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02-27-15 City Manager ReportCITYOF City of Kalispell p OFFICE OF THE CITY MANAGER it MONTANA Information Memorandum 2/27/2015 1. Parks Department We met with representatives of Kalispell Convention & Visitors Bureau on Monday to do a walkthrough of Woodland Park after the Pond Hockey Classic. During the walkthrough, we discussed the benefits of the location with KCVB and the potential to bring the event back to the park in the future. A few of the benefits of the location were: • Spectators could use the walking path to stand on, which is more comfortable than ice. • The operation and infrastructure of the location lent itself well to teams and spectators. • There is potential to expand to 9 rinks in the future. This would help keep it viable in Woodland Park as the event expands. • The proximity of the location to the Ice Rink would, or can, serve as a backup in case of ice issues on the pond. KCVB will be sending spectators and players a survey to gauge the economic impact, get a satisfaction rating and receive comments about the event. We asked KCVB to share with us the results after they have been collected. KCVB estimate that the results should be available within three to four weeks. A video was produced to showcase the weekend and can be seen at https://vimeo.com/120318048. On Saturday, February 14, 2015, the group called "Paws for Play," held a dog park rally at Lawrence Park. Over 60 people and 80 dogs were present. The group's goal is to raise funds for Kalispell's first off leash dog park. On February 17, 2015, Park staff held an Arborist meeting on chemical application for trees and turf. Twelve community members were in attendance, mostly from private tree care businesses. The Kalispell Boulder Project (KBP) is a partnership project formed with Kalispell Parks and Recreation and the Flathead Community Foundation to build a climbing boulder at Lawrence Park. The project is headed by Jandy Cox, and is being well received by the community. KBP held a "Beer for Boulders" event on February 17 at Kalispell Brewery, with $1 from each beer sold that night donated to KBP. Leading up to that event, KBP sold 150 raffle tickets for a pair of carbon DPS skis valued at $1,300 dollars. KPB raised $1,850 dollars prior to the event in raffle ticket sales. The day before the brewery night, Mark Remington of Glacier Eye Clinic put out a challenge that he would match any donations up to $2,000 dollars from the Beers for Boulders event. KBP met the $2,000 goal and by the end of last week, had raised $8,020 in total. Kalispell Boulder Project's next event "Burgers for Boulders" at Five Guys Burgers and Fries is scheduled for March 12, 2015, from 5:OOpm-7:30pm. Five Guys will donate 15% of the nights proceeds to the Kalispell Boulder Project. Recreation has mailed sponsor packets for Picnic in the Park series to over 150 potential sponsors. There are 15 concerts scheduled, starting June 30, 2015. Rosters and schedules are being finalized for the Little Dribblers basketball program. We have 190 participants registered on 20 teams and will start on March 14, 2015. Our summer brochure will be inserted in the Daily Interlake on April 13, 2015. We are working on finalizing the design and getting the information ready for print. 2. Building Department Permits have been issued this year for new construction of seven single-family residences and two town -homes. In 2014, six single-family permits were issued during the same time period. With the adoption of the 2014 Electrical Code, staff has formally petitioned the State Building Codes Division for transference of the building code inspection program from the state level to the City of Kalispell. We have requested that the program be officially transferred on May 1, 2015. Several commercial projects have been submitted and are moving through the Site/ Architectural and Plan Review process. These include: the restoration/remodel of the old Flathead County Jail & Juvenile Detention Buildings; Flathead County South Campus just south of the Earl Bennett Building; Proven Graphics print shop on Westview Park Place; Beehive Homes memory care facility on Stillwater Road; and Chick-fil-A located north of the new Verizon store on Highway 93 North (Chick-fil-A is not scheduled to be open until October 2016). 2 Work is starting on the construction of the Dress Barn and a shell building on Treeline Road along the west side of the Cabela's strip. The addition of a Starbuck's inside the Target store on Highway 93 North is also underway. Demolition work has been completed within the former Army/Navy building downtown, and the focus is now on construction and refurbishing of the future Toggery, scheduled to open June 1. During the winter months, fire safety inspections of existing commercial buildings have been increased. 3. Planning Department CTA, as part of the South Kalispell (airport) Urban Renewal Plan update, has scheduled a major community open house for Tuesday, March 10 from 2:00 p.m. — 8:00 p.m. at the Hilton Garden Inn in South Kalispell. They have also posted an on-line survey. Their website (with links to the city web site) is http://southkalispellurbanrenewal.com/. The March 10 planning board has 2 hearings scheduled. The first will be an annexation request with B-2 zoning by Town Pump for a 14 acre site located at 859 West Reserve Drive. The site encompasses the former "River Church." Town Pump proposes to operate a gas island, convenience store, and casino within the existing buildings. The applicants are also requesting a conditional use permit to operate the casino at this location. The board will also hold a hearing on a request by TKG Spring Prairie Development Four, LLC, to develop a 28 acre site located on the southwest corner of US 93 North and Old Reserve Drive. They propose to create 14 building pads to be utilized for general commercial development similar in nature to phases 1-3 of Spring Prairie to the immediate north. The request involves a Growth Policy Amendment from Public to Commercial, a rezoning request from P-1 to B-2, a planned unit development overlay, and a 14 lot subdivision. 4. Public Works Traffic Signs and Signals Traffic Signs and Signal have been replacing signs and street lights that have been damaged from vehicular accidents. Traffic signs and poles are replaced immediately if the ground base pole couple is not damaged. If the base is damaged, temporary signs on tripods are installed until the ice leaves the ground and permanent base and poles can be reinstalled. Currently, there are 11 temporary signs that will be permanently re -installed this spring. Street lights can be reinstalled immediately if there is no damage to the wire or pole. Replacement of damaged street light poles typically takes up to three months, due to the order and shipment schedule of the poles. It takes a crew of three to stand and mount the 35-40 foot poles that weigh around 450 pounds. Currently, there is one street light pole at Center St and 3rd Ave NE that will be replaced upon arrival of a new pole. Annual Bio-Solids Report The City of Kalispell Wastewater Plant maintains and operates the disposal of sewage sludge (bio-solids) under the regulatory authority of the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Annually, the WWTP completes and files a `Bio-Solids Report Form." The report tracks the annual production of bio-solids in dry metric tons. In 2014, the WWTP generated 552 dry metric tons of bio-solids. 484 dry metric tons went to Glacier Gold, LLC for composting and 68 dry metric tons went to the Flathead County Solid Waste landfill site. The Bio-Solids permit also regulates the disposal of the Primary Digester solids which are land applied on the City/EPA co -owned 40 acre disposal site on Cemetery Road just south of the WWTP. The Primary Digester was cleaned for the Digester Lid Replacement Project and 26 dry metric tons were land applied in April of 2013. The next cleaning of the digester is scheduled to take place in 2018, as part of the routine maintenance program. 5. Human Resources HR is working with Lake County to have Jeff Minkler, former Bureau Chief for the State Department of Laborer Employee Relations Division, put on an all -day "Discipline & Discharge" training course in Polson. This class is suited for Supervisors, Department Heads, Elected and Appointed Officials. The City of Kalispell hosted the program last year with over 40 attendees with the majority being supervisors and union officers. HR attended the Job Service Employers Committee (JSEC) monthly meeting held at NOMAD Technologies north of Kalispell. Job Service Manager, Bill Nelson, reports they now have over 500 job orders, which they are having trouble filling. The biggest issue, he noted, appears to be low wages. They are also not seeing much impact from the oil fields in eastern Montana. 6. Information Services IT staff have been working on building and deploying new computers with eighteen computers being built or waiting to be built. The Council meeting on February 7 failed to stream on the City's website. The Granicus system tested out successfully. IT staff found the event controller had a bad output port. The stream cable was moved to a working video output port and meetings are successfully streaming again. 7. Fire Department Since the last update, the Kalispell Fire Department has received 137 calls for service and has conducted 2 outreach trainings to the community. Fire department staff, in cooperation with the Safe Kids Safe Communities Coalition, is developing an implementation schedule for outreach training, car seat installation and fl inspections, and general safety awareness events for the community. These scheduled dates will be released to the public when they are finalized. Recently, the Kalispell Fire Department hosted the popular rope rescue course at station 62. This course, offered by the Montana State Fire Service Training School, encompasses multiple aspects of rope rescue. Fire Department personnel are also attending training for fire investigation practices for the company officer. This course knowledge will be used to develop our own in-house training that will be offered to all employees of the fire department as part of their yearly training requirements. This training will offer basic skills and abilities for the first responder in recognizing and securing potential evidence in the case of fire or other like incident. The department is also involved with the development of a standardized Tactical Interoperability Communications Plan (TICP). This plan takes an organized look at all of the communications assets available to responders or agencies in the event of a large scale incident and how to request them. It also maps out a strategy for cross discipline use of the communications assets including police, fire, ems, public works, federal, state, tribal and other infrastructures or groups that may be involved. This is paid for through a communications grant and works in unison with the local Communications Users Group. The attached picture is from a recent hazmat call that involved chlorine gas.