Council Oks building codes and approves tourism marketing strategies

With City Manager Anette Spickard’s last day set for Tuesday, Nov. 3, Sedona City Council met in a closed-door executive session Tuesday, Sept. 22, to discuss two outside candidates for interim city manager: James Krischke and Kevin Phelps.

Krischke has served as interim city manager for municipalities in Illinois and Missouri. Phelps was Glendale’s city manager for 10 years until his retirement in February.

On Spickard’s recommendation, the council chose an outside interim rather than one of the city’s three deputy city managers — Lauren Browne, Andy Dickey or Barbara Whitehorn — Interim Mayor Holli Ploog said.

The decision also avoids giving any deputies an unfair advantage if any of them apply for the permanent job, she said.

Council discussed recruiting a new city attorney during Tuesday’s executive session and was scheduled to take up the topic again Wednesday, Sept. 23, after deadline. Assistant City Attorney Monique Coady has led the city’s legal department since City Attorney Kurt Christianson left Aug. 13 for a private-sector job in Atlanta.

Codes

Council unanimously approved the 2024 International Building Codes and the 2023 National Electrical Code. However, the city will retain the 2018 International Energy Conservation Code, along with Chapter 11 of the 2018 International Residential Code.

The Wildland-Urban Interface Code, which aims to mitigate wildfires, was not proposed for adoption. At a May 27 work session, council directed that the International Property Maintenance Code be discussed later.

During the discussion, Ploog took aim at the city’s development impact fees, which the council approved Jan. 14, 2025, on a 5-2 vote, with Ploog and Councilwoman Kathy Kinsella opposed. According to the Community Development Department, the fees add $17,228 to cost of building a 2,500-square-foot, $500,000 single-family home.

“I voted against the DIF fees because I want to reduce the cost of construction, not increase the cost of construction,” Ploog said. “At the time, I remember being told that all these municipalities were in the process of implementing DIF fees, and so we were going to be an outlier. Except they haven’t.”

Assistant Director of Community Development Steve Mertes said the city of Cottonwood and the town of Clarkdale are not implementing DIFs, adding that the Town of Camp Verde did not respond to the city’s information request. Other municipalities cover development impact costs through property taxes, which Sedona does not have.

Tourism

Council unanimously approved the Tourism Marketing Winter 2026-27 campaign and a year-round campaign strategy to target high-net-worth tourists. It also approved a $736,000 contract amendment for Day Vengley & Associates Advertising and Public Relations “to allow spending authority for account management services, travel, advertising, advertising planning, and advertising placement costs for upcoming 2026/2027 Winter, 2027 Summer and high-net-worth destination marketing campaigns, and creative asset production,” the council packet reads.

As a consent item, council approved a letter asking U.S. Rep. Eli Crane [R-District 2] to co-sponsor legislation designating the Upper Verde River as a federal Wild and Scenic River. Council previously approved a similar letter in 2023.

“The Upper Verde has qualified for designation as a Wild and Scenic River since 1981. This means that for over 40 years, the Upper Verde has been recognized for its wildlife, agricultural, clean water and recreational values,” the letter reads. “Over this same time period the river has also become increasingly vulnerable as its flows have decreased and water demands have increased.”

Future Meetings

School- and housing-related items are tentatively on the agenda for council’s next regular meeting on Tuesday, Oct. 13.

The Community Development Department is scheduled to present its latest update to the city’s Balanced Housing Strategy, which aims to guide housing development over the next decade with a goal of adding 775 new housing units. One of the strategy’s goals is to boost enrollment in local schools by 50% over the next 10 years.

To support that goal, council will consider approving $225,000 to maintain the baseball field at Sedona Red Rock High School, along with an additional $102,000 in spending on school projects. Of that, $76,000 would hire a school security consultant for the Sedona-Oak Creek School District, an independent government, and the remaining $26,000 would go toward other small capital projects for the schools.

An agreement between the city and Arizona Water Co. was tabled until the Oct. 13 meeting at the request of Dickey. Under the agreement, AWC would install a new water main along Forest Road to deliver water to the Uptown Parking Garage and eventually up Van Deren Street.