[0:04] testing one two three

[0:07] four

[0:14] i just love working for the district 2 supervisor but district 1 and 3 are my

[0:18] favorites

[0:22] all right good evening ladies and gentlemen i am so excited to see all of

[0:25] you out this evening i am respectful of everybody's time

[0:29] but i'm glad that you all got the notice this time we did a second

[0:34] round of retail strategies and what the county is doing to move forward so

[0:38] tonight a couple of housekeeping things

[0:42] one when you there's going to be an engagement piece

[0:45] and so when you um speak if you choose to

[0:49] sharon is going to come and bring a mic so that it can be included in the

[0:54] recording because this meeting is being recorded

[0:57] and we'll post it later but that you can't capture if you're not using a

[1:00] microphone that's number one number two

[1:04] there's an engagement please so we want you all to talk back with us um and just

[1:09] another thing bathrooms to the left for ladies to the right for the gentleman

[1:14] um just really quick tomorrow is our covet clinic at the social center

[1:20] um they are giving the kovic vaccinations as well as the boosters for

[1:24] all three and so if you are interested please you don't need an appointment you

[1:29] can just show up from three to six miranda from three to six tomorrow

[1:34] um quite a few people have called in so we're excited to just keep moving

[1:38] charles city forward we have about close to 70 percent of our county fully

[1:42] vaccinated we have three percent that already have boosters and so we want to

[1:48] get the boosters numbers up um so we're excited to to have that large percentage

[1:53] of people that are fully vaccinated so please share with your neighbors from

[1:58] three to six tomorrow at the charles city social center

[2:01] okay so tonight um the meeting discussion is for retail strategies and

[2:06] so as you all know the board of supervisors and i would

[2:10] like to say good evening to our chairman our vice chairman and i

[2:13] remember mr smith mr code and mr atkins thank you all for being here so i'm sure

[2:19] between the people in the room your district representative is here as well

[2:24] but the vision that those gentlemen have as well as administration is to move

[2:28] charles city county forward and to develop very strategically

[2:33] to keep a rural character but however bring the amenities um that's

[2:37] desperately needed and so if you um

[2:41] if you you during covet we had an impact of where you could get items from and so

[2:47] i think the dollar general really helped during that time to help people get some

[2:53] necessary items that you needed for just life right doing doing rough times and

[2:59] so we are excited to move charles city forward in that capacity mr chairman or

[3:04] other members would you all like to have a word before i get started or

[3:09] all right great all right so

[3:12] my assistant county administrator dr rhonda russell will join me shortly

[3:16] so tonight we're going to go through what the county has what we where we are

[3:22] get your feedback and we feel like as we're designing movement and growth in

[3:27] the county it's important for the board and i

[3:31] to get your feedback and what you want for the community now are we going to

[3:34] get everything every person wants no but if we can get a general consensus of

[3:39] what the ideas are then that helps us as we're doing the planning process

[3:44] so the county has contracted with a company out of alabama um retail

[3:49] strategies who performed the last meeting um who also shared the slides

[3:54] with charles city for tonight so the vice president of the company sarah beth

[3:59] thornton and beth miller are our point of contacts for this project and so

[4:04] basically um what they are doing is just basically doing a market analysis for

[4:08] the county looking at all the demographics that we'll talk about later

[4:12] looking at the county topography and exactly what's needed here once they

[4:18] come complete the market analysis then they will

[4:22] make a recommendation of what businesses would fit here in the community some

[4:27] national brands and then from there

[4:30] approach those retailers to come to our community so they have been very

[4:34] successful with bringing grocery fast food and other commercial

[4:39] development in other communities around us and so we thought that this was a

[4:43] great idea to just have the study done and then have someone actually advocate

[4:48] for us okay and so micah and julia are also part of

[4:53] the team that's um just doing all the analysis for the county

[4:59] so let's look at the retail trends we're going to have a pop quiz and let's see

[5:04] what you know so and you can just blurt out your answers

[5:08] and then we'll go through what the findings are so in your thought process

[5:12] what do you think the percentage of jobs in america are retail

[5:17] a 25 percent b 40 or c 50 just pop it out like popcorn

[5:25] see 50

[5:29] yeah pop it out like popcorn

[5:35] so the percentage of jobs in america that are retail are actually 25

[5:42] not 50 so one in four jobs are retail here in

[5:46] the united states okay the next question how many jobs does a

[5:52] qsr quick service restaurant typically bring to the community to a community

[5:58] well she gave us the answer [Laughter]

[6:03] you're the winner mr atkins so when they look at quick service restaurants like

[6:09] mcdonald's chick-fil-a hearties those restaurants the fast food entities that

[6:15] we service they bring about 15 jobs for each um

[6:21] business to a community i know we have bonnie here tonight with calls how many

[6:25] employees do you have bonnie

[6:30] 12. so that's right in line with what's the national trend so we can see that

[6:35] additional retail restaurants bring about 15. so

[6:40] let's try not to give the answer away on the next question okay

[6:44] so when you look at the average raises especially from retail versus non-retail

[6:50] between individuals between 25 and 34. is that 34

[6:56] 54. my contacts are failing me so when you

[7:00] look at non-retail workers the average salary is about 34 000 versus retail

[7:06] salaries of 35 000 and we're going to go into our household median income later

[7:11] right dr russell and just talk about what that looks like

[7:15] for charles city so retail

[7:19] actually can earn more than non-retail nationwide when you look at the trend

[7:26] so in your

[7:28] and here are some options what is the largest consumer demographic group

[7:33] millennials gen z's

[7:36] baby boomers greatest generation or generation x

[7:41] what do you guys think

[7:46] generation x i hear

[7:49] eight millennials baby boomers

[7:53] well to tell the truth the millennials

[7:57] are the largest consumer demographics guess that's young folks they don't mind

[8:02] spending money because they're spending our money right

[8:06] they they buy everything and everything is probably from amazon or e-commerce

[8:11] and so millennials the national trend shows they are the

[8:15] largest consumer okay question

[8:41] we need a microphone yes because it's being recorded

[8:50] the sad part about this is the median agent charles city's 47

[8:56] which we don't spend a whole lot of money or

[9:00] 47 and up don't whereas millennials spend everything

[9:03] they own and which produces sales tax income and all for the county

[9:09] you have to use the microphone for recording thank you sir

[9:14] all right

[9:16] so millennials we see are the largest demographic

[9:19] group okay so what percentage of retail sales are

[9:25] online 15 22 or 53

[9:30] national trend what do you guys think see 53 percent

[9:36] b 22 anyone else

[9:40] and the winner is 15

[9:44] i couldn't believe that i would have gone with 53 percent too but 15

[9:48] based on national trends is the percentage of retail sales

[9:53] online um so that was very like eye-opening for me because i know some

[9:58] of us in the room shop at amazon at least three days a week i'm not gonna

[10:02] call any names they know who they are

[10:08] all right so when you look at post covet what the retail strategies are seeing

[10:13] you know how you restaurant tech clothes um you know smalls had closed it had a

[10:19] lot of restrictions so what they're seeing post covet is just opportunity

[10:24] for drive-through curbside um delivery and pop-ups and so what they're seeing

[10:30] is that's trending like retailers who that are developing new projects are

[10:36] focusing more on external service than internal service so you know they're not

[10:42] doing the um like the child fund gyms and like the chick-fil-a's and that sort

[10:47] of thing so a lot of the the the new retails or the retailers are focusing on

[10:51] drive-throughs and curbside delivery

[10:56] so the process that retail strategies you will take first

[11:00] they're in the discovery phase which they're in right now

[11:03] um which they're researching charles city looking at the demographics looking

[11:07] at the travel times looking at um everything all the assets that we have

[11:12] here in the community and then connect the next phase would be to connect with

[11:17] retails just to see exactly what will be a good

[11:21] fit here okay we don't want retail popped up all over the place

[11:25] um you know we want to keep charles city county beautiful the way that it is but

[11:30] we do need amenities i know if you're like me you have to travel 20 30 minutes

[11:34] to go to the grocery store get insulated bags so everything won't defrost um so

[11:40] we still want amenities but we want to keep it real and beautiful as it is and

[11:44] then the next phase would be the advance phase where

[11:47] they just look at their efforts and then they go out to those retailers and

[11:51] advocate for charles city county okay and so dr russell is going to talk

[11:57] about demographics here right all right

[12:06] good evening everyone miss johnson actually did a few more of

[12:10] the slides and i thought so i'm going to be in front of you for maybe one maybe

[12:14] two minutes at the most but i want to go back and pick up on

[12:19] the slide that talked about the percentage of sales nationally that

[12:24] are online or e-commerce space and just draw a conclusion that should be very

[12:28] obvious to everyone it is prudent for us to

[12:32] [Music] invest

[12:34] in attracting what we call brick and mortar retailers

[12:38] to our community because presently the national trend is that consumers still

[12:43] want that on-site retail experience right and there everybody is not doing

[12:49] it as well as amazon in terms of timeliness and the easy return policy

[12:55] and the um shipping costs the reasonable shipping

[13:00] cost of any at all and so we have a potential to capture

[13:06] i guess what they call leakage in terms of

[13:10] money that's spent outside of the community for your convenience oriented

[13:15] retail needs to capture that and keep that in the community

[13:19] okay so is it so you go back to where we were so

[13:26] our potential market to capture retail spending dollars in charles city

[13:33] county is broader than our boundaries our neighboring communities prince

[13:39] george hopewell even

[13:43] henrico and bordering james city county

[13:47] we have the potential to capture consumers who are traversing through in

[13:53] and around our communities and so not retail strategies data but our census

[13:58] our u.s census data estimates that the majority of our population community um

[14:04] commutes 25.6 miles um weekdays to and from work

[14:10] right and if you think about your own shopping trends

[14:15] and what motivates you in terms of where you go to shop

[14:19] consumers for the most part aren't shopping they're not making a personal

[14:24] decision to i want to shop within my locality boundaries i want to shop

[14:28] within my municipal boundaries they're looking for an opportunity that they

[14:32] desire or they're looking for something that's convenient and so if you think

[14:36] about your own behaviors and see if your behaviors are like mine

[14:41] i and i don't know why i'm like this but i'm like this

[14:45] i can't pass my house um to go to a shopping opportunity if

[14:51] i'm on my way home it just it just drives me crazy so i'm gonna stop

[14:56] before i get home and it just depends on what i need

[15:02] if if i want to do it in a hurry i'm

[15:04] looking for a small venue like dollar general or a small neighborhood

[15:10] mart there's a walmart

[15:13] off of route 5 in williamsburg that i'll stop

[15:18] stop at and i keep just like miss johnson the insulated bags in the car so

[15:22] that it won't go go bad right but i have all of those opportunities in and around

[15:28] me um where i live

[15:30] but i would have to pass my house to get there right

[15:35] i love amazon for a lot of different reasons right

[15:38] love amazon um

[15:41] i don't like macy's for online shopping you want to know why because it takes a

[15:45] week and a half for it to get to you right so i'm just talking about me but

[15:50] if you think about your own behavior and your own experiences and you multiply

[15:55] that times the number of households and adult shoppers in this

[16:01] community and that are also traversing in and around charles city county to to

[16:06] richmond the great richmond metropolitan area or or the williamsburg james city

[16:11] county area we have lots of opportunities to capture leakage that is

[16:16] coming out dollars that are not coming in our

[16:19] community and this graphic is meant to show

[16:24] retail strategies analysis for what our

[16:30] market area our expanded market area is for attracting retail vendors to charles

[16:36] city county miranda

[16:41] so when we look at our population we are

[16:46] right under 7 000

[16:49] persons in the county and so that number that's reported in front of you looks

[16:54] like it's deceiving but it represents the broader

[16:57] um opportunities for shoppers in our

[17:01] community if we look outside of our boundaries

[17:06] so i believe not just charles city county but when

[17:10] you get in the roxbury road area the closest grocery store is where

[17:18] food line on route 60. so we have a large larger premium is

[17:24] that what you would call it what do you call like the krogers and the

[17:28] publix the larger brochures um you'd have parties well

[17:33] outside of the community that would come and and shop in charles city because

[17:38] it's convenient and it represents an opportunity that they seek and they want

[17:43] right i shared with miss johnson earlier and

[17:46] as you know if you a numbers geek this stuff gets real exciting to you right so

[17:51] the median household income nationwide in 2010 was 50 000 right

[17:58] that's two a household has it's two people so it wouldn't be called a

[18:02] household if it weren't two people that's two people making

[18:06] 25 000 a year right so the number that was reported for

[18:12] retail average retail annual salary was 36 to i think it's 36.238

[18:19] a household with that is an income of above 70 000 a year

[18:24] so we potentially have access to median household incomes of 72 000

[18:30] in our market area that's very attractive to

[18:36] retailers in terms of what's the surplus income that those households can spend

[18:43] for their convenience oriented retail needs and so we we believe or we would

[18:50] not have invested in this opportunity that it is going to

[18:54] result in some immediate returns

[19:01] you wanna okay so miss johnson is gonna come back

[19:05] and this is we're liking this to a focus group we want your um popcorn just

[19:10] respond like you know very um um transparently with your answers to

[19:17] these questions about what you would like to see in our community and we're

[19:21] not going to um we're going to share that information

[19:25] with retail strategies untouched you know we're not going to try to correct

[19:29] it or or add to it or take away from it and they're going to look for trends in

[19:35] your comments and summarize what the needs for our

[19:40] community are based on the feedback that you provide and those are the

[19:44] opportunities that they're going to be seeking on our behalf

[19:48] all right i want to thank you again for your time this evening and partici your

[19:52] participation one thing if we could go back to the

[19:56] other slide with the chart that's taking place right now no one

[20:00] more right there so one of the things that's being conducted

[20:05] whether you know it or not so the mobile tracking is very very important it's not

[20:10] something that retail strategy implemented it's already on your phone

[20:14] right and so they are tracking our movements um so that they can see and

[20:19] basically just by zip code and it's just any a lot of people can get this data so

[20:24] they're looking at to as to where you live and where you shop okay so

[20:30] one of the reasons that the

[20:33] the new dollar general on wayside road in 106

[20:38] dollar general when they came back to charles city county said we want to put

[20:42] another one here because the sales at this location has superseded our

[20:48] expectation but what they found is that individuals who lived in district 1 in

[20:52] district 2 part of district 2 did not shop here

[20:57] but they tracked the mobile numbers and those citizens actually shopping at

[21:02] dollar general in other localities that's not something that we do it's

[21:05] just a national thing and so that that would that is what promoted or motivated

[21:11] dollar general to say we want to bring another location to

[21:14] charles city and then they noticed okay we don't have a grocery store so the

[21:20] second dollar general will have the market component um and i'm excited that

[21:24] that's going to be the first one in virginia of its kind okay

[21:28] so the market

[21:32] right the second one in the country new model it's in north carolina so we're

[21:36] excited that for virginia another first for charles city county okay

[21:41] so if we go forward this is the time now where we want to capture your thoughts

[21:45] get your feedback don't be shy because this is your opportunity to just say you

[21:50] know what you want your county to look like

[21:53] what your thoughts are and we're capturing those so that as they're

[21:57] developing all of the analysis putting all the data together they have a full

[22:01] picture of you know what citizens are seeing in charles city county and so i

[22:06] think at the last meeting we had about 20 24 people who attended same about

[22:10] tonight so we want to we're going to take your answers and um actually give

[22:14] it to retail strategies so um what sets in your opinion what sets

[22:20] our community apart from others popcorn just pop up

[22:27] bonnie we'll have to give you a mic

[22:34] um i feel like we're a visitor type community also okay and probably i don't

[22:40] even know what the what it could be but

[22:43] what what is brought in from visitors could be almost equal to what

[22:47] the residents spend here uh when we first opened the restaurant i

[22:51] was like we're gonna do breakfast you know starting at seven oh i am so sorry

[22:55] go ahead so um

[22:59] so the breakfast we did it for about a month and no one in charles city goes

[23:03] away to eat breakfast because they're traveling

[23:06] by half an hour to an hour to their um their work so we'd scratch that so what

[23:13] we do is mostly i'd like to see us be a big visitor

[23:17] type of a retailer and we do need that dollar

[23:21] general let's help our restaurant out 100

[23:25] but so i i just think you got to take it slowly to see

[23:30] what's different from us in other counties

[23:32] and i feel like visitors are the biggest thing we have i don't of course

[23:36] personally don't want to see fast food drop through places and and

[23:41] and just to see it grow the way it has with

[23:45] bed and breakfasts with other restaurants

[23:50] you know with to have shops open up in charleston to

[23:54] have i think local shops and charles city would just be awesome

[23:59] but i think we're a visitor county

[24:01] driven and that's what makes us different okay i think your neighbor she

[24:05] right there [Laughter]

[24:08] hi um my name is jennifer um i think what

[24:11] sets charles city county apart and i am a transplant i've only been here for

[24:15] about a year um is number one the history obviously

[24:20] you can't touch that um but honestly something that sets it apart is

[24:24] how untouched the county is and the fact that there aren't these huge national

[24:30] names dotting the highway and whatnot i don't think that needs to hold us back

[24:36] but i do think that's something that makes us

[24:39] special okay

[24:51] that's my man but this is my best man and my only man

[24:57] the bill so well it's all right with us but

[25:00] nevertheless i thank god for bill coley in jesus name he plays a big part in me

[25:06] and my husband's life and i thank god that we was able to visit this meeting

[25:11] but what i would like to see in charles city

[25:14] is a laundromat many people have their washing machines but it ain't nothing

[25:19] like going to the large map throwing your big

[25:22] quilts or comforts in them you know

[25:25] i just love the laundromat and we got to go miles to get to a laundromat i would

[25:31] like to see charles city with one or two one down the county and one

[25:36] up the county okay we up the county so i sure would love to see a laundromat here

[25:40] in charles city okay i went to the laundromat recently

[25:45] to do a comforter and i took like four dollars in coins i'm like what i hadn't

[25:50] been a colander man in like 30 years i was like oh my god i got to go to the

[25:54] atm machine to do my comforter what in the world okay

[25:59] who else what sets charles city apart anyone else

[26:08] thanks so

[26:13] when you drive up route 60 toward richmond you arrive down route 60

[26:18] toward williamsburg it's nothing but crap

[26:22] packed in everywhere national chains the businesses selling

[26:27] all kinds of things trash everywhere right

[26:31] we don't have that to anything like that extent i mean i

[26:35] live on ruthville road it's trash everywhere you know

[26:39] it's fast food junk all down the road there

[26:42] it's bad enough now if you start bringing in a mcdonald's or

[26:45] a hardee's or something like this what's that going to do

[26:49] to the county i mean we're going to be buried in trash

[26:54] and we're going to lose

[26:57] the rural character that has made charles city

[27:01] what it is for the last 400 years okay

[27:12] what i love about charles city is the small town feel

[27:16] the fact that like we walk in here tonight everybody's like hey hey how's

[27:20] your son how what you know like we all know each other like hey hey how are you

[27:24] how are you you know um and

[27:28] you know we do need to grow and i am super glad that charleston is taking it

[27:33] seriously and taking it carefully because we

[27:36] have seen what has happened to other counties who didn't

[27:40] you know and just sort of let it happen and it just went crazy

[27:43] um and i do i would love to see

[27:47] like bonnie said more small businesses more local businesses i do know that

[27:53] there's no way we're not going to have any chains come in and i do appreciate

[27:57] what dollar general has done and that that kind of opportunity but um

[28:03] you know i would just love to not lose that

[28:08] you know sort of local feel and we got a lot of talented people in this county

[28:14] yeah with all kinds of madden and just gills and they could bring them you know

[28:19] to bear if they had the opportunity yeah um and i don't know how to tap that

[28:24] but i just you know i think like this is

[28:28] this is a big chance for the people here um

[28:33] to

[28:35] to you know make that come true for people

[28:38] that have that kind of dream right okay all right so we're going to go to the

[28:43] next question [Music]

[28:46] i'm sorry so we have a couple more questions to go

[28:51] through

[28:53] let's go to the next question miranda up so people other people can see the next

[28:57] question that's coming up while he's giving his answer

[28:59] good evening everybody you know you know

[29:03] i've looked at charleston is a a beautiful place i've been living here

[29:07] for 75 years and uh

[29:10] i think that uh the older folks and i including the young folks i think

[29:16] we have to have activities that i won't have to go all the way out

[29:21] of town just to get a loaf of bread

[29:24] to vote you know i think that everything that

[29:28] we the people that anticipated charleston had i think is going to be a

[29:32] very big helper to the people in charles city because we need we need playing i'm

[29:38] a very i'm a person i love to be doing something

[29:41] and i don't want to go to pittsburgh just to get me something

[29:44] to get but to do at home we had to have this thing so

[29:50] the older people has hard to go like doctors and

[29:54] whatever you know okay because like i'm saying i'm just getting older

[29:58] right and i don't want to move around like when i was young when i was young i

[30:01] wanted to get on that but now i want to stay in town

[30:05] okay so while you have the microphone um so the next question is which

[30:09] communities do you leave charles city to go get goods and services so where do

[30:13] you primarily shop like for groceries

[30:18] say that again i know what i'm saying what's what communities do you go to to

[30:22] shop primarily like for groceries do you go to hopewell or richmond

[30:26] williamsburg or we go to we go to hopewell and sometimes we go to the

[30:30] restaurant okay i don't go i don't visit william bear too much okay but uh we go

[30:35] to hope we're enriching hannah rocco okay places like that you

[30:39] know okay and we can just pop that out what about other people's where do you

[30:43] go to shop

[30:47] yeah i go to williamsburg i go to james city county i go all the way to newport

[30:50] news for costco um that is please don't put a costco here even though i'd love

[30:55] that but

[30:58] all right well so the surrounding counties just like you know most of us

[31:01] do and when you go if you're going to go to the doctor's appointment you guys

[31:05] like okay i'm here let me grab something on the way back like rhonda said if i'm

[31:09] in town already next question what category of retail businesses would

[31:14] you like to see in charles city so you have

[31:18] fast food you have grocery you have of course apparel what

[31:24] categories would you primer like to see here in charles city county

[31:29] pharmacy

[31:37] specialty shops boutique type shops

[31:45] okay

[31:56] okay so i think we've heard that a couple of times tonight just specialty

[32:00] unique boutiques and when we did its economic development study back in 2015

[32:04] that was that model show that you know williamsburg is where you go to see

[32:08] history you should come here and experience it and create entrepreneurial

[32:11] opportunities pharmacies

[32:14] and another any other areas of retail grocery

[32:21] definitely grocery miss

[32:27] not jones expand it so big but at least the whole 50 to 70 people

[32:32] still are going to mcb hospital you know

[32:36] that would be nice because when i went to hospital in june

[32:40] it took me up to um where did it take me baby

[32:44] took me up on 60. okay they had to go to m's then i had to go

[32:49] to mcv so urgent care urgent care okay all right anything else

[32:56] next question miranda what brands would be successful in this

[33:01] market we all shop at different brands i think

[33:05] i need to buy some chick-fil-a stock myself but

[33:09] i know what brands did you all think would be successful here we've heard the

[33:14] specialty shop but so we have some national brands that have approached us

[33:19] but in your opinion what brands do you think would be great for this community

[33:29] just for retail

[33:32] or grocery any of the categories aldi

[33:36] one of my favorites uh aldi will be really good the price

[33:40] point for aldi is great

[33:44] lidl two brothers yeah

[33:49] anything else any other brand national brands that you guys can think of

[33:55] okay so what are our biggest challenges in

[33:59] charles city um if you had to guess if we have you know challenges what what

[34:04] would you say our challenges are here

[34:13] infrastructure lack of broadband we are remedying that

[34:17] problem we are almost there we find out december

[34:21] 8th rhonda we

[34:24] december we can't wait the county just wrote another 12 million

[34:27] dollar grants and some bring every household so we're waiting to hear from

[34:32] that we're going to get them the microphone

[34:37] i think i think communication is much better than it's been in past years um i

[34:43] personally miss the virtual meetings because i think it makes it so much more

[34:48] accessible for working folks within the community to stay

[34:53] connected i think communication is still a challenge for us as a community

[34:59] you guys do good work and letting us know

[35:02] that there are things but it's just such a big gap

[35:06] facebook is there but if a lot of people aren't on facebook

[35:11] so connecting our community we've got a lot of diversity we've got a lot of

[35:17] gaps in age of population

[35:21] and we just need to do a little bit better job in getting the word out

[35:26] timely so people can get excited and engaged in the things that we need to do

[35:32] to grow our tax base a good point and we are working on the virtual component

[35:37] back to virtual we've been testing now for two months it's gone great we don't

[35:41] want to deploy it until we make sure we have any glitches and so hopefully the

[35:44] first of the year we'll be back because it would hate we would hate to launch it

[35:49] and it just fails again so we're looking to that biggest challenges in charles

[35:53] city i would like to

[35:56] ask that question again but the december event is going to take up like the money

[36:02] or something because when when they had um

[36:06] i just had found out about you could go to the

[36:09] down here and they would pay your light bill

[36:12] they answered they would give you so much money towards your life or whatever

[36:16] but when i came down here they said we're totally out sorry

[36:21] right it wasn't no help like

[36:24] i had heard and i didn't get no help at all

[36:28] yeah that would be a social services i'm not sure how they market that but i can

[36:32] talk with the director for the energy share program through dominion

[36:36] oh i just think one of our retail challenges is um just the space of you

[36:42] know the general area that the county

[36:45] contains uh you know obviously the people on the eastern side head to

[36:49] williamsburg for everything the people on the western side are always going to

[36:52] enrico so so i think that is going to be a challenge

[36:55] that we need to overcome in centralizing kind of our kind of economic corridor

[37:00] okay any other challenges

[37:03] yes

[37:07] maybe this is lack of knowledge on my part but i i think um law enforcement

[37:13] and response times could as we bring more retail to the community

[37:20] there's more potential for traffic incidents and or

[37:26] crime incidents and and i live on route 5 which is a major corridor and there

[37:31] was an accident on route 5 a few weeks ago in front of our house and we were

[37:35] there 15 minutes probably

[37:39] before the rescue squad arrived and that's pretty significant when they

[37:44] could have been on another call however

[37:48] their couple miles down the road and the state police beat our local law

[37:53] enforcement to the accident again understanding staffing can impact those

[37:58] things it was an evening of eight o'clockish accident on a sunday

[38:02] night but i think those things are

[38:06] it takes money but it's something as we grow we have to

[38:10] keep up with the pacing to make sure that we have that infrastructure in

[38:15] place i totally agree i think

[38:18] we've done a much better job since we have paid fire ems we have two of our

[38:22] ems folks here tonight and we're thankful for them we've reduced our

[38:25] response time down from about 18 to 23 minutes to about 11 to 14 minutes and i

[38:32] can assure you if they weren't at the call

[38:34] quickly they were out on another call because we have to

[38:39] yeah and mr fleming will respond to that and i think that you know we're getting

[38:44] ready we've gotten purchased some new apparatuses so we're getting there so i

[38:48] think calling 9-1-1 and having someone come to

[38:51] your house 11 minutes versus 23 minutes we're getting there

[38:55] so one of the biggest challenges that we

[38:58] face here in the county is that the paid staff

[39:04] operates out of wilcox neck so that's five miles

[39:08] shy of the chickahominy river so it takes us

[39:12] 10 minutes to get from the firehouse to here

[39:16] so if we're heading west that's additional time and we're on curvy roads

[39:21] and we're driving large pieces of apparatus there is a

[39:24] volunteer station on atkins road has been there for many years

[39:28] but it's not staffed they kind of show up when they show up i get it

[39:32] they have jobs families obligations we are currently in the process of building

[39:39] a new station on roxbury road

[39:42] we'll fully staff that station and i think things will get better yeah

[39:48] so we have the the roxbury road we are negotiating the final stage of the

[39:53] contract hopefully they break ground sometime in january but that station

[39:57] will be open in the fall or the fourth quarter of 2022 we are renovating the

[40:04] old high school bus garage behind the old high school in ruthville so we'll

[40:08] have staffing there so we're trying to bridge that gap so but we're getting

[40:12] there all right

[40:16] is there anything else you'd like us to know about charles city or anything else

[40:20] that you would like to see we've heard you know small boutique retailers we've

[40:25] heard grocery laundry mats what else would you like to know like us to know

[40:30] about charles city and what you would like to see

[40:39] i think i'd like to see um you know obviously the things we're talking about

[40:43] tonight in terms of economic development um

[40:46] are kind of years down the road in theory um so in the meantime i think i'd

[40:51] like to see pop-ups and community-supported events

[40:54] where we bring you know whether it's festivals or things like that where you

[40:57] can bring these boutique reels to like you know local artisans and whatever um

[41:02] things that are supported community-wide rather than just i know peace hill for

[41:06] example had one this past weekend things that are are supported locally and um

[41:11] you know maybe not having them be done by an independent person maybe them put

[41:16] on by the county i think that would be a way to start getting people to know

[41:20] about charles city and and put us on the map before these big things you know

[41:24] happen yeah that would be great it's um is the town

[41:29] center i mean the um what was it going to be called there at the courthouse

[41:33] green area that development is that totally

[41:36] out of the question now the courthouse area plan yes yeah no that's what we're

[41:41] working on i'm going to touch on that a little bit later great okay

[41:45] what else would you like for us to know what else would you like to see here in

[41:48] the community because as we're reporting back to

[41:52] retail strategies and the board is continuously developing strategy we want

[41:56] to make sure we capture as many as much feedback as possible

[42:01] i would like to see i've been a resident of charles city

[42:05] too for x amount of years

[42:09] [Laughter] but nevertheless

[42:12] i thank god for the coal that i got this morning

[42:16] to come to this meeting because most of the time we don't know

[42:21] nothing that's happening in charles city and if you don't come to the meeting

[42:25] you're losing out more than losing in so if we know more about it like send

[42:31] flyers out in the mailbox or whatever whatever

[42:35] get the word of morse is more sufficient

[42:40] than if i hadn't answered my phone this morning i'd don't miss this meeting okay

[42:44] but i think if if we are anxious about charles city getting this and that

[42:50] it should be more people out to support the meetings

[42:55] okay more communication so we do have the alert system so there

[43:01] are four streams of communication that we get out we advertise in the chronicle

[43:07] okay we send out text alerts or it will call

[43:11] your phone number that you designate to get a we call them robocalls on your

[43:15] home phone or your cell phone text messages

[43:18] we put it out on social media on facebook and we also put it on the

[43:22] county's website we would like to um and we also will email that

[43:28] that robocall does whatever you sign up for text message email

[43:33] um and voicemail right um we

[43:38] would like to send out notifications to every household for everything but it's

[43:43] so expensive and you know we don't want to take taxpayer dollars and spend four

[43:47] thousand dollars every time we have something um so we are working on other

[43:52] communications within each district to get the communication out faster and

[43:56] better but right now those are the four main areas the four main ways that we we

[44:01] communicate so we appreciate whoever calls you we appreciate them

[44:07] what else would you like for us to know

[44:20] notices that will come out things we sometimes get notice of the meetings

[44:25] a couple of hours before they happen right and so i really appreciate the

[44:29] fact that we got notified of this one on friday okay

[44:32] good job good job anything else that you would like us to

[44:37] know and i'm excited to see that we have some

[44:41] eda economic development authority members here tonight because they're

[44:45] partnering with the county to help us bring economic

[44:49] so they're getting to hear exactly what the board of supervisors is

[44:53] hearing all right so

[44:56] uh following this meeting in the previous meeting we're going to take all

[45:00] of the notes send it back to retail strategies and sometime

[45:05] in december we will have the final report of what they what they recommend

[45:10] what retailers will fit based on all of the analysis and then we'll develop a

[45:15] plan to move forward like i said retail strategies will go to those entities and

[45:21] advocate for charles city but a part of this project

[45:25] staff and our economic development authority

[45:28] members will also get go through retail strategies academy

[45:32] to learn how to approach you know a chick-fil-a or you know whatever entity

[45:38] we want on our own behalf once they go away so the goal is for us to learn as

[45:43] much as possible and advocate it's very important when you look at the

[45:47] demographics that they expand because they looked at um

[45:53] jordan on the james so for those individuals to get to a grocery store it

[45:57] takes them about 19 minutes you know you don't realize that and even with the

[46:02] dollar general market that was one of the things it takes them about eight

[46:05] minutes to get there so that's going to help our numbers here in charleston when

[46:09] we have neighboring communities that large you know right next door

[46:15] any questions for us while she's queuing up the next

[46:19] um presentation

[46:23] any questions mr coda will be able to answer them all

[46:29] right there you can start right there

[46:36] one moment the microphone is headed your

[46:40] way she's right behind you you can come up at the end

[46:45] i hate this microphone

[46:49] the courthouse area plan that mrs johnson is getting ready to

[46:54] show you um i disagree with a hundred percent

[46:58] but i want to tell you why um i said that because there's one

[47:04] beautiful thing that's happening here in charles city and that's called a balance

[47:08] and it's a balance of ms johnson me the board members and we all have our ideas

[47:14] and what we want to see charles city go i'm a

[47:18] dollar and sense person ms johnson

[47:22] she is a constituent person and it makes for a good balance because

[47:27] she wants the courthouse area plan and all for the you know like the farmer's

[47:32] market that she put together her and her staff dr russell

[47:37] and this lady back here mentioned festivals

[47:40] um and and whatnot the problem with with festivals and bike races and

[47:46] farmers market is they don't generate a lot of income

[47:49] income for the county and

[47:52] years ago we signed on with waste management

[47:55] because it was the only thing we had at the time

[48:00] and it enabled us to lower the tax rates on your property in charles city because

[48:04] charles city had the second highest tax rate in the state of virginia

[48:10] only behind fairfax so imagine that you're living out here

[48:15] in the country with the second highest real estate tax rate in the entire state

[48:19] only behind fairfax the problem with having all your eggs in

[48:23] one basket happened to us in 2014 and if you recall what happened then

[48:29] in the middle of a budget year waste management came in and said

[48:33] we're not going to be able to give you a million and a half of those dollars

[48:37] well that was catastrophic because that happened

[48:41] midterm mid-budget year so

[48:45] we've been talking and i've been hammering ever since i've been on this

[48:48] board my colleagues agree 100

[48:51] ms johnson agreed that we have to do something

[48:55] in order to not have all of our eggs in one

[48:58] basket i it is my vision my my vision and the

[49:03] boards also to develop 106

[49:07] because if you go 5 000 feet and look down at trial city it's the only place

[49:11] to do it 155 is already filled up with houses

[49:15] route 5 you don't want to you don't want to

[49:18] diminish the historic of route 5. 106 actually connects interstate 85 95

[49:23] and 64 together and if you see all the food line trucks

[49:27] running down it's because they're at the other end out there and they shoot

[49:31] across 106 to get all out to this end of the end of the

[49:34] state but

[49:37] we're talking about the other communities that we go to shop

[49:40] and let me tell you how that hurts charles city

[49:43] when you go to williamsburg hopewell new kent

[49:47] and you shop you pay your sales tax there

[49:50] and we get nothing because out of that six percent which is

[49:55] now six percent has been an increase we get almost two percent of that

[49:59] and to tell you how

[50:02] how that plays in one year we ended up with

[50:06] 330 some thousand extra dollars and we couldn't figure out where it came

[50:10] from so we're scrambling trying to figure out where this extra 330 000 came

[50:13] from it was from sales tax because dominion when the dominion that

[50:18] did the big upgrade to their thing so it's critical that we collect those

[50:21] dollars from those millennials that's spending

[50:24] all that money and and they're not going to spend it in charles city unless we do

[50:28] something and i've talked enough

[50:32] yeah and you know since dollar general has been

[50:34] here i mean it's not an astronomical amount but we see more sales tax i think

[50:39] this year we exceeded a million dollars in sales

[50:43] tax where we budgeted based on trends about 800 and about 774 000 between 774

[50:52] and 882 is what we budgeted when we finished june 30 we had collected over a

[50:56] million dollars in sales tax so that goes to show you when those retailers

[51:00] come that sales tax is what drives us is what

[51:04] helps us to fund schools what else helps us to fund other projects and so we

[51:09] that's one of the reasons you can actually

[51:12] capitalize you know financially on those retailers being here

[51:17] one of the reasons you know the courthouse area plan mr colt and i we

[51:21] respectfully agree to disagree on this but economic development you have

[51:26] industrial you have retail but you also have tourism

[51:31] our neighbors in henrico clear about eight million dollars in

[51:35] sports or recreational tourism so those softball leagues those baseball league

[51:40] soccer that comes eight million dollars between hotel restaurants and other

[51:45] entities that's what they bring in and they don't do anything for it we have

[51:51] something that no other locality has around us and that is the golden road

[51:55] called the virginia capital trail in 2020 1.2 million people

[52:02] rode that trail 337 000 of them were in charles city okay

[52:09] just imagine if we got one dollar from every rider on the trail we probably

[52:13] should just put out a bucket or something like drop your

[52:17] dollars you're passing by right but i know

[52:21] bonnie you've seen the uptick in in services for the capitol trail

[52:27] tripled right and so the courthouse area plan for us is very important because

[52:32] like mr coda said we don't want to compromise the rural character okay i

[52:37] mean i'm born and raised here i love this place right so we want route 5 to

[52:41] still be beautiful to ride down and see the canopy is amazing but we want

[52:46] industry on 106. we want to develop the courthouse area plan we want district 3

[52:51] to focus on our recreational opportunities the beautiful rivers down

[52:55] there and then that's all that this board has vision

[52:59] the next board next county administrator we don't know what they're going to do

[53:03] okay so the courthouse area plan is our

[53:06] economic tourism um engine okay and so what the board of supervisors has

[53:12] agreed to do and allowed dr russell and i to do is purchase property around the

[53:17] courthouse area so dr russell presented the courthouse area plan the board of

[53:22] supervisors adopted it in 2020 and so the area that you see in purple

[53:28] it's a little faint but that is our courthouse area so right

[53:32] beyond um the schools right in front of vdot and up to this building that is the

[53:38] entire courthouse area plan okay and so

[53:42] the nfb site is what we already own um however the county has leased that to a

[53:48] private developer and we'll show you some renderings in a minute um

[53:53] the two parcels to the right is that 40 58 and 40 59.

[53:59] the county actually um we're purchasing that i don't know if you all seen the

[54:04] activity the gas tanks were being removed this week but the county

[54:08] purchased those two parcels for about 11 point something

[54:13] acres and so that's going to help

[54:16] bridge the gap for this courthouse area plan

[54:20] along route 155 next slide the county has purchased these three parcels so

[54:27] dollar general is not on this map but right in the wooded area in front of the

[54:31] elementary school is dollar general so the county has purchased all three

[54:35] parcels here that we are looking to bring affordable housing okay

[54:41] and retail that was a you know it's a compromise if i come to the board

[54:47] with the idea then they tell well you can have this but you got to do this so

[54:50] we want um retail for the general community and

[54:55] the potential homeowners as well as a walkable community because you have the

[55:01] bike trail that they can walk to dollar general up to the courthouse

[55:06] complex and so

[55:08] one of the newer establishment is milk and honey brewery that we've leased the

[55:13] neighborhood facility building to and then the next slide will show you

[55:17] the rendering of what that will look like okay so this will bring

[55:22] a brewery which will be brewed on site a cafe

[55:26] outdoor area and one of the things that's so unique about this the beer

[55:31] will not only be brewed but it will be a canning operation and there will be a

[55:36] lab that they have worked uh negotiated with

[55:39] virginia tech and virginia state to create a certification for our students

[55:45] so once the students go to that program they can work at any lab in america okay

[55:51] and so this just shows you a little conference area um a small cafe and then

[55:56] the brewery and the in the rear of the building and so our vision is that this

[56:02] entire complex will be a walkable downtown charles city

[56:07] i think the more that we bring the more people that will stop here we see on

[56:11] saturdays the courthouse area this park line is filled with cyclists and so we

[56:16] want to capitalize on that and gain

[56:20] some of their sales tax right because the great thing about tourism they come

[56:25] in they experience your county and they leave we don't have to educate them you

[56:30] know hopefully i know firing ems they seem to pick up one 80 year old man off

[56:34] the bike trail who's falling at least a week or somebody breaks their arm you

[56:38] see the 911 calls like why would i mean he's 96 why is he on a bicycle anyway

[56:43] right but they come in they spend their money

[56:46] at coals and other places and we want to make sure that this area is like a

[56:51] downtown charles city or a hub because this is the center

[56:55] of the capital trail it's 51 miles charles city has 27 of those miles and

[57:01] this is the center of the virginia capital trail

[57:04] and so we um i think that's that's all for this so we are looking to develop

[57:10] this area to help it make sense and to gain you

[57:15] know that tourism component bringing the boutique shops

[57:18] we are going to be working with some design team once the analysis comes back

[57:24] from retail strategies on what this would look like for the entire corridor

[57:29] we have applied for housing grants for the affordable housing projects we

[57:36] have two that we are applying for looking at over close to three hundred

[57:40] thousand dollars to help with that project and what's great about it that

[57:44] project is gonna score really high with virginia housing because it's walkable

[57:49] to the schools so if that brings you know

[57:53] um parents single parent families or just families with children that can now

[57:58] walk to school which is you know scores really high on

[58:02] their process and so we're excited um to continue to move

[58:09] this area forward like stated earlier we are building the fire station and a 5

[58:14] acre parcel on 106 the solar panels which you will not be

[58:19] able to see we are also purchasing 47 acres on 106

[58:24] and that's the area we think where retail should go but we'll wait

[58:29] for this analysis to come back because we can just spin off of that development

[58:35] area um looking to bring water and sewer down 106 for other industry in the

[58:41] roxbury industrial area and that is our vision now after us again we don't know

[58:48] what the next board of supervisors the next county administrator will bring but

[58:51] that's where we think what is best for the community

[58:54] questions

[59:02] yes moving in 12 13 years ago and using the money i

[59:08] had from my retirement to open that business

[59:12] um it's hard to compete against a county that's also

[59:18] using money to have competing

[59:21] um businesses and that's the part i don't i mean i'm glad i hope this all

[59:25] works good but so the county has pretty much done this correct yes and competing

[59:31] against a small woman-owned business well we're not competing against a small

[59:35] woman on business we're looking to strengthen the small woman business

[59:39] because statistics show that the more development you bring the more

[59:44] opportunities because now they have more than one option in the area the area

[59:49] that's down on route 5 that's where we're looking to do the retail

[59:52] development with specialty shops on route 5. but this is the old social

[59:57] services building correct which is almost across straight from us

[1:00:01] correct okay um so different model but you know the more that we can provide to

[1:00:07] uh you know what they retail strategy especially has told us that it'll bring

[1:00:11] more people that are looking for other options

[1:00:14] yes when um can we expect to see any changes

[1:00:19] or anything done so the

[1:00:23] neighborhood facility building they are submitting their permits actually this

[1:00:27] week okay so it's already been gutted um so you will see they're looking to open

[1:00:32] the brewery and spring of 2022 okay the the fire department again will

[1:00:38] break ground probably in january and will be completed in december of

[1:00:43] 2022 as far as the other development we have to wait for this analysis to come

[1:00:48] back to tell us

[1:00:51] december

[1:00:55] so you had mentioned another county had made a lot of money off of um

[1:01:00] like outdoor sport things um has there been any

[1:01:05] thought of maybe attracting somebody like james river outfitters

[1:01:10] to do like their kayaking business or

[1:01:13] something like that out of charles city since we are

[1:01:16] right on the james river and i mean we don't have you know big

[1:01:20] exciting rapids but we got a really beautiful river and

[1:01:24] um you know i know the

[1:01:26] [Music] there's like a non-profit organization

[1:01:30] that does things that they took the kids from the high school out and did like a

[1:01:34] really cool ecology thing but maybe james river yeah maybe there would be

[1:01:38] you know some some tourist dollars we could get from something like that i

[1:01:42] don't i don't know this is just like i do

[1:01:46] yeah so we are in when is that meeting chiron is it december with the tourism

[1:01:52] so tourism entities we're all coming together to

[1:01:56] just put together a brainstorming session for just tourism for all of our

[1:02:01] entities so this is a time where money is just

[1:02:04] flowing from the federal government more than we ever have seen and more we

[1:02:08] probably will ever see and so there is the american rescue plan

[1:02:13] act funding that we're going to get here in charles city

[1:02:16] county and so we're going to use that to we have to use it for like marketing and

[1:02:22] different development but we are looking to enhance our tourism part the only

[1:02:28] problem that we have as a county we don't have riverfront property we have

[1:02:32] lawrence lewis park but a lot of the entities especially the kayaking area is

[1:02:38] owned by private entities so gary mitchell in community development

[1:02:43] came up with a good idea game the wildlife area has over 4 000 acres

[1:02:49] so we're going to put together a plan to approach our legislators about making

[1:02:54] that a state park because that wouldn't be any county dollars it's you know

[1:02:59] wildlife management area and it could be another opportunity because there's

[1:03:04] really no state parks within our region that size so

[1:03:08] that's something that we're going to explore as well but everything just

[1:03:11] takes time yes

[1:03:15] any updates on when the breeze in on sandy point or route 5 may open

[1:03:19] so they were looking to open july 4th and then they ran into

[1:03:24] some well and septic issues with vdh so now

[1:03:29] they're looking to open early

[1:03:33] in november yeah so they the the store has really been outfitted so they're

[1:03:37] excited to be here so sometime this month or first part of next month

[1:03:43] uh this um is just directly about the last statement about um making the

[1:03:49] uh cwma a state park is there any um

[1:03:54] way i can get further information about that since i live

[1:03:57] in there so that is definitely talk later idea hot off the press

[1:04:03] that's just like we had a brainstorming session and we were like wait maybe we

[1:04:07] could do that so that's once we move further along we'll engage district

[1:04:11] three but so that's the idea hot off the price cool thank you

[1:04:16] yes i think miss jones and then pat

[1:04:19] why is it my husband

[1:04:23] has put in about six different applications for down at the river

[1:04:28] to work because he's a good cleanup man

[1:04:32] and he knows about

[1:04:35] what happened to the bridge or whatever before and all that good stuff

[1:04:39] it was repaired but i wonder why he was never called and

[1:04:44] some of the others that we've seen there because we go down the river anytime to

[1:04:48] fish in the winter time or summertime

[1:04:51] but my husband he even fished in deep snow down the river but

[1:04:57] i wonder why he was never called to give a chance to work down the river

[1:05:03] you know to clean up um so that's something that can talk

[1:05:06] offline i'm not really sure i would have to talk with recreation but we can talk

[1:05:10] offline on that on that topic

[1:05:14] this isn't really an economic development question but just a maybe a

[1:05:18] safety question in the community are there more parking opportunities that

[1:05:23] are being developed for the people that take

[1:05:27] advantage of the bike trail i know they can use the county complex

[1:05:32] i've seen people parking sometimes trespassing on private property

[1:05:39] parking on the bike trail itself at the historic markers different places

[1:05:44] and i think people are just trying to get out here and enjoy the bike path but

[1:05:49] it can create safety

[1:05:52] safety issues and we've personally have had some trouble with trespassing but

[1:05:56] just more in general i'd like to know if there's any ability i know it's

[1:06:02] private property maybe trying to find places for parking yeah i'll be honest

[1:06:06] it's not something that we have explored but that doesn't mean staff is taking

[1:06:10] notes tonight that we can't i know breesen will have some opportunity

[1:06:15] and they're looking to acquire more property to expand another operation so

[1:06:19] it may be something in the future but i know it's especially on the

[1:06:23] eastern end because they have herron creek they have the courthouse area in

[1:06:26] this end but i've seen that on the on the eastern end

[1:06:30] just in the like the little cuts so we

[1:06:35] the yeah the board and i we have not

[1:06:37] explored it again because we don't own property so it's kind of it's harder to

[1:06:41] do development on property you don't own right

[1:06:45] so that's something we can we can explore

[1:06:48] i was also just gonna ask off that um so if you're gonna put a brewery right

[1:06:52] there same thing are you gonna account for people parking for long periods of

[1:06:56] time there and if not can we put it on the radar

[1:07:00] for this development i think you know

[1:07:06] maybe so we'll we'll explore that further

[1:07:13] anything else

[1:07:19] absolutely

[1:07:25] um i would like for people to

[1:07:28] shout out answers on this one how much do you think it takes to run

[1:07:32] the county and the schools for one week in charles city

[1:07:36] hang on how much

[1:07:40] how many 100 000 anybody else

[1:07:46] 100 and what 150 000 to operate the schools and the

[1:07:51] county for one week what does it take

[1:07:56] i haven't run the numbers on the new budget

[1:07:59] but as before july was 436 000 a week that's what it takes to run the schools

[1:08:06] now there's some federal state money in that but that's why the board is

[1:08:10] really adamant about bringing in economic development charles city

[1:08:15] we have to and and i've said it for years and years

[1:08:18] and michelle's tired of hearing me say it if we don't we're going to down the

[1:08:21] vine

[1:08:26] all right i i do believe that it only takes an

[1:08:29] hour to have power and so um or if there are not any other

[1:08:33] comments mr chairman do you have anything you would like to address the

[1:08:38] audience we have a microphone for you behind you

[1:08:41] we all have to use a microphone

[1:08:47] first i'd like to say good evening to everyone and i commend the account

[1:08:51] administrator and our assistant can administrator for

[1:08:55] making a great presentation and i think we need more of this and i hope you all

[1:09:00] continue to do this on the count of the citizens and i would like to thank the

[1:09:03] citizens for coming out this evening to have the input we can always agree to

[1:09:08] disagree but still we want to hear what you have to say

[1:09:12] it's very important that you come out and address these issues

[1:09:17] and a whole lot of people i would call them

[1:09:20] parking lot meetings and you know that doesn't count i mean

[1:09:24] you come to us we don't we don't have to disagree

[1:09:28] but we can work out these issues and you know i commend all y'all for coming out

[1:09:33] this evening and i hope that uh see you all shortly i know miss johnson

[1:09:37] and dr russell scheduled another meeting they just beat us to death

[1:09:42] but thanks everyone for coming out this evening

[1:09:45] we appreciate all of you um our doors are always open via email phone calls i

[1:09:51] know we get you know several emails you have a question and i try to get back to

[1:09:55] you within the week everything takes time right you know some of these ideas

[1:09:59] have been going on now for three years you know

[1:10:02] and we want it to happen expeditiously but it just that we're in government in

[1:10:07] corporate we can make things happen right but here it's a process we have to

[1:10:12] get public input but we are excited with the direction that we're going we feel

[1:10:17] the board and administration that we're going we're being very smart about it um

[1:10:22] and so we appreciate all of you if you have any other questions you know we're

[1:10:26] going to hang around for a second but please come out you know the next

[1:10:30] board of supervisors meeting is the 23

[1:10:35] tuesday before thanksgiving um so please come out we have our christmas parade

[1:10:40] coming up on the 11th we put out a poll on facebook about ice skating ring and

[1:10:45] we had several people about 85 people to say yes so we'll have ice skating mr

[1:10:50] coat is going to get on some skates y'all

[1:10:55] and so

[1:10:58] we had 129 responses we had 37 no and the rest were yeses

[1:11:06] well we're going to try one day and to make sure we have the participation

[1:11:09] before we make the investment so our grand illumination is december

[1:11:15] 5th and so we're going to do a drive through

[1:11:18] on this area and so we're going to light up the

[1:11:21] downtown we have some treats for everybody who drives through we got some

[1:11:24] special things we're going to be giving away so you stay in your car you enjoy

[1:11:28] the lights and you just drive out so we're excited to do that on december 5th

[1:11:32] at 5 00. so a lot of things that are going on parks

[1:11:36] and recreation is doing a lot you know i see a lot of their events are now sold

[1:11:41] out and so we're excited to just continue to offer great programming to

[1:11:45] you guys but we do appreciate you we want to say thank you for coming out um

[1:11:50] and if you have any questions just let us know enjoy the rest of your evening

Community Meeting

Transcript