What's with this? The study session on September 10th that City Manager Chris Brady said was canceled somehow did happen! ... ain't that interesting to say the least!
So what's to say about that last-minute change in plans previously announced at the council's last public meet-up for no meeting?
Hizzoner the mayor is a very sloppy Presiding Officer when he starts by saying that he sees everyone is there on the Virtual Platform (we don't) and wants to begin by talking about Fried Chicken --- that starts off a comment thread that gets interrupted by the city manager who wants to make sure there's a presentation ready for the proposed Cannon Ranch water sports complex "since it's got so much media attention" ---- WHAT A GROUP!
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BLOGGER NOTE: There is one item on the agenda that might explain the strange behavior that opens the study session
6 Convene an Executive Session
Item 6-a ES-004-20
Discussion or consultation for legal advice with the City Attorney. (A.R.S.
§38-431.03A (3))
Discussion or consultation with the City Attorney in order to
consider the City’s position and instruct the City Attorney regarding the City’s
position regarding pending or contemplated litigation or in settlement
discussions conducted in order to avoid or resolve litigation. (A.R.S.
§38-431.03A(4))
1. Bacuetes v. City of Mesa and Officer Worrell
Maricopa County Superior Court, Case No. CV2020-093200
City Council Study Session
Thursday, September 10, 2020 7:30 AM Virtual Platform
City of Mesa
Meeting Agenda - Final
Mesa Council Chambers
57 East First Street
Mayor John Giles
Vice Mayor Mark Freeman - District 1
Council member Jeremy Whittaker - District 2
Council member Francisco Heredia - District 3
Council member Jennifer Duff - District 4
Council member David Luna - District 5
Council member Kevin Thompson - District 6
MEETING DETAILS
Item 1 Roll Call
Item 2 2 Presentations/Action Items:
2-a: Approval of minutes of previous meetings as written.
| File #: | 20-0827 |
| Type: | Minutes | Status: | Agenda Ready |
| In control: | City Council |
| On agenda: | 9/14/2020 |
| Title: | Approval of minutes of previous meetings as written. |
| Attachments: | 1. August 24, 2020 Study, 2. August 31, 2020 Regular, 3. August 31, 2020 Study |
1 Review and discuss items on the agenda for the September 14, 2020 regular
Council meeting
THERE ARE 27 ITEMS
| Meeting Name: | City Council | Agenda status: | Final |
| Meeting date/time: | 9/14/2020 5:45 PM | Minutes status: | Draft |
| Meeting location: | Virtual Platform | ||
| Published agenda: |  Agenda |
2 Presentations/Action Items:
20-0925 Hear a presentation and discuss an update on the 2021 Employee Benefits
Program.
2-a
| File #: | 20-0925 |
| Type: | Presentation | Status: | Agenda Ready |
| In control: | City Council Study Session |
| On agenda: | 9/10/2020 |
| Title: | Hear a presentation and discuss an update on the 2021 Employee Benefits Program. |
| Attachments: | 1. Presentation, 2. 2021 Plan Change Recommendations Summary, 3. 2021 Plan Document |
20-0926 Hear a presentation, discuss, and provide direction on an update of the Mesa
CARES Healthy Community Program.
2-b
| File #: | 20-0926 |
| Type: | Presentation | Status: | Agenda Ready |
| In control: | City Council Study Session |
| On agenda: | 9/10/2020 |
| Title: | Hear a presentation, discuss, and provide direction on an update of the Mesa CARES Healthy Community Program. |
| Attachments: | 1. Presentation |
3 Acknowledge receipt of minutes of various boards and committees
3-a 20-0911 Economic Development Advisory Board meeting held August 4, 2020
| File #: | 20-0911 |
| Type: | Minutes | Status: | Agenda Ready |
| In control: | City Council Study Session |
| On agenda: | 9/10/2020 |
| Title: | Economic Development Advisory Board meeting held August 4, 2020. |
| Attachments: | 1. 2020-08-04 City of Mesa EDAB Approved Meeting Minutes |
3-b 20-0941 Housing and Community Development Advisory Board meeting held on May 7,
2020
| File #: | 20-0941 |
| Type: | Minutes | Status: | Agenda Ready |
| In control: | City Council Study Session |
| On agenda: | 9/10/2020 |
| Title: | Housing and Community Development Advisory Board meeting held on May 7, 2020. |
| Attachments: | 1. Housing and Community Development Advisory Board May 7, 2020 |
4 Current events summary including meetings and conferences attended
5 Scheduling of meetings
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Looks like it wasn't postponed after all....and why is City Manager Chris Brady so bent on getting to the presentation for Item 6-a while Freeman, Hizzoner and Duff go on about other stuff
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ADDED FEATURE >> MEETING MINUTES it's 10 Pages!
Office of Economic Development Economic Development Advisory Board
57 E. 1st Street, Mesa, AZ 85201
Lower Level Council Chambers August 4, 2020 7:30 a.m.
1. Chair’s Call to Order
Chair Kasselmann called the Economic Development Advisory Board meeting to order at 7:30 a.m.
2. Items from Citizens Present - None.
3. Approval of Minutes from the June 2, 2020 Board Meeting
4. Healthcare Update Pages 1-5
Laura Snow is the Executive Director of Women, Infant and Pediatric Services for Banner Health. Prior to that, she spent 18 years in strategic planning for Banner. She also served six years on the Mesa Economic Development Advisory Board both as a member and former chair. She holds advanced degrees in business and public health and is appearing before the Board today in a personal capacity. . .
5. Mesa CARES Small Business Reemergence Grant Statistics Pages 5-8
Jaye O'Donnell, Assistant Economic Development Director, advised that the Mesa CARES Grant is one tier of a three-tier program made possible through the federal CARES Act and Coronavirus Relief Fund. The Mesa CARES Grant Program
- the first tier, provides financial assistance for Mesa businesses,
- the second tier is the Technical Assistance Program, and
- the third tier is the local and regional Marketing Campaign.
6. Director’s Update Pages 8-10
In the GPEC report for the fiscal year ending in June, obviously industrial projects are down, and office projects are down overall.
GPEC reported 48 prospects over 200,000 SF in FY20 which is up from last year. Everything else is down in terms of the number of projects overall. The region's industrial market vacancy rate is 5.9%. Mesa's is 5%. Typically, a healthy market is in the 8-9% range. There are about 13 million SF of industrial buildings under construction in greater Phoenix but 40% of that has already been committed to prospects. That gives us an idea of the demand and we need to continue to encourage industrial development, especially the larger sized buildings. We don't have much left at 100,000 SF and above.
Kim Lofgreen is our marketing guru.
- Our media impressions were 166 million for the year, 119 earned media placements or stories that we had influence over.
- We ran in 8 different national industry magazines and news websites.
- We had 379,000 posts on LinkedIn and 374,000 on Twitter.
- There has been a lot of activity on Mesa CARES and some of the different projects going on.
Jaye O’Donnell reported that Mesa had applied for the National League of Cities First Tier Suburbs grant in April and won.
Mesa will host a virtual summit on September 15-16 focusing on small business development services across the East Valley.
- Our partners on this grant include the towns of Queen Creek and Gilbert.
We will look at what we are providing as municipalities, identify potential gaps, and look at how to leverage our resources collectively to address those gaps and to build small business resiliency.
- The first day of the summit will focus on the national stage, what is happening around the country, and what other cities have implemented especially during the pandemic to help small businesses recover and build resiliency.
- A local survey is being conducted to look at what our small business development service partners are doing. That research and the survey results will also be presented on the first day of the summit.
- The second day, a localized core group of businesses will discuss how to better function as a region and not duplicate efforts. It is a great opportunity for everyone on the Board to at least listen in on the first day of the summit to get an idea of what is occurring on the national stage.
She expected a few Board members would be happy to plug in the second day of the summit and help us develop some localized strategies and programs to take forward for consideration in our future strategic plan.
Mr. Jabjiniak, Chair Kasselmann, and Vice Chair Adams have been working together on three main points regarding what we want to accomplish this coming year.
- We will have a virtual tour of Falcon Field in conjunction with the October meeting and we will revisit the goals of the Falcon Visioning Committee from a few years ago and what has been accomplished.
- We will also focus on the Bring Them Back reshoring strategy and how to continue growth.
- We will also look at the City of Mesa Economic Review and where the city gets its financial resources.
These items will be scheduled for future meetings.
Board Questions/Comments:
Brian Campbell echoed the comments in support of the Bring Them Back reshoring program. He emphasized that we are spending all of our time and resources, justifiably so, on the short-term emergency and issues presented from COVID and on the CARES program.
- We need to have a discussion on long-term strategic issues to capitalize on the new environment that is being presented to us. The reshoring is a critical component, although according to the industrial numbers we are running 60-70% below normal and we don’t have the product to sell when we bring them back. We need a more comprehensive plan as we approach the reshoring model as that is the opportunity for our community that we need to seize.
- We need a strategic visioning plan to be able to implement that. Mr. Jabjiniak noted that there are things on the books, but there is still some hesitancy from developers. We have one ready to go for 7 buildings and another that has made no progress because they fear the pandemic. What will it take to push some of those properties forward and keep it going? Mr. Campbell stated we all will emerge from this at some point. Those communities that planned for that emergence will be the most successful. That is what we must do now to beat the competition whenever we emerge from this and we need to be in a position to capitalize on it.
- Matt Likens reported that he saw a commercial for Dexcom while watching the morning news...They are now going directly to the consumers. Dexcom is the most exciting growth story in life sciences and medical devices right in our own backyard.
- Mr. Kasselman is probably too humble to talk about it himself. We can all appreciate such a phenomenal growth story with a $42 billion market cap as of this morning. When we started with Mr. Kasselman, it was half of that. Chair Kasselmann appreciated those comments.
- Mr. Jabjiniak noted that just three years ago, Dexcom said they would bring 500 jobs. Today they will have over 1,000 jobs and just announced they will be expanding their presence in Mesa with another 486,000 SF. That is huge. He thanked Mr. Kasselman not only for his service on this Board but for the growth from the Dexcom perspective.
- Chair Kasselman appreciated the support and hospitality City of Mesa which made that all possible.
- 7. Other Business Councilmember Duff was thanked for joining the meeting this morning.
- The next EDAB meeting will be held on September 1, 2020, 7:30 a.m
