease and uh other
specifics uh while she's coming up in
case you want to add uh uh to that area
of the
presentation or uh is that split off
entirely into another uh will you
schedule to speak as well for item 22
okay good so what we're going to do is
we're going to get uh now our city
engineer to uh speak to item number
22 uh and I I do want to know note that
U there were no requests to speak so I
will open and close public comment there
appear to be no no speakers U on this uh
these two cases why don't you proceed
with item number 22 okay thank you um
Allison Tim Q city engineer um this is
item 22 the Fairmount Scott sale
Princess Hotel ground lease agreement
Amendment okay so the item is to adopt
resolution number 13297 to authorize
agreement
19862
25-c e1- A5 the Fifth Amendment with fmt
Scottsdale owner LLC for property known
as the Fairmount Scottsdale Princess
allowing for increased Hotel keys and
commercial space so um this item the
lease amendment is basically
necessitated by the zoning case because
um the the Le actually includes the
allowable number of hotel rooms or Keys
as well as the commercial space so when
that's increased then the lease then
needs to be
amended okay this um just depicts the uh
the land area of the resort itself um
the area in blue is actually the
city-owned parcel parcels and then the
areas in red are um the fmt owned
parcels
um it's important to note that back in
1985 when um the original lease uh we
entered into the original 99e ground
lease with um with fmt for the resort um
in in the previous years uh fmt had
acquired some additional Parcels as seen
here originally it was just a ground
lease with the city um we have gone
through four different amendments every
time that the resort has been basically
improved or
expanded and the key points of the Fifth
Amendment um the first one is first were
again necessitated by the zoning case
were increasing the allowable number of
units and square footage of commercial
spaces to match the increased units in
square footage in the zoning case that
you just heard um we also did some
clarification to some of the language um
specifically regarding how the annual
rent is calculated it's 2% % of the
revenue from the portions of the resort
that are both on the city-owned portion
as well as the privately owned portion
um we also corrected some legal
descriptions and depictions for both the
city and the total resort property to
more clearly Define these areas these
legal descriptions dated back to 1986
and were just sort of some line diagrams
um we also clarified language that
addresses maintenance and long-term use
for three buildings that um are
basically encroaching improvements that
are built over the property line and
then we also updated insurance
requirements to match current Insurance
Market practices and to increase the
liability Cur um liability coverage from
5 million to 10
million and that summarizes the
amendment thank
you thank you so I I do want to note
that there are different uh resolutions
for each uh for item um 21 and 22 um
however um we're open to U well at this
point uh I have councilwoman Janik and
council member Durham uh wishing to
speak and then vice mayor
Graham thank you mayor um just some
comments first of all I'm real happy to
see that you are going to be having
underground parking I think that's going
to enhance the appearance of the
princess not that it's not wonderful the
way it is but with the expansion I think
that's a really nice um feature uh the
other thing is I really really want to
thank Jack for the vibrancy he brings to
the city of Scottdale we love it thank
you so
much thank you and council member
Durham thank you mayor first I had a
question for
Allison um when when you say that's
gross when you say it's Revenue 2%
revenue is that net or gross or how do
we calc calculate
that uh council member durman's gross
revenue okay thank you um my second is a
question for um uh Jordan Rose about the
parking
um in your
presentation you you emphasized that
most of the conference space is uh used
by people who are staying at the at the
hotel and I'm certain that's true most
of the time but I think most of us have
been to events there where the parking
gets pretty
crowded especially uh especially leaving
and looking at the map it's a little bit
hard to follow but you know currently
there's a big parking lot that's east of
the Palamino um conference area is that
going to stay or is that going to go it
I don't I don't see a parking lot there
anymore and I'm just trying to figure
out what the what the arrangement
is Mayor and councilman Durham um yes
that is now almost a fully built parking
garage so you're right it is not there
yet um it is not there anymore the the
um empty lot uh but the parking garage
is replacing it and that was approved by
the design review board okay months ago
so yes so that that that parking lot
East no I'm sorry west of the Palamino I
get my directions let me uh yes uh
councilman let me make sure I I'll go
through this uh some of the parking
questions so we're replacing I me West
okay uh yes I think I have let me let me
show you these slides and see this ANS
your question um we're replacing the
1,638 uh surface parking lots with this
parking uh structure which is a which is
going to contribute to the
1855 and we went out just to look at
what the parking situation is um I'm not
saying it's right now where Christmas at
the princess at this exact moment is
going on but but earlier in the day this
last week we went to visit and you can
see the emptiness of these Lots um you
may in fact be talking about either the
Northeast lot the southeast lot um you
may be talking about the Southwest lot
also very empty or the the main lot is
more full the north lot is entirely
empty the I I think I'm talking about
the main lot is that the one that's uh
immediately west of the current
Conference Center
yes okay yes so this is the main lot and
this will be supplemented then with um
the new parking okay and so is that lot
going to remain the main
lot a portion of it yes let me show you
a a schematic here hopefully yeah I I
it's a big property and it's kind of
hard to that it is to get
aligned um
sorry slide 13 oh okay well we're at
about slide 100 but it's at 13 okay here
we go let's
see
yeah because that the reason I'm asking
this is because the new Conference
Center what you've got marked is the new
Conference Center would seem to be
replacing that that main lot to the stay
stay on that uh yeah that picture
showing the event lawn yeah for instance
the event lawn excuse me could have uh
been eliminated but they provided an
event
lawn part of the leave it leave it there
for a okay yes this should explain it
turn to the slide previously that showed
the event
lawn yeah that um okay so yeah this is
the yeah this is the one change so more
parking could have been conserved if
that event lawn uh uh if the if the new
building was squeezed towards Palamino
but they're not they're giving it
breathing room with an event the event
lawn gets rid of some of the parking you
see that uh I didn't it's in between the
the new build and Palo right there's a
green area called okay is this on this
one is North is to the top of the
correct but isn't isn't the main parking
lot that we usually use for the Palamino
isn't that to the west of the Palamino
room this that North one Prince's Drive
is at the North with that circular uh
got my directions confused I think Tom
it's just right here this thing yeah
North is up um princess Drive is along
the north and so when you come into the
hotel now you'll see this new parking
garage will supplement that um area that
was lost if that makes sense okay I I
think I see it now I've got my direction
I had my direction screwed up before but
so the event line and the new Conference
Center are going to take up part of that
parking lot
right councilman Durham yes but the the
parking garage will supplement those
spaces and and where's that parking
garage going to be um it is just uh do
you see the gray um I don't know how to
make a pointer on this um is it it says
it says a,1
100,0 what do I do the mouse oh
brilliant okay it's the mouse of course
it's a m um so here do you see where my
my mouth yeah I I see it now I see it
now okay thank you Meredith for your
Tech help okay that that that helps to
understand yes thank
you but
and so as they say that that parking lot
already is often filled for at the
Palamino with the additional conference
space that's in the new
yellow uh box there you think that
that's going to be enough with the new
parking garage for all of that new
conference space because you do have
many events I mean many events you have
attract
Outsiders but you do have quite a few
events that attract a lot of people here
from Scottdale who drive you I because
i' I've been to many of them over the
last four
years and it it gets a little crowded so
there is a multi-level working garage
there yeah so it's going from the
surface use to
multi and chances are people would
probably pull toward into that parking
garage once it's built that's true yeah
anything else no no thank you thank you
Vice thank you for the
clarifications Jordan
um thank you for the presentation the um
what would be under the current parking
code so we're going to add basically
we're going to fill in where that bright
yellow is that's going to be new
build what would be the number of spots
required under the parking code uh
3,234 and our reduction is very similar
to the reduction that the four seasons
has at 44% at 42% we're asking for a 44%
see that's right there I mean the fact
that there's comparison to somebody else
we're just talking about precedence you
know that's what makes these tough for
me
because you know like my colleague just
talked about parking lots you know it's
not for yes it's for everyday use but
it's also for like the most use and like
we all think about you know Christmas at
the
princess and we all know just how can
how busy it is and it's because you guys
are so successful I get it everyone
wants to be
there um do you
um how confident are you
that the new parking
garage is going to meet the needs of
those big events those those those
because I mean how long does Princess
Christmas event go for several weeks
correct five weeks so we're not talking
about like a week end a year we're
talking about you know 9% of the Year 8%
of the year plus we have I know you guys
have more events than that there's I
mean it's just a hot place I get it um
how confident are you that it's going to
be able to meet the demands of
those M Mr Miller maybe you you you kind
of seem to be uh suggesting maybe you
want to respond to this mayor and vice
mayor if if Jack wants to come up and
talk about it that's great I would say
we're incredibly confident um they have
been operating this hotel for 36 years
they don't have any parking problems um
that is I think um uh also supported by
the fact that we don't have any
neighbors in opposition and those people
that you know places that have parking
problems have neighbors that are really
really not happy um and we just don't
have that so we feel very confident and
in fact only 27% of the resort guests
today have cars isn't that interesting
and that's how this particular Resort op
operates they have buses that pick up
you know tours um or conference goers at
the airport or they Uber there or they
ride share or whatever it is and only 8%
of conference users do not stay at the
hotel so I know we've all been to Mayor
State of the State there and those kinds
of activities but those are very rare
compared to what the you know day-to-day
operation of the princess is with people
who just don't drive and the last thing
we need to do is overbuild
parking well well I mean depends on the
area of the city we're talking about yes
indeed so that's here in North are
specific beauti the how many rooms are
we adding again hotel
rooms 10 and something 155 okay um I
really don't like the parking reduction
I wish you were requesting like 20% 15%
25% 40 something perc that's kind of
getting up there um however the um I
kind of see that as a demerit for this
application but I do appreciate the
investment and the expansion of what's
going in there and also the increased
rooms increase keys I like that and you
know the additional restaurant you know
hey I wish if were up to me I I would
have asked you very kindly to add
another level to the parking garage
maybe you'll consider that at some point
in the future but um I will support it
uh but those are just some of
considerations that I have wanted to ask
Alice and Tim Q real quick one question
about that sorry to haul you back up
there um that
2% um Arrangement that we have that that
2% has been that that that's been the
number since the beginning of the lease
correct that's correct okay and uh does
that have any like um like brackets
where it goes down after after he hits
certain points or anything like that or
is it just a flat 2% it's flat 2%
there's no ceiling or anything like that
are there any addb backs to it or net or
any netting to
it no it's just based on the gross
revenue 2% okay gross revenue as defined
by Accounting Standards correct yeah
okay well those are my comments and my
questions so thank you thank you Mr
Miller I know you were considering
answering some questions but I think we
got them resolved you I I appreciate you
very your alacrity your your cheerful
Readiness I appreciate it and I'm glad
you're here so thank you mayor okay
councilwoman caputi councilwoman
Whitehead and council member Durham
proceed I'm very comfortable with the
reduction in the parking we've actually
seen a couple of projects in the last
month or so that have had almost this
exact same scenario our parking
ordinance for some weird reason requires
additional parking for each use so a
person would be at a hotel and we
require additional parking if they go to
the Coffee Roastery and then they go to
uh the restaurant and then they um use
some other part of you know another
amenity at the facility and it that's
just not realistic we certainly wouldn't
want to build to the absolute extreme
like that and have thousands and
thousands of extra parking spots with
hot asphalt that just seems absolutely
ridiculous as again we've seen these
cases over and over and I would actually
push back and say that I wish we could
revisit our parking ordinance because I
think we are grossly overp parked
especially in a hotel in North Scott
still like this the hotel has been there
for 36 years I've been there in the
height of the summer I've been you know
during a station I've been there in the
busiest of times I've been there for
City events I have never not been able
to find a parking spot and I really
highly doubt that Jack would want the
hotel to be in a situation in which
people wouldn't be able to park and get
frustrated it's just highly unlikely so
again I'm completely comfortable and and
it would be my desire to to change our
parking ordinance I I feel really bad
that I can't work on that but uh I'm
very happy to approve this is someone
going to do a motion or are we going to
have more SP
speakers I I uh I would move to approve
item number 21 Fairmont scotdale
Princess Hotel Master Plan update adopt
ordinance number 56 4659 approving a
zoning District map amendment to amend
the previously approved development plan
including amended development standards
an increase in the number of hotel guest
rooms and a parking reduction for a 66
acre property with planned Community
District zoning with Central business
district as the comparable zoning
district and adopt resolution number
13305 declaring the document titled
Fairmont Scottsdale Princess development
plan to be a public record
second we have a motion in a second any
uh further
discussion I'll speak to a second okay I
did you want to speak to your a second
yes
sorry go ahead okay oh okay Council
whiteed go ahead okay I'll I'll speak
real quick first of all I am so excited
there's nothing like a big expansion to
um show the confidence in uh Scottdale
and our current economy and and nothing
bolstering our future Prosperity so I
could not be more excited I do want to
speak to the parking thing four of us
with the exclusion of uh vice mayor
Graham did do this bill uh this parking
code and I would second the notion that
we need to the Future Council which I'll
be part of does need to look at the
hotel parking component we were very uh
cognizant of protecting public parking
from like a private apartment complex
but this is our third hotel that has
come to us and asked for a reduction in
parking in a situation that absolutely
the only entity that could possibly be
hurt by the reduction in parking is the
applicant the hotel so this is not a
situation just like the other two hotels
where if they
reduce the parking and no neighborhood
will be impacted nobody will be impacted
so and also I'm always opposed to
government overreach in a place we have
no business being which is telling a
hotel how much parking they need when
they're coming to us and saying we'd
rather have tax um produce tax dollars
and have more rooms and more conference
space so that's clearly what we're doing
here so uh again I second to this I'm
super excited appreciate all of you
being here thank you
council member Durham and myself thank
you mayor I just had a quick question I
I've been looking through this I'm
trying to find a a bottom line number of
how many net parking spaces are being
created or how many are being
reduced um does does anybody sort of
have that what the there was a slide on
that the gross number I think was
1655 or so and the net with the
Improvement is
1800 uh I think 10 so there's
a yeah if you want the number it's shown
on a slide and it it the net is an
increase I think of what 200 spaces so
it's a 217 so they've added more spaces
so it's a net increase around 217 okay
but of course the gross square footage
has increased right right yeah okay that
thank you that's the number I was
looking for okay um okay well um I will
support uh the motion and remind people
that we were talking about the land
lease only at uh at 2% of the gross
there's still room tax and sales tax and
a lot of other good things uh the main
comment I have is the equalizer on this
okay when you have peak time you have
repeat loyal U uh guests which is pretty
amazing and they tell me that that uh
they've come here for years and they'll
continue to come so the the real
equalizer in all this is really the
courtesy and TLC that you provide there
at the princess you're famous for that
and I can say that because yeah it gets
crowded but you've got uh people uh
valet hustling all over the place
they're finding the car they getting it
back to me and Mar guest I mean it it is
uh buzzing with activity and that's a
good thing uh you tend to have Allin by
your by your employees I think that that
special courtesy in TLC pays off and I
think that's why you're successful and
why you're growing on success uh please
record your
vote Yes okay we are unanimous that was
uh councilwoman Littlefield a voice I
heard so 70 now we will vot uh vote go
on to item number 20 two which is the um
U ground lease agreement and that
resolution with that I will um move for
approval to adopt resolution number
13297 uh as listed item number 22
agreement on um case number
1986-2015 excuse me A5 the Fifth
Amendment to the uh fmt Scottdale owner
LLC for the property known as Fairmont
princess allowing for an increased Hotel
keys and commercial space and uh
therefore um um allowing the city
manager to prepare those documents for
my signature as soon as possible second
okay we have the motion a second any uh
discussion okay please record your vote
Kathy Littlefield yes so we are
unanimous as um 7 to1 congratulations
we'll look for improvements as we move
forward um since thank you very much
congratulations and um since councilman
Littlefield is on board I want to
revisit with uh you councilwoman uh we
had a motion in a second for the um uh
cons agenda items uh 1 through 19 and uh
at that time we broke off Communications
with you so do you have a vote on item
consent agenda items U Move for approval
item
1-9 how do you
vote Yes mayor thank you I vote yes
thank you so we are unanimous in that
respect and that closes that item um at
at this point we are moving on to to the
possibility of public comment a second
opportunity for the public to step
forward mayor we have another item oh
I'm sorry that's right we have one more
item a little anxious there item number
23 which is the uh fiscal year 2023 24
Financial audit as presented um and by
an independent
auditor and of course we have our
treasur available as well please proceed
a mayor Ortega vice mayor Graham members
of the city council thanks so much for
having me here tonight um I think we're
bringing up a presentation for
you
maybe yeah we had just uh Sonia's
presentation was up she will be giving a
much more indepth uh presentation on the
financial results of the city after this
um did you have anything you wanted to
say Le before I started yes thank you
mayor TGA members of council I'll just
do a brief introduction and then I'll
hand it over to Britney to go over the
financial audit results ex um can you
move it to the next Slide by any chance
sure thank you there we go by City
Charter the council designates an
external CPA firm to perform an
independent audit of the city's
financial statements our office manages
the contract for the CPA firm and the
city Treasures Office um actually puts
together the fin reports that are in
your
packet the fiscal year 2023 24 Financial
audit reports were presented to the
audit committee at its November 18th
meeting and the committee voted
unanimously to recommend the full to the
full city council the acceptance of
those
reports and with that um I will turn it
over to Britney to go over the results
and then afterwards uh we'll have a
second item for the council to um
consider uh regarding a compliance item
thank you
thanks Le uh as Le mentioned my name is
Britney Williams I work with heinfeld
meeching company we're a audit firm here
in Scottdale and I'm the audit partner
for the city of Scottsdale audits um so
with that H like she mentioned we met
with City uh with the audit committee
already and kind of went over all of the
results in depth and answered some
questions but I'll give you a brief
overview of what we have uh issued so
far and leave it up for any questions
you might have we did is issue
independent Auditors reports on the
annual comprehensive financial report
which is the big the big financial
statements as well as Auditors reports
on five component units four of those
being the cfds and also the municipal
property Corporation all of those audit
opinions were considered unmodified
which means they're a clean audit
opinion also um as part of the audit I
always issue a communication to govern
governance which goes directly to all of
the audit committee members and
management it talks about key points
such as accounting practices uh any
significant estimates that might have
been made in the financial statements by
management any audit adjustments or past
audit adjustments ones that management
elected not to book for materiality
purposes there was one this year for OPB
Health assets and any other similar
items such as if we encountered any
difficulties during the audit or
disagreements with management we didn't
have any of those problems at
all this is a great synopsis page we so
in addition to issuing our Auditors
reports on all of those other reports we
do the single audit report as well for
the city which audits the um federal
grants that have been spent during the
year and this is kind of a summary page
of all the results of our audit here
that is very helpful to look at
basically what it says is for the
financial state ments we didn't have any
um really big findings that would have
been considered significant deficiencies
or material weaknesses and the same held
true for the federal awards that we
tested as well um it also indicates
which federal programs we tested for the
current year which was the cdbg
entitlement special purpose grants
cluster as well as the housing voucher
cluster this is uh housing is pretty
sick of seeing us we're there every year
right now and a a great thing to say is
that last year while housing had
experienced some findings in the prior
year they have cleared all of those up
they had no findings this year
everything looked really great so
they're doing a great job over
there let's see um we have a couple of
letters in the single audit report one
of them is a report on compliance for
each major federal program report on
internal control over compliance and
Report over those Federal Awards and
everything looked really good as I
mentioned the total um amount of federal
awards that were spent by the city this
year was about $15.5
million we also issue a report on your
state funding that Highway user Revenue
fund money that comes in to be spent on
on streets and highways um and that is a
state auditor or not it's not an
Auditor's report it's an accountants
report and that was issued as well and
it looked really good everything was
clean there we do some test work over
some of the expenditures from the herf
fund we do have a few reports that are
still going to be completed here in uh
in 2025 that includes the annual
expenditure limitation report of the
city the HUD reac report and
Associated uh schedules that go with
that as well as the MPC 990 Federal
filing so those those are still on the
docket they're still out there waiting
to be issued um before I hand it back
over to lay to talk about the compliance
uh piece here I just want to extend my
appreciation uh to the audit committee
um to Sonia the city treasurer Anna and
Sarah are here in finance they do an
exceptional job uh with the ACF for it's
always the first one that I receive for
the whole year um for the December 31st
filing deadline and it it always looks
really really good so I just want to let
you know they're doing a great
job well thank you um at this point I
would mentioned we have an opportunity
for public comment there being uh no
request I will close public comment and
uh move on if the council has any uh
question or um I'm prepared for a
motion uh vice mayor Graham um I'll make
a motion if if there if if there are no
additional comments or
questions uh I will move to um
accept the FY 2324 annual Financial
audit report submitted by the city's
external Auditors heinfeld meeno and
accept the staff report of compliance
with ARs 411
1494
second we have a motion is that
satisfactory very
good okay uh that is correct as to form
uh please record your
vote Cassy little F
yes so we are unanimous thank you very
much you
70 um next we will move on in our
regular agenda uh uh requesting public
comment second opportunity for public to
come forward I open and close public
comment there were no requests to speak
moving on to Citizen petition as per our
Charter uh there were no uh citizen
petitions presented therefore I will
close item number 20 24 uh at this point
we were we have uh concluded our regular
agenda and we will move into the work
study uh work study is a um less formal
setting for the mayor and Council to
discuss specific topics with each other
and City staff and provide staff an
opportunity to receive direction from
the council to provide the an
opportunity for public input we all also
provide for up to five speakers to
comment uh and I am told that there was
uh there are no requests from the public
to speak therefore I will open and close
uh public comment on our work study item
at this point we're proceeding with a
presentation by our city treasurer Sonia
Andrews on the fiscal year uh and that's
2023 24 Financial report good to see you
evening thank you mayor thank you
Council I know you're all tired so I'll
try to keep this short but I have some
pretty important things to share with
you next
slide so just to start out our fiscal
year end is June 30th and our yearend
process includes closing out books
preparing for the audit going through
the audit and as you heard from Britney
presenting to the audit committee and
finally tonight's presentation to
Council next slide first of all I'd like
to recognize and thank the accounting
team led by Anna hanthorne and Sarah
dado for their hard work and amazing
accomplishments we will be submitting
this report for the gfoa financial
reporting award again this year next
slide so for my presentation I will be
highlighting numbers from the audited
financial report I'll also go over some
key metrics on the city's Financial
Health and also report on our compliance
with the state expenditure limitation
next slide sor next
slide so our fiscal yearend balance
sheet which is the state uh statement on
our financial position shows that our
total assets increased while our total
liabilities decreased from the prior
year so that's that's a good thing when
we have assets increasing and
liabilities decreasing the increase in
our assets is due to an increase in our
cash position an increase in our Capital
assets while on the liability side we
paid down pension liabilities and
outstanding debt
we're going to dive into more details on
these balances in the next slides next
next
slide so the increase in our cash and
Investments is due to the increase in
cash in our various funds as shown on
this slide so I'm not going to go over
each one of them but the largest
increases are the funds accumulated for
our capital projects and also to pay
down our
liabilities next slide our Capital
assets total over 6.6 6 billion and
consists mostly of the land that we own
water sewer systems our streets and
storm drains and our buildings so with
all these assets and annual depreciation
of 179 million we have to be mindful of
maintaining and repairing and keeping up
with these investments in these assets
that we have next slide our total debt
outstanding at June 30th is 722 million
made up of this different debt that is
shown on this slide side so the city you
know with 6.6 billion in assets we only
have 722 million of debt remaining
that's a very good position that we're
in all of the debt have specific
dedicated funding
sources and aside from debt the other
significant liability on our books is
our pension liability next slide our
pension liability is made up of
non-public safety pension which is the
asrs pension for our non-public safety
personnel and also our Public Safety
pension which is the
psprs and as you can see it's I'm sorry
as you can see it's gone down a little
bit and we've been actively paying down
our psprs
liability next
slide as far as our revenues and
expenditures for fiscal year 24 they
came in as expected this chart shows our
general fund and other non-enterprise
fund revenue and
expenditures next slide our Enterprise
funds which are our water sewer
operations solid waste and Airport
revenues expenditures are were also as
expected next slide so now I move on to
the exciting part talking about the
city's fiscal Health next
Slide the city's finances are very
healthy we maintain a AAA Bond rating
but I want to talk about how we assess
the Financial Health we look at a lot of
things and I'm just going to highlight a
few key metrics that we look at as well
as the bond rating agenc look at the key
metrics one of the key metrics is our
fund balance and our liquidity to stay
financially healthy and maintain our AAA
Bond rating we have to maintain a strong
fund balance and liquidity position
given our strong Revenue growth in the
last few years we have a very strong
fund balance and
liquidity next slide another key metric
to stay financially he healthy is strong
Revenue growth since the pandemic our
Revenue growth has been extraordinarily
high due to the pandemic stimulus
spending and high inflation the strong
Revenue growth is one of the reasons our
fund balance and liquidity has been very
healthy however starting in 2025 we
expect to see a reduction in our Revenue
primarily from the uh elimination of the
residential rental sales tax and also
the state shared income tax reductions
we also expect our sales tax tax growth
to slow um and not be as robust as the
last 3 years so next slide so this chart
looks at what our year-over-year sales
tax growth has been on the leftand side
you see that before the pandemic our
year-over-year sales tax growth averaged
less than
5% before the pandemic then in 2021 with
the pandemic stimulus spending and high
inflation our sales tax revenue grew by
11% and continued to grow by another
21.3% and then
99.7% in 2023 we knew this growth was
not sustainable so in 2024 the year that
we just closed our books on we ended
that year with a decrease in the
year-over-year growth as we expected so
with the loss in residential rental
sales tax and the eventual slowdown in
consumer spending we may see a much
smaller growth moving forward we will
continue to monitor this and manage our
budget
accordingly next slide another metric we
look at to assess all Financial Health
is the level of debt we have we have
maintained very manageable debt levels
as you can see from this chart of our
debt per capita it's actually very low
however we still have about 190 million
of bond 2019 debt to issue so we expect
this metric will Trend up a little as we
issue the remainder of that
debt next slide and the last metric I'd
like to share with you is the level of
our pension liability the level of
pension liability is a very critical
measure for our bond rating agencies and
can affect our bond rating this chart
shows that our psprs liability for
Public Safety levels over the last five
years we have been actively um paying
down this liability because it is the
most most expensive debt for the city
and we still have more pay down to do
other cities in the valley have also
been paying down their psprs liability
next slide here's a comparison of the
total psprs liability among cities in
the valley that is of similar size to us
as you can see we're a little bit behind
in paying down the liability so we will
be recommending additional pay down
through our upcoming budget process
so now I'm going to next slide so now I
I'm going to switch to reporting on the
compliance of our state imposed
expenditure limitation the state imposed
expenditure limitation is the maximum
limit that we can spend on our operating
expenditures um the limitation is
calculated by the state with annual
population and inflation adjustments and
the recent voter approved increase for
our expenditure limitation which was
prop 491 will not be effective until
fiscal year
2526 next slide so for fiscal year 24 we
are at 94% of our expenditure
limitation and with that I can answer
any
questions thank you um I'll lead off I
CED in first and then Council woman
janic you know first of all I want to
point out that U uh our item 23 was the
independent audit and not only did it uh
show that we were sparkling clean and um
it was um accepted by our Council just
minutes ago uh but it's really a strong
Testament to um the performance of the
city and your office um the second thing
I want to mention is that audit also
looked into uh as well as the audit
committee uh looked into expenses
including uh several uh which sometimes
make the headlines uh for instance the
Pima Road um expansion and drainage
solution and then the Scotsdale Road uh
one which was recently issued
um the point I'm making here is both the
Puma Road I believe that project was in
excess of $30
million uh that it was um actually paid
7
71% by the county funds and other funds
through our drainage uh contributions as
a city uh so we remained within our
budget on that project another one to
point out is the uh two plus miles of
Scottdale Road including the
intersection of dynamite uh once again
that project uh we had funded originally
apparently six years ago an estimate of
about $13
million uh by the time we got through
covid and everything it uh was um shown
to be 43 million with an expanded scope
however once again the um uh the state
uh Revenue funding um I'm sorry the
federal funding covered over $30 million
of that cost so our outof pocket as a
very diligent uh financially sound city
was not not $43 million it was uh as
originally estimated conceptually uh it
was actually uh it was estimated at 13
million and in fact our contribution is
less than $13 million uh because of
federal funding so that's a very wise
and prudent uh manner to operate our our
city um another example of course is the
um U the fire um uh Fire Department
Academy building and um again uh where
estimates may have been uh obsolete or
underestimated scope changes uh the um
project uh ended up I believe costing
somewhere around $20 million it might
have been estimated at
10 however we had uh general fund uh
make up for the uh balance and so what
we're basically doing is taking cash
from one side of the B balance in
general funds to supplement the the bond
2019 and then we result on the asset
side is a $20 million asset so my belief
is that we went from you know uh we
actually supplemented I think 10 million
from general fund plus 20 uh plus 10 of
the bond fund uh to result in a $20
million asset that's not a loss of $10
million the we go from one side of the
ledger to the other side of the Ledger
um I also believe that the uh Bond 2019
funds uh were would be released uh you
know as as bonds whereas we had cash I
believe from general fund uh through
very scrupulous handling of our balance
sheet to actually avoid uh to pay cash
to to make up the difference on that
very essential uh project uh you know
that project will open soon it's a very
um necessary part of our infrastructure
and it will keep the fire department
safe and well trained with the police
department and so that they can in turn
save lives uh so that's that's how
Scotsdale again sometimes headlines get
blown out of proportion when in fact we
end up with a um uh let's let's look at
Puma Road an asset over $30 million that
uh Scottdale only paid a fraction of
that and that's because of the county
funds uh the other part of that of
course is with the federal fund
contribution and we all pay tons of
federal taxes we have a wonderful asset
really under our control in in in
Scottdale once that um uh two and a half
mile stretch of Scottdale Road gets
completed um the the other so that's
that's how I see the big picture in uh
strong governance um on on uh your
office's part and on on our council's
part uh the other thing that you have
mentioned is that the um uh success of
prop
491 again there were opponents that were
fighting that and uh and U the public uh
voted that uh for that um
overwhelmingly uh because we had to
update that algorithm rthm that was set
back in 1980 right and that's just uh
common governance well with that uh we
were really trapped on the
psprs uh uh pay down and we were all
aware of it we saw the presentations uh
during co uh we made a a pretty strong
payment I think it was close to 4 or $45
million why because the the federal
government uh was uh putting out
Millions tens of millions of dollars to
municipalities and that uh uh freed our
balance a bit so that we had enough of a
a margin to pay that down of course once
everything resumed uh and those Federal
monies went away uh the FED spent over
$4
trillion in subsidizing Municipal and
state operations and uh with that we
were now um uh with the passage of of
prop 491 that was one of the most comp
competent things we could have done and
we as was accomplished by by our um by
our Council we unanimously set up a
policy there was no policy for review of
that so at least and that was by the way
unanimous by our Council we said hey we
need need to have a policy so that we
can uh look ahead in case we get too
close to the red line on on expenditure
um at the same time I think your
predictions about the cooling off of the
federal uh stimulus monies is come to
pass and U of course there's this other
erosion uh by the state for our Revenue
share and our um rental tax so all of
those were um part of the job of of the
audit audit uh Committee of council as
well as you know our oversight was to
look ahead and and have that warning uh
it's a big win that we got the U prop
490 passed as well uh for those um um
needs that were uh unfunded and uh our
outdoor spaces and then a big win with
uh uh prop 491 to allow us to um pay
down that debt uh many people um may not
be aware that any uh of pension debt
acrs at a
7% U um rate so the state the fund
charges us 7% for every balance we carry
and by by paying that off uh or paying
it down we essentially you know if we
put uh um 20 million in uh then you know
we we save 1.4 million on the uh on the
interest charge so it's it's pretty
significant ific as we move forward I
will say and I know um uh our I have
nobody's called on city manager this
entire time and you worked very closely
uh Jim I want to commend you on that
with the Treasures Office uh we saw I
was with you too when we saw that
lawsuit question regarding the uh uh
State being sued or um payment on
property taxes and that hit us for $1
million we were sitting together when we
got that notice and it was a shock
because the county hadn't done their
work their job and we we were held
liable for that so in spite of all those
conditions uh I do expect you to I I
want to call on you Jim because uh just
to say hello and how you feel our
general revenues are and the performance
as a city from your experience
yeah thank you Mr Mayor members of
council I I think financially we're
we're in a great place if if you recall
you know we we through this process we
went from a 10% Reserve now we hold 25
plus 5 so we're at 30 you know our our
bound rating strong um I look back at my
past when I arrived we had just over 30
million in fund balance now we're well
over 200 million fund balance that
allowed us to buy down during the period
of of the pandemic buy down pens iions
and other things that number was about
88 89 million when I got here on the
police side um some would argue that
wasn't the liability but it but it in
fact is because we were paying 100% of
what we were being build but keep in
mind if you're paying 100% of what
you're being build and at the time it
was about
41% per dollar that an officer earns we
had to pay 41% of that which 40 41 cents
on every dollar into the pension plan
we're now over 50 but if we hadn't
bought down the 45 million and then on
fire that one year we would probably be
up in the 65 cents. 70 cents and so some
of the other cities are up almost a
dollar for dollar and so we're actually
paying it down with funds that we've
built into the budget process said no to
certain things and otherwise and built
up the fund balance one for the rainy
day the other reason I think we've done
an amazing job is when we did see the
effects of the pandemic afterwards and
we had issue bonds before right or had
approval to go out and issue debt to
build projects we've seen this crazy
escalation in prices and we sat in this
room we've had those talks and
everything else but really we were able
to go and complete those projects very
few cities cities that had bonding
Authority did not issue debt nor did nor
did they complete the projects to the
dismay of their residents because of
that increases we were fortunate enough
to have the ability to do that um
capital projects treated a little bit
different than maybe on the on the
expenditure uh limitation side so
getting 491 past you're 100% correct
mayor it allows us to continue to do the
things that are necessary to deliver the
services that our residents desire and
in some cases demand of us and so um
Scott sale is very fortunate in that
Avenue I think our revenues will see a
little bit of dip because we had those
other various revenues coming in but but
we're solid and and when you look at
tonight this evening um the the
improvements being done out there at the
princess and others that we have seen
come forward that that creates more
Synergy that brings more people to town
and if you look at our numbers on
tourism we continue to go up it's it's
not going down you're up over 12 million
now we were at about nine when I arrived
and that was just eight years ago so
that that's a substantial growth almost
25% growth in your tourism and they're
spending more than what they
traditionally did you also then look we
had a bunch of closures of malls in the
region we're the last one standing that
indoor mall that there's one down in
Chandler but but the Paradise Valley
Mall closed the Mesa Mall Clos there's
malls that closed so around shopping
time this holiday season you go to you
go to Fashion Square One of the last
standing indoor mall it is packed on the
weekends you can it's it's hard to get
in there and walk so I think we're in
great shape yeah there's always things
that we can improve upon there's always
things that we could do on the expense
side which we try our best there and
that's why we've been able to build up
the fun balance because we don't say yes
to everything we we we really analyze
and think about what's best for the
greater good of the organization to
serve our residents and what they desire
so I'm I'm proud of we W financially and
I I think that that Sonia and her team
has have done an amazing job keeping us
on top of things and bringing forward
new policies like the Merit alluded to
the one associated with reviewing our
expenditure limitation on a regular
basis um the one that was brought
forward associated with our fund
balances and so forth and I can go in
much more depth on stuff but I
appreciate that mayor an opportunity to
speak on it but but I'm very proud and
happy of where we're
at thank you and I I uh also wanted to
um just cover one other area as you
described the debt on The Preserve and
those bonds uh approaching $200 million
or just under 200 million uh when we
issue debt uh not only do we pay
interest whe whether it's semiannual or
whatever but we have to pay back
principal and so uh one of the things
I'll point out is that um in February of
2022 uh we bought the dip we bought the
dip on interest uh uh rate we went out
to bid with our uh our bonds outstanding
bonds and um we had 17 biders and we
generally uh they were sold at about 1.3
5% so that resulted in about a $31
million you know uh net gain for us and
uh you know now we would just hope and
pray you can sell bonds for you know
three and a half or four even with our
rating so all of these accumulate over
over time their wins there're small wins
but big wins uh they add up as big wins
I see councilwoman janick and uh
councilwoman caputi
thank you mayor first of all I truly
appreciate the fiscal Prudence that
Sonia you show and Jim you show uh
because we have phenomenal results and
it's easy to spend but it's not so easy
to save and balance the accounts so
really appreciate that approach to
finance I do have two specific questions
could we look at slide
17 this will show my lack of
understanding of of the way I think it's
back when more it's the one where that's
the
one you said that the the reference is
year over-ear so I'm looking at we made
99.7% in sales tax in
2023 and then in
2024 it was down
3.4% from
99.7% I don't quite understand how those
negative numbers work am I right with
that mayor council member council member
Janet this chart shows the
year-over-year percent increase so the
99.7% is the increase in our sales tax
revenues from 2022 right the 3.4%
decrease is the decrease in our sales
tax revenues from 2023 so 2023 if you
recall was the Super Bowl year right so
sales tax revenues was higher than
normal so in 2024 we expected the sales
tax Revenue to decline so instead of
growing more it dropped didn't it grew
but not as much correct okay that's what
I thought I wanted to verify and then
the next question I have is on
psprs um I have slide 18 I don't know if
that's accurate and I know that our
psprs debt went
down which is wonderful we didn't put
any more money towards it did we and why
did it go down was it return on
investment
so mayor council member council member
janic the psprs liability is affected by
yes the pay down the amount we
contribute and also the investment
return that's of the fund we don't have
control over the investment return so I
believe that between 2021 and 2022 the
investment returns were significant that
year and it's also factored in the
significant pay down that we made and um
um it takes a lot to pay down the psprs
debt in order to pay down the psprs debt
to a level that we will save in terms of
our Public Safety costs in the future
we're probably looking at another 50
plus million so that's how the when you
reference 23 to 24 our debt went down
even though we didn't pay extra money
and is that because the Investments
performed better do you understand my
question
question
um I the Investments did not perform
terribly but we only paid 10 million I
believe in 23 and 24 and 10 million
doesn't really get us very far okay but
you did contribute more money to psprs
correct that's what I was curious about
thank
you councilwoman caputi and councilwoman
W I just wanted to make two quick
statements first of all we spent a lot
of time this year and the last talking
about how inflation impacts our costs as
a city and this is the first time that
we've really chatted about how much
inflation has impacted our income so
just interesting to note there is
another side to it and that was a bonus
we took in so much more money too
because of the hugely inflated cost and
it's funny how no one complains about
that um and the second point I wanted to
just make is as we've heard tonight um
the city is an unbelievably excellent
Financial Health right assets are down
up assets are up liabilities are down
we've maintained our AAA Bond rating you
know you've I don't have to repeat all
of the wonderful Rosie things so having
just come through a bruising election
cycle in which we're continually blamed
for a financial mismanagement and that
we've ruined the city um actually our
city is in one of the strongest
positions of any City in the valley we
are um in a place that you know everyone
is envious of we are the gold standard
of the valley and that is because of the
awesome work of this Council and this
incredible City staff and I just think
um this is the moment where we just
celebrate what a great job we've all
done so thank you everyone proud to be a
part of it councilwoman wh thank you
mayor I'll just add to that that uh the
old question were you better off four
years ago or today I can tell you having
been on this Council the longest except
for Council woman Littlefield we are in
such incredible Financial shape and I
just want to thank my colleagues I want
to add to what councilwoman caputi said
not only um are we stronger financially
we have more employees and we're able
and as always we've maintained or
increased our uh uh I guess our scores
with the uh residents about our service
you know we are the gold standard in
many ways including service to our
residents even though we still have far
fewer employees than we did in 2010 so I
just want to thank everybody on this St
and um our staff incredible job it's
it's such an honor to work for the city
of Scottdale it's an honor to live here
too thank
you thank you I uh don't see any other U
speakers who wish to speak um therefore
um I believe we're concluded with our
work study item greatly appreciate all
the preparation and and um at this point
um I move we
adjourn second okay we have motion a
second please record your
vote Yes we are unan we are unanimous we
are adjourned good night thank you
everybody