Meeting Minutes
November 27, 2017

Attendees

Staff and Guests

Open Discussion

Legislature

Magistrate Courts

John indicated there has been a recommendation from a legislative committee on what to do with the magistrate court problem.

There are two parts to this legislative recommendation. Idaho code gives the district court the power to order a city to build a magistrate court facility. The first part of the recommendation is to repeal this entirely. The second part is to fund the magistrate court. Funding could come from a portion of the growth in the liquor sale redistribution formula, and details would be worked out. At the end of the day, cities would be off the hook for magistrate court funding and counties would get funding for this.

DUI Laws

John said, the police, sheriff and prosecutor’s associations are reaching out to AIC on some tweaks they want to see to the DUI laws. He is not fully versed on what this is about but will report more in the future.

Grocery Tax

John said we are going to see Grocery Tax Repeal. The general consensus is not if it is going to pass. This could have a long term negative effect on us. When they back fill those revenues it captures the growth. He is not sure much can be done about it.

Local Option

John said he understands that Senator Brackett is willing to sponsor a bill that would include transportation only. It will be interesting to see how this comes out.

Water

Nathan said when he first got involved with the AIC Water User’s group he was worried that they would take the actions they did in the Aquifer in Eastern Idaho and spread it around the State. However, he does not see that happening. There are a lot of groups that are involved with this issue and he is not sure how it is going to come out.

Stan asked about the reimbursement for the water that leaches out of the ditch into the local water supply. His understanding there has been a decision about ditches that are not lined; they want municipalities and water companies to reimburse them for that water. Their city attorney’s filed a brief on this issue.

Joe said there is a farmer between Kuna and Melba that wanted to get more irrigation water. The discussion became that the city needed to tile off the ditches within their jurisdiction. Their attorney got involved with that but is not sure where it is at now.

AIC Director

John reported that Jess Harrison has been hired as the new AIC Director. She has a background as a lobbyist for the State School Board Association and has a good reputation with the legislature. She does not have any experience with cities and city issues. However, she does have experience running an organization similar to AIC.

Tammy said she was also concerned about Jess’s lack of municipal background. She indicated that Jess was extremely prepared and felt she had good instincts.

John said he had a chance to talk to a couple of lobbyists and legislators about Jess and from what he heard he felt she will be a good hire.

Fairness in Taxation

Tammy asked Bill what the response was to the survey for the Fairness in Taxation issue. Bill passed around a copy of all the survey’s he had received back. Seven or eight jurisdictions responded to the survey. He said Star’s survey response was the most detailed of the survey’s he received. They have a police contract with Ada County, pay a prosecutor fee to Ada County and a highway fee to Canyon County.

Bill said based on his feel for the information we got back, this issue may not be something we can go further with as it does not seem to be that significant.

Tammy said a lot of things they identified were projects or activities where they had specific agreements with the County. She asked what brought up the need to do a survey.

Bill said that Garret, Mark Hilty and he were discussing the Fairness in Taxation issue getting ready for Mark’s presentation to the Partnership. Mark wanted a picture of what is occurring so he could frame a presentation on this issue.

Tammy said her fire department is always scratching their head on why they pay dispatch fee’s and the police don’t. They don’t want to start paying dispatch fee’s, for police so they don’t really bring it up. Why is there a charge for one and not the other?

Dave said he has two or three BSU surveys on double taxation. Bill indicated he had talked to Amber and she was unaware of those. Dave said he would get Bill a copy of those surveys.

AmericaCorps Vista Opioid Program

Bill said we discussed in October about the Partnership taking on an Opioid program through AmeriCorps Vista. Bill said he has reached out to a bunch of organizations in this regard and feels this project will take on a life of its own.

The Idaho Office of Drug Policy had just completed a Strategic Plan on Opioid misuse and abuse. The Director, Nicole Fitzgerald has totally committed to the effort. She has even offered to help write the Concept Paper as well as the Grant Application. Bill felt they are wanting to use our group and our effort as a model on how they might implement opioid education activities in the other regions of the State.

Both Central and Southwest District Health departments are on board with this project. He is scheduled to give a presentation to the Central District Behavioral Health Board on January 11, and anticipates the same presentation opportunity with Southwest District Health.

Other entities that have committed to participate include the Idaho Board of Pharmacy and the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare to name a few. He pointed to a quick report he had prepared for the members which detailed organizations that have committed to be a part of this effort.

Bill said the big question to him is in regards to this effort is Hospital’s. It is his understanding that Hospital’s don’t have to report overdose cases and it is unclear how they are participating in community wide efforts on this issue. It is in his plan to reach out to the hospitals and get them involved with this effort.

Bill asked for a couple members to participate in the exploratory meeting with this group. He anticipates holding that first meeting in mid-to-late January. Tammy and Nathan volunteered. Darin volunteered Garret. Bill said he would talk with Garret about this and felt he would like to be involved.

Public Lands Issues.

Bill pointed to a handout that Nathan wanted to bring up. It was a letter to our congressional delegation from the Idaho Outdoor Business Council revolving around the issue of transferring public lands to the State.

Nathan said he assumed that all the members had received a letter like this from the Idaho Outdoor Business Council. They are concerned about public lands disappearing. He thought it would be a good topic for discussion.

Darin said he had received it. He thought that cities are very interested in supporting businesses and recognize the resources that come about because of public lands. He forwarded a response to the group and copied Mayor Tammy and Mayor Evans.

Tammy said the concern is, if the State takes over public lands, you are going to have the same results of what occured with Wilke’s brothers from Texas, where they closed off access. The concern is the State can’t afford to manage the land so they will start selling it. With the sale of these lands you are going to see a limiting of access. She added there have been a lot of businesses impacted by either Potlatch or Boise Cascade selling their lands. They always left their lands open to the public. And with the closure of access, it is impacting businesses throughout Idaho.

This has started a new dialogue. She has talked to these folks and has told them they have her support.

Tammy said, until the State has a policy and protocols in place, there should never be a transfer of Federal lands to the State. How are they going to manage it, afford it and, if they sell it what are the stipulations that these lands remain open to the public?

Brad said we just don’t have the population to support and manage the public lands we are talking about.

Dave said he agrees with everything Tammy said and he is in favor of this. He didn’t know if it might be an individual thing or should the Partnership do something as a group.

Darin stated he would be very comfortable with the Partnership sending a letter on this issue.

Darin moved the Partnership write a letter and have everyone sign it. Joe seconded.

John said he is worried there might be some agenda that he is not aware of. Tammy said she hasn’t had time to meet with them, but on the face of it, there is concern about this issue. Local economies are really built around the outdoors. When you start to restrict access, it has a devastating affect that apparently no one is giving consideration to.

John said he does not know enough about what the State’s intent would be if they got ahold of public lands. And he is also not very happy with what the Federal government does, so it creates a conflict with him.

John said that the letter should go to the Congressional Delegation with a copy back to the Idaho Outdoor Business Council. The letter should say we are concerned about this issue and list some of our concerns.

Bill said he would craft a letter and route it around for the Partnership, after he has had a chance to meet with them.

Motion carried.

Mayor’s Walking Challenge Results

Amy Stahl introduced herself and Courtney Frost. They are part of the three groups that fund the Mayor’s School Walking Challenge each October. The other partner is the Idaho Dairy Council.

This was their fourth year. They had a good year and expanded the program to Eastern Idaho. Mayor Petrie of Emmett walked the most. However, they tried to even up the playing field for those who are not able to walk 15 miles a day. They want to honor those that were able to be good role models and walk at least 10,000 steps. That is the benchmark for healthy behavior.

The objective for the Partnership is to have Mayors and Commissioners be good role models for kids. For those who participated, she is sure you experienced this.

Courtney said they did expand to Eastern Idaho. As a result they had 47 mayors participate. Over 100 schools participated. Every mayor that participated beat their average from last year. Paul Loomis in Blackfoot was able to take the challenge to the Army 10-miler in D.C. Mayor Tammy walked with every single school in her district.

Mayors walked over 17,000,000 steps in the month of October. They were able to award $60,000 to schools and the Mayors.

Amy gave a shout out to Mayor Bieter because he is the one that got this program started in 2013. She said this funding is year to year. They do not know if it will continue going forward. If you have personal experience, they would love to hear from the members. Members are encouraged to share their experiences with Amy. They have to take this program to their boards each year to request funding.

Mayor Evans was one of their winner’s this year. John said the funding would be split between two schools.

The overall winner in the Treasure Valley was Mayor Tammy. Part of the challenge with this program is how you make it sustain itself beyond one month. They are really impressed with her walking club.

Tammy said during the first year she had six schools participate, this year she had 16. It was so enthusiastic. A PE teacher said that when she comes to walk with the school, there is such an effort by the students. That teacher asked how we can do it again. The following spring they launched Mayor Tammy’s Walking Club. It is a six week program. They recognize miles logged by classrooms. She goes out and gets sponsors that buy lunch and provide prizes for each school. It starts to get expensive but it has connected her with schools in a lot of different ways.

Tammy said the competition and the idea of $1,000 to those kids was huge. They were walking to get new playground equipment and other things. Each school would say what they were walking for and would say, “You have to help us”. It does get kids out. She had entire schools come out.

Amy said Mayor Henry and Mayor Nancolas also earned some money in the contest.

Director’s Report

Bill pointed to an unofficial listing of meeting dates for the Partnership for the next year. He will send this out electronically to see if any conflicts with the dates can be identified.

Brad said he and Nathan talked about co-hosting a meeting at Parma Ridge Winery in the spring time. May was decided as a good time for that meeting and an adjustment was made in the schedule.

Bill said that recently March has been our attempt at an annual retreat. This year he would like to have that held in town to see if you can get better participation. Tammy said going out of town has its advantages, but we need people to go.

Brad said the end of March doesn’t work for him and would like to move the retreat date. Bill indicated that this would be a different effort to corner a date for the retreat and that we could do it any time the members wanted.

There was some discussion about having our one day retreat at Parma Ridge. Nathan said they were building a bigger facility but was unsure when it would be done. He said he would look into when it will be available and pass it along to Bill.

Both John and Dave said Bogus would be a good option for us on our Retreat. As an aside, we could ride the zip line and that might give us something fun to do. However, March may be a little early in the year. Bill said he would connect with Bogus Basin and identify good times to meet.

Election of Officers

Brad said we also need to look at election of officers for the Partnership because Bob won’t be with us.

Tammy said her plan was to have elections for Treasure Valley Partnership Officers at the December meeting. She added that you do not have to be present to win.

Joe moved to approve the minutes and financial statement. Stan seconded, motion carried.

Meeting adjourned.