Fishers City Council Meeting – Monday, December 19, 2022

Dec 19, 2022

The December Fishers City Council Meeting will be held at 7pm on Monday, December 19, 2022.  I warmly encourage you to participate.
IMPORTANT LOCATION CHANGE: All City Council meetings will now be held at Launch Fishers, 12175 Visionary Way. Launch Fishers is located in the tech park, just north of Super Target.

WORK SESSION
A Work Session will be held at 6:15pm, prior to the 7pm City Council Meeting. No action is taken at a Work Session. It is a gathering of the city council members to gather information about a specific topic. Work Sessions are always open to the public to observe. It will be held at Launch Fishers. The topics for this work session are

In June 2021, The Plan Commission stripped out of the 2040 Plan the following bullet points and wait instead for the outcomes of the upcoming Housing Study. These bullets were removed from the 2040 Plan.

In addition, the State of Indiana released a report from the Indiana Housing Task Force in October 2022 which included 16 findings and recommendations. One recommendation is for city government to adjust local zoning regulations to encourage lower cost housing.

  • Non-Profit Funding. In 2022, $250,000 was granted to several non-profit organizations upon recommendation by the Non Profit Committee. The funds were granted out in two parts. Three organizations received a total of $130,000 in grants in January. And then nine organizations received a total of $120,000 in grants in July 2022, including more grant funds for the original three organizations plus grants for six additional organizations. This second round of grants were awarded after an application process when 24 non-profits applied.
    As a member of the non-profit committee, I have advocated for substantial changes in the application, review, selection and reporting processes for these grants. I fully support devoting this amount of city funding to grants for non-profits that serve our community and citizens.


How to Observe and Participate in the City Council Meeting at City Hall

  • The meeting will be held in-person and will be open to in-person attendees.
  • A video of the meeting will be broadcast live at http://tinyurl.com/CityOfFishers starting at 6:15pm on Monday so you can watch from home. This is a way to observe the meeting only.
  • In-person attendees are welcomed to address the City Council during any Public Hearings during the meeting – and during Community Comment, which is held at the end of every meeting.
  • Fishers residents are also welcomed to submit public comments electronically prior to the meeting. In order to submit a comment, you need to designate the date of the meeting that you want to comment on. Look at the public meeting calendar. Then, complete the online Public Comment Form.  Select “City Council” and that will open a comment box for you to type in. Submit your comments by NOON on Monday, the day of the meeting. All comments submitted before the meeting will be presented to City Council members. These comments are not read aloud but become part of the official meeting minutes.
  • Community Comment at the end of each City Council meeting is always open for your comment on any Fishers topic. This is an “open mic” opportunity for 10 Fishers residents to address the City Council for up to three minutes each. The council members are not required to resolve or respond to your comments at that moment. Usually, pathways are identified for follow-up and additional dialogue.
  • Meeting agendas and past meeting minutes can be found here, under City Council tab.
  • Past meeting videos are supposed to be posted within 48 hours of the meeting. You can find the videos in the City of Fishers YouTube channel.

CITY COUNCIL MEETING
The City Council Meeting agendas are available here, under the City Council header. Each agenda has items on it that appear in blue. These are links to open the supporting documents.

Here’s a rundown of this meeting’s agenda items and my interpretation of them.

6. Council Committee Reports.
Finance Committee Report. The Finance Committee is charged with advising the City Council on matters concerning the general financial operations of the City. The City Council is responsible for fiscal oversight and final approval of the municipal budget. Typically, the Finance Committee report is reflected in action items for the City Council that are reflected in the “Budget/Financial” part of the meeting agenda.
Rules Committee Report. The Rules Committee was created 11 months ago by City Council. One of the committee’s responsibilities is to make recommendations for 2023 appointments to Boards and Commissions. These appointments must be finalized next month. The Rules Committee met last week for the very first time this year. There was no agenda. According to the Rules Committee Report, this meeting was only 5 minutes long!

7. Department Reports.
The monthly Fishers Health Department Report is usually made available to residents every month about our city’s vaccine status, COVID community risk status, and other important public health info. This report was not yet available. The FHD 2021 annual report is available.
The Engineering Department Report is focused on Private Roads and implementing the Barrett Law, which charges local businesses to defray the cost of improving a nearby private road. These improved roads will then become a public road that the City will maintain.

8. Consent Agenda.
There are three items on the Consent Agenda.
Item a. is approval of last month’s City Council meeting minutes.
Item b. transfers funds. These actions transfer funds within the city budget, which is needed periodically. The transfers do not adjust the bottom line at all. This is a transfer of dollars from one budget category to another to avoid a negative balance in a category.
Item c. voids old checks the city cut but were never cashed by the recipient. The City Controller has confirmed that all of the check recipients on this list have been paid. Either they have been paid in a different way or the check was re-issued after getting lost in the mail. This action voids out all of these old uncashed checks.

The Consent Agenda is a grouping of routine reports that should be approved in one swift action, instead of approving each one separately. I believe that all items included on the Consent Agenda should be approved as presented and approved unanimously. If not, the item that requires a revision, abstention, or other action needs to be removed from the Consent Agenda and considered as a separate voting item.

REGULAR AGENDA

Economic Development
9. This is an amendment (revision) to the Project Agreement for New Development at 96th St/Allisonville Rd. This is transformative project for a location that serves as a gateway to our community. The original Project Agreement was approved in Feb 2022. The project is a $96 million development that will include multi-family housing, townhomes and retail space next to a new City of Fishers 98-acre parkland adjacent to the White River. It is notable that the project has sparked a commitment from the City of Fishers to change the disliked 96th St/Allisonville “Michigan Left” intersection into a roundabout. This action corrects an error in the Project Agreement language. The Agreement erroneously defines “Infrastructure Proceeds” in such a manner to require the Company (CRG) to pay a portion of the Infrastructure Proceeds and receive a credit for such payment. The subject First Amendment corrects the definition of Infrastructure but does not otherwise change the obligations of the Company, or the incentives provided by the City to the Company.

Budget/Financial
10. I-69 Economic Development Area. Back in Oct 2020, the City Council approved a plan for apartments, townhomes and condos called Maple Del. It was located on 116th St, between Municipal Drive and Hague Road. The project fell through and was never started. The developer, Hageman, still owns the land, I’m told. Because of its prime location, it will be developed certainly. This action declares this land as part of the I-69 TIF District.  

More about a Tax Increment Financing District:
What Is a TIF short video – https://www.trilandproperties.com/what-is-a-tif-and-how-does-a-tif-work/

11. Opioid Settlement Funds. The City of Fishers will soon receive a total of $383,000 in increments over the next 18 years as part of Indiana’s settlement award from opioid litigation. The city has to open up separate accounts (funds) to deposit these funds and record expenditures from them appropriately. There will be two funds that need to be opened because the money is divided into two uses: unrestricted for any use and restricted specifically to be used to pay for opioid treatment/care/prevention.

Government/Miscellaneous
12. Cumberland Road from 106th and 116th St. This is an agreement between the city and the county to improve this important roadway.

Planning/Zoning
13. Voluntary annexation of 14050 Allisonville Rd.
14. Voluntary annexation of 13880 E 116th St.
15. Voluntary annexation of 11444 Timberlane Dr.
A voluntary annexation is when a property owner wants to incorporate into the City of Fishers and receive city benefits, i.e., access to city utilities and city services like road maintenance and snow plowing. The annexed property will start paying city property tax to cover these benefits. Sometimes, annexations are a first step for a property being sold for development. Annexation Procedures can be found here.

Agenda items 13, 14 & 15 will welcome public comments in a Public Hearing format.
A PUBLIC HEARING means that any resident is invited to comment on this topic. This is the only opportunity to make a comment and address the City Council on this specific matter. Fishers residents are welcomed to submit comments for the public hearing on this matter electronically prior to the meeting. All comments received by noon on Monday on the day of the meeting should be presented during this part of the meeting and will be part of the meeting’s official minutes. The Public Comment Form is live on the website right now.

If you do attend the City Council meeting in-person, you may comment on this matter during this part of the meeting. The City Council President will open the public hearing by asking if anyone would like to speak. If no one indicates that they want to speak, the public hearing can be closed quickly. So, please indicate immediately that you have something to say when the public hearing is opened. Otherwise, you may miss your chance.

16. Amendments to the Unified Development Ordinance. The UDO is the development standards of our city. These revisions are miscellaneous updates.

Unfinished/New Business.

Community Comment. All comments submitted through the online are supposed to be provided to the city council members before the meeting and become a part of the meeting’s official record. The Public Comment Form is live on the website right now. Select “City Council Meeting” and that will open a comment box for you to type in. Submit your comments by noon on Monday, the day of the meeting, so they can be distributed before the meeting.

Meeting adjourned!

If you have any comments or questions, please send them my way. Email is a good way to get a hold of me.

Thank you for reading all of this. 🙂