Loading...
HomeMy WebLinkAbout04/30/2013 Special Council Meeting MinutesSPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING MINUTES 11555 W. Civic Center Drive Marana, Arizona 85653 Council Chambers, Apri130, 2013, at or after 6:00 PM Ed Honea, Mayor Patti Comerford, Vice Mayor David Bowen, Council Member Herb Kai, Council Member Carol McGorray, Council Member Jon Post, Council Member Roxanne Ziegler, Council Member SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING CALL TO ORDER AND ROLL CALL. Mayor Honea called the meeting to order at 6:02 p.m. Town Clerk Bronson called roll. All Council Members were present. PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE/INVOCATION/MOMENT OF SILENCE. Led by Mayor Honea. APPROVAL OF AGENDA. Motion to approve by Council Member Ziegler, second by Council Member Kai. Passed unanimously. CALL TO THE PUBLIC. No speaker cards were presented. PROCLAMATIONS PRESENTATIONS P 1: Presentation: Relating to Finance; Presentation of proposed financing structure for the acquisition of the Marana Wastewater Treatment Facility as well as possible refunding of certain outstanding Marana Municipal Property Corporation Revenue Bonds. Council Member Kai left the dais during the presentation. Presented by Erik Montague, who introduced Mark Reader of Stifel, Nicolaus & Company and Michael Cafiso of Greenburg, Traurig. Mr. Montague led off with some of the financing goals and assumptions with respect to the resolution of the wastewater acquisition. In addition to the money required to acquire the assets, money is also needed for initial improvements of about $1 M. Future improvements must also have a funding source. In Study Session Minutes—April 30, 2013 Page 1 of 12 December, staff spoke to Council about re-funding the general fund and for the town to be able to issue its own debt. Mark Reader noted that his firm has been actively engaged with town staff on this acquisition; he has been working on bond issues with the Town since the early 1990s. He specifically addressed the role of Stifel, Nicolaus which is to act as underwriter to the town to help structure, manage and underwrite the sale of obligation; and Greenberg Traurig, whose role is as special counsel to assist with all legal and disclosure related matters relating to the bonds. Mr. Reader reviewed the purpose and process of issuing bonds. The projects to be funded are the acquisition of wastewater utility assets for $16,670,000; reimbursement of costs to the Town's general fund of $4M; new money improvements to the wastewater plant of $1M, for a total of $21,670,000 and capitalized interest of $1,891,783. The number for the wastewater utility assets are estimated pursuant to the settlement agreement with Pima County and subject to change based on market conditions. Capitalized interest will be funded from June 26, 2013 to July 1, 2015. Mr. Reader then discussed the refunding of the Series 2003 bonds. He stated that the town does have an opportunity to refinance some of the old bonds which were issued for the purpose building the new town hall. The current outstanding balance is $14,160,00 at between 4% to 5%. He believes the town can get a rate of somewhere in the range of high twos which would lower the cost of capital by over 2% which is substantial over the life of the remaining bond. When the savings were calculated, it was about $2.4M of cash flow savings to the town over the next 15 years. On a present value basis about $2.1M, net of all costs. The savings have been structured on an annual basis, and the average annual savings is about $155K if the savings are taken equally over the next 15 years. Next he talked about an efficiency indicator for refinancing; the town is at about 14% which is good. Then he briefly reviewed some information on recent market activity, and he talked about "flight to quality," which means there are a lot of assets going into municipals. People seem to like bonds, strong rated bonds such as Marana has. They like tax exemptions, although it's under attack in Washington DC. Rates are still very strong for municipals. The interest rates are at historical lows. He next presented the preliminary sources and uses of funds and excise tax revenue obligation, Series 2013. The transaction will be about $38,605,689. Issuing bonds is an extremely important decision for a community with long-lasting implications. Mr. Reader reviewed the preliminary sources and uses of funds for excise taac revenue obligations, Series 2013. For the wastewater utility acquisition, the cost is estimated at $16,055,000 with a 20-year amortization at 3.5% interest, a$1,360,000 annual debt service, capitalized interest through July 1, 2015. Debt service begins in 2015/16. New money improvement obligation for the wastewater utility reimbursement is estimated at $SM with a 20-year amortization at 3.5% interest. Annual debt service of $400,000 with capitalized interest through July 1, 2015 begins in 2015/16. Refunding obligations are estimated at $12,905,000 with a 15-year amortization. Study Session Minutes — April 30, 2013 Page 2 of 12 Council Member Post asked what would be happening to three years of collecting impact fees. Mr. Davidson responded that the town wants to build up an account that would be used for paying the debt. The plan is to set aside every dollar that comes in for impact fees for the next year or two so that there is enough cushion to be able to make those debt service payments. Mr. Montague also noted that the impact fee would be eligible for use of any allowable cost attributable for which the fee was established. This would be one of the eligible uses. We will be reviewing the impact fees and still don't know exactly what they'll look like, but the acquisition of the plant will be a key piece of that overall debt structure. The $1 M for interim improvements will provide the capacity for that over the next two to three years. Council Member Post reiterated that the next three years of impact fees will go toward debt repayment. Mr. Davidson stressed that every dollar that can be set aside for debt service payment can be critical to the way this is structured. Council Member Ziegler asked if staff has to come back to the Council for direction on how to spend that impact fee money. Mr. Montague responded that it's could be used for any purpose for which the impact fee was established. He then went on to give examples of projects for which the money could be used. Any long-term capital improvement plan would be brought before Council for approval. In answer to a question from Council Member Bowen, Mr. Montague stated that impact fees will be accounted for in its own fund, and as part of the annual budget process, it will be appropriated for either some specific project or for debt service attributable to this initial acquisition in an ongoing, going forward basis. Mayor Honea confirmed that this money has to be used for wastewater; the majority will be used for debt retirement, but should we need some need for the plant, that would be an acceptable legal use, with Council approval. Council Member Post asked if there were funds allocated now to do any work to the Rillito plant. Mr. Montague responded that improvement to that utility are not currently included for next year's funding program. It is his understanding that the town is still in the fact-finding process to determine the nature and deficiencies of that plant. It will be eligible if and when it becomes an asset and is conveyed to the town through a separate agreement. At that time, there will could be costs attributable to maintaining it, but as far as significant capital improvements to get it to operate more efficiently, the plan for action for that is still being formulated. Council Member Ziegler asked if the Rillito plant improvements would be eligible for the funds under discussion. Mr. Montague said that it's not likely that the Rillito plant was identified in the town's overall improvement program; it's probably not initially eligible. As far as how it will be included and what it will look like in the next evolution of the wastewater impact fee study, the consultant is still reviewing that. Mr. Montague continued that one of the positive things going into that responsibility, if and when we accept responsibility for it, it is a very small system. Mr. Reader continued his presentation with information on the bond transaction and debt structure components and a little bit about the credit rating process. What they are looking at for 2013 that was not done in the past is to eliminate a pretty expensive provision of the town's financing — that being a debt service reserve fund which was a set aside of 10% of the issue in a trust account. Although we're issuing about $36M of bonds, and would normally have to put aside $3.6M, since Marana is now a AA rated Study Session Minutes — April 30, 2013 Page 3 of 12 town and Erik Montague and his staff as well as management and legal have a proven record of fiscal responsibility, the reserve is not needed. Once we get this through the credit rating agencies, we feel confident that we will be able to eliminate that provision. So the savings would be about $3.6M. Our goal is to not have to do this in the future. Council Member Post asked if that 10% is currently set aside for bonds that the town owes on, to which Mr. Reader responded affirmatively. Council Member Post asked what will happen to that money. Mr. Reader responded that the town needs to keep that money set aside until the last bond payment on the newly issued bonds. Council Member Ziegler again asked when the $3.6M will be available to the town. Mr. Reader replied that the $3.6M that he referenced is the savings the town will get on the current 2013 transaction; that's money that doesn't have to be set aside. On the previous transactions, we had a set aside of 10%. For the previous bond issues that the town has done, that set aside was required and must be kept until the bonds are paid off. The 2013 will be subordinate to the other bonds; they'll be paid behind those bonds because we're setting up a new line of credit. There are 1997, 2004 and 2008 bonds outstanding. This is not necessarily a bad thing. One of the things we'll try to do is to incorporate some release provisions. The town will be pledging some of it excise tax; this is very common for Arizona cities, towns and counties. This is very efficient and very secure. One of the things we'll try to incorporate into the structure with special counsel may be some release provisions. Once the investment becomes successful by gaining customers and achieving certain benchmarks, then we'll try to incorporate some release provisions so that eventually it will be a complete enterprise system. This is exactly what happened with Oro Valley when they bought their two water systems. Their water utility is now AA rated credit, very strong, and they no longer back it on the excise tax part. For Council Member Ziegler, Mr. Reader gave an example of successful benchmarks. A reasonable benchmark would be where your enterprise system grows such that you're able to meet your debt service payments with a bit of a cushion. Customer growth that is not dependent on just one significant user is another example. Council Member Bowen asked for clarification on a method of structuring whereby payments per year would rise, so they'd be lower in the beginning and higher later on as revenue picked up. It doesn't look like that is built into this deal. If that's true, how does that jibe with our revenue assumptions? Mr. Montague responded that there were three structures we looked at. One was assuming the County debt based on a repayment schedule; one was called level debt service where we have basically the same payment every year; and one was accelerated debt service — shorter in the front and longer in the back. We have looked at each of those scenarios. There are costs and benefits to each of those. One of the challenges to an accelerated debt service is there is a significant additional interest cost; most of early payments are almost all interest. From a cost benefit, in order to evaluate that structure, you would need to measure it against the projected inflows of resources. Under the current structure, what we're striving for is to maintain a level debt structure which allows the organization to make significant contributions toward the principal and not make payments of unnecessary debt interest. Some of that could change, but we're not anticipating it based on an update that we did on the analysis back in December. Council Member Bowen asked if there had been any major revisions to the projections on growth to which Mr. Montague replied that with respect to the reasonably conservative current numbers that we're using as a basis to identify the capacity for these Study Session Minutes — April 30, 2013 Page 4 of 12 initial and future improvements, there has not. He is working with the Planning Department in regard to the other town-wide impact fees to establish growth projects and structure. Mr. Reader then reviewed how Marana became a AA rated town with Standard & Poor's. The goal is to stay in the AA category for this transaction. The criteria to get to a particular rating is strong management, good leadership, the ability to manage growth, the budget and finances including reserves and liquidity, debt load, acquisition of assets, revenue stream for repayment, the local economy, the stability, diversity and magnitude of pledged revenues. The credit rating also depends strongly on the town's history of maintaining strong reserves and conservative budgeting. Mr. Reader's group is working on the rating materials now and expect to meet with the issuers in the next two weeks. He then concluded his presentation with the preliminary financing calendar, noting that the Council should adopt the resolution to authorize the issuance of bonds at its regular meeting on May 22. Mr. Cafiso will be walking Council through most of that presentation, and it will be necessary to have an emergency clause in the resolution since the financing has to close expeditiously under the rules of the IGA. The credit rating should be finalized on June 6, the obligations sale will occur during the week of June 17, they will recalculate escrow for the wastewater utility acquisition pursuant to the IGA and will work closely with Mr. Montague and Mr. Cassidy on that. June 27 is the current closing date to deposit the money and wire it to the County as required under the IGA. Mr. Reader responded to a question by Council Member Bowen, that general obligation refers to a property tax, so these are not secured by any form of a property tax. These bonds are secured by your excise taxes, local sales tax, state sales tax, state shared revenues and other miscellaneous revenues. Council Member Bowen asked what the market is like right now for municipal bonds at the size we're offering. Mr. Reader responded that our market is impacted by what goes on around the world, so right now we're fortunate to have a bull market in municipals because it's an asset class that people want to go into, and the rates are low and protected. He thinks there will be a demand for these bonds. Council Member Bowen asked how much cushion we have in our current revenue streams that will be paying for these right now. Are we even or ahead? Mr. Montague said that based on the scenario, for the first five years it's pretty close to break- even. P 2: Presentation: Relating to Budget; review, consideration and direction to staff regarding the fiscal year 2013-2014 managers recommended budget for the General Fund. Presented by Gilbert Davidson and Erik Montague. Mr. Davidson noted that budget presented is a reflection of the community's priorities as set forth in the Strategic Plan as well as the Council Study Session in January to highlight Council initiatives and program requests. This budget is structurally balanced between ongoing revenues/expenses and one-time revenue/expenses. This budget continues our investment initiative that we started several years ago in the deep part of the recession to have a clean, healthy and safe community. We want to be strategic in the allocation of resources. Mr. Montague will walk Council through the revenue outlook and then Gilbert will come back and highlight the recovery plan. Study Session Minutes — April 30, 2013 Page 5 of 12 Mr. Montague began with the FY 2014 revenue outlook beginning with revenue growth for the state of Arizona since 2004 through 2012, focusing on consumer confidence, unemployment and single family housing prices. Next he reviewed the sales tax numbers, focusing mostly on the largest revenues. There is about a 2% negative change from the FY 2013 budget primarily due to contracting revenues which are down about $1.2M. State Shared Revenues show an anticipated slight increase except for Auto Lieu with about a 1% negative change. Licenses, fees and permits are expected to increase slightly over FY 2013. Mr. Montague concluded his summary with about a 3% overall positive increase for FY 2014. Mr. Davidson then talked about setting priorities in the economic recovery plan which focuses on the three primary areas of current staff, hiring for strategic positions and resources including facilities, tools and vehicles — all of which are included in the Strategic Plan. At is relates to current employees, there has been a set aside of approximately $577K that will be used for pay adjustments for the next fiscal year. Still in development is some general adjustment across the board and a one-time lump sum for employees, similar to what was done last December, dependent on number of years of service and position within the organization. This budget does reinvest back into current employees and their value to the organization and the community. They were also mindful of the class and compensation study going on right now. Phase II of that study will be finalized in the next fiscal year. There will be a number of recommendations coming out of that process after analyzing all the positions within the town, including market comparators as well as private sector indicators. There will most likely be positions within the organization that were below market. If we want to be competitive as an organization to attract the best and brightest, we will then develop a strategy for increasing those salary lines to make sure that we retain those individuals or bring in new people in the future. $504K, with $311K from the general fund, as been designated for other pay and benefits such as special equity adjustments, health, retirement, disability insurance, etc. and $31K for the Phase II compensation classification study. Also driven by the Strategic Plan is investment in people. We have identified some training and development opportunities for an investment of about $1.3M. One of the things we launched this year was a partnership with the University of Arizona to have them come in and talk about our culture and how we need to develop internal talent. Several years ago, we started programming vehicle replacement costs within department line items. With this investment, we'll have a fully funded vehicle replacement program at a cost of about $1.4M. The vast majority of that is for public safety. One of the big changes with our fleet, we have moved to a new police vehicle. The Ford Crown Victoria is being discontinued, and we did research on several vehicles and decided on a Chevy Caprice Interceptor package, which we'll be purchasing. It's the same color scheme but a different looking car. Also, within this budget, is our continued effort to make sure technology is available for employees and community benefit with server upgrades of $40K, eCitation Units in Phase II of $104K (after a pilot project was completed on their use) and in Development Study Session Minutes — Apri) 30, 2013 Page 6 of 12 Services, CRW Trackit 9 upgrade for further efficiency for $25K. We will also be investing in general maintenance projects throughout the organization for $lOSK. The total investment for resources $1.4M. The last investment in the recovery process is for strategic positions which we have needed but not been able to fund since the depth of the recession. We knew as the economy recovered, we needed a plan which was developed by a committee of departments looking at growth demands on the organization. The first position is an Emergency Management and Safety Coordinator. This has been piece- mealed out to a variety of staff to deal with neighborhood needs. Coupled with that is added mandates by federal OSHA law and state requirements for training and equipment. Over the past couple of years there has been a rise in employee claims, some of which can be attributed to not having certain policies and procedures in place. We're now at a point of overtaxing individuals and committees to oversee these projects. Because people move around in various positions, there has been a lack of consistency in some of these projects up to and including no activity. This has been identified as a critical position, and will eventually have a bigger payoff as we have a better safety-trained staff and the ability to reduce claims. The Website Administrator is a position driven by the Strategic Plan and is one of the most valuable ways for people to get information. Again, the functions of this position has been done by committee and is affected by turnover within department and lack of consistency. The town has hosted this website, so that the back- end infrastructure is done by the private sector. It's difficult to make timely changes and modifications that we believe meet the needs of the community. The Building Inspector II position is in direct response to the number of residential structures now going up. At the height of the building boom, we had 11 positions in that department; we now have three. The review and inspection activity for the number of units we have going, and the ability to keep up with customer service and demand, is beyond the ability of the three that we have now, especially if any of them were sick. A police officer position is to maintain full staff. This is not a full new position. This was occupied by a person who moved into a sergeant role, and we did not fill that position but used some of the funding to supplement the sergeant's position. So this is reinstating that function so that the team it's assigned to is made whole. The Utilities Operation I position is part of the wastewater management to make sure we have enough staff to manage the north Marana plant but also our obligations at Rillito. This is an entry level position. We hope we can bring someone in with a baseline of skills and then work with the staff inember to obtain addition certifications; someone we can help grow within our organization. The Civil Engineer position is within Utilities. This is a reassignment of a staff position, but in the long-term it will help to reduce external costs that we have now. This person will help us plan for some of our long-term infrastructure needs on the water and the wastewater side. The total investment is $503,785 including benefits. Mr. Montague then gave an overall financial summary for the general fund. The numbers for both FY 2013 and FY 2014 intentionally exclude contingency. Contingency we will appropriate in 2014. The contingency fund would provide for capacity expenditure authority for some unanticipated event. Current practice for use of that money would require Council approval for reallocation of resources for whatever purpose. On the revenue side, we're anticipating, based on the programs that were just described to you and others listed on the summary, about a 3% change. Currently, there Study Session Minutes — April 30, 2013 Page 7 of 12 are some significant changes in capital outlay. But with respect to a balanced budget, we've calculated about $1.6M in resources that are available for expenditures. Within capital outlay — a one-time resource — the remaining portion of roughly $400K of additional dollars that are not shown on capital outlay are in one-time projects and programs within contracting services and for operating supplies and equipment. So we've allocated 100% of those one-time revenues on one-time uses. For other sources and uses — meaning money coming into the organization or need to be transferred out, there is some change there. We anticipated in the current year getting a capital lease for the radio system improvement that are currently underway - that type of structure would not need to occur next year. In transfers, based on the current numbers, there is a reduction of about $64K or about 2%. So year over year, we're showing a balanced budget or a total change in the fund balance of zero. As talked about earlier by Mark Reader, reserves are among the criteria rating agencies look at with respect to the health and condition of an entity. Reserves are excess revenues that are collected over a period of time and are then available to use for a specific purpose. Those are one-time revenues by nature. We don't hoard resources, so that any resources that are accumulated are accumulated through a thoughtful process for some future intended use — maybe a building, maybe a major capital improvement or contribution or some other one-time item. The town has done a significant job with respect to managing those fund balances and the required reserves. In 2007, we established a required reserve, and then by town policy we established a targeted reserve, that 25% of annual appropriations or expenditure authority. What that is intended to provide is the minimum balance in a rainy day fund such that you'd be able to meet your obligations for a reasonable period of time. And as a goal or strategy, you would not want to have less than that targeted capacity. We have been able to manage that reserve even though the depths of the great recession, we have been improving reserves modestly over the past number of years. We're currently on track to add somewhere in the neighborhood of about $1M in reserves for FY 2013, and that's mostly as a xesult of increased development previously described, as well as some of the additional sales tax revenues that are coming in ahead of schedule. We are pushing about $19.3M in reserves which is the highest level of reserves we had for a number of years and is significant for us. Unless there's a need to meet again, the next time we'll be before you is on May 22 to adopt the tentative budget, and then on June 18, we'll bring before you for consideration the adoption of the comprehensive fees schedule and adoption of the final budget. Mr. Davidson answered questions from Council Member Bowen about dollars allocated for the strategic positions and whether that was reflective of the phasing in; is the intent to go out and hire these positions as quickly as possible or is there a prioritization, and if so, does the list reflect that prioritization? The list before Council tonight is not in any major order, although the committee ranked these. For instance, we had included the building inspector in previous year's requests, and it always had a trigger of an increase in building number. We've been able to get by, but this past year we've exceeded that expectation. The police officer is making sure that we've got good Study Session Minutes —April 30, 2013 Page 8 of 12 coverage, but at any given time we are down on the number of officers needed. The emergency management position and the website positions don't necessarily have a timeframe associated, but probably in the first quarter. It's not something that's absolutely critical if we don't find the right person. If there were to be a change within our budget structure from what we're estimating, we've got the capacity to delay or cancel any of these if need be, and we've done that in previous years. Council Member Ziegler noted that she had several questions beginning with reimbursement to the town's general fund of $4M for the wastewater project. Is that reflected in this year's budget? Mr. Montague replied that it's part of reserves, so the way it's structured to get into the business, within the general fund, we have a"due from," which means a receivable. So we have a receivable from the wastewater utility in an amount that's anticipated to be given back to the general fund at the appropriate time. So because it's still an asset, it's still included in reserves. As part of the current $18.3M, a portion of that is that amount of money that's expected back; it's in anticipation of some future reimbursement. The reimbursement is not tied to any specific project, program or activity — it's the replenishment of cash that would be redeployed by any other use of cash. Council Member Ziegler referred to a mention of the Downtown Redevelopment Fund. Is this a new fund? What is it? What are you doing with the $125K? You need to come in front of the Council to do something. Mr. Davidson noted that the Council took action on this about two weeks; there was a presentation given that highlighted a concept of taking the Economic Roadmap definition of what is our downtown area — it's from this building all the way to the interchange — taking the existing businesses that are here today, taking any new business that may come online, and 50% of the taxes that was collected from today's business and future businesses would go into a set aside account, and that account could be used to help build public infrastructure. One of the big challenges we are going to have in building a main street or a downtown, is that we do not have a lot of infrastructure. The numbers that we're dealing with are not going to solve these problems, but we're trying to be a partner with the private sector to put some dollars on the table, so that if someone came in and wanted to put in a new business, we would be willing to work with them to make it more attractive to build in north Marana. Council Member Ziegler: and will you come back to the Council before you get into that $125K? Mr. Davidson: the program outlined some of parameters, so the first part will be an investment of doing an infrastructure facilities master plan, so that will be some of the initial dollars as authorized by that policy to make sure what are all the costs associated with building a downtown. That will be presented to Council as "Here's the total potential bill. ..." Of what we're looking at, and then strategies with how we partner with the private sector. Individual projects under the current policy, if we did have business that wanted to come in, that will be triggered by the actual master plan. Council Member Ziegler: on a lot of your charts you said "from the general fund," "from the general fund," "from the general fund." Where are you getting the other money (that's not coming from the general fund)? Mr. Montague responded that the way it's shown, most of the funding is coming from the general operating fund, especially with operating costs or increases in pay and benefits. The other monies would be coming from any other fund that pays for employees. There is a certain portion of salaries that are paid for out of HURF funds related to street maintenance, as an example. A very small piece would be community development and other grants. Another piece would have to do with utility Study Session Minutes — April 30, 2013 Page 9 of 12 funds — airport, water and wastewater. Those are the largest examples. Specifically with training and development, one of the programs Chief Rozema was looking to advance in the next cycle has to do with using RICO funds. Council Member Ziegler noted that we have a contingency fund, a general fund, a reserve fund, an operating fund. On the reserve fund, what percentage of the budget is going into contingency fund? Mr. Montague: when I started with the town, we established a kind of arbitrary $1 M fund as a contingency fund. In the current year, we're looking to define that at 5%. He defined contingency as the ability to handle an unexpected expense to provide for capacity. Council Member Ziegler: when we need to get into the contingency fund, will that come back to the Council? Mr. Montague responded affirmatively, again giving the requirement for authorization. His recollection of the last time staff came before Council to use the contingency fund is attributable to the settlement arrangement with United Casualty and Fire related to the sewer project. There were two large payments we were obligated to make. Council Member Ziegler: and I know I gave you an assignment regarding the sewer hookups in Honea Heights; I know you're looking those up for me, because I'm just a little concerned on how we spent the 30 hookups, and I didn't know that. Maybe it's just me that didn't know it, but that concerns me that we expended that at $12K a piece; that's a lot of money that I and the Council didn't personally know what we were spending, and I know you said that money was under a certain budget and it was allowed under this and allowed under that, and since we don't do line item, by line item, I don't want to be surprised. I'm not berating you, I'm just — I don't want to be surprised again. Did anyone else on the Council know that or was it just me? (Council Member Ziegler asked from the dais who knew about this. She indicated that only two people knew and didn't think that was a very good percentage.) Mr. Davidson addressed the Council and said that this project, as we learned about last week, has a long history. There was an initial grant that was obtained by the County, and under that grant the town had contributed, and when the Gladden Farms sewer went in, there were a number of homes along Moore Road that were automatically hooked up. Those were part of that 30 number. And then the grant helped to pay for an additional number of homes. Since that grant expired and all the issues with the contractor came up, there have been emergency situations where septics have completely failed, and the town through various meetings and initiatives hase tried to get people hooked into the system .... Council Member McGorray left the dais at 8:00 p.m. Council Member Ziegler: let me stop you right there, and maybe that's the point. I am in favor of helping anybody who truly needs help, but I think when you said the town jumped in and did all this stuff, I didn't know the town had jumped did and did all this stuff to help these people. Maybe somebody should have said something to the Council. Mr. Davidson: when the whole situation with the contractor was going on, all of that information was provided to the Council. Council Member Ziegler: I did not know that we were paying for hookups in Honea Heights out of our general fund until last week. I don't want to be surprised like that anymore. I'm not saying we shouldn't do it, it's got to go beyond the Mayor, and we need to be told what's going on. Again, I'm 100% for Study Session Minutes —April 30, 2013 Page 10 of 12 helping people who need the help, but I was really taken aback that we'd done 30 of these and not known about it. Council Member Bowen: right now we're in the process of drafting policies that will guide all of these kinds of things in the future, axe we not? Mr. Davidson replied affirmatively. There were further comments from Council, including Council Member Kai's suggestion to invite members of the community affected by the town center development to add their comments at a public meeting on the issue of using their future tax money. Council Member Post noted that he was extremely impressed with this year's budget. Mr. Davidson concluded by saying that since he's been Town Manager, we've put money back into the savings, and we've never dipped into the emergency or contingency funds other than when there was a lawsuit that we had to finalize with a neighborhood. Every single year we have been able to put back into savings. We've always lived within the budgets that have been approved by this Council year in and year out. Most departments have had a little bit of surplus revenue that we've been able to put back into savings with an ongoing structured, balanced budget. We have never used contingency other than what was approved by Council. Motion by Vice Mayor Comerford to direct the Town Manager to incorporate the items discussed this evening in the preparation of the tentative budget which will be considered for possible adoption on May 22, 2013, seconded by Council Member Bowen. CONSENT AGENDA. Motion to approve by Council Member Post, second by Council Member Bowen. Motion approved 6-0. C 1: Resolution No. 2013-038: Relating to Personnel; approving and authorizing staff to implement employee benefits rates far fiscal year 2013-2014. LIQUOR LICENSES BOARDS, COMMISSIONS AND COMMITTEES COUNCIL ACTION ITEMS FOR DISCUSSION/POSSIBLE ACTION EXECUTIVE SESSIONS E 1: Executive Session pursuant to A.R.S. §38-431.03 (A)(3), Council may ask for discussion or consultation for legal advice with the Town Attorney concerning any matter listed on this agenda. FUTURE AGENDA ITEMS Study Session Minutes — April 30, 2013 Page 11 of 12 Notwithstanding the mayor's discretion regarding the items to be placed on the agenda, if three or more Council members request that an item be placed on the agenda, it must be placed on the agenda for the second regular Town Council meeting after the date of the request, pursuant to Marana Town Code Section 2-4-2(B). ADJOURNMENT. Motion to adjourn by Council Member Post, second by Vice Mayor Comerford. Passed unanimously 6-0. CERTIFICATION I hereby certify that the foregoing are the true and correct minutes of the Marana Town Council meeting held on Apri130, 2013. I further certify that a quorum was present. Study Session Minutes—April 30, 2013 Page 12 of 12