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minutes meeting date 2026-10-07 · fetched 2026-10-25 · 18482 characters · official file · plain text
MINUTES OF THE MEETING OF THE MAYOR AND CITY COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF SODA SPRINGS, CARIBOU COUNTY, IDAHO, HELD OCTOBER 7, 2026. ROLL CALL SHOWED THE FOLLOWING PRESENT: Paul Gritton, Mayor Ryan Carpenter Paige Byram Daniel Larsen EXCUSED: Mitchell J. Hart, Council President ALSO PRESENT: Dan Squires, Director of City Services Andrea Haderlie, City Clerk Thomas Smith, City Attorney Cejay Golightly, Police Chief Morgan Rowland, Recreation Director Hope Hansen, Library Director Sherrie Gritton Brandon Hall Laurie Bauer Jerry Stoor Bill Horsley Molly Beseris Galen Wilson Amanda Larsen Brock Byram Waynet Jo Turner Robert Goodenough Jeff Young, Power/Streets Director Kip Browning, Parks Director 1. Roll call & Additions to Agenda: Mayor Gritton called the meeting to order at 5:00 PM. Mayor Gritton called the roll, confirmed that Council President Hart was absent, and excused the absence. Galen Wilson led the prayer, and Mayor Gritton led the Pledge of Allegiance. 2. Review & Approval: Councilwoman Byram moved to approve the minutes of the past meeting and dispense with the reading thereof. Councilman Carpenter seconded the motion. All were in favor, and the motion carried. Councilman Larsen moved to approve accounts payable dated September 15-28, 2026. Councilman Carpenter seconded the motion. The Council discussed park lighting upgrades, oil purchases, and planned wastewater-treatment sprocket work. Councilman Carpenter abstained from voting on vendor 140 because it is his employer. All were in favor, and the motion carried. Councilman Carpenter moved to approve the September 2026 payroll. Councilman Larsen seconded the motion. All were in favor, and the motion carried. 3. Appointments: Lori Bauer of SICOG presented Pocatello Regional Transit services for Southeast Idaho. Rural service is available to all ages, generally requires scheduling the day before, and costs $2 one way or $4 round trip for local service. Heard an overview from Lori Bauer of Pocatello Regional Transit, including rural, door-to-door service available to residents of all ages. The council discussed coverage, Medicaid trips, funding, local drivers, and outreach to senior residents. Amber Torgesen Mic Night Canceled. The council reappointed Waynet Jo Turner as a planning and zoning commissioner. Mayor Gritton swore her in. Councilman Carpenter confirmed the nomination and confirmed Robert Goodenough. Councilman Larsen seconded the motion. All were in favor, and the motion carried. Mayor Gritton swore in Robert Goodenough as a new member of the Planning and Zoning Commission. Molly Beseris summarized the feasibility study and community support for selling the underused building. The Mayor and Council reviewed the feasibility-study recommendation to sell the underused building because it no longer served a public purpose; supporters said a sale could avoid ongoing city maintenance, labor, and other financial costs, return the property to private use, and support downtown revitalization and economic activity. The council clarified that the sale includes the building and roughly the east half of the adjacent parking area. A public hearing is required before the real-property sale proceeds. The council will publish the public hearing per state requirements, scheduled for November 4, 2026, at 5:05 PM. Mayor Gritton asked the council to review draft Declaration Resolution 2027-6. Councilman Carpenter made a motion to adopt Resolution No. 2027- 6, a resolution of the City of Soda Springs, Idaho, declaring the city's intent to sell real property, commonly known as the Ender's Building, and establishing a minimum value yet to be determined for the sale, providing for the employment of prime-time auctions to market and sell the real property at an auction, and establishing the terms of sale. Councilman Larsen seconded the motion. Councilwoman Byram stated that the $850,000.00 is too high in her opinion. Councilman Carpenter agreed with Councilwoman Byram. Councilman Larsen asked whether we can quickly establish that we are selling the building itself; he thinks there's something in there, but the parking lot is part of it and is outlined in that red section. Councilwoman Byram stated it's too high. She thinks we want someone willing to bring it back to life; we don't want to make it so outrageous that nobody can afford it. We want someone to come in, bring something to our community, and liven up Main Street. She doesn’t think we want to make it unreasonable for someone to come in and put the work in. If she could throw out a number, it would be $650,000.00. Councilwoman Byram proposed setting the minimum bid at $650,000.00. Councilman Carpenter agreed and stated we don't want to price ourselves out of the market. He doesn't know we'll have another opportunity to sell this, and he certainly doesn't want to have this discussion again next year, the year after, or in five years, when the money we've put into this building has multiplied exponentially. As for his thinking on this, the lump sum doesn't tell the whole story; this one-time reimbursement is basically what it would be. There's some easy math that we can do where we're not taking advantage of that taxable property, which is not a lot, but it is something that's about $10,000 a year. When a private entity owns it, we benefit from that. But the other part of that is the monthly recurring and yearly maintenance fee. Some of it we can calculate in money that we spend out, and some of it we can't in labor and time committed to it, and so that's a tangible cost that we can't see. But if we look at this $850,000.00 and we knock it down to $650,000.00, that's $200,000 a year. It is about $50,000 a year that it costs us, which you know may or may not be right, but you know, $60,000 a year; in four years, we're back up to what we think it's worth, just in money that we're not paying out and accruing, not to discount the utilities that come in with that. We must look at the longer-term picture. If people think we're undervaluing this, intangibles we can measure, we can say, yes, we're not getting a million dollars for it right now. Still, in 10 years we'll be at that million dollars by not spending this money on selling the building. Aggressive in our establishment of a minimum value, and like Paige said, we want somebody in there who's going to utilize this building, who's going to invest in our city to bring jobs, to bring something downtown, to make that the anchor that it needs to be, to revitalize Main Street maybe and get some people down there, and he doesn't know what these interested parties have planned, but retail brings real estate. If 10 more people in town get a job. That's worth it to him. And his fears of somebody tearing down a building. No one's going to sink over half a million dollars into something to tear it down. Not next to a railroad track. We talked about this a while ago. Soda Springs has much more lucrative property if they want a bare lot. We may be leaving a little money on the table with the lump sum, but he thinks it will come back to us within a few years. Councilman Larsen said Council President Hart sent us some information, did some math, and put together some arguments. He's a little bit higher on his recommendation. For the record, many on the council, including the mayor, have thought a lot about this, and this is not a decision taken lightly. Anyone who thinks that would be mistaken. As he thought it through, he asked, "How do we do this?" He spoke with Molly earlier. There are a couple of ways to look at this. We're not talking about the price. We are not talking about what we're going to get; we are talking about a starting bid value at an open auction, where the strategy is to attract multiple bidders willing to spend and bid each other up. We have, and we've spoken in previous meetings and put it up here. We had several appraisals in past years showing what the appraiser estimated it was worth. It’s worth what the market will bear, and it doesn't really matter what an appraiser or anyone up here thinks it's worth. The market says what it's worth, and an auction is a good way to figure that out. And to Councilman Carpenter and Councilwoman Byrams' point, we want to price it to attract multiple bidders and encourage competition at auction. Hopefully, Prime Time Auction is doing their thing, which I'm sure they will. Molly has several people as potential buyers, and we can figure out what it's worth. Closer to what was recommended is what he understands to be kind of like the maximum/minimum values; Prime Time Auctions was not necessarily an average, but like, don't go any higher than this; that is the high end. He can get on board with a lower minimum. We see ourselves as stewards of this property until we can put it in someone else's hands. We're being reimbursed for our stewardship of this asset, and now it can go back to the private sector, where it can become something beautiful for our community and drive economic growth. It's reasonable to say, yeah, $650,000.00 is probably an appropriate starting bid, knowing that as the auction goes, it may go up to eight, nine, a million, depending on what the market, what these potential buyers are willing to spend on it. Hopefully, it will. But more importantly, hopefully, it just becomes an asset to the community. Councilwoman Byram voiced that the city shouldn't be in business against local people. So, to get it up and running, she thinks the best option is to put it in someone else's hands. She dislikes competing against the people who pay the taxes and similar groups. Attorney Smith said you have a motion pending on this. You don't have to vote on it. You can vote on another motion to approve it with amendments. And just to be clear, he drafted this. Based on the information he had, he isn't suggesting or recommending it. That's how he read it; then you can vote accordingly. He took what was proposed because he figured you need something that's a starting point. And it's easy to tweak the numbers. You need a motion for whatever you want to approve. If you can approve this with that change or say you want to do a different starting bid, you can do that. Councilman Carpenter amended his motion, Resolution 2027-6, declaring intent to sell the real property with a $650,000 minimum starting bid and authorizing Prime Time Auctions to market and auction it, subject to the required public hearing before final disposition, and advised that the mayor sign the revised Resolution 2027-6 after changing the $850,000 references to the council-approved $650,000 minimum starting bid/value and updating the related public notice to match. Clerk Haderlie was advised to revise Resolution 2027-6 in all three places where it currently shows the $850,000 figure. It should reflect the council-approved $650,000 minimum starting bid/value and update the related public notice to match. Councilman Carpenter amended his motion for adoption of Resolution No. 2027-6, a resolution of the City of Soda Springs, Idaho, declaring the city's intent to sell real property, commonly known as the Ender's Building, establishing a minimum value of $650,000 for the sale, providing the employment of Prime Time Auctions to market and sell the real property at an auction, and establishing the terms of sale and authorizing the mayor to sign that resolution once the edits are made. Councilman Larsen seconded the motion. Roll call vote: Councilman Larson, aye. Councilman Carpenter, aye. Councilwoman Byram, aye. Motion carried. Molly Beseris discussed execution methods and Structured options; as we pointed out, what will really go through is what we want to do with the personal property inside. The personal property has come from multiple sources. We've discussed this repeatedly in our meetings. And again, throughout the feasibility study, it is something of great importance to the community. Many family members have donated items, and in all the research we've done, there is no record of who gave what. We recommended putting it up for public auction and letting the public get back what they want if they value it personally. We did say that at the last meeting. We also reached out to the Maughan family. Of course, they went out and found a lot of those antiques all over the world, and a lot of those have a lot of historic value. And in addition to that, there's some monetary value there as well. While walking through the Enders with the owner of Prime Time, she was completely taken aback by how much was in there and what treasures we have. She thinks that's really the best and fairest way to get those disseminated out. It was brought to our attention that the Caribou Historical Museum. The City asked the Caribou Historical Museum what they would like to continue showcasing in the community. She took the time to go through with Bill Horsley and Galen Wilson. They walked through all the floors of the Enders and provided you with a list, with pictures, of everything the historical museum is interested in having and considering. Does the city want to sell everything separately, or would you like to donate the items listed to the historical museum? Galen Wilson commented that we went through there specifically looking for items we felt were pertinent to Caribou County and us. There's a lot of historical stuff in there, but some of it doesn't relate to us, and our main objective is to restore the historical value of our area and our community. So those are the items we're looking for. As Bill says, I can think of maybe one or two. We were conservative. Councilwoman Byram moved to approve Resolution 2027-8 to donate, at no charge, only the specific items identified in the attached list with photos to the Caribou County Historical Society, not all contents of the Enders Building. Councilman Carpenter seconded the motion. All were in favor, and the motion carried. Councilman Larsen moved to adopt Resolution 2027-7 authorizing Prime Time Auctions to market and sell the remaining personal property. He authorized the mayor to sign that resolution and the personal-property consignment agreement. Councilman Carpenter seconded the motion. All were in favor, and the motion carried. Prime Time Auctions will market and sell the remaining personal property under Resolution 2027-7. Councilman Carpenter moved to approve the consignment agreement and authorize the mayor to sign it. Councilwoman Byram seconded the motion. All were in favor, and the motion carried. The proposed auction process includes cataloging, public previews, a two-day closing period in December, and scheduled pickup days. 4. Citizen Input Mayor Gritton opened citizen input, which was opened and closed without recorded comments, followed by a five-minute recess. 5. Unfinished Business: Director Squires provided a project update: Airport hangar construction has started with groundwork, and Mountain View improvements will start soon; the contractor has acquired supplies. We were approved to use the lead service line funding for Mountain View. Water meters were installed for the West End Water users. AARP trail benches were installed at Ledger Creek. Gravel acquisition from the Highway project: because of fuel prices, they will haul it to the gravel pit. The HydroX truck will arrive by the end of the month, and Council discussed two days of training. Rick Hill completed training to lead citywide safety meetings; a new water-wastewater employee will start October 20. Councilman Carpenter moved to approve the mayor’s previously executed agreement with Fairview Cemetery. Councilman Larsen seconded the motion. All were in favor, and the motion carried. The agreement supports irrigation monitoring and conservation before future rate adjustments. Council reviewed updates to Chapter 17, including modernized definitions and language on home occupations. No additional comments were offered; the council agreed to adopt the ordinance at the next regular meeting. Chief Golightly discussed the mutual-aid agreement with the Caribou County Sheriff’s Office. Councilman Carpenter moved to authorize the mayor and Chief Golightly to sign the mutual aid agreement. Councilwoman Byram seconded the motion. All were in favor, and the motion carried. Chief Golightly discussed cross-deputization and construction-zone safety; the highway recorded 10 accidents this year. 6. New Business: Recreation Director Rowland reported seasonal program participation; flag football and Volleyball are complete for the season, and preparation for basketball and ice rink setup is underway. She is also preparing for the trunk-or-treat. Director Young of Public Works reported hydro rake repairs to #4 and #5, a new sweeper arriving next week, and equipment purchases. Director Hansen of the library reported strong program attendance and Festival of Trees sponsorships. She will also be attending the Librarian meeting next week. Director Browning of Parks reported plumbing repairs at the city park, tree planting at Ledger Creek, trail maintenance, branch removal at Kelly Park, and needs for garbage and signage at Ledger Creek Trails. The visitor book is full; he asked for a replacement. Clerk Haderlie said the office will order one. Clerk Haderlie reported that utility-account migration and document scanning are going well and asked for additional funds to complete the scanning of the blueprints and maps. Councilman Larsen moved to approve up to an additional $5,000.00 for the scanning project. Councilman Carpenter seconded the motion. All were in favor, and the motion carried. She provided Council with copies of the issued building permits and business licenses. Attorney Smith reviewed property-access implications of the new law for the utilities. He will review and get back to Clerk Haderlie and Clerk Schneider. Fire Chief Squires reported that Enders is up for reinspection of the fire suppression system, and he will have them recertify it. 7. Citizen Input: No one provided citizen input. Councilman Carpenter moved to adjourn the meeting. Councilwoman Byram seconded the motion. All were in favor, and the motion carried. PASSED AND APPROVED BY THE MAYOR AND CITY COUNCIL ON OCTOBER 21, 2026. _________________________ Paul Gritton, Mayor ATTEST _________________________ Andrea Haderlie, Clerk
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