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09-29-17 City Manager ReportfTYOF ira - City of Kalispell - _is, OFFICE OF THE CITY MANAGER - 1A OVA Information Memorandum 9/29/2017 1. Parks Department Kalispell Parks and Recreation is excited to announce our first ever outdoor movie night on October 20, from 7-1Opm at Woodland Park (field west of Woodland Water Park) with a showing of Ice Age- Collision Course. This event is free to the public thanks to our sponsors; Parkside Credit Union and Radiance Tanning Studio. Dates for Running Rascals Football and Fall Into Soccer were pushed back due to the air quality and unforeseen closures to schools and sporting programs. On Friday, September 22, Kalispell Parks and Recreation's first Fall Into Soccer program started with a total of 142 participants. Running Rascals started on Saturday, September 23, with a total of 63 participants. The Begg Dog Park grand opening took place on September 17. The ribbon cutting ceremony was attended by Jerry Begg, whose mother donated the land to the city in 1985. Paws to Play, along with Parks Director Chad Fincher, made speeches commemorating the event. NMAR awarded a grant of $3,500.00 to Paws to Play to be used to build and install a footbridge from the parking lot to the west gate. The Depot Park restroom is in the process of receiving a new coat of paint. Over the years, the stucco building had been vandalized numerous times by vandals puncturing the stucco. Park staff have begun work to improve the showers at the Woodland Water Park. Park staff will frame in the shower, then a plumber will move the center shower fixtures to the walls, after which park staff will finish up by tiling the facility. The Forestry department is currently advertising for an arborist position. Twenty trees are being removed or pruned as part of a forestry contract. 2. Public Works The 4th Ave E Water Replacement Project is currently ahead of schedule. Most, if not all, of 4th Ave E will be open to traffic this upcoming week. All water main work and paving has been completed. The contractor is working to finish sidewalks, signage, landscaping, and crosswalk striping. Signage is in place to turn the street over to two-way traffic upon opening the street. The Sand Shed Replacement Project at the City shops was completed in August of this year. The new sand shed will store the winter salt/chip mixture, cold mix, and 3/4" crush used for backfill on water/sewer main breaks. 3. Building Department Eight single-family building permits were issued in the past 2 weeks, bringing the total of new single family/duplex units for the year to 99 compared to 112 last year at this time. The first of four apartment buildings of the new Lofts at Ashley Apartment complex located @ 2050 Airport Rd has been issued a building permit. This phase is valued at approx. $1.2 Million and contains 20 residential units. This places the total number of multi -family housing units to date at 20 compared to 86 multi -family residential units (the college housing project) last year at this time. Harbor Freight located at 2298 Hwy 93 N has broken ground. The shell permit was issued for this location and the project is valued at $1.3 Million. The new Fairground bathrooms located at 265 N Meridian are under construction. This permit has a valuation of approx. $1.1 Million. 4. Planning Department Staff has begun Phase 5 of our program to rezone the Core Area from B-2 and I-1 to B-3 (Core Area Business) for a 35 acre area with 65 owners. This area is bounded on the north by Idaho, the east by 7th Avenue, the south by lst Street West and the west by Meridian. This will be the last phase and will complete the rezoning process. As is our process, all property owners in phase 5 will be notified by mail and an open house will be held at city hall on Tuesday, October 10 from 4:00 — 6:00 p.m. prior to a planning board work session scheduled for November 14. 5. Information Services IT staff are troubleshooting an issue with a few printers on the system. Large 2 multifunction printers are not affected. IT staff resolved issues with courtroom microphones not being heard on the recorded audio files from court sessions. The microphones were loud enough to be heard in the courtroom but the recorded sessions were not picking up all the microphones. Functionality has been restored and all the courtroom microphones can now be heard on the recorded sessions. The ESRI map server software version upgrade is underway. The map server software must be upgraded to move the map database to the new database server. The finance and utility billing system is being moved to a new server. Remote sites and field computers have been updated to the latest antivirus version. 6. Human Resources The annual Employees Health Screening was recently held at the Hampton Inn and Kalispell City Hall. We had 136 of 193 eligible employees (just over 70% participation) and 58 spouses attend this year. The health screening is designed to target five (5) pre- established personal health improvement goals set by Montana Municipal Interlocal Authority (MMIA). These targeted goals included targeted Body Mass Index (BMI), Blood Pressure, Cholesterol and Fasting Glucose. MMIA and member cities are striving to help improve employee and family members' health, which in turn helps to reduce health insurance usage. HR staff attended Flathead Job Service Employer's Committee (JSEC) board meeting. According the Job Service manager, unemployment in the Flathead is now at 3.9%, which is below the national average of 4.4%. They currently have over 1200 job openings. Some employers are now beginning to raise their entry-level wages in an attempt to attract employees. 7. Community Development The work at Kidsports/Kalispell Youth Athletic Complex funded by a Montana Youth Recreational Facilities Grant is wrapping up this week. The $1.4 million grant funded necessary infrastructure for seven new multipurpose playing fields and additional parking at the north end of the existing facility. The grant work will conclude this week. Additional work that is required to finish the fields and amenities will be completed by Kidsports in the coming year with fields projected for play in spring 2019.