[0:02] I will bring the meeting back to order. Okay. Mayor Pro Tem, I'm going to do the roll call. You hear?

[0:10] Mayor pro tem.

[0:13] Councilmember Joyner. Councilmember Andrews. Councilmember Lao. Councilmember Santa Guido here. Councilmember Clinton Quintana chairs here. Everybody is here in the counter for. Turn it back. Yeah I'm here. Sir, I got you here. Okay, okay. Thank you. We are going to pivot just a little bit. Talk about the unsheltered populations update because that may drive some of the other budget conversations.

[0:36] So I will turn it over to Rachel Shuler. Good afternoon. Thank you. So just to get started. We've talked a little bit about homelessness, exiting homelessness. I think it's always important for us to talk about the ways that you literally exit homelessness as part of this context. And so there are generally three ways. One is self resolved, rapid exit.

[0:58] That's for the folks who may just need to get back in touch with family, and maybe someone who just needs to have a month of their mortgage paid, whatever it may be, their rent, whatever it may be, that small interventions a little bit. Next step is that rapid rehousing that's usually up to about three months of rental assistance, down payment assistance, things like that, deposits just to get someone situated.

[1:25] And then they're pretty self-sufficient. Moving on. And when I say self-sufficient, that may include on vouchers, housing, toys, vouchers or other things like that. And then permanent supportive housing is the most comprehensive where you're talking about the actual units and the rental assistance. And that as well as the wraparound services, due to the chronic mental and physical disabilities that are associated with the folks who are in that population.

[1:53] So back in September of 2024, Council and the Board of Commissioners were presented the shelter strategy. We called the strategy to address unsheltered homelessness. This strategy was put together with a number of our partner agencies, as well as New Hanover County, over the course of several months from March to September, where we did a lot of deep diving into the problem, hearing from those with lived experiences, looking at paths forwards, and defining what success would look like.

[2:25] This plan was a collaborative effort through those partner agencies and the county, with all of the different players having a different role in this strategy and the outcomes. So just briefly fresh on what that looked like, we had the low barrier options shown here are the outcomes, objectives and progress measures. As you can see, some of these progress measures and even outcomes.

[2:51] Some are not necessarily something that you could just put funding behind, but rather systematic and process changes that go along with that. When we talk about empowerment courts, I know Council Member Joyner could speak a little bit more than I could on what that looks like. But when you're speaking about the folks who are in that situation due to homelessness, there are not typically lengthy sentences like there may be for drugs or some other different situations that those empowerment courts have helped to be successful.

[3:25] And so while this is there are some communities that have what they call homeless court, a lot of what that looks at is connecting people to services at, at those places. And so while they're obviously our financial implications of some of those relationships, a lot of that is just that the partnerships, relationships, being at court, being able to make those referrals to get to those folks house.

[3:52] And again, there's not necessarily a dollar amount you can associate with that, but just rather that larger systematic change. Again, looking at the 911 calls for people who are homeless, that really came out with how the county was tracking calls. And so again, it's it's looking at the overall system approach of not looking to arrest your way out of a homelessness problem, but rather intervening in different ways.

[4:18] And so when we look at how we interact with our social workers and some of those street outreach teams and offering the community solutions of who to call rather than just the police, are there agencies that we can call? Are there people that they can call instead of just the that's 911? When we look at the case load capacity, a big piece of that is how we move people through the system.

[4:43] And when I say system, I mean the homeless services system. So when folks are in, say, a good shepherd, and if you have a case manager who has a case of 75, it's going to be very difficult to pour in and assist those 75 individuals. When we are able to get people out of shelters and into permanent housing, that's going to reduce what their caseload is.

[5:06] And so again, the solution is not necessarily always just additional case managers, but it's sometimes funding programs like rapid rehousing or housing units to get folks into that. So that way that they can have the ongoing case management when they're not worrying about the day to day needs as well. And so, moving on to some of the comprehensive day services and overnight shelter capacity, we'll get into that a little bit.

[5:33] But again, that is we can have free or more beds available if we can get people into housing. And so we'll talk a little bit about that as far as case management through coordinated entry, a lot of that is through a system that a lot of other communities have used. And not sure if you've heard of it before, but it's case counseling.

[5:53] And so when you're looking at the different ways that people are in coordinated entry, which is how anyone who's looking for that permanent housing is on this list, they meet together twice, a twice a month. The agencies of how can we place these folks? It's talking about the individual needs of those people to figure out what's the right connection, agency, etc. when we talk about the gaps in services or surrounding the point in time, numbers in your packet are the updated continuum of care point in time numbers.

[6:26] What's interesting about it is we've talked about this in the past two, where a lot of that is during since it's in that last time that last week in January, it's cold weather. A lot of those folks are already in services like the warming shelter in good Shepherd. They are being sheltered. So they are at this at those services.

[6:48] And so what we have in the past, and we've been working with the continuum of care, is to do a summer count, see what the numbers look like in a different time of the year. It's not an official HUD mandated, but a local count that we can do within the city to see our people located near the services, or are they going to the services?

[7:07] What does that look like? And again, the destinations to miss will get to that in a minute. Moving on to the solution of supply and capacity for supportive housing, we talked about reducing the length of homelessness in the population. That's a measure that's in that CoC data that you can see. How long are people in the system before their house?

[7:32] We have a lot of great success when we can get people housed. But again, how long does it take to get them house? And that is determined by the number of units available. This area here, when we get into land use regulations, that was really a county initiative at the time. The city did look at their code and we did not find issues of where supportive housing is permitted.

[7:56] And so that's not necessarily something that the city had to to pursue. But we were always looking at on a case by case basis. If there was a conflict with our code, we would examine it and bring forth a text amendment to make that appropriate. Same thing with the referrals to street outreach and code compliance. The city has had a tremendous relationship with that for many years.

[8:19] That was really more aligned with the county zoning, getting into touch with some of that street outreach at the time, the number of households assisted with rapidly housing. I'll get to that in a minute. But that one, the good Shepherd center, received a significant grant from the community endowment, sorry, the New Hanover Endowment, where they were funding that rapid rehousing.

[8:43] And we have seen tremendous success. They have more than doubled the numbers of folks that they have been able to house and stay house due to that rapid rehousing. Again, that three months of assistance as well as that housing retention. And so we have seen a minimal investment. And I'll get to those numbers in a minute of a little over $2,000 per individual that's having this tremendous result.

[9:09] And then participating landlords, that is a huge need where just the general understanding of what a housing voucher means, of what it means to have potentially a master lease with some of our partner agencies where they need to have a number of units available for their participants, and getting over some of the barriers that are on there, whether it's the application fee, whether it is background checks, credit checks, you're basically as an organization able to say, hey, we are accountable for our residents.

[9:43] We are going to do that and we need to get landlords involved. So moving on, we also identified in this some short term outcomes that we're sort of going to be talked about moved forward. I'm going to start with the growing the capacity of the continuum of care. We have had some really great movement and success there. The endowment also granted the Continuum of Care, a grant to help build their capacity.

[10:10] We've had some to assistance, some technical assistance from HUD that have been able to help. Take a look at the system performance, our system performance, out of a score of about 200. We two years ago we were at 90. We are now. We have almost doubled the score. And that's just that's the basis of how we get funding here locally due to that system performance.

[10:33] And so some of it is data clean up, some of it's telling our story better. Some of it is just getting partners on board to tell their stories as well. And then again, the capacity for existing service providers. We talk about HMS, which is basically the software of how we track folks in the system. There are a number of providers that just don't understand the importance of it.

[10:57] They don't have the ability to to do the work. And so training them, having them understand this is the outcome of your do this, that's been another part of that grant as well to be able to improve that. Looking at the capacities of facilities, I will highlight this second one here, that mental health focus treatment, that really was a county initiative.

[11:20] And they are the folks who do these mental health. They work with their the partners with Trillium. And so that really was their initiative. But as we look at the partners to increase day shelter and spaces, that has been a number of of our conversations. And I'll get to that in a later slide as well. And then finally, again, the regulations, incentives, looking at that, as we talked about that landlord engagement and housing assistance programs and how we can increase access.

[11:52] So very briefly, I apologize if I talk in alphabet soup, but when we talk about the continuum of care. So there are a number of continuum of care organizations throughout the state. As you can see in this map, we are what is called the Wilmington, Brunswick County, New Hanover County, and Pender County Continuum of Care. That is house at the Cape Fear Council of Governments.

[12:16] They are the lead agency. Shown here is the administrative support that all of the different jurisdictions have been participating from the administrative. As you can see, the city in fiscal year 26 was at 73,000 in the fiscal year 27 budget. That does increase the 76,000. How are these numbers determined? There's some big differences in this table. So I'm trying to understand how one government is paying 73,001 is paying zero.

[12:46] It is how much they would like to contribute. There's no obligation. There's no formula. It's just the desire of those boards. Thank you Rachel. That's that's a good question to segue into. But isn't this mandated by HUD.

[13:04] So there are different models. And I know Dennis has had a lot of experience with this. So and Tom as well. So feel free to to talk about this. But when you look at the different lead agencies so it is mandated but there are different ways you can do it. You can be in the balance of state, which again is that you can see there's a large portion of the state, especially with our more rural communities, where there's a lot of strength in being in the balance of state because of the tools and resources that are provided.

[13:35] So different jurisdictions have it set up differently. And so you can see we I highlighted us in blue of where our lead agency is, the Council of Governments. Other ones may have cities or counties be the lead agency. And that's where you're going to see the different levels of investment financial investment, time, investment, all of those things. And so while it is mandated, the participation in financial aspect is not necessarily mandated.

[14:01] And I think that's the important thing to bear in mind. There is is the, the the likeness of those communities that are generally covered. So if you look at the balance of the state, that is because it is predominantly rural. And so as the Cox evaluate which grants they're going to pursue, which Novas are going to be available, obviously if you're a rural focused entity, you're going to be pursuing those sorts of things.

[14:30] Charlotte-Mecklenburg is a very different thing, right? There is no rural pursuits. All of that is focusing on on the, the, the urban dollars. We're in sort of this blended thing where Wilmington's really the, the most urban urbanized, and there's tension, I think, to a certain extent, just because of the fact that we've got more rural communities there in our Kok.

[14:53] So it makes this a little, a little dichotomous. I don't we don't need to go into this level of detail today, because I actually would like to follow up with you and get more detail, but I want to understand what mandated by HUD means in this context and what that would mean for if you're not in compliance, which agencies feel a pain point.

[15:14] So down the road I'd like to talk about that and I will. I do want to add that a majority of the funding from the cost is for services and beds and units in the city of Wilmington. We have some success in Pender County with with one of their domestic violence shelters because of some of the bonus points that they had.

[15:37] But a majority of the funding that's coming from those different sources are going there. What's really interesting, this is just a snapshot of it, but we can send out the link that our continuum of care has a dashboard that compares our performance tracking across the different state national trends. So you can sort of see how we are performing and where.

[16:01] And so again this is just a snapshot of what they are looking at. Some of the duties. To your point, Councilmember Joyner, they are the HUD approved homeless continuum of care. It's the collaborative alliance. So it's not just the Cog. It's not the continuum of care. They are the lead agency. We are all partners. The city of Wilmington has a C, a designated C on the board.

[16:26] That is I sit in that role. I'm actually we just created a little change where we now will have a government representative on the executive committee. So that is I'll be serving at the executive committee as well to make sure that we are part of all of those conversations. And we have that. And so that way I can provide context to you all to help with some of these decisions and conversations.

[16:49] And so what that means to me. I'm sorry, I just had a question a few slides back. Oh, yeah. You are COC dues. Sorry. Our council of government, our Cog dues. Do they also help support the continuum of care because. Or is that the full budget for the CFC. So know that the funding that we send to the Cog as part of that is not this is a separate agreement that we have with them for the continuum of care.

[17:17] And so it was a five year agreement. Next year is the last year of that five year. And then we'll renew it, bring it forward for you all. And so that this funding is the administrative support. The cock here has two full time staff members and three part time staff members. Some of that funding to pay for that staff is from the grants that they get through both the federal government and the state.

[17:43] And so their overall budget for everything they put out does include some of that administrative because they are doing the program delivery. So if they are doing the coordinated entry intake, if they're doing the mis training, that money is part of that, those grants. And so that's a big piece of the administrative budget that they have. But it's not all of there's some additional funding that they get through that through the competitions.

[18:10] So.

[18:15] So again being a lead agency here, there's a lot of different models that are across the state. There are some folks where the Mis administration may be in one place of government, and the actual collaborative applicant may be in another here at NC 506 this they're doing all of this. And so again, the city is not the lead on homelessness services in this region.

[18:42] We are a partner and a player. And so we as a collaborative applicant, when folks are applying for these funds through these competitive grants, we are at the table helping with the scoring. We have representatives there. So we are again part of this process, but we are not taking the lead on it. When we get into funding. There are several different funding sources that support homeless services and housing.

[19:09] In blue are the funding sources that are coming from and through the city of Wilmington. So we have our general funds all the way on the right. We utilize those for gap financing, for affordable rental development. When we think about that, it can be everything from the SEC, the Sparrow that we just went to the ground or ribbon cutting for three weeks ago.

[19:32] It may be sorry, where they are doing. It's a low income housing tax credit, but we have had partnerships between them, the Wilmington Housing Authority for project based vouchers, good Shepherd and other partners where they are able to house people who may be in this spectrum. And so it's important to note that when we talk about some of these units, it's across the housing spectrum and not just focus on homeless services.

[19:59] We also have in our budget this year as part of that affordable housing fund, a ready to rent program, because housing is a continuum. And if we can't just look at putting a Band-Aid on, we also have to look at preventing that as well through eviction prevention, getting people ready, looking at credit, helping folks that they may income qualify for a long housing tax credit, but they may not meet the credit requirements.

[20:25] So how do we help them improve their credit? By having some of these property developments. Property managers participate in some of these credit programs for their residents to help improve that. Additionally, we have federal funds that flow through the city as an entitlement community that include home that we utilize again for gap financing and rehab programs, keeping people in their homes, because preservation is a big piece of this puzzle.

[20:51] As people get priced out, age out, things like that, this is what's keeping people in our homes at an affordable rate, especially if you have a homeowner who doesn't have a mortgage. But they need repairs and their house is no longer going to be habitable. It's important for us to intervene and not have them become homeless. The Community Development Block Grant that specifically allows us to fund shelter services, which we are only allowed to do a small portion.

[21:16] It was $134,000 last year because it's capped. So there's a 10% cap in what the federal government allows us to do. And then we also do, again, down payment assistance and rehab programs through that. The funding that flows through the continuum of care is, again, that COC competition. That's where some of those administrative costs and those operations are coming from that funding source, as well as how they fund currently permanent supportive housing and rapid rehousing, as well as the ESG, the Emergency Solutions grant, which has the buckets shown there.

[21:50] But of course, this picture is not complete without the private and philanthropic funding as well. And so, mayor, to your point, earlier, as we look at the changes in funding streams and systems, that piece is going to become more and more important and how we leverage some of that in this region. We have not unlocked all of the potential for that bucket.

[22:13] There are communities that have much deeper pockets of Community Reinvestment Act, the CRA, through banks, I mean, housing trust funds that people are able to contribute to that can then be utilized for some of these programs. So is as we look at changing trends, that's going to probably be a piece that we all have to look stronger at.

[22:38] And that's part of the conversation at the cost of facilitating those discussions, understanding the needs. And what we're seeing time over time is that these other federal ones are becoming are shifting. And so when we've had pauses where in the latest COC competition, it's going from, their focus is permanent supportive housing. Well now is shifting to more supportive services.

[23:06] So as a city or as a private funder, how do you adapt and be flexible to fill in those gaps to maintain the services that have been happening, and then also try to expand? So over the past, I guess a year and a half since then, we've had some some pretty good progress and success measures that we want to highlight, I apologize.

[23:31] It's a little small on your print out and screen, but as you can see, the presentation was presented in September of 2024. Since then, we have had a HUD technical assistance visit to talk about permanent supportive housing and capacity building. That happened. It was actually in February 2025 when it was right when there was like that federal freeze, but then it opened back up.

[23:55] So we were able to get the Tas in, and they provided a really great baseline. They actually skipping ahead. They were just here two weeks ago to talk a little bit more about predictive analysis, that we're going to be able to share some of those numbers with you because of the work that has been done there. But in the meantime, we have been trying to update you on the progress through different through a memo, we did some appropriation of some of that home Arpa money for the Sparrow.

[24:24] We celebrated a success with the Salvation Army grand opening, opening up 75 beds and some community space. We've also had a work session last August where we got into some of the details, talked a lot about the cock data. That was the 2025 data. I put the 2026 in your packet so that you have that updated information. A lot of that was about centering around the conversation about the ordinance.

[24:52] And so at that time, council did request us to explore property conveyance for shelter. We've provided some updates on that. We also approved the social worker correspondence model. We are happy to announce that we've had two folks start with us in recent weeks, and they're getting acclimated and will be again a vital part of this continuum. We also put out an request for information for a low barrier shelter, to explore what some of our current partners and potential future partners could do with some of the spaces that we may be able to provide, or are there other sites that we should be looking at, other models we should be looking at, and how we can

[25:30] continue to collaborate? And then finally, we did the housing ecosystem presentation at your planning conference in February, again, kind of updating you on the progress. But what we also want to show is what our investments are. And so when we look at our investments for this fiscal year, you can see that we have made quite significant strides. We have budgeted $500,000 for those social workers.

[25:57] As we mentioned, we had a 20 fiscal year, 25 reimbursement of just shy of $200,000 for the Getting Home Street program. For our portion of that, we also contribute through the MSD $88,000 for our street outreach for Block by Block. Everyone knows about Jack Morris, who is a phenomenal asset in this community and the work that he does.

[26:22] And so, again, just making sure that you all understand that that is due to the contributions of the city through the MSD. We also did our CDBG funding, as I mentioned, which was at 134,000. Our contributions to the Continuum of Care, the Council of Governments, and through our human services nonprofit funding, we have funded some partners through that.

[26:43] So that's totaled a little over $1 million in this year of how we've contributed towards those programs. Obviously, that doesn't include the larger projects that we had already contributed to that are opening along the way.

[26:59] So in your packet are these slides, again, talking a little bit about what the the design of that street outreach program was with New Hanover County. A little bit about the MSD. And these are slides that I think I showed you either in February or August or maybe both. So just as a refresher, again, some of those bigger investments we've made, we talk all the time about how when we're funding these low income housing, affordable housing projects, we're not just funding the folks who are working in the workforce.

[27:31] It may be the folks who are on these coordinated entry list and who some of them are working. So it's a big mix. But just as progress, we have our low to no barrier progress. We just want to kind of update you on where we are with that. So we did issue that request for information. In the end of January.

[27:51] We received six submittals. And based on the information provided as a lead partner, we did move forward with some conversations with link to explore what that looks like. We did speak with them about potential partnerships with some of the other local agencies that are doing this work that could benefit that link could benefit from by participating with them, whether it is The Healing Place, living Hope, good Shepherd, all of the different agencies that sort of have their hands in this, how do we create a place for everyone to come together?

[28:29] We have looked at different site locations, potential budget needs. Through that predictive analysis and some other conversations. I'll show you sort of what that may look like. So that way what we can do is develop a a robust request for proposal that has actual numbers, budget and kind of those ideas. We also want to invite you. I'm working with providers up in Wake County to take you on a field trip, so you can see potentially what some sites may look like.

[28:57] Councilmember Joyner and I were able to go to Greensboro on a trip and see a site there that was a low to no barrier shelter. So I think it's important for you all to sort of experience. Other communities are seeing, feeling neighborhoods are experiencing from that and just really have that overall picture. But one of the questions that was asked is if we were to implement the strategy, what would that cost?

[29:22] And so through the predictive analysis that we did, looking at past projects that we have funded, that we are just a partner to, we sort of broke it down into different buckets. And so when you look at cock capacity, whether that's talking about their landlord engagement, potentially additional staff, additional training for both them and for some of our partner agencies looking at the average cost of rapid rehousing or housing retention, basing that off of if we wanted to estimate about 200 people adding new units, what new construction costs for permanent supportive housing?

[29:59] The SEC, the Sparrow is an example. I will note that that $7.5 million did not include land costs because it was conveyed from a former fire station. So when you think of that number, we would like you to think about the fact that lands not in there. So it probably would be closer to potentially that $8 million mark.

[30:21] When you have a site, there are costs associated annually. And so that is probably about estimate about $10,000 per person annually in those supportive services. So again, those wraparound services, instead of building new construction, if you were doing a rental scattered site that's probably closer to the $13,000 a person annually, when you look at shelters, looking at what Salvation Army and some of the good Shepherd expansion that's in the $12 million range.

[30:53] And then along with that, there's operating expenses of over $600,000 in your packet. I've also included a pamphlet from Salvation Army about their future expansion and Good Shepherd's because. And I'll get back to that slide in a second. But it's important to note to of some of the work that's being done when we talk about that potential $26 million to implement this plan, we would be competing against some other projects that are happening now.

[31:22] And so the good Shepherd expansion on Martin Street, which will include additional family beds as well as permanent supportive housing units, has this consideration of they already own the land. They're looking to do that. They're in the midst of their campaign and, you know, they need additional funding to get that complete over the finish line as well as the Salvation Army.

[31:44] So, as you know, the Salvation Army opened their 75 bed complex, but they have a next phase, which is their core community center. This is something that will benefit the community in a lot of ways. As that hub, as we talked about, think about the Community Justice Center, where there's all of these different agencies that are on site together.

[32:06] That can be a place for someone to go, to be referred, to be able to have that. And so that more information about that is in there as well. It's also a community place where they can offer after school programs and some different athletics as well.

[32:26] And then I did include some background information. I apologize if I did any alphabet soup, but I did want to give the definitions as well, so I'm happy to go into any more information. Go back to any slides you have, any questions you may have.

[32:43] I have a question. So I see that you included the the pit, the pit count for 2026. Do we have any did you happen to have any overall slides about what direction we're going in? And I know that counting. Counting can change what the numbers are, you know, because I know that there's a lot of factors when we do the point in time count, but do we have any indication of where we're going?

[33:14] Are we are we having more individuals experiencing homelessness in our area?

[33:24] So yeah. Where are we going? Yeah, I don't have the slides here, but I can get them over there if we want to pull up the cock data. If you want to just give me one second, I can get those pulled up. But essentially our numbers did increase slightly. Again, it has a lot to do. There's a lot of factors that have that are accounted for in the Y.

[33:47] Sometimes the problem and I don't want to say the problem, sometimes the better you are at doing a point in time count, the worse your numbers look, but you're just doing a better job of capturing. And when you're looking at this particular count, it happened to be when the warming shelter was open. And so you had a lot of people in one place, which is good because you're capturing them.

[34:07] But it doesn't mean that they didn't exist last year. And so that's kind of a tricky number to always go off of. So I do want to kind of give that a piece. So our number for this year was 610 compared to 506 last year. But again we are we are in year three of our director Andrea. So who is really doing a 180 at the Cock and making huge improvements.

[34:34] And some of our partners that have been improving as well. So we also had the Salvation Army open this year. So that again is going to lead to a higher count. We've had new transitional housing beds and then a lot of our shelters were over capacity because they were flexing for the for the weather. So it's on it's in your slide here.

[34:54] There's the point in time summary. And then some of the key changes just for you to highlight that context. And then again when you look at the housing inventory count, when you look at how many beds were occupied, there's there's higher utilization because of that overflow as well. But one of the things that we remain extremely successful here in our regional COC is our return to homelessness rate is only 4%.

[35:19] And so what that means is when we get people house, they are staying house and they are not returning back into homelessness. And that is such an important data piece that we love to talk about and really should be celebrating that success we have from an exit to permanent housing, and the retention is at 95%. So again, we're doing really well when we have the units.

[35:48] Yeah, I don't think you can say enough about that because North Carolina, you are allowed as a landlord to discriminate your tenants based on their source of income, so that success is something to really be proud of. Rachel, when we're talking about the rent on the scattered site, with 200 people going back the other way, oh, I was going there.

[36:18] Always go right there. Back.

[36:23] There, we go right there. So we're in the process where I believe the housing authorities in the process of redeveloping Hillcrest and Houston more. And I think they're upping the amount of density at Hillcrest to make possibly six, 600 units from 224. And I don't know what the number is for Houston more. Would this be an area when we're talking about scattered site putting people in?

[36:56] Absolutely. And if we had that conversation with the Housing Authority, because I think there's a tremendous opportunity on these two sites in addition to maybe some other ones. And with that rent on the scattered site all into play, like what we have done with the units over there at Greenfield and the Sparrow, where you have the support of services.

[37:21] Because anytime we have supportive services, the wraparound services on the support of on the housing side, it works beautifully. I mean, it doesn't seem we have any problem. People stay there, everybody's comfortable. Would we be putting supportive services on the scattered sites to or. This would be a level of folks that are experiencing homelessness on a temporary basis when you're, you know, because the vast majority are usually rehoused within a month or two months, what have you.

[37:50] The case I'm talking about more of the chronically homeless, of what we're witnessing a lot of or feel the impact of. Yeah, I think it's fair to say that there's a spectrum of people who would qualify for a permanent supportive housing. Some are successful in the scattered site model where they may need a they need to be have those services, but it's a lighter touch.

[38:12] They can be transported, they can go to appointments, they can do those things. They may be successful in that. There are going to be folks that need it on site. They have different needs. And then we have probably one of our highest needs population for permanent supportive housing at driftwood, which has a totally different population. And so under.

[38:32] That's why it's understood it's important to understand the actual case and the person to know what is success for them. Because there are folks, there are models that have been successful in other parts of the country where they have actually done. It's kind of called moving on, where they get they graduate out of permanent supportive housing. They may always need to be in subsidized housing, but the services get less and less as the intensity.

[38:55] So it's really important for us to know what our population needs and where they can be successful. And that's what those conversations are at coordinated entry. So on the coordinated entry, what is the lead agency on that? The continuum of care. Continuum of care is going to be the agency that will give us the information for you, the information necessary to to decide that to help indicate that.

[39:19] So where that's important is that the housing authorities at the table for those discussions, because it happens around a table where they say, hey, I have this resident, these are their needs, who is the most appropriate partner to house them. And that's where that was because everyone knows their clients, everyone knows their programs, and that's where those conversations are happening at that table.

[39:42] So having all those partners, and I know Andrea has done a great job of bringing the housing authority into those conversations. Tyrone was at our predictive analysis to talk specifically about the Housing authority, their voucher program, what their needs are. I mean, we're looking at two is some of these shifting programs of if there's a work requirement associated, what does that look like for some of their residents?

[40:06] How many of their residents are working compared to not? And if if it's what's the percentage. And so having those conversations, being at that table, having the board make up that you have at the Housing Authority to that are informing these discussions as well, have all really helped to bridge some of those gaps. And on the Cape Fear Collective, I think, I don't know how many units they had purchased a number of units on the open market that they were rehabbing.

[40:33] We put in some money, I believe, into that program, did we not? Yes. We put just shy of $900,000. And the way that we had set up that funding is that any rent or sale, their property would be reinvested into other properties that they have. So they're not necessarily paying the city back for us to regrant. We had their board set a policy, and we set it in the agreement that all of the proceeds would be reinvested into future construction because, as you know, they have quite a large portfolio.

[41:04] So would that fall, could we use some of those homes for this? Absolutely. And so that's where some of those partnership and conversations have been of they want to occupy those units with different folks that are income eligible. And so yes, absolutely. We're having those conversations as well.

[41:27] I wanted to ask about I know that a big part of what we talked about in 2024 was a downtown day center with wraparound support of mental health services. And I understand that mental health is the is in the realm of the county. But we we have been operating with a downtown day center at least three days a week between 9 and 1, which is living hope.

[41:54] And they're losing their their space as of July. And so we've got a situation where, you know, in the old Stephen Covey graph, we've got urgent and important and.

[42:11] I just wanted to point out that what living Hope was doing and is doing until they lose their space is there are a lot of people operating out of that small space. And, you know, we we all talk about the the street outreach through WD, through Jack Morris. He's actually operating out of that day center. That living Hope is running.

[42:36] You know, that's his office space. That's his client space. And and the other thing that I think is, is pretty awesome that we were able that they are able to do they have several paramedics that are, that are being provided by Novant that that use that space and, and help clients with things like wound care and maintenance medications and, you know, so we're losing a lot of services if we lose that that space.

[43:10] And I'm just wondering, you know, what the city can do to continue having some kind of downtown day center. And I know that this isn't just about the humanitarian aspect of it, of having a place where people can get services and can get out of the heat and the cold and the rain. You know, it's also an economic development situation, because we've heard so much from our local businesses that they want us to, you know, help these people to have a place to go during the day, even if we can't find them nighttime shelter, at least we can have a place for them to go during the day.

[43:44] And so I guess that's my big ask is, what can we do to continue having some kind of facility, some kind of day services downtown?

[43:58] I will add that when we looked at the different options of shelter, one of the the conversations was about centering people where they are and having instead of a concentration in one place or the other, looking at small scale ways to meet the needs of different populations. Because we do have a concentration of focus on town, we also have concentrations of people over by the hospital or sometimes in the unincorporated county and things like that.

[44:33] And so having a sort of a right size in different places to have these little satellites is something that we talked about. Again, how do we get that synergy of all of the different agencies having that place? One of the things when I was talking with Tim at Salvation Army, with their expansion, is some of the partnerships that they and Eden Village have with Novant, with the Michael Jordan Clinic right there.

[44:56] And as we look at investing in other transportation, like wave is sometimes like, how do we get people to there and get them, get folks reliant on the services that exist as they are, that we have made significant investments as a community into? And yes, there are there is a need for that on call triage, on site triage, but getting them to the actual services also the next step of kind of graduating them out of shelter and into that long term care.

[45:27] So I think that's important to note. I think as far as looking at that, I mean, I'm sure the mayor you remember when good Shepherd was found as the as a daytime shelter, and then they moved over to Martin Street. And it seems like we have this kind of a cycle of where we are having this conversation. Well, I guess what I'm I'm looking at two different things here.

[45:51] We're looking at the permanent supportive housing. We're looking at folks that need housing that can't afford it. So that's you know, that's one. And then we're talking about the shelters where folks are going getting some basic services or help. And then after they get that, they matriculate back out into the community. And that's where you see some of that's happening, I think with Tony, because I talked to Tony Perez yesterday with living Hope, I was asking, what is the size of unit that he needs?

[46:24] I think right now he's operating out of about 2500ft², and he really like to see if we could find something at 5000. He was sharing with me a site at 10th and Dock, which was an old theater there, but that's at $1.7 million, which is on the market. And obviously that's in a neighborhood also. And what kind of impacts they would have, I think, you know, and he does provide a pretty good service.

[46:49] I've been there and and I've had a pretty good discussion. I think you've been there to and to talk to them about. And Jack Morris was there. And Jack believes in him very strongly. And they have provided a significant amount of help for us. But there's also an impact that goes with that. And I think one of the things is I know that they've been housed there at the Baptist First Baptist, which has been very gracious and working with them.

[47:17] And they also had a certain amount of money that they were getting from the endowment that I understand has now gone away. And then we have first Fruit Ministries that I think we do support through our nonprofits. And I think obviously the Salvation Army as well as the good Shepherd. So those are kind of also, I would consider them shelters have some magnitude of shelters in them.

[47:40] So if, if, let's just say living hope does go away. And I agree with you, how do you provide transportation initiatives to get people to those locations that maybe we could offset some of the service delivery to those adjacent sites, and at the same time, look for some location for living Hope, because I do think they play a good role and getting a better understanding about the low barrier shelter, because we had some discussions about that, and that comes with its own complexity and issues itself, because that is just bringing in anybody, and you can't really force anybody to go into a shelter.

[48:17] They have to say, I want to go. What does that look like? Because I think we need to have a better understanding. If we go to this low barrier concept, what are the impacts and what does it look like, and what is the security apparatus? Because I understand now more from talking to Tony and others as to why you need a certain level of security, because you are bringing in people that are either under the influence of alcohol or drugs, or having some mental issues and just bringing them into a general population with other people that are experiencing homelessness.

[48:52] I mean, homelessness, but they may not be dealing in those issues. Is is bringing in kind of a more dangerous situation. So I have to get a better understanding about that. But I think with living Hope, they do play a pretty significant role in helping offset a lot of the things that we're seeing downtown. And you can see when they're open, you can walk downtown, you can drive downtown, and you don't see people just watering around.

[49:22] You see them up there at the living Hope facility. Sure. And I think part of this, too, is also recognizing that shelter is supposed to be part of an ecosystem, right? Because it's it should be a circle where we're getting people back to some sort of stable housing, whether that's permanent supportive housing or independent living or whatever that looks like.

[49:42] And so the purpose of the shelter should not just be a place where people just go. They should be participating fully in the cock and two, one, one and coordinated entry. They should be referring people to other agencies so that people are moving through the shelter. So you also have to look at what the shelter, whatever the shelter is, is doing to help move people through the system, through the ecosystem and get them more than just a place to go for a day, a week, right, a cold night, those sorts of things.

[50:18] I'm not by no means that my recommending this, but we do have the fire station at Prince's Place Drive that we have turned over to link. I know that link is trying to raise money for their programing, and I think link is one of the lead agencies that we are contracting out with or we're working with in respect to some of these initiatives.

[50:37] Is that correct? And I'm just wondering if there could be a conversation with Frank and his team about the combination of what we have done with the Sparrow, where that work, where you could you could go vertical, put a certain amount of units for supportive housing, but at the same time help him and his organization on the bottom floor to be able to accommodate his specific needs.

[51:00] I think it would be a win win for everybody, but I wouldn't. I wouldn't do that unless we have a conversation with them to see if we could work in that capacity. But I mean, we're going to have to start partnering in ways because of the limited amount of space that we have. We're surrounded by neighborhoods wherever we are.

[51:18] But I've seen that the support of housing, wherever we have put it has worked wonderfully. We haven't had the impacts to those neighborhoods that people thought we would have, because they've been done well. And we have a good track record with good Shepherd, but I think that would be one of the things that I would definitely at least explore, because we have the property they need to raise the funding and they're doing a certain amount of that.

[51:42] And what could we inject into it to maybe accommodate supportive housing, as well as the initiative that Frankie has on the books, which I think would be a great thing if it could be done. And then going back to the Housing Authority, because I think they're going to be starting with Houston more sooner than Hillcrest, is what I understand.

[52:00] And I don't know how many units that we're talking about their Rachel in regards to Houston more. And it can we take a section of that because I know HUD should have that in their in their, in their core. What they should be doing is helping us with some of these initiatives. So you're smiling and smiling because you obviously didn't see the latest budget predictions for what may be coming out of the house for public housing, but it significantly cuts some of that.

[52:29] But but yes, absolutely. And those are absolutely the conversations that we're having of it. When you have people living there permanently as well as some of these day shelters, it provides a different level of impact to the community because you have residents as well. And and you have that, that, that feeling. And so we absolutely have been having those conversations with that angle because we see the success in that as well.

[52:54] And Frankie sees the success in that. And I think that there's a room and that's what we're saying. The link may be our lead partner that we're talking to, but it's also yes. And who else can be a part of that? Because then again, when we talk about whether it's the Healing Place or other organizations, maybe it's Trillium, maybe it's coastal horizons of getting some of those other agencies involved to help with some of those other pieces.

[53:17] So could we find maybe a space for Tony? Let's just say if he were to identify a space also where he needs 5000ft², which is not a lot of square footage, but, you know, and we could help on the rental aspect of that, taking care of, of that side of it or something along those way. I'm just kind of throwing it out a suggestion.

[53:37] But I think what's something we need to look at? And that's absolutely the conversation that we were having with Lincoln relative to having somebody operating the day component as part of this, because the the shelter residents do need a place to go while you're resetting, cleaning, changing, betting, all those sorts of things. So so having the day shelter component as part of the overall project is absolutely where we're trying to go.

[54:09] Do we what is the capacity for for the three that I just with first fruit when I read the capacity, the building size, the capacity that they have at first fruit. Good Shepherd

[54:26] And Salvation Army, I think as you saw that there are the expansion efforts for good Shepherd and Salvation Army. So I think they're adding capacity, both physical space capacity. And then of course, with that is going to come the staff and support services. So that is a place where I think if we were to make investments into their expansion and programs, that's when we get to have a seat at the table to say, hey, this is what we want to see there.

[54:52] And so we're kind of buying that, that, that conversation. So I think that's a that's a powerful tool. I think it's also a question that we would have to I haven't spoken with first directly about what their capacity looks like. But those are definitely conversations we can have. And I think it's it's something that we can pull together all of these different agencies and say, hey, if this is what we need, what can you what do you have planned or what can you do to help expand to help fill those pieces?

[55:20] So looking at the county's budget from last year, when they shared with us the things that they're doing for the unsheltered, when I was looking at some of the funding where they were getting a lot of their funding, it seemed like it was coming from the endowment side. And that's fine and good. What I'm saying is, can we get the endowment back into that if we partner with the county?

[55:43] Because it seems and Dennis and Becky, I think y'all have had more conversations with them, with anybody. That's my understanding that if there is a partnership with the city and the county, the endowment would come in and help with some of these endeavors, which they seem to already be doing anyway. But I don't know if that's in their budget for this year or not.

[56:02] I would just say it helps the application, but it certainly wouldn't be a guarantee. But also, getting the county back to the table would be a big question mark. Okay. Yeah, those are absolutely I mean, in the in the HUD tier, we've had members of the endowment participate. So they're part of these conversations. And so I think what they would value is a comprehensive look at the system, the ecosystem, to put forward a comprehensive plan of how all of these agencies are going to be a part of it.

[56:32] And I think that's part of what we're doing with some of this. And I think that's the that's the natural next step is looking at that collaborative application to them. What would be the first step? Pulling them all in together. We can facilitate another meeting here and and saying what's your what's your number what's your ask. And pulling it together I'm not talking about months of conversation.

[56:54] I'm talking about like hey come prepared. We have these rough estimates. Are we off? Who's going to own each piece of it? And that's what we do because we've we've kind of already created the plan. Oh, absolutely. And then, you know, we're just basically saying if this is our budget.

[57:13] Who owns it, who owns each piece of it, who's our partner for each piece? And that's that's the request.

[57:25] Any recommendations?

[57:29] We're looking for some. And so I think part of this goes back to their structural conversations to be had. I mean, talking about the kiosk, we have a we have a Wilmington centric sort of need. And so should we have a Wilmington centric continuum of care. Right. Should we be the lead agency instead of the Cog? Right. Should we be the collaborative applicant?

[57:57] Right. Those are the sorts of, I think, other structural conversations that we have to have, because that changes some of those conversations and some of those leverage points because we are the lead. So so I think there's there's more to it than, than that. But at the but these things can happen in in parallel. Absolutely. I just think the complexion of the conversations can change depending on who's sitting in the seat.

[58:23] And I've personally done this. So when I was at Mecklenburg County, we took control of the costs from the city of Charlotte because it had languished and had not worked very well and reconstituted. The board redid the bylaws and saw significant positive change as a result of that, with the county being the lead agency and the collaborative applicant on a forward going basis.

[58:48] So I have I have been able to see a change in a community because of those sorts of structural shifts. So you think I'm not putting you on the spot, but obviously we're contributing a lot to it. I think it merits exploration from from my from my perspective, it merits exploration. And then if we were to go that particular route, what is what is the conversation from the from the other entities that are part of this?

[59:17] Or they happy to say, okay, you guys take the lead or are they. Oh, this is this is upsetting the apple cart. Sure. And then they've got up. They have options as well. Right. So they could either decide to stay and be a rural cock and live with the cog. They could go into the balance of state. So I think there are there there are different scenarios.

[59:36] What we know is we're in the last year of the current agreement, and this is a good time to start having those conversations and thinking through what that looks like in preparation, rather than just mindlessly walking in and reappearing for the way things are. What is the agreement in the next year? Next year? We're in the last year of the agreement, so it ends June of next year.

[59:59] Yes, person I'm sorry, I was just going to say I think we should start having those conversations, given the difference in need within the different agencies in the current Kok and understanding that we are a major contributor, I think it makes a lot of sense for us to start to have those conversations. I think their chairs out of Brunswick County, correct.

[1:00:20] I'm not I'm not questioning, you know, the qualifications or the goodwill or the hard work of that person. But the resources are here. Sure. And and the needs, again, are just different based on the community that you're in. So that's, that's something that we have to look at again, who is I think to your point, who's who's providing the greatest amount of resources, who also is, quite frankly, consuming the greatest amount of resources.

[1:00:42] I mean, most of it comes here as well. So it I think it behooves us to have the conversation and explore the options. And I just wanted to speak to one of the things that the mayor was talking about as far as like the ownership, not maybe in a, in a necessarily a fiscal sense, but probably the ownership of any facility that we're putting significant public funds into.

[1:01:11] You know, I think we can contract with nonprofits for sure, but I think that, you know, first of all, when we talk about low barrier, we are not just talking about active addiction and active untreated mental health issues. We're talking about, you know, people who are with animals, with their with their pets that have become homeless and, and will absolutely sleep on the street rather than have to give up their, you know, their only family that they have left.

[1:01:42] We're talking about, you know, mothers who may have a, a teenage son or even a older son who is dependent on her for, you know, whatever reason, maybe especially needs person. You know, we're we're traditional shelters want to separate them into, you know, different gender dorms. So there's there's a lot of situations that, that don't have to do with addiction or mental illness.

[1:02:15] And, and I know that this is one of the reasons why we, we were having the discussion a couple of years ago about the God Pods, because there's something special about having a door that locks, you know, and being able to have a nice, secure place, you know, with a roof over your head that, you know, you can be with your special needs child or with your pet, who's your only family member left.

[1:02:38] So that's one of the other things. And that the fact that, most of the nonprofits who are in this realm are faith based organizations, and sometimes they impose their own ideas of what a family is and and who belongs together. And, you know, I feel really strongly if we're going to put public dollars into this, we should have some public ownership of it and make sure that opportunities are available to everybody.

[1:03:07] Great.

[1:03:15] Question. Because you've said that you're looking at different sites. If I miss this, I apologize. Are there specific city properties that you've narrowed it down to? Not yet. There's some challenges, as you can imagine, with a low to mid no barrier shelter. You're also talking about folks who may be on the sex offender registry that aren't allowed within certain, you know, feet of schools, daycares, etc. and so just when we think we find a perfect site, we look at the Google map and it's, oh, there's a nursery right there, you know, whatever it may be.

[1:03:47] And so there are some challenges even on parks. Theme parks are if we carved out a section of a park. So when you're talking about this population, there are some challenges that come with actual physical location of it. And that's why we had looked to about even just the number of folks being served there, because it's a lot more manageable.

[1:04:06] We know that there may be 600 folks who are in the point in time count, but when you look at what's an appropriate scale, whether it's in a neighborhood or something like that, you want to keep it small, you want to be able to pour into people, get them through, move on through the system into success, and then be able to do, you know, a next group of folks, or it doesn't have to be a cohort at a time, but just how people move through their systems.

[1:04:31] And that also speaks to why we took the shift away from city owned properties, because it may not be a parcel we own. It may be a parcel that a partner has control of or something that's still privately owned. But it makes the most sense in order to do all of the things, because that is the conversation we've been having.

[1:04:49] Can we co-locate permanent supportive housing with the shelter, with other community needs and wants in a way that works? And so trying to figure out the what and the who the partners are and then the where, recognizing that it may not be our our property today, but it may very well. I think to your point, we need to have control of that.

[1:05:13] But yeah, thank you. And I think we also need to take into consideration, you know, when I look at $12 million in new construction costs, I mean that's a really scary number. And so we need to continually, I think, consider adaptive reuse of other facilities because that's that's going to make the sticker look a lot better. Question. So when we think of our point in time count and how many people we are currently looking at that are homeless or unhoused, all of them can't be sex offenders, right?

[1:05:53] Right. So I think that we could also utilize multiple facilities. You still have link who is constantly working with or doing most of this already, but are we going to track who is a sex offender and could we look for that particular location now all we have other nonprofit organizations who are already addressing these things. Absolutely. I think that is part of and I'll have to take a look at what we are asking as part of that intake.

[1:06:30] We've gotten away from the old, old one where we were asking if they had a bookie. I mean, that's that's the type of questions that we were asking about that. Do you owe money to a bookie? So as we're transitioning to the actual questions that we need to know, not that if someone owes money to a book, he's not important, but we need to know some of these actual things to figure out what the right placement is.

[1:06:51] And that's part of those conversations. So again, we can sort of start we're starting to look at how we tailor some of these questions, the intake and and not trying to say that we're segregating populations, but there are some that are going to be able to be in, whether it's a veterans or whether it's a family or whatever it may be.

[1:07:09] That's where you're going to have to have those partner conversations of, I have ruined this in my facility. I specialize in this, or I will take anyone and everything, you know. So that's part of that conversation. I certainly don't want the bookies shaking down. No, no, not at all. And that's why having the miss participation is so key.

[1:07:29] Because if you're just taking somebody in and you're not collecting any of that info, it's not we're not able to know. So having those sorts of requirements to as of our partners is important. David, just I'm going to ask a question.

[1:07:46] I think me you and select were at the meeting with the at the county at the government center and you were asking a specific questions about a matrix, about information so we can get an idea about the individual. What are the specific needs? How many of these do we know or need this? How many need that? Remember that conversation?

[1:08:08] That's the Miss Homelessness management information system where you are. You are we getting that information at the level that we needed? I know you can't extrapolate, but so much. Right. I will say that we, as the city of Wilmington, are not necessarily receiving that level of detail, but we are receiving general information through the kiosk of understanding that when we're having these conversations, we are talking with them to say, hey, when we look at this population, what are the actual needs?

[1:08:41] Because not we talk about sport of housing, but not everyone is that capital PSA so so not to that level we can get it. We can have access to that, if that's what you're asking. And the reason I'm asking that is because, you know, in the process, I mean, obviously we're growing region. We've got a lot of things that are happening, especially in health, and they're talking about behavioral health.

[1:09:06] We all know that we need more beds. We need more of that. Trying to extrapolate how much do we need in addition to what's out there. What are the current needs? Because if we're talking, let's just say to Novant or whoever the new provider is going to come to town, we need two 300 more beds. That's a discussion that needs to be had with the endowment, with the county, with the city, because they all see the same need.

[1:09:33] How do we know what the number is if we don't have it? I mean, it's easy for me to go in and say, we need 200 beds. Show me the evidence where you need 200 more beds for 400 more beds. And you know, they're talking about the possibility of taking behavioral health off of the Novant campus and maybe relocating somewhere else.

[1:09:51] So I know there's a specific need there. And we know that if we have an issue, we don't have a place to take folks at times. So those are the things that that's why I think it was so important that we try to get some of that information, not just for for our mental health needs, but for other things to know, but it also it also is going to unlock the different funding sources, because if it is a concentration of opioid dependency, and then there's specific funds that can be activated, whether it's mental health and their funds.

[1:10:21] So it is going it it's such an important part of that conversation. Absolutely. One of the really great concepts that good Shepherd will be doing with the Sparrow is tracking their, their residents. And so we're bringing 32 folks into this new residence. We're going to track them long term. Are they having lower air utilization? What does it look like from other costs?

[1:10:45] Because we talk about how it's going to save money. But until you actually show what that looks like, it's just conversation. And so having that data is going to be really important as we show future success. Like.

[1:11:00] So we're on the right track. So we're on the right track. I know the frustration. I know everybody wants the we're the ones that they when they see the people on the street, we're the ones that they call to say, can you do something? Can you help these folks legitimately concerns? Thank you. Thank you. Okay. Five minutes.

[1:11:39] All right. We're back in session and I'm going to take a roll call again. I think everybody I can see is here. So everybody's here.

[1:11:54] Mayor pro tem, are you here with bells on. There we go. Everybody's here. Thank you. Everybody here in the counter for. All right, all right, Miss Hawk. Thank you. We want to go to the line item review to make sure that we can get through that today. So Laura has moved over to do some driving. We do suggest that we focus on general fund departments, because those are the only ones that are going to be potentially impacting the tax rate, a little bit of level setting, about 65% of our general fund budget comes from salaries and benefits.

[1:12:32] So you are already down to the remaining 35% leaving those alone. And then some of these we think will be very quick because they are tiny, tiny budgets, very small. There's really no fluff on them. But we do want to go ahead and get started. So we will just go through these one by one in order. And if they do not touch the general fund, we will just state that and then we will move on.

[1:12:58] So we'll actually start with you all. So with council you have a $47,000 increase, $46,000 increase. The vast majority of that is in personnel and benefits. But there is a little bit in operating. Laura, can you pull that up, please? This is the magic of Laura's work and her staff's work on spreadsheets. So do we have the line items?

[1:13:29] Laura? That's what these are right here. So you have so, so so the it just says Sappho a lot. So.

[1:13:40] I was, I was I was trying to get away from you.

[1:13:47] The those are the travel lines for each of the the council members okay. So so you can see that you've got your initials there on the left hand side, that funding column, those are dollars. So we've got business travel. We have Dos and subscriptions, some other services training and professional development, printing services, postage, food and provisions is probably your next largest one.

[1:14:15] After training and professional development.

[1:14:22] There was a disagreement about whether there was a consensus at our last meeting related to salary increases or pay increases for council. Yes. Do you just want to to state that? And that is that is my fault. So I thought that at least four of you had indicated that you were supportive of that. But we do want to put that back on the table for you all to discuss.

[1:14:44] So if you do want to look at the salaries for that, the the difference was it was about $31,000, 33 and excuse me 33 and change. If council wants to talk about salaries I will say I brought that forth. So I'm in favor of removing the salary increase for council.

[1:15:10] For Public Information. They should know how much we make.

[1:15:15] What is it right now? About 22,000. Make a lot of money. What is it right now? We're about 22,000. And then the increase would be a 3000 per ish. I'm looking at others for that.

[1:15:32] Sorry. The mayor.

[1:15:38] The mayor's stipend will rise to 31,783, and then all else will be 25,970. Well, I will say it's the only thing that we never get complaints about. But anyway, I'm in agreement. I'm okay with that. You're okay with leaving it or taking it out? Just. I'm. Cassidy. I don't mind taking it out, I do. I am curious about.

[1:16:07] I think in one of the in the operating expenses. Expenses is that the travel expenses like the allowance for auto. Is that included in that in some a little bit because there's a lot of so you've got something for local mileage. But then your your travel is going to include that mileage reimbursement when your training is out of town.

[1:16:32] Okay. Are you asking about the vehicles type in Jason. Yeah. The monthly that's that's up in the personnel. Yeah. This travel this is like when we go to conferences and yeah, yeah I know I know with the 4150 is I was just asking about the other. Yeah. Sorry I misunderstood your question.

[1:16:57] 29,400 for all of you.

[1:17:08] That's the same as the in the proposed budget. The only thing that would increase is the city council salary. That's correct. And that would be a 20% increase in line with the rest of the living wage increase. That's correct. And then the slight bit of benefits that come along with that. So what I'm putting forward is to is to not do the living wage increase for council for savings of 33 660.

[1:17:35] Right. I'm in favor I don't agree with that. And I don't agree with that because in some of you may or may not know, I currently make wanting to whatever it is now that is my only salary. So that's what I live on. I have a role that I'm working in as a business broker and attempting to make money, and that is all commission based only.

[1:18:04] So if you want to talk about who's living in poverty, potentially one of your council members, maybe I'm I'm not joking. But like, seriously. So I do not want to agree with that at this time. Thank you. I think you should give the background as to how we got to this point about the increase. This increase was supposed to happen whether there was a living, livable wage increase or not, because this was established 4 or 5 years ago when there was a study of market study done by the previous city manager and staff stating that we were well below the salaries of the municipalities across the state as a governing body.

[1:18:52] So this is something we put in place where there was no salary increase for council last year. And this is the the last iteration of of that plan that was put in place. Now again, I will reiterate if there is the elimination of the assistant city manager, the elimination of the assistant chief, and a freeze on some of the other high level positions that we're looking to hire, I'll forego I'll forego mine.

[1:19:26] But, I mean, you're listening to Councilwoman Clinton Quintana expressed that this is this is her only her only salary. And I asked the previous question of how much we currently make.

[1:19:41] $22,000 to live on when you're being stopped everywhere you go, being asked about the budget and everything else, it's.

[1:19:52] It ain't that much to brag about. For clarification purposes, that benchmark study, I believe, and I could be wrong on just maybe a year or two, but it wasn't FY 22, and it was a three year study that we put money into the budget to increase the stipend for council. At that point, we changed the ordinance to say that you would get any equal percentage for merit.

[1:20:19] That the staff got. It was cool. Yeah, yeah. You're right, I was cola. Cola. Sorry. So so having the increase is in line with the policy.

[1:20:32] And I appreciate Council Member Clinton Quintana contributing that that information and everybody else as well. I mean I'm in the same boat. I it's my only salary. It's not my only household income, but also we you know, we talked earlier about that. This is theoretically a part time job. I mean really all of us. I was just talking to Tom earlier about all the, you know, the other boards and, and things that I'm on because of being on council and even a national board.

[1:21:06] And so the amount of time I put into this is really as much as a full time job. And, and that's and I'm, I'm blessed and privileged to be able to do that. I just wonder about, you know, somebody else who might want to take this job and looks at it and says, I can't get away from my regular job enough to be able to do this job for 22,000 a year.

[1:21:29] And so and that's why I would say I would continue to increase it at the same amount as the rest of the staff because, you know, frankly, this this is a sacrifice for everybody to be able to do this job. And I'm again, I'm glad that I have the privilege of being financially able to do this, but not everybody does.

[1:21:50] So I don't know how everybody wants to do this, but I've got two columns. One is the items that we discussed and then one item that we have consensus on. So I would say, let's put this in the discussed column and keep moving forward to see what we can find consensus on. And if we can't get there we'll come back to the discussed column.

[1:22:07] Okay. Was there anything out of the operating budget for council that you wanted to look at before we move on to the next department? What can I ask what what professional development or trainings that that the council is taking? I mean, I did I did Essentials of Municipal government in January, which was a two day course. And I think that we also I mean, I'm hoping over the next, you know, however long I'm on council that I'm able to take advantage of some of the other courses that are offered through the Unk school of government.

[1:22:44] Yeah, usually go to I usually go to 1 or 2 School of Government events a year. I've got one next week on, closing the wealth gap and stuff like that, if I may. That is also in addition to training. That's how we pay for certifications for your conferences that you go to, and all of your other travel stuff is there as well.

[1:23:04] So it's not just training.

[1:23:10] Do you like us to move on? Well, no, it seemed like it was a just a different line item or a different part of money that was separate that I don't.

[1:23:20] What is it costing us to go to trains? I mean, of course, are they. They weren't free, were they? I'm not looking at it. So there's, there's, there's typically a multi hundred dollar registration fee for most of the courses through the school of Government. Okay. Yeah. We can move on. We can come back okay. City clerk.

[1:23:48] Can we can we show the before we go to the detail. So we are actually this has a reduction in operating expenses for FY 27. So your your increases here are in personnel and benefits. So if you'd like to look at the detail we can. But this is already less than it was last year. Good to move okay.

[1:24:15] We'll keep going. City manager we are looking at the increases in salary and benefits. And then again on the adopted versus recommended for operating. We are less than we are in the current fiscal year.

[1:24:47] Just a general.

[1:24:51] General statement. Just FYI. Going back to the clerk real quick, I do believe that.

[1:25:03] I think and I have a screenshot of this just I don't recommend that we do anything in the clerk section. I just want to point out something that I'm aware of is that I'm. I'm Miss Penny. I hope you don't get mad at me about this, but I know for a fact she doesn't know that I know this.

[1:25:28] High point and Wilmington have the two lowest paid clerks in the state in our area, so I just want to point that out. Others have salaries as high as 180,000 190,000. This is Charlotte, Raleigh, Greensboro, Durham, Winston-Salem, Fayetteville, Carey, Concord, High Point and Wilmington are the two lowest, High point being 90 and Wilmington being 116. That's for the FY 26.

[1:26:05] Doesn't include what's been proposed. So I also want to jump in. It's my understanding that city manager, city clerk and city attorney are not part of the living wage increase because those salaries are determined directly by council. That is correct. And as a separate process, that is correct.

[1:26:24] Yes. Okay. I hear your statement. I just also wanted to clarify that that wasn't part of that. That is correct. Salaries for those three employees are not part of the three of us. We we move $0 unless you all make that change during our review process. Thank you. Thanks. Okay. City city manager operating is lower in FY 27 and 26, so we will keep moving.

[1:26:51] Budget not not budget and strategy. No strategy and innovation. We are looking at operating of $4,000, which is less than the 5000 in the existing year and 2700 versus 4000 in the existing year. So this is basically all personnel. Can we get the corresponding page number from the original proposed budget? Yes.

[1:27:30] Thank you, thank you.

[1:27:35] That's asset and property management.

[1:27:44] Know where I'm getting there 73.

[1:28:11] Okay. Okay. Communications and engagement which is 75. Page 75.

[1:28:24] We do have a proposed increase in the operating budget compared to FY 26 adopted. It is a $70,000 increase and that but then on the production side you have a $30,000 decrease. So your your net there is 40. And then engagement we pulled from other departments over. So those were staff that was doing engagement work in other places.

[1:28:52] So those dollars came with them. But Lauren do you want to. If we can I can help with that. That that's literally the money coming from sundry for the newsletter. And we're just shifting it over into their department to own it. Okay. There. It's not new money. Thank you. What else is an operating. Can we click on operating.

[1:29:19] So your your big needle movers printing services which like we said is the newsletter. Lauren are you able to speak to what is in other services or in some of these other lines briefly.

[1:29:37] Sure, absolutely. So let's see. Yeah. So our biggest expense is going to be the newsletter we do two of those with with that cost every year. This year we were able to right size a software and service contract to at about $17,000 to do a less expensive software, as well as a $4,000 in contract that we had for AV services to support a large piece of what you're looking at for our our requested additions are the addition of our new engagement division.

[1:30:15] We did not have translation services, and that feels very important as we're going into engagement. So that was part of it. And then we also had.

[1:30:27] The we have some broadcast and technology increases that go along with being able to live stream from out of skyline. That shifted when we came over to from Thalia until here we have some technology increases. That's mostly what you're looking at.

[1:30:51] I thought when we transferred over a business spectrum that runs the streaming service. Yes, sir. And that's just the cost of it is. Yeah. And we have some closed captioning that's built into there as well. That's another piece of that ad. Ada compliance communications. Lauren I'm under that section and under operating in FY 26. And you may have said this and I may have missed it.

[1:31:20] So I do apologize. We were at 65. 132 but under year 27 we're going to one 3120 yeah, that's the so our dollars for our newsletter and for a lot of our marketing ads used to be handled in a sundry account. This is, you know, my first time as the department head. And so that really didn't make a whole lot of sense to me for it to live in a separate account, as much easier to manage a budget and look at it holistically by bringing those dollars over into our into our communications budget.

[1:31:54] It was just in a separate account, correct? Yep. Not any money. Thank you. Thank you. Chair.

[1:32:03] Good to keep going. Okay. City attorney's office was there. Were there. I'm sorry. Were there positions added or is this just another. So so this was pulling. Yeah. This was pulling engagement staff that were embedded in other departments and putting them all into one department. So it is not a net increase in new positions. It's just moving people.

[1:32:26] So there's a corresponding reduction in the departments that they came from.

[1:32:33] Attorney's office is page 50.

[1:32:38] Operating is a $23,000 reduction from FY 26 adopted. So your your main cost drivers there are in salary and benefits.

[1:32:54] Meredith. How many attorneys do we have now on staff.

[1:33:01] Myself plus five more for a total of six is.

[1:33:07] Is that also include the one that's over in the police department? Yes. Okay.

[1:33:15] How many? Paralegal.

[1:33:19] Six. Six. Does that include? The one that includes six support staff. So that includes office manager, executive staff assistant. And for paralegals you have 12 altogether. Yes. We'll have I think we've actually got the one final paralegal from a vacant position that's starting on Monday. And so it'll be seven, seven administrative staff, six attorneys for a total of 13 in the department.

[1:33:49] And like we said in the questions this morning, we're not set up by specialty. We're just set up by each attorney and paralegal, have a number of departments across the city to support.

[1:34:01] In a new position, starting at.

[1:34:06] The new position, I believe she will be at 54 around 54. Our paralegals got a significant kick last year because they were more than 20% below market. And so they got a significant bump last year. And so that's I believe that's close to the bottom of the range that we've got now. And she actually part of her or a large part of her job initially at least, is going to be assisting the police attorney at the police department.

[1:34:39] He does not have a dedicated support staff over there. He's got a paralegal who, you know is in the main office, but she's going to this one is going to be assisting him with a lot of the public records requests that come through when we get the new software on board for public records.

[1:34:59] Question. Yes, ma'am. Don't shoot the messenger narrative with this question. Do our executive assistants support more than one person? So my executive admin assistant supports the whole office. She's kind of our front front gatekeeper. And so yes, she supports the whole office and and actually assists the manager's offices when they need assistance as well on the same floor.

[1:35:25] And so she does she, she helps the entire office with administrative tasks with organization, things like that. What about across the board and throughout the city for executive assistants. So the only question I would have in the fire and police departments that position supports all of the executive staff. Yes. Okay. I'm seeing head nods. So it would be four in the four plus in the police department.

[1:35:55] And how many does that position cover? Chief McClure, you're talking about chief Macy's. Executive assistant? Yes. Senior staff. So that's fine. Okay. And for mine, that's for the entire office. So all 12. It's not just the attorneys. Thank you Kimberly. Yeah. And so she supports for okay. Good deal.

[1:36:26] Okay. Moving on to human resources. The recommended operating budget is 78,009. The adopted FY 26 was 100,000. So that is a reduction of page 77. That is a reduction of $21,000. Let's see what's in there.

[1:36:52] 77 so the training and professional development that is that includes a lot of citywide training. So that is not just for their department, but they also pay for the background checks, drug screens, you got advertising for open positions. And then the business travel would be trainings that they go to. Is there anything else that would be in that?

[1:37:19] Laura, just to clarify, a mayor.

[1:37:26] There was a lot of manual changes of, of labels. And so this must have been pulled down to all of travel. This blame that you're going to get blamed for everything. Just just for the record, the mayor does not have hidden line items throughout the budget. This is specific to I want to find it. This is specific to the human resources about this.

[1:37:49] This budget was very challenging in the sense that we don't have ledger codes. And so we had to put labels, put everything under mayor staff. So it was just it was yeah, it was just an error pulled down. But the numbers are correct. So if the mayor retires, there's going to be a lot of cleanup in this budget.

[1:38:08] And with me, this is making the cuts easier. But you've you've got 12 to 13 people in this budget. So when you look at spreading that training across the number of people in that department, it's about $1,000. An employee would be applied to any registration fees, conferences and then any of the travel and subsistence that goes along with that.

[1:38:34] So this background check, this is this background check line that's background checks for the entire citywide. Okay.

[1:38:43] Oh what is the line item for that. It's the fourth one down. It's like 16 860 it looks like.

[1:38:54] That's for the whole organization. That is for the whole organization okay. Thank you.

[1:39:01] Yeah. Thank you so much. Better. Thank you.

[1:39:08] Yeah.

[1:39:11] Yes. Thank you. Great. Any other questions? Okay. We will keep going to finance page 63. Thank you. Mary.

[1:39:24] All right. We have a reduction of 62,000 in operating costs between FY 27 recommended and FY 26 adopted. And Martha or Laura I will let you explain allocated costs. Allocated costs are indirect costs that we can charge to other services. And this has to do with the convention center because we have our three. I think it's three people in finance that does a lot of work with convention center, and the convention center can pay the general fund back, thus giving us a credit, helping the general fund out.

[1:40:04] So we like it when it's in parentheses. Yes. And then we are combining finance and budget under the realignment. And so the numbers under budget were just pullovers from the previous budget department. Let me see what's an operating for finance. Sure.

[1:40:24] Martha do you want to go through these?

[1:40:33] Not every single one, but just some of the general.

[1:40:41] I know some of our larger expenses. For example, for professional services. I can't see it in front of me right here. We have like the audit cost, the costs associated with some of the I'm going to get tentacle for a minute actuary studies, which are things that were required to do each year. So.

[1:41:05] Whenever you look at our professional services wait a minute. Which one?

[1:41:17] Where is it? It's under business travel. Okay. Well, I will start with training. A lot of the training. A lot of people in our office and finance department actually have various types of certifications, whether it's CPA grants, certifications, different items like that. We do have larger printing expenses. We do do as far as the loans that are associated with the home program, we have statements and stuff that we mail out with that dues and subscriptions.

[1:41:51] A lot of that is for professional organizations, whether it's in North Carolina Government Financial Officers Association or the National Government Finance Officers Association. As far as professional fees, those would be like financial advisors, our auditors, different items like that. I don't know if there's any specific line item you have questions about. I know that's only 2200. Whenever we do like debt issuance and different things like that, we're actually required to do public advertisements.

[1:42:32] All property.

[1:42:36] Any other questions? Looks like the travel for Sappho is again where that is going to start. Such a rumor.

[1:42:47] Again. For the record, that is travel for finance department employees only. Mayor Pro Tem, I don't think they're coming for you. They're coming from mayor. Is there any other line item you have a question about that I can assist with? But sorry, but it's still $34,000 for employee travel. That would include I'm assuming it also includes some training in travel.

[1:43:15] So most of our travel we try to do local and honestly being finance. I will say there have been times when we have actually elected not to stay at a conference hotel, but stay at one that's a little bit closer. Just because we we do run the numbers. And so I can take a look to see if maybe there was a reclassification issue where some other expense might have been included in there.

[1:43:43] So it might have a little bit of training in there. Martha, how often do you I mean, when you when you go, when you're selling the bonds or anything. Do you travel in New York any for the bond? No we don't. In our office, for example, I am a licensed EPA. So with in order to maintain your license within the state of North Carolina, you have to have 40 hours of continuing professional education.

[1:44:12] We try to do as much of that locally as we can. Then I do have staff that have various grant certifications and stuff, and they will attend travel with that, or sometimes we'll do classes at the School of Government. So but as far as council falling, do you folks do everything? Yes it does. Yeah.

[1:44:35] Usually whenever we do meetings with bond council and stuff with that, we try to do as much electronically as possible. So we'll do teams meetings, zoom meetings, a lot of different items like that okay.

[1:44:54] Okay. Thank you. It.

[1:45:02] Page 66. Page 66. The operating budget is $19,000 higher between FY 27 and FY 26 adopted. And we did talk a little bit about potential for stretching out some of the replacement schedules for computers. There are certain computers that we do not recommend doing that with, but there are a small number that we do think that we could stretch another year.

[1:45:34] So that would result in a savings of $40,000 if council would like us to pursue that. But otherwise we can also we can click on that number and see if there's any other questions that you have. What are the ones that we wouldn't recommend stretching out, like some of the mobile data terminals for police cars and things like that, where they just they, they take heavy use and abuse and they're, they're pretty dead by year four.

[1:45:57] Okay.

[1:46:01] When you have questions about the tech fund itself, which I think is part of this too, which is in the back of the.

[1:46:09] Replacement phone is on page 130. Yes, sir. So page page 130 has some additional detail.

[1:46:18] How many vacancies do we have in this department? This is probably a question I should have been asking for every department, but how many vacancies? We have two. Two vacancies now. One of them at our helpdesk is that including the cyber security officer. Those are new positions. Mary, use the microphone. Sorry. Those are new positions that are not in the budget yet okay.

[1:46:47] Any other questions? 2.6 million for software rentals and licensors. Yes. Thank you. Microsoft. This is city wide I mean that's that's the thing. Like it's subscription based. We don't own anything. Yeah. So most of these programs have moved to a SaaS format, subscription as a service because they make a whole lot more money than us buying it once and being able to use it for years.

[1:47:12] So we are in many ways beholden if we want to be able to use Microsoft Office Suite and Adobe Acrobat and a lot of those very, very common softwares, we cannot buy licenses to not have these costs. And this is most of some of this that's in here is citywide software and services. So it's those that impact think of your municipal, which is you guys might understand that as your financials and our HR systems.

[1:47:45] And those pieces are what's housed in here in the technology fund that you're referring to. That's in the back of the book. I just want to clarify some of what is in there that that's not all replacement cost associated with computers. So about 600. And some of that is actually the cost for computers. The remaining in that fund is the associated network costs that we deal with.

[1:48:07] So it's not as simple as reducing that fund would reduce by reducing our replacement of computers. We actually that's our our our bills for paying. Like I always say Time Warner it's not Time Warner anymore. But anyway our network in those games, can we go into that. I don't know. We can. Well, well, we're searching for that.

[1:48:33] I have a question about the software licenses. Where are we in that cycle? Like when will we renew the Microsoft just renewed? Is that on the next agenda or is that on the following? We just did it at the last meeting. That's what I thought. Okay. And I'm assuming every time it comes up for a renewal, we take a look at comparable we we do I mean, Microsoft is I mean, you're sure.

[1:48:57] But we also looked at when we negotiated with sweet. We negotiate what that is. They used do a lot more stuff included in it. And now they're breaking off into to paying individual licenses on some of those things. So okay. But yeah, and I would also say there's a high level of oversight in adding any additional programs. Like like I came and asked for Adobe Acrobat and had to go through a process to make sure that I should have Adobe Acrobat.

[1:49:25] Yeah, which is fine. So it's not just that we're just loading everybody up. It's what any specific. So we just renewed with Microsoft to take a three year. Is that a three year? I can't remember off the top of my head okay. Yes. And we so we'll take a look again in three years and make sure that that's still the best use of again.

[1:49:45] We also actually are getting ourselves in before there's an 8% increase July 1st. So we were trying to get ourselves in there. And each time many of our softwares, we will try to do a multi year run just to kind of lock in some rates, because some of these, they will go up anywhere from 3 to 10% a year.

[1:50:04] So the more we can lock them in earlier the better. So and the tech fun is on just to give everyone 130 page 130 in your budget, can you start by explaining to me, rose seven and eight, and how the transfer in from general fund plays into this or whatever that general is? I'm assuming it's cut off fund.

[1:50:27] So, Laura, I mean, yeah, what the budget. So each of the departments are each computer has a replacement cost and that that is budgeted in the general fund and that amount that goes over to the tech fund. So we can pay for those replacements in the future. And so the 612 is the annual cost for the replacements of the general fund computers.

[1:50:57] And what we're paying for those. Okay. And so explain to me the different hardware that's being paid for in that versus what's being paid for in seven in row seven computer replacement. Those are revenue lineups as well or so. Yeah, I think the 831 is actually the computer replacement fees. And then the 601 what we pull from general fund.

[1:51:21] And then we have the fund balance I think was 500 or 450 that. Yeah. You're you're correct. I'm apologize I was flipping the two. So the transfer from the general fund is actually to keep that fund whole and to pay for some of the network costs that the general fund uses. So the computer replacement is literally all of the computers that the general fund has.

[1:51:45] The transfer in from the general fund is a mix between what the fund needs to balance with what they have to replace, their known replacements, and what the general fund pays for in network and switches and widgets and wings, and that they have to replace all year. And just to clarify that 831 includes all funds, correct. Not just general.

[1:52:07] So that that's all funds. So it's not just a general fund that would also include any computers that are housed in, let's say, solid waste services or stormwater or those that are enterprise funds that are not funded through the general fund. So is that so if we go down to operating, yes, that's the actual amount that we are spending on.

[1:52:31] Well, yes. Computer replacement. It's not all computer replacements. So how do how do we get to the number of what we're actually spending on replacing or purchasing new hardware. So this is the detail of each of those budgets that we would actually be able to spend out of. So you've got 657 for computer replacements, 41 for equipment. My 644.

[1:52:57] 644,000 for software and 502,000 for phone facts. And I presume internet. Internet. So we're locked in on software and foam. We just have to pay that to use the items. Yes. So it's the 41 since the 41,000 out of the technology equipment and 657 out of computer replacement, where if councils if we say no new computers this year, that's the savings, potentially the equipment I'd be careful of because that's also switches and stuff.

[1:53:27] That's networking, that's network switches. So that's not computers. I mean, you can take away it and we've got it somewhere else. We have to. But the six something is actually the computers, the top line somewhere else. I mean you can. I mean either way we have to provide that. We, we we have to provide these, these services. So this is this is not an again, I think we're comfortable taking $40,000 from the computer line.

[1:53:57] But we have massive amounts of equipment that is due and needs to be replaced next year. We we have some connectivity issues that continue to crop up. There are things that constantly need to be replaced. There are servers that need to be replaced. This is this is the backbone of everything we do, particularly in our our critical service areas.

[1:54:27] I mean police, it has to work fire. It has to work. Recycling and trash uses technology to to run their roots and track their roots. So again, we'd be comfortable with slowing down on some of the computers that we identified. But this is not otherwise an area that we would suggest touching in any way shape. I'm hearing some of this is a large portion of this.

[1:54:51] Are deferred costs specifically related to public safety. So if we fund this this year, can we expect this number to be smaller once we make those replacements. So it's everything. Everything cycles because everything gets worn out and needs to be replaced or becomes outdated or the placement cycle on some of this public safety technology you're talking about. So, so most are four years.

[1:55:17] We suggest that those stay at four years because of how worn out they are, some of the lesser used equipment we believe we can extend to five years, but that is a small minority of the equipment that we actually purchased. That's the 40,000.

[1:55:35] So I have several questions here.

[1:55:41] I'm looking at the new positions. So again I'm going to ask the security risk and compliance officer at $147,508. IT support personnel, public safety $184,994. And that's so I didn't I'm just looking that's on page 67. So we're going to we're trying to its proposed that we have to it support personnel for for public safety and one compliance security risk and compliance officer.

[1:56:20] That's correct. So that is about you know not about that is.

[1:56:31] $517,496.

[1:56:40] And we currently have 30 authorized 29. We have 29 people working in it for us currently.

[1:56:54] That's correct. With the operating budget of $3,204,516, I don't have it. So they pulled up. But yeah, we'll we'll accept. Yeah, that's page six. Page 66. Thanks for accepting. So I mean, there there's some wiggle room there, I believe, because I hear us talking about software. But again, I've been here long enough to under to know that we've moved a lot of services to the cloud.

[1:57:30] So I understand what you expect as far as safety and risk and things of that nature. But I also think that with some innovation and creativity, we can.

[1:57:44] We can get support.

[1:57:48] Other places, and it should be way easier and way cheaper than a half $1 million. The the support mayor pro tem that we need for public safety needs to be available 24 hours a day. So we have had things go down in the middle of the night over the weekends, and we send staff out to fix it because again, those services cannot go down.

[1:58:14] There's also a lot of specialized technology in those departments. That is not something that your typical help desk technician is necessarily going to have. And they're also servicing the rest of the city. And so we do feel very strongly about the need for dedicated personnel to support those departments. That is very, very typical. Quite frankly, it's a little surprising that we don't have that.

[1:58:41] I believe we may be used to back in the day, but two is, quite frankly, a small number. But we we do think that because of some of the things that you're talking about, that we can make that work. But we have staff that they come in off the road, or they go to start their shift and something doesn't work.

[1:59:03] Something updates and everything needs to be reset. They're there, you know, walking, you know, technology that is that is on them and around them. And so we have had many instances just in the time that I've been here that we have had to scramble and having somebody there, we we cannot dedicate people their full time with the existing staff that we have because of the other needs across the organization for the whole.

[1:59:34] Right. Let me say this. So I'm looking at the numbers and I'm in my office at work. And so I'm, I'm researching the average salary salary in the US for a security compliance officer. And it's around 91,000. That's a Glassdoor estimate. There's a 98 five, 97,000 to 101,000 range. We're proposing make sure this is the right. But we're proposing 147,000 so that that includes their benefits costs.

[2:00:16] That's an all in number on that person okay. 105 plus. Gotcha gotcha, gotcha. Okay. And still and I want to so are our all of our IT professionals. Are they salaried. Are they hourly? No a number of them are hourly or hourly okay. Yeah. Because I'm, I'm a salaried IT person. And let me tell you I, I covered three sites and they're not all close.

[2:00:52] And if one of my sites was to go down, there's a time period that I, that I, I have to be there. And so that that comes with the job. So I don't know if, if we could look at trying to other folks up, you know, or better equip them to, to handle some of the, the needs that we have, whether it's public safety related or just, you know, regular operational issue that may occur.

[2:01:23] But I mean, it it comes with the territory. I think the best way to describe it, Mayor Pro Tem, is that there is enough work between the police department and the fire department that we can assign them there full time, and they will never leave because there's so much to do and to keep up with and make sure that it's operational.

[2:01:44] And so the needs across the rest of the city is such that we don't have two extra staff in the IT department presently that we can permanently assign to the police department and fire department, and not then leave other departments underserved because that capacity is being taken away from them.

[2:02:10] Right. And I hear, I hear you and I've I've heard that explanation when it's come to several departments and I'm not refuting it at all. Everybody seems to be busy, almost to the point of, you know, being overwhelmed. There's, you know, there's a need to wrap up personnel. I get it. But I mean, again, we're we're we're looking to do something that's impactful.

[2:02:44] Right. That's going to that gets us all to appoint a good point. Not a not a bad point. We all we're trying to get to a good point. So I hear you and I hear you defending what what you're trying to do. But from my position. This is what I have to do where I can safely, safely walk around the community and not, you know, be questioned about, you know, how how we're just blowing money.

[2:03:16] I have a I have a question of the the 29 fi, 26 adjusted positions in this department. How many are vacant? Two. Yes.

[2:03:29] Okay. So it's it's two not including do not including these three additional. That's correct. So and and I don't want to overstep into management. So I just want to put this out there is there.

[2:03:46] From what I am hearing it seems like the public safety rules are high are a high priority. Are they a higher priority than the existing two vacancies? Because I think what I'm trying to understand is you're saying our folks are spread to thin, but we also have some vacancies. So I'm trying to understand what it looks like if we're fully staffed.

[2:04:08] Well, one of the vacancies is the director, one of the vacancies is the director. So Jen has been serving as our interim director. So we do think that's an important position. Agreed. And then what is the other vacancy right now. It's helped us. So it's not it's not the same kind of work that we're looking for in these other positions okay.

[2:04:29] That's that's what I was looking for. Thanks. Thank you.

[2:04:37] So I think there is agreement to remove the $40,000 to slow down the replacement schedule, so we will take that out I agree. Is there any is there anything else that we need to consider? Did we. Sorry. Did we click into operating here already and come back? Let's do that. I'm still proposing a freeze on these position.

[2:05:03] Yeah we did because I asked about the software rental. Yes.

[2:05:10] I guess I'll say where I stand on this. I am comfortable removing the 40,000 to slow down the computer replacement. I am in favor of keeping these three positions in the budget.

[2:05:24] I feel the same way about both of those.

[2:05:32] Personally, I'm putting the 40,600 in the consensus column and the three IT positions in the discussed column.

[2:05:45] Does anyone else want to weigh in? What does it mean when you put it in a discuss column? David, I this is just my shorthand that I'm saying these are numbers that we brought up, and there was some argument, one way or the other about whether it could be removed, but we didn't seem to have a majority that wanted to move it forward.

[2:06:04] So I'm sort of saying, well, what could we come back to if we get through the whole thing and still need more? Okay. Thank you. So do others want to weigh in to see if we want to keep it in the discuss Later column, or we can potentially put it to rest. Now I'm I'm in favor of keeping the positions, deferring some of the computer replacement, but realizing that as with the networks, which is another things we've talked about, I mean, if you need them, you need them and you're going to find it somewhere.

[2:06:36] So.

[2:06:40] I feel like I where was the $657,000 number? What was that? A that was on the tech fund. 130.

[2:06:55] I'm on page 130, but I don't see that number. Maybe it was the revenue. Was that the was that adding the computer replacement and transfer in for general part of the. Yeah. So so what you want to look at is the appropriations line the 1.845. The numbers above are basically where it's pulled from from different departments that that add up to the amount of revenue that we then have to spend in this area.

[2:07:29] So we right now charge departments. So police would have a charge that would get pulled. Every department would have a charge that gets pulled, that goes into this fund to be able to make these purchases.

[2:08:08] I'm still undecided, mayor.

[2:08:14] We're looking at a straw poll related to the three positions. Do you want to discuss them later or just put them put them in the whole column for something if you don't mind?

[2:08:26] Okay. Yeah. I'm trying. Okay, okay. Downtown and thanks, John. Downtown and special events, page 98. Page 98.

[2:08:42] Again, this is a new department. This is pulling folks from other places. So we do have a $10,000 increase in operating expenses from the current year. Can we click on that real quick.

[2:09:08] Can anyone speak to what consumable materials are.

[2:09:18] I believe that this is this is wait, this is downtown Tom. Dino, play things for for you. I can't okay where it came from. Can you speak into my phone? Sorry. Wrong. Time to grab a snack downtown. Special events and services. There are a number of community functions that they'll hold, and in the course of holding them, there will be items, what I would call sort of small items that we would giveaways, giveaways, giveaways.

[2:09:52] And so generally speaking, that's the kind of things that would be. It's it's branded. It's and it's sometimes for kids sums for adults coloring books. Sometimes it's actually some activity books that we would have also for some of our community events.

[2:10:12] Any other questions on this one? This looks slightly different when you go back out to the department. This looks slightly different to me on the screen than it did on page. What do we say? 98 oh 98 that's why. Sorry.

[2:10:32] So we're going from downtown and special events. Every year has been, well, 23,168 33,277 33,331, $528,070. We're giving away that many small prizes downtown. That's a merger of all, many staff coming from different locations. And so what we were able to do in the budget, and it probably won't look this way last or next year because of the general ledger, but we were trying to move anyone who had a division on its own.

[2:11:13] We moved the division money with the person so you could track some of the money that was changing in the realignment. And so that's why you're seeing it this way.

[2:11:34] We will keep moving compliance.

[2:11:44] 96 page 96.

[2:11:50] Again, this is a new department where we pulled folks that were in code enforcement as well as zoning enforcement and put them together into a new department and so on. The operating expenses, you've got 272,000 compared to 297 in the current year. So that is a reduction of $25,000. Let me see what's in there. Yep.

[2:12:24] So your your biggest financial driver is your site cleanup. So this is for dilapidated properties. Or if we need to go in and do the mowing because somebody is noncompliant with a notice of violation. And Rachel I'll let you go over the rest. And again, for the record, that is not Mayor Sappho's business travel line. It's going to live on a cruise ship.

[2:12:49] Yes. So with our site cleanup and abatement, that's really where bulk of this. We've taken a look in last year's budget. We did take some funding out of that account. We did a year over year comparison to see what our actual spend was versus what we had budgeted. And so we've gotten it as lean as we could year over year.

[2:13:10] We did have some the legal services as well as the public notice, because of course, we're advertising all of our public hearings that we are having. We do contracted services as part of our administrative hearings for our minimum housing and nonresidential cases. So that's that's a big bulk of it, as well as travel and training. I think almost every single officer has a and so that's really important to maintain that certification as well.

[2:13:40] So that those that is a specialty certification that does require you to attend the conference to get the continuing ed credits. So yeah.

[2:13:51] Help me understand why they need to travel to a different jurisdiction to get trained on zoning when it's our only laws that they're applying. It's the state zoning. So it's a state certification. And so it's basically a lot of property rights of where you allow it to go. How far on a property without a warrant, a lot of those types of laws that they have to be aware of and best practices that we able to apply here locally?

[2:14:19] Okay. Thank you. And of course, I just want to add that abatements are added as liens to properties. And so the idea is that they eventually could get collected back and go back to general funds. They don't go back into this budget necessarily, but just back to general funds as a whole.

[2:14:42] And for the record, the consumables from the downtown services includes Christmas decorations, Santa Claus. So we don't want to take away Santa Claus consuming Santa Claus. Well, that is that is his special. And it's very expensive to travel from the North Pole. So yes, especially could do it.

[2:15:10] Does he does he have a background? You're never going to live right down. Make 180,000 pieces.

[2:15:19] Safety is next. This is a a new department. We are putting a significant focus on safety. But this is this is people making stuff safe. So you have an operating budget of $12,000. Oh sorry. Sorry 65.

[2:15:47] And this is reallocation of resources from other areas to create this, this function, because it used to just live in HR as a single person. So we have pulled HR people from other places in the organization as part of the reorg. And so that is what this is.

[2:16:07] 65.

[2:16:11] Do you like to see the detail on operating? Let's do it. Let's do it just to save that 2 or 3 seconds every time. Let's look at operating. All right. Time not what do you mean we have a technical glitch. Jason is in. Jason is in the room. Would you like to speak to your 12,800? No. That was money that I put in there from public Safety.

[2:16:37] It was public works. Had a safety officer and the money that he used for training. I moved into that line item. I think this is an actual table that was created, not a pivot table. Yeah. There there's no there's no actual like breakout of this in terms of because it is a new area. So there really is no resources in there.

[2:17:02] So it's not like travel or training. They're still developing what that would look like. But we expect there will be needs in the future to keep their certifications up. Correct. And then we've just been moving money as we needed to from other places if we find.

[2:17:22] I'm not being funny when I say this, I'm sorry, Mary, but I like how you keep referring to we'll find money in other places. Let me finish, let me finish. But when you say that, I know that gives me an idea that I can cut the budget and you'll still find money somewhere else. What I mean by that is, in this case, I will stop saying that.

[2:17:42] What I mean in this case is if we need to create a travel and training line item for safety, I'm going to revisit other places that currently have it, which means someone else will not be able to do that. And we're not trying to create new resources for that, I get that, yeah. So I know you'll I'll stop saying it.

[2:18:01] But in terms of telling us that you can find some money somewhere else. No, but this this area was developed by pulling in from other places, which is what I'm saying. So we're trying to still determine what we actually had in those departments for safety. So like we try to erase your statement. Okay. We raised it completely. I did not say it.

[2:18:19] Okay. Thank you I don't see.

[2:18:27] There it is. I found it a different way. There's your 12,000. Oh.

[2:18:37] Again, not the mayor's travel budget. Keep saying it. I'm going to say it as many times as it shows up on the screen, because the last thing I want is somebody to to come to the video at that point in time, and they don't hear me say it because I only said it before.

[2:18:58] Any questions on this one? How many people are in this department? There are. So eventually there will be four full time people for next year. Hopefully eventually we will get to five. But at the current it it's for I'm hearing six. And then you're saying for six staff six.

[2:19:20] But I thought one of them we were six one I'll take four. Okay. There are six. The six all the six is the public safety piece that's coming over from you. Use the mic. Sorry, I did misspeak. It is six. The six person is number one. I forgot about Jason. I wasn't counting him in my count. Sorry, Jason.

[2:19:44] Sorry, Jason. And we're glad you're here. Sorry. In the sixth position is actually one as we work with public safety was creating a safety position over public safety. And so that's what that six position is. The other ones are one is a generalist. And then the other one is working with our more of our frontline employees. Like our right of way mowing are what used to be public works are solid waste and those pieces.

[2:20:09] And then we have an Ada compliance officer as well. That's what those positions are.

[2:20:19] That's okay. I'm still learning a mom assets. Oh yay. So this is a new combination of existing departments and functions. So I think if you page 60 in your book page 60.

[2:20:41] The this does show a significant reduction in operating costs of for hundred and 33 433,000, and then also significantly lower operating costs for skyline. But then again, you see some some lines come over that don't have it. So everything is just kind of combined. So can we go down to the bottom and see do we have a net.

[2:21:17] Just go ahead and pull up some of the operating costs so that we can see what's included in those.

[2:21:31] You're clicking on benefits Laura. No, I realize that. But this is no longer reading as a pivot table, which I'm confused about.

[2:21:59] I'm going to have to pull it up a different way.

[2:22:20] As associated with.

[2:22:26] While we're working on that about the the skyline costs, because we we learned earlier, what is it like $3.7 million a year that the city is bringing in for rent? Is that being applied to this line item? How does that work? Because this is this is showing 1.6. And so I'm wondering how expenditure you're seeing. You're seeing the expenditure.

[2:22:55] Right. I guess what I'm trying to understand is where are those. Where's that revenue being applied to address some of these expenses. So the so the revenue is going to go into a dedicated fund. And then it'll be available for capital needs as they arise. But it will also be applied to covering the expenses of the people who are working in skyline.

[2:23:23] Did it will be applied to some of the line items on here? Yes. So is what we're seeing in the budget I guess is that already does that already include that revenue that's coming in? Yes. So we made that change in time for FY 27 okay. Because it looks like the skyline total is 2 million. If we're generating 3.7 where is that other 1.7 going.

[2:23:54] You're not on 1.7 million. Is is literally going into a SIP project for maintenance for capital on Harrelson building and skyline. And the rest of it is going to pay for this division. Okay. So it'll sit in its own fund for then HVAC and and things like that when it's needed. Thank you.

[2:24:18] Okay. Looks like we're back in business with the pivot tables.

[2:24:26] We we do pay for utilities, a significant amount of utilities out of this line item. You're at 2.138 million in utilities for electricity. This was this this is the streamlining of. Yeah. And this is citywide. So we used to divide out the utilities by department and by location. And that is a billing and administrative nightmare. And so we said how about we pay one bill.

[2:24:56] And so we combined everything into a single budget. And then it will be that way year after year. But we have seen significant increases in utility costs over this current year that are putting major stressors on some of our budgets because we're way over budget on utilities. So departments are having a carbon to other lines and not do a lot of other things just to keep the utility bills paid.

[2:25:24] Overall, I think we're going up about $535,000 next year just based on trending of actuals.

[2:25:36] And that is part of the tax increase that you're recommending. Is that 535? Yes. Yeah.

[2:25:44] Can you scroll down, Laura, see if there's anything else that jumps out to.

[2:25:53] 10,000 consumable.

[2:26:06] Is that like paint and that kind of stuff that we use for maintenance projects? Yeah. They're not giveaways. Correct. Is this where the light bulbs and toilet paper go? This is all. Yeah, yeah.

[2:26:22] This is also where right of way mowing and those kinds of pieces are in this, this area department as well.

[2:26:39] You scroll down one more time.

[2:27:30] What we're looking at on the screen is all of the operating combined for asset property management. That is correct.

[2:27:40] I don't have anything else on this. Me neither. Anyone else? Yep. I'm good. Okay. We will keep moving to design and construction. This was basically a spin out. So this used to be under the engineering department, but wanting to put a significant focus on the ability to complete CIP projects and other work across the city in the kind of time period that we want.

[2:28:08] Yes. Page 70. So we have put this together as a new department. So there's a couple. There are people from a few different areas, and can we go down to see if there's any comparison? Okay. So again in this one I would say if we could just open up the operating and look at it scroll through like the other.

[2:28:33] The only clarification I would add is where it does say surveying that is design and surveying. That is our in-house design group. We do have a city surveyor, but it is the only position we have. So that is a kind of mistype in there. Again, we do have a city surveyor, but it's in-house design and surveying. So we are actually what is that, $160,000 less than last fiscal year in operating?

[2:29:15] Any specific items that council has questions on? The one that I would I do want to point out one item. If we're looking at our budget, I think there's a ton there. But if we looked at that furniture and fixed equipment, we had looked at that fund to replace some of our equipment that was old and needed to be updated.

[2:29:34] We do still have a city surveyor. That is something that we want to update and calibrate our equipment. We still need money to at least calibrate it. That equipment is old. That city surveyor can still go out and emergencies and use that equipment. That money would be used for that now. It would only be used by the city surveyor.

[2:29:51] Again, we are decreasing the amount that we are doing there. I would ask that we would at least leave about 5000 in there to have that equipment sent off to calibrate, as we need to do that on a regular basis. But if we wanted to keep just old equipment, that again can be used in a pinch, we could reduce, we could use that number.

[2:30:10] But I think everything else how old is that equipment. Equipment is about 40 years old. 40 years old. And so what we do when we look at that, we look at sending it. We sell that equipment, we look at it, and then we look at buying equipment that's like a year old. Because again, survey equipment is kind of like a car.

[2:30:28] You buy brand new and as soon as you get it, it drops in price. So it is about four years old going on five years old. What's the I guess, I guess what's like the manufacturer's recommended lifespan for there isn't a manufacturer's recommend lifespan, but I'll say survey equipment does make leaps and bounds, and it has over the past several years.

[2:30:45] Again, it is still acceptable. It is still usable. It is just something that doesn't provide. Maybe the survey equipment gets newer, it provides more and more or smaller tolerances to what we do. You get more and more exact. So this equipment is still exact. It has been used in the past. It still can't do that. It just doesn't provide quite the same level.

[2:31:07] Sometimes we have software updates as we look at AutoCAD softwares in our survey, softwares that sometimes struggle to talk. So when we get newer software and we have new AutoCAD software, sometimes they can struggle to communicate. We do find ways around that takes us longer provides inefficiencies but we can't do it. So I know as we're really sinking in that would be one item as we've shifted what our what how we are doing business.

[2:31:33] That's the one line item I would say that I think we could look at. So that can come down to 28 528 five. You want 5000 left in it, right? That could come down to five. Yes it will. We then need to replace it next year. The answer is is that no we again we again can look at utilizing that.

[2:31:51] It will be good. You know, I think there's some point in the future we would want to, but it is something we could we could handle putting off for a couple of years. Thank you. Thanks for bringing something to the table. Yes, absolutely.

[2:32:09] Oh, you. Lunch.

[2:32:36] I don't have anything else about others. Okay, thanks. Anything else?

[2:32:47] All right. Transportation is a combination of engineering, traffic engineering, and Vision Zero, as well as streets and stormwater. Page 80. We are on page 80. What? Page 80. 88. Zero.

[2:33:29] With things being combined a little bit differently. The stormwater is its own enterprise fund, so we won't talk about that. And, Laura, I hope we didn't just break the budget. There we go.

[2:33:59] Under storm management non-departmental 47,000.

[2:34:07] Can you scroll down, Laura? We'll find its own. That's. I'm sorry.

[2:34:17] Is located in on our screen. Aaron, do you know what that is? It's for when people retire. So employees who were hired before the 2011. R eligible to receive retiree health insurance. And so we still have a number of people who are who have retired and are on the plan. And so we have to carry those costs.

[2:34:48] How many how many vacancies do we have right now in the 69.48. Do we know? Do you know where we're talking? Aaron I know on the street side of this general fund, it's 2 or 3 in. I don't know that there's many in traffic, so.

[2:35:13] One one in traffic. And then what about stormwater? I know it's not general fund, but yeah, there's, there's probably at least ten in stormwater right now. So there's ten vacancies. And I just want to say this out loud, about ten vacancies in stormwater. That's an enterprise fund. Applying the living wage to those positions and the filled positions is not part of the tax increase that is coming from that enterprise.

[2:35:40] That is correct. Okay.

[2:35:44] We do also have vacancies in our it's our our traffic signal people, both traffic signals and senior traffic signals. And again those are positions that we're not filling because we're not competitive on the task. Those are hard to fill positions and their general fund positions. So they are very hard to fill and and to keep filled. Got it.

[2:36:26] 3333.

[2:36:37] Oh that's our utility cut program that materials for utility cuts. So we it essentially asphalt and stone which we we have another line for that too. But we track utility cuts separately from regular work. So it's just it's own line. Yeah.

[2:38:03] Planning reduction of $130,000. Again, remember we pulled the zoning enforcement out of this department and that is now in compliance. So that is one of the main drivers of the reduction. But we can pull up operating where where is that in here. Oh I'm sorry 99. Page 99.

[2:38:45] So advertising is going to be for all of your rezoning.

[2:38:58] And Mr. Chambers is here if you have questions on anything.

[2:39:04] Did operating costs go down so much just because of the movement? That's correct. Okay. So that moved somewhere else. It did okay.

[2:39:24] Wasn't there a consultant for the comp plan? It's not in here. It was somewhere else. But I can't remember where it's located in sundry. Okay. Seems like that would be related. We are. We're at the ten year mark for our comp plan, and so it is due to be updated.

[2:39:55] Okay. Okay. Keep moving. Great job. Good job Brian.

[2:40:01] Any time.

[2:40:04] All right. Community building.

[2:40:10] Is affordable housing. Community grants, community risk reduction. Resiliency and sustainability. Page 90. And then not captured in this is that the nonprofit grants the community Investment Program does flow through that. So that's that $783,000 that if you wanted to consider making any reductions in that allocation, that would be part of the discussion for this department as well, which.

[2:40:48] And so, again, no grants were made or done at this time. It would just if you made a reduction in the amount you allocated for that, we would have a reduction in what we put out for request for proposals. So if you wanted to reduce that to 500,000, that is the number that we would be working with instead of that other amount.

[2:41:25] Is the operating their restricted?

[2:41:29] Yes.

[2:41:39] Yeah. I think there are general funds that are added as part of that .67 cents for affordable housing. So again, if you wanted to look at a reduction in what you were allocating for the affordable housing fund, that would incense reduce some of what was going into that account? But that would be the other kind of lever you could pull.

[2:42:04] Do you have a suggested amount? I wouldn't go more than we're at that point. Six seven is about $2.5 million. I wouldn't recommend going below 2 million on that just to be able to sustain programs operating in things. What it would cut into our some of our gap financing. So a lot of the larger projects that we're doing, that's probably where you'd see the biggest impact.

[2:42:25] That would be my recommendation if you were to touch that fund. I will say, I don't think I'm interested in cutting into that point. Six seven. Weird. The only people still at the table with this, I, I know it costs us, but I think it's such an important part of making our city more affordable to live in. I'm not interested in cutting into that.

[2:42:46] Agreed. And it's not just our money. It's it's money from all over the community. It's a lot of leveraging of other, other people's money that goes in. It is it is an investment that we can expand. It gets bigger when we invest. And and there's not a lot of places where we can do that. So I'm not willing to walk away from that.

[2:43:05] And I agree with that. And I go back to our very first budget work session when we did the, the the fish bowls, the jars, you know, and affordable housing was something that really came up high in our priorities. And I wouldn't be interested in taking from that. Right. The and and I think with the what is it called now the community investment on page 84, page 54, I, I think that the way that we're rethinking this, I think it's such an important look at how we make sure that that these funds are, are, are going to the mission of the city.

[2:43:48] It is such a I mean, it's such a small portion of the budget. If and I, I don't know that I necessarily support this, the only thing that I would be willing to cut here is to say, let's not do the 3% increase, let's keep it at 760 and still still hold the funds that that we've used in the past.

[2:44:05] I'm not sure what the appetite is for other members of council on that, but from my perspective, that is of the things that you've brought forward. That is the only the only thing I'm willing to cut. I was, I was willing to go to from 783, 466 to just even 700. I wouldn't go any lower than that. I'm not willing to cut anything.

[2:44:34] Yeah, I, I agree with the mayor pro tem. I think that, you know, just as all of our residents are facing increasing costs and, and the city itself is facing increase in all of our costs, I think our nonprofits are certainly, you know, feeling the pinch, too. And I look at all of these organizations and they're all doing services that the city just couldn't replicate.

[2:44:55] I mean, it's a great investment, which is why I don't want to go lower than where we are. Yeah.

[2:45:02] My understanding is it's not automatic for the organizations that are already on the list, but we're doing we're completely changing it up to like eight RFPs. Yes. And so it would be enhancing some of the service delivery that we have at the city. So it may be the midnight basketball, a request for proposal for that to expand what's happening.

[2:45:23] So that way it's the city is going to be again leveraging the other funding that the nonprofits have by providing this service to us and offering it to our residents, but at a lower cost than if we were putting it on on our own. Yeah. And I didn't mean to apply that we were going to give to the exact same organizations.

[2:45:40] I'm just saying, you know, just looking at the types of missions that some of these organizations have, they're doing it and they're leveraging donor dollars and volunteer hours, doing things that the city just couldn't do for the community. So, wait, Rachel, we restate that comment we just made about midnight basketball, one of the examples of a request for proposal we had discussed bringing forward is for midnight Basketball, where we could partner with an agency that specializes in youth programing, that they could do a lot of the administrative work.

[2:46:17] When you think about going to Sam's Club to get snacks and making sure we have volunteers and staff, so that way the police officers and firefighters, whomever else is volunteering from city staff as chief says, everyone is always welcome if you want to. It's not just basketball to be able to participate and just do that piece, build those relationships and not have to do the other pieces that some of our nonprofits are able to do as well.

[2:46:44] Okay, well, I the police department does a great job of handling that. I think they truly enjoy it. I happen to be at midnight basketball on Saturday night. And yeah, I know that to be true. And I, I leave it at that. Well, and I think it's a great example of ways that we can expand that offering. Maybe it's more hours, maybe it's more days, whatever it may be through this funding.

[2:47:15] So are we saying that I just want to I'm sorry. Go ahead. Maybe Tim. Michael here. I don't think we need to expand it to an outside organization. So, I mean, we could better support our personnel. That does it. But I don't think anybody else needs to do it. Unless the people that are in charge of it don't want to do it anymore.

[2:47:36] I hadn't heard that they could use more volunteers, though I wish I do.

[2:47:46] I just wanted to confirm that this list of our members of the Community Investment Program. I'll just use it as label it as that. So are we stating that not everyone will get these funds that are on this list? Correct? We are going to be putting out request for proposals for specific programs that in the past, what we had done is applications and basically put it out.

[2:48:14] And whomever wanted to apply for whatever programs they thought fit into this, and that's where that came from. Now we we expect to award fewer grants and service agreements, but at larger amounts for those organizations. So if you're thinking of an after school program, it may not be five different after school programs or funding. We may be funding one and really pouring into it at a different amount.

[2:48:44] I'm sorry, I'm a little heartbroken here. There's so many of these. I'm aware of who they are, all the work that they're doing. It's great work. Okay. Thank you.

[2:48:59] I wrote down this in my disgust column. I don't. This might be something that we can revisit, but I'd like to move on to the next topic if everybody's reading. Okay. Thanks, Rachel.

[2:49:21] Parks and recreation, page 83. Page 83. So right of way maintenance was pulled out of Parks and recreation. So that is the significant decrease in operating expenses that you see between FY 26 and 27.

[2:49:47] But let's go into the operating for these.

[2:50:04] Lots of travel for the mayor in this one.

[2:50:08] Again that is parks and recreation staff. Parks and recreation staff.

[2:50:15] Have to have a press conference.

[2:50:24] I'm just assuming the consumable materials are so higher. Just because of the nature of this type of programing. There's a there's a lot that a lot of materials, things we use give away okay. I don't want to we get so much hell about the right of ways that are not ours. Correct. Is there any way we can just put a sign up there and say, this road is maintained and operated by the Department of Transportation?

[2:50:50] Because I've asked that question ten years ago, can we just get a sign to let people know that this is their road because they're the ones that are responsible for it? And yet our guess we contract that with them? I don't it's insanity. Because Dot's permission to place a sign. And I will tell you, I was driving down Carolina Beach Road on Saturday and you can see where the city limit is.

[2:51:16] I mean, it's it's time for them to take ownership of their obvious and trying to, you know, you know, the Cincinnati I mean it's their road correct. Raise the revenue man and and cut the grass and take care of it. I think a lot of their budgets may allow for four times a year to cut it. And so we we do we do some of the right of way maintenance on a few areas.

[2:51:43] We, we contract basically to have it at a higher rate than what they're willing to maintain it.

[2:51:52] But yes, they pay us to do that. Is what you're saying. Yes. Okay. Yeah. I mean, I think it's worth exploring if we're doing the work. I think it's worth exploring, making sure that we're at least recovering the cost of that, especially when we're looking at a budget like this, where we have all of these people going line by line by line, like, I, I want to be a good neighbor.

[2:52:15] I also want to make sure that we're not leaving money on the table if we're doing the work well. So if if we are doing, say, the four times a year maintenance, we would get paid for that. If we want an enhancement beyond that, that's on us. We pay for that there. There's zero reimbursement for that. Are they paying the what they're paying us?

[2:52:37] Is it for the four four times a year. So so the ones where we are maintaining the road then. Yeah, we're just getting paid for the four times a year I understand. Thanks. Thanks for the clarification.

[2:52:55] We scroll down I'm going to start going my grass four times a year. I'm just kidding. My neighbors are killing.

[2:53:05] Plenty. How it works that way. Maybe we could send code enforcement out to them. Send them a letter stream? No, thanks.

[2:53:15] I am not that is not something I'm very good at.

[2:53:25] Where's the money? Stop it! Stop!

[2:53:31] Oh, man. All right. Where are we going next? We're going off the rails. Okay. It's getting late. Yeah. Let's go. We will keep moving. These are all designated funds for CDBG and home funds. We'll skip all of those. Convention center is a special fund. So fire is next.

[2:54:02] Can we go ahead and click on operations. It's 108. Page 108.

[2:54:47] So I want to make sure what we're looking at here. It does not include the the several things that are being proposed to be added for FY 20 does include it does it doesn't put those. So the mission ready gear the technology okay. Yes.

[2:55:09] On some of these that have a high usage of fuel like police and fire, how do you even begin to budget for that? Especially in this state, they track actuals and then look at projected increases. Obviously it is a very volatile it is a very volatile line item. It it has not been uncommon, I'm sure, in Wilmington and in my past life where you get a bad year with spikes and prices and sometimes you even have to go back for a fund balance appropriation because you just don't have it in your other lines.

[2:55:45] So it it's always tricky. But this is based on actuals history of actuals.

[2:56:06] On page 111, totally in favor of doing a police and fire mental health program. How was it only a one time expense?

[2:56:19] So that is not a one time expense. That is, that's a budget modification. That would be every year. How did we was looking for it in the narrative. But how we down the recommendations for two fewer positions. So so they got transferred out. So the community risk reduction position used to be in there and as well as an engagement.

[2:56:49] Yeah. So Wendy and then is it Brooke. Right. Yep. So Brooke is now in communications and engagement and Wendy is under Rachel.

[2:57:06] We will keep going. Police.

[2:57:12] We did talk previously about the $29,000 reduction for Clearview AI. Want to make sure that that is the consensus of at least the majority of council. I am in favor of removing Clearview AI me to Clearview AI. It's on page 105. Can can somebody give me an overview of what that does. Sure. So Clearview AI uses basically publicly available images to help with the identification of suspects.

[2:57:43] And so if somebody has public images on Facebook it's able to search through and try to match. If you have, say, a surveillance video of a suspect, then it would try to match it up with somebody who who may be in it. So many, many, many other agencies have this. So we do utilize it right now. But we have to essentially ask for another department to help us basically.

[2:58:10] And there's a limited number of uses that you can have depending on the level of subscription that you have. So sometimes they're not able to to assist us when we're trying to identify a suspect. So we are using it. Currently we're just borrowing it from neighbors. That's correct.

[2:58:31] I think when this came up, when David brought this up last time, it was in the context of having an AI policy for the city before we move forward with AI purchases, because I've anecdotally heard some things about this particular piece of software that are very concerning to me. So, yeah, so we're happy to remove it, work on that policy, and then we can revisit it in the future.

[2:59:00] Do we need to add in? I know we're trying to strike things, but the email you sent us about the bulletproof vests, we do. So we were hoping to get a federal grant that would reimburse for 50% of our costs for bulletproof vests. The federal government applied all available funds to jurisdictions with populations under 100,000. So we did not qualify under that parameter.

[2:59:26] And so the grant loss is $125,621. That number again, please. 125 621 so does that mean that the figure in a on page 104 goes up 125,000? Where is that. So it was a reimbursement grant. And so you would really it depends on how you want to look at it. You would need to take half of the 125,000 and put it in to be able to fully by all the vests that we had planned, but then just know that we would have an equivalent.

[3:00:04] What would it be? Half of 125,000 would be a loss on the revenue side. So if you want to make it whole, we would need to reduce the revenue and then increase the expense if you want it to fully match. Yeah. 63 and change okay.

[3:00:27] So we would be looking at spending closer to like 150,000 on ballistic. We would be looking to spend like about 125,000. We just won't get then half of that back like we had intended. But our our net overall loss by the time you get to the end of the fiscal year is 125,000. Got it.

[3:00:52] Is that do we have a consensus to put that in the add to add that? I mean I think that's something we have to we do they they I don't see a way around that. They expire. And they're also getting more expensive. When do the existing vest expire. They expire on a rolling basis. So we replace on a rolling basis.

[3:01:14] So they expire every five years. So where are we with the existing this. So so we have so it's because it's rolling. We have a slug that are coming up that are expiring that we have to replace next year. Do they expire it. It would be in FY 27 okay. Thank you. So like maybe it would be like 20% this year another 20% next year, another 20% to follow.

[3:01:39] So this tends to be a pretty static line year over year. Just keeping up with the increased costs that come as the equipment gets more expensive. Losing is the $125,000 grant. That sounds like it's being applied to rural communities at this point, correct? Okay. And how many has has the federal grant been something that we've basically budgeted for because it's been basically assured?

[3:02:07] No, no, it wasn't something that we had budgeted for. But we we went to council and had asked your permission to apply for it. And so it was something that we had expected to get in the budget that now we're not getting.

[3:02:23] Because we typically that's a grant that you you always get it like a yeah, yeah, yeah. I've never received a notification like that. Appreciate you continuing to look at other sources of income. Yeah. Grants we can click on operating.

[3:03:12] On this thing that we have one here. We do. And we have one at the at the station. The one that two we have two sting centers or one know we've got one sting center. And it's here. It's all here. It's all incorporated here. And that's up in operation. It is up and operational.

[3:03:56] I want to understand not because I'm opposed to it, I just want to understand it. So in the summary on page 106, you explain that training costs or training. Per employee has been $514 in this budget. It's recommending going up to 1215. Can you expand on the types of training we've been missing and or what we will be adding?

[3:04:24] Chief, can you talk to that?

[3:04:29] This is not because I'm looking to. It's because I'm looking to understand what what training receiving.

[3:04:44] So generally speaking, that was very significantly underfunded for our department. Our size. You know, we've got a fully staffed a total of 370 employees that we were running on, $150,000 of training money, maybe a little more. So some of the training we're going to is just we try and do it first and foremost locally whenever we can. Obviously, we won't have to pay travel costs, lodging, meals, things like that.

[3:05:09] But there's a lot of the training our folks do that is very, either technology laden or very specific training that you can't just go online and do. A lot of the training that our folks do is hands on training. So it could be training like training for a Swat team where they are getting very technical, tactical type training.

[3:05:27] And when you do that, because it's a team, we can't just send 1 or 2. Usually a lot of times we'll have to send larger groups and we'll try and segment them out. Could be technical training for someone who is using devices to access phones. So if we sees a phone that's evidence in a crime and we have to get a search warrant to get into that phone, to be able to use the technology to do that is very technical.

[3:05:50] And it's something that is constantly evolving. Right? So as soon as you know, the software figures out how to, you know, get into the phone, then somebody creates another way to make sure we don't get into the phone. Right. And so it's something that you're never fully trained. You're constantly training. There's training like crime scene training for crime scene technicians that are having to go out there and learn how to properly collect blood and body fluids, how to properly photograph scenes, because all those types of things, if they are not trained very professionally and technically, and then when we get to court, they've got to be able to basically state their credentials in front of

[3:06:25] a judge or jury so that they can obviously get whatever that evidence is into the record. And there's a variety of others across the spectrum, is there? So is there ongoing training on like laws that change and is that included in this? Yeah, a lot of that. We will get legal updates either in conjunction through the district attorney's office as well as through our in-house legal staff that will provide those things.

[3:06:48] So a lot of that type of stuff will come in, but there's some very technical stuff sometimes that we will send folks to get. But again, try and do as much as we can locally here whenever possible. And how many hours a year is like standard for training for a sworn officer. So what's the best practice? Yeah. So state standards require how many hours?

[3:07:09] Elena. It changes from year to year depending on there are made in service. Training is which is every year. What is it this year I'll have to look up the exact number. Yeah. So a lot of that is mandated by the state to maintain certification as a law enforcement officer in the state. You know, learning my way through that as well right now.

[3:07:32] But a lot of that stuff can be done online when possible. But again, there's some hands on stuff. Like, for example, our folks have to go and qualify minimally by state standards with a firearm at least once a year. Right? That's ammunition that we have to use to shoot to to qualify for that. And then there's different courses that they mandate.

[3:07:50] So it's not just, hey, go shoot five rounds and make sure you hit the target. It's both scored targeting as well as what they call some tactical training courses as well. So of this list, I'm concerned that we maybe have not been training to the extent that we need to do. Is there additional training that you would add to that list with this budget that our department needs?

[3:08:12] So I would say we want to make sure that all of our officers are trained up to best practices and standards. One and then yes, to your other question as well, which is, are there other trainings that we want to do to expand our officers knowledge? Right. And you know, the story I'd tell you, you may have heard this story before, but, you know, there's there's two managers sitting in a room and an older one and a younger one, and the younger one says, you know, we keep spending all this money to train people and they keep leaving.

[3:08:38] And the older one says, well, what if we don't train them and they stay, right? So, you know, there's there's this piece that and there's also our attention piece to that too, right? Which is, you know, a lot of our folks are very interested in taking on additional responsibilities, collateral duties within our department. A lot of those require additional training.

[3:08:59] And so if they can get a specialized duty or assignment that they can be a part of, right? That is something that will help keep them here. In addition to the proposed increase in salary that we're discussing. Thanks for that detailed explanation I appreciate it. So let me ask this question. If we're talking about training, right. And I'm hearing Councilwoman Santa say that she feels as if.

[3:09:24] The force that we had prior to you coming here and prior to her getting on council was there was an adequate training, the responsibility of training for the officers. How much of that is self-initiated? So I'm not sure I understand your question completely, but I'll try and answer and then you can clarify if you need to. You know, there are certain standards that we've got to meet to meet state standards.

[3:09:51] Right? So, you know, the criminal justice standards for the state says that officers need to do X, Y, and Z each year and they'll put out what they call mandatory in-service training. And that's something each year they publish, our officers have to go through that, the firearms qualifications to do certain roles in the department. You have to have certain training.

[3:10:10] So if there's a, say, a traffic fatality accident that an officer needs to go work, you know, you're one of the male new officer and including me, I couldn't go out and do a traffic reconstruction. Right. There are certifications that you get to be able to do a traffic reconstruction. So again, if you ultimately charge somebody with vehicular manslaughter or something like that, we can go to court and say, we know that this vehicle impacted that vehicle in this way because this officer has such and such certifications to do traffic, recreation of traffic accidents.

[3:10:43] So I'm not sure if that answered your question. If it didn't, please clarify and I'd be happy to. Yeah, not really, but it's okay. I just want to to say that, you know, I know Chief Williams to have been pretty, pretty innovative and up to date as, as it related to, to this organization. So, yeah, I just want to put that on the record.

[3:11:08] I know chief would appreciate that. He's probably. Why. And, Kevin, I want to make clear I'm not I'm not criticizing anybody or decisions, but a $700 is fine. I want to clarify that. What I was talking about is the $700 per employee increase. And I just want to make sure that I understand that that is necessary training for our officers.

[3:11:32] And that is such a significant jump that it makes me question what what was being missed prior. That's not a and I don't mean that to be a judgment. I'm just I'm just trying to understand why the increase.

[3:11:47] On the you have authorized positions on Sable. I thought sable was gone. Two recommended in 2002. So those are drone fliers. So so so so we still call it say we do not have a helicopter. We are working on getting rid of the helicopter parts that we kept. And but they're the officers that go out and fly drones.

[3:12:15] So they're certified to be able to do that when there's an incident that we need to get aerial on. Okay.

[3:12:23] And the horses were in there, we had this huge debate about the so yes, we're jockeys. So so there are four officers that are allocated to the amount of patrol program. I will say the numbers that were discussed last year seem to also have been taking into account the salaries for those officers that if Mounted patrol had been disbanded, we would have kept the officers and reassigned them.

[3:12:50] So the actual cost to run the mounted patrol program is much, much lower than the 300, whatever 1000 that was being discussed last year. So that included for salaries. So so we do have lease costs for the stables that they're kept out, of course, feed and all of that. But it is a much lower cost. I do think that there is there are things to look at in terms of our, you know, eventually, perhaps replacing the horses and eventually looking to probably relocate the stables.

[3:13:27] They're very far outside of town. It takes a lot of time to go get them and bring them back. But, you know, if we're going to keep it, we want to make sure that we're doing it right. And Council Member Santa to the number of hours per year is 24. That is the minimum number of hours for training a year for sworn officers.

[3:13:45] And and to be clear, everybody is meeting those minimum hours, everything that is required by the state. We have not had any lapses at all in not meeting those minimum hours of training. It's all of the other stuff that makes a department more effective that needs some additional attention. Thanks.

[3:14:38] How many more departments in the general fund do we have to go through? This is the last one. The only other thing if you want to look at it would be the MSD.

[3:14:52] Okay. Thanks, chief. Thank you.

[3:15:01] Most of.

[3:15:11] Let's go back to the computers real quick. Can we we you folks need those computers? Yes. Correct. And how much were the cost on that? So the the overall cost was 600. So we can we can reduce it by 40,000. And and I would need to go back and look at which of that is general. Well I'm just going to ask the question because, you know, we've done this in the past.

[3:15:36] I see other governments are using it. I'm looking at the undesignated fund balance. It's 21, 24%. It's $38 million if we got it down to 20%, which which follows our policy and took it out of there, because these computers are going to last four years, five years, it's one time expense. We got to replace them 4 or 5 years.

[3:15:56] Why can't we do that. And just and and at least use some of that. This is a savings account. These are the taxpayers money. And we're trying to accommodate what you need. At the same time trying to be fair to the taxpayers. Also, this is a, you know, a tall ask of all of us here. So we're trying to be innovative here.

[3:16:15] And I've seen the fund balance go as low as 19%. I've seen it one time when the county made a miscalculation on taxes where we had to take, you know, it went down to 12%. I would never dare want to go that way. But I think we're pretty healthy there. And I feel that it's a one time expense.

[3:16:35] And and if we're not going to do it there, we ought to look for another one time expense that we could appropriate some funding there to, to deal with it. So I would not suggest computers because this is next year's slug of computers. And so if you take that away then there's no funding for the FY 28 2930.

[3:16:56] So again, it's a it's a revolving here. Is there any where we can find some? I think that I want to be fair to, to budget and finance and be healthy. And I think we would be healthy. But I'm not talking about a heck of a lot of money, but it would be something and we could help reduce some of those costs.

[3:17:15] How much are you looking for a meal, a million? How much is the mission ready? Gear three, 78 and 45. I'm sorry, I just heard three different numbers. How much? Just sort of says right here. I was just looking at that page. I'm sorry. Where?

[3:17:35] The 378. So. So this is great. Mission ready. Gear buys a set for everybody. And then it would be how many years before we would expect to need to replace it started this five years 5 or 6 years. And so there was 3833 annually for to start the replacement. Okay. So so I would say you could take the 378 out of fund balance if you wanted to, to cover that cost to still make the purchase, but that would be a reduction that gets you about a third of it right there.

[3:18:13] Because right now we've got I just want to be clear. We got somebody saying 21% fund balance. You're saying 24% fund balance. I know there's a calculation based on cost, and you take it out of the cost estimate, some of that. So just coming up I've got two different finance people here.

[3:18:38] So the the difference between the numbers, the number that I originally had provided to you historically, whenever we're talking about fund balance, when doing the budget, we start with where we ended the last audit. And so based on the last audit, we ended at 25.27% of the general fund. So that was the unassigned fund balance. Now during fiscal year 26, we did appropriate approximately 1.9, close to 2 million of the fund balance during the year.

[3:19:13] So if I were to take that into consideration, it would bring the number down to 24.64%. Now, one of the things to that that gets a little bit complicated. So it's not a one for one switch is if your budget increases then your fund balance percentage decreases, even if you don't use any more because it's based on the operating expense.

[3:19:43] So I think Lara's number that she has shown in the budget is based on a projection based on what the proposed budget is. So remember, we took 1 million out to purchase a park, which was a lot. And you've taken into consideration the 24. But making the adjustment that if necessary, was some adjustment in cost. I think we're safe.

[3:20:09] I think at 20% I'd be more than happy. I just think this is a savings account. We keep it for hurricanes. We understand that. I don't think it's reckless, and I think it gives us some leeway, some breathing room to these help reduce some of this. It's not a lot, but it helps. Every little bit helps. And I hope it shows the community that we're doing everything we can to be fair to not only the staff and the managers budget, but also to make sure that we're being able to pay these folks what they need to be employed here and be competitive, and at the same time, taking into consideration consideration the issues that they're

[3:20:48] dealing with in just in the general economy, with costs going up, especially with fuel costs and food and everything else, that's just just to take on it. I don't know how how old are the computers that we have now?

[3:21:06] Maybe I missed that earlier. So they they vary. But the the typical replacement schedule right now is every four years. There are a number of them that need to stay on that schedule because of their the rate that they wear out. But we can move a portion of them to a five year schedule, which is the $40,000 cost savings that we've suggested.

[3:21:28] Right. And then the rest need to go ASAP. So the rest should continue on a four year cycle, which they would be then due to start being replaced in July if there's funding available. So I mean, but they have to be all Windows 11 at this point, right. So it's it's not that they're not Windows 11. It's it's no I'm asking, I'm asking I'm asking like how current how current they are.

[3:21:58] Because how much wiggle room. Do you have like have we as a let me ask this different as an organization. Have we all moved every computer to Windows 11? Yes. Yes okay okay.

[3:22:14] That's all.

[3:22:17] I would be happy to have the conversation about fund balance. I also wanted to revisit my question about the 0.1 on the.

[3:22:26] Estimated investments and sales tax. So Laura did do some calculations on the interest earnings. A 0.1 is only going to earn you 15,000 additional dollars. Okay. We are seeing interest rates trend downward. And so we expect that we'll earn 2.2 million this year. So the 1.5 million was anticipating additional reduction in interest rates like we're seeing. The other thing I will also caution is that is also an extremely volatile revenue line.

[3:22:59] So if things flatten out like they did a couple of years ago, that line can drop to close to zero. So we are in because interest rates are so high right now. We're sort of in boom times with interest earnings. But it wasn't that many years ago that that line was essentially zero. So it's not something to rely on consistently in future budget years.

[3:23:22] But we do think that the 1.5 is safe for 27. If you wanted to go at 15,000, we could, but I don't know that it would be wise to go any higher than that in sales tax. So sales tax, we are not conservative in that projection for next year. Every locality or almost every locality, including the county, is keeping their projection flat at a 0% increase.

[3:23:52] We are already projecting a 3% increase to try to be as aggressive as possible with that fund to try to alleviate the tax burden, so an additional 0.1 would earn. I lost my note.

[3:24:10] That $500,000 five. It's just shy of $500,000 shy of 500,000. But given that we're already aggressive at the three, going up to four does not feel like a number that we would expect to hit a lot. Wait a minute. On the investment that he's talking about, the interest on the CD? I would imagine so. It's a it's a variety of interest products.

[3:24:34] What is what is the total amount? We are budgeting $1.5 million in earnings for next year.

[3:24:43] What's the what's the right.

[3:24:47] What's the what's the percentage that we expect to earn 3%.

[3:24:58] On on average.

[3:25:02] We can do about I mean we can do better than that. So so here would be one suggestion would be to if you want to budget a higher amount we can do that knowing then if we miss that mark, we would be coming back to you all partway through next fiscal year for a budget amendment to pull money out of fund balance to cover any loss of revenue projection that we didn't hit.

[3:25:36] But you would then need to like. Exactly. It's it's it's it's moving shells. But you would then need to understand that for FY 28, we would then have to adjust based on actual projections. At that time, we may not have natural growth to be able to accommodate estimate, but let's just say we make more money based on locked in rate.

[3:26:01] Then we're in better shape. Right? 15,000 per .01 you go up.

[3:26:12] My travel budget, I can do much better than that. But anyway, I have a quick question about the what is the potential we would get back from the labor bank incentives that they have walked away from? I don't know that we have there aren't any. Our agreement is a pro rata share for the county. There's an agreement with the state and then there's a local agreement.

[3:26:35] And so they're hitting their goals on the local agreement and we pay pro rata. And we've just certified their request. There is no we're we're due to pay what we owe under that agreement.

[3:26:54] There were two things on the table and it's my fault. Sorry. So let's go back to the portion about fund balance and where we're comfortable, because right now we're at 24%. And we've got a policy that says we're going to be somewhere between 20 and 25. Correct?

[3:27:09] Yes. Yes, yes.

[3:27:20] One of the items I want to make sure is clear, though, that the fund balance percentage is based off of the operating expenses budgeted. So if our operating expenses budget increases, then the percentage naturally decreases because I mean it's based off of that denominator. So that's one thing to keep in mind is it's not a one for one.

[3:27:48] There is a correlation that we need to kind of keep in mind. Yeah. But you're 24 now. She's budgeted at 21. So you're still within a threshold of 1.5%. So you've got it 1.5% in the play with if we use that if we use that to pay for the mission ready gear, I think that keeps us pretty close to 21%.

[3:28:12] That seems like a I mean, I don't know, I haven't done the math, but that I think that keeps us in our healthy desired range. I mean, I think you're covering your base there. I mean, I believe you're playing you're doing it very conservatively, as you should. But I think you've got the 24. She's budgeted at 21, 21 point, whatever it is, 21 five, 21 eight.

[3:28:37] So I think you've got that. We'll give you 20 if it gets to 20 if it happens together.

[3:28:44] Yeah. So I isolated with calculator. So take this to the greatest. But if we if we look at the things that we've talked about, if we use the general fund balance to pay for the mission ready gear, if we move forward with reducing computer replacements, $40,000, if we move forward with alternative one for the living wage, which is a $15,000 cap for public safety, $12,000 cap everywhere else, that brings us down to an increased tax rate of 5.492 is what I'm just the lady with calculator that I that that's not 4.9, but it is below 5.75.

[3:29:30] And based on this exercise that we've done, I think we're we're using taxpayer dollars responsibly in the city. I, I am comfortable landing there. If I've done my math correctly. Please double check me. We will we will double check you.

[3:29:52] So what what I came up with was the 29,000 reduction for a clear view AI. Oh, I left that out. Yeah. The $40,000 reduction for computers, the 28,500 reduction for equipment, the survey equipment. But then adding back the 125,006 21 for the grant loss and then using 378,000 in fund balance for mission ready gear. Our net out of those things is 350 $350,000.

[3:30:42] Which, Laura, if we we are going to pull back up the tax rate implications.

[3:30:55] Sorry to clarify. You were starting from alternative one or. Okay. Yeah. So that's 15 15,000 for public safety, 12,000 for everybody else.

[3:31:09] Yeah. That looks like that. That's point one for sense might only be about point one.

[3:31:22] Well what it shows here is 5.75 down to 5.61. Maybe I'm doing the math. Yes. Yep. So so this is related to living wage implementation. And then 350,000 would be another point one of a penny. So you'd be down to 5.51 if if you made it 5.5. Yeah. Yeah we can we can play with the fundamentals numbers a little bit.

[3:31:50] That was if we, we, we, we removed the things that we've all already agreed that we would be comfortable removing. We use the general fund balance to pay for mission ready gear. We add back in $125,000 for the ballistic grant, and we implement alternative one that would put us at 5.5.

[3:32:13] So what about alternative two?

[3:32:25] I like alternative to I'm alternative to what I, what I, what I need to see is that specific compression ladder like those. I want to see those examples and understand those ranges. It is hard for me to visualize it without that. So when as soon as we get that, I'm, you know, I'm happy to be convinced that alternative to is appropriate if, depending on what that looks like alternative to with the adjustments we made, that would be it would just be 5.34 be 5.34 versus 5.5.

[3:33:04] So it's .0.16. Yeah. But having the compression issue with police and fire. Right. And I think, you know, what I'm trying to say is that I.

[3:33:17] I'm assuming that compression issue under alternative to really is something that would have a major impact on our ability to promote or recruit into the public safety departments. And that's, that's going to cost a taxpayer anywhere from $0.30 to I don't know, what is that? It's $7.28 a year for the median house. Right? So, $0.61 a month for the median house.

[3:33:50] Yeah, yeah.

[3:33:54] I mean, that's the trade off that I'm balancing in my head.

[3:34:03] I appreciate this exercise because I think it for me, what it highlights is what it costs to run a city, which is a lot, but also that that I think you all have taken a look at, at what the budget needs to be. I think we've found a couple of things here and there. So, you know, I'm prepared to support 5.5 based on everything we've looked at.

[3:34:53] But I'm open to being swayed in either direction if there are compelling arguments.

[3:35:27] Army is is skewed by all of the people moving here, working remotely, making salaries that are New York City salaries or personally, Indianapolis salaries are anywhere around the country. So and I used to work with Army when I was in the nonprofit sector and watch how conditions in a community change it and how it's different in different counties.

[3:35:54] Anyway, that's just a preface to say I do believe in the living wage philosophy and.

[3:36:04] Considering where we are and how hard we work to dig through all this stuff and how little of a dent we've made in getting our number down. One idea, because I gave you some really complicated math, and I regret that just put you through so much. But one thought I had was the 14. It's about 14 million for the living wage increase as a general.

[3:36:33] 1416 I'm not talking about the health insurance, just the it's 14 in the general fund, in the general fund, 14 of the general fund. So if we just reduce that by 5% across the board and that wouldn't impact your, your compression because everybody would be like, just eat down a bit, that would, that would be over $700,000.

[3:37:03] To and it would impact everybody just a teeny bit. Instead of picking out different departments or different wage categories. So it's just I mean, it's just an idea. The bat around. So you're suggesting that 15% adjustments. No, not to like take the model she's already set up and just shave off 5% off of every number. That would be about savings of a $700,000.

[3:37:37] And it would kind of be a lower impact for everyone instead of well, at the end of the day, it's a great raise for everyone, minus the five 5% of what the ideal is. So the the issue that you have is it's it's not placing us at that level of aggressive competitiveness that we feel like we need to be to be able to move the needle on some of these positions.

[3:38:07] And then we would still have some employees under 60%. Yeah we would.

[3:38:24] Anybody else. It's been a long day. Thank you. This is what we're voting on Tuesday. I think this is what we're looking at right now. We still have several hours before we go to the meeting on Tuesday. You bring any more thoughts, ideas by Monday to the very last day you vote. I've seen it happen. I want to clarify.

[3:38:41] What are we voting on on Monday? What is the number? Correct. Let me let me go through that. So. So you all left question marks by nonprofit grants, council pay and the three IT positions.

[3:39:00] My perspective from my perspective all those need to stay in the budget.

[3:39:06] The the positions and the community investment funding.

[3:39:15] All I got is you should get some rest too. We're going to be in a council meeting all night.

[3:39:26] I know that we did not spend much time on MSD, but I wanted to clarify. MSD is is that image and roll fund? Is that where it's out? I mean, it has to be allocated within the within the MSD. But so it's a separate fund. So the revenues come in and they are kept in a separate fund. Just wanted to make that point clear.

[3:39:47] Since we suspect there are some people watching today who want to know what we would have said about it, but we didn't get to it. And I do want to leave city leaders time to speak with staff. And it's, what, 430 now?

[3:40:04] So let me, let me, let me recapture what we're going to bring forward unless we are told otherwise. How about how about that? So we would be bringing you a 5.5 cent increase. That would include a fund balance appropriation to cover the mission running gear for $378,000. It would include a reduction of Clearview AI for $29,000. It would include a reduction of the tech fund for $40,000, and a reduction of the survey equipment in the design and construction department of $28,500, and it would include those 5000.

[3:40:52] It was going from 33. Yeah, it's a reduction five no reduction 28 525252 5000 to 5000 okay. But then it would include an increase of $125,621 to cover the grant loss. And all of that. We will figure out the .01 to get us down to the the 5.5. We may throw a few extra dollars in on a revenue line or from fund balance.

[3:41:27] It's a it's a nominal amount. Do you think that we should go over the procedure, since we have both a new city manager and three new council members and two who are still in our first term? Would somebody else like to do that? Because I'm one of the people that needs to hear it for passing the budget procedure.

[3:41:45] How will how will it be on the agenda and what will the procedure for voting?

[3:41:53] So you've got three different ordinances that are coming forward. There's the the main ordinance which is the budget ordinance. And you've got a fee schedule. And then what's the the other one is the capital and the capital project. So there's three separate ordinances. You'll be able to you'll take separate votes on each of those. You've got to have two separate votes on the budget.

[3:42:15] So your final vote for the budget won't be this time. It will be next time. So this is your first vote on the budget. So what will be coming forward is what the manager is bringing to you. You still have an opportunity to talk amongst yourselves, but we've already had the public hearing, so there won't be a public hearing.

[3:42:31] So you'll still have a, you know, whoever wants to make a motion, we'll be able to make a motion either to accept the budget or to amend the budget. You'll be able to discuss that amongst yourselves, and then you'll vote on the budget, and then it'll have to come back at the next meeting, the second meeting in June for a second reading.

[3:42:48] But there will will not be any type of public hearing for this one. Just council discussion and an opportunity to ask staff any further questions. But we have two people that have already signed up to speak on the public information about it.

[3:43:03] And what's in the packet is the original proposed budget. So we can bring so so we would do a walk on item to bring an amended ordinance forward. Because what is in your packet right now is the recommended budget. So we will make those adjustments and hand in hand walk that right. Yeah. We won't even have to walk them on.

[3:43:23] We'll just we'll just give you the amended items. And so what you'll be voting on or the actual amended items that you'll get on either Monday or Tuesday. We'll try and get them out to you as soon as possible. And clarification the ordinances that are currently being looked at does have the clear view out of it. It has council's stipend reduced, and then it has a shift of the economic development for NC film Film partnership eventually from your development so that whatever the film commission.

[3:43:59] Yeah that's okay. So we will bring you a correct budget or revised ordinances bias ordinance. We did not talk about the film Commission. We did not talk about the CJC was another item that was requested to be talked about parking fees.

[3:44:23] Is there any quick discussion on that? We do have council contingency if you want to do something with the film commission. So there are dollars that you could use for that if you so choose. So I just had a quick question. It seems like the information that we got from the Film Commission, I mean, this is lovely, but it's really not the kind of proposal that we would look for for an Economic development Partnership grant.

[3:44:47] And those grants will be made next year. Is that right? I think actually the year after. Yeah. So, so, so FY 27 is year two of a three year cycle. And I do believe that the county ended up giving the film partnership 300,000. They gave them 100,100. They gave they gave the CJC 300,300 to the CJC. Okay, okay.

[3:45:16] Thank you. So the Film Commission's request to us was $100,000, and the CJC request to us was $100,000, which the field party should not. The film commission. Excuse me. Film partnership. And I understood that part of this, but I've talked to Miss Hamilton is the fact that she's got, I guess, some money in the state budget, but the state budget hasn't been passed.

[3:45:38] This is kind of a holdover to help her get it, get over the hump until the state budget is feel pretty confident, will pass and finally get a budget after 70 years. And that was brought up with the with the Casey the eligible to apply for some of the community investment funds that we are setting aside.

[3:46:05] Probably not. The biggest thing that we looked at with the CJC is there. There isn't a great mechanism to put money into the budget because it doesn't really fit under either category. So we looked at their cost of rent per square foot and then how much space we are taking up with our own staff to potentially look at a lease agreement.

[3:46:29] They are getting a heck of a deal on how much space they rent and what they pay for it. So our equivalent space is worth about $8,900 a year.

[3:46:43] And is that. But that is the 8900, isn't there currently? No, it is not.

[3:46:50] I, I know we're at the end of the day on Friday, but the I think the work that organization is doing is really important. I know that we're participating in some of that work. We're sitting in the building. So I want to maybe that needs to be part of council contingency that we discussed, but I don't want to I don't want to open a new topic at the end of the day on Friday.

[3:47:12] But that is something that I think is important to. So I believe there's $135,000 in council contingency. So that is a pot of money that you can always make that decision after July 1st. That's something that you could take up and make an allocation out of that pot of money. You could do a balance appropriation if you so chose.

[3:47:33] So if you if you want to look at it as you're open to continuing these conversations without it impacting the actual ordinance amount because you'd be looking to pull it from council contingency, then ordinance stays the same. And those are topics that you can take up at a different time. I just think timeline where we are, I think that's the best option.

[3:47:55] Okay. I just wanted to I'm just wanted to that that was on the table.

[3:48:02] I think the on the deciding vote on the council stipend, if my account is right, and I have been thinking about it a lot since it was brought up the first time, and I don't think you should have to be independently wealthy to do this work. And I I'm very confident that the city council members are the absolute lowest paid per hour of the entire staff.

[3:48:27] So since we're, we're, you know, including the living wage, I think it's fair to leave our city Council stipend that you have calculated for us in their.

[3:48:46] One final item. And then I promise, we're done. Just wanted to bring you all attention that we we had some additional discussions about parking fees. And for four years there has been requests over and over to bring back the hour of free parking in downtown. It got reduced to 30 minutes. We've looked at the revenue loss that we would expect if we were to make that adjustment.

[3:49:11] It's about $35,000 a year. We then looked at what we believe we could generate if we increased the fee for special events, and we believe that we can offset that revenue loss. And so the net result would be the same, but it would allow us to bring back the hour of free parking in our decks in downtown, which a lot of the business owners have been asking for.

[3:49:36] So if council is amenable to that, that would be included in our fee schedule that we would be bringing to you next week.

[3:49:46] Yes, I see three I see for I see five, six, six. I'm not sure if there's a thumbs up from Mayor Pro Tem, but we will move forward with that. One point of clarification. Just Market and second Street decks where it was originally. Excuse me, it was only market and second Street decks, not the convention center deck or skyline center deck.

[3:50:06] Thank you for that clarification. So everywhere that it used to be, it will come back. Thank you. We're done that we stand adjourned.

Council — City Budget Work Session - May 29, 2026 part 2

Transcript