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12-02-22 City Manager Report1 City of Kalispell OFFICE OF THE CITY MANAGER Information Memorandum 12/2/2022 1. Parks Department The past several weeks have been dedicated to storm cleanup from the November 2 snow event. Initial passes through the community to collect broken branches have been completed by Public Works and Parks Staff. A contactor will be hired to go through the entire municipal urban forest pruning hangers and broken branches. It is anticipated that this work will take approximately six months to complete. In preparing for the holiday season, Parks Staff have put up the Christmas lights on the 80-foot-tall spruce tree in Depot Park that will be lit by the Kalispell Business Improvement District and Kalispell Downtown Association on Friday, December 2, as a part of their annual holiday stroll. The Kalispell Kids After School Program is nearing the end of the year with two and a half weeks left until the winter break. The kids participated in activities such as Pin the Tail on the Turkey, and arts and crafts for Thanksgiving. Frosty’s Music March, candy cane art, and gingerbread making will be taking place throughout those remaining weeks of school leading up to break. Freeze Out Camp registration is now open. Freeze Out Camp will take place December 22-23 and December 27-30. On average, there is 1-2 registration forms coming in daily putting us on track to be at full capacity by the time Freeze Out Camp begins. Ice Skating Lessons session 1 is now full and session 2 is nearing capacity. This puts the program at the same pace as last year for our record setting participation levels. Session 1 begins on December 6 and will end on December 15. Session 2 will start up on January 3, 2023. 2 The Little Dribblers fall basketball season is now over. Registration is open for our spring Little Dribblers basketball season that will start March 11, and will be played at Rankin, Russell, and Peterson Elementary Schools. Registration is open for Kalispell Kickers, our indoor youth soccer program. The season will start January 21, and games will be played at Rankin Elementary on Saturdays. The early registration deadline is December 23 at 5pm and regular registration is January 6 at 5pm. We are in week 4 of our adult futsal league. There are 12 teams in the league who are each guaranteed 14 games including playoffs that will run through February 23. 2.Public Works MS4 Construction Stormwater Permit The City manages a Construction Stormwater Permit to stay in compliance with the Municipal Separate Storm Sewer System (MS4) Permit issued by the State of Montana’s Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ). Permits are required for any activity where the total volume of material disturbed, stored, disposed of, or used as fill exceeds five (5) cubic yards or all land disturbances greater than 1,000 square feet within the City of Kalispell. Kalispell’s stormwater system typically runs untreated to our local lakes, rivers, and streams. When pollutants and trash are on the street or flow off construction sites during rain events, they flow down the curb, into storm drains, and discharge into and pollute local water bodies. The intent of the permit is to review the plan on how all pollutants, including sediment, will be kept onsite during construction at the project site. The City’s Environmental Coordinator manages the Construction Stormwater Permit and is responsible for all the permit reviews, approvals, inspections, and enforcement actions. 2022 Construction Stormwater Permit Stats: -261 Construction Stormwater Permit inspections in 2022 -125 Construction Stormwater Permit application submitted 3 50/50 Sidewalk Replacement Program The 2022 50/50 sidewalk program has been completed for the season. The City had another successful construction season with various curb and sidewalk projects completed throughout the city. Projects this year included a mix of private property and City ADA accessibility projects. The City’s contractor completed 16 work orders that included 3.3 blocks of sidewalk and 6 ADA accessibility improvements. As part of our concrete contract the contractor also completed 357 LF (approx. 1.1 blocks) of curb and gutter replacement. 3.Planning Department The Kalispell City Planning Board will hold a public hearing at their December 13 meeting and take public comments on the agenda items listed below: 1.File #KCU-22-03 – A request from Mark Gillette for a conditional use permit to allow four (4) multi-family residential units as part of a mixed-use development at 428 First Avenue West. 2.File #KCU-22-04 – A request from Aaron McPherson (Absolute Ministries) for a conditional use permit to allow a group home for up to eight (8) individuals located at 730 1st Ave W. The group home is anticipated to house five (5) individuals as transitional housing as part of a faith-based drug and alcohol rehabilitation program. Individuals in the home would participate in the first phase of the program at a separate location and would have at least four (4) months of continuous sobriety before coming to the home. 3.A request has been submitted to include 5th Street West between 5th Avenue West and 6th Avenue West within the Westside Parking Management Zone. The Westside Parking Management Zone was established by Ordinance 1759 on August 2015. At that time, it was found that within the vicinity of Flathead High School the demand for curbside parking far exceeds the curbside space available resulting in limited availability of curbside parking for residents, congested streets and compromised roadside safety. Accordingly, residents, students and teachers have to purchase parking permits in order to park on the street within the Parking Management Zone. Ordinance 1759 allows for the amendment of the Parking 4 Management Zone by increasing or reducing the boundary after holding a public hearing before the Kalispell City Planning Board. Requests to be added or removed from the management zone shall be done at the block face level (both sides) of the avenue or street by petition from at least 75% of the property owners. In this case, a petition has been submitted by property owners on the frontage described above to be included in the Parking Management Zone. The petition includes a request to be included within the Parking Management Zone from 6 of the 7 property owners (85%). Documents pertaining to the agenda items are on file for public inspection at the Kalispell Planning Department, 201 First Avenue East, Kalispell, MT 59901, and are available for public review during regular office hours. In addition, information on the agenda item is posted on our website at https://mt-kalispell.civicplus.com/314/Planning-Board under planning board “upcoming agenda.” 4.Building Department There have been 464 multi-family housing units issued so far this year. Last year at this time we had issued 560 multi-family housing units. There was a total of 120 combined building and/or fire inspections completed in the last 2 weeks. Residential – 29 Plumbing – 17 Commercial – 28 Mechanical - 16 Electrical – 14 Fire – 16 5.Community Development Community Development submitted a grant request to the US Environmental Protection Agency Brownfields Program for $500,000 under Community-wide Assessment funds on November 22. If awarded, the funds would allow the City to conduct Phase I and Phase II environmental site assessments on behalf of private property owners to assist in moving properties to higher and better uses. Community Development worked with the Kalispell Business Improvement District (BID) to submit a grant application through the Montana Main Street Program. The grant requested $50,000 to be matched with $11,000 from the BID to replace 20 benches in the downtown area. Existing benches were installed in the early 2000’s under the Street Scape project and have suffered deterioration over time. The proposal is to replace 20 of the 55 benches within the BID boundary with the same benches recently installed on the Parkline to improve continuity. 5 6.Fire Department From the period of November 16 to November 29, the Fire Department had 160 responses. Of these, there were 116 medical incidents, 8 Motor vehicle accident with injuries, 10 Fire alarm activations-smoke scares, 4 public assists, 2 Haz-Mat incidents, 1 illegal burning, and 19 dispatched and canceled. The Department has had several severe motor vehicle accidents with entrapments this past week due to the icy road conditions. The new ambulance specifications have been finalized and put out to public notice for bids. The aerial ladder and all ground ladders were tested and certified for annual inspection. Chief Pearce is working with Leadership Flathead for an upcoming presentation to the group. 7.Police Department Sgt. Dennis Bain attended an Instructor Development course in Missoula the week of November 14. This course certified Sgt. Bain as a Montana Peace Officer Standards and Training (POST) recognized instructor and he will be able to deliver POST accredited training hours, required by law, for all officers of the Kalispell Police Department. On November 29, Officer Michael Frame was sworn in at the Kalispell Police Department by Judge Hickel. Officer Frame has prior experience at the Missoula County Detention Center. Following the first week, Officer Frame will be going to the Montana Law Enforcement Academy in Helena along with Officer Caron DuBois. The Kalispell Police Department has one remaining vacancy. The Department will conduct a new officer testing on December 8. The Kalispell Police Department has hired 9 new officers in the last 12-month period with one vacancy remaining. Our process remains committed to identifying the quality of the candidates over qualifications. The Kalispell Police Department recently hired a new Animal Control Officer, Marinna Ewing. Officer Ewing completed a two-part online training program, Animal Control-1 & Animal Control-2, which are specific to the safe handling of animals, animal code enforcement, and animal cruelty investigations. In cooperation with the Flathead County Sheriff’s Office, Officer Ewing then completed an eight-week Field Training Program put on by the FCSO Animal Control units. The KPD is happy to welcome Officer Marinna Ewing to our team. Year to date calls for service are 32,787, this compares with 32,115 in 2021, and 29,618 in 2020. Detective assigned cases are currently 620, this compares with 541 in 2021, and 411 in 2020.