City Council Minutes 2020 04 07 - Laserfiche WebLink

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City Council Meeting Minutes April 7, 2020 Page 4 of 12 Councilmember Dickinson stated the proposed grant program is important. Council needs to give direction on the way to provide money, the amount, who will qualify, when it can start, and the application process. Mayor Stolzmann stated this may be a phased program as well. This program will be focused but there may be other areas we need to address later. What goals does the Council want to address with the program. Mayor Pro Tem Maloney agreed time is of the essence and this should be a small business assistance program. We need to consider business resumption as a future phase. Members agreed this should be a small business assistance program. Mayor Stolzmann asked what the initial budget might be. She suggested taking $250,000 from the General Fund to pay for the program. She noted Councilmember Lipton will ask the Revitalization Commission if they could put some funding towards the program at their next meeting. Councilmember Lipton stated he hopes this is the first phase of help the City can provide to help small businesses. Councilmember Brown suggested a larger grant program to help the economy as a whole and would like a program that fills a gap that other programs don’t cover. City Manager Balser stated staff needs direction on the criteria so that staff and Council’s expectations align. She noted the criteria will determine how many grants the City can afford. City Attorney Kelly noted whatever is decided a Council resolution will be needed to approve this and added the Council will need to make clear the specific purposes of the program to meet constitutional requirements. Members agreed it should be a grant program and agreed to start with $250,000 in funding. Members noted that until the Council has a better grasp of the effects of this downturn on the City budget it is hard to commit additional funding. Members discussed some of the eligibility and criteria for applications including having a brick and mortar location in town and being current on all City accounts. Members were generally supportive of requiring a local brick and mortar location. Councilmember Leh would like some restrictions on how the money can be spent; it can’t be spent on a tax lien for instance.