[0:04] All right. I'd like to welcome everybody to the July 21st, 2025 town council regular meeting.

[0:13] I'd like to go ahead and call this meeting to order at 531. I will go ahead and do the invocation.

[0:22] Give me one second. I'd written it down.

[0:42] All right. If you'd mind your heads.

[0:43] Heavenly Father, we gather today mindful of the weighty, excuse me, responsibilities placed

[0:49] upon us as Cargill Town Council. We ask for your wisdom and guidance as we

[0:54] deliberate on matters that impact the lives of our citizens, grant us clarity of thought,

[1:00] discernment in our decisions, and a spirit of unity as we work together for the betterment

[1:04] of our community. Help us hear and listen to all voices to consider the needs of every resident

[1:10] and to act with integrity and compassion. May our decisions reflect your divine purpose

[1:16] this and lead to a more just and prosperous town for all.

[1:19] Amen.

[1:21] OK, if you would mind joining me for the pledges.

[1:27] Pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America

[1:31] and to the republic for which it stands,

[1:34] one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty

[1:38] and justice for all.

[1:41] Honor to the Texas flag, our pledge allegiance

[1:44] to thee, Texas, one state, under God,

[1:47] one and indivisible.

[1:53] All right, that brings us to the open forum.

[1:56] Ms. McComis, do we have any?

[2:13] Nope.

[2:15] One.

[2:20] I have Ms. Dela Shaw.

[2:31] The $1 show.

[2:32] About two months ago, I came to you and asked for a sign to be put on Harriet Lane because

[2:38] of people running through my fence.

[2:40] And I just wanted to thank you because I left home this morning when I came home.

[2:45] There was a sign on Harriet Lane now showing a double curve.

[2:51] I still wish we had that sign up that's the unenforceable speed limit of 20 miles per hour.

[2:58] But maybe this sign will take care of that problem.

[3:02] I just wanted to thank you for getting that done.

[3:09] Even if you didn't sign up, is there anybody else in the audience that would like to speak?

[3:14] Going once, twice.

[3:16] All right.

[3:16] We'll close the open forum, which brings us to the consent agenda.

[3:21] I would like to go ahead and remove item number 3 and 7 for the councils.

[3:28] Any other ones that you would like to have separate consideration for?

[3:37] I'd like to make a motion to approve the consent agenda with the exceptions of item 3 and item 7.

[3:46] I'll second.

[3:48] All right.

[3:49] A motion and a second.

[3:50] All those in favor?

[3:51] Aye.

[3:52] Anyone opposed?

[3:53] All right.

[3:53] Motion carries.

[3:54] Number three, consider approval of ordinance 2025-26, authorizing a funding request for

[4:02] the Argonne Crime Control Prevention District to purchase five speed monitoring devices

[4:05] for all traffic solutions and five decorative poles for centerline supply, from centerline

[4:11] supply for the use of Argonne Police Department.

[4:13] The only clarification, I guess maybe it would have to be you, Chief, because I don't

[4:17] see a town manager.

[4:19] Are those for Argao or areas outside of Argao, like the ETJ?

[4:26] Argao.

[4:27] That's all I need to know.

[4:29] So having said that, that was the only clarification and look for a motion to approve item number

[4:36] three.

[4:37] Mr. Mayor, I'll make a motion to approve item number three on the consent agenda as

[4:41] presented.

[4:42] I'll second that.

[4:44] All right.

[4:44] Got a motion and a second.

[4:45] All those in favor?

[4:46] Aye.

[4:47] All right, anybody oppose?

[4:48] All right, motion carries.

[4:51] The item number seven, it was really intended

[4:55] to give our town manager a little bit of credit.

[5:01] I don't see him here, so I'm gonna go ahead

[5:02] and pinch hit for him.

[5:05] But essentially what item seven comes down to

[5:08] is we, he had a bid, I'm going by memory,

[5:11] maybe Bobby, you might remember.

[5:14] You wanna step up, please?

[5:17] I think the original bid was $46,000, $47,000 for the amount of work, and then just...

[5:25] I don't want to speak for you, but anytime you get into doing redo work and things like that,

[5:31] things creep up and you all found other things that really needed to be tend to, right?

[5:36] Yes, sir. As we started removing panels that were busted, we realized other areas

[5:42] that we're taking on rainwater and anything like that to get underneath the panels that

[5:47] we were originally hoping could be left.

[5:51] What was discovered out of it is an entire point A to point B that really needs to be

[5:57] done for it to be a lasting repair.

[6:01] That's what this is asking.

[6:07] Consistencies from what I think you would like to see normally.

[6:11] help me out. Compaction, the thickness of the concrete that's existing, we found it

[6:17] ranging anywhere from three inches to six and a half inches. But quite a few areas

[6:23] are only around three inches thick.

[6:27] And was the rebar thick enough or was it

[6:30] subpar? I actually found two different sizes of rebar and some of the stuff

[6:35] removed. Some of it is what is ideal and some of it is smaller. The concrete that's

[6:41] there was actually breaking extremely talky and brittle. It was breaking

[6:47] very easy, but we found records of the concrete that was poured previously and

[6:52] it's a very low PSI, low strength concrete. So what we're planning on

[6:57] going back with in this entire repair is a much stronger concrete that they

[7:02] can hold up to the type of traffic that travels.

[7:05] Would six inches be the standard thickness, minimum?

[7:09] Six inches is a standard minimum.

[7:12] And the PSI was subpar, too, right?

[7:15] Yes.

[7:16] Right now, what the current As-Built plan

[7:18] say was 3,000 PSI concrete that was put down,

[7:22] both sidewalks, 3,000 PSI.

[7:26] What the contractor is putting back right now is 5,000.

[7:30] And 4,000 is good for a roadway, many places that's what your standard roadways are, but

[7:37] 3,000, especially not for the aperture.

[7:42] And what Bobby is pointing to there in that picture on your right, that's essentially

[7:46] the seam between the north and the south, which there wasn't any connection, any rebar

[7:53] connecting the two, that's why they were opening it up.

[7:55] And actually, Mike had taken, I don't know what it is, some kind of rubbery filler thing

[8:01] that he was going to actually show us, but anyway.

[8:04] It's basically the stuff that you use to fill cracks in the ground.

[8:09] There's probably close to 200 feet long out there that's almost three inches wide.

[8:15] So some of it's gone.

[8:17] Some of it, as you can see in that picture, was filled in with grout.

[8:20] other areas where it was actually filled in with crack-sealed material. It's

[8:25] basically a rubber consistency that's heated up to fill a crack but it was

[8:29] three inches wide, five inches deep of crack-sealed. So all that would be

[8:37] removed along with these panels and new concrete would be going down,

[8:41] butted up against the existing eastbound lane and it will be dalled in.

[8:46] and they'll drill holes in the existing endow it together

[8:49] to where it's joined the way it's supposed to

[8:51] and then seal the top once the concrete.

[8:53] You know, just that thought.

[8:55] I drive that quite frequently.

[8:57] There are several drill sites along the French town

[9:02] being kind of a collector.

[9:03] And they haul water, water tanks from disposal.

[9:08] That's a lot of weight on that concrete.

[9:11] Yes, sir.

[9:12] Is six inches adequate for the heavy traffic?

[9:15] Six inches should be fine. I mean the road that's there it's it's held up for at least 13 years

[9:22] Down so that's actually surprising

[9:24] With what's there that it held up that long

[9:28] But six inch thick with the proper psi and it should be fine, but if we went

[9:34] If we went thicker it would increase things we'd have to remove some of the soil because you still want the top of it

[9:40] to be at the top of the other lane.

[9:42] So that would increase trying to remove more dirt from this lane.

[9:47] They can up.

[9:48] Bobby, you want to reflect on, and you

[9:51] can see it in actually both pictures in the distance

[9:54] on the right-hand side in the left corner.

[9:57] That's a light system that controls the traffic

[10:00] and your feelings were?

[10:02] You'll notice we did do temporary traffic signals

[10:06] on this project instead of detours,

[10:09] while detours are maybe a little bit cheaper to do. They would have had to

[10:16] detour traffic all the way back to Gibbons. Gibbons back to 407, 407 down to

[10:22] 377, get back to Frenchtown. This temporary traffic signal seems to be

[10:27] working pretty well. Now it was a little bit for everybody to get used to it the

[10:32] first couple days but it's actually it actually seems to be going really smooth.

[10:36] There's actually an intersection, a T intersection in the middle of the closure of Indian Trail.

[10:41] There's also a temporary traffic signal on that road.

[10:44] Fall works off of sensors and timeframe of the speed limit and the length space between

[10:50] them.

[10:51] So it has so many seconds of green light, so many seconds of red light to clear traffic

[10:55] out for other turns green.

[10:58] When a car pulls up trying to leave Indian Trail from that residential cul-de-sac, it

[11:03] Clicks a sensor that tells the other lights they need to turn red to give traffic from our residential area time to get out

[11:10] It must be going pretty smoothly

[11:13] So that worked really well because last time

[11:17] We had all kinds of issues. We had to call for police backup so to speak to

[11:23] Kind of monitor some other ones that didn't want to listen to the signage

[11:27] So anyway, the whole point was to give you an opportunity to shine here. He's done an awesome job one

[11:33] And two, anytime that we start doing projects like this,

[11:37] I think we have to be aware it's like opening up a wall.

[11:41] You just don't know what you're gonna find, right?

[11:43] And so the fact that we're adding to this original budget,

[11:48] I still think it's very, very cost effective.

[11:51] We're gonna fix French Town.

[11:53] It's hopefully gonna last another 20 years.

[11:56] And Gustave, I know you've been wanting to

[11:59] show more actual projects out there.

[12:01] So this is the very first.

[12:02] I don't want to get ahead of ourselves, but I know Mike has, I think, a million six for road construction for the next FY, so

[12:09] Anyway, any last words or sir all right doing awesome job. Thank you. Thank you. Appreciate it. All right

[12:15] If there's no question look for a motion for item number seven

[12:21] Mr.. Mayor make a motion that we

[12:24] That we approve item number seven on the con consent agenda as written

[12:30] Second.

[12:30] Okay, got a motion and a second. All those in favor?

[12:33] Aye.

[12:34] Anyone opposed? All right. That brings us to the public hearing number eight.

[12:39] Public hearing concern to take and take action on ordinance 2025-22 amending TDS 25-004 to article three

[12:48] zoning of the town, Argo Town Development Standard regarding amendments to section 14.3.34

[12:54] single-family residential estate, one zoning district, and other related

[12:59] provisions in the town development standards. Mr. Harrison. All right, thank

[13:05] you, Mayor. So this item is a public hearing that was brought before you. It

[13:12] came before you as open forum item. This was something that a resident spoke

[13:17] about. And one of the takeaways from that was to bring it to P&Z to

[13:23] discuss the amendment and then to Town Council so that's what we're that's what

[13:28] this item is for tonight is to discuss a potential amendment to the section 14

[13:33] 334 single-family residential estate one zoning district so this is a

[13:39] residential zoning district that requires a minimum of one acre and so

[13:43] the amendment has already been discussed by the Planning and Zoning

[13:47] Commission, they recommended approval with the condition that it be allowed only by issuance

[13:55] of an SUP, so a specific use permit.

[13:58] This ordinance language that you see here is the language that's currently proposed with

[14:03] the condition from the PNZ Commission added in there, so you can see on the first line

[14:08] a property zone to SF1 may be allowed only by issuance of an SUP to have the usual

[14:13] farm animals as defined under the Farm General's Livestock Branch Use.

[14:18] And then further down in that paragraph, to clarify, I used the same language that was

[14:24] a part of the SF2.5 and the Ag Zoning Districts.

[14:27] So those zoning districts are larger.

[14:30] They already require or they already allow livestock and ranch animals.

[14:34] So I just used that same language.

[14:36] And then further down in the paragraph it says, so long as the property has a

[14:40] minimum one and a half acres of land available for grazing, excluding property

[14:45] use for structures and other non-ag uses, and follows section 2.01.014, the code

[14:52] of ordinances for the one animal unit per acre. So that language, the difference is

[14:59] www.youtube.com

[15:00] It's one and a half acres of land available for grazing as opposed to two and a half.

[15:04] So that was the big difference for SF1. It's that if we're going to allow livestock

[15:10] animals on SF1's own property, you have to have a bigger threshold of one and a half

[15:15] acres as opposed to just one acre. But the matrix is still the same. So if you

[15:20] have a horse and you want one, you want to bring your horse to your SF1's

[15:24] own property, it would still be one acre per horse. You would still, even

[15:29] Even though if you have one horse, the minimum is one acre in the matrix, but you would still

[15:33] be required to have one and a half acres of grazing land.

[15:36] So it makes the threshold a little harder for SF1 properties.

[15:41] I think that's a good thing just because we want to make sure that those properties

[15:46] have enough land and that the goal is not to put animals on small properties.

[15:54] You know, so I think one and a half acres is a reasonable ask.

[15:59] And then the second paragraph, it talks about private animal lots or stables may be allowed

[16:04] only by issuance of an SQP and subject to the following standards.

[16:09] Those standards are the same standards that we have for the SF2.5 and the Ag Zoning

[16:13] District so nothing changes with that with the exception of one and a half acres as

[16:18] referenced as opposed to two and a half acres.

[16:20] So those are the big changes, and then in the staff report you'll see, I believe it's page 159.

[16:30] That is a section that was previously in SF1 that talks about standards of commercial,

[16:37] for commercial animal lots and stables that we're proposing to delete, to remove,

[16:43] because oddly enough you had these standards for commercial stables in SF1,

[16:48] and we didn't even allow livestock and ranch animals in SF1, so it was kind of funny that

[16:53] it was there, so we just decided to remove that one.

[17:00] As far as SF1, to give you a sense of where it is in the town and how big they are, there

[17:08] aren't that many.

[17:10] Of the areas that are zoned SF1, I've highlighted here, so you can see how it shifts.

[17:14] I've put little red lines around the properties that are zoned SF1 so you

[17:22] can see some notable neighborhoods if you've lived here long like Rolling

[17:27] Acres, Shadowwood Estates, Bin Boyd Road, you have the Shenandoah Court area, the

[17:35] north side of old Justin Road, Surrey Lane. So these are areas that are zoned

[17:40] Only a small fraction of the number of those lots actually have enough land to allow for livestock and ranch animals.

[17:50] So even though looking at the map it doesn't look like much so you would take even less than that.

[17:57] So maybe about 10% of these lots are even eligible to have the size requirement for grazing land to have a horse or livestock or ranch animals.

[18:06] So it's pretty limited.

[18:07] I think the overall goal is to allow those lots that have the space to have ranch and livestock animals, but also

[18:18] Making sure that

[18:20] Areas that are next to them are not going to be impacted. They still have to have the space

[18:24] They still have to have the setbacks as far as ag structures. Those don't change at all from the zoning districts

[18:30] I said 2.5 an ag it's still

[18:32] 50 feet from the property line for ag structures

[18:36] and then 100 feet from nearby residents

[18:39] for any ag related use, like piles of manure or feed

[18:43] or any of that stuff.

[18:45] It still has to be 100 feet away.

[18:47] And so are there any questions about this map

[18:51] before I go on?

[18:55] So again, the recommendation from the PNZ

[18:58] from their meeting on July 9th

[19:00] was a recommendation of approval

[19:03] with the condition may be allowed only by issuance of an SUP.

[19:08] So this was done, I think the Planning and Zoning Commission

[19:11] wanted to ensure that they had control

[19:15] over the types of animals, the lot that was requesting

[19:19] the use, so that was the reason for adding that condition

[19:23] to make it a specific use permit.

[19:25] It does add an extra level of bureaucracy,

[19:29] so to speak, it's still a public hearing,

[19:31] it'll still require the applicant to pay the application fee for that so it

[19:38] overall the amount of enforcement that we're doing on other properties that are

[19:42] SF 2.5 and ag we're doing that today you know we get complaints not regularly but

[19:49] occasionally where someone will say we have too many animals on a property so

[19:53] we'll go and investigate and if we find out that there are too many animals

[19:56] will tell that property owner that they have to get rid of some of them so

[20:01] Typically, it's larger animals like cattle, horses.

[20:05] I don't think I've ever received a complaint

[20:07] for the number of chickens, because I

[20:10] think they'll have to have like 1,000 for them

[20:12] to be in violation.

[20:16] But overall, this is a public hearing.

[20:18] It's an ordinance amendment.

[20:19] So I believe we have a couple of people here

[20:23] to speak on that if they wish to.

[20:25] But otherwise, I'm here to answer questions.

[20:28] Harrison, you pointed out last time, I think.

[20:30] and how many actual lots there were.

[20:32] Do you remember the number of SF1?

[20:36] Well, of properties that are zoned SF1,

[20:37] I said it was approximately 100.

[20:39] 100.

[20:40] So, you know, and I think, I don't know,

[20:43] I thought we talked about it once,

[20:44] but I think it's a great idea from an SUP

[20:47] because we have one code enforcement guy.

[20:50] And for him to, I mean, he knows the area pretty well,

[20:52] but it's unfair to him to run around and see that,

[20:55] oh, they have enough room and it's grazeable

[20:57] and they have setbacks.

[20:58] So I think it gives the opportunity for folks to enjoy that land to its fullest, but at

[21:05] the same time, we do monitor what's going on.

[21:09] But having said that, if there's no other questions, are there, Dr. Herman?

[21:13] I'm sorry, go ahead.

[21:15] I was just going to ask, did we get any responses from the neighboring, or did we

[21:20] have to do?

[21:21] No, because it's not a specific.

[21:22] It's to the standards.

[21:24] Okay.

[21:24] Sorry about that.

[21:25] Thank you.

[21:26] That's coming.

[21:28] Harrison, when it said one and a half acres, excluding other structures, I suppose excluding

[21:33] would be a residence and things of that sort.

[21:37] That's right.

[21:38] Okay.

[21:38] So anything on the land that would be the main house, accessory structures, a pool,

[21:45] all of that would have to be in excess.

[21:48] You would have to have a barn as well.

[21:50] A barn.

[21:50] Okay.

[21:51] You would have to have one and a half acres of grazeable land.

[21:54] so it has to be land that animals can munch on.

[21:57] So I wouldn't classify a single family home

[22:01] with accessory structures in a pool

[22:02] and the grass around there to count

[22:05] as far as the grazeable land.

[22:14] All right, well, if there's no one for the question,

[22:18] we'll go ahead and open the public hearing at 553.

[22:30] Right, hello, everyone.

[22:34] While I understand the primary reason

[22:35] for PNZ's proposal of requiring,

[22:38] Oh, I'm sorry, I always forget that.

[22:40] Amelia Thompson, 180 Hartpole, Rd West.

[22:44] So while I understand the primary reason

[22:46] for PNZ's proposal for requiring an SUP

[22:50] by way of enabling them the opportunity

[22:52] to understand what animals and what land would be used,

[22:56] my position is to not proceed with requiring an SUP

[23:00] at least initially.

[23:01] Instead, I'm in support of keeping the original proposed,

[23:05] a proposal of incorporating the language for SF1 zoned properties that have one-and-a-half

[23:11] acre minimum that would allow animals to be on that set property as defined by the farm's

[23:17] general use chart matrix.

[23:19] In discussion with Harrison and as he's highlighted, the reach of this for us in

[23:26] changing this SF1 zoning regulation is predominantly housing additions, which would be sanctioned

[23:31] by HOAs and is likely more limited

[23:36] than even how we're defining it today.

[23:39] I would be remiss if I also didn't highlight

[23:40] that another fellow Argyle resident stood up

[23:42] during the PNZ, the July 9th PNZ meeting

[23:45] who was also in favor of just proceeding forward

[23:48] with the SF1 zoning revisions,

[23:51] stating similar reasoning.

[23:55] Another piece that I highlighted

[23:57] during the PNZ committee meeting on July 9th

[24:00] was that the one and a half acre requirement

[24:03] actually goes above and beyond the one acre

[24:05] to one large animal requirement

[24:08] that the SF2 and a half land is privy to

[24:14] which leads to my next point

[24:16] and that SF2 and a half zone properties

[24:18] are not required to go through the process of an SUP

[24:22] where they have to prove that they have one acre

[24:25] for every large animal

[24:27] that those same properties have to get approval for that SUP.

[24:36] Personally, we've already done the rezoning process.

[24:39] I'm challenged by, yet again, this SUP requirement being included as part of the SF1 revisions,

[24:49] which is another process with associated risks, additional costs of its own

[24:54] versus just allowing it based on the property size

[24:56] as it's been defined.

[24:58] That being said, I am in favor of pushing forward

[25:01] the SFZO Anyone Regulations as initially proposed

[25:04] and this would in turn support families like my own

[25:06] to be able to have animals on their property

[25:08] as defined by the Farm's General Use Chart Matrix

[25:11] that deepens work ethic

[25:13] and furthers sharing agriculture

[25:15] and equestrian passions in our day to day ways of life.

[25:19] And so I'll just leave it as perhaps consider

[25:23] proceeding forward with not requiring the SUP and then if it does become an

[25:28] issue then implementing an SUP as part of the process. Thank you.

[25:36] Is there anybody

[25:37] else?

[25:41] Okay then we'll close the public hearing at 5.56 and look for

[25:49] deliberation from the council.

[25:54] Anybody have any thoughts?

[25:56] Just one, Amelia? I just wanted to make sure I got that right. We should name this ordinance

[26:02] after you don't have to get up. This is all just compliments. You guys are shepherding

[26:06] this all the way through. We understand the incredible amount of patients it takes

[26:10] and so I think this is the right direction to go for y'all's property and the three

[26:17] or four SF1s that are big enough to support this.

[26:20] So it's the right thing to do, and it's a pain.

[26:23] And we appreciate your guys' patience pushing it forward.

[26:28] Yeah, I would concur with Council Member Stewart's.

[26:32] I wish there was a cheaper version of doing it,

[26:37] if there was such a way of doing it,

[26:39] take the cost factor away.

[26:41] But I still think, and Amelia, if I may call you that,

[26:47] We have seen some things firsthand.

[26:49] Unfortunately, I'm sure you're not,

[26:50] you're going to take care of the animals just great,

[26:52] but unfortunately that hasn't always been the case.

[26:55] I think the logic about the two and a half

[26:58] is just the fact that two and a half is, there's a lot.

[27:01] I mean, a house is going to be,

[27:03] it's not even going to take a fraction of that,

[27:05] nor the pool, the hardscape, all of that.

[27:07] And so there, the probability that you're going to have

[27:10] at least one acre per animal is much,

[27:14] much greater in that sense.

[27:15] But there is no perfect scenario. You have to come up with some rules, right?

[27:20] So anyway, if I look for other...

[27:23] Just real quick, let me jump back on this.

[27:26] You know, theirs is the most scrutinized property that will ever be scrutinized under this little amendment

[27:31] because we've been studying it for six months now.

[27:35] If there was a way to grandfather theirs in to approve it without an S.U.P.

[27:41] and then make anything going forward require an S.U.P.

[27:43] because, like I say, they've been scrutinized as much as anybody will ever be scrutinized

[27:50] for this, because they've been, like I say, they've had it up in front of P&Z two or three

[27:54] times.

[27:55] They've changed the zoning.

[27:56] It's been well, like I say, I can't imagine studying it anymore for them.

[28:02] I would love, personally, I would love to accommodate them without the SHP.

[28:07] My only concern would be in terms of legalities would be if you do it without the SHP,

[28:13] right now, and then you're trying to change the tone somewhere down the road, how do you

[28:18] accommodate and resolve that conflict at that point in time?

[28:24] So Harrison, when you look at this SUP requirement, I mean it's pretty quick. There's not a whole

[28:31] lot of math that has to be done, right?

[28:34] No, not really. I think overall it's time because it takes 60 days from turning in the

[28:40] application, going through the public hearing process, and then it's cost, you

[28:43] know, an SUP costs a thousand dollars. So if anyone wants to put their horse on

[28:48] their property, you got to say, hey, you need to pay a thousand dollars before you

[28:51] can even know if you can do it. And for some people that's going to be cost

[28:55] prohibitive. So Brenda, is there a way to have like an ag SUP? So the only way

[29:05] to allow the, I'll call her the applicant because really this is her request, is to

[29:15] approve the text change without the SUP requirement.

[29:21] There's been no notice and a hearing that would allow us to grant an SUP to her tonight.

[29:29] So if you have the SUP requirement, she would have to go through that process.

[29:34] But as far as a cost factor, is there a way to have a tiered, like an ag SUP fee?

[29:44] I suppose there is. You set a fee schedule every year with the budget and you can create new categories of fees.

[29:51] So the point I'm getting at.

[29:52] The logic, though, would be that the staff time required to process it is less than a regular SUP.

[30:01] And so what I'm getting at councilmember steward is the fact likelihood that PNZ is going to

[30:09] prove it is almost certain. I can't speak for the council here, but I have a feeling it's

[30:15] going to get, you know, passed. And so it's just a cost factor and a time factor. And

[30:21] if we can figure out the cost factor, then, you know, I think to your part, we're going

[30:28] going to keep parity with all the other properties, but we still can defend that we're treating

[30:34] everybody equally.

[30:45] So the Texas Constitution prohibits the expenditure of public funds for a private purpose. You'd

[30:54] have to find a public purpose behind waiving the fee in order to waive the fee for one.

[31:00] I don't recommend that as a general rule because fees suck for everybody, and I don't want to

[31:11] caution you against waiting for one and then getting another dozen requests.

[31:17] But we could, if this is going to take 60 days, we could by the next meeting essentially adjust

[31:22] a fee schedule for an ag fee application.

[31:26] Yes, you can.

[31:26] And I don't want to speak for you, Mr. Wicks, but if this is a two-hour deal, a three-hour

[31:33] deal to look at it, you know, is adjusted accordingly to $150, for example.

[31:40] So an S.U.P. permit is $1,000, whether it's an S.U.P. for this or whether it's for sport

[31:48] court lighting or whether it's for, like, a school or a church or anything like that.

[31:53] It's $1,000 for everybody.

[31:54] That's right.

[31:55] And so I do think that that makes sense that there's some type of fee schedule, right, because taking a look at something as massive as, let's just say, you know, whatever a 40,000 square foot building has a lot more particulars to it to look at than this.

[32:10] I do understand PNZ's logic behind making it an SUP, and while I, you know, don't want to put undue burden on anybody, I do think it makes sense.

[32:23] And especially since we're changing something and we're doing something new, I would hate

[32:27] for somebody to come in and they're like, oh, well, I'm SF-1 and that's all they see

[32:31] and then they go get their horse and then it's a matter of like, oh, well, no, it's

[32:34] SF-1 but with one and a half acres and this and that.

[32:38] And then it kind of goes, you know, kind of gets off the rails really quickly.

[32:42] And in the meantime, there's a horse already there or whatever.

[32:45] And so then, you know, I mean, it just, it kind of snowballs into creating more

[32:49] trouble down the line.

[32:50] Whereas if someone had kind of this specific thing where it had to be looked at we have to say yes

[32:54] This does meet the requirements. You do have the right land space and whatnot

[32:58] I think that that would prevent problems in the future when this would come up. I

[33:04] don't want to overstate the

[33:08] How often this happens I people already do that

[33:12] You know the zoning in SF one has language in those in the zoning district standards that

[33:18] talks about a commercial stable and private stables when we haven't allowed

[33:23] livestock and ranch animals in that zoning district and so people just go

[33:27] down and read oh I see private stable okay I can do it and so there it's

[33:32] already happened and it's it's not that common but when it does happen we tell

[33:36] them I know you saw that that was inaccurate and that we don't allow it

[33:42] in SF1 so you have to remove it and they do. So how many how many actual

[33:48] properties in reality, how many properties would have adequate acreage to be subject

[33:54] to this change, you know, that they would have access, one and a half acres in addition

[33:59] to the structures and all of that.

[34:01] From what I heard you say, there are minimal number of these tracks in Argao.

[34:06] Could we create, why don't we call it SF1, if we really, it's SF1 and a half, why

[34:10] don't we call create a separate, can we create a separate zoning just for the

[34:15] properties that have more than one acre?

[34:19] Well, we do have SF 2.5.

[34:21] So SF 1 is just a minimum one acre.

[34:24] And then so anything between one acre and 2.49 acres is SF 1.

[34:29] So you do have 2.3 acre lots that are SF 1.

[34:34] And then once you hit 2.5, then you're zoned SF 2.5.

[34:38] What I'm looking for, I guess,

[34:39] I'm looking for a way to accommodate

[34:42] these handful of properties that would actually

[34:45] qualify for animals and so on without going through the burden of SUP and everything else.

[34:52] Is there a way?

[34:53] Well, I think the potential for complaints of people violating this, I think the cost

[34:58] of managing that is less than the cost of doing SUPs.

[35:05] The overhead that it takes to process a public hearing, depending on the lot, if we have

[35:10] to send out 100, 150 letters, we have to use postage, we have to take the time to draft

[35:16] up the staff reports, you know, all of that staff time, if you combine that, I think it

[35:20] would be less than the overhead of having a code enforcement officer doing the enforcement.

[35:25] Gustav, if you, there's 100-ish SF-1s out there, and we have one code enforcement person,

[35:33] and he knows the area pretty well, but all of a sudden, it's not a matter, I guess

[35:39] the question is, people that have the SF1, are they going to be honest, well I'm going

[35:46] to say honest, are they going to recognize that you have to have one acre of usable?

[35:50] Quite honestly, I wasn't even aware of that, even though I have SF2.5 until Larry told

[35:57] me about it.

[35:57] He said it was grazeable land, I'm like, oh that's interesting, I never thought

[36:01] about that.

[36:02] So I think there's a lot of folks out there that just don't know.

[36:06] And the fact that you're getting so close to the minimum, right, per our schedule, I throw out again.

[36:14] Is there a possibility that we can amend our fee schedule to make it a little bit easier on the pocketbook?

[36:21] Absolutely.

[36:22] And, you know, in this case, they can proceed with their application,

[36:27] and hopefully by the next meeting we have this amended, so at least it takes that off the table for them.

[36:32] And in quite honesty for what it's worth, I think if you're the SF1 that has an SUP,

[36:38] it's going to be more special than somebody else's that doesn't have an SUP.

[36:42] Because yours will be, you know, usable for, you know, a horse or whatever you're trying to get.

[36:53] I think the fee schedule amendment would be my recommendation if that's the way you're leaning.

[36:59] It doesn't require public hearing. We can put it on the next agenda. It would not slow her down.

[37:05] when do you have to pay the like the whatever the fee is do you have to do

[37:11] that when like you apply for the scp yeah when you submit the application you'll

[37:14] have to pay the fee mm-hmm well the application isn't complete until you

[37:21] submit the fee mm-hmm are you pay the fee however staff could start working on

[37:27] it when it's submitted a lot of times people are late paying but you know

[37:31] what's coming so you can do some of the legwork.

[37:35] I just think we need to try to do something

[37:37] to provide some type of accommodation.

[37:38] I don't want it to be another, like, okay,

[37:40] so it's a month before we get the fee schedule changed

[37:43] and back to us, and then you're able to fill it out

[37:46] and fill the permit fee, and then it's another 60 days

[37:48] after, I mean, it's dragging on forever,

[37:50] so I'd like to try to find some way

[37:52] to be accommodating of something like that.

[37:55] As soon as staff knows the direction y'all want to go,

[37:58] we can certainly do that.

[37:59] that we will be very accommodating

[38:01] to help this applicant.

[38:02] We understand the position that you guys are looking for here.

[38:08] So we just need a motion.

[38:12] I'll make a motion to approve item eight as presented.

[38:16] I second.

[38:18] Okay, we have a motion to approve and a second.

[38:21] All those in favor?

[38:22] Aye.

[38:23] And just understand we'll work diligently

[38:25] to get that done, okay?

[38:27] All right, thank you.

[38:28] By the way, will you guys

[38:35] All right, that brings us to the next public hearing.

[38:38] Consider and take action ordinance 2025-23 amending TDS 25-005 to article 3, Zoning of

[38:46] the Town of Argo, Town Development Standards, regarding amendments to section 14.3.23, amendments

[38:52] to zoning ordinances in districts, administrative procedure enforcement, and other related provisions

[38:57] and the town development standards, Mr. Wicks.

[39:01] All right, thank you, Mayor.

[39:03] So this item is another one that was requested by town council.

[39:08] This is for the standards that talk about a public hearing

[39:12] and planning and zoning consideration.

[39:16] So whenever planning and zoning commission has to take action

[39:20] on a zoning, rezoning, or text amendment request,

[39:25] the section that we're talking about 14-3-23 had some language that said the

[39:31] Planning and Zoning Commission may on its own motion or at the applicant's

[39:34] request defer its decision recommendation for not more than 90

[39:38] calendar days from the time the public hearing was first opened. So this was

[39:44] brought to our attention by Council Member Brating. This was during the

[39:49] heritage plan development district PD public hearing we had to table that

[39:55] item a couple of times because we were waiting on information from the

[39:58] applicant and so that we had already had the public hearing and so we were

[40:02] thinking are we going to hit that 90-day calendar limitation and so we

[40:05] would have to make a decision and so the understanding would be to remove

[40:13] that language so that anytime the Planning and Zoning Commission needs to

[40:17] defer its decision to get more information from the applicant or you know

[40:24] maybe the applicant wants to request a deferral as well it eliminates that 90

[40:29] calendar day requirement so it just says defer its decision recommendation until

[40:33] it has had an opportunity to consider other information or propose

[40:36] modifications. So it's just eliminating that 90 calendar day

[40:42] So during the P&Z meeting on July 9th, they did recommend approval of that change as presented.

[40:51] So there was no condition or change to the revision.

[40:56] So right now this is the recommended for approval revision.

[41:01] And I'm available to answer any questions.

[41:04] Is this the so-called shock clock?

[41:07] Right.

[41:08] The planning and zoning shock clock.

[41:10] And we imposed that on ourselves?

[41:14] I think that could have been when we adopted this standard back in 2010.

[41:22] I did learn that the framework of the 2010 ordinance that we used is from the city of Keller.

[41:28] So I think this might have been something that came from Keller.

[41:32] But it was something to speed up the process if you think 90 days is fast.

[41:38] But that was the idea, I think.

[41:41] To be clear, it is not required by state statute.

[41:46] So we're looking to expedite it even further and do it within 90 days in full?

[41:50] Well, we would like to, but if there's more information that comes up that we need to consider, it eliminates any requirements.

[41:57] So it could be longer than 90 days if we wanted to be longer.

[42:00] There have been incidents in the past where there was pressure to make a decision when not all the information was there.

[42:06] I'm

[42:14] forward omitting it then.

[42:17] I think we need all the information.

[42:21] Well, we can do that in the form of a motion.

[42:24] Oh, it's probably my bad, getting ahead of myself here.

[42:28] All right, so we'll open the public hearing at 6.13.

[42:32] Do we have anybody that wants to speak on that topic?

[42:39] Go on once, twice.

[42:41] All right, we'll close the public hearing at 6.13

[42:46] in probably 30 seconds, so make a difference.

[42:50] I'll make a motion to approve planning and zoning's recommendation and that's ordinance 2025 2023 as it's written for public hearing item number nine.

[43:01] I'll second that motion is second. All those in favor. I anybody oppose motion carries brings us to the last public hearing item number 10 public hearing concern to take action ordinance 2025-24.

[43:16] For allowing a zoning change request, Z-25-002 from Agriculture to Old Town One Zoning District

[43:25] for the Mission Investor slash Outdoor LP Property on a 3.4 acre tract of unplanted land

[43:33] in the Jay-Gazaway Survey Abstract 481, I don't have to read all of that, do I?

[43:40] No.

[43:40] Okay.

[43:41] All right.

[43:41] It's on Front Street.

[43:43] Just to orient you.

[43:45] All right.

[43:46] Thank you, Mayor. So this item is a public hearing for zoning change request. The

[43:53] property itself, like you stated, it's on Front Street just to the north of Old

[43:58] Justin Road, south of Eagle Drive, and west of the railroad. So it's this long

[44:05] sliver of land that used to be owned by the Union Pacific Railroad. And since

[44:11] Since 2007, it's been owned by the same owner, Mission Investors, and currently it's unplatted.

[44:22] It's part of three different abstracts, if you can believe it.

[44:26] But the ultimate goal of this zoning change is to fix an error that was done when the

[44:33] zoning change, the zoning map was approved back in 2017.

[44:36] The map in 2017 had identified this parcel as right-away, which before 2006 it was right.

[44:44] It was owned by the Union Pacific Railroad, but now that it's privately owned it had been

[44:51] zoned ag and then in between zoning maps so it was ag and then the next zoning map said

[44:57] it was right away and so now we're going back to

[45:00] We're going to make it zoned again. So initially, the zoning change, we just said it was ag, and

[45:07] so the proposed new zoning district is OT1. OT1 stands for Old Town. That's the area of

[45:17] Argyle that is the oldest. But on the east side of 377, you have OT1, and that's the

[45:24] residential slash retail portion of Old Town. And then as you get further back to the

[45:29] older houses. You have OT2, which is just the residential standard for that area.

[45:35] But since this area is the historical part of Argyle, so I thought, speaking

[45:43] with the property owner, the best use of this property would be OT1 to make it

[45:49] consistent with this area as opposed to Ag. So current conditions of the site

[45:54] you can see here. This is looking north. You can see Front Street here on the

[45:59] left and then you can kind of make out the railroad tracks on the right side of

[46:02] the image and then across 377 you can see the red bank building and the blue

[46:06] Meadows building. So this is looking north and then this is looking south from

[46:14] the top of the property. You can kind of make out the railroad tracks on the

[46:17] left side of the image and the real estate station building and the former

[46:23] post office building, Turner Massey Realty Building. So you can see that it's

[46:28] long and skinny. It used to be operated or the property owner had a contract

[46:35] agreement with the town to use it to stage aggregate, gravel, dirt that we

[46:43] would store here in exchange for the town maintaining that property to keep

[46:47] it landscaped in mode. So for a period of time the town did use it to house some public

[46:54] work items. But here are the zoning maps showing the current zoning on the left. You can see

[47:01] that the parcel is shown as right away, unzoned, and then the proposed zoning on the right

[47:08] would show it as OT1. So you can see the blue area just on the east side of 377.

[47:15] and that's OT1 that allows retail and residential.

[47:19] On the north side of this parcel,

[47:21] there's a child daycare center, the Fine Art Preschool.

[47:26] That's zoned OT1.

[47:28] And then this parcel, the proposed OT1

[47:30] on the east side of Front Street.

[47:32] So that's the proposal right now.

[47:35] The OT1 land uses, this is the description

[47:41] that comes with the zoning district

[47:43] whenever we look at it in our standards

[47:45] and so it says old town one is intended to create a mixed use focal point for the town.

[47:50] This district is appropriate within that portion of the original dedication of the town of Argyle

[47:54] that is located east and west of the centerline of US Highway 377 and west of the centerline

[48:00] of the right away of Cypress Street. The mixture of retail office governmental

[48:05] residential uses is appropriate within the OT1 district. Public pedestrian walkways,

[48:11] open areas in order to promote interaction among the various land uses and to create

[48:15] a pedestrian friendly environment are encouraged. So the idea of anything

[48:21] developing on this site would help to meet those standards, create a more

[48:25] pedestrian friendly environment, a focal point for the town, create more

[48:29] compatibility of uses,

[48:33] and here are some potential OT1 land uses that are

[48:37] available in the zoning district. So a couple of items like a barber, beauty

[48:42] shop, a church place of worship. I know we need more of those. I'm sorry. Museum. I said

[48:53] it before you said it. Medical office uses, general office uses, pharmacy, specific use

[49:01] permits. So this would still require a public hearing for a specific use permit, a bed

[49:05] and breakfast, general retail, low intensity, which it just means any use that's not

[49:10] not formally identified in the use matrix that's under 5,000 square feet, and then a

[49:19] public garage parking structure, sports court, private, not lighted.

[49:24] So these are some of the potential uses.

[49:26] Right now the property owner doesn't have anything planned for the site.

[49:29] This would just be to establish the base zoning.

[49:32] So we don't know yet exactly what could possibly go there, but these are the potential.

[49:46] of residential and retail. So presumably retail on the bottom, living on the top, yes, that

[49:55] is a possibility. But that also exists currently in OT1 now. So it would be allowed under that

[50:04] circumstance so not apartment just for apartment sake you'd have to be retail

[50:08] with something on top. What are the dimensions do you know? I know it's

[50:14] small just curious if you had I think at its top it's about 130 feet wide.

[50:25] Sir

[50:25] I would hate to have can you approach please.

[50:38] The property is roughly 1,300

[50:40] feet long probably pushing 200 feet at the north end and south end

[50:46] gets pinched down as you can see, the state of Texas, the very southern end, old Justin

[50:54] Frontage, corners down the state, widening, reliant, and that's it, this was

[51:04] the old depot

[51:04] location.

[51:08] It would be really cool if it was returned to that, right, put a restaurant in there

[51:13] or something.

[51:14] You know, we have had thoughts like that, we've owned the property for 15 less years.

[51:20] We are developers for our own account.

[51:26] I just want my partner's 90 years old process.

[51:36] And a lot of people get tired.

[51:38] Nothing happened.

[51:40] I'll tell you, worries.

[51:44] One of the local dentists located.

[51:47] Building.

[51:49] Supercharging stations.

[51:50] Yes.

[51:53] Everything.

[51:55] Nothing close.

[52:05] No, this doesn't have the dimensions.

[52:06] I don't think this is part of what we're going to need in the Pacific Highlight Sale Default

[52:13] Profession.

[52:13] All right.

[52:14] Well, thank you.

[52:16] I mean, I'll say I'm for taking the handcuffs off.

[52:20] Well, you've got a public hearing, you're right.

[52:24] Yeah, that's a public hearing, so anyway, before you make a motion, well, I appreciate

[52:31] the information, sir, just that was a question, and I guess to your point, nothing has

[52:37] happened there and nothing will happen until something changes and this is the

[52:41] change. So having said that Harrison is there anything else you want to add

[52:46] before we open the public hearing? Just as far as public input so we did send out

[52:52] letters to property owners within 200 and a thousand feet. We haven't received

[52:57] any letters back to our office. Some people called asking questions to

[53:01] clarify what the item was for and then at the meeting on July 9th for

[53:06] of the PNZ Commission.

[53:07] We did have four residents speak.

[53:09] Two were seeking to clarify information

[53:12] and two were against the proposed zoning change.

[53:18] Could you outline what councillors

[53:21] Udavik and Snell dissented on?

[53:24] I think I'd guess, but.

[53:27] Yeah, I think the overall stance was,

[53:33] there was discussion about what was allowed

[53:36] on the property and that comes from the attachment that we had here, the deed

[53:44] without warranty that was shown in that meeting. So it showed some restrictions

[53:49] that came with the property that gives Union Pacific ability to say no to any

[53:56] above ground structures. I think it said it was for human habitation or

[54:02] human occupancy so that was something that was a concern for some of the

[54:07] commissioners but town attorney McDonald clarified that any sort of restriction

[54:13] from a deed without warranties between the property owner and that entity so

[54:18] it's a private it's a private case between those two the town doesn't get

[54:24] involved. So ultimately I think Udavik and Snell didn't see that property as having a

[54:33] lot of commercial value. The fact that it was too close to the railroad that might have

[54:38] some impact on the danger of a pretty active railroad going right next to some commercial

[54:47] buildings. So I think they were hesitant based on that concern and then whether

[54:52] there or not, that's how I would get developed at all.

[54:54] I'm sure all the neighbors would appreciate it.

[54:58] Sound buffer.

[54:59] Mm-hmm, yeah.

[55:00] Sound buffer, that's right.

[55:02] It seems to me that if the railroad

[55:05] is the final arbiter of what can go on the property,

[55:08] that just kind of makes that property almost not

[55:11] valuable, if you propose something

[55:13] and they can kill every deal.

[55:16] What's really the, where's the value that I would find

[55:20] really challenging myself. But that'll be up to the owner to take up. So anyway,

[55:26] having said it, let's go ahead and open the public hearing at 626. Is there anybody

[55:31] that wants to speak on this? Yes, sir.

[55:42] The negotiations obviously purchased property,

[55:44] but the intent of the deed restrictions were the railroad did not want residential

[55:48] hotel type uses of property. It wasn't meant to restrict the commercial type

[55:55] retail, barbershop, dental uses added. It was meant to reflect hotels and apartments.

[56:02] Was that?

[56:03] I'm sorry, was that reduced to riding?

[56:08] It's in part of the deed.

[56:10] It's part of the property too.

[56:17] Unless you want to say anything else, it's public hearing.

[56:20] Alright, so anybody else want to speak on this item?

[56:26] Is that what you're talking about?

[56:28] I haven't said that 627 would close the public hearing.

[56:32] One thing I want to point out is, Harrison and I asked Kelly earlier, she didn't have

[56:36] the answer and it was an unfair question to her.

[56:39] But if you look at Charlene, for example, there's houses that back up right to the

[56:44] railroad tracks.

[56:45] So it may seem not as a desirable piece of property, but that's going to become a

[56:51] quiet crossing one of these days.

[56:53] I think actually the fact that a textile took some of that skinny part. It's not a bad thing. Hopefully that paid you fairly

[57:01] But I still think there's something that can be done with it

[57:04] And it could be some kind of a commercial use, you know restaurant or something like that. I

[57:09] Have a quick question for Harrison. So on our packet it says that this is town initiated with property owner approval

[57:15] So is this something that you guys that you were just looking through like hey

[57:19] What do I need to go through and fix and whatever can I can you tell me a little bit about how the request came about?

[57:25] Yeah, so

[57:26] the property owner had reached out to us and

[57:29] When we were looking at the property we saw that it was shown as right away and not zoned and so

[57:36] When he asked about things he could do on the property we were I guess it could be a road

[57:41] You know it wasn't it wasn't zoned for anything

[57:44] And so whenever developers would call and ask questions about what they could do on the site, we just didn't have an answer for him.

[57:50] So that's why it was town initiated with his approval.

[57:55] And based on our conversations with him, we thought OT1 was the best solution for that parcel.

[58:02] And I do agree. I think it makes sense to match it up with what it is across the street there.

[58:06] And there could be something really cool that could potentially go in there.

[58:11] So, okay, thank you for that.

[58:13] I appreciate it.

[58:19] I'd like to make a motion to approve item 10 as presented.

[58:23] I'll second that.

[58:24] You got a motion to approve and second.

[58:26] All those in favor?

[58:27] Aye.

[58:28] Anybody oppose?

[58:29] All right, motion carries.

[58:31] All right, brings us to action items.

[58:33] Pick up speed now.

[58:34] So consider and take actions on ordinance 2025-21.

[58:38] Calling a special election be held on November 4th,

[58:41] 2025 for the purpose of increasing the sales tax

[58:44] tax and use tax levy to 2% and authorize the mayor to execute an agreement with Denton

[58:49] County elections administration for election services. Mr. Sims, is that your item?

[58:56] Yes, sir. It's relatively straightforward. This is the same election that happened in

[59:01] your May cycle that almost passed but didn't. We thought that based on the mayor's request,

[59:07] we should bring it forward, let you guys consider whether or not you'd like to have

[59:10] on the November ballot. Your option is if you put on the November ballot, then it would

[59:16] be the only item you have, right? And you would be needing to pay Denton County elections

[59:21] somewhere in the $8,000 to $12,000 amount to have the election. If you wait till May,

[59:26] you'll have city council members up for election, and so you would not have an

[59:30] added cost for having the election at that time. Given the amount of money it is,

[59:35] it's probably prudent to move forward, but we need council's decision on that.

[59:38] And so just to clarify for everybody, this mainly applies to Harvest or to the Belmont

[59:45] II only, okay?

[59:48] And we have, help me out, an agreement with Belmont II that essentially we split the

[59:54] sales tax 50-50, okay?

[59:57] So we're not

[1:00:00] I mean, we already have 2% in the rest of the town. I know it's written in a certain way,

[1:00:04] but we already have 2% in the rest of the town, and that's between all the entities.

[1:00:09] I know the town is only 1%, but as far as what you pay at the retail store, it's going to be 2%.

[1:00:16] So it really helps us raise more taxes. It does help Belmont, too, raise more taxes.

[1:00:22] My only question on that is, what they participate in the cost, since it benefits them as well,

[1:00:28] How can we ask them to do that?

[1:00:30] We can certainly reach out and talk to them about it.

[1:00:33] I don't want to guarantee that right now, but we can talk to them.

[1:00:36] And so there is a little bit of clarification.

[1:00:40] When I was campaigning, a lot of folks just didn't understand what we were talking about.

[1:00:44] And I know there are limitations to what a town can do as far as putting out information.

[1:00:50] There is.

[1:00:51] I guess my comment to you would be we had very little public information from what

[1:00:56] I could tell, it predates me, but I saw not a lot of anything, right?

[1:01:02] So I think that given the amount of time between now and November, if you want to do it, staff

[1:01:09] can gear up and provide nothing that says vote yes, but we can provide a lot of information

[1:01:16] about this because it is, after all, let's face it, it's confusing.

[1:01:20] The average resident is not going to be able to read it and say, oh, well, that's

[1:01:24] just intuitive.

[1:01:24] It's an odd case because special purpose annexation to collect a limited portion of sales tax is not particularly common and people need to understand what's happening.

[1:01:35] So just getting the clarity out there is extremely important.

[1:01:40] And it only lost by eight votes. It didn't pass by something. It was eight, nine, something like that, right?

[1:01:47] and do only the people in Belmont to get to vote on that so like do I vote on

[1:01:53] that as an Argyle resident? Go ahead Claire. I don't remember so only Argyle

[1:01:59] residents vote okay okay in Argyle elections you know we go ahead sir we

[1:02:07] caught in the weeds of how we're split with Belmont but we always forget to say

[1:02:11] that all it does is raise it to tax parity because everybody else is already

[1:02:16] charging the two percent and that there's just a little sliver of the

[1:02:19] Belmont district that's not paying the same tax rate as the rest of the town.

[1:02:23] That thinks that they are I'm sure right when I go buy a Chick-fil-A meal I'm

[1:02:26] not like oh well I only got charged seven percent or what I'm confident in.

[1:02:30] So we're not even though it has to be specified this way on the ballot because

[1:02:34] we are raising that tax rate but we're just raising it up to match

[1:02:37] everybody else's tax rate and the rest of our job. Okay say what you're gonna

[1:02:41] say it is a tax. It's a tax haven over there. If you go eat at Chick-fil-A, you're safe

[1:02:47] in pennies. I had to give him that lead. The way it's written right now, it's really

[1:02:56] confusing because if I was a citizen, I look at that, I said, oh my gosh, they're raising

[1:03:02] the tax again. And that's where it's just sort of not only confusing, but it's kind

[1:03:07] irritating. I wish that was written in a way that it's limited or that there is the word parity

[1:03:13] written into it. Just people understand it's just specific to a certain area. I don't know if you

[1:03:19] can do that but... Well I think that that's where the communication piece right? Like we can't change

[1:03:24] how it's worded on the ballot but if everybody knows going in and they've seen enough information

[1:03:28] there is zero that went out about it. Not one single thing that I ever saw anywhere that

[1:03:32] the town put out, or that anybody could put out to talk about it.

[1:03:35] And for it to fail by eight votes with zero information, if we did a good enough job of

[1:03:40] letting folks know what it is and what it means, then when they go in there, I think

[1:03:44] that it's going to give people the knowledge and the power that they need to feel more

[1:03:47] comfortable voting yes.

[1:03:49] I agree.

[1:03:50] Any information that we put out is better than...

[1:03:54] I think because Council has already given us a good partnership with the Argyle Business

[1:03:59] Association and some of the other groups in town it really is just doing the

[1:04:03] live work of getting out and talking to those groups ahead of time and showing

[1:04:07] them appropriate not leading but appropriate public information and we

[1:04:11] can do that very effectively between now and then. And this way everyone's

[1:04:15] benefited. I did the math one time just an estimate it's it's well over a

[1:04:18] hundred something thousand dollars and that what we would gain in doing so. That

[1:04:23] we shouldn't wait until May right to start getting that like why would we

[1:04:28] You know what's unfair here is they're collect well they're collecting sales tax

[1:04:33] They mean the state they're not necessarily remitting it to the town

[1:04:37] I don't know if that's already gone into effect has it

[1:04:40] Anyway, no

[1:04:45] The sales tax for that area started July 1st, and so we won't see it until

[1:04:51] September yeah, so state is collecting it. We're not getting our shares. So anyway, I don't know how that works out

[1:04:57] We will where it's just two months behind, but just started for our portion of it.

[1:05:01] We want that two months.

[1:05:03] I know.

[1:05:04] But anyway, but you know also in all fairness to Belmont too, it helps them pay down their

[1:05:11] mud district sooner, so it's a win-win deal for everyone.

[1:05:16] I have no issue with that.

[1:05:19] I see that somebody is raising my taxes again, two percent, and that's where I stop reading.

[1:05:24] You know who to talk to?

[1:05:26] Mayors, the town manager.

[1:05:27] No, not the town manager, the person sitting next to the town manager.

[1:05:31] I mean, there's a certain legal structure, and I think Brenda even ran it.

[1:05:38] In the public information that we create, we can state it in English, and we can explain it in English.

[1:05:44] What it is in the ballot is going to be a state law topic, and I'm going to support your attorney in that.

[1:05:50] Just leave that alone. Let that be what state law says it has to be.

[1:05:53] But when I'm out talking, when the mayor is out talking, we can have public information

[1:05:57] that clarifies here's the reality behind that confusing battle language.

[1:06:03] And if it behooves the financial perspective, like we were saying, versus going in November

[1:06:07] versus May, I'm for it as well.

[1:06:11] All right.

[1:06:12] Any other discussions?

[1:06:14] Looking for a motion?

[1:06:17] Mr. Mayor, I'd like to make a motion that we approve item 11 of the action items

[1:06:24] as it's proposed, as it is written.

[1:06:27] I'll second that.

[1:06:30] Who was the second?

[1:06:35] Okay.

[1:06:35] I'll second that.

[1:06:36] I, Council Member Boyd got the second.

[1:06:40] So I have a motion and a second.

[1:06:42] All those in favor?

[1:06:43] I.

[1:06:44] Anyone oppose?

[1:06:45] All right, motion carries.

[1:06:47] So off we are.

[1:06:49] Number 12, consider take action on resolution 2025-33

[1:06:53] authorizing the mayor to execute a professional service agreement with Dunaway Associates for

[1:06:58] civil design services related to the town center project in an amount not to exceed $47,838

[1:07:05] located on the six acres tract of land along FM-47.

[1:07:14] Mayor and Council, I'm going to come over here just to ease this presentation up a

[1:07:19] little bit.

[1:07:20] I'm going to ask Ramon with Ramel to come on up and he'll help me introduce a couple

[1:07:24] of people as well.

[1:07:25] So several months ago, y'all took action to hire Ramel

[1:07:31] to give you the preliminary steps related to your police headquarters town center location on 407.

[1:07:38] What was the discussion at that time?

[1:07:40] The discussion at the time back in early this calendar year

[1:07:44] was to use Ramel to go out and try to find an architect and an engineer

[1:07:50] to take your next steps on the police building at the town center.

[1:07:54] The engineering firm is going to do all of the tasks that you would instantly think of, right,

[1:07:59] exactly where's the drainage going to be, where's the water going to be, where's the sewer going to be,

[1:08:03] what are we going to do on 407 because we're going to need a traffic light on 407

[1:08:07] or we're going to need a left turn lane, all of the engineering associated with that project.

[1:08:11] That's the Dunaway part of it.

[1:08:13] We did an RFQ process.

[1:08:16] Ramon helped us walk through that process.

[1:08:19] We had quite a few firms that we interviewed and worked with.

[1:08:22] We did select Dunaway as the lead firm that we're recommending to you tonight.

[1:08:27] Then in the next agenda item, you'll see the discussion of the architecture firm.

[1:08:31] I'll talk a little bit about that.

[1:08:33] So with that, let me ask Ramon, is there any other feedback?

[1:08:38] No, sir. I mean, we went through the competitive process under, you know, our process.

[1:08:43] I got good competitive responses, I think, of the civil work.

[1:08:47] We had 12 responses, I believe it was.

[1:08:50] very competitive, and then Dunaway proved themselves to be the best value for this.

[1:09:01] Explain to me one more time what exactly you guys are doing.

[1:09:04] Is it you're choosing, you're choosing an engineering company?

[1:09:07] Exactly, so under state law we want to make sure that we don't just pick the buddy, right?

[1:09:12] We're not picking a buddy.

[1:09:13] We've had an open competitive process to pick a firm that we think can do the best to deliver the product.

[1:09:21] Frankly, Dunaway was one of the few firms that had the combination of being able to do

[1:09:25] your structural work when we get to the structural phase, be able to do the site work associated

[1:09:29] with the water sewer drainage, and also have a professional transportation operations engineer

[1:09:35] available that can really do the work to figure out, okay, if I'm going to manage

[1:09:39] traffic on 407, which is its own beast, and convince techs.we need a traffic light

[1:09:45] and make sure our emergency vehicles get in and out in an efficient manner.

[1:09:49] That takes some real expertise and we were attracted by that the down the way

[1:09:54] Is that familiar to like an EPC company?

[1:09:58] Engineering procurement construction where you're you're they don't do construction. They're strictly just engineering

[1:10:03] But if you're afraid you sub that would you sub it out though?

[1:10:05] Yes, whatever we got to the point of construction. Yes, that would go to all under umbrella. No, not under our brother

[1:10:11] No, we're just facilitator of the process. So we're just thinking that you're on the right you're going the right direction

[1:10:17] Eventually what you'll see, but this isn't going to happen until you adopt a master plan.

[1:10:22] After you adopt a master plan, what you'll see is a recommendation that we have what's called a construction manager agent.

[1:10:28] We would pick a construction manager agent firm to be that umbrella, look over all of the work that goes from the detail of the architecture,

[1:10:36] the detail of the engineering, did it, and then oversee it during the construction process.

[1:10:41] That's the umbrella in the public sector as a CMA.

[1:10:43] Okay, we'll get there.

[1:10:50] Is this for just specifically to the police building or is

[1:10:56] this the I guess the Dunaway piece or whatever for action? The Dunaway piece

[1:11:00] would cover what we would sort of nicknamed the six acres. The plot that we

[1:11:04] talked about. Exactly, the full six acres and frankly one of the things that

[1:11:08] at least just going to have to get worked on is saving money by combining

[1:11:13] drainage the six acres and the 12 acres making sure the roadway that goes

[1:11:17] through the six acres is properly serving the 12 acres, so there'll be some coordination

[1:11:22] just on the six but also the 12.

[1:11:24] Dr. Herman, if you remember, the MDD actually sponsored a study for the 12 acres, which

[1:11:31] was pretty close to this number here.

[1:11:34] I don't think you can essentially, you know, there's no correlation necessarily between

[1:11:38] the cost and acreage, but it's more like the cost and the task.

[1:11:44] And so we have the study from the 12 acres, which is good.

[1:11:49] I would think, I don't want to speak for you,

[1:11:51] you're going to be able to dovetail that into this study.

[1:11:54] They took it from let's look at the 12

[1:11:56] and make the right decision for the 12.

[1:11:58] We're going to take it and look at it from an 18-acre point of view

[1:12:01] and try to make sure that the right distance

[1:12:03] is made from our 18 acres

[1:12:05] and really go in a greater depth than they were going.

[1:12:09] You'll see an opportunity.

[1:12:11] and I want to make sure I'm combining the two items that are separate to vote on,

[1:12:15] but I want to make sure y'all are thinking about it like this.

[1:12:19] You hire an engineer, you hire an architect. You don't say go to bid immediately, right?

[1:12:25] There's a lot of discussion and decision-making that the council will need to be looking at here.

[1:12:31] We'll see some preliminary information from Dunaway. We'll see some preliminary information from your architect.

[1:12:36] We'll ask you, do you want to go this direction? Do you want to go that direction?

[1:12:39] Here's a decision point. I'll be identifying various decision-making moments in that series

[1:12:45] and get you to a master plan that answers some of the questions about exactly how big

[1:12:51] is that road, exactly how wide is that road, what's exactly going on there, meet the private

[1:12:55] sector need in exactly the right way. All of the inherent questions that everybody

[1:13:00] is wondering right now have your engineer in place and you have your architect

[1:13:03] in place. You can ask those detailed questions, and my goal is to get you to December when

[1:13:09] you have answered the questions, not because somebody went and studied it in a black box

[1:13:14] somewhere, but because there was an open process in open forums with council to really

[1:13:19] get into those questions in great detail. So this kicks off what I would call an iterative

[1:13:24] procedure of trying to get feedback, the different ideas and make sure that we're

[1:13:29] following. So to sum it up, we get one shot at this staple piece of property,

[1:13:36] correct? I mean, we want to make sure we're doing it right and

[1:13:39] attractive and that everyone's proud of on the council. Absolutely. Yes, sir.

[1:13:45] Well, and I think it makes sense to you though, Chad, because like, you know, we

[1:13:48] talked about the town center piece, we talked about the town hall piece,

[1:13:52] we talked about the police department piece or whatever, but it's one track

[1:13:55] land that the town owns that needs to, you know, kind of come together and look cohesive and then in

[1:14:00] addition to that we have the extra challenge of the piece behind there that's the additional

[1:14:05] whatever 12 acres or whatnot that even though it's owned by somebody else we want it to,

[1:14:09] you know, to flow together and to be cohesive and stuff like that. So I think that does make

[1:14:15] sense. So, and correct me if I'm wrong here, so if we all are in unison here and agree,

[1:14:21] like this is the model or the vibe our guy wants to follow, maybe that can kind of even

[1:14:27] transcend to some further developments where now all of a sudden we have some conformity

[1:14:31] and everybody's in unison.

[1:14:33] I think that's a terrific point and I'm going to talk more about that in the next agenda

[1:14:36] item because that's a little bit more the architect but the engineer's going to feed

[1:14:41] into that as well so it's both.

[1:14:42] Okay.

[1:14:43] I did have one question.

[1:14:45] I'm just looking at the, I guess the proposal for professional services on page 195 of our agenda packet where it talked about some of the preliminary things and the cost behind that.

[1:14:56] So boundary survey was $6,500, typographic survey was $9,500.

[1:15:00] And my only question has, has none of that already been done? I mean, to some extent, I feel like,

[1:15:07] I feel like we probably did a tree survey at some time before we bought the land or not

[1:15:11] or, I don't know, help me out.

[1:15:13] So when we got involved, no, none of that had been done. I think you purchased the property,

[1:15:16] which is kind of unusual without a boundary survey. So that hasn't been done. The topo

[1:15:21] has been done. I don't think there's been a detailed tree survey, survey either. We

[1:15:25] We don't have one of the records, so no, ma'am, none of that had been done.

[1:15:30] And my only question was like, you know, if we just did something six months ago, I don't

[1:15:33] want to pay to redo it again, right?

[1:15:36] You'll recall when we purchased the property, the Six Acres had not been fully defined,

[1:15:40] and the contract allowed for the definition of the Six Acres at a later point.

[1:15:46] The other thing from a legal standpoint that an engineer will do is help with

[1:15:51] the proportionality analysis of who pays how much for what. Because we have to, all of

[1:15:58] the drainage for the entire site has to work together and the parties will share proportionately

[1:16:03] the costs for how much they're producing and that's one of the things that an engineer

[1:16:08] will do is determine what the proportionality is.

[1:16:13] If you recall, I know you do, the Waterbrook experience where there wasn't the right amount

[1:16:21] of work done and the impact that it had to one of the neighbors to the south.

[1:16:27] So the property across the street is higher than this, so it's, you got to take a lot.

[1:16:33] I'm not an engineer, we got one engineer here on staff, so to speak, and maybe

[1:16:36] he wants to talk, but I would think all that has to be taken into consideration

[1:16:40] because what if the

[1:16:55] 407 plans that exist in detail are from gateway going to the

[1:17:02] West all right in this area there are no detailed 407 plans and frankly this is a

[1:17:08] very important opportunity so thank you for bringing it up we will want done a

[1:17:12] way to say you know what if you're going to make this a district if you're

[1:17:16] going to make this work within the zone right which is what we're all

[1:17:19] want it, right? We want not just six acres of really nice development, we want to turn

[1:17:25] it into a sector, a zone where you can feel like, okay, I like this overall. Ben and Wade

[1:17:29] will give us advice on that and give us, we hope, the best shot of getting tech stock

[1:17:34] to say, oh, okay, we like Argyle's plan. We're going to adopt what Argyle did there.

[1:17:38] Now that's easy said and hard to do, but having a professional engineering firm will

[1:17:43] get us the best shot at that.

[1:17:48] Yeah, there's no identified, something like they need the

[1:17:53] first ten feet for something that they're doing.

[1:17:56] So we need to hurry up and build.

[1:17:58] There you go.

[1:18:01] That actually is true. You do want to get ahead of TextDog because, yeah, they don't

[1:18:06] really consider what we want.

[1:18:09] For

[1:18:13] resolution, so what you'll see is there's a resolution authorizing a professional services agreement,

[1:18:19] professional services agreement is for the mayor to sign and it has the

[1:18:23] attachment which is the done away agreement.

[1:18:28] Well I'll take a stab at it. I

[1:18:30] mean I know we want to do this right the first time so I'll make a motion to

[1:18:33] approve action item number 12 as it's written.

[1:18:39] I will second that. All right we

[1:18:40] got a motion and a second. There's no further discussion. All those in favor?

[1:18:46] Aye. Anybody oppose? Okay so the motion carries. So that brings us to item

[1:18:52] item number 13, consider and take action on resolution 2025-34, authorizing the mayor

[1:18:57] to execute a professional service agreement with GFF architects for civil design services

[1:19:03] related to the Town Center project in an amount of $69,060 located on the six-acre tract of

[1:19:10] along 407, FM-407.

[1:19:13] So similar idea here, we've used Ramel to come up with a well-procured architect,

[1:19:20] right?

[1:19:21] We've looked at various architecture firms.

[1:19:23] We've had presentations from architecture firms.

[1:19:25] We've gone, we've asked them questions,

[1:19:27] tried to figure out, okay, who's the best firm that can really meet the needs of the town and the district?

[1:19:33] DFF is the firm that bubbled up to pop in that process.

[1:19:36] We've got confidence in them in order to bring you the life cycle of this.

[1:19:41] On agenda item page 208, we made sure we wanted to really highlight here.

[1:19:46] There's three things that we're going to be asking this firm to do.

[1:19:50] and we've got a master plan, visioning for the site and building.

[1:19:54] That's the step you're going to embark on. That's the $69,000

[1:19:57] associated with this particular part of the project.

[1:20:01] Whenever you say move forward on there, they're going to look at what you call the programming

[1:20:05] of the building. So if you have ever been through the construction process, you talk

[1:20:09] about an architect programming a building. How many square feet are for

[1:20:14] the men's locker room? How many square feet are for the ladies' locker room?

[1:20:17] How many square feet's the lobby?

[1:20:19] How many people are we building this building for?

[1:20:22] Are we building an emergency operations center

[1:20:24] that can do X, Y, Z, or are we gonna forego that expense?

[1:20:28] We need a property room, but we don't need a dispatch, right?

[1:20:31] So all of that thinking goes into it,

[1:20:33] and they'll come up with a number.

[1:20:34] So we've kicked around, well, gee,

[1:20:36] what if it's 8,000 square feet?

[1:20:38] Had another study done several years ago

[1:20:40] that looked at putting the police building

[1:20:41] on this piece of land.

[1:20:42] That was more around 6,000 square feet.

[1:20:44] What's the exact right number of square feet?

[1:20:46] We would not want to offer to you an exact right number of square feet right now, right?

[1:20:51] We want to make sure that you go through the programming process and get to the end game there, give you all of that.

[1:20:58] I think very important questions that you guys should ask as part of that would be things like,

[1:21:02] are we going to move our town hall immediately?

[1:21:05] Are we going to build this first or are we going to build that first?

[1:21:08] If we move only police building, will we be able to have city council meetings in the Emergency Operations Center?

[1:21:15] All of those questions are ones that are natural at this stage,

[1:21:19] but we don't want to answer right now.

[1:21:20] We want to make sure that we put some real math to the cost of the building

[1:21:23] and you're not in the position of saying,

[1:21:26] well, I want it, but I don't know how expensive it is.

[1:21:28] You want your architect to be able to go through a programming process,

[1:21:32] be able to answer to you definitively.

[1:21:34] If you put it as a 10,000 square foot building that includes everything in the world,

[1:21:39] then here's how expensive it's going to be.

[1:21:42] If you want to minimize your expenses and move phase one, phase two, here's the cost

[1:21:47] of phase one and the size of phase one, here's the cost of phase two and the size of phase

[1:21:51] two.

[1:21:51] And you're doing it with numbers from an architecture firm that's really embedded through that process.

[1:21:57] So that's what they would be doing under the heading of master plan.

[1:22:01] And again, it's a series of presentations to you and discussions with you about what

[1:22:05] your options are, where they don't go to the next step until you say, yep,

[1:22:09] we like that option.

[1:22:10] Number two, a small area plan and zoning overlay for the core zone.

[1:22:15] So, Councilman Boyd, you just brought this exact issue up, right?

[1:22:19] You're basically putting your signature on this building and saying,

[1:22:22] this stands for Argyle, this is our major investment, major new public building.

[1:22:26] Why would you not use that architectural theme, those building standards,

[1:22:32] those things that you're doing on that site to help define the area around it?

[1:22:36] We know enough to put our arms around that right now.

[1:22:39] Not really, but if you have the same architectural firm

[1:22:41] doing what you would call a small area plan

[1:22:44] and doing a zoning overlay within that area,

[1:22:47] we'll roughly start just thinking about that 377407 intersection.

[1:22:51] Okay, what if I had a battle plan for that area overall

[1:22:55] and I knew what I wanted to do within that overall district.

[1:22:58] We feel that they can be working currently on master plan

[1:23:00] and on small area plan.

[1:23:02] You feel like we can bring to you at a future agenda, maybe August, maybe September, an

[1:23:07] opportunity to vote on the small area plans.

[1:23:09] That's not this money.

[1:23:10] That would be another step.

[1:23:12] And so that's items one and two.

[1:23:15] And then item three is after a approval by the council of a master plan.

[1:23:20] We think that's December.

[1:23:22] Then you would use this same firm to take you all the way to the end zone of final

[1:23:27] architectural services.

[1:23:28] is get your bid documents ready and oversee the process

[1:23:31] all the way through the introduction.

[1:23:33] That's our recommendation for the three steps with GFF.

[1:23:36] The only thing to vote on tonight is step one,

[1:23:39] which is creating that master plan for GFF.

[1:23:44] It is only staff vetted GFF.

[1:23:47] We work with the amount which Carl hired

[1:23:50] to help us work through the process,

[1:23:52] but that's been the work with GFF.

[1:23:54] It makes calls and get referenced with GFF.

[1:23:57] What if you could distribute some portfolio

[1:23:58] of cement.

[1:23:59] Oh, absolutely.

[1:24:00] They did a very good job in their presentation to us, showing us their capabilities of all

[1:24:06] the firms they absolutely did of and beyond showing us prep work into it, that they were

[1:24:14] there to really earn the project.

[1:24:16] They've got a better planning of service for the other firms, which means that that

[1:24:21] small area plan and element will be professional for sideways.

[1:24:26] So several meetings back, we were given presentation that kind of combined the concept

[1:24:35] for the six acres along with the concept for the 12 acres.

[1:24:40] Would this design in any way coordinate with, obviously, the property owner of the

[1:24:46] 12 acres?

[1:24:47] It should be kind of in a uniform would be my feeling, right?

[1:24:51] Right. So the point that we're making is that that is an input to their work, right?

[1:24:58] So they've got that. The MDD helped coordinate and made that happen.

[1:25:02] And that is a direction the owner of the 12 acres would like to go.

[1:25:06] So that's input. You need to be considered that input as part of your overall decision-making process.

[1:25:11] So we'll get that all coordinated.

[1:25:13] Yeah, I was having a conversation with the mayor the other day.

[1:25:15] one thing we do lack and we're in such the infancy stages of developing is having boundaries

[1:25:21] or a box of how we are constructing or an architectural design. Even my daughter and

[1:25:27] I were in New Orleans last week and over the weekend and even the French Quarter, even

[1:25:32] though it's old and worn down as is, you can only use these paint colors and you can't

[1:25:37] do any modifications unless it looks like this. If you go up a notch, you go to

[1:25:40] Westlake and you can only use this stone. I think we do need a defining stance

[1:25:46] So I spoke to Mike about this, go my memory, I think we have five different projects in

[1:25:57] that area.

[1:25:58] And if you look at the area in question, it's south of Cook, north of French town, east

[1:26:06] of 377, and just a little bit west, I'm sorry, a little bit east of Myrtle.

[1:26:12] If you take those two quadrants, there's at least five different projects.

[1:26:18] Two of them under contract, one is already closed.

[1:26:22] And so to the point what you're saying, Council Member Boyd, it's very important that we have

[1:26:26] some kind of unified look and I think that's what Mr. Sims is trying to essentially achieve

[1:26:31] here.

[1:26:32] And I think he understands the importance of that.

[1:26:34] Yeah.

[1:26:34] The master plan tells you how big a thing you're building, what's in it.

[1:26:39] And that's what this contract is.

[1:26:40] The next contract that we would propose to bring forward to you for your consideration

[1:26:44] either August or September, same firm, will be that number two item which is to create

[1:26:49] your small area plan and your zoning overlay.

[1:26:52] And that's where you get, I've had this conversation with one of the other elected

[1:26:56] officials here, that's where you turn the page from, well, we're reactive and we

[1:27:00] just try to make it up whenever somebody says, here's what I'm building.

[1:27:05] That's not a good position, right?

[1:27:07] You want to be proactive.

[1:27:08] If you want to have your own vision for what you want to do,

[1:27:11] otherwise you're just playing.

[1:27:12] That's not helpful to the developer or yourself.

[1:27:19] So I wouldn't say that we're far ahead of it,

[1:27:22] but I think there's still room to catch up

[1:27:25] and get in front of the, before they come for proposals.

[1:27:28] So our staff has the standards

[1:27:30] that we want those folks to live up to.

[1:27:32] The thing that we're missing really

[1:27:34] is we don't have a distinct downtown,

[1:27:36] like some smaller communities and old downtown.

[1:27:39] So we're essentially creating a new old town or downtown if you will and have that kind of a look

[1:27:45] And I think there'll be plenty of time for input, but I've encouraged Mike to really really, you know turn up

[1:27:51] The the emphasis on this because we can't wait much longer and start having projects come to us

[1:27:56] You know, there are some buildings now that my opinion don't reflect what I think our guy wants to look like and

[1:28:03] You're gonna have a hodgepodge before you know it

[1:28:31] into those tracks, too, again, so.

[1:28:34] And that is the goal, Mike, is to extend that, you know,

[1:28:37] whatever design we need.

[1:28:38] I'm only taking a step-by-step approach here.

[1:28:40] Step one is doing this, I think Councilman Branding's 100%

[1:28:45] correct.

[1:28:46] You also very much need to be proactive on your I-35

[1:28:49] corridor, and if Council wishes,

[1:28:52] we can make sure that it's included.

[1:28:54] I can talk to the Mayor about finding a place for that

[1:28:56] in the next year's budget.

[1:28:58] I think it's important to be proactive.

[1:28:59] of that.

[1:28:59] I don't understand the detail of the box.

[1:29:00] We're going to get back to you.

[1:29:01] Yeah, I mean, there are projects happening on the heath and heritage.

[1:29:06] We know it's coming, and it's just a matter, and I've shared that with a couple of you

[1:29:10] all, is start thinking what is important to you, and it's in fairness to the developers

[1:29:15] because they get very frustrated when all of a sudden we put the brakes on, but

[1:29:19] we sit there and we don't know what we want, you know?

[1:29:21] So the fair question, what do we want?

[1:29:24] Let's identify it, let's define it, and that way I think we're going to move

[1:29:28] move along much quicker and get a better product.

[1:29:30] In terms of just this item tonight, again, same format we put into resolution.

[1:29:36] Resolution authorizes the Mayor to sign a professional services agreement

[1:29:41] on an outline of the proposal that was provided to you.

[1:29:45] I think this one incorrectly lists me as the signer of that.

[1:29:49] But if you'll prove the resolution, then we'll fix that clarifier.

[1:29:54] Clarke.

[1:29:56] Brenda would not let me have the executive session to show you.

[1:30:00] I have to convey it in a different way, but the point I'm getting at, you should be very,

[1:30:04] very excited what's coming down the pipeline. There are people very interested in Argonne,

[1:30:11] and so there's an opportunity here.

[1:30:20] Well, I'll make a motion to approve agenda item 13 as presented.

[1:30:23] I'll second.

[1:30:25] Okay. We have a motion to approve in a second. Any other discussion? No other discussion?

[1:30:29] All those in favor?

[1:30:30] Aye.

[1:30:31] Anybody opposed? Okay. It carries. So it brings us to item number 14, consider

[1:30:35] that are approved at Ordinance 2025

[1:30:37] amending the fiscal year 2024-2025 budget

[1:30:41] to allocate equipment replacement funds

[1:30:43] for the purchase of an interstate trailer,

[1:30:48] G20DT flatbed equipment trailer.

[1:30:50] So, Mayor and Council, I'm gonna immediately be

[1:30:52] out of my element, but one of the things

[1:30:55] that you do when you're in my position

[1:30:57] is you asked your fleet manager,

[1:31:00] hey, are we up to snuff

[1:31:01] and are we obeying all the rules?

[1:31:03] Are we dragging around any equipment on something that's actually breaking the law?

[1:31:08] And Bobby actually brought to me a proactive piece of information from himself as director

[1:31:14] and said, look, we got a problem here because sometime fairly recently,

[1:31:19] I can't say exactly when, but sometime fairly recently there was a purchase of a trailer

[1:31:23] to haul our heaviest equipment and it doesn't meet the weight requirements

[1:31:28] associated with our heaviest equipment.

[1:31:30] So what we'd like to do is to make that fairly new, fairly recently purchased trailer something

[1:31:36] that's our number two trailer instead of our number one trailer and go ahead and buy the

[1:31:40] trailer shown to you here because it does meet the weight requirements.

[1:31:44] It's a little frustrating because I think you probably would wish that you'd bought

[1:31:47] the larger trailer to begin with, but nevertheless if we do make this purchase it is a one

[1:31:53] that fits all of our heaviest equipment and it will make us more efficient in response,

[1:31:58] give us a safer response because it does meet freight loads.

[1:32:03] I could not do it under my budget authority because it exceeds

[1:32:06] the maximum that you guys had set in your FY25 budget.

[1:32:11] We needed that just a little bit of additional funds available

[1:32:14] in order to forward on this.

[1:32:16] We're hauling backhoes and skid steers?

[1:32:19] Yeah, Bob, you want to?

[1:32:27] Our skid steer does fit on the current trailer.

[1:32:30] We have a mini-escavator that within 150 pounds of our trailer can hold.

[1:32:37] And our backhoe is overweight.

[1:32:40] What are the axles on the current trailer?

[1:32:42] I don't remember the specs on the current trailer. It was purchased before my appointment.

[1:32:48] Because that would be an important determination and seeing if the weight load was adequate.

[1:32:52] And the current trailer we have is a is a tandem axle, but it's single single wheel on both sides this particular trailer

[1:33:00] Dual wheels on both axles actually eight wheel

[1:33:06] This one's I think the skid steer probably weighs more than the Mini X

[1:33:11] And I'm actually the skid steer play weighs more than the backhoe to our current skid steer is a small one

[1:33:16] And is it on wheels or tracks? It's on wheels. Okay. It's probably only around seven thousand pounds

[1:33:22] pounds. Our mini-esque here is closer to 11,000 pounds. This particular trailer here holds

[1:33:30] 20,000 pounds. Our backhoe is closer to 15,000 to 16,000 pounds. Obviously, we don't have

[1:33:41] right now. Plus, our current trailer has the flatbed spaces between the tire. This

[1:33:48] This is on top of what we have on the platform.

[1:33:49] Something to consider, because I'm guessing it's a 20 foot in length.

[1:33:53] Is that right?

[1:33:53] No, this one holds 20,000 pounds.

[1:33:56] So it's 10,000 pound axles?

[1:33:57] Yes.

[1:33:58] Okay, so keep in mind the weight of the trailer subtracts from the axles too.

[1:34:04] Well, this trailer is rated to carry the weight we need for our backup.

[1:34:10] I'll just give you some advice.

[1:34:11] Just heads up.

[1:34:13] What do you use when you pull this weight?

[1:34:16] This can be pulled with what we call our crew truck. We have a one ton that already has a gooseneck.

[1:34:21] And they have DOT license?

[1:34:23] What's that?

[1:34:23] They have a DOT driver's license?

[1:34:25] Three of us do.

[1:34:30] How many trailers do we have now? Just the one that isn't as good as we need it to be?

[1:34:40] Some of the older trailers were on our surplus list.

[1:34:44] Together, we probably have five trailers right now that are flatbed trailers, but we want

[1:34:52] to get a couple of them that are older trailers that don't necessarily need, and if we were

[1:34:58] able to add something like this on and as I was saying, be able to step the other one

[1:35:04] to do a little bit more flexible things and use this for the heavier equipment.

[1:35:09] What I think that you know we should recognize that there was a cost savings in

[1:35:13] the purchase of the vehicle or whatever like it was budgeted for X amount and you

[1:35:17] guys were able to get something cheaper than that so that's really good and then

[1:35:20] also if we're able to get some money back for the trailers that we don't

[1:35:25] need that we can sell that is you know another way to help kind of offset the

[1:35:28] cost of the new one here that you need. I wouldn't put your hopes on that

[1:35:32] because there's a lot of government auctions out there I've been

[1:35:34] looking at them and they sell for some ridiculously low prices.

[1:35:39] Ron is interested in some of the lesser priced trailers.

[1:35:43] Unfortunately, I can't stand in that line.

[1:35:46] That is what I'm hearing. He has some things that he wants to haul around, so...

[1:35:49] How many jeeps can you put in for the price?

[1:35:59] Twenty grand.

[1:36:04] We're talking about roughly twenty grand.

[1:36:06] We had around 15 left in the budget.

[1:36:10] We just needed this additional $4,700 of budget.

[1:36:18] A motion to approve.

[1:36:19] Item 14 is written.

[1:36:21] Second.

[1:36:22] Next.

[1:36:25] All right.

[1:36:28] So we have a motion to approve and a second.

[1:36:30] All those in favor?

[1:36:31] Aye.

[1:36:32] Anybody opposed?

[1:36:34] Okay.

[1:36:34] Well, the motion carries.

[1:36:35] brings us to item number 15, Discuss and Consider Actual and Ordnance Authorizing Issuance

[1:36:39] of Town of Argon, Texas Tax Notes Series 2025, specifying the terms and features of said

[1:36:46] notes, levy in a continuing direct annual ad valorem tax for the payment of said notes

[1:36:51] and resolving other matters, incident and related to the issuance sale payment, delivery

[1:36:55] of said notes, including approval and execution of paying age and registrar agreement,

[1:37:00] and a purchase letter and providing an effective date.

[1:37:03] Before you say something, Mr. Sims,

[1:37:05] I just want to clarify something from the last meeting

[1:37:07] that I think could have been misconstrued.

[1:37:13] Ms. McDonald made a comment that if it was interpreted,

[1:37:18] could seem like we were trying,

[1:37:19] that we wanted to rush through some bonds

[1:37:22] before the legislature changed,

[1:37:24] and that's not the case at all.

[1:37:26] If we were to float a bond,

[1:37:28] which is not a certificate of occupancy,

[1:37:29] if we would want full input from the community.

[1:37:33] You had made this, I just remember that.

[1:37:35] I got a call on it.

[1:37:37] So, Mayor, I would say that this is the small thing

[1:37:41] and this is not the big thing, right?

[1:37:45] In preparation for the big thing,

[1:37:47] borrowing the money for the construction costs,

[1:37:50] that's where that conversation goes to.

[1:37:53] This part of the conversation is,

[1:37:55] okay, we've got pre-construction expenses

[1:37:57] as one will when one is building a public building

[1:38:00] and the grounds around it and all that good stuff.

[1:38:03] So what is our method of paying for that?

[1:38:06] Our suggestion at the staff level was to go ahead

[1:38:09] and take $750,000, borrow that,

[1:38:12] pay it off over a two year period

[1:38:14] and make sure that we're keeping our INS tax rate

[1:38:17] in the state where if we do wanna make

[1:38:19] a larger borrow in the future,

[1:38:21] you've preserved your INS capacity to do so

[1:38:24] and moving forward at this time now

[1:38:26] with that 750 allows you to do something I think is very important in the financial strategy

[1:38:31] of this town. You've got $2 million at the end of FY25 that you will have put aside

[1:38:38] the police headquarter town center. So you've got FY23, you put about a half million aside.

[1:38:45] FY24 I think it was a million. And then this year you're putting another half million

[1:38:50] a side. That gives you $2 million in a savings account identified strictly for police building.

[1:38:58] Okay. Now the intent was to use that for construction money. We don't want to burn that $2 million on the

[1:39:03] pre-construction expenses. We want to do this little short-term borrowing paid off over a two-year

[1:39:08] period. So that's pretty quick, right? You pay it off over a two-year period and help you deliver

[1:39:14] for your pre-construction expenses

[1:39:16] with this small scale tax note

[1:39:18] and at the same time preserve your equity position

[1:39:22] that you're gonna be able to put in your building.

[1:39:24] So trying to keep the financial strategy moving forward.

[1:39:29] I've got Hilltop here.

[1:39:30] I've got Norton Rose Fulbright here.

[1:39:32] That's your financial advisor and you are on council.

[1:39:37] They can answer more detailed questions about it

[1:39:39] but we're happy to come forward and recommend it

[1:39:40] gotten good pricing on this orchard.

[1:39:45] And so did you audit, you sure it's $2 million at the end of this fiscal year?

[1:39:48] We did go through those details. Yes. Okay.

[1:39:53] I was going to ask about borrowing the money a little cheaper.

[1:39:57] So do we have $20 million saved up somewhere?

[1:40:01] Is that right? We have $23 million total in all funds. I mean, it's not

[1:40:04] in the general fund that's less, but in total we do. And so some of them

[1:40:09] can't be used for this purpose.

[1:40:10] We can borrow it against that, though?

[1:40:12] No, I don't know about that.

[1:40:13] So the idea in this instant wasn't to loan from fund to fund.

[1:40:18] There are local governments that loan from fund to fund.

[1:40:20] And I would say that I don't know

[1:40:22] that you've got a purse enough structure here

[1:40:26] to be loaning from fund to fund.

[1:40:28] I think here the aim was making sure you managed

[1:40:31] two things at the same time.

[1:40:33] One is preserving your $2 million

[1:40:36] and not buying it down by spending a lot of pre-construction.

[1:40:39] On the other hand, you want to make sure that your INS tax rate has some stability to it.

[1:40:44] Your INS tax rate can fluctuate up and down,

[1:40:47] given valuations and all that good stuff, and the amount of debt that you have.

[1:40:51] By taking the 750 and putting into your debt structure at this time

[1:40:55] on your INS tax rate right now, that gives you a level way of moving forward.

[1:41:00] Tax payer is unaffected. You're not changing your tax rate.

[1:41:03] but you're also not letting that INS tax rate

[1:41:06] fall off a cliff, which would impact your flexibility

[1:41:08] in future years.

[1:41:10] So you understand that there's INS,

[1:41:13] interest in sinking, and MNO, maintenance and operations.

[1:41:17] That's essentially what makes up the 0.34 cents, right?

[1:41:22] And there's other factors coming to play about,

[1:41:24] you know, legislature that caps how much we can increase

[1:41:29] on an annual basis, but that can be offset

[1:41:33] if that's a good way of saying that, with an increase in INS funds.

[1:41:38] Am I?

[1:41:39] Absolutely.

[1:41:39] Yes, sir.

[1:41:40] Okay.

[1:41:40] And so, there is some strategy that comes along with this.

[1:41:46] I don't know where we're going to be on interest, five and a half percent, is that?

[1:41:50] I believe we ended up at even 4.125, what am I trying to say?

[1:41:56] Yeah.

[1:41:57] 4.195.

[1:41:58] And so, you know, you're a little bit less than 40,000 for the first year.

[1:42:01] The only thing I think everyone has to understand is, excuse me, every year we've been tucking

[1:42:10] away half a million dollars that's essentially from a surplus towards this, whatever we're

[1:42:15] doing at the municipal complex.

[1:42:17] Well, you're going to have debt service of half plus the interest every year, so that's

[1:42:24] going to make that squeeze a little bit harder, right?

[1:42:27] We have to either generate more of a surplus, and I know Mike is working on that.

[1:42:31] his directive, and we're not there yet, we're not, what, Brenda left so I can get away with

[1:42:35] it, but we're not talking about, we're not talking about budget right now, so, but he's

[1:42:40] working hard to maintain our expenses where they are, but just keep that in mind, so it's

[1:42:46] half a million that we're trying to tuck away every year, plus whatever, 400,000 probably

[1:42:51] the first year, so 900,000 that we're going to have to have as surplus.

[1:42:57] I'm very, usually very critical of our finance reports, but the last one you gave that explained

[1:43:03] the bonds falling off and our INS capacity needing to be increased, I really appreciated

[1:43:07] that and I'm very clearly done and like I say, I'm just so glad you noticed that.

[1:43:13] So take advantage of this opportunity.

[1:43:16] And I did put an updated version of that in the Council packet.

[1:43:20] I didn't want to read it to you tonight, but it is a little dry, but that analysis

[1:43:24] was updated and provided again.

[1:43:25] And so, Council Member Brady, one of the things I do want to, we had conversation, do want

[1:43:30] to clarify, but let Mr. Sims clarify that, that this money is not earmarked for one building

[1:43:37] or the other necessarily, it is earmarked for the towns, for the municipal complex.

[1:43:43] Yes, sir.

[1:43:43] Yeah.

[1:43:44] So it, yeah.

[1:43:46] Like the things that we just approved, 11 and 12, 12 and 13.

[1:43:49] So where will we pay for your other two agenda items?

[1:43:52] We'll be paying for it out of this to make sure that we're doing a good job with that

[1:43:56] police building overall.

[1:43:57] When you get to December, you won't be looking at me saying, well, where's the money for

[1:44:02] the next step?

[1:44:03] We will have arranged all of that.

[1:44:05] The overall strategy is, and I'm estimating now.

[1:44:09] You got to do estimating sometimes.

[1:44:11] If reconstruction is 1.5 million overall, then half of it is 750.

[1:44:18] through that through an INS tax note, take the other half of it and spend it cooperatively

[1:44:25] through a partnership with MDD and with CCPD.

[1:44:29] I was at your MDD meeting and at your CCD meeting talking about the next step of that.

[1:44:35] They're still working on their parts of that.

[1:44:37] And whenever you see your FY26 budget, we'll hope it all comes together.

[1:44:41] This is just a part of the puzzle right now.

[1:44:43] And there's another part of the equation that we had briefly touched on.

[1:44:46] I think it was last week because we do see, hopefully, a huge influx on sales tax revenues.

[1:44:54] And that sales tax revenue is going to be distributed not only to the general fund but

[1:44:58] also MDD.

[1:45:00] D.C.P.D. and road maintenance. So, you know, the amount that they're going to be collecting

[1:45:05] goes way up. And so the idea, we don't want to get into it here now, but the idea of financing

[1:45:10] or capitalizing, say, the police department could actually come from a different source

[1:45:15] than the town necessarily. So lots of conversation have been had. Probably the one thing, Mr.

[1:45:21] Sims, I want you to point out, in the event that you don't need all the monies that

[1:45:26] that there is excess of this barring, what is your plan for those?

[1:45:30] So this allows you to, so the 750, you would continue to draw that down.

[1:45:36] And part of the reason I didn't put one and a half million in is that your other sources

[1:45:41] of funds, the 375 from ECPD, the 375 from MDD provides you that flexibility of not

[1:45:49] having to have, you know, your ordinance language tying that down.

[1:45:52] But in this particular case, if I say, hey, I'm going to go forward and build a police

[1:45:58] building that's a little bit smaller, then I guarantee you're going to spend that much

[1:46:02] money on architecture.

[1:46:04] This isn't designed to be the full thing.

[1:46:07] The 1.5 is the full, and savings would accrue to those other sources.

[1:46:20] Can you turn it off?

[1:46:21] If you follow the news, there's a lot of pressure on the Fed to reduce the interest

[1:46:26] grade.

[1:46:28] I think it's going to happen sooner than later, but that's only assumption on my part.

[1:46:32] How will that affect the financing?

[1:46:35] Would it reduce our burden in terms of financing?

[1:46:38] But of course, it will also reduce the interest that we generate in our money.

[1:46:43] I think you're on a good point here.

[1:46:45] So let's take it step-by-step.

[1:46:47] Let's say tonight it's Council's choice to move forward and say, yes, we want to

[1:46:52] move forward. We want to make sure that our FY26 tax rate is the correct tax rate. The

[1:46:59] 750 borrow helps you do that. What will be the next big question? The next big question

[1:47:05] is how much money is overall building going to cost? When you build the building in

[1:47:11] the grounds for the property on 407, what's that dollar amount? I hate going around quoting

[1:47:16] But it will be fairly large.

[1:47:19] You will have bought a lot of it down with equity

[1:47:22] because you're saving your money,

[1:47:24] and then you're going to borrow a big chunk of money.

[1:47:26] So that large dollar amount, right,

[1:47:29] it's going to be somewhere between 5 and 10 million

[1:47:32] that you're going to end up borrowing within that range.

[1:47:35] If you decide to borrow that money today,

[1:47:38] I would say, yeah, not a good decision, right,

[1:47:40] because that $7 million is probably going to finance a paper

[1:47:43] if you're financing FY26.

[1:47:46] So you'll have an opportunity to consider that question of borrowing the construction costs.

[1:47:51] You'll look at a window of time in the spring and you'll look at a window of time in fall of 2026.

[1:47:57] Those would be your two windows of time.

[1:47:59] We look at it and say, okay, is it appropriate and are we ready to go out for the construction cost borrowing of it?

[1:48:05] So exactly the right question to be asked.

[1:48:08] We're just several months away from being at that moment.

[1:48:11] And

[1:48:15] we can also consider, so our money is also gaining interest at 3, 4, 5 percent.

[1:48:21] Yeah, I mean actually right now the 2 million is invested around 4.49.

[1:48:25] So you're more of money than really the delta zero-ish.

[1:48:30] In the spirit of Councilman Brady, I make a motion to approve 15.

[1:48:39] Are you seconding that?

[1:48:41] Yes.

[1:48:41] Okay.

[1:48:42] All right. So we have a motion to approve motion in a second. Is there any other discussion?

[1:48:49] I guess I'm new to council. I just see professional fees flying out the door. Every conceivable one of these things, I can't really put my head around it.

[1:48:59] And I was just thinking, you know, if I'm an average person watching in the town council looking at, you know, the money is that they're paying to our guy when there's a professional fees everywhere.

[1:49:10] I mean, I totally understand the INS tax rate issue and how we need to do it for that.

[1:49:17] But I'm hearing one and a half million dollars for eight or nine thousand square foot buildings

[1:49:23] and professional fees and seventy thousand dollars for a piece of cement on four acres

[1:49:28] of land.

[1:49:29] I'm just struggling with it, but I'll certainly go with it for the INS tax rate issue.

[1:49:34] I mean, I agree with you.

[1:49:36] I spoke to someone that's going to build twenty three thousand square foot commercial

[1:49:39] building. I understand it's not a police department for example and it was nine million dollars for

[1:49:44] 23,000 square feet as opposed to I think we're talking 8,000 or something like that.

[1:49:50] So these are very valid questions and I encourage you to we're just starting out though to have

[1:49:57] those conversations with with Mike. Keep him honest and you know make sure that you're

[1:50:03] comfortable with it because you're right someone's going to corner you one of the

[1:50:06] constituency you know we're spending a lot of money where is that you know case

[1:50:10] in point chief we actually had a concept drawn I thought it was one time about a

[1:50:15] police station I don't know how much he was kind enough to show to me there's a

[1:50:19] concept for in the parking lot back here yeah so I don't know if it still has

[1:50:25] if that's a starting point if it had all the you know all the things that he

[1:50:31] was looking for we will definitely be passing that on to GFF the architect

[1:50:35] that we approved earlier in the meeting

[1:50:38] and we'll be doing our best to try to streamline

[1:50:40] the professional services.

[1:50:42] I hear the comment and it's one that's

[1:50:45] always near and dear to my heart.

[1:50:47] Am I spending money on a professional service

[1:50:50] that I don't really need?

[1:50:51] I think that we all just need the

[1:50:54] religion on it to work on that.

[1:50:56] Yes, sir.

[1:50:59] Okay, there's no other comment.

[1:51:02] All those in favor?

[1:51:04] Aye.

[1:51:05] Anyone opposed?

[1:51:06] Okay, that brings us to the discussion items. Thank you, Mrs.

[1:51:13] Could I request maybe a five to ten minute recess?

[1:51:17] Five?

[1:51:18] I second. Motion carries.

[1:51:21] I will take a five minute break, 7.22.

[1:51:31] We'll go ahead and resume the meeting at 7.36,

[1:51:36] and we're going to go ahead and roll into the discussion items number 16.

[1:51:41] Discuss schedule and process of upcoming fiscal year 2025-26 budget for the town of Argo, Mr. Sims.

[1:51:48] I

[1:52:04] want to see a about a 70 page line item report that's got a lot more refinements

[1:52:10] and a lot more detail that you've been able to provide in the past.

[1:52:13] I think that Council be well satisfied with that product.

[1:52:16] All of the big picture concepts that we mentioned to you last time would be in the budget.

[1:52:21] should remain there, keep the tax rate the same, be very conservative about spending,

[1:52:26] make sure we build our capital balances, make sure that we're able to deliver some important

[1:52:31] projects out in the field. I think there's a path there to do a very, very substantial

[1:52:35] amount of asphalt work on our streets, very important patching on concrete locations on

[1:52:41] our streets. We did put money in there for our ground nature trail, a number of

[1:52:45] other things. We are a project delivery heavy budget and a operationally lean budget. So

[1:52:54] that's what's in process. If you take a look at the PowerPoint slide here, we've got ongoing

[1:53:00] council input opportunities. Everybody's going to get an email from me tomorrow saying,

[1:53:05] hey, if you want to chat budget in any level of detail before the next meeting,

[1:53:09] come on down, let me know. We can go to have lunch and talk about it. We can sit

[1:53:15] and chat about it in the morning. Not a requirement, but I like input, so that'll

[1:53:19] be an opportunity there. And then some of the rest of the dates here are state

[1:53:23] requirements. You've got a date where you're going to publish your tax rate.

[1:53:27] You've got a date when you publish the notice of your budget. That's August

[1:53:31] the 8th. You've got a filing the proposed budget of the town secretary and

[1:53:35] put it on the website. That's August 15th. And then August the 18th is your day where

[1:53:42] you have a public hearing on the budget and the tax rate. And so that will be your details.

[1:53:47] And then you do not get asked to adopt that budget until September the 15th. So there's

[1:53:52] your process remaining. Again, thus far, I feel like the budget is shaping up to

[1:53:58] be what we want it to be, but I don't want to over-promise. I think that it will be a

[1:54:06] linear, I think that's important when you're trying to build the biggest building you've

[1:54:11] ever built. That's what we're going to be committed to.

[1:54:14] So keep in mind,

[1:54:17] one of the things I can say about the learning process for me this

[1:54:21] time around is the fact that it really is simple. It is so simple. And the reason

[1:54:28] reason I say that, because you can break this down into components. You have revenues,

[1:54:33] you have expenses, okay? Of course. But the revenues, it's not like a business in which

[1:54:39] you have much impact and changing those revenues in the short run, right? Because some of this

[1:54:45] is driven by the county, for example. Some of the things are just driven by the economy,

[1:54:50] there's little sales tax. Yeah, we could affect that somehow by making some efforts,

[1:54:54] but not much. So we're takers of revenues. And so you have the general fund revenues and then you

[1:55:01] have departments, if you will, or funds, I'm sorry, not departments, but funds that are derivative

[1:55:07] of that revenue. Like MDD, for example, gets a certain percentage of the sales tax. That's it.

[1:55:15] So it should be correlated to what you see in the general fund. And then it comes down to

[1:55:20] expenses and we've talked about that and since we're breaking which in the past we

[1:55:25] had administration which included town secretary and accounting and such and

[1:55:31] we're breaking that separately. So then it just kind of narrows down what

[1:55:36] everybody has to focus on and I think with the amount of detail that that

[1:55:41] Mike is willing to provide it's going to make it a lot easier to compare. The

[1:55:46] key thing that we have to make sure of and that's not always been the case

[1:55:49] not intentionally, is when you have a comparison that it truly is a comparison, that people

[1:55:55] weren't moved around and all of a sudden something looks way off.

[1:55:59] And so I think instead of having iteration after iteration after iteration, which wears

[1:56:04] people down and sometimes leave them feeling less like they had input or whatever, I think

[1:56:12] it's more of a final product that we're shooting for.

[1:56:15] And so based on that schedule, I think we'll definitely make that.

[1:56:21] But any thoughts?

[1:56:23] I know some of you guys have gone through the budgeting process.

[1:56:25] Last year it was a squeaker.

[1:56:29] We have to get it done statutorily.

[1:56:31] We have to get some things done.

[1:56:33] So I think there's plenty of room, which I don't foresee to happen,

[1:56:39] but plenty of opportunity for discussion and follow-up.

[1:56:43] Okay.

[1:56:48] All right. That brings us to item number 17, discussion review of monthly budget report for May of 25.

[1:56:54] So, Mayor and Council, it's been a team effort to improve your monthly reports.

[1:57:03] And so I appreciate all the different staff members have been working on it.

[1:57:06] The first couple of pages starting in page 273 is a little bit of just the summary of it.

[1:57:11] And it is, again, showing that half a million dollar

[1:57:15] they'd get transferred to the cap improvement fund

[1:57:20] for the building, so that's an important part of it.

[1:57:23] I go over to the actual numbers, page 275.

[1:57:27] You can see where we stand.

[1:57:30] Most of the agglorm taxes have come in,

[1:57:32] so you can see a rather small number there.

[1:57:34] You can see we're running over budget on sales tax.

[1:57:37] That's great.

[1:57:37] We like running over budget on sales tax,

[1:57:39] So, more of that is a good thing.

[1:57:42] I would say that this time around, you can see some fairly large numbers in there for

[1:57:47] construction permits.

[1:57:49] We amended the budget, expected 403, we've got 513 in thus far, part of that's ARGAL-ISD.

[1:57:56] If you look down through the rest of there, you can see we've cleaned up what we were

[1:58:00] doing with the ARPA funds and some of the other transfers in the budget as well.

[1:58:05] If you look at the expenditure survey, you can see only a few items were running a little

[1:58:10] bit on the high side.

[1:58:11] Some of those are the overall transfers that are formula-based, so they're finished for

[1:58:17] the year, so that's an okay thing.

[1:58:20] You can see that some of the other line items are a little bit on the low side.

[1:58:24] I'll mention police, since it's such a large portion of our budget.

[1:58:27] They are running a little bit below on their budget.

[1:58:30] Why would that be?

[1:58:31] right? For a lot of the year they had three vacancies. They've worked through the process

[1:58:36] getting those vacancies hired and they anticipate going into FY26 fully staffed.

[1:58:42] The next page is your MDD budget. That gets a lot of scrutiny from your MDD board. But

[1:58:50] again, that budget is running just fine. They did pay out one of their economic development

[1:58:55] incentives so you can see that in their budget.

[1:58:58] What's in contracted services for MDD?

[1:59:01] Contracted services is a combination of things.

[1:59:04] One of those is going to be the contract

[1:59:06] with the retail strategies group.

[1:59:08] There's a lot of conversation about that

[1:59:09] at the most recent meeting.

[1:59:11] I think it was probably there.

[1:59:15] The next page over here is our crime control

[1:59:19] and prevention district.

[1:59:21] Again, I think that the sales tax was under budgeted.

[1:59:26] That really should have been more around $500,000, so you can see it shows they're running rather

[1:59:31] high on that.

[1:59:34] But they've made many of the purchases they anticipated making through the course of FY25.

[1:59:40] We did get a big thank you, by the way, from the CCDB budget, because they see these reports

[1:59:45] as well, and they were very enthusiastic that they finally get to see the amount

[1:59:50] they have in the bank.

[1:59:51] They like the fund balance, and I think that's a good addition that we've been

[1:59:55] able to add to our reports. So before you go on... Yes sir.

[2:00:00] Just keep in mind that I'd mentioned earlier some potential retailers coming our way and

[2:00:08] a big box retailer, for example, could generate an excess of $200,000 in sales tax for MDD so

[2:00:14] they can see their revenues grow by 50% literally within a year. It's a good problem to have,

[2:00:22] but it's a question also to how do they apply that additional money.

[2:00:28] You still have to

[2:00:29] focus on what your mission is and the same thing applies to CCPD too who has

[2:00:34] been funding help me out step and vehicles certification some of the

[2:00:40] equipment the ballistic yeah and so if there's not in a large amount of

[2:00:46] increases and and staff there will be a surplus which again could be used for

[2:00:52] other purposes like police building for example so it can close the gap that

[2:00:56] that we can bring the municipal complex together.

[2:01:00] If you move to street maintenance, you see the fund balance that they're carrying right there.

[2:01:06] When I say that we've got resources available to do some very substantial street work in FY26,

[2:01:13] this is what I'm talking about. This is the funding source that's available for that.

[2:01:18] Again, I think that the original budget was estimated low.

[2:01:21] So that really should be roughly half of the sales tax

[2:01:26] associated with your general fund.

[2:01:28] And so you can see they've already collected 95%

[2:01:33] of their projection.

[2:01:34] And they're running a lot on that.

[2:01:37] And very little spending happening there, almost none,

[2:01:41] actually.

[2:01:42] And you'll see that we did the French Town project

[2:01:46] out of that fund.

[2:01:47] We'll have plenty of money available in FY26

[2:01:50] and move forward on that.

[2:01:52] Apple Improvement Fund gets split up next year,

[2:01:55] but here's what it looks like right now.

[2:01:57] We will be transferring out of that the police funds

[2:02:02] and creating a new fund for just the police building

[2:02:04] in our FY26 budget.

[2:02:06] And you can see, again, very little spending

[2:02:08] in this item this year.

[2:02:11] The next page is Waste Border Operating.

[2:02:14] That's got your harvest rebates in there

[2:02:18] there as we've been tracking through that process. I'm going to also mention something

[2:02:22] here that's, I think, I guess I'll call my glass half full. This is a positive here.

[2:02:29] Look at your unrestricted balance there, $2.7, almost $2.8 million in the projected end

[2:02:38] of this year. When you think about how large that program actually is, that program

[2:02:43] is only spending around $2 million a year.

[2:02:48] So you've got a very, very healthy fund balance

[2:02:51] that particular area and they're doing just fine

[2:02:54] through the course of this year.

[2:02:56] Their revenues are on pace

[2:02:57] and their expenditures are a little bit on the low side.

[2:03:01] After that, we show your cash balances

[2:03:03] and this is what Mayor was referring to

[2:03:06] just barely over $24 million in either cash balances

[2:03:13] at our local bank or in investment balances.

[2:03:16] So that's a quick overview.

[2:03:17] I'd be happy to answer any questions about the report.

[2:03:20] Go back to the first page if you wouldn't mind,

[2:03:22] which had the general fund.

[2:03:24] I just want to point something out.

[2:03:26] So this is applicable to May, which is the eighth month.

[2:03:31] So we should be 66% complete

[2:03:34] if there are some categories that are linear.

[2:03:39] And so if you look at the bottom,

[2:03:40] I mean has 100%, 76% and 100%.

[2:03:43] Those are one time, so don't be surprised

[2:03:47] that once that's done,

[2:03:49] that there's nothing else gonna happen the rest of the year.

[2:03:51] So those are very explainable.

[2:03:53] If you go above that, you have the court,

[2:03:57] which appears to be a little bit over.

[2:03:59] I mean, if you assume 66 is your eighth month,

[2:04:04] but then you also have to look at the revenues too,

[2:04:06] because some of it is driven by revenues.

[2:04:08] Same thing with development, for example.

[2:04:09] If your development is up, you're going to collect more fees, but you're also going to

[2:04:14] have more expenditures.

[2:04:15] So these percentages are really relative to the budget.

[2:04:19] So the thing to maybe look at, and I wouldn't necessarily jump up and down, is 68%, it's

[2:04:26] only two points over.

[2:04:27] There's probably a reason behind that, and communication and marketing slightly over.

[2:04:32] But then again, the total budget is fairly small in the scheme of things.

[2:04:39] But some things are linear, and some things are not.

[2:04:42] And if you look at those, I think you can get a good idea of where you are.

[2:04:48] And again, municipalities are heavy with labor, so that's why in the case of the police department,

[2:04:55] if they're shy police officers, that's why they're trailing as far as their budget.

[2:05:01] Anyway, thank you.

[2:05:06] You're good. Thank you.

[2:05:08] Thank you, Mr. Mike.

[2:05:09] All right. That brings us to the last item, which is discussion on considering going out,

[2:05:16] discussion on considering going out for bid for sanitary sewer line and proof plans to be designed

[2:05:23] for freeze and nickels with an estimated cost of 544,987.

[2:05:28] So the reason we put this on the agenda, you wouldn't normally say,

[2:05:31] let's have a discussion item about something that's out to bid.

[2:05:34] But as I looked at this project and tried to gather up the history of this project,

[2:05:39] it seemed like the number that we are estimating this is going to cost, around $550,000, seems

[2:05:46] really out of whack with what's been reported in the past to council.

[2:05:50] I thought it was useful to say, okay, we're gathering bids right now.

[2:05:54] Let's sit down, let's talk to the engineering firm a little bit and figure out where

[2:05:58] do we feel like this project is in the big picture.

[2:06:01] So, big picture before I ask Frieze and Nichols to come up and talk about it a little bit.

[2:06:06] Big picture, what you're doing here is you're abiding by an annexation agreement.

[2:06:12] You've got the sonic location and an annexation agreement that says,

[2:06:16] hey, we're going to provide sewer service to this property.

[2:06:19] You looked about, hey, should I run my sewer line south?

[2:06:23] And is that going to be the most cost-effective thing?

[2:06:25] Am I going to run my sewer line north?

[2:06:27] Will that be the most cost-effective thing?

[2:06:29] Taking your sewer line to the south would be over $900,000 at this time.

[2:06:34] Taking your sewer line to the north, meaning crossing French town, is going to be that $550,000 number.

[2:06:41] I don't think anybody's satisfied with where those numbers stand right now,

[2:06:45] but we won't have an accurate number to report until we are back in front of you next month

[2:06:50] and we're showing you the actual bid numbers.

[2:06:53] We are out to bid now and maybe we get lucky.

[2:06:56] Maybe we get somebody coming forward with a lower bid

[2:06:59] than what's anticipated here on the page,

[2:07:02] but that's wishful thinking, right?

[2:07:04] We're gonna have to wait until the bids be what the bids are.

[2:07:08] So with that just a little bit of introduction,

[2:07:10] let me introduce Ashley from Freeze and Nichols

[2:07:13] and Travis if you'd like to as well, but take it away.

[2:07:17] Good evening, Mayor and Council Members.

[2:07:20] So I remember when we were kind of going back and forth

[2:07:23] on different alignments for the sanitary sewer to serve the fell station. Conceptually, we were

[2:07:30] about $380,000 if I'm not mistaken. There were some assumptions in there that have changed since

[2:07:38] I came up with that conceptual. Previous direction that I received from former town staff was we

[2:07:45] could open-cut French Town Road, which was not included in that conceptual cost estimate that I

[2:07:50] provided, and then as well when I provide that conceptual cost estimate, Argyle Water

[2:07:56] Supply Company was not relocating their water line, so they had an existing 8-inch water

[2:08:01] line kind of hugging the right-of-way line, and then they now installed a 12-inch water

[2:08:06] line that's now kind of in the middle of the available right-of-way space, so that

[2:08:11] is going to kind of tighten and congest the allowable construction area for the contractor.

[2:08:17] We also, when we got the survey information, the sewer line is going to be a little bit

[2:08:21] deeper than anticipated.

[2:08:23] So once we bore under French Town Road and go from French Town Road all the way to Waters

[2:08:29] Edge Drive, we're going to be going from 7 feet deep, and it's going to end at about

[2:08:34] 15 feet deep.

[2:08:36] I have a question.

[2:08:38] Yes.

[2:08:38] Is it accurate when bidding municipality work that you can only have a certain

[2:08:45] margin of profit from the contractor.

[2:08:49] Yes.

[2:08:50] So you're able, the bids are very open, transparent, because some of these numbers are kind of

[2:08:57] shocking.

[2:08:57] This bore, typically when you do a bore, if it's 16 inches you can say it's times three

[2:09:03] and that's a fair price.

[2:09:05] If you look 16 inches it's actually $800 a foot, if I'm reading that accurately.

[2:09:10] That seems like a pretty high bore.

[2:09:11] And just due to the, you know, tight areas when you look at where the bore pits are going

[2:09:16] to be and just the, you know, small amount of linear footage.

[2:09:19] So for the material, for the contractor to get only 55 linear feet of 16-inch steel casing

[2:09:25] versus if they were doing like the 2000, yeah, exactly.

[2:09:29] Because you've got to pay for the MOB to get them.

[2:09:30] Correct.

[2:09:31] But again, these numbers are really high, so I didn't know how transparent some

[2:09:35] of these bids were.

[2:09:36] Like, if you're able to really break them down, they're really showing you the

[2:09:39] the price they're getting,

[2:09:40] because the contract is using a sub, too.

[2:09:42] Correct.

[2:09:43] Assuming that they are using a subcontractor

[2:09:46] and not self-performing.

[2:09:47] And then another thing with Argel Water Supply Waterline

[2:09:51] kind of being in the middle of the right of way.

[2:09:54] And we're still staying within the right of way.

[2:09:57] In order to meet TCEQ,

[2:09:58] I have to now install this line with pressure rated pipe

[2:10:01] to meet TCEQ requirements.

[2:10:04] San Terry sewer and water lines

[2:10:06] are supposed to be nine feet apart.

[2:10:08] and that we just can't achieve that with where Argyle Water Supply put their 12-inch water line.

[2:10:14] When did that water line go in, the Argyle Water Supply water line?

[2:10:17] I believe they're wrapping up construction now.

[2:10:19] I've been in communications with them to get their plans on where everything is located.

[2:10:24] So my last conversation with them was they were going to wrap up construction here in the next couple of weeks.

[2:10:29] So they just put it in. I know where you're going.

[2:10:33] Okay. Thank you.

[2:10:35] So, again, I'm sorry to turn it over to you.

[2:10:38] Go ahead.

[2:10:39] You don't know if it's a subcontractor or not.

[2:10:42] Are you familiar with this bid?

[2:10:44] With the bore, for example.

[2:10:48] We haven't received the bid yet.

[2:10:50] This is the engineer's opinion.

[2:10:53] I got you.

[2:10:54] And when you're at your August meeting,

[2:10:56] you're going to see what the bids came out to be.

[2:10:58] Okay.

[2:10:58] Yeah.

[2:10:59] This is just your heads up.

[2:11:02] So, question, was freezing nickels our engineering firm in 23?

[2:11:08] Okay, and I seriously doubt, Erica, that you pulled that number out of the sky that you presented to us.

[2:11:14] You probably got a number from freezing nickels.

[2:11:18] Sorry, yes, and that's what Ashley was just alluding to is the difference between that number then and then what you have now.

[2:11:26] It's a lot higher though.

[2:11:28] And, you know, when we, so the idea behind this whole concept goes back to 23 when I

[2:11:36] think, is that one, Brian Livingston was still the mayor, I think was towards the end, 23.

[2:11:42] And it was essentially, I thought it was sort of an economic decision in the sense that

[2:11:47] we provide, you know, sewer services and then in return would have them annex and

[2:11:54] I remember presenting to the council an analysis based on the cost that I was given, based on

[2:12:00] and then also the revenues that they were collecting.

[2:12:03] And it was about a three-year payback.

[2:12:05] And even then it had grown from before.

[2:12:09] So I'm just,

[2:12:12] I mean, where's the end of this?

[2:12:14] It's what I'm saying.

[2:12:15] And this is not the only instance where I've seen cost overruns higher.

[2:12:21] It's the same thing with 407 barbecue, much, much higher.

[2:12:26] And I mean, personally, I'm tired of it.

[2:12:29] I just can't continue to make a decision

[2:12:31] that all of a sudden then grows.

[2:12:35] I understand.

[2:12:37] We have updated the plans based on input

[2:12:41] from Public Works Director to ensure

[2:12:44] the sewer line can serve Shell Station.

[2:12:47] And this is the updated cost estimate,

[2:12:50] Just based on now the available information with some of the changes that were made.

[2:12:56] And there's no value engineering this to save money?

[2:13:00] I can take a look at the plans and see if there's anything that could provide some value engineering.

[2:13:07] But I would want to run that by the Public Works Director to ensure that it's still serving the purpose.

[2:13:15] just real quick aren't we annexing the building further to the south also do we

[2:13:21] have a soft agreement with them which the hell shape the new one yeah that's part

[2:13:26] of it so this is going to service this health station and that's correct it'll

[2:13:30] serve all of that development but when you did your three-year payout have

[2:13:34] both you had both buildings yeah I have both okay yeah I think the good thing

[2:13:38] is from what I understand some of the tenants are going to be to our better they're going

[2:13:44] to have more retailers than I had initially planned but you know well it's just it sounds

[2:13:49] to me this changes it from a three-year payout to a five-year payout this still makes good

[2:13:53] economic sense.

[2:13:55] There is one more sort of difference and that is originally it was a special purpose

[2:14:00] annexation it has turned into a full annexation where you'll be receiving some property

[2:14:06] property tax, ad valorem property tax, as well as sales tax.

[2:14:10] Yeah, but that last analysis that I gave out did have that in there.

[2:14:16] Okay.

[2:14:16] Yeah.

[2:14:17] But actually, this is an 800-foot light, the pipeline.

[2:14:20] About 950 linear feet and 8-inch sanitary sewer, about 950 linear feet.

[2:14:27] Okay.

[2:14:28] And so the property...

[2:14:29] How do you get that on this?

[2:14:31] Yeah, I might stop, is this it?

[2:14:34] It's spied.

[2:14:35] And so the property that's mainly to the south of that is not included in this right and they don't need to be included because they have

[2:14:42] Access to sewer already. I'm just trying to see how we can maximize our expenditure here

[2:14:49] If you're referring to the go started the two-story building, right?

[2:14:54] If I go to the two-story building and then I go south from there, they'll have opportunity

[2:15:00] To get into the same TRA line, and if I can say it accurately, it's not quite at the Starbucks.

[2:15:09] It's at the business just to the north of the Starbucks. There's another sewer line opportunity for them to pour into a manhole that's just north of there.

[2:15:17] So not too far from the, you know, if you imagine south going down the hill, right, that line of businesses can get in.

[2:15:24] and I'm not remembered in the name of the street off the top of my head but

[2:15:29] there's the street that goes into the residential neighborhood just in the

[2:15:32] north of Starbucks. Tucker Street. There you go. Say again. Tucker Street. Yeah

[2:15:37] there's a manhole at Tucker Street that they'll be able to get into and you

[2:15:41] know I I don't view that as punitive for them to do that in the future so.

[2:15:48] Can I just check is the car wash actually part of there? Yeah. Oh it is.

[2:15:52] Okay, so that's just a typo.

[2:16:03] I mean, we got to go out to bed, right?

[2:16:05] Yeah, it's out right now.

[2:16:06] It's out to bed now.

[2:16:07] And so when you see it in August, you'll have real numbers

[2:16:10] and you can make your decision at that time.

[2:16:11] Good, Jack, give her a card.

[2:16:15] What was the opposite of annex?

[2:16:21] I don't have that number off the top of my head.

[2:16:23] Do we know how many contractors we send it out to?

[2:16:25] There's a state board.

[2:16:26] So we have it advertised through Sivcast.

[2:16:29] And so I will be reaching out to contractors

[2:16:31] to let them be aware that the project is advertising

[2:16:34] to get some competitiveness and hopefully get

[2:16:38] a wide variety of bids to review.

[2:16:42] You don't think it would be beneficial

[2:16:43] because unfortunately, you know,

[2:16:46] the faces up here change from time to time

[2:16:47] is to have that as a base number

[2:16:49] so people can see what we came from.

[2:16:51] I just happen to remember what it is.

[2:16:53] I think Dr. Herman might remember what it was.

[2:16:55] I don't think Casey was even on council at the time

[2:16:58] that we're looking at this

[2:16:58] because it was Mr. Livingston that was the mayor.

[2:17:01] She was here.

[2:17:02] Oh, Christy was here, yeah?

[2:17:04] She remembers.

[2:17:05] But there has to be an end to this.

[2:17:09] Government doesn't have endless money.

[2:17:11] We're spending the citizen's money.

[2:17:13] And I'm really disappointed that each and every time

[2:17:18] the estimates are higher than what we based our initial

[2:17:22] decision on.

[2:17:23] So I'm good.

[2:17:24] Well, how many times have you guys

[2:17:27] I had to rework this based on whatever the changes was from the first time that you've

[2:17:32] done it to this iteration that we're seeing here before us.

[2:17:34] Is it two, three, four times?

[2:17:36] I feel like this is at least the fourth number that I've seen.

[2:17:39] We have done several different cost estimates and granted it is all conceptual before we

[2:17:44] get topographic survey, get detailed information and start getting into the design.

[2:17:50] Like I said, there was a lot of things that weren't considered in that conceptual

[2:17:53] just based on direction from previous town staff on,

[2:17:58] hey, we could open cut French Town Road.

[2:18:00] And obviously that's a big cost adder

[2:18:01] because we're going to have to go under

[2:18:03] with a 16-inch steel casing pipe

[2:18:05] just for an 8-inch sanitary sewer line.

[2:18:07] But I didn't, who told, never,

[2:18:12] it's a never-ending question, I'm sorry.

[2:18:13] I mean, Robert was the, was the,

[2:18:16] it was Robert when he was public works director.

[2:18:22] So not only does the cost of the project go up every single time, I mean we're paying

[2:18:29] you guys to read.

[2:18:30] We have been on hold for design until we've gotten direction from town staff.

[2:18:38] So we haven't done like five iterations of plans, so we have been aware of town's money

[2:18:47] making sure we're using it fruitfully. And so this is going north, right? Yes.

[2:18:54] Okay. And so Shell and everybody knows that all we're doing is bringing sewer to

[2:18:59] them. They have to connect to it, right? So they're gonna have to saw cut their

[2:19:03] driveways or whatever. This goes to the manhole that's roughly at the drive

[2:19:11] through. Okay, yeah. This line actually goes almost to right where their current

[2:19:18] grinder pump is. Okay. Where their two lines come together from from the

[2:19:24] Osbury building and shell station. That's going to be the beginning of our our

[2:19:29] line will be a manhole there that they dump it. I believe there's four or five

[2:19:34] total manholes throughout the system.

[2:19:42] Any other comments?

[2:19:47] All I can say is

[2:19:48] better hurry before the price goes up even more so anyway well thank you for

[2:19:52] your presentation we do not have on the agenda call for a future agenda items so

[2:20:00] I would just recommend to send those to Erica and Mike and we'll get that on the

[2:20:07] next agenda so if there's nothing else we will adjourn at 804 did you what

Jul 21, 2025 Town Council

Agenda

Transcript