[0:08] Meir Porta Maki to the flag of the United
[0:16] States of America. to the Republic for which it
[0:20] stands, one nation, under God, indivisible with liberty and
[0:26] justice for all. I think you'll be seated. We'll
[0:29] do the roll call starting with city council member Hernandez,
[0:32] District one. P
[0:36] Councilor Hill, Conor Jordan, present.
[0:39] Councilor Simmons, uh, is under the weather and she will not be
[0:44] attending the next meeting. Council member Ots present.
[0:48] Uh, Councilor Ranker also is away. Mayor Putha Maki and
[0:54] council member Mitchell. We'll do the announcement and
[0:58] comments in the same order, starting with Councilor
[1:02] Hernandez. Hello, everyone. Happy June.
[1:05] Happy Pride Month. I just want to remind everyone, uh, that
[1:08] this, this month we take a moment to recognize that love
[1:13] exists in all shapes and sizes and forms and that we here in
[1:18] the City of College Park provide a welcoming, uh,
[1:21] environment for all. We're gonna be celebrating pride on
[1:25] Friday, uh, with our, uh, city's Pride event, uh, the
[1:27] Friday Night Live. Uh, I wanna share, uh, as the summer comes,
[1:32] uh, to our I guess our sessions come to
[1:33] a close for at least about a month that there's gonna be
[1:37] schools that are graduating. I wanna congratulate Hollywood
[1:39] Elementary School and the Monarch Preschool, uh,
[1:42] graduates, uh, and all the other high school students who
[1:45] made it to the end. This is a great opportunity to check out
[1:48] some of the cities's, uh, reading programs
[1:52] that we are currently offering. You can find more information
[1:55] at the website, uh, uh, or any social media that you may have.
[1:59] Finally, uh, I wanna just take a second to remind folks that
[2:04] if you are uh going out of town, there is an opportunity that,
[2:09] uh, is provided by our College Park contract police that they
[2:13] go and do a, uh, a checkup on your property. Uh, all you have
[2:16] to do is register online with uh the Prince George's County
[2:21] Police Department. It's a good opportunity for, uh, folks to
[2:24] make sure they just keep an extra eye on your, uh, property.
[2:28] Separately and uh there's, I know that there's
[2:30] gonna be a lot of opportunities over the summer, but if you're
[2:33] interested in helping out with some of the projects that we've
[2:35] got going on around the city. I know that many, I, I have some
[2:38] opportunities, but some other people may have some
[2:40] opportunities too, uh, to get involved. So please reach out.
[2:42] Talk to you guys soon. Yes, hi, so this past Friday,
[2:55] uh, uh, myself and, um, um, Morten Maki, uh, attended the
[3:01] uh city employee employee appreciation, um, lunch. It was
[3:05] a great turnout. It was great to, uh, see the, the
[3:09] hardworking, um, employees of the city be recognized for the
[3:13] work you've done. Um, and today I had an institutional
[3:18] biosafety Committee meeting for the University of Maryland
[3:20] review ing um biological research at
[3:23] the at the um university and, uh, let's see, tomorrow will be
[3:29] the United States Green Building Commission, uh,
[3:33] workshop that uh the mayor and I will be attending at
[3:35] University of Maryland day after tomorrow, day after
[3:38] tomorrow Thursday, right, that's right.
[3:39] And then um we have Friday Night Live, this Friday, the 66
[3:45] or 8:30 right here at City City Hall, um, courtyard, and on
[3:50] Saturday we have the trolley trail day and um that'll be
[3:54] from, where's the time on the trolley showing?
[3:57] I believe it's 8. Depending on where the event is
[4:03] happening, but it goes all, all kind of most of the day and it
[4:07] ends up in um at the College Park Airport Museum with a
[4:11] great performance usually, uh, great, great, uh, music and,
[4:15] and, and performances there. Uh, and then most of us will be
[4:19] heading out to Maryland to Maryland municipal, uh, League,
[4:23] uh, Saturday, Sunday, and on Sunday, there will be um a
[4:29] history month um.
[4:30] uh event at the College Park Airport Museum as well with ice
[4:34] cream. and uh let's see.
[4:40] Oh, on June 26th, there will be the, uh, committees and boards
[4:45] appreciation dinner at the uh hotel.
[4:48] That's all I have for now Thank you. A lot's going on
[4:51] Um, thank you, Councilor Jordan. Yes, thank you. On Monday I had
[4:56] the um the pleasure of attending with Mayor Kabir, um,
[4:58] the celebration of the $3.1 million award to Attic Towers.
[5:02] Senators Van Hollen and also Brooks and Representative Ivey
[5:05] and State Senator Rosa Pep all, um, uh, uh, presented a a check
[5:10] to them. It was a, a, a wonderful ceremony and um, uh,
[5:13] just a, a, a great time to, to, uh, to be able to, to celebrate
[5:18] this, um, director Michelle Johnson was instrumental in the
[5:21] effort and it will bring much-needed
[5:22] repairs to the attic Towers building and be a great help to
[5:25] the residents there. It houses low-income seniors and
[5:28] residents with disabilities. Um, uh, I was able to stop by the
[5:32] BBCA planting event where they planted 500 plants donated, uh,
[5:37] for the per permaculture garden, um, I, I did, uh, I did see
[5:41] that, um, the board the Board of Education has announced they
[5:45] will have a continuation of the Chinese immersion program
[5:48] across all of Prince George's County, including Paint French
[5:50] Elementary School and District 2 yes.
[5:53] I will show you Um, uh, on a lighter note this
[5:58] weekend, uh, the Boy Scout troupe that meets in District 2
[6:00] will be walking to their summer camp. It is, uh, 208 miles over
[6:06] 14 days that they will be walking, just starting at Holy
[6:09] Redeemer, um, in District 2, uh, there are two meetings that
[6:13] may be of interest to District 2 residents and, and throughout
[6:16] the city, uh, in College Park, uh, on, um, June 24th, the
[6:21] State Highway Association is having um a meeting with res
[6:24] with residents to discuss, uh, the development and
[6:28] improvements on uh Baltimore Avenue between 193 and
[6:33] Sunnyside Avenue and then on June 25th, uh, Thursday at 6:45
[6:37] p.m., um, the Metropolitan will be hosting a, um, a resident
[6:42] engagement time, uh, the city was gracious enough to host, I
[6:45] mean to, uh, to provide, um, a meeting space for this. It'll
[6:48] be at Davis Hall and that is a that will have a
[6:52] hybrid, um, a hybrid option, and then finally, uh, the city
[6:55] has put together a walking tour and survey for community
[6:59] members to give feedback, uh, for a space in Berwyn, um, but
[7:05] the 8807 and 8811 Rhode Island Island Avenue, property that
[7:09] the city owns, um, it's a, a community space exploration
[7:13] walk and it's designed to be, um, uh, like there's a survey
[7:16] that you can take that you can give feedback about what you
[7:18] would like to see in that in that area. Thank you
[7:20] very much. Thank you. um, so I had the honor and the privilege
[7:26] to attend rather represent um College Park at the US Mayor's
[7:32] Conference, um uh, last week, um, and it was a
[7:36] wonderful opportunity to connect with, uh, quite a few
[7:38] mayors I already know and connect with the new mayors and
[7:42] uh it's a wonderful opportunity of networking.
[7:45] and lots of learning in different sessions.
[7:50] Um, I also, I had the opportunity to attend yesterday
[7:54] morning with Councilor Jordan at the attic towers, and this
[7:57] is such a huge deal for College Park, uh, because of attic
[8:02] towers in College Park, the senior housing, and they
[8:05] received, um, 3.5 and $3.15 million. It's a lot of money,
[8:12] um, for much needed repair at the attic towers and um
[8:17] they brought a big check, um, but, uh, it is, it is, it is,
[8:21] it is very wonderful, um, event and um I'm, I'm sure this will
[8:26] benefit the community at the Attic Towers. Um, and I'll be
[8:30] at the MML conference and the day after tomorrow, as
[8:34] Councilor he mentioned, I will also have the honor to welcome
[8:40] the participants at the US Green Building
[8:45] Is that coalition or uh USGBC, um, uh, they, they're
[8:51] very first symposium. um, in College Park, it will be
[8:57] on uh River Road. I believe it's called Physics Building,
[9:02] um, and there'll be, um, close to 100 people attending, um,
[9:07] talking about different sustainability initiatives. Um,
[9:11] so this is such an honor for College Park because this is
[9:13] being hosted in College Park for the very first time.
[9:16] That's all I have. Thank you, Councilor Mar Oz.
[9:20] Thanks. Um, I won't repeat, uh, some of the things, but look,
[9:23] we'll look forward to seeing folks at Friday Night Live and
[9:26] trolley Trail day. Um, I will note, um, that the, uh, it's
[9:32] summer, uh, and so wanted to remind people that you can get
[9:35] 30% off, uh, outdoor pool memberships as part of Reckwell,
[9:40] um, for the UMD pool. Um, so encourage people to avail
[9:44] themselves of that, um, and then also, um, just to flag the
[9:48] national orchestral Institute is
[9:51] ongoing, um, at the Clarice and so there's lots of performances
[9:54] folks may wish to join. Thank you for mentioning that
[9:58] Appreciate it. Mayor Putan Mackay. Yes, thank you. Um, I
[10:01] won't repeat either, um, but I wanted to just thank the West
[10:05] College Park neighborhood watch for doing an ice cream social.
[10:08] That was a lot of fun on Saturday. Um, I want to also
[10:14] encourage people to take advantage of the GoGov app,
[10:18] which is College Park Connect on there you can get, uh, you
[10:22] can sign up to get all kinds of alerts and bulletins about
[10:25] what's going on in the city. uh, because like my colleagues
[10:29] have said, several of us are going to be out at MML, which
[10:33] is, um, we will be out of town, so the app will be something
[10:37] that you'll, you'll need to be using. um
[10:41] I also wanted to just encourage people to take advantage of the
[10:46] free parking that's available over the summer and um
[10:51] to um make sure that uh you're just uh looking out uh for in
[10:57] this extreme heat to stay hydrated and looking out for
[11:02] young people and older people, um, making sure that you look
[11:05] in on on neighbors that might have, um, might be senior
[11:09] citizens or have a lot of young children just to make sure that
[11:14] we are mindful of our neighbors during the hot summer months.
[11:18] Thank you. Thank you.
[11:19] Uh, let's go to Councilor Mitchell.
[11:21] Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Well, is that time? It is coming. It's
[11:26] here in a couple of days, early voting is your time to exercise
[11:30] your right to vote. Um, voting, early voting will begin on June
[11:35] 11th through 18th from 7 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. and you can go to
[11:40] the College Park Community Center, or you still have time
[11:43] to submit your replacement ballot.
[11:46] a ballot that says replacement on there in the box uh don't
[11:52] laugh, Mr. Mayor. Um, to, uh, no, I, I did too.
[11:57] The exercise your right to vote. So I wanted to, um, uh,
[12:02] acknowledge that for a second, I want to acknledge that people
[12:05] having such problems with their water bill or your utility
[12:08] bills, you can call 211 211 is the main number the
[12:13] warehouses on customer service where you can ask questions
[12:17] about either your WSSC bill, your PEPCO bill, any utility
[12:21] bill, you can go there and they can provide you assistance with
[12:24] that. Also, I don't have all the information, but there's an
[12:27] AI technology workshop for adults that's being hosted by
[12:30] University of Maryland College of Information. I will need to
[12:33] get more information in regards to time, and I will pass along
[12:36] the flyer to deceased staff so they can post that to the
[12:40] website hopefully And for single fathers, we know
[12:43] Father's Day is coming up. There's a single father's
[12:46] Awareness Care Day for you, um, which will be held on June 22nd
[12:52] from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. and the location will be at the Mixed
[12:57] Food Hall, which is 3809 Rhode Island Avenue and Brentwood,
[13:02] Maryland. Also, there is a job fair on
[13:05] June 17th from 10 to 1210 a.m. to 12 noon, being hosted by the
[13:12] Greater Washington region, Clean Cities Coalition,
[13:15] coalition at the Second Baptist Church at 5501 Silverhill Road
[13:21] and District Heights, Maryland, and I will leave this with the
[13:23] step also to um publicize and put information on the website.
[13:27] And that's all I have, Mr. Mayor. Thank you. Thank you.
[13:30] I'm sorry, I forgot one thing. This coming Wednesday, there is
[13:34] a senior activity at the College Park Woods Clubhouse
[13:37] from 1 to 3, which is game time. It's loads of fun and I hope
[13:41] that lots of seniors come out and and participate. Thank you.
[13:45] Thank you. It's good I'm sorry It's, Mr It's. Mayor, I did
[13:47] want to add something. I'm not, it's senoritis day to day. It's
[13:51] really sad. But um just to echo my comments of my colleagues
[13:54] that most of us, 3/4 of us will be out next week attending the
[13:58] Amre Municipal League Conference.
[14:00] and just want residents to know it's not an opportunity just a
[14:03] fellowship, but an opportunity to to learn different
[14:07] information about affordable housing or anything to that
[14:10] nature that we are working on in regards to our strategic
[14:12] plan, and we look forward to bringing back a report, a
[14:15] comprehensive report from all of us when we get back. Thank
[14:17] you. College Park will be in force.
[14:21] Thank you. All right, let's go to our
[14:26] student liaison, uh, starting with, uh, Stone liaisons.
[14:29] Martin. Hi, uh, so we've been meeting
[14:33] with the council members. We're trying to meet with everyone,
[14:36] um, Sammy and I to discuss our initiatives and then how we can
[14:39] help you guys with your own initiatives and then I recently
[14:43] applied for the bicycle and pedestrian Advisory Committee.
[14:46] So I'm excited to maybe uh do some work with that and then
[14:51] we're also restructuring the student liaison advisory
[14:53] committee, um, and we're working on getting that, uh,
[14:56] fully ready for when the semester starts in the fall.
[15:00] Let's go to side. Yeah, just, you know, building
[15:03] on that, we're kind of creating our priorities for the year, uh,
[15:06] really excited to work with you all on those and just building
[15:08] a really strong student advisory council as well as
[15:10] important because it's gonna allow us to connect student
[15:13] voices with all of you. So there's ever an issue you guys
[15:16] want student voice on, we're gonna have a very, very active
[15:18] council who's going to be able to immediately provide input.
[15:21] So that's kind of the structure we're formatting it around, but,
[15:23] uh, you know, just really looking forward to building
[15:25] initiatives and working with you all to do that.
[15:27] certainly. Thank you. Let's go to our city
[15:30] manager's report, Mr. Yang, uh, good evening, Mayor and council,
[15:33] residents of College Park, uh, just a couple of quick
[15:36] announcements. One, we'll be having some roadway patching
[15:39] work done this week. Uh, our contractors will begin, uh,
[15:42] roadway pageant and College Park Woods, and the Hollywood
[15:45] area to fix the deteriorating asphalt's following locations,
[15:51] uh, 3706 Marlborough Way, 3735 Marlboro Way, the 4900 block of
[15:57] Indian Lane between Forty-ninth Avenue and R
[15:59] ho de Island Avenue, Hollywood Road, and 51st Place
[16:03] intersection, and we also will have the 9700 block of
[16:07] Narragansett Parkway on the West Roadway section, and then
[16:11] we also will have the 4900 block of Nantucket Road. Uh, so
[16:15] we'll be having, uh, parking restrictions posted where
[16:18] necessary and just ask people to use caution in those work
[16:21] zones and adhere to posted parking restrictions. Um, we
[16:24] also have uh, College Park, uh, the
[16:27] Friday Night Live, our encore event, uh, this Friday from 6
[16:32] to 8:30 p.m. uh in our City Hall Plaza, uh, the
[16:40] entertainment is the dead flowers. I just had to make
[16:43] sure I was reading that right. And uh uh free parking will be
[16:47] available in our, our parking garage. Um, we also will have
[16:50] um begun our college planning for
[16:54] College Park Day, uh, believe it or not, we're already
[16:57] working for that, that's coming up in October. Um, right now,
[17:00] we're officially, uh, have opened our vendor food vendor
[17:04] applications, and we're encouraging people to apply for
[17:07] that. Uh, this year's event will be on Saturday, October
[17:09] 3rd. It'll be from 12:00 to 6 p.m. at the College Park
[17:14] Aviation Museum and Airport. Um, usually we get about 12,000
[17:18] visitors over those coast of those hours. Um
[17:21] so we would, uh, encourage, uh, anybody interested in being a
[17:25] vendor, uh, the applications, uh, are due by June 30th. We've
[17:31] only pick about 15 to 20 vendors. So there's, it's very
[17:35] limited, um, and, but we also look for a very wide diversity
[17:40] of food offerings, uh, for attendees, uh, to apply. You
[17:44] just need to go to www. College ParkMD.gov/CPD food vendor.
[17:54] You can also go to our website and you can uh see where you
[17:57] can apply there. Um, so, the applicants will be, uh,
[18:01] notified by July 15th of, of whether or not they were
[18:04] selected for our event, and then there's a $100
[18:07] registration that's due upon, um, approval.
[18:10] Uh, lastly, I just wanted to say thank you to, uh, Prince
[18:13] George's fire chief. I'm gonna, uh, butcher her last name,
[18:19] Michaelottis and Deputy Chief Harris and their staff as well
[18:23] as the council member Eric Olson, uh, uh, for a meeting
[18:28] that we held today, they kind of gave uh our staff briefing
[18:32] on some of the changes that are upcoming uh for the College
[18:36] Park Station. I've sent to each of you in your email
[18:40] um, uh, internal, uh, memo that that kind of outlines what
[18:44] those changes are, um, basically, um, it will remove a
[18:51] um, a unit, uh, advanced life support unit, out of the
[18:54] College Park, uh, location, uh, after 3 p.m. um
[18:59] so Monday through Friday and then on, on, on the weekends.
[19:03] Uh, so, um a little different, not ideal
[19:08] kind of model uh for us, but, um
[19:11] I think we're going to try and work with the university. I've
[19:14] already had discussions with uh Ms. Claros from the university
[19:19] and um also talked a little bit with the council member, uh,
[19:23] Olsen today. That's all I have for today
[19:25] Thank you, thank you for the update. Any question for Mr.
[19:28] Young? Seeingan. Let's do acknowledge,
[19:34] sorry, Muram Mr. Hernandez had his hand up very late, sir. I
[19:39] apologize. Uh, Mr. City Manager, the only question that I have
[19:42] is, uh, you said that they would be responded to by July
[19:45] 15th, uh, whether they did or didn't get uh accepted, right,
[19:50] the vendors, OK, I just wanted to make sure that we can
[19:52] communicate that back. Thank you. That's correct. July 15th
[19:55] is our um notification, uh, we'll start
[19:59] reviewing applications, obviously, uh, on July 1, so
[20:03] great, thank you. Thank you.
[20:05] Uh, let's do the acknowledgement. Uh, we have
[20:08] two elected, former elected officials in the meeting, um,
[20:14] one is in the room, a former district to council member Bob
[20:18] Catlin. Thank you, Mr. Catlin, for joining and also we have
[20:21] um District 3, former District 3
[20:26] city councilor John Rigg also joined online. Thank you, Mr.
[20:29] Rick, for joining Uh, Mr. Shorter, where did I
[20:33] miss? Uh, former District one city council or uh
[20:37] Mark Shorter also as shown. And Miss Collipark is with us
[20:42] as well. Thank you for coming. All right, um, let's do the
[20:48] proclamation an awards. We have 4 of them and let me read them,
[20:53] and they're fairly short. The first one is about
[20:58] Juneteenth and it reads as follows, whereas President
[21:04] Abraham Lincoln's emancipation Proclamation declared the
[21:08] freedom of enslaved people in Confederate territory and
[21:12] helped pave the way for the abolition of slavery in the
[21:16] United States, and whereas on June 19, 168 1865. News of
[21:24] emancipation raged and enslaved Africa
[21:26] n Americans in Texas, giving rise to the observance now
[21:30] known as Juneteenth. and whereas Juneteenth
[21:35] commemorates freedom, resilience, and the
[21:39] contributions of African-American.
[21:41] while providing an opportunity to
[21:44] reflect on our nation's history.
[21:47] and the ongoing pursuit of equality and justice, and
[21:51] whereas the city of College Park joins communities across
[21:53] the nation. in recognizing the significance
[21:58] and legacy of Juneteenth. Now they are forbid proclaimed by
[22:01] the iron council of the city of College Park, Maryland, that
[22:06] June 19, 2026 is hereby recognized as Juneteenth in the
[22:11] city of College Park and that all residents are
[22:15] encouraged to reflect upon our nation's history.
[22:19] and the continued pursuit of liberty, justice and equality
[22:22] for all. Proclaim this 9th day of June 2026, fozul Kabir mayor.
[22:28] City of College Park I will read the
[22:34] one on parade at the very end, and you
[22:37] will find out why I'll be doing it.
[22:41] Um, I'll then read the proclamations on the pollinator
[22:45] week, which is June 22nd to June 28, 2026. And it is as
[22:52] follows, whereas pollinators such as bees, butterflies,
[22:55] birds, bats, and other animals play a vital role in
[23:00] reproduction of flowering plants
[23:03] supporting healthy ecosystems that biodiversity and food
[23:08] production and whereas pollinators contribute to the
[23:11] production of approximately 1/3 of the food consumed worldwide
[23:16] and are essential to maintaining healthy
[23:20] agricultural and natural environments, and whereas
[23:24] pollinator populations face increasing threats from habitat
[23:28] loss, pesticide yields, climate change and other environmental
[23:33] pressures And whereas the city of College
[23:35] Park is committed to environmental stewardships and
[23:40] to supporting efforts that protect
[23:43] pollinators and their habitats. Now therefore be proclaimed by
[23:46] the Miran Council of the city of College Park that June 22 to
[23:50] 28, 2026 is hereby recognized as pollinator week in the city
[23:55] of College Park and residents are encouraged to support
[24:01] pollinator friendly practices that help sustain healthy
[24:05] ecosystems, strengthen food systems and enhance the quality
[24:10] of life in our community proclaim this 9th day of June
[24:13] 2026. Fazil Kerier city of College Park.
[24:18] and the third one is about the 25th
[24:23] 250th anniversary of American independence.
[24:27] and it reads as follows, whereas on July 4th, 1776, the
[24:33] 13 American colonies adopted the United States Declaration
[24:37] of Independence proclaiming the principles of liberty, equality,
[24:42] self-government, and the pursuit of happiness.
[24:45] and on July 4th, 2026, the United States will commemorate
[24:51] the 250th anniversary of its founding, known as America's
[24:57] semi Quincendental. semiquincentennial marking 2.5
[25:04] centuries of democratic governance, civic participation,
[25:07] resilience and progress. And whereas Independence Day
[25:11] provides an opportunity to honor the generations of
[25:15] military services, service members, public servants,
[25:18] community leaders and citizens whose efforts have helped
[25:22] preserve and strengthen the ideals upon which this nation
[25:27] was founded. And whereas the city of College
[25:31] Park joins communities across the nation in recognizing the
[25:35] significance of this historic milestone and encouraging
[25:40] residents to reflect on our nation's history and the
[25:44] endearing principles that unite us.
[25:47] Now therefore be proclaimed by the Mean council of the City of
[25:52] College Park that July 4th, 2 2026 is hereby recognized as
[25:57] Independence Day and the 250th anniversary of the United
[26:01] States of America and all residents are encouraged to
[26:07] commemorate this historic milestone and renew their
[26:11] commitment to the ideals of liberty, equality, and
[26:15] self-government, proclaimed this 9th day of June
[26:18] 2026 Basil Kabir mayor's City of
[26:21] College Park and the 4th and final one.
[26:25] is about the turret syndrome awareness month and it
[26:30] is as follows. Whereas Tourette's syndrome or TS, in
[26:34] short, is a neurological disorder characterized by
[26:41] involuntary movements and vocalizations known as tics,
[26:46] affecting individuals of all ages and backgrounds, and
[26:50] whereas Tourette's syndrome, and other tic disorders can
[26:55] impact daily life and are often misunderstood, leading to a
[26:59] stigma and barriers to inclusion and whereas increased
[27:05] awareness. education, and understanding
[27:09] help faster acceptance and support for individuals and
[27:13] families affected by Tare syndrome
[27:17] and whereas individuals living with Tourette's syndrome make
[27:21] valuable contributions to their schools, workplaces,
[27:24] communities, and civic life. And where organizations such as
[27:30] Turret Association of America, promote research
[27:34] education, advocacy, and support for those affected by
[27:38] Tourette syndrome. Now therefore be it proclaimed by
[27:41] the mayor and council of the city of College Park that the
[27:44] month of May is hereby recognized as Toret syndrome
[27:50] awareness Month in the city of College Park and all residents
[27:54] are encouraged to learn more about Tourette's syndrome,
[27:58] support those affected by condition and help create a
[28:02] more inclusive and understanding community for all,
[28:06] proclaimed this 9th day of June 2026, Fazil Kiir Mayor, Syria
[28:11] College Park. So what I'm going to do, this
[28:15] is a proclamation that was requested by our Miss College
[28:19] Park, and thank you for asking us to do it. So I'm going to go
[28:22] to the podium. and give the proclamation to
[28:26] her. Um, I hope that is OK with the council.
[28:30] Um, and probably I think it'd be fitting if you all can take
[28:33] a group photo with his college park. Thank you.
[28:51] So let's give it to you first I.
[28:55] I think Thank you. Your counsel, please
[29:03] come forward and we can tell you what to see
[29:09] Oh It's a good idea
[30:04] Thank you. That's our, that's our city
[30:14] center. All right, that was wonderful.
[30:26] So let's do our next order of business, which is about public
[30:30] comments. So if you have been patiently waiting to make
[30:32] public comments. This is your time. If you have joined online,
[30:36] please raise your virtual hands, and we will allow you to speak.
[30:41] um Thank you, Mr. Dors and using,
[30:46] if you follow our new rules of councils council's rules and
[30:51] procedure, you can talk about anything under the sun at the
[30:56] the only condition is you only have 3 minutes, no more than 3
[31:00] minutes. Right, uh, my name is Dave Dorse and I'm here for
[31:05] over half a century in the city of College Park. Uh, one of the
[31:08] things that I wanted to find out is did you guys sell that
[31:11] house at 4704 Calvert Road yet if not,
[31:15] why not? The city does not need to be in the housing business
[31:20] The other thing I've noticed is that we've started putting
[31:24] these cameras on the stop signs.
[31:26] Now supposedly this was for a public purpose.
[31:30] But the purpose is, it seems to be just gouging money out of
[31:33] people that, that the wheel doesn't come to a 100% complete
[31:38] stop, even though it might just be turning a quarter of the way.
[31:43] Nope. fines, and I don't think that's
[31:47] really justified unless you've had a lot of accidents at one
[31:50] of these intersections. I don't think this is justified. The
[31:54] only people that make anything out of this or the company that
[31:57] supplies it in the city because both of them get the money.
[32:00] Thank you. Thank you so much. Let's allow, unless someone, OK.
[32:07] Councilor Catlin, former councilor.
[32:09] Please come forward For the record, please state
[32:11] your name and if you're a resident. Yes, thank you. I'm
[32:15] Bob Catlin, Collis Park resident since the late 80s, uh,
[32:19] also I'm currently the vice chair of the College Park
[32:22] Housing Authority. So I'd like to thank the mayor and uh
[32:26] Councilwoman Jordan for attending the ceremony
[32:30] yesterday honoring the award of $3.15 million to Attic towers
[32:35] for much needed renovations uh, that helps. We've got money
[32:38] from a couple of other people that stayed in from the city in
[32:41] the past couple of years, so that contributes a lot to the
[32:44] funds that we have to make these renovations. We're not
[32:47] all the way there yet, but I think we will be in the near
[32:49] future. um.
[32:53] A few weeks ago, you started talking about the boulevard
[32:56] project, which was uh the resurrection of a detailed site
[33:01] plan for uh an apartment project at Cherokee Street and
[33:06] it's had 3 DSPs approved since the early 2000s and the one now
[33:11] apparently is resurrecting the last one that was approved
[33:14] about 2013. So it gave me a topic because we've had other
[33:17] DSPs approved in the city over the last 30 years, where the
[33:21] projects never got built either. Uh,
[33:23] so it's, I can't talk about all of them in the next minute and
[33:26] a half, but I get probably take 2 sessions to
[33:30] give you just a quick, uh, rundown on what happened. uh
[33:34] about 30 years ago, McDonald, it was a McDonald's next to the
[33:38] vigilante Coffee. and
[33:41] it got approved to put another McDonald's behind that one, and
[33:46] that never got built, uh, because McDonald's bought the
[33:49] property across the street where the McDonald's is
[33:52] currently, and they resurrected that as a McDonald's. We had
[33:56] two other, uh, fast food projects approved with DSPs on
[34:02] Route one in that area, a Wendy's and one I can't recall,
[34:05] and they were approved by the planning board, and they never
[34:07] got built. But they were not built for the
[34:10] same reason that the first project at the Metropolitan
[34:12] wasn't built. The counts, the uh county councilman for the
[34:16] district rejected the planning board's approval. That was
[34:19] something they could do way back then. They could change
[34:22] the approval or they could reject the approval. Uh
[34:26] so the city opposed both of those uh fast food projects and
[34:31] fortunately we got them rejected by the district
[34:34] council. So those are two things that
[34:37] happened that were really important. College Park would
[34:39] look a lot different today if we had two more fast food
[34:43] restaurants across from Lakeland and Berwyn. Thank you.
[34:45] Thank you so much and thank you for your service to the housing
[34:48] Authority. Appreciate that
[34:51] Um, saying none in the room, let's go to virtual and let's
[34:55] start with former consumer John Rick. Um, let's kind of staff
[34:59] allow Mr. Rick to speak. I don't have that privilege.
[35:03] Yes, can you hear me? Yes, please. Thank you, Mr. Rick.
[35:06] Please go ahead. Thank you, Mr. Thank you, Mr. Mayor, and thank
[35:09] you for uh the council for permitting me to speak this
[35:12] evening. I'm coming to you with a matter of uh substantial
[35:16] importance and also of time sensitivity. Um, I was notified
[35:20] last week through colleagues who, well, for those of you who
[35:22] don't know me, I've worked for the last 25 years as a, as a
[35:25] paramedic. A paramedic is an emergency medical services
[35:27] provider with the highest level of training. We can provide
[35:31] certain surgical interventions administer medications and de
[35:34] fi b ri ll ate uh, or, or change the heart rate or rhythm
[35:37] of, of many different heart rates that will otherwise kill
[35:40] somebody. We're also extremely helpful in the event of a
[35:42] massive trauma and are considered sort of the top of
[35:44] the profession in terms of emergency medical services that
[35:47] are provided by calling 911. Our only paramedic unit in the
[35:51] city of College Park is Medic 812, which sits at the Company
[35:55] 12 fire station on uh in Lakeland, um right there that
[35:59] you all are familiar with across the street. Uh,
[36:01] basically from, from City Hall, just down the street
[36:04] from City Hall. Early last week, I was notified by a colleague
[36:07] of mine who is a Prince George's County firefighter
[36:10] that, uh, the county is proposing to pull the only
[36:13] paramedic unit in the City of College Park out of the city of
[36:15] College Park, except for the hours of 7 a.m. to 3:00 p.m.
[36:19] Monday through Friday. This will leave an enormous gap
[36:22] in service in the city of College Park. We will have to
[36:24] be served by other outlying organizations for, for, for
[36:28] paramedic service. They would have to come from A Delphi or
[36:31] from Greenbelt, um, and Company 812, Paramedicate12 is the only
[36:36] medic service between Beltsville and the DC line. Um,
[36:39] it will leave an enormous gap, not just for the City of
[36:41] College Park, but also as a primary paramedic service for
[36:43] the cities of Hyattsville, uh, the city of, uh, Riverdale Park
[36:47] and, and others up and down the Rat one corridor.
[36:50] My understanding is that the county is proceeding very
[36:52] quickly with implementation of this change, which will have an
[36:56] extremely negative impact on our own emergency response in
[36:58] the city of College Park. I believe that they intend to
[37:01] implement it on the first day of the new fiscal year, which
[37:04] is July 1. I would urge the City of College Park to speak
[37:07] strongly out against this. I've had conversations with the
[37:10] university and with other concerned uh residents, but
[37:13] it's happening so quickly, it seems as though the county's
[37:15] going to try to to pull a fast one and do this as quickly as
[37:18] possible and then um and then try to make us fight to get it
[37:21] back. I, I would urge you to, to draft a letter tonight in
[37:25] strong opposition to making this change and protect the
[37:29] residents of the city of College Park. Um, as I've
[37:31] listened to all of you, uh, make your announcements tonight.
[37:34] I'm reminded of the many residents in our city who are
[37:38] vulnerable to having an emergency who might require the
[37:42] services of a paramedic, the prompt services of a paramedic,
[37:44] uh, College Park Day is a graded example. Attic Towers is
[37:47] a primary user of advanced life support services in our city.
[37:50] Both of those just as small examples
[37:52] would be much. more poorly served if that
[37:55] medic unit were removed from the city of College Park. So on
[37:58] behalf of our city and our 35,000 residents, I would urge
[38:01] the city council to draft a letter to to the county, uh,
[38:05] instructing them to keep advanced life support services
[38:08] in the City of College Park. Thank you.
[38:10] Thank you so much for your advocacy and
[38:13] we will consider sending a letter today, uh, as well.
[38:16] Thank you. It's coming. All right, let's go to the next
[38:21] speaker, Jay Herrera. Can you please unmute yourself
[38:28] and uh for the record please state your name and if
[38:31] you're a resident of College Park.
[38:33] My name is Juan Herrera, and I am a resident of College Park.
[38:36] Are you able to hear me? You can hear you. Please go
[38:38] ahead OK. I initially wasn't gonna
[38:42] say anything, but council remember Hernandez brought
[38:46] something up, so. I wanna speak to that, um.
[38:49] back in May, I went on vacation and I did fill out that uh
[38:53] premise check form online. I did not receive anything from
[38:57] the city or the county saying that my form had been received,
[39:01] that it had been approved, or that it had been forwarded. It
[39:04] was just utter silence since I completed the form and like
[39:08] I've said in prior meetings, even my neighbors, they told me
[39:12] that they didn't see any police presence during that time that
[39:15] I was on vacation. Uh, my ring cameras also didn't catch any
[39:20] anybody. anybody that, uh, they caught
[39:22] other people, but they didn't catch any police like pull up
[39:25] to my house, kind of look around, or it was just regular
[39:29] people, regular neighbors that I would see on the ring cameras,
[39:32] never saw a police officer, never saw a police car stop in
[39:35] front of my house, and according to my neighbors, also
[39:38] they never saw no police. so I just wanted to bring that
[39:41] up, so you know, I'm not sure if you even do get a response
[39:45] when you complete the form or or not. That was all.
[39:50] Yeah, I would strongly encourage you to be in touch
[39:53] with our staff, um, and they can probably find out what
[39:58] happened and suddenly we are here to serve you and make
[40:02] things better. Um, thank you
[40:06] Mr. Mayor, may I make a suggestion that, uh, Mr.
[40:09] Herrera sent an email so that we can follow up with the
[40:11] details with our contract please.
[40:13] So that because I mean it would it's just a like a prudent step
[40:18] of us. I know that we're not supposed to respond, but yeah,
[40:20] certainly I'm just making the recommendation.
[40:22] Yeah, um, please reach out to the staff and certainly, um, we
[40:26] can find out more. from our side
[40:30] So just via email, uh, Mr. Herrera. I just think it's,
[40:33] it's important for us to be able to follow up through our
[40:36] liaising, uh, with the director of Public Services.
[40:40] Thank you. All right, uh, Xing Nan, let's
[40:45] go to the next order of business, and which is.
[40:52] um amendments to and approval of the agenda, Council member
[40:56] Os. Yeah, uh, Consumer Hernandez,
[40:59] who's gonna do it. You wanna do it? OK, sure, um, so, uh,
[41:04] wanted to thank, uh, former council member Rigg, uh, for
[41:07] his attention issue and again appreciate staff uh and had a
[41:12] meeting earlier today regarding this issue with the Prince
[41:14] George's County Department of Fire and Emergency Medical
[41:16] Services, um, I think knowing that this is um coming up
[41:20] quickly, uh, I would like to propose to add to our consent
[41:24] agenda, um, to ask staff to send a letter conveying the
[41:27] strong view of our city council that College Park continued to
[41:30] have advanced life support, uh, in College Park, um.
[41:35] happy to, uh, have any discussion of other things that
[41:39] folks would like added. Thank you. I think, I think
[41:42] it's pretty clear. I don't think there is a discussion for
[41:46] Councilor Hernandez, 2, but just to add a comment, I mean,
[41:49] I hope that this is just like the letters the first step and
[41:53] that we include the our our legislative officials, county
[41:57] officials, and other impacted municipalities, uh, for
[42:02] awareness, uh, I think it's, it's an important step, but we
[42:05] also have a county lobbyist, don't we? Uh, this time around
[42:09] we're not, we're gonna ask them for some help.
[42:11] uh to make sure that they're, they're advocating, I mean,
[42:15] we're gonna go into like a big hiatus throughout the month, so
[42:18] the um maybe Mr. Yang, do you have any
[42:21] comments? Uh, I think that would be
[42:23] appropriate. I think we'd add, uh, University of Maryland as
[42:26] well, um, along with that, but yes, we can, LA Perez and
[42:31] Associates were also involve them as well, certainly, thank
[42:34] you, Mr. Holtz just suggest that, uh, you know, as opposed
[42:39] to the focus being on the letter, I think it's, you know,
[42:41] that's a part of this, but I'm trying to convey it on behalf
[42:45] of council, um, although it is on the proposed for the consent
[42:48] agenda that, um, you know, the policy of the council and the
[42:52] mayor of council is that, you know, we want this,
[42:54] so what you know if there's other advocacy that's needed, I
[42:57] think that can be a staff discretion.
[42:59] Thank you. All right, Council on this for
[43:02] the comment. Yeah, sorry, Mr. Mayer. Uh, if possible, if the
[43:05] letter could request the data, uh, and analysis demonstrating
[43:09] the need to do this pilot, uh, I understand that we've asked
[43:12] in the past for uh Prince George's County fire and EMS to
[43:17] provide data, but it, we need to be able to tell the
[43:21] residents what the impact is going to, like how it's going
[43:24] to affect them. Uh, I'd also ask for them to encourage the,
[43:28] the county fire, uh, to uh engage residents and other
[43:33] stakeholders. I feels like this is just like a, a quick letter
[43:36] that was sent on I see June 5th for action on June 29th. I'm
[43:40] sure that there's a lot of different things that go on, uh,
[43:43] and that this is a well-meaning effort by our partners at the
[43:46] county, but we want to express our our deep concern. Certainly.
[43:50] So I think there is an agreement and there is a motion
[43:54] and the second, um, all in favor. Say I on this amendment.
[43:59] I, and he opposed to any abs 10 tion
[44:01] So this motion, this item has been
[44:06] added to the agenda. Is there any
[44:08] other amendment? Saying none, I entertain
[44:12] emotion right now. to accept the agenda the way it
[44:16] was amended. All in Swiss 2nd, second by
[44:22] Councilor Hernandez, um, all in favor say aye, and he opposed
[44:25] any abstention. the um agenda has been approved.
[44:30] So now we have 2 consent agenda items
[44:36] Mr. Mayor, what is the item number for the, um, letter? It
[44:42] should be 26159. Am I correct? Am I sure, Madam Clark, OK. 26G
[44:49] 59. So there are two concerned agenda. Let me read them first,
[44:52] and then I will entertain emotion. The first one is 26G58,
[44:56] which is the approval of the March 3, 2026, Mayor and
[45:00] council minutes, and the second, which had just has been added,
[45:04] is 26G59. is a letter to Prince George's
[45:12] Fire department and other entities as expressed during
[45:18] the council comments about expressing concerns about the
[45:23] um discontinuation or lack of services of the advanced life
[45:30] support, um, services in College Park, otherwise called
[45:33] ALS. Um, and the staff will, um
[45:36] take from there Uh, I entertain emotion at this
[45:40] point? Moved to accept the consent
[45:42] agenda. Second.
[45:46] Council member, moved by Mayor Putam Maki and seconded by
[45:49] Council member. Oates, all in favors the I.
[45:53] and he opposed any abstention, the
[45:58] consent agenda has been approved.
[46:01] All right, now we go to uh the two actually quite a few
[46:06] presentations we have a we'll, we'll start with
[46:10] 4 of them. Well, let's start with the first one, which is
[46:13] the um where the discussion of the bike and pedestrian
[46:18] community, BPAC regarding their annual work plan, and this will
[46:22] be kicked off by our grants coordinator
[46:25] Mr. Rafi and thank you, um, um, the
[46:30] members of the uh BPAC for your service to the community. Thank
[46:34] you. Uh, I appreciate that. Uh, Mr. Rafi, please. Good
[46:36] evening, Mayor and council. Um, I'm joined here by Chair
[46:42] Schroeder and um by committee member Shelby Burke. Uh, today
[46:46] will be a brief presentation just to discuss um a committee
[46:51] overview what we do as a committee, um, then I'll pass
[46:54] it over to, um Mark to discuss some of the committee
[46:58] priorities over the past, uh, mentioned over the past 6
[47:02] months or so, and then we'll conclude with the Q&
[47:05] A session Um, for some background, the
[47:07] committee was formed in 2023. Um, it functions as an advisory
[47:12] committee, uh, with a focus on assisting in the preparation of
[47:16] a citywide, uh, bikeway master plan and assisting in
[47:21] conducting evaluation and assessments of bike and
[47:24] walkability equity in the city. uh, to date
[47:27] the committee has developed an annual plan, which is a
[47:29] document that's a high level strategic document, uh, that
[47:34] collects our recommendations and it will be a form of a
[47:37] foundation for either a bikeway master plan or, or any uh
[47:42] similar plan that the city will put out eventually. Um
[47:46] some things we've completed or are working on are the um we've
[47:50] received a bike friendly community uh designation, uh,
[47:55] bronze designation, um, we've advocated for the ordinance on
[48:00] enforcing bike lane obstructions in the past year,
[48:03] uh, the committee has, uh, assisted staff in, um, applying
[48:09] for and um positioning ourselves for uh safe streets
[48:13] and roads for all, which is a federal grant program to
[48:17] establish a comprehensive safety action plan, uh, that's
[48:21] to eliminate roadway, uh, fatalities and serious injuries
[48:24] for all modes of transportation.
[48:28] and um the committee has assisted staff in bicycle and
[48:33] pedestrian impact statements which make recommendations for
[48:36] infrastructure and facilities within a half mile of new
[48:39] development. Uh, the committee is also involved, uh, in, uh,
[48:43] community outreach, uh, that includes bike to Work Day,
[48:46] College Park Day, Hollywood Farmers' Market, uh, conducting
[48:51] community surveys and audits with other committees as well,
[48:54] um, and some of the outputs include assisting development
[48:57] of citywide, uh, safety action plan, which is forthcoming in
[49:00] the next few months we'll be working on that, um, informing
[49:05] city policies and planning similar similarly to what we um
[49:08] helped with the uh bike lane obstruction ordinance and just
[49:13] continuing community engagement and expanding on those measures.
[49:17] I'll go ahead and turn it over to um Mark now.
[49:20] Mr. Shorter, thank you OK
[49:24] Thank you. Um, first, I would like to address what I take to
[49:28] have been uh, a complaint at the, when we
[49:32] were asked to present and the complaint was that the bike
[49:36] plan was vastly greater than any possible activity we could
[49:41] accomplish in the in the coming year. That's true. I take
[49:44] responsibility for it. Um, the reason it is such a a wide
[49:50] ranging plan is that to a large extent we don't control.
[49:55] uh, our priorities. Our priorities come from you and
[49:58] your priorities tend to change. We are advisory, um, we tend
[50:02] not to want to spend a lot of time advising you about things
[50:05] that you don't want advice about.
[50:08] Um, so, uh, and, and since the things you want advice about
[50:13] tend to change. We wanted to, to make ourselves available to
[50:18] give you advice about whatever that might happen to be. And so
[50:21] that's why it's uh that's why it's all over the map there.
[50:24] Um, now for in preparation for, uh, for this presentation, I
[50:30] went to the, to BPAC and, and proposed certain priorities
[50:34] based on what you have been doing and what you have been
[50:37] asking for from us or what we thought you were asking for
[50:40] from us. Um number one, our first priority
[50:44] is your complete streets program.
[50:46] uh, and to remind you what is the plan
[50:50] for Complete Streets in FY 27. that would be
[50:55] uh DARP, um, excuse me, 4-eighth
[50:58] Place. uh, possibly Dartmouth, there's
[51:01] a, there's an indication here that it's on hold for some
[51:04] reason. Badwin, also a possibility
[51:07] that's on hold. Wellesley ranchville Road
[51:12] um, and in FY 28, the indications are
[51:15] uh, Dartmouth
[51:18] Bowden 51st Avenue phase 2.
[51:22] and uh uh Saint Andrew's Place.
[51:27] Um the second priority we had
[51:32] based on your preliminary budget, which turned out not to
[51:36] this item turned out not to get into your final budget was for
[51:38] bike racks. That was a potentially very interesting
[51:43] program, but since it isn't currently funded, it may not be
[51:46] our second priority. Uh, the third item I'm going to
[51:51] combine these two because although they're somewhat
[51:54] different, they're both tend to be very cheap projects, uh,
[51:58] BPIS, uh, bicycle pedestrian impact statements. Those are,
[52:03] those are pri private development will have impacts
[52:07] on on cyclists and pedestrians. Um, but we can't ask for a
[52:13] million dollars for impact mitigation. Um, they tends to
[52:18] be less than, less than $100,000. So those will be
[52:22] fairly cheap projects. Um, safe streets for all,
[52:25] similarly, uh, those will be demonstration projects, which
[52:30] means that you can't put up, you can't spend the money on
[52:34] anything that will be a permanent change to the street
[52:36] grid, um, so those will, those will be like temporary barriers.
[52:43] Our 4th priority is connectivity, and here we're
[52:47] getting into some fairly deep waters, but many neighborhoods
[52:51] in the city were built without any thought that the people who
[52:55] live there might have to leave there by
[52:59] foot or bicycle. Um, I will go through a I will
[53:02] go through a couple of the, of, of examples and at, and at the
[53:06] end of what I have to say, shall be bid, we'll have a,
[53:09] we'll have a cut, we'll have some comments about College
[53:13] Park Woods. Um, so I was on the council when we
[53:18] approved the IKEA project with the associated, uh, apartments
[53:23] and townhouses, um we were giving no thought to
[53:28] anything except get that project was going to be built
[53:31] regardless. We were giving no thought to anything except
[53:34] getting the tax revenue. We did, it was clear that if we, if we
[53:38] wanted to have a, an exit out of there that would serve
[53:41] cyclists and pedestrians. um
[53:43] not Route one um, that it would just be, it
[53:46] would just it would just kill the project if we, if we, if we
[53:51] got it, but we weren't going to get it. The project was going
[53:54] to go ahead anyway. What we have is
[53:57] you can't get in there and out of there by, by bicycle or foot.
[54:02] Um, if you're going to, if you're going from the city or,
[54:05] or to the city. Um.
[54:07] that's unsafe Um, second
[54:10] um we have
[54:13] Crystal Springs Crystal Springs, the only way
[54:16] in and out, it's legal. is Metarat Road
[54:20] If you want, if you, if you want to get to the university
[54:24] from there by, by what? uh I wouldn't suggest doing
[54:28] this by bicycle. You will walk up, you will walk over a wooded
[54:33] grassy area to 193 walk in, walk in the, on the shoulder of
[54:37] 193 until you get, until you get to a red light to cross
[54:40] there. Um
[54:43] Metsarat Road is not appropriate for, for banks for
[54:46] bikes or pedestrians. and they're any number of other
[54:51] um ways in which we have created bottle bottlenecks,
[54:56] lack of con connectivity like and therefore lack of safe
[54:59] egress. Um our fifth priority and this one,
[55:04] I abstained on this one because I didn't think you wanted any
[55:08] advice about it. Um, is lowering the speed limit to 20
[55:13] MPH in the city. Um, and, uh, the uh
[55:18] my fellow committee members would like to point out to you
[55:21] that the enfor that if you said a 20 mile per hour speed limit,
[55:25] it's really only enforceable about 40 miles an hour, um, and
[55:29] at 40, so if you set it at 25 miles an hour, it's only really
[55:34] enforceable at 45, and if, if a car hits a pedestrian at 45
[55:37] miles an hour, the pedestrian is probably going to die.
[55:40] That's what they would like to tell you. Um, number 6, we, we
[55:46] want to cont we want to work with the city on, uh, improving
[55:50] certain, certain important corridors in the, in the city.
[55:54] Obviously Rhode Island Avenue, um, Duke Street, Saint Andrew's
[55:57] Place, Edward 49th Greenbelt, Rhode Island
[56:01] Campus Drive at Route 1 and the Mets, and Metzra Road
[56:04] crossings. Uh, and if Shelby has a word to
[56:09] say. Sure, thank you so much. um, Shelby Bird, District 4,
[56:15] and College Park Woods residents. So thank you all so
[56:18] much for the opportunity to speak. Thank you, Mark. Thank
[56:20] you, Mr. Rafi, for your leadership as well. And just to
[56:26] add on how important connectivity is in building
[56:30] community in College Park Woods, we have several, um, amenities
[56:34] that have been invested in by the city
[56:36] as well as by the County and the Park Commission, and they
[56:40] are very difficult to get to. without a car, and so as part
[56:46] of the bicycle pedestrian advisory Committee. We want to
[56:51] emphasize that being able to reach elementary schools by
[56:55] foot, perhaps such as Cherokee Lane, um, would be possible if
[57:00] it were safe to walk to where those paths are, at this time,
[57:05] we have many parents who choose to drive their students, uh,
[57:09] down to the park entrance, um, very close to my
[57:13] residence on 9116 St. Andrew's Place, and they choose to do
[57:17] that not just in bad weather, but in all times because it is
[57:21] the safest way to transport their children. Similarly, my
[57:26] daughter attends Robert Goddard Montessori School. Her bus stop
[57:30] is at the top of our neighborhood, Saint Andrews and
[57:34] Duke, and um she is a very quick, uh, 5 year old, but I
[57:38] would not trust her to be able to walk up there by herself,
[57:41] nor would I feel safe walking her even holding
[57:47] hands as surprisingly, um, how fast individuals are able to
[57:52] drive between two stop signs in front of my house that are 0.1
[57:58] miles apart with a speed hump at each stop sign, and folks
[58:03] are still able to reach speeds that would be catastrophic if
[58:08] they were to hit a pedestrian. And so we certainly appreciate
[58:12] the continu ous investment and research
[58:15] that it takes to make the best decisions for our community to
[58:18] make everybody safe. Thank you. Thank you
[58:20] Um Mr. Raffi, please. Yeah, I'll
[58:26] just turn it over to questions at this point if there are any.
[58:28] OK. So, um
[58:31] there are, there have been quite a few, uh
[58:35] ideas and suggestions from VPAC and thank you, thank you for
[58:38] sharing those ideas. Let's hear from the council, um, we'll
[58:43] start with Councilor Hernandez. Hey, thanks for, thanks for the,
[58:46] the very thorough report and the strategic nature of it. It
[58:49] was really well, you can tell a council
[58:52] member, a former council member is leading the charge there. Um,
[58:55] I've, I've had the opportunity to join some of these BPAC
[58:57] meetings, and they are run like a well-oiled machine. Uh, I
[59:03] wanna make a suggestion slash recommendation, uh, to the
[59:07] bicycle and pedestrian advisory Committee. The Route One
[59:10] developments that are coming up. I mean, we need all hands on
[59:13] deck in order to make sure that like proper bicycle and
[59:20] pedestrian infrastructure is in place.
[59:22] So I mean that means comments, that means showing up to the
[59:25] meetings, that means writing letters. It's gonna be super
[59:28] important because I've heard or the suggestion that it might
[59:32] not necessarily be suitable for, but I, uh, bicycle like
[59:37] infrastructure north of Maryland 193. So, as the most
[59:41] uh organized I've ever seen, uh, a,
[59:44] a committee, uh, to, to, to lobby and advocate. I'd really,
[59:48] really appreciate seeing some of those recommendations being
[59:51] pushed, mostly in a, in a, in a way that can be executable,
[59:56] right? Uh, there's gonna be a lot of folks that talk, but I
[59:59] mean, if people show up and they're organized, I think
[1:00:01] we're gonna see some successful recommendations. One of the
[1:00:05] things I, I didn't have the opportunity to, I guess, really
[1:00:08] get into, but or see Edgewood itself is, so Edgewood,
[1:00:12] which sits in District one, in North College Park for those
[1:00:16] who are unaware, um at some point was going to be
[1:00:21] redone Uh, I'm wondering or curious
[1:00:27] what recommendations BPA has in place ready for that, um, for
[1:00:32] that development, I know that we've seen recommendations
[1:00:35] prior to or I've seen them from, uh, Mr. Hayes, I want to
[1:00:38] believe, uh, when during one of his presentations, uh, do you
[1:00:42] have any, uh, predictions on how you guys
[1:00:46] hope to work with the city engineer.
[1:00:47] So Steve Halperin told us that his
[1:00:52] plan, his plan, which of course is subject to your approval. Uh,
[1:01:00] when Edward next needs uh repaving is to install a bike
[1:01:07] lane on the north end of it. from, uh, Route one to Rhode
[1:01:12] Island. Um, that would have
[1:01:15] two effects. Uh, first of all, it would protect bikers in the,
[1:01:21] in the bike lane in that stretch.
[1:01:23] Uh, and second, it would, uh, force narrowing of, it would
[1:01:27] narrow the street, which would force slower traffic, which
[1:01:32] would tend to pre protect both the children walking to
[1:01:37] Hollywood Elementary, and the people and the children walking
[1:01:41] to the bus stop, that's right near Hollywood Elementary.
[1:01:44] um so
[1:01:47] we thought that was a good plan, um, and
[1:01:51] uh, we are therefore waiting for
[1:01:53] Edgewood to get torn up I, I, I'm hopeful that when we
[1:01:57] do do that, we preserve the like some aspects of the
[1:02:01] parking. I know a lot of the residents have have raised
[1:02:03] concerns about the limited parking that's on Edgewood. So,
[1:02:06] I mean, we're gonna need to work together. Um, and secondly,
[1:02:10] I know that, uh, the North College Park Community
[1:02:14] Association sent over a letter requesting the extension of the
[1:02:19] trolley trail. Uh, we can get into the historic elements of
[1:02:22] where the trolley was or where the trolley was not, but
[1:02:26] uh I believe that you all have been connected with uh Megan
[1:02:29] and their team, uh, in order to try to, to look at what it
[1:02:33] would look like to expand north of, I want to say it's, I guess
[1:02:37] north of Maryland, 193, and possibly connecting to the
[1:02:41] counties recently, uh, developed a large sidewalk just
[1:02:46] north of Odessa, uh, heading up towards, uh, Sunnyside. I'd
[1:02:50] like for there to be some strategic consideration here,
[1:02:52] given the fact that many of our projects that are forward
[1:02:55] facing, including uh the annexation efforts may connect
[1:02:59] back into that if we are successful. So I, I believe it
[1:03:04] would be very helpful. if, uh, the city engineer
[1:03:11] received a message from the council
[1:03:14] that they would like him to do a walking tour.
[1:03:18] and indicate which there are there are at least 3 ways.
[1:03:22] that you can extend the trolley trail for, for
[1:03:26] pedestrians, um, one is with the current
[1:03:29] substandard uh
[1:03:33] sidewalk on the west side. uh, on the Western Service Road.
[1:03:39] One is by putting a sidewalk which does not currently exist
[1:03:44] on the eastern Service Road and the third is, I'm probably the
[1:03:49] most expensive alternative. Um the, uh, putting a sidewalk
[1:03:55] directly next to uh, the, the bike lanes that
[1:03:59] you've already got there. Um, now,
[1:04:02] I think it is not helpful, it is not useful.
[1:04:05] to have to not have some expert
[1:04:11] opinions about whether one of those alternatives is cost
[1:04:16] prohibitive or not. Um, so in my view,
[1:04:19] um, we, you need to, we need to
[1:04:23] have an idea about what's feasible.
[1:04:26] Thank you. Yes, uh, for those who don't know or who aren't,
[1:04:30] uh, regularly up in this area. uh
[1:04:33] there tends to be a lot of residents who use the bicycle
[1:04:38] lane as a walking lane. Uh, I mean, it is an active road, uh,
[1:04:42] Rhode Island Avenue. Uh, and these are, you know, temporary
[1:04:46] bollards that won't necessarily do much to stop, uh, any sort
[1:04:51] of car should something happen, it's more of a reminder of
[1:04:53] anything. Uh, what I'd like to make sure that we're all
[1:04:56] working together, right, on is, is what that looks like in the
[1:05:00] future. Happy to have a larger conversation on council. I
[1:05:02] don't know if you're aware, but Conso was
[1:05:05] proud to uh to include in this year's budget a traffic study
[1:05:09] that's going to look at what potential uh
[1:05:13] outlets, I guess like egress, uh, spots will be best for cars
[1:05:18] to come out of the service roads. Right now, what's
[1:05:21] happening is people are rushing right out of them to try to get
[1:05:23] onto Rhode Island Service Road, uh, potentially putting a lot
[1:05:26] of people in danger and also just causing extreme backup and
[1:05:29] delays, uh, and with Duval Field coming on board, uh,
[1:05:32] we're gonna see a lot more traffic. So hopefully we can
[1:05:36] tie all of these multiple efforts together in order to be
[1:05:39] able to move forward successfully. Thank you, thank
[1:05:41] you so much. Let's go to Councilor Mitchell and then
[1:05:44] Councilor Oates. No.
[1:05:50] No. OK, thank you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you for your report. I
[1:05:53] appreciate your due diligence and intentionality, um, one
[1:05:57] thing I, I know we just have the, uh, we will have the
[1:06:01] opportunity to nominate Miss Martin to be a part of the BPAC
[1:06:05] Committee, and one of the things that we talked about
[1:06:07] with her, I did, was the fact that, um, looking at the
[1:06:12] university's transportation plan and trying to incorporate
[1:06:15] that into our plan as well, moving forward to help us with
[1:06:19] um um bicycle safety as well as um
[1:06:23] those who are pedestrians. Um, also, I just wanted to ask in
[1:06:27] regards to your plan, I hope it's my hope that we will have
[1:06:32] more opportunities for engagement with the community.
[1:06:36] Going out to the community and talk about
[1:06:40] what you do as a committee and what your recommendations are.
[1:06:44] I think what comes as a little bit of a uh.
[1:06:49] how can I say the word, um, heartburn for some individuals
[1:06:54] cause they don't know what you're actually doing as a
[1:06:57] committee and what you're trying to achieve. So I hope we
[1:07:01] can have more conversations, especially in the District 4
[1:07:05] area, um, I rega regards to what the committee is actually
[1:07:08] doing. And the third point is Crystal Springs, yes, there
[1:07:12] needs to be some type of help with Crystal Springs, as long
[1:07:16] as myself and may approach and Mackie lived there. That has
[1:07:19] been a sticking point with us in a really public safety
[1:07:23] concern cause as you know, far, you know,
[1:07:26] ambulance can get down there. No one can get out if there was
[1:07:29] an emergency. So if anything can be done, I know the city
[1:07:32] has put in for plans with um parking planning to do. I know
[1:07:37] Mr. Young's doing something with regard to 35th Avenue, but
[1:07:40] that is huge. Um, my other point, my
[1:07:44] last point is, um, we would like to think about possibility,
[1:07:50] some residents were asked by Lauren Speed.
[1:07:52] because we know that's a problem, but also along Metarat
[1:07:56] Road, you know, there's a potential development with the
[1:07:59] county. Many residents are now aware about that in the
[1:08:02] sidewalk and how that will impact Metaro going into Saint
[1:08:07] Andrews and along that Duke corridor. So what we can't,
[1:08:11] what can be done in order to, number one, bring that report
[1:08:15] back and bring out the actual essential components, so
[1:08:19] reticence are made aware, especially on Metarat Road
[1:08:21] because many of them do not know there's a potentiality of
[1:08:26] a sidewalk coming and they're gonna be caught off guard by
[1:08:30] how we can work with them, the county and your committee can
[1:08:34] work together to get the communication, but also to see
[1:08:37] the feasibility of other safety measures.
[1:08:40] Thank you, councilmember Mitchell. I, I will, I will ask
[1:08:45] in return that that there be um second appointment to the to
[1:08:51] BPAC from from District 4, you have a, you have a, you have a
[1:08:55] vacant, you have a vacant seat here. We appreciate very much
[1:08:58] Shelby being with us, um, otherwise this would not be
[1:09:02] represented. District 3 is not currently represented at
[1:09:06] District 2 is not currently represented. Um, we need, uh,
[1:09:09] we need to, we need to have those vacancies filled because
[1:09:14] I know, I know as a former council member, I know you want
[1:09:17] to be hearing from the committee, from a
[1:09:20] committee of your constituents. and and and we are definitely
[1:09:25] gonna be looking for someone else to be on that committee,
[1:09:28] but again, I, this is important, um, for all of us, especially
[1:09:32] as we start to talk about our strategic plan. We need to have
[1:09:36] as many many of you on the table to talk about how we move
[1:09:39] forward. So thank you, Mr. Mayor.
[1:09:40] Thank you. Um, I see Cons Ols and then Mayor Potamaki. That
[1:09:45] story. Great. First, I just want to thank you both for your
[1:09:48] report and for um coming here today before us, um, and, uh,
[1:09:52] I'll say we're working on it for District 3, and it we'll
[1:09:55] make our our broader, um, advisory board appointments,
[1:09:58] and there are some new appointments, um, uh, including
[1:10:00] one in District 3. I wanted to pull on a few threads, um, and
[1:10:06] the first one was related to bike racks, um, because I think
[1:10:09] that in my view, uh, to some extent, this is
[1:10:13] actually um an economic development issue in the city
[1:10:16] of, you know, people, uh, try to visit College Park
[1:10:19] businesses or restaurants or other places and then don't
[1:10:22] have any place to put their bike, um, or go to a playground
[1:10:25] and, you know, don't, don't have things. Um, so, uh, I had,
[1:10:30] uh, in our council discussions on the budget proposed that
[1:10:33] there be money put in the budget to support bike racks.
[1:10:36] Um, the reason that didn't end up, um, in the final budget was
[1:10:39] that the view was uh, existing resources can meet
[1:10:42] the need and that there's grant opportunities, um, that we
[1:10:46] could pursue that would effectively pay for what the
[1:10:49] needs are. So I'll just say I personally would be very
[1:10:51] interested to hear more from BPAC on what, where are the
[1:10:56] places that in the city um where you think there should be
[1:11:00] by cracks, and in particular thinking about um, you know, so
[1:11:04] new developments have to kind of build that infrastructure in,
[1:11:06] but what is our, our older development and where, uh,
[1:11:09] we're, where, where that ' s needed. Well, one of our
[1:11:13] members was going to do a a a a huge survey operation to get
[1:11:19] recommendations and, and when we found out there was no
[1:11:22] funding, then she has she has suspended that effort, but I
[1:11:26] will, um, I will say personally that I was
[1:11:29] uh I think it was, was it yesterday or the day before, um,
[1:11:33] in the College Park Shopping Center, which has no bike racks.
[1:11:38] Um, I had, I got there by bicycle and I had to go, go, go
[1:11:43] outside, go outside the shopping center to find a
[1:11:45] railing to, to, to park my bike at. So it's
[1:11:49] um, it's, it's all around us Yeah, I'm, so I'm happy to,
[1:11:53] I'll, I'll be joining your meeting, uh, next Thursday. So
[1:11:56] happy to, happy to chat more, but, um, I do think that that
[1:11:59] is a need and one that, uh, is pretty easy to fulfill, but
[1:12:04] that will change the feel of, oh, this is hard, even so even
[1:12:08] if you have the connectivity, if the endpoints, you don't
[1:12:10] have anywhere to put your, um, your bike, then it, it's not
[1:12:13] there. I think, um, the other one, question I had for you all
[1:12:17] is, is kind of, um, a weird one, but, uh,
[1:12:22] I think I assume that when uh BPAC was last, uh, given a
[1:12:28] charge. Um, it, uh, it was probably before the the era of
[1:12:34] electric scooters. And so, you know, the focus on pedestrians,
[1:12:38] the focus on bicycles, um, are scooters, uh, within the scope
[1:12:45] of BPAC and do you think they should be?
[1:12:47] Um I, I'll tell you what, if, if
[1:12:51] you want to add it to our charge, we will take it in our
[1:12:54] charge, and especially if you want to, if you want to add any
[1:12:57] scooter activists to our, to our, to our committee, and we
[1:13:01] will definitely be working on that. Um,
[1:13:03] I, I haven't frankly seen. uh
[1:13:08] much of an much of an issue where you're treating, where we
[1:13:11] would be treating scooters differently from bi bicycle or
[1:13:14] pedestrian. But you know, I'm open to it.
[1:13:18] Yeah, part of the reason I ask is just, you know, the city
[1:13:21] does have uh viaride contract, there are other issues where,
[1:13:27] um, uh, they share resources with bikes and pedestrians. I
[1:13:31] sure do. It seems to me like something that if we in the
[1:13:33] future are reviewing the charge of the committee, it might be
[1:13:36] worthwhile to include in scope. Thank you.
[1:13:39] Thank you. Uh, let's go to Murta Maki and then
[1:13:42] Councilorgil. Yes, thank you, and thank you for your report
[1:13:46] and thank you to whoever answered all of my questions. I,
[1:13:50] um, that I sent earlier. It was very helpful to receive those,
[1:13:55] um, those answers. And I, I too, um, support your idea about
[1:14:02] lowering the speed limit. I was the one who asked for this
[1:14:05] speed limit to be lowered on Rhode Island Avenue, um,
[1:14:08] several years ago. Um, and I'm glad that I did. I
[1:14:12] don't know that it's it's, it's effective, but I
[1:14:17] think it is that we went down and lowered the speed limit. Um,
[1:14:21] one of the things with lowering speed limits and, and having
[1:14:25] traffic calming. Those are all voluntary, um, you know, people
[1:14:29] can choose to go over this beat hops really fast. They can
[1:14:33] choose to not follow the speed limit. They can choose to go
[1:14:36] through stop signs and not slow down. Um, so I am very um
[1:14:44] supportive of measures that protect
[1:14:47] cyclists and pedestrians, um, in ways that keep them safe. Um,
[1:14:53] not just slowing people down, but keeping them safe. I want
[1:14:57] to tell you that I actually went to the meeting about
[1:15:00] Metarra Road. Um, it's a very extensive study and report that
[1:15:07] if you haven't seen it, you should. And, um, you should
[1:15:10] look at it. I think I might still have it if you want to
[1:15:14] contact me um, but it's a very interesting
[1:15:17] report about, um, that's Sara Road and um.
[1:15:21] I'm, I just wanted to say that for me, um, engaging the
[1:15:26] community is very, very important and also looking at,
[1:15:32] um, issues, um, like one of the issues is that
[1:15:36] we have a a epidemic in our country of childhood obesity
[1:15:41] too. So it's very important that we're making places where
[1:15:44] children can walk to parks, can walk to school, can walk to to
[1:15:49] the the bike, um, to the bus stop. I saw the, uh, I was
[1:15:54] driving back home into College Park Woods and saw the two bus
[1:15:58] stops and was shocked at the amount of cars waiting there to
[1:16:03] pick up their kids from the bus stops.
[1:16:05] So, um, thank you for this report. Thank you for outlining
[1:16:09] your priorities, um, and, uh, and um I just really want to
[1:16:14] applaud you for the work that you're doing in the city and um
[1:16:18] to really encourage you to continue. Thank you.
[1:16:20] Well thank you and Rocky, uh, we've had now two requests that
[1:16:24] we look at the messra Road development for our next BPEC
[1:16:29] meeting? Can we do that? Yeah, we can review it. Um, we
[1:16:31] have reviewed it after, uh, the county did go over it. There
[1:16:36] was a, I think there was a workshop or something that they
[1:16:39] conducted. It was a virtual one. so we did do, uh, overview of
[1:16:43] that, just a quick rundown, I believe in one more, um, beatPA
[1:16:46] member was part of that, uh, session, but we did run down,
[1:16:50] but we can do it again, uh, just as a refresher again just
[1:16:54] so we're I don't know if, I don't know if we ever had an an
[1:16:57] our agenda. Yeah, yeah, OK. OK, go ahead
[1:17:04] Um um, Mr. Mayor, if I can just
[1:17:12] extend my um my day jobs, expertise in
[1:17:18] getting you a point of contact to DPWT's liaison, who can
[1:17:23] actually come to the meeting. and with
[1:17:27] the committee to talk about the actual
[1:17:29] project, so you'll have someone there firsthand to answer
[1:17:32] questions for you. Thank you
[1:17:35] because Mets are that that road is a county road, correct?
[1:17:38] That's the reason? OK. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Hill,
[1:17:41] for patiently waiting. Please go ahead and then Councilor
[1:17:44] Jordan, I believe. Sure. Um, I'd just like to, uh, kind of
[1:17:47] follow up on a council member Oates' comments. Uh, he, he
[1:17:51] made me think about um uh something that was brought to
[1:17:56] my attention by another resident, um, there are more
[1:18:00] and more e-bikes on, on these trails nowadays and um
[1:18:04] I, I have one myself from early adopter, but um one of the
[1:18:09] things that can be an issue is that that
[1:18:12] the amount of power, the wattage.
[1:18:15] of these bikes, um, the residents urged me an article,
[1:18:19] I forget where it was where a regular cyclist and a uh uh
[1:18:25] biker that had a high powered motor.
[1:18:29] um, head-on collided and uh they both died.
[1:18:32] So, um, that's something that we need to take into
[1:18:36] consideration. I've noticed a number of these um souped up
[1:18:40] e-bikes now beginning to uh make appearances and um the
[1:18:45] young individuals that have them uh are getting together
[1:18:48] and, you know, daring each other to do, you know, kind of
[1:18:52] reckless things. So, um, I know that some trails are
[1:18:58] limited to the wattage, and then you can, you can only have
[1:19:01] 500 watts to blow, you know, that sort of thing. So this
[1:19:04] might be something you might want to start considering as it
[1:19:08] become more frequent, um, out there. Yeah, Yeah the Yeah,,
[1:19:11] the Yeah,, the trail from um. think of it as the Park Run
[1:19:16] trail, but, uh, I, I believe it's technically the paint
[1:19:19] branch trail of, uh, is uh they have a limit, they have,
[1:19:24] they say low powered bikes only that, but that's park and
[1:19:27] planning. That's not the city, um, you would, you would have
[1:19:31] to have, uh, you would have to have, if you want to address
[1:19:34] this on city um city right away, you're
[1:19:37] going to have to pass an ordinance, um, and if you want
[1:19:40] us to talk about it, we can talk about it.
[1:19:44] My main concern is the Charlie Trail.
[1:19:47] the, the other, other, um, uh, bike lanes on Route 1, you know,
[1:19:53] they're, they're single direction and you're flowing,
[1:19:57] you're flowing with a faster um pace, uh, vehicles and new
[1:20:01] sidewalks for pedestrians, but we're pedestrians and, and
[1:20:05] other cyclists mixed together like on a trolley trail. I
[1:20:08] think we need to consider um some sort of regulation.
[1:20:16] Um, before my Jordan Cosmomo Jordan speaks. So in regards to
[1:20:22] the scooters on
[1:20:25] college, not the trial trail, but Payne ran trail, um, Mr.
[1:20:31] Rafi probably remember we made a request
[1:20:36] to, um, change the geo fencing of the vehicle.
[1:20:40] so that our residents can use the trail to get into College
[1:20:45] Parkwood. a couple of months ago. Um,
[1:20:48] there's a complaint that the residents could not get into
[1:20:51] the neighborhood. Um
[1:20:56] as they are trying to cross, I I believe uh the um golf course
[1:21:00] is road which the intersection is.
[1:21:03] um, so there was a cutoff in in power once they passed the geo
[1:21:08] fence or correct. Yeah. Um, that was handled by my
[1:21:13] colleague Carlos, um, presumably, um, who spearheads
[1:21:18] uh efforts with VO, um, but I can definitely follow up with
[1:21:21] them. I wasn't included in in any updates for that, but, um,
[1:21:25] I'm sure we would hear more if it wasn't taken care of. Let me
[1:21:29] check and follow up if you could, please. Yeah, that would
[1:21:31] address the, the, um, the um, connectivity issues that Ms.
[1:21:36] Shelby was talking about, you know, residents.
[1:21:39] don't have many options to get into College Park Es other than
[1:21:42] driving. um
[1:21:44] This is a wonderful opportunity Thank you. Thank you, Miss.
[1:21:48] Councilor Jordan. Thank you very much for this
[1:21:51] report and um this is an important issue for the council
[1:21:55] and for the, the residents of College Park. Um, I want to
[1:21:57] echo, um, Council member Hernandez about the advocacy,
[1:22:02] especially for the um developments and improvements
[1:22:04] that are coming to, um, some of these areas that you
[1:22:07] highlighted in your, in your report, um, specifically the
[1:22:12] Metropolitan is having uh a a session for community
[1:22:16] engagement on, uh, January 25th. I mean, sorry, June 25th, um
[1:22:19] but they're, they're, uh, in, in their, um, detailed site
[1:22:23] plan in their, in their, uh, um, presentation to the um College
[1:22:30] Park Mayor and council, uh, they talked about different
[1:22:32] kinds of improvements that have to do with, with lighting and
[1:22:34] bike lanes and and things like that. And so I think having uh
[1:22:38] as as council member Hernandez said having members of BPAC or
[1:22:43] are more and more residents who can show that the um the
[1:22:46] interest of College Park that this would be something that
[1:22:48] would be sorely needed. And similarly,
[1:22:50] on June 24th, the, um, uh, State Highway Association for,
[1:22:55] uh, is, is having a a community engagement meeting up for
[1:23:00] Baltimore Avenue from 193 to Sunnyside and and as you know,
[1:23:04] that is, that is one of the areas that you, um, that you
[1:23:08] identified and so um. I think that this would be a a
[1:23:12] a ripe opportunity for this. We already know that this, that
[1:23:15] there will be changes to those areas and so if we can get in
[1:23:19] and uh have a seat at the table, have a voice, then, um, then we
[1:23:23] can see what we can do about, about, uh, affecting change for
[1:23:27] College Park and then I also would like to echo Council
[1:23:29] member Oates on the importance of bike racks. Again, I, I
[1:23:32] don't know that it was, um, the intention of council that these
[1:23:36] were not important. It was, it was, it had to do with the
[1:23:39] funding sources, not not that it was not something
[1:23:42] that we wanted to move forward with. Um, certainly it would be
[1:23:44] one of my priorities, um, that's a part of using your
[1:23:48] bicycle to go places means that you can go places. It isn't
[1:23:52] just, um, I wanted, I wanted to ride my bicycle and then go
[1:23:55] home, right? You, you want to go to dinner, you wanna go to
[1:23:58] school, you wanna go, you wanna commute, you want to go
[1:24:01] shopping, all these different things, um, so I appreciate, uh,
[1:24:05] I, I do want to, to make sure that that is one of the
[1:24:10] priorities, I believe, of, of counsel, certainly of myself.
[1:24:12] Thank you. Thank you. I, I do echo the
[1:24:17] importance of attending um, not only by BPAC but also community
[1:24:21] as a whole, um, at the um, the rawan phase 2 and phase
[1:24:27] 3 meeting at Bellsville. Um, because this is a
[1:24:31] once in a lifetime opportunity for us to advocate whether we
[1:24:36] need to have multi-moral um privilege, transportation
[1:24:40] options on Route one, once this is built, it's built, and we
[1:24:45] lose that opportunity. Thank you. Um, question to Mr.
[1:24:48] Yang. I know you have been involved in organizing this
[1:24:52] meeting on face2 and phase 3. how will this meeting will be
[1:24:57] handled, is it there, I don't think there'll be any QA
[1:25:01] session or anything or any presentation's going to be more
[1:25:04] participatory, um, kind of roundtable, uh, discussions, uh,
[1:25:09] and presentations by the engineers they're involved,
[1:25:12] they'll have the, the sketches, the um draft
[1:25:17] um. renderings of, of, of their
[1:25:19] project engineering. I'm not sure at what um
[1:25:22] percentage of engineering, they're presenting, uh, at that
[1:25:25] meeting, but, uh, it'll be the first time I, I, I will have
[1:25:28] seen it myself. Thank you. So, there'll be some sort of, uh,
[1:25:33] way to get community input, uh, as part of the discussion. So
[1:25:37] suddenly, uh, you're input will be very valuable. Yeah, that's
[1:25:40] been part of the delay is really getting some of the
[1:25:42] preliminary engineering, uh, completed so that they could at
[1:25:45] least start the conversation and people would have a place
[1:25:48] at which to start and to have the conversation as to what
[1:25:51] improvements would be needed. Thank you.
[1:25:53] I appreciate it. All right, um, so Steph and BPA.
[1:25:59] I, I, I think you had quite a bit, um, um, I'm, I'm sure that
[1:26:03] we'll be working on and coming back with a report or something,
[1:26:06] so, and some of the projects are related to his complete
[1:26:12] street projects and probably could be incorporated in the,
[1:26:16] yeah. the CIP
[1:26:18] and some of them like the bike rack, I don't think, you know,
[1:26:21] they need a CAP that could be done by our maintenance budget,
[1:26:25] public works maybe. Um, so it looks like the
[1:26:29] council has a support for that. Uh, so please let us know how
[1:26:33] can we support you, soundly, and please continue to, uh,
[1:26:37] advise us. uh, the way you want to say
[1:26:41] College Park more walkable and bikeable.
[1:26:44] Thank you for your work. Appreciate it.
[1:26:46] All right, let's go to the next presentation, which is about
[1:26:51] the framework for strengthening property regulations through
[1:26:54] licensing and to its included business and residential rental
[1:26:59] and vacant property registries, short term rental oversight.
[1:27:04] overcrowding enforcement and adoption of updated property
[1:27:08] maintenance code. And this will be taken by our deputy city
[1:27:14] manager. Good evening, Mayor and council.
[1:27:16] Thank you. Hi, um, thank you for reading
[1:27:18] all of that, Mayor. That was a, I made the longest title for
[1:27:21] you ever and I apologize for that. Truly, so, um, thank you
[1:27:27] again and um so toni tonight council, we're here, this is,
[1:27:31] uh, so for the record, Michelle Billy Hedgepeth, deputy city
[1:27:34] manager, um, I want to first acknowledge staff, um, I've got
[1:27:38] to Tinder, Cookar our our Department of Public Services,
[1:27:42] um, David Spalding's here. He's our code enforcement manager
[1:27:46] and Derrek Davies, our code-enf f or ce ment supervisors in the
[1:27:48] audience. Mr. Davis, please come forward. Yeah, Davies.
[1:27:51] Come on come on. So, um, what we wanted to first just provide
[1:27:57] some um an overview, uh, for the council kind of something
[1:28:00] brief today to get us started because there's been so many
[1:28:03] questions about code enforcement. What are, you know,
[1:28:06] how are we working through some items? Where are we going? And
[1:28:09] I think over my 1st 2.5, I guess, whatever, whatever I'm,
[1:28:12] I don't even, I'm kind of lost about I about 2.5 or maybe 3
[1:28:16] months, whatever we' ve been kind of working on some
[1:28:20] ideas of things that need to be addressed. So what we did is
[1:28:23] put together this framework as a way for the council to sort
[1:28:27] of see where we are. So I'm not gonna read every
[1:28:30] slide. I'm just gonna kind of acknowledge some things that we
[1:28:33] all know that's going on. One, that this presentation will
[1:28:36] then just summarize some of our challenges. Um, it'll start to
[1:28:40] align where we go with code enforcement. Um, we'll provide
[1:28:44] some refinements to what we're looking at for the regulatory
[1:28:47] items like our like the International Property
[1:28:50] Maintenance Code, um, outlined some coordinated next steps and
[1:28:53] then just kind of establish this framework for the council
[1:28:57] in a policy direction moving forward.
[1:28:58] Um, what we wanted to kind of just kind of say is like we
[1:29:02] understand and we get them all the time or what are the
[1:29:04] recurring nuisances that the council sees that residents see
[1:29:08] that are out there, um, you know, we see businesses
[1:29:12] operating outside of the zone uses. There's noise, we get
[1:29:16] overcrowded rentals, um, and then, um,
[1:29:19] we've got a lot of, um, just a lot of news we have some
[1:29:22] nuisance issues, parking, trash, all those kinds of things.
[1:29:25] Because we're a university, we have transient issues. Um, we
[1:29:29] have unauthorized uses, um, in our short term rentals like
[1:29:32] yard events, um, and we, we're still trying to get our arms
[1:29:38] around short-term uses or short-term rentals. I think the
[1:29:41] rise of Airbnb sort of put this in the forefront for everybody.
[1:29:44] So we, um, we did adopt a we adopt a, um, we adopted an
[1:29:49] ordinance for it, but with everything else that's going on,
[1:29:51] we're gonna, we need to really tighten that up and also put
[1:29:55] that together. And then repeated
[1:29:57] property maintenance violations.
[1:29:59] Again, that same trash and litter and then um adjacent
[1:30:03] Holmes, homeowners, and long-term residents that clash
[1:30:05] that kind of happens and university towns. All right.
[1:30:09] I'm always forgetting which one to do. All right. Next one. So
[1:30:12] we did just a quick overview of the complaint process. Um, Mr.
[1:30:17] um Cookar kind of like, and I love his notes because he's got
[1:30:19] the best handwriting in the world. So he put together kind
[1:30:21] of these great notes for me in regards to what, what happens
[1:30:26] in a complaint. You know, we perform the research and assign
[1:30:28] an officer We start to activate the case,
[1:30:31] advise the the complaint of a case number and provide a staff
[1:30:35] contact. We do that field inspection, and then we verify,
[1:30:38] and then we have a decision point, you know, issue a code
[1:30:42] enforcement finding or not, um. and then what we do is we
[1:30:45] comply, we follow up through inspections and compliance and
[1:30:49] then either that case is closed or it's moving on.
[1:30:52] When I'm looking at like this whole idea of our notice of
[1:30:56] violations and steps. We have the, you know, what we collect
[1:30:59] on notice of violation. So when the RNR is a violations, these
[1:31:03] are the things that we, that we see and then these are what,
[1:31:06] what's part of a notice of violation when something occurs.
[1:31:09] I'm going to just kind of go through um some of these issues
[1:31:13] that and and then staff will be here to answer the questions
[1:31:15] that, you know, to answer where we are, but
[1:31:20] again, where are we? What are we doing and how are we going
[1:31:22] to get there in these focus areas.
[1:31:25] Um, in the area of the city businesses rental licenses, etc.
[1:31:32] um, we're primarily, um, working through this whole idea
[1:31:36] of permit or permitting so we have um occupancy permits and
[1:31:42] most people usually kind of call them rental licenses. I
[1:31:45] think we even call them rental licenses and business licenses,
[1:31:48] but we, um, are really looking to move to make it more
[1:31:52] more consistent in our in our nomenclature and also making
[1:31:56] sure that we are kind of not calling them necessarily
[1:32:00] occupancy permits because some people um
[1:32:03] have occupants believe their occupancy perm are the same as
[1:32:06] the state, I mean sorry, the county has an occupancy permit,
[1:32:09] and when they get an occupancy permit from the from the county,
[1:32:12] they think that they don't need one when they come to the city
[1:32:16] of College Park and it's not a, it's not right, but, um, it's
[1:32:21] an issue that we've kind of find all the time. We were like,
[1:32:23] well, I've gone to this, the county, and it should be the
[1:32:26] same thing. You have to have the occupancy permit, and we're
[1:32:31] not saying that we're going to change our process
[1:32:33] a great deal about what we're going to inspect or what we're
[1:32:35] going to look at, but we are still going to maintain the
[1:32:39] fact that we need to have, um, we're gonna have the pretty
[1:32:42] much the same idea. The next thing we found is our
[1:32:47] um our code enforcement software, um, even today, and
[1:32:51] our ability to answer things in a, in a, a really coherent way.
[1:32:55] It's not great. Uh, we've had, we've had an experiment with
[1:32:57] the cello over the last 2.5, last 3 or 4 years. Um, no, um,
[1:33:03] no, no knock on a cellar, but totally knock on aa that um it
[1:33:08] hasn't been what we expected, um, and we use our GoGov, which
[1:33:12] is a separate process that what the um Department of
[1:33:14] Public Works has been using and we'd like to move to GoGov, um,
[1:33:19] in regards to your code enforcement. So we are working
[1:33:22] through that module and we'll have some timelines, but what
[1:33:25] we're hoping to do is we, we're going to enter into that this
[1:33:27] summer, get it completed by the end of the summer and then stop
[1:33:32] and start implementing through GoGov, which will allow us to
[1:33:35] do a lot of the things, um, mobilely. I mean, I hate to
[1:33:39] kind of to expose all of our secrets, but it's hard
[1:33:45] um, for our employees to, um, they don't do our everything
[1:33:48] mobilely. They have to come back to the office, download
[1:33:51] photos and coming back and forth. And so you would think
[1:33:55] that their jobs should mostly mobile, and it's really not at
[1:33:57] this point. Um, in our parking, it is, but for our code
[1:34:00] enforcement, it isn't. And so getting those processes, we
[1:34:05] streamlined and putting them together in a way that really
[1:34:07] works efficiently and effectively. It's something
[1:34:10] that we'll be working on this summer.
[1:34:12] All right So again, this is the whole
[1:34:15] idea of the transitioning to licensing. Um, again, defining
[1:34:19] the regula like regularly activities, reducing that
[1:34:23] confusion, improving the tracking and the responsible
[1:34:26] priorities, um, and then, you know, basically aligning our
[1:34:29] enforcement tools across rentals, short-term rental,
[1:34:32] non-residential, and the vacant property.
[1:34:35] Um, we've passed an, a lot of ordinances recently. We've got
[1:34:39] the, um, vacant property ordinance. We have the short
[1:34:43] term rental property, and we also have the early lease
[1:34:47] option. The early lease, which we're all working on
[1:34:49] simultaneously and I don't even have early lease in here.
[1:34:51] You'll have a separate thing while I'll just talk about
[1:34:53] early lease, um, but those are all sort of, those are all um
[1:34:58] uh enforced by our code enforcement officers. Um, and
[1:35:02] so right now we are trying to make sure they're all aligned
[1:35:06] and they're all in their individual buckets. And what a
[1:35:08] lot of this is, is sorting and placing and sorting and placing
[1:35:13] for you all to understand where everything is. Um, what we're
[1:35:16] proposing is that we're gonna regulate it as our rental
[1:35:19] license, our business license, a distinct short-term rental
[1:35:23] license, a vacant property license aligned with the
[1:35:26] registry. That's part of the ordinance. And then
[1:35:28] licenses that are in Chapter 129, which are special licenses
[1:35:34] and Sharon has explained to me what all these are, but I will,
[1:35:36] I will depend on, um, Derek and them to answer those
[1:35:40] extensively for you. Um, lastly, on the last ones is
[1:35:44] about going to the short-term rental.
[1:35:46] Um, some of the issues is that we said, the boom of Airbnb
[1:35:50] kind of caused these short-term bundles to pop up, and I know
[1:35:53] that a couple of the council members have, um, have, have
[1:35:55] alerted us, and we, we know they're out there and they've
[1:35:59] been operating. And a lot of questions have been asked like,
[1:36:01] well, I can't, can staff go on and, you know, basically go on
[1:36:06] to Airbnb and just kind of figure out where they are,
[1:36:08] which I'd love to have the time to do that, but what I'm hoping
[1:36:11] is maybe something that we can figure out through AI or
[1:36:14] figuring out to be able to track these better
[1:36:17] um, is a better response for us than probably looking through
[1:36:20] Airbnb every day to see who and what, but we will use it as a
[1:36:25] resource when we see, you know, when they're reported to see
[1:36:28] how they're listed. Um, but beyond just that normal um
[1:36:34] short-term rental, we also have these special event and party
[1:36:38] houses and outdoor areas and pools that extend beyond that
[1:36:42] typical family and vacation rentals. So that's where the
[1:36:46] issues are. The issue of overcrowding, I
[1:36:49] wanted to do a quick, um, slide on that. Overcrowding itself is
[1:36:54] something that has been a pain, I would say I guess of the code
[1:36:58] enforce its existence and even the council's existence from
[1:37:01] the standpoint of identifying it properly, understanding
[1:37:05] where it's occurring and being able to coordinate, you know,
[1:37:09] an effective enforcement, you know, a lot of times it takes
[1:37:12] working with um our parking enforcement. It's how it takes
[1:37:16] looking at trash and working with public works.
[1:37:18] and you know doing that and Jacob Basilotti, I'd have to
[1:37:21] give him his shoutouts today that he's done a really good
[1:37:24] job with a project when we look at looking at where the um
[1:37:29] garbage cans are. And so he's actually he's and uh um they've
[1:37:35] they've got they've done a, it's like it's amazing how
[1:37:37] they're tracking where the tra the trash cans are that will
[1:37:40] help us to understand where we're where we're seeing this
[1:37:44] issue. So we're starting to get the data and since they have
[1:37:47] GoGov and we have GoGov, that can all
[1:37:49] overlap together, which is going to be helpful to us.
[1:37:52] So here's our proposed timeline.
[1:37:55] So implementing of GOGA would be the again, the summer of
[1:37:59] 2026, we're looking to purchase the program. I think we've
[1:38:03] finally purchased it in the last couple of days. So that's
[1:38:07] done and programming, it will take another month or two to
[1:38:10] get it together. Staff has been working really hard on that and
[1:38:14] really putting together those processes. I'd also like to
[1:38:17] thank, um, to Tinder and the and actually the code team. Um,
[1:38:21] there's several days and nights when I'm walking around here
[1:38:24] and they're still here working on the policies and
[1:38:26] procedures that we've been revising and aligning so that
[1:38:30] when we use GoGov, it's correct. It matches our code, it matches
[1:38:35] as our operations. And so over the last few months, we've been
[1:38:38] really working on one of our processes and what our policies.
[1:38:42] And then the next step would be developing a comprehensive
[1:38:46] licensing framework. Um, the Code of amendments that we'll
[1:38:49] be working on, and I'm going to overwhelm probably poor
[1:38:54] Stephanie, our our city attorney on this as well.
[1:38:56] is working through our code and um looking at that for the
[1:39:00] standpoint of our IM of the IMPC and making sure that we're
[1:39:04] aligning that to our licensing structure and we believe that
[1:39:07] that should occur through August through November, August
[1:39:10] through November of 2026. Um, we're also right now
[1:39:14] implementing a new code enforcement standards and
[1:39:17] operating procedures. It's kind of backwards. I have this
[1:39:19] listed, um, which is going on right now in theta, as I
[1:39:22] mentioned, the staff is working through that, which is in July.
[1:39:25] Um, which should be completed in July. Um, we're doing
[1:39:28] training with our staff, which the first set of training is
[1:39:30] actually in the next 2 weeks, and we will continue to train
[1:39:34] our code enforcement staff throughout the summer on both
[1:39:37] the launch and also this change in our framework.
[1:39:40] And then the public launch will happen this fall to the winter,
[1:39:45] depending on how we, how the implementation of some of the
[1:39:48] code changes happen. Um
[1:39:51] we are reviewing, um, the fees and costs. We've got some
[1:39:55] information that we provide some initial information that
[1:39:58] you will see from us and that item will be presented this
[1:40:01] fall, um, and probably fall to winter, which I like to not
[1:40:05] give box myself in too much and then hopefully we can get an
[1:40:10] adoption of the 2021 International Property
[1:40:13] Maintenance Code. And why aren't we adopting, let's say
[1:40:16] the 2026 or 2024, um, the county, I believe is still on
[1:40:20] 2021, um, and it's got one of those things
[1:40:23] that you kind of take a little bit more gradually than just
[1:40:25] doing the latest and greatest. So just in case you get that
[1:40:28] question, like, why aren't you doing the new one? Because this
[1:40:30] is much newer than the one we have. So
[1:40:34] I'm here for questions and staff's here. Thank you. Thank
[1:40:37] you so much. I have a couple of questions if I may ask, very
[1:40:41] quick ones. Um the, I, I, I think you
[1:40:45] mentioned the public works ceases go go and.
[1:40:51] and public services yes DPS is Asala, am I correct? That is
[1:40:56] correct, Mayor. Yeah, we've been using Acela for our
[1:40:58] licensing, um, since about 2021, 22 or 2020, 2020, excuse me,
[1:41:06] it's 2020. So when, when residents like us, uh, we use
[1:41:11] the, the uh interface, the Collegeber Connect, or tell us,
[1:41:17] um, what those those requests go to the CRM, which are the
[1:41:20] customer service ones go through GoGov,
[1:41:23] but the licensing and all those are going through. We are, we
[1:41:26] are duplicating that in the cellar, so they're duplicated,
[1:41:29] OK. Yeah. So that's why the process is. They're two
[1:41:32] separate streams and my and staff is nodding so I'm getting
[1:41:34] it right. So they're two separate streams. Uh, that's,
[1:41:36] that's not the most efficient, uh, doing business. So I, that
[1:41:40] makes sense that uh if you could use the same system.
[1:41:42] Thank you. Totally agree. Um, 11 other thing as we've been
[1:41:48] attending different conferences and the meetings, so we have
[1:41:51] been seeing. uh more and more um cities and
[1:41:54] towns and even counties, there have been adopting, um,
[1:42:00] AI-driven software to do the initial screening. I'm not
[1:42:05] talking about the review. I'm talking about the initial
[1:42:08] screening, did you. the when someone submits the
[1:42:11] forms and associated documents, the AI could be very helpful in
[1:42:15] the software um to do the initial pass, um, is there
[1:42:19] something, um, go go or Acea or any other software could uh
[1:42:23] support. Yeah, I can speak to, uh, this
[1:42:26] mayor. I think AI and machine learning, that process has been
[1:42:31] used in building plan review process for new construction
[1:42:34] aspect of things. And even in that it's still in the early
[1:42:38] stages of implementation in the country. There are some, uh,
[1:42:42] you know, big organizations who have, uh, started to, you know,
[1:42:46] think through that, but there are still many challenges and
[1:42:48] they are in terms of QAQC and other aspects of the operation.
[1:42:54] As far as this, uh, uh, I think Accella
[1:42:57] and GoGov, uh, uh, they don't talk to each other very well,
[1:43:01] and, uh, uh, you know, we have had challenges in the Xala
[1:43:05] implementation, how it was sold to us and how it was
[1:43:09] implemented, so we probably had a lot of interfacing and uh the
[1:43:15] software's working together for the, uh, effectiveness and uh
[1:43:20] streamlining and efficiency part of our operation. What we
[1:43:23] have realized, we imple ment ed uh CRM in the later
[1:43:27] part of 24, and we are really doing well, and that is helping
[1:43:31] us, but I think since, uh, you know, our licensing and
[1:43:36] permitting aspects in our system is through Excella. So
[1:43:40] in many cases we are duplicating a lot of things,
[1:43:43] and sometime in Aksala there are some inherent, uh, you know,
[1:43:47] automation functions which are not implemented correctly when
[1:43:50] we bought the software as itself, uh, we are just working
[1:43:54] through those phases and, uh, we have
[1:43:57] recently kind of uh, uh, you know, uh, signed an agreement
[1:44:01] with uh GoGov to move on to the licensing and permitting aspect
[1:44:07] so that uh the same kind of software is used all across the
[1:44:11] organization like DPW was you know, permitting and
[1:44:16] licensing aspects all on the same, you know, like portal.
[1:44:20] it'll streamline the efficiency, streamline the information flow
[1:44:24] to the public internally as well as externally.
[1:44:28] Thank you. I appreciate that. I'm, I'm suddenly took their
[1:44:30] right initiative by the steps to streamline the two softwas
[1:44:35] into one. Thank you. All right, um, let's see. I see a couple
[1:44:38] of hands, starting with Councilor Hu and then Councilor
[1:44:41] Hernandez. Uh, yes, thank you. I, I'm just
[1:44:44] curious, what is the process for, you know, an individual to,
[1:44:49] to register a uh rental, you know, it is a totally volunteer
[1:44:56] volunteer or um. is it uh something that staff
[1:45:01] you know. um intervenes on how, how is it
[1:45:05] that, uh, a rental is declared cause I, I just reported, um, I
[1:45:10] guess today, um, that the house went for sale. I had sold and
[1:45:14] now it's a ferreent sign is up. So as new homes get sold, um,
[1:45:19] you know, there's a high ratio of homes that are, are bought
[1:45:24] in this city, get turned into rentals. So what's, what's the
[1:45:28] process for following up on that?
[1:45:34] Yes, um we try to track all the
[1:45:39] properties that are sold in College Park and we'll reach
[1:45:41] out to the new owner. We'll take down that information and
[1:45:45] then we will issue an invoice or a letter to the new owner,
[1:45:50] uh, talking about the rules of renting a College Park and how
[1:45:53] to apply. We'll send them a leak on how to apply for rental
[1:45:56] and we'll follow up with that as well.
[1:45:58] But as far as volunteer, a lot of times that they buy in
[1:46:01] College Park, they're not aware that they need to get a rental
[1:46:03] license. um
[1:46:06] Oh. so
[1:46:09] Oh. OK. And um
[1:46:14] and how
[1:46:17] I, I know that when, when I'm out there campaigning and I,
[1:46:23] I'll be talking to residents and they'll be, you know,
[1:46:25] saying that there's all these unregistered, um, no.
[1:46:30] uh rentals that, uh, we
[1:46:33] are maybe aware of, not aware of
[1:46:36] that, you know, it has not been followed up on that they've
[1:46:40] complained about um, you know, what, what,
[1:46:43] what's, how can we help? fix that situation when we're
[1:46:47] told about this. I think Councilman, what you know what
[1:46:50] you did when you submit through, let's say go, like when you
[1:46:53] submitted it to us, we actually are going to put that we put
[1:46:56] that into GoGov and we do that. So we take, I think
[1:47:00] it's a multi-pronged approach, right? It's the enforcement
[1:47:04] through the fact that we're we're, you know, we're we're
[1:47:06] sending it as the things get sold. We're following up with
[1:47:11] on complaints. I mean, it's complaint driven. It's it's
[1:47:14] process driven. It's like, you know, we're going to have to do
[1:47:18] multiple hits. So it's not perfect, and I think the other
[1:47:21] part, what we're also looking at, we also look at previous
[1:47:24] databases and we look at that homes that have been um
[1:47:27] historically rented, right, Derek? I mean, do you want to
[1:47:29] talk a little bit about like, so we we do
[1:47:32] have an idea of houses that are traditionally have been rentals,
[1:47:37] and we have a list that we follow up on that, but the
[1:47:39] issue that we've had with the cella is that every year we
[1:47:44] create a brand new license, and that license is not necessarily
[1:47:48] linked to the old license, and so we have all of these files
[1:47:53] that are not connected, and we've got to then connect the
[1:47:57] different um files together and so part of it has been
[1:48:00] very hard in our tracking, and we're hoping that with the new
[1:48:04] system that this some of these um inefficiencies will be
[1:48:09] corrected, but I think the one good thing is that our staff
[1:48:12] themselves does have a good idea before we had a cella with
[1:48:16] our old program um, and I don't know, I'll just
[1:48:18] let you guys talk to that. So let me, let me stop talking and
[1:48:20] let you talk. So
[1:48:24] So a lot of y'all that have been around for a while,
[1:48:26] remember the old green screens, the legacy system, they have
[1:48:31] 400. They would alert us that system would alert every time a
[1:48:36] property came up for renewal for an annual permit.
[1:48:40] The Ocea is not alerting us. Um, so we basically have to
[1:48:44] manually go in to find what is being expired or it's getting
[1:48:48] ready to expire. Sometimes it's slipping through the cracks,
[1:48:51] trying to get that, um, so we're looking forward to going
[1:48:55] to GoGov to be able to have that and also email
[1:49:00] notifications as well, the old system would give out an email
[1:49:03] notification to a property owner saying, you're, your
[1:49:06] permit's gonna expire in 30 days. It's time to re-up. It's
[1:49:09] time to renew. We're not finding that right
[1:49:11] now with, with our system, so we're looking forward to that
[1:49:14] as well. Thank you and lastly, um, I,
[1:49:19] when I attend the um National League of Cities in their expo
[1:49:24] uh hall. I'm not sure if you'll be there at MML. I hope they
[1:49:28] will be, but there is a vendor who will
[1:49:33] utilize all the online services like uh for for short term
[1:49:37] rentals, like, you know, uh, Airb Airbnb and Purple and all
[1:49:42] that to, to give us a profile of all the um short term
[1:49:47] rentals that are operating within our city, uh, you know,
[1:49:50] the hunt that stuff down and provide that information, so
[1:49:53] this might be initially something we might want to
[1:49:56] consider to get a baseline, uh, of the short term rentals in
[1:49:59] our city. I appreciate that and we can
[1:50:01] look that up. That's thank you. Yeah, please connect uh offline,
[1:50:06] please. Thank you. Uh council member Hernandez and Councilor
[1:50:10] Arts after that and then Councilor Mitchell.
[1:50:13] So first and foremost, I'm supportive of, of us like
[1:50:16] transitioning entirely to GoGov from just uh a standardization
[1:50:21] perspective. What I found useful is, you know, that's.
[1:50:24] it's easier and easier to sell to to residents to submit their
[1:50:29] own complaints. Um, one of the things as a council member, if,
[1:50:34] if it's possible for us to, I don't know if you can, but like
[1:50:37] for us to be able to track some of the, some of the items
[1:50:41] because otherwise we're kind of just repeating the same
[1:50:45] submissions. I don't know if that's a growth opportunity
[1:50:47] that we can do, um, but I think that would be helpful and also
[1:50:52] helpful for us to be able to follow up with our residents
[1:50:54] and says, hey, that proper ty ' s already been submitted,
[1:50:56] like they're working on it and we can track it. Otherwise,
[1:50:59] it's us submitting it in addition to our residents. So
[1:51:01] any, any efforts to try to optimize it, it's fantastic.
[1:51:04] I'll say when it comes to some of the other more lofty uh
[1:51:09] frameworks that we're proposing, uh, it's, it's gonna be a lot.
[1:51:13] It's gonna be a lot. I know that we've worked on the vacant
[1:51:16] and blinded property tax in the previous council. I think it's
[1:51:18] really, really important that we do that, especially with the
[1:51:23] commercial properties across the city, uh, and some that are
[1:51:27] just chrono like chrono or chronically uh just mm, I don't
[1:51:32] know, uh, operating out of bad faith, I really don't know, uh,
[1:51:37] so early intervention is more effective and less costly than
[1:51:40] adjusting the long-term deterioration that we've seen
[1:51:43] in uh some of our communities. I'm wondering
[1:51:48] I'm wondering if when we do launch these different
[1:51:53] ordinances that we, we possibly work across some of the
[1:51:56] departments, right? Code enforcement and public services
[1:51:59] has a, has a really important role in enforcing
[1:52:03] efforts, but we have other departments, let's just say if
[1:52:06] we're talking about commercial sectors, to work hand in hand
[1:52:10] with economic development, work hand in hand with uh
[1:52:14] some of the other departments that may be able to assist,
[1:52:18] perhaps planning, uh, as you do these targeted areas. Uh, I'm
[1:52:22] specifically focused right now on Edgewood and Rhode Island
[1:52:25] and in the future, uh, Route one north of north of Maryland
[1:52:32] 193. There are a lot of businesses there that operate,
[1:52:35] um, and when you just see the consistency of, of broken code.
[1:52:39] I mean, you'll see the yard's out of place, the, uh, what's
[1:52:43] it called? Uh, smoke shops that just
[1:52:45] continue to pop up like, like just a bad weed, uh, and I'm
[1:52:49] not really sure if they have licenses, but I don't know the
[1:52:54] operational tempo that code enforcement is doing this. I'm
[1:52:57] hoping that this serves like this, the standardization
[1:53:00] serves as an like a, a trackable, measurable
[1:53:04] effort for us to be able to to go after some of these long
[1:53:08] term issues. Um, on the short term rental, just one, just one
[1:53:12] comment. Uh, one of the issues that I've seen, at least
[1:53:15] through one of the short term rentals in our district is a
[1:53:22] lack of ability to enforce. Do we need ordinances in place
[1:53:28] to be able to enforce some of the ordinances that we have
[1:53:31] currently. in order for you all to be able
[1:53:36] to address those issues. We need a process and we need a
[1:53:42] license that allows us to, um, we have the ordinance in place
[1:53:45] and I think, and I believe that we have the fine structure in
[1:53:50] order to do it. We just need the operational, um.
[1:53:54] so that someone can get our license. Does that make sense?
[1:53:56] because the county license exists and Jatender please take
[1:53:59] it on from there. Uh, I think Council member
[1:54:02] Hernandez, you make a great point. Uh, one of the reasons,
[1:54:06] uh, why we are switching our licensing, you know, from
[1:54:10] Excella to Goavis. We want all that database within one system
[1:54:15] and I will give you one example. I think we implemented, you
[1:54:19] know, trash fees recently, and we were trying to implement
[1:54:23] that in our Exceler software, but they were like they were
[1:54:27] not avenues to generate billing within that, uh,
[1:54:31] whereas, you know, like, uh, uh, when we talk to the Goga people
[1:54:34] to implement that, they are just creating that. And as uh
[1:54:41] Michelle has indicated earlier in her presentation that uh uh
[1:54:45] we basically have rental property database. We got
[1:54:49] business license database and then we got uh vacant property
[1:54:53] registry, and then, uh, we're gonna be doing, uh, you know,
[1:54:57] like any uh enforcement issues. They are all going to be in one
[1:55:00] software talking to each other, and then also
[1:55:04] all the transitional information that is also being
[1:55:06] used by public works that is also going to be all in that as
[1:55:10] well. So that will definitely enhance the streamlining and
[1:55:14] the systems are easily talking to each other. So, you know,
[1:55:17] for example, short term rental was implemented back in 23 and,
[1:55:21] but we did not have means to implement that in Excella, but
[1:55:25] with Goga when we are transitioning for this
[1:55:28] licensing, we are already creating those applications and
[1:55:32] because I think legally we cannot utilize the same rental
[1:55:34] application for short term rentals. There has to be a
[1:55:37] separate application based on the, you know, legal
[1:55:39] department's suggestion, and even the vacant registry we
[1:55:42] passed last year, and we have created a database and we are
[1:55:47] managing that process at the present time through the uh
[1:55:50] regular, you know, Excel spreadsheets that we have in
[1:55:53] our system, but we will be implementing that also as a
[1:55:57] license in GoGov, you know, implementation that we are
[1:56:00] doing. Yes, it seems like lofty, but it is
[1:56:03] doable, and that is probably the best streamlined process as
[1:56:07] we go forward. OK. And we are not going to have a, you know,
[1:56:10] like a big bite, but I think we're going to implement one by
[1:56:14] one and to implement those we're gonna have to bring in
[1:56:17] the ordinance changes, and that was the whole purpose why we
[1:56:21] implemented the timeline in one of the slides that Michelle
[1:56:24] talked about earlier. Thank you. Uh, so I, what I'm hearing is
[1:56:28] that the current state is unwieldy, right? You're getting
[1:56:31] it's, it's very difficult to take pictures, go back, process
[1:56:34] it. And as we introduce new ordinances, you all are having
[1:56:39] a challenging time, making sure that there's a streamlined
[1:56:44] methodology to be able to to hit those certain
[1:56:48] enforcement metrics This is going to help resolve
[1:56:52] that. Absolutely. What I'm, what I'd like to ask just for
[1:56:55] clarification purposes, and this can be taken entirely
[1:56:58] offline, um, is, do you have the ordinance infrastructure in
[1:57:04] place to be able to hold these entities accountable, uh,
[1:57:08] because as I've understood that may have been an oversight
[1:57:11] in the 2023 provision, at least for the short-term rentals.
[1:57:15] Yeah, I think there will be minor, you know, ordinance
[1:57:18] amendments that will be needed. And we will go forward with
[1:57:21] those, you know, like efforts as well as we go along this
[1:57:25] process. Fantastic. I, and I, uh, I'm interested in making
[1:57:28] sure that we continue that discussion. uh, but it doesn't
[1:57:30] need to happen right now. Uh, one final thing, I think
[1:57:33] registration and licensing provide accountability and
[1:57:36] transparency. and this new licensing, uh,
[1:57:41] structure that we would potentially explore, could be a
[1:57:46] huge revenue driver for, uh, the city. I think I saw our
[1:57:50] financials, uh, come in for, was it the last quarter here?
[1:57:53] Uh, we were close to just one, just under 1 million in, in, uh,
[1:57:58] licensing and registration fees. I think it's fantastic. I think
[1:58:01] even me, I have one of the, like a rental property.
[1:58:04] It's not deep, um, but it's, it's definitely provides us
[1:58:11] an accountability like metric. I think if we have to add
[1:58:14] business licenses, we should talk about it and have like, is
[1:58:18] this multiple entities that they own? Is it a restaurant? I,
[1:58:22] we have to have a full conversation across council
[1:58:24] before we end up doing that business license. Thank you and
[1:58:27] we'll bring it back to you. Thank you. I appreciate it. Um,
[1:58:30] let's see. Councilor Mitchell, sorry, Councilor Os, counselor,
[1:58:34] and then Councilor Mitchell. And then Conover Hughes the 2nd
[1:58:37] bite. Thank you. Um, thank you and
[1:58:40] really I just want to say I appreciate the work that we've
[1:58:42] done together over the last several months, um, and excited
[1:58:45] to, to be here and getting these updates from you. Um, and,
[1:58:48] and really appreciate the work that you did with our, um,
[1:58:51] District 3 intern, Oliver Slade, um, uh, to collect data in in
[1:58:55] District 3. I think, um, on the, the business license point, I,
[1:59:00] you know, my understanding is that um we currently don't
[1:59:04] issue our own city business licenses. It's like a state and
[1:59:06] county re gu late d piece, um, so I want
[1:59:09] to understand that more, um, that doesn't have to be right
[1:59:11] now, but, um, but I think on, uh, kind of revising the code
[1:59:17] and and moving towards licensing instead of permitting
[1:59:20] and moving towards GoGov, all sounds great. I think one thing
[1:59:25] as uh as part of that transition implementation, um,
[1:59:29] that I know folks in the past, uh, that we had prior to Eella,
[1:59:34] um, that people appreciated was having contact info publicly
[1:59:37] available for landlords or landlords agents.
[1:59:40] Um, so that residents or city staff could contact, uh, if
[1:59:46] there are problems, uh, with particular rental properties,
[1:59:49] um, I think that was helpful for folks, um, who would want
[1:59:52] to see that, um, continue to, to move forward. I know that,
[1:59:55] uh, we raised a question on AI earlier, I think, trying to
[1:59:59] figure out how to use AI to review, um, uh, rental
[2:00:05] advertisements for potential violations or um, you know, if
[2:00:09] you're adver ti s ing a 14 bedroom house
[2:00:11] that's permitted for 5 people, maybe, you know, look into that.
[2:00:14] Um, uh, but, uh, and then, uh, on the point on vacant
[2:00:18] properties, I think, you know, really, uh, great
[2:00:23] uh first steps in terms of kind of understanding uh what the
[2:00:28] scope of the problem is. I think it would, I'd like to see
[2:00:31] the city do more in terms of actually maybe doing outreach
[2:00:35] to improve the utilization of the housing stock and vacant
[2:00:38] properties, particularly. I'll say uh uh a non-resident
[2:00:42] reached out to me, uh, and from a, a neighboring municipality,
[2:00:46] uh, recently and noted, you know, said, hey, you know, can,
[2:00:50] can I, um uh, can I get access to the
[2:00:53] vacant property lists like so I can contact the homeowners and
[2:00:56] try to buy their home, those, those homes, right? And so like
[2:00:59] the, the point isn't to just study the problem, it's also to,
[2:01:04] um, uh, figure out why particular properties are
[2:01:06] vacant and how do we, um, how do we convert them into, um, uh,
[2:01:11] things that are helping, uh, housing, the housing stock, um,
[2:01:14] within the city. So, um, and that can be, I think, through
[2:01:18] collaborative means with landlords or with property
[2:01:21] owners and through maybe less
[2:01:23] collaborative means, um, but, uh, I think ultimately the goal
[2:01:26] is to ensure that, um, as, uh, we're dealing with uh housing
[2:01:30] affordability issues that there's not just vacant
[2:01:33] properties, um, that are, aren't contributing to the
[2:01:35] community. So again, uh, really excited
[2:01:38] for for this work, um, and really appreciate the work of
[2:01:41] staff to um put this together and look forward to many
[2:01:45] further conversations, um, particularly on the, um,
[2:01:48] changes to code, um, um, uh, that will have in the future.
[2:01:52] Thank you. Um, let's go to Council member
[2:02:00] Mitchell first and then Councilor Mackey and then
[2:02:03] Councilor Hull. Canomer he has to get off. I
[2:02:06] don't. Yes.
[2:02:10] OK, there we go. We got you, got it. We, 3rd time it's a job,
[2:02:14] John. Um, thank you, Mr. Mayor, I appreciate it. Um, thank you
[2:02:18] for your report. I appreciate the information. I know this
[2:02:25] has been a long time in discussion and coming around
[2:02:28] the corner and the bend, but we are here and I know that um
[2:02:31] moving forward, this is gonna be some excellent work that's
[2:02:34] gonna be come out of your department. Um, one thing I
[2:02:37] wanted to ask in regards to, we talked about the short term ren
[2:02:40] tal s and the um Airbnbs we can we can we consider them
[2:02:45] businesses, so hopefully you will consider them as a
[2:02:48] business license versus a rental license, but also are we
[2:02:52] gonna be um looking at some of the social media platforms such
[2:02:56] as Willow and Zillow to obtain information on regarding those
[2:03:03] entities, those houses who are using their house as a rental,
[2:03:06] but now it's really as an Airbnb.
[2:03:08] Yes, uh, no, maybe. I think that, you know what
[2:03:13] Councilmember Hume is mentioning is that looking and
[2:03:16] trying to find, I think an AI bot probably would help us a
[2:03:19] lot in this, um, in the search and I think the one thing that
[2:03:23] it's, it's really um, let's say providential that we're going
[2:03:27] to um go to um MML very shortly and I think
[2:03:31] that we'll probably see some resources that will be able to
[2:03:33] help us with this in the data. So I think it is something I, I
[2:03:38] feel like it's much better. It's a much better, um
[2:03:42] lift for some something that's not um not staff intensive by
[2:03:46] using AI or something like that, so we will, we will, we will
[2:03:49] figure that out as a next step. And I hope that be going along
[2:03:53] the lines when we talk about illegal construction. Um, with
[2:03:58] houses that are being purchased and assumed to be Reynolds, but
[2:04:01] they're all, but they are building them out to add more
[2:04:04] rooms to them, and I know uh Mary Parton Mac and I have seen
[2:04:09] many iterations of calls from residents about
[2:04:11] several homes in the woods and in Crystal Springs have been
[2:04:15] that have been done I know Mr. Days has been working with Depa
[2:04:19] very intentionally in trying to help us um get violations on
[2:04:23] that, so I hope that's another aspect that we can work on, um.
[2:04:28] I think um those are my questions my
[2:04:33] colleagues answer other questions that I was gonna ask,
[2:04:36] but I received the answers, but I just really look forward to
[2:04:38] the outcome, but I also hope that we can really also work
[2:04:44] with the county with some of their best practices that they
[2:04:47] have and trying to dig out the um the
[2:04:52] large volume of issues that they have to deal with and how
[2:04:55] we can rectify them in a timely fashion about some of their
[2:04:58] best practices. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Let's go to Mayor
[2:05:02] Potomaki. Yes, thank you. Thank you for answering all my
[2:05:06] questions that I sent you, and I just had a, a few additional
[2:05:11] from your presentation. Um, so you said that there that um.
[2:05:16] that DPW is doing a trash study.
[2:05:21] Like I, I was very interested in that because there's houses
[2:05:26] that have like 4 trash cans and 4 recycling. So I'm thinking to
[2:05:31] myself, how many people are living there to make that much
[2:05:34] trash and that much recycling, so I was, so you're studying
[2:05:39] the like how much trash is being, so we're doing inventory
[2:05:43] of, they were doing an inventory of the, um, number of
[2:05:46] trash and recycling bins and where they're assigned
[2:05:49] and trying to determine which ones belong at which houses and
[2:05:53] all that information and so that's what we're trying to do
[2:05:56] is to see where, what the actual numbers are. And I mean,
[2:05:59] you know, Robert's really passionate about all this stuff.
[2:06:02] I'm like I, I don't, I only, I can't even match his enthusiasm
[2:06:05] on half of the stuff, but um I'll say that that's that is
[2:06:10] something that is going on in public works that is sort of is
[2:06:14] happening in parallel, and I guess that's the one good thing
[2:06:16] about working with both public works and with DPS and with
[2:06:20] planning, is that we're kind of talking about these issues now
[2:06:23] a little bit broadly like I'll hear one thing here and connect
[2:06:25] it to there and so I think we're connecting more on those
[2:06:28] levels, but yes, this is going on simultaneously. We had an
[2:06:31] intern who did a um. who did a, uh, what's a
[2:06:36] capstone process we had a capstone project on this where
[2:06:40] not a capstone, um the university project, the
[2:06:44] Powells project were interns actually looked at all these
[2:06:47] and worked with Jacob as well. So we have some very
[2:06:49] interesting results that we will be working through and
[2:06:52] along with um what Overton District 3, we've got some
[2:06:57] really good synergies even from that and how that also kind of
[2:07:00] overlaps. I can add there, you know, what it really uh allowed
[2:07:04] us to do is make sure that we are billing for through the
[2:07:08] amount of uh trash and recycling uh containers at each
[2:07:12] proper ty has because we, we, we found
[2:07:14] some, uh that we were only getting, uh,
[2:07:18] one, uh revenue source for, for one
[2:07:23] can and they probably had about 66 to 8. So, um, and that was
[2:07:27] from, um, probably, uh, one of our, I guess they call those uh
[2:07:33] more of a nonprofit organization uh that we were
[2:07:37] trying to assist over the years. So, um, they were already at
[2:07:39] our lowest rate. So, um, you know, we have to work toward
[2:07:42] correcting that because, you know, our, our resources, um,
[2:07:46] require that we make sure that we're accurately, um, charging
[2:07:50] for the services that we're delivering. Right. I had one
[2:07:52] more question, I think, um, so, am I understanding this
[2:07:58] correctly that, um parking is staying with the
[2:08:01] cella. or no, no, they're, they're,
[2:08:05] they're already on GoGovern. They're, they have a different,
[2:08:07] they have a different one, AIs, they have AI, AI which is
[2:08:12] separate. So they're gonna stay on that. And they're fine. Yeah,
[2:08:15] that's working. That's working because I think that
[2:08:19] when you drive by a house and they have 3 cars in the park in
[2:08:23] the in the driveway and 3 cars in front, and there's no place
[2:08:26] to park on the street. It's a pretty good indication that
[2:08:30] there's more than 5 unrelated people living in the house, so
[2:08:35] I was just wondering if parking is gonna be in on on this too,
[2:08:40] like in in some way. I believe that Ames has better
[2:08:43] reporting and we're able to pull that reporting a lot more
[2:08:47] consistently and we're able to pull those reports to get the
[2:08:49] information, which is why we're considering this, we're
[2:08:52] continuing to stay with Ames, um, and I don't think go and I
[2:08:56] was mentioning it to Mr. Young is that when I was in
[2:08:59] Bladensburg, we had GoGov and I wanted to move to parking, and
[2:09:02] they couldn't do the parking the way I needed it, so I would
[2:09:05] say stick with AMS because that was one of the ones I did look
[2:09:08] at, and I would say that they are do it that we are not
[2:09:11] having problems so this one's not broke. I
[2:09:13] don't want to fix it this minute, OK, that's good to know.
[2:09:15] So thank you very much and thank you again for answering
[2:09:18] all my questions earlier. Thank you. Let's go to Councilor
[2:09:22] Jordan. Thank you again for your report.
[2:09:25] Um, I had a question about, uh, the inspections and how those
[2:09:28] would happen and who they would like what properties those
[2:09:31] would be applying to, um, so can you walk me through, uh, um,
[2:09:38] what happens now and and what differences there would be
[2:09:41] after this. I'm gonna let Mr. Spalding or
[2:09:44] Mr. Mr. uh Davies worked with it, yeah.
[2:09:48] Um, cause I, it's, uh, I, it'll be pretty much the same, but it
[2:09:51] will be more of an electronic process, but Mr. Davies, take
[2:09:54] it on from here. Dave, sorry. I know the last
[2:10:02] name and I just I broke my mostly beat up. So the process
[2:10:06] is really not going to change, um, the new software is going
[2:10:11] to be able to enable us to track it better, to be able to
[2:10:15] renew things quicker and be on the alert for those things that
[2:10:18] um come up when it's time to renew. So the actual inspection
[2:10:22] process will still be the same. We're still going to be
[2:10:27] inspecting all residential rentals, all commercial
[2:10:30] properties, all multi-family buildings all the way across
[2:10:33] the board. So that, that process is not going to change.
[2:10:36] And then my understanding is that um we're we're expecting
[2:10:39] that there are some under the radar rentals at the moment
[2:10:42] that will that will likely be found in this new process, and
[2:10:46] so, um, that that's, that's good because the inspections in
[2:10:50] addition to um you know, the, the rental
[2:10:53] license has has benefits for the city financially, but also
[2:10:57] we, we do want to see that our residents live in a safe
[2:10:59] environment, um, and we want to make sure that, that, um, that
[2:11:04] the buildings are, are in proper order and all those
[2:11:06] kinds of things. Um, so this, this will be, uh, so
[2:11:11] so short term, medium-term and long-term rentals, and vacant
[2:11:15] properties. Is that my, is that what you, what you were saying?
[2:11:20] um, and then businesses as well, uh, to the extent that we do
[2:11:24] them now. All right. We encourage all residents to
[2:11:29] notify us 30 ears and eyes of the neighborhoods. They're
[2:11:33] there all the time. If they suspect there's a rental
[2:11:35] property and they don't think it's licensed, please reach out
[2:11:39] to us, um, send us an email or give us a call so we can
[2:11:41] investigate to see if that's the case.
[2:11:44] but please, yeah, please encourage your residents to do
[2:11:47] that. Thank you very much. Thank you. Before we go to
[2:11:51] Councilor Hull, um, um, Mr. Cocker, uh, thank you,
[2:11:55] thank you for your email to one of our residents, um, over the
[2:12:00] weekend and you gave uh some good news about
[2:12:04] keeping track of a rental property database. I
[2:12:09] remember many years ago we used to have it under proper
[2:12:12] database, but because of some reasons. Yeah, we don't use it,
[2:12:15] but now it looks like you have a way to bring that back. Yeah,
[2:12:19] sure. Uh, I think in the legacy system we had that there and I
[2:12:24] think all the residents, all the, you know, like management
[2:12:27] company, they really liked it. Uh, when Excella was
[2:12:30] implemented, there were some inherent, you know, security
[2:12:34] issues as well as like, uh, uh, you know
[2:12:36] certain things that we couldn't share that in a public forum or
[2:12:39] a public portal because the, uh, we were concerned about the
[2:12:43] system being hacked, uh, with this, uh, implementation,
[2:12:48] everything across through the GoGov, you know, like platform,
[2:12:51] uh, that issue is gonna be resolved, and we have heard
[2:12:54] that loud and clear from all the stakeholders in the city.
[2:12:58] We are going to do that and we are going to implement that.
[2:13:00] There's already, you know, conversation happening in the
[2:13:04] design of the switchover. Thank you. And this will be in
[2:13:07] terms of timeline. This will be done by the summer. Am I
[2:13:09] correct? We hope. OK, let's, let's,
[2:13:14] that's around the corner. Uh, and, uh, the residents will be
[2:13:18] able to search the property by the address or straight timer,
[2:13:22] so, uh, they will, uh, like have the same capability as it
[2:13:27] was in the legacy system. I think we, we have already
[2:13:30] talked to GoGov about that particular need. Yeah.
[2:13:32] Yeah, the, um, I think it's been at least 4 or 5 years,
[2:13:37] then. Yeah, up until 19 uh 2019 or 2020 it was there, but when
[2:13:44] there's like in 201 and when this thing got, you know, like
[2:13:48] moved to Acella, uh, that was a, uh, you know, inherent
[2:13:52] incapability. Yeah, it's kind of downgrading but I'm very
[2:13:56] happy that this is coming back. Appreciate your work.
[2:13:59] All right, Councilor Mar here, thanks for your patience so I
[2:14:01] think you just asked my question whether we would have
[2:14:04] access to the uh rental, um uh what
[2:14:08] the rental listings so that we can, uh, provide accurate
[2:14:13] updates sounds like everybody will, uh, residents and council.
[2:14:17] who have access to that database. It'll be made public,
[2:14:21] correct? that interface to yeah, like, uh, I think the, the
[2:14:25] things which are, uh, you know, like legally rented uh through
[2:14:28] our process, that listing will be there, right? Of course, I
[2:14:31] think when I heard council member Mitchell, uh, like, uh,
[2:14:35] there are other, you know, platforms or the conversation
[2:14:38] like from Michelle about chatbot or utilizing. There are
[2:14:42] companies out there who probably have reached out to us,
[2:14:45] but I think we want to make sure that uh how much we are
[2:14:49] gonna utilize or what is the extent of, you know, like a
[2:14:52] short term rentals out there, I think the numbers differ like
[2:14:56] it, you know, like uh earlier, you know, like they were single,
[2:14:59] there may be 30 or 400 just in one district, you know, in one
[2:15:04] area, and the, the reality is when we are trying to check it
[2:15:08] from the outside, you know, available, uh, listings, those
[2:15:12] numbers are a lot smaller, but we are definitely in case we
[2:15:15] have a need, we will definitely look
[2:15:17] into that option. Thank you, just to be clear,
[2:15:20] not, not everything will be accessible to the public. Not
[2:15:24] everything will be accessible to council members as well. So,
[2:15:28] um, but there will be things that will be appropriate to be
[2:15:31] able to share and we'll walk through that process, um, if I,
[2:15:35] if I recall in the old system 5 years ago, we could only see um
[2:15:40] the name of the property and when was the last time a
[2:15:45] citation was given Mayor, you are taking me to the side of
[2:15:48] that I'm thinking of bring ing my legal hat here. Uh, I
[2:15:52] think anything that we share with the public, uh, you know,
[2:15:56] it has connotations of privacy and uh definitely certain
[2:16:01] things we can share without any issue coming back to us, but I
[2:16:05] think those things definitely as the city manager said, they
[2:16:08] will have to be kind of vetted through the legal process as
[2:16:11] well, certainly, yeah, and I agree totally. Thank you. um,
[2:16:15] just to um clarify on this point, I think, um, there is
[2:16:18] some information that is currently available, um,
[2:16:21] publicly, um, it is not, most of the information, I think
[2:16:24] what you're hearing from council is not all information,
[2:16:28] but some information should be available. I think that the
[2:16:30] intention from from my perspective is, um, having the
[2:16:34] city be able to help uh people solve their own problems, um,
[2:16:38] when there are issues with uh rental properties, um, and I
[2:16:41] think when the city removed uh the listing of a contact phone
[2:16:48] number or other things. It meant that
[2:16:50] people ended up having to go to the city to help solve those
[2:16:53] issues more rather than just, you know, calling the landlord
[2:16:56] and saying, hey, you know, can you
[2:16:58] um, check in on this? So I, I, I, I think that's clear, um,
[2:17:02] and I appreciate your, um, your work, but if, if, I think to,
[2:17:06] to um council member Hughes's question around like which
[2:17:10] properties are rentals. That's already public information
[2:17:13] that's on the city's databases that are publicly available
[2:17:16] online. Um, so where, uh, if, if they are permitted, um, then
[2:17:23] that information is, is available. Um, what is not uh
[2:17:26] available is the contact information for a landlord
[2:17:29] Thank you Appreciate it. So, looks like
[2:17:33] you had a robust discussion and there's quite a few good ideas
[2:17:36] came sorry, Mr. Coker thank you Council members. I think you
[2:17:41] expressed it very well. Thank you.
[2:17:43] Thank you, Mayor, please, can I ask a question? Sorry, I don't
[2:17:47] know how this works, and I apologize the question suddenly,
[2:17:50] yeah, no problem. Um, yeah, thank you so much for the
[2:17:53] fantastic presentation. Looking forward to a lot of items in
[2:17:55] here, especially you guys we're talking about monitoring
[2:17:57] parking and, you know, trash to look at overcrowding. That's
[2:18:00] going to be very interesting and looking forward to the
[2:18:02] reintroduction of that database. Uh, one thing I want to
[2:18:04] highlight, I don't think is important when we're developing
[2:18:07] these codes and you know, any ways you guys can support this.
[2:18:10] I think there's often times a case where landlords,
[2:18:12] especially for young college students, are not fully
[2:18:14] informing them of all of the rules around, for example, how
[2:18:17] many people can stay in a house, uh, the trash fee for the
[2:18:20] number of trash and recycling bins. So we want to make sure
[2:18:23] that we're protecting tenants who may not actually know about
[2:18:26] these roles because you might tell the landlord and if the
[2:18:29] landlord doesn't pass that on, then they get a fee for it. The
[2:18:31] student gets a fee. That's gonna be on a bunch of college
[2:18:34] kids who quite simply did not know the, the very specific
[2:18:36] rules and codes we're going to be introducing. So when you
[2:18:39] guys are creating these codes, figuring out ways that we can
[2:18:41] make sure to be informing tenants with a
[2:18:43] be through online, mail, anything like that. Uh, I think
[2:18:46] that's key because I definitely know that I did not know all
[2:18:49] the rules about my own home when I moved in, you know, the
[2:18:51] landlord doesn't sit down with their tenants and say, OK,
[2:18:53] here's all the College Park codes that, you know, are, are
[2:18:56] applied, but I know for a fact that we pay fees on those. So
[2:18:59] making sure to protect tenants, I think should be a key part of
[2:19:02] this and whatever way you think of. So, just FYI, mayor, um, we
[2:19:07] will be attending some, um some of the things that the
[2:19:11] university provides to students in regards to housing
[2:19:14] Actually, Lisa and I are signed up for an event that's actually
[2:19:18] happening, I think this summer, but we'll continue to do
[2:19:21] outreach to the students, um, population in regards to our,
[2:19:24] you know, in regards to our public services, um, and a
[2:19:27] different pro and the different things that are going on. We're
[2:19:31] working closely with Laura on um just making sure that more
[2:19:35] of this is available online. Um, especially because we're, we're,
[2:19:38] again, like we have the ELO, we have the new move-ins. We are
[2:19:42] part of Maryland Day and when people come, so we
[2:19:45] are really working towards those to getting students more
[2:19:49] educated, but I mean, I also think, Derek, we do knock and
[2:19:51] talks and do you want to talk a little bit about that? Yes, um,
[2:19:54] the first week of school we started this, uh, almost 20
[2:19:58] years ago. The first week of school, we spend, uh, the 3
[2:20:03] nights, about 3 hours each night, and we're concentrated
[2:20:06] in the old town area where its students, and we knock on doors,
[2:20:11] we provide information about the rules just like you
[2:20:13] were talking about, um, we have code of student conduct comes
[2:20:16] along, a police officer comes along, talks about safety, and
[2:20:19] then I'll talk about noise, I'll talk about trash pickup
[2:20:22] days, things like that, and we do that throughout the old town
[2:20:26] area, the first week of school, trying to get the word out that
[2:20:28] way. If you can think of anything else, we're all ears
[2:20:31] here. Yeah, perfect. I, I think, uh, you guys came by my house
[2:20:34] when I wasn't there that day, but my housemates informed me
[2:20:36] about that. So that's a perfect example. But just making sure
[2:20:39] if there's any new rules that get introduced that, you know,
[2:20:42] tenants are informed of that Um, we're protecting tenants
[2:20:44] from getting fees that they weren't aware of short so, but
[2:20:46] everything else sounds great. Thank you all for the
[2:20:48] presentation. Thank you. I appreciate it. I
[2:20:51] think uh we had a good discussion. A staff, uh, final.
[2:20:55] I'm sorry, very final one. I'm sorry, I just got a, a text
[2:20:59] question from a resident, um, regarding and just want to make
[2:21:02] sure they that they heard going back to the initial process
[2:21:07] when someone purchases a home and they are intending to use
[2:21:11] it for um they say rental property.
[2:21:15] You sent out a well let me back it up.
[2:21:18] When they purchased a home, do you send them a letter
[2:21:22] asking them their intent on what the use of the house is.
[2:21:28] Yes, we send out what we call usage intention statement to
[2:21:32] the new owner, um, A lot of times we get the
[2:21:35] information by doing to door knock because STAT doesn't
[2:21:40] update very quickly. Sometimes it can take 5 or 6 months
[2:21:44] before even find out who the new owner information is. So a
[2:21:46] lot of times we will just do a door knock and try to find out
[2:21:50] who the new owner is and may contact that way.
[2:21:52] So the person who purchased the house, you sent the letter of
[2:21:57] intent. They had not responded and you just said that SA takes
[2:22:02] a couple months. But if you're using it as a rental property
[2:22:06] instead of as a owner occupied property.
[2:22:10] What is the ruling? So if we can confirm that it is
[2:22:14] a rental and being rented without a license, we will
[2:22:18] issue basically a notice of violation saying you're
[2:22:21] rendering without a rental license, and you have 10 days
[2:22:25] to make application. If you don't, then they can be subject
[2:22:29] to amissible infraction fine. A mere prote Maki just asked me
[2:22:35] that, what is the, the fine, the monetary amount of the fine.
[2:22:40] How much is it changed. It's now $2500.
[2:22:47] $2500. OK. And if between the time of them applying for the
[2:22:51] license and acquiring the license, they have uh
[2:22:55] violations in between that are very um uh guess pub public
[2:23:00] safety, what happens then? We will knock on the door and
[2:23:04] ask to do uh an inspection at the time to see if tenants will
[2:23:07] let us in to confirm that it is safe property. We can do that.
[2:23:11] OK. All right. Thank you. Thank you.
[2:23:15] Appreciate it. All right, so that's all we have. Thank you.
[2:23:18] um, thank you for all the um all the work you have done and
[2:23:21] looks like some good stuff is coming in the pipe and I can't
[2:23:24] wait to see them coming. Uh, maybe end of summer.
[2:23:28] as early as that Thank you. Keep doing you,
[2:23:31] counsel. Appreciate it. Alright, so next
[2:23:36] two items will be um Res items, right? I can see.
[2:23:42] The first one is the strategic priorities and the long-term
[2:23:45] visual framework. Um, please go ahead. Floor is
[2:23:48] yours. Thank you so much. Good evening, Mayor and council.
[2:23:51] Tonight I am very pleased and excited to be here to talk to
[2:23:56] you about strategic priorities in a long-term vision framework
[2:23:59] for the city of College Park. Um, I've got a few slides
[2:24:02] hopefully we'll get through them quickly because I think
[2:24:04] what I'm most interested in tonight is hearing your
[2:24:07] feedback on this proposal. Um, so why now? Um, our
[2:24:11] strategic plan that we had in place between FY 21 and FY 25
[2:24:15] has reached the end of its life cycle. It did serve as a
[2:24:18] guiding document for us throughout this past budget
[2:24:21] season and I think it's important for us to also
[2:24:25] consider community contexts. So we know that there's been
[2:24:28] significant redevelopment and investment underway. There are
[2:24:31] obviously changing needs in the community and priorities, we
[2:24:35] see increased demands on city services as well as our
[2:24:38] infrastructure. the continued growth of the
[2:24:40] university and I think what I've seen in my time here is a
[2:24:43] recognition, you know, by this council as well as by staff and
[2:24:47] members of the public that the decisions that we are making
[2:24:51] today in this room will shape the future of College Park.
[2:24:55] I want to explain this slide to you this all these speech
[2:24:59] bubbles with lots of big buzzwords in them and what it
[2:25:04] is is when I joined the city 5 months ago, I walked in here
[2:25:08] knowing that one of the items I'd be working on was the
[2:25:10] strategic plan and it was something that was really
[2:25:13] excited about, but it was also something that was a very aware
[2:25:17] of as somebody new to this community that I needed to do a
[2:25:20] lot of listening. and so I joined here right when
[2:25:23] we were talking about budgets, and there were a lot of budget
[2:25:25] meetings, a lot of individual meetings, and I started doing a
[2:25:28] lot of listening and taking a lot of notes, and I started
[2:25:31] hearing a lot of common themes come up in those conversations
[2:25:35] between council members as well as conversations with the
[2:25:38] members of the public and so common themes started to emerge
[2:25:42] and as I was hearing those themes, it started to emerge as
[2:25:46] balancing today's priorities with college parks and
[2:25:49] long-term future. And so as I continue to think
[2:25:52] about that, and I think about the strategic plan, it started
[2:25:57] to come together in a framework where we can look at planning
[2:26:00] for today and for tomorrow. So what does
[2:26:03] that mean? That means looking at the next 3 to 5 years, what
[2:26:07] our strategic priorities? What are the operational needs we
[2:26:09] have. So where should we put our efforts and focus on? How
[2:26:13] do we allocate our resources and then thinking about what
[2:26:17] outcomes matter the most and then thinking beyond that in
[2:26:20] terms of a community vision. So that's what kind of
[2:26:23] community do we want to see College Park B? How do we want
[2:26:26] to see College Park grow and evolve. And it started to come
[2:26:30] together that I think we haven't clear opportunity here
[2:26:33] to establish clearer priorities for the near term, while also
[2:26:36] being able to define the long-term vision for College
[2:26:39] Park's future. So what you'll see here is kind
[2:26:43] of a three-part structure. We'll get into the next slides
[2:26:46] a little bit more detail here on the structure. What I want
[2:26:49] to highlight here is really the two pieces that will run
[2:26:53] concurrently, so that's the looking ahead piece, which is
[2:26:57] our near-term strategic priorities and then looking
[2:27:00] beyond peace, which is a vision proposed vision for 2045. So
[2:27:05] those processes have different purposes, but they are
[2:27:08] complimentary, and we're suggesting that they would be
[2:27:10] developed concurrently through a coordinated public
[2:27:13] engagement process. Doing them concurrently allows us to
[2:27:17] maximize our community engagement efforts, maximize
[2:27:20] staff capacity and time as well as our community's time and
[2:27:24] input into this process and ensures our near term
[2:27:27] priorities, those strategic priorities are informed by the
[2:27:30] visioning process. So now I'm gonna dive a little
[2:27:33] bit deep into this. So first step would be looking
[2:27:38] back and I think it's really important that we look back to
[2:27:41] close out the priorities that we had identified in the FY 21
[2:27:45] to FY 25 plan by doing a strategic plan closeout
[2:27:50] assessment. So what that means is looking at our
[2:27:53] accomplishments during those times, evaluating the progress
[2:27:56] that we made on the goals that we adopted, identifying any
[2:27:59] unfinished initiatives. taking some lessons learned and
[2:28:03] establishing what our baseline is for future planning.
[2:28:06] This is proposed as a staff-led project, um, something that we
[2:28:10] do leading up to the next two steps. And it's main
[2:28:13] deliverable would be a strategic plan assessment
[2:28:16] report. and our proposed timeline for
[2:28:18] bringing that forward to council is this September.
[2:28:22] Then, once we accomplish that, I think we get into two of the
[2:28:25] more exciting pieces. So then we start looking ahead
[2:28:29] and we start thinking about what are our strategic
[2:28:31] priorities for the next 3 to 5 years. And again, that is more
[2:28:36] like what are immediate organizational needs and
[2:28:38] priorities are? What are the actions that we need to take?
[2:28:41] What is the resource allocation that we have? What data do we
[2:28:44] need to collect so we can measure those outcomes, and we
[2:28:47] use those priorities to guide our annual budgets as well as
[2:28:50] our departmental work plans. This is proposed to be led, as
[2:28:54] I mentioned earlier, concurrently, led by consultant,
[2:28:58] and it has several deliverables. So those deliverables, the
[2:29:00] strategic priorities, the action initiatives, those
[2:29:04] measurable and data-driven outcomes so we can keep track
[2:29:07] of things, aligning with the budget as well as an
[2:29:10] implementation and a reporting framework.
[2:29:12] The timeline that you'll see here is proposed to start this
[2:29:15] September and then take us up through that next FY 28 coming
[2:29:20] up budget cycle. And then now the piece that I
[2:29:25] think I'm most excited about. is why beyond 5 years and why
[2:29:31] 2045, um, so I don't know if everybody knows this, but the
[2:29:34] city was incorporated in 1945, so in 2045 College Park will be
[2:29:40] celebrating 100 years since incorporation.
[2:29:42] and I think that Centennial milestone really gives us an
[2:29:45] opportunity to think about what kind of city we wanna be, how
[2:29:49] we're growing, how we're evolving.
[2:29:51] how do we intentionally strengthen our partnerships?
[2:29:55] What investments we're making that are gonna have the longest
[2:29:58] term impact. and what legacy do we all wanna
[2:30:02] leave for future generations. So this is again proposed as
[2:30:06] consultant-led, and the deliverable, I'm calling
[2:30:09] College Park 100, a vision 2045 plan.
[2:30:13] It's a working title open to suggestions, um, the timeline
[2:30:16] for this one is a little bit longer. So again, kicking off
[2:30:19] at the same time as the other one, but then extending through
[2:30:22] November of next year. Why use a consultant
[2:30:28] So I think we've heard earlier that our staff has a lot on its
[2:30:32] plate, um, so that's one piece of it a consultant can also
[2:30:36] offer us uh specialized expertise and strategic
[2:30:40] planning, best practices, benchmarking, other communities
[2:30:43] processes. It also gives that independent facilitation
[2:30:47] perspective to really guide the community engagement, which I
[2:30:50] think is important for the public trust piece of this.
[2:30:53] and then that ties into the community engagement capacity
[2:30:56] as well as our communications capacity on this process. This
[2:31:00] process is going to require a lot of outreach. It is a very
[2:31:04] important process for the city and we don't want to skimp on
[2:31:07] outreach, so I think that by adding a consultant to this,
[2:31:11] that allows our staff to continue. It's very busy daily
[2:31:14] operations. Support this process, but have
[2:31:18] it be led and give it the attention that it deserves.
[2:31:21] Um, so what does a consultant do that manages and leads that
[2:31:25] citywide community engagement and communication support for
[2:31:29] the engagement meeting facilitation that can include
[2:31:32] things like council retreats, stakeholder interviews,
[2:31:34] community forums, surveys. There may be other methods of
[2:31:37] outreach that are proposed by our consultant as well and then
[2:31:41] developing that strategic priorities framework that I
[2:31:44] mentioned earlier and facilitating leading the
[2:31:47] visioning process. Now this does not mean that staff is out
[2:31:49] of it. We're not, um, staff are will remain responsible for
[2:31:53] implementation as well as project management throughout
[2:31:56] and the ongoing plan management.
[2:31:59] Um, roles and responsibilities. I've already talked here about
[2:32:03] what the consultant will do, um, staff obviously, I think I've
[2:32:08] spoken to that as as well. I do want to highlight that. I think
[2:32:11] it's important um that staff is involved in this too in terms
[2:32:14] of like giving input to the plan and being involved in the
[2:32:18] planning process as well, just as much as council and just as
[2:32:20] much as the community and the stakeholders, um, council is
[2:32:24] obviously an incredibly important stakeholder for us to
[2:32:27] establish the priorities to participate all throughout this
[2:32:31] process, and then ultimately this council will be
[2:32:33] responsible for reviewing adopting the final plans. The
[2:32:37] community and stakeholders, so again this is gonna be heavy on
[2:32:40] community outreach. We want to hear from our community. We
[2:32:43] want to hear what their priorities. We want to hear
[2:32:44] what their vision is for College Park at 100 years. So
[2:32:48] we're asking folks to participate in these engagement
[2:32:50] activities. Give us the feedback on priorities and
[2:32:54] visions and help us identify what issues and opportunities
[2:32:57] this community has. Um, proposed timeline and I
[2:33:01] will say that this, uh, timeline is kind of my best
[2:33:05] case scenario here. We do need to hire a consultant and work
[2:33:09] with a consultant on timelines and hear their, their strategic
[2:33:12] advice on this, but this is kind of how we sketched it out
[2:33:15] so far. The things that you'll see highlighted here in yellow
[2:33:18] are the major deliverables for this plan. So this summer, um,
[2:33:22] as I mentioned earlier, staff will be conducting a strategic
[2:33:25] panel and close out assessment of our past plan. We would also
[2:33:29] be issuing an RFP for the consultant and working
[2:33:31] through that selection process that would then come back to
[2:33:34] council, um, to authorize that contract for the selection in
[2:33:38] the fall. In the fall, you would see that closeout report.
[2:33:41] We would kick off this project with the consultant, and that
[2:33:45] will very likely include something like a council
[2:33:47] retreat to have to make sure that council is very involved
[2:33:49] in this process from the beginning and then moving into
[2:33:52] winter, we would be deep in community engagement,
[2:33:57] stakeholder interviews, visioning activities, so very
[2:34:00] much working with the community during that time.
[2:34:02] In spring, it's our hope to align the priorities that we've
[2:34:05] identified with our budget process so we can make sure
[2:34:08] that we are aligning our resources with our priorities
[2:34:12] and in the summer really looking at what that draft
[2:34:16] vision 2045 is with a goal to adopt that in the fall.
[2:34:21] Once you adopt, of course, it doesn't end. So you see there's
[2:34:24] a very long horizon there, 2028 to 2045, which is implementing
[2:34:30] and assessing the plan and so I, I think on the next slide I've
[2:34:33] kind of set up a framework for how we might do that just to
[2:34:36] give some insight into that. So how do we maintain this plan?
[2:34:39] I I think it's something that becomes a part of the lives of
[2:34:42] the staff and the council here as well as we want to integrate
[2:34:45] it with the community, so we're making sure on an annual basis
[2:34:48] we're aligning with the budget and the work plans with those
[2:34:52] priorities were consistently monitoring progress and
[2:34:55] reporting outcomes. We're reporting on data and our
[2:34:58] departmental work plans are being updated to align with the
[2:35:01] strategic plans, um, on an every 2 to 3 year basis, I
[2:35:05] think it's very important to intentionally look at
[2:35:07] doing a council strategic retreat, reviewing the goals
[2:35:10] and objectives. I think this has to be a living document too
[2:35:14] and update that document as needed. And on every 5-year
[2:35:18] plan, really looking at those strategic priorities, how are
[2:35:21] we refreshing them? How are we moving forward and then putting
[2:35:25] in those checkpoints at the 10 and 15 year mark, which I know
[2:35:28] sounds very far ahead, but it's really not um so looking at
[2:35:33] that what that progress assessment looks like as we
[2:35:36] head towards College Park 100
[2:35:40] So tonight, um, what I'm really looking forward to is hearing
[2:35:43] your input on a few things. So first off, we would love to
[2:35:46] hear your input on the proposed framework. So do you support
[2:35:50] this kind of three-stage framework which we have
[2:35:53] proposed as like looking back by closing out the FY 21 to 25
[2:35:58] plan. looking ahead
[2:36:00] developing those strategic priorities for the near term,
[2:36:03] for the next 3 to 5 years, and then looking beyond for a
[2:36:07] longer term community visioning process. And if you are
[2:36:10] interested in that longer term community visioning process, um,
[2:36:13] the, the follow up question is really should the city's
[2:36:16] centennial be that goal, um, that planning horizon for our
[2:36:20] long-term vision. Based on the feedback that we hear tonight,
[2:36:23] um, we will refine the project scope. Uh, we will develop an
[2:36:26] issue that RFP this summer and then we'll begin working on
[2:36:29] closing out the plan. So with that, I will turn it
[2:36:32] back over to council and thank you for your time.
[2:36:35] Thank you, thank you. I, um what is interesting, um, you
[2:36:43] went beyond the our traditional five-year cycle planning
[2:36:47] process, you, you went even further.
[2:36:50] and that's probably because of the centennial milestone we'll
[2:36:53] be having in 2045 Yeah.
[2:36:56] Um, will the consultant be working on both plans
[2:37:02] simultaneously or two different consultants. No, no, it would
[2:37:05] be one consultant. I think that's definitely the way to do
[2:37:07] it, that maximizes your time with the consultant. The
[2:37:09] strategic expertise, and it rolls into one. I would not
[2:37:12] propose having two different consultants. So there'll be
[2:37:16] engagement either through a staff, city councilor, or the
[2:37:19] community, uh, those engagement will be for both plans short
[2:37:28] term and the long term. Correct, yes,
[2:37:29] and we would work very closely with our consultant to make
[2:37:32] sure that they're strategically organized to get to, I think,
[2:37:36] you know, both of those two things. So the longer term
[2:37:37] horizon, the overall visioning, as well as those kind of
[2:37:41] near-term action things within that same meeting and I think
[2:37:44] that benefits us too in terms of, you know, having these two
[2:37:47] items which are very heavy on community engagement. Sometimes
[2:37:51] when you continually going out to your community and asking
[2:37:53] them, well, what do you think about this? What do you think
[2:37:55] about that? That can lead to some fatigue
[2:37:57] just on the part of your resonance. So being able to
[2:38:00] combine these two efforts into one, I think overall benefits
[2:38:04] both the community as well as us. Yeah, it's the, is the same
[2:38:07] person, same resident will be giving input and residents
[2:38:12] oftentimes could be thinking short term,
[2:38:15] but they might have also some kind of dream ideas that think
[2:38:21] it farther ahead. um, so it probably makes sense
[2:38:23] if you go into that both routes. Thank you. All right, I see a
[2:38:27] couple of uh starting with uh Mayor Porte.
[2:38:30] Yes, I just, I love this report and I support the idea of doing
[2:38:35] a five-year and then the longer plan. I, I think that that's
[2:38:40] very important. Um, and I love the community engagement. I
[2:38:44] think it's really important because this is, this is, uh,
[2:38:49] people's homes, whether they're 4 years here or whether they're
[2:38:52] 50 years here. Um, I think it's really important that we have
[2:38:57] community engagement to, to give us a vision for the future
[2:39:02] and for the short term future and for the long term future.
[2:39:06] Um, I'm looking forward to it. I, I thought you did a great
[2:39:08] job with this, and I didn't really have
[2:39:12] many things to add or, um, you know, I, I think that the
[2:39:18] process will help us to hone in on things that have changed for
[2:39:23] the, from the last time. And, um
[2:39:28] just making it very clear to the residents what what we're
[2:39:31] doing cause, you know, if you don't have a plan, you just,
[2:39:36] you know, you, you, you're, you're going to fail. And so
[2:39:40] it's really important that we have this plan, so I, I, I
[2:39:43] support this, so I thought I'd start off um just telling you
[2:39:48] that thank you. Thank you
[2:39:51] Uh, let's see customer Os. Um, also I want to thank you
[2:39:55] for this as I have reached out, I'm interested in kind of the
[2:39:59] long term vision and how uh what we, what we want to be as
[2:40:04] the future of College Park and how we can think about how to
[2:40:07] make a a sticky, um, uh, slogan. I think one question I had on
[2:40:15] the, the schedule, um, was related to agreement on the
[2:40:23] vision part. versus the
[2:40:26] um uh strategic priorities in
[2:40:28] alignment with the budget. So like, knowing that like budget
[2:40:32] is a driver of a lot of big ideas and big thinking, um, you
[2:40:37] know, to what extent will we have discussions on the under
[2:40:42] this proposed timeline, the discussions on Vision 2045, um,
[2:40:47] will that not start until summer 2027, or would that be
[2:40:51] like I, I think my uh proposal would be that like we have
[2:40:58] the bigger picture outline um by uh the spring 2027 as we're
[2:41:04] thinking about our budget, so we're aligning our vision, or
[2:41:07] aligning our strategic priorities, and then, you know,
[2:41:09] assuming that this is some longer report that, you know,
[2:41:12] OK, it takes some time to put meat on the bones of uh of what
[2:41:16] we're doing. Is that basically what you're proposing? I think
[2:41:18] we're definitely aligned in that. I think it, you know, it
[2:41:21] does. start with the vision, right?
[2:41:24] and it ties into it. What I, what I didn't want to miss was
[2:41:27] the opportunity to make sure we had actions that we could tie
[2:41:31] to the budget, and we, when we did the timing with that, but I
[2:41:34] agree with you. I think they're very interconnected, um, but I
[2:41:38] think you do have to start with the overall kind of mission and
[2:41:42] vision before and then you kind of drill down into it. So it,
[2:41:45] it will be happening concurrently. I just, in my
[2:41:48] experience, I think that we will get to a good kind of
[2:41:52] midway point, by the time we're in budget, but I don't think
[2:41:55] we're going to be at the wrap up point, which is why I've
[2:41:57] left additional time at the end
[2:41:59] Yeah, I think, I think time at the end to
[2:42:02] finish the product, but my hope would be that for council that
[2:42:05] we would buy the budget point, you know,
[2:42:08] like our vision can drive our, our strategic priorities as
[2:42:11] opposed to developing our priorities and then figuring
[2:42:13] out why we, why those were our priorities afterwards. I think
[2:42:16] the, um, thank you. Thank you, Councilor Jordan.
[2:42:19] Yes, thank you for this report. Um, I, uh, I'm in, in favor of
[2:42:24] the, the framework, the closeout, the, the strategic
[2:42:28] plan and the long-term vision all um as you've laid out, uh,
[2:42:33] when you're creating the RFP for the consultant, um, I
[2:42:36] wanted to, uh, to bring up just sort of to highlight that the
[2:42:41] uniqueness of College Park. So this is this this global hub, I
[2:42:45] mean just a driver and and uh um accumulating knowledge to
[2:42:50] disseminate to the world and it's a place to raise
[2:42:52] a family, you know, it's a place to just, you know, to
[2:42:55] live and be and so when you're creating it, when you're
[2:42:58] creating the RFP and and the things that you're looking for
[2:43:00] as a for a consultant that to keep that in mind um that uh
[2:43:05] we're, we're all residents as students and long-term
[2:43:09] residents and uh but also um what the university provides,
[2:43:15] not just that people live here, but also that makes perfect
[2:43:18] sense. Yeah, so, uh, I know Cons Hernandez wants to talk.
[2:43:24] The uh the consultant who will be coming um what Councilor
[2:43:28] Jordan and I believe Councilor also also uh talked about the
[2:43:33] opportunities we have about branding College Park, like,
[2:43:38] you know, having a slogan or something like that and even
[2:43:41] bringing some logos um, and we actually did that
[2:43:45] exercise of about 1015 years ago, um, there was a separate
[2:43:49] but totally done by a separate consultant, not as part of the
[2:43:52] strategic plan, um, so, um, maybe branding is
[2:43:57] you know, a separate piece of it. I mean, I think that
[2:44:02] we could certainly look at having that included into this.
[2:44:06] Um, you know, this kind of slogan, the sticky slogan that
[2:44:08] we were talking about, I think that ties very much into the
[2:44:11] vision of it. Um, you're prob probably getting a little bit
[2:44:16] deeper into another project as we go into branding and maybe
[2:44:18] that's something that branches off from this once that's
[2:44:21] decided. Yeah, and, and, and there's lots of brainstorming
[2:44:25] in the end we selected the slogan Smart place to live, but
[2:44:30] we never used it. for some reason. Anyway, uh,
[2:44:33] Conor Hernandez. Sorry.
[2:44:36] Thank you. Uh, first off, thank it's a thing. Are you guys here?
[2:44:42] Is it like the speaker? Is it that?
[2:44:45] No, oh, no, no No, I think it's a microphone
[2:44:47] that's right there. 000, really? Oh, we don't know.
[2:44:55] Uh, we seem to be having some technical difficulties here and
[2:44:58] uh. chambers, uh
[2:45:00] oh. I suppose it's me. All right,
[2:45:05] uh, let me just, let me really just say this has taken an
[2:45:09] incredible amount of work. I know that we started talking
[2:45:11] about this probably probably a couple of the little
[2:45:16] fan maybe, um, so uh I think a couple of years
[2:45:22] ago and it's really refreshing to see how much thought is
[2:45:26] being put into this. Um. so thank you. I know it's, it's,
[2:45:29] it's a lot of work, uh, so I'll start off with saying that I'm
[2:45:33] fully supportive. What's happening
[2:45:35] Oh All right. Well, it's fully
[2:45:40] supportive of uh bringing in consultants to help support
[2:45:44] some of the extra work It maybe your computer laptop,
[2:45:49] uh, volume. No, no. I.
[2:45:52] Oh, it just went away. Oh.
[2:45:58] hello All right, somebody's trying to
[2:46:01] tell me not to talk, uh Kenny, um.
[2:46:07] yeah, right Can you hear me now? Yeah, I
[2:46:11] can hear you. All right, great. Um, so yes, supportive of, of
[2:46:15] bringing in consultants uh to help out, uh, with refining the,
[2:46:21] the overall workload, uh, for those people who, who struggle
[2:46:25] with the understanding of why we need consultants. Uh, I
[2:46:28] think that it takes a dedicated team that specialized on this
[2:46:32] particular, uh, effort, um development of strategic
[2:46:36] priorities and actions for the next 3 to 5 years. I think
[2:46:40] that's great because I think right now what we're facing is
[2:46:45] we're operating off of a, uh, a strategic plan that was
[2:46:50] built out almost now almost 8 years ago, um, so although
[2:46:55] we're all eager to make sure that this happens, uh, I think
[2:46:58] real good thought is needed. Of course we're gonna need a lot
[2:47:01] of community input, uh, and having that dedicated support
[2:47:04] is definitely going to be super important. Um, a long term.
[2:47:09] community visioning process. I'm trying to go off of the
[2:47:11] things that you want from us, um, the one thing that I wanna
[2:47:14] make sure is threaded in. whether adjacent to the entire
[2:47:19] effort or as a part of the process is some sort of
[2:47:23] strategic communications plan. Uh, I think that
[2:47:26] what the city does very well is uh
[2:47:31] it, it has a lot of programs. We have a lot of different
[2:47:34] efforts, a lot of different initiatives that staff works on
[2:47:38] consistently, right? Um, but I believe that
[2:47:43] we could optimize by refining the entire approach to how we
[2:47:48] do communications, uh, I say that because there's
[2:47:52] there's just a such, such a, such an important
[2:47:55] element of civic engagement is going to be to understand not
[2:48:00] just the tools that are available for us.
[2:48:04] but like the priorities from that.
[2:48:07] communication strategy. Uh, so I'm hopeful that we can, we can
[2:48:10] find some sort of opportunities, uh, I, I didn't see that in the,
[2:48:14] uh, I think it was the word clouds that were presented, uh,
[2:48:18] I don't know if it was a word cloud, but it was definitely
[2:48:21] the various, uh, buzzwords that you said a lot of words. Yes,
[2:48:25] uh, so I really, I just wanna, I wanna a footst stop as, as
[2:48:28] hard as I can, uh, the, the, the communication not only to
[2:48:33] the residents, but just in terms of our overall
[2:48:36] policy, uh, I'm, I'm, I'm well aware that there are often a
[2:48:40] lot of different, um, staff that handle communications for
[2:48:45] the various projects that we have and maybe our
[2:48:48] it's, it's framed in an entirely different way, but I
[2:48:52] think that we should be thinking about how we, how we
[2:48:55] conduct outreach, how we implement bilingual
[2:48:59] communication, how we're speaking towards the business
[2:49:01] community, uh, with an effort to, to hopefully, uh, draw the,
[2:49:08] the outcomes that we, we all want. I will say I wanna say it
[2:49:12] was a council member Oates, uh, sent around a uh
[2:49:16] a vision which I found incredible. Uh, it was, it was
[2:49:19] wall that out, it was forward looking. We, we should be
[2:49:23] thinking about the, the massive investment that's coming in
[2:49:27] from the world, uh, into College Park as the Quantum
[2:49:30] capital of the world, right? So how, what are we doing to make
[2:49:34] sure that we are not only just a willing host, but also, uh,
[2:49:40] an economic driver that brings in those entities, uh, and the
[2:49:44] supporting entities, um, so I'm hopeful that that can
[2:49:46] be kind of threaded in here. It doesn't need to be specific to
[2:49:49] quantum. It can be towards technology innovation, uh, and
[2:49:53] then I would also add an element of trying to, uh, if at
[2:49:58] the very least consult with the university, um, they have a
[2:50:02] very large uh, planning process when it
[2:50:05] comes to how they build out, um, I think it would be helpful for
[2:50:09] us to conduct that outreach ahead of time, um.
[2:50:12] it's just, it's, it's, uh, something that we're, we're,
[2:50:16] we're gonna work with them as partners or we're gonna be
[2:50:18] working at odds and I really would rather work with them as
[2:50:20] partners. OK then
[2:50:24] that's helpful. I appreciate that. Um, I agree with, uh,
[2:50:27] just to address some of your points, um, consulting with the
[2:50:29] university, yes, they're incredibly important
[2:50:31] stakeholder, and we would be a full not to look and see what
[2:50:35] resources they have. So I agree with you, um.
[2:50:39] regarding the strategic communications plan. I, so
[2:50:42] communications as you know, you know how I feel about it. I
[2:50:44] think it's incredibly important. Um, I do think that a strategic
[2:50:48] communications plan is a different effort that involves,
[2:50:52] you know, looking at our communications audience
[2:50:55] analysis. it is a different thing than a
[2:50:59] than this plan. I think that communications can absolutely
[2:51:02] be threaded into this plan. but I don't want to put out the
[2:51:06] false impression that this will also be a strategic
[2:51:08] communications plan because that is a different thing and
[2:51:11] it's worthy of its own effort. You have to
[2:51:25] Thank you. Uh, see, that's the muzzling. Um, I, I entirely
[2:51:31] agree. I think that the maybe it would be worthy to to push
[2:51:35] that, uh, for a different effort.
[2:51:37] I just want to be mindful that everything that we're doing
[2:51:40] with this strategy has a communication element.
[2:51:45] Absolutely. Involved with it, uh, whether that be what our
[2:51:49] what our affordable housing plan is, uh, or our economic
[2:51:53] development. Everything should have some sort of effort to
[2:51:56] explain the why back to the residents and to whatever
[2:51:58] stakeholders are, are their public safety, uh, I mean, what,
[2:52:02] what does our current crime statistics look like more than
[2:52:07] just an insert in the uh in like the weekly bulletin, right?
[2:52:11] Uh, it's you know sus tain ability We have so many
[2:52:13] different programs and advisory boards. How do we communicate
[2:52:17] that back and also draw on some of the efforts that have been
[2:52:22] successful like LED, um, and our investment into the city
[2:52:28] streetscape, all of it just threading together to say, hey,
[2:52:30] this is what we're doing. Absolutely. I mean, I
[2:52:33] completely agree with that. I think that once, you know, we
[2:52:36] develop that vision and then that vision obviously comes
[2:52:39] with action plans as well as like key things that we wanna
[2:52:42] focus on and each one of those deserves its own communication
[2:52:47] strategy. So I think we're aligned on that for sure. OK.
[2:52:50] Thank you. And if, if, I mean, I'll ask my colleagues, uh, if
[2:52:54] we want to do some sort of larger project, but, uh, we'll
[2:52:57] take that offline. Thank you. Thank you. Um, speaking of the
[2:53:01] universities's plan, I believe they have a 10 year plan, 20202,
[2:53:05] 2030. So, um, that might be helpful
[2:53:09] as well. I know our plan is our plan, but uh we can always look
[2:53:13] into what they have as well so that
[2:53:16] we can um
[2:53:19] it can be complementary to each other.
[2:53:21] All right, uh, who is next? Council member Hill, I believe.
[2:53:26] because also, yeah, sorry for a second bite, um, but just on
[2:53:29] this point, I do think um doing more than I think it's
[2:53:33] important to understand what the university is doing in
[2:53:35] terms of their long term planning, but I also think,
[2:53:38] um, looking at what opportunities there for
[2:53:40] alignment, so more than just kind of talking to them, but,
[2:53:44] uh, you know, the future of College Park is inextricably
[2:53:48] linked to the future of the University of Maryland College
[2:53:51] Park, um, and we should recognize that fact and um and
[2:53:54] see how we can work together towards a common vision so that
[2:53:58] university is not pulling in one direction to say, oh, you
[2:54:00] know, the only thing that matters is quantum, and we're
[2:54:03] pulling in a different direction or vice versa. um,
[2:54:05] but I think, um, so I think they'll be a, a
[2:54:07] very important stakeholder, um, in the process and would be
[2:54:11] good to to chat with them. And again, thank you for your
[2:54:13] help. OK, thank you. Councilor here. Thank you. Um.
[2:54:17] so, so when we're looking at our long term strategic plans,
[2:54:22] uh, going out to 2045. I think that that also are setting
[2:54:37] standards for the region, and we should keep the regional
[2:54:42] goals in mind as well, especially along the lines of
[2:54:46] environment and sustainability issues.
[2:54:48] That's a great point. Thank you.
[2:54:50] Thank you. Um I believe those are the
[2:54:53] comments they have. Thank you. Yeah, thank you. And
[2:54:56] thank you for your leadership and your work. I know it's a
[2:54:59] lot of work and more work is coming on the way. OK, so
[2:55:03] you're not going away because next item I can see your name.
[2:55:06] against it Um I'm not allowed to leave.
[2:55:10] None of us are living, um, charter review workgroup. Last
[2:55:16] one, please. Thank you so much. OK, um, and we'll get into this
[2:55:19] next one, which is our charter review workgroup, um, get into
[2:55:23] this one. I do want to acknowledge just right off the
[2:55:26] bat that this was um a council initiative. I, I think it's
[2:55:30] very much aligned with best practices and governance, so I
[2:55:33] wanna give some shout outs to our council members. I believe
[2:55:36] those council member Mitchell who was spearheading this
[2:55:40] originally and then of course support
[2:55:41] ed by council member Mackey so I wanna give credit where
[2:55:44] credit is due as we get into this, um, I do want to talk
[2:55:47] through just kind of some kind of basics of how this work
[2:55:50] group would be set up. um, first off, what is it? We're
[2:55:53] proposing it as an internal advisory work group. Keyword is
[2:55:58] advisory there, um, that is tasked with reviewing the
[2:56:02] charter and developing recommendations that will come
[2:56:05] forward for council consideration. What is the
[2:56:08] scope of work so our city charter, I'm sure you've all
[2:56:10] read it. You probably read it every
[2:56:12] night before you go to bed. um, you're looking at those 12
[2:56:15] charter articles. I mean, that's what I do, right?
[2:56:19] Bedtime story bedtime story. Um, so you're looking at those 12
[2:56:22] charter articles that cover all kinds of things, the governance,
[2:56:26] elections, personnel, public improvements, finance, and
[2:56:29] really looking at those, um, it's been a while since they've
[2:56:32] been looked at, looking at them for compliance with state law.
[2:56:36] Look at them, are there outdated references and
[2:56:40] provisions in there. My guess is that yes, there are, and as
[2:56:43] well as making sure that we're consistent aligned with the
[2:56:46] city's current practices as well as municipal best
[2:56:49] practices, so the main deliverable coming out of this
[2:56:52] work group would be a report that is presented to council
[2:56:56] with recommended amendments for council's consideration. As far
[2:57:01] as the composition of this work group goes again it's composed
[2:57:04] of um both staff and council members. It's an internal
[2:57:08] advisory group, and that was being proposed
[2:57:11] as made up of the mayor 4 council members, 1 from each
[2:57:14] district. Our city manager or his
[2:57:18] designee, our city attorney or her designee, um, our city
[2:57:22] clerk and then a staff member subject matter expert, which
[2:57:25] may vary based on what the needed basis is, and what do I
[2:57:29] mean by that? So if we're talking about finance chapter.
[2:57:33] We may want to have our treasurer there for that
[2:57:35] conversation. If we're talking about personnel, we may wanna
[2:57:38] have our human resources director there. So that that
[2:57:41] position kind of varies depending on what the work
[2:57:44] group is working on at that particular
[2:57:46] time. Um, what I have proposed here
[2:57:49] is a phased work plan and really like looking at this in
[2:57:53] the phased in order to kind of help us manage the capacity of
[2:57:57] this. So allowing to give us time for detailed review, sort
[2:58:00] of section by section or kind of um category by category,
[2:58:05] while also really trying to keep the workload to this
[2:58:08] approximately one meeting per month. So kind of thinking
[2:58:12] about both staff and council's capacity to get this done. So
[2:58:15] as we look at the phases here we've broken this down
[2:58:18] into phase one, which is really just kind of an overall sort of
[2:58:22] flagging stage is kind of how I see it. So looking at all the
[2:58:26] different articles we have looking for state law
[2:58:29] compliance looking for those outdated references kind of
[2:58:31] flagging areas where we think that I, I don't know what I'm
[2:58:34] doing with this. I can try.
[2:58:41] Yeah, I don't you try to, yeah, I think this might be a little
[2:58:45] clicker thing? Yeah, there's a clicker, OK. Give me the
[2:58:48] clicker. I'll sit down. Thank you.
[2:58:52] That It's not you?
[2:58:56] Jacob, OK, you know what, I can just reach over here and, and
[2:59:00] tap it. We'll make it work. OK, guys.
[2:59:04] Hope this doesn't do it to me. All right, um, so looking at
[2:59:07] that ambiguous language and then flagging it. Thank you, I
[2:59:10] hear that. Um, for review. that would be sort of overall
[2:59:15] phase one, do some flagging, where areas that we'd like to
[2:59:19] dive into deeper and then moving on to phase two, which
[2:59:22] we have set up here looking at the various articles that
[2:59:24] you'll see listed there, which is really focused on our
[2:59:27] elected officials in the charter and governance. So
[2:59:30] looking at the powers and duties of the mayor and council
[2:59:33] looking at elections, looking at our districts and our
[2:59:36] boundaries and looking at council meetings and what's in
[2:59:39] there for that. So that is, that's kind of a beefy section
[2:59:41] right there. There's a lot in there
[2:59:43] Um, moving through to that, we would move on to legislative
[2:59:47] procedures that is very much tied closely with state law, of
[2:59:50] course, looking at whether we're compliant with the
[2:59:52] adoption of our ordinances and charter amendments. Excuse me,
[2:59:55] I'm sorry, I have a motion to extend.
[3:00:01] All in All in favor side. We don't need it, right? Oh, the
[3:00:04] new rules. Oh, here you go. Still living in the old time.
[3:00:11] No worries. OK, um, moving on, so then we'd be looking at
[3:00:16] after that personnel and administration, so looking at
[3:00:18] the charter provisions that relate to our personnel, our
[3:00:21] study manager as well as other personnel, and then moving into
[3:00:25] finance and infrastructure. So there are pieces of our charter
[3:00:28] that relate to budget, taxes, public improvements, special
[3:00:32] assessments, um, and then that would take us to a final phase
[3:00:35] where we'd have that internal advisory work group develop
[3:00:40] their recommendations. So looking at all of the
[3:00:43] recommendations that they've done through the phases I
[3:00:45] mentioned before, prioritizing those recommendations and
[3:00:48] developing a final report that would come back to submission
[3:00:52] and presentation to the full council as well as members of
[3:00:55] the public at a meeting just like this.
[3:00:57] um the deliverable, as I mentioned
[3:00:59] earlier, would be the report to counsel.
[3:01:02] Ideally, that report would include what the rationale is
[3:01:06] for each recommendation. And a prioritization on the
[3:01:10] recommendations as well, we may come out of this process with a
[3:01:13] number of recommendations. I think it's really important for
[3:01:16] that advisory group to say, OK, this is the number one thing
[3:01:19] that we've got to accomplish and here are kind of the
[3:01:21] subsequent ones we have. Another suggestion here would
[3:01:24] be to categorize the recommendations, are they
[3:01:26] technical? Are they administrative? Are they
[3:01:28] compliance or are they substantive?
[3:01:30] right? The ones that obviously that are most meaningful and
[3:01:36] will require the most amount of public engagement are ones that
[3:01:38] are substantive, and that takes us to the public engagement
[3:01:42] process, um, so I think all of you know that prior to the
[3:01:45] adoption of any recommended charter amendments.
[3:01:48] the city has to provide opportunities for public input.
[3:01:52] At a minimum, a public hearing is required for any change to
[3:01:56] the charter, but there are certainly opportunities for us
[3:02:00] to give additional input opportunities. I think that
[3:02:03] that could really depend on what changes we're talking
[3:02:06] about. If we're talking about a change to make us just
[3:02:10] compliant with state law, that probably does not need the same
[3:02:13] level of public engagement as something that may relates to
[3:02:17] how we do elections or the terms of
[3:02:19] council members. That is something that is more deep to
[3:02:21] the core of our governance that would require things like
[3:02:25] informational meetings, public forums, surveys. Now I threw
[3:02:28] that one out there just as an example. Don't get nervous. But
[3:02:32] just to explain, you know, there could be some substantive
[3:02:35] things in there. um, so what you have here is a proposed
[3:02:38] timeline, um, so this is really broken down taking each of
[3:02:42] those phases and I'll kind of one month chunk, um, starting
[3:02:46] in July, if the council wants to
[3:02:48] move forward with this, we would establish the work group
[3:02:50] and appoint the members, um, have an organizational meeting
[3:02:53] in August and then really kick off the work in the fall, which
[3:02:55] would take us up through early next year with a goal of
[3:02:59] presenting that report to the full council in March, and then
[3:03:04] giving council time to absorb and digest those
[3:03:08] recommendations as well as doing some initial public
[3:03:11] engagement. And then summer would really be the time where
[3:03:14] we look at that list that this council has come up or the
[3:03:17] advisory work group has come up with that
[3:03:19] prioritize the list and saying, OK, we're gonna consider X, Y,
[3:03:22] and Z first and moving forward from there.
[3:03:26] Um, so tonight, uh, just immediate next steps, uh,
[3:03:29] hoping to receive feedback from council on this proposed, uh,
[3:03:32] work group, and then you'll see sort of the sequencing of
[3:03:35] events after that and I'm really glad this stopped
[3:03:38] ringing on me here, so thank you for that. Like we're all
[3:03:41] done. Thank you
[3:03:45] Um, any comments? So I, I see the council packet and there
[3:03:50] there's a there is a guidance of
[3:03:54] kind of high level guidance or the other goal
[3:03:58] the goal of this charter review committee and what kind of work
[3:04:01] they'll be doing. The goal is to ensure the charter is in
[3:04:04] compliance with the applicable municipal law and aligned with
[3:04:08] best governance practices. um,
[3:04:11] yeah, I, I, I I, I, I like that kind of guidance, otherwise,
[3:04:16] you know, it could probably talk about anything we want.
[3:04:20] Yeah, I don't think that is a good idea on the scope. Yeah,
[3:04:23] we need to, we need to keep ourselves within, within the uh
[3:04:26] framework. Uh thank you
[3:04:29] All right, I see, uh, Mayor Puran May Puran Puran May
[3:04:33] Puran Puran May. Yes, um, this is a very, um, I, I love the
[3:04:38] report. I think it's very well done and and um
[3:04:42] I support the, the idea my colleague has been saying it, I
[3:04:46] think, from before I, I was on council, so I'm very glad that
[3:04:51] this is coming to fruition. I'm just a little worried about the
[3:04:56] aggressiveness of the timeline with you just talked about the
[3:05:00] strategic plan and then, um, the deputy, uh, city manager
[3:05:05] was talking about the major changes in, so, um, I, I'm just
[3:05:10] a little concerned about the the timeline. Yeah, I, I think
[3:05:13] that's fair. I think it is an aggressive timeline, um, and we
[3:05:16] certainly do, we, we absolutely have a lot on our plates, um,
[3:05:20] so, you know, I put this word as sort of best case scenario.
[3:05:25] I think that um we, we should also, you know, provide this
[3:05:30] work group with the flexibility to shift and adjust as needed.
[3:05:36] You know, I, I don't think you want to have it be, you don't
[3:05:39] want to be be a work group that lives forever, right? Of course
[3:05:42] not. So there's gotta be like some reasonable stop point on
[3:05:44] it, but at the same time, I think, um, you know, internally,
[3:05:47] and that's one of the benefits of having it be an internal
[3:05:50] advisory group, you can have some flexibility there.
[3:05:54] OK, thank you. Any other comments?
[3:05:58] concerns about us? Yeah, I had one which is uh how around how
[3:06:05] often do we review the charter? or do municipalities or when
[3:06:09] was the last time we did Councilor Mitchell can remember?
[3:06:13] 10 years. Yeah, last time I did, I think it was a resident
[3:06:17] community, am I correct? Yes, we had um residents and
[3:06:24] two council members and the city attorney are part of it.
[3:06:27] Yeah, I, I would say around every 10 years is
[3:06:32] probably the standard that I've heard, but it can vary from
[3:06:35] community to community. So, my, my only question then
[3:06:39] is, um, if we are keeping the scope tight to only look at the
[3:06:45] part I, I, I would be open to thinking about potential
[3:06:49] additions as opposed to only amendments if, if we, if there
[3:06:53] are like through we realize, oh, actually every other
[3:06:56] municipality has this thing and we don't even talk about that.
[3:06:59] Um, uh, I think given if we're not looking at this.
[3:07:04] except once a decade. Um, I think it's worth, uh, including
[3:07:08] that as part of the scope that. you know, we're looking at
[3:07:12] legal sufficiency, but if we identify gaps that there can be
[3:07:16] things that we would potentially change. Again, not
[3:07:18] trying to boil the ocean, but um, I, I wouldn't want to
[3:07:21] preclude at the, at the initial stage, um, that, uh,
[3:07:28] at potential additions. I don't it wasn't my intention to
[3:07:31] preclude that. you know, I, I think if we're
[3:07:33] in there we're in there
[3:07:36] if you're making changes, you're making changes, yeah.
[3:07:40] an amendment to the absence of addition addition is a change
[3:07:43] too, right? All right. Any other comments?
[3:07:46] Uh, Councilor Jordan. Yes, thank you. Um, thank you for
[3:07:48] your work on this. It's, uh, it's going to be needed. It
[3:07:52] sounds like there are a lot of things to clean up and, and we
[3:07:55] always want to be in compliance with state law, and it's good
[3:07:57] to think about the bigger picture, um, as Council member
[3:08:01] Oates said, um, my question is, uh, can you, um, can you walk
[3:08:05] me through at what points, um, this will be something like,
[3:08:11] will the, uh, will these be made public or brought to mayor
[3:08:14] and council? at each of the phases or only
[3:08:17] at the final recommendations, uh, portion please. So the way
[3:08:21] that I was thinking about it was that it would only come
[3:08:24] forward as part of the final recommendations. So giving the
[3:08:27] working group really the time, yes, work on it in phases, but
[3:08:30] then take sort of that last month or 6 weeks to really
[3:08:35] compile all the things that we've learned from the
[3:08:38] different sections into one report that would then be
[3:08:41] public, rather than doing it, you know, piece by piece.
[3:08:44] I think as I was thinking through this I was also in my
[3:08:48] head thinking about what we're going
[3:08:51] into with the strategic plan and vision and how we're going
[3:08:54] out to the community and that will also be happening sort of
[3:08:58] in this like winter time period. So I wanted to keep it to like
[3:09:02] one real really like one major public engagement piece on the
[3:09:06] actual report. Thank you.
[3:09:08] Yeah All right, that's all we have.
[3:09:12] I think you have clear guidance from the council.
[3:09:15] That's, uh, bring it up, um we don't need a resolution to
[3:09:20] form the committee.
[3:09:22] right? I, I don't believe so because it's an internal
[3:09:26] working group. Um, I can consult with the city attorney
[3:09:29] on that and confirm. OK. Thank you.
[3:09:32] All right, so we are done with all the presentations. So we
[3:09:36] are the very last item, which is interestingly action item,
[3:09:40] uh, and now it's 10 : 30 Actually, more than that
[3:09:45] 1040, um, and this is about 26G55 approval of the boats and
[3:09:53] committee reappointments and appointments and our city clerk,
[3:09:58] Ms. Ellen, do you have any comments before we, we take a
[3:10:02] motion? No, I have no additional comments. OK. Thank
[3:10:05] you. Um, I believe, uh, we have the list in the packet.
[3:10:10] and also you have a updated list on
[3:10:16] um, with the one additional change to one of the committees.
[3:10:20] Um, looks like, um, the council is in agreement. If that is the
[3:10:23] case, I will entertain a motion. Mr. Mayor, I move to approve
[3:10:27] the appointments, uh, as included in the attached list.
[3:10:31] So I uh, moved by Councilor
[3:10:35] Hernandez, seconded by, I believe, Councilor.
[3:10:38] Mayorpotamaki, um, for comments, Councilmember Hernandez.
[3:10:44] No thank you. We greatly appreciate, absolutely everyone
[3:10:47] who applied, uh, and if you weren't considered, we highly,
[3:10:51] uh, encourage you to participate as a part of the
[3:10:53] boards, though you may not be a voting member, your input is
[3:10:57] absolutely welcomed and appreciated. I mean, it, it's
[3:11:00] impossible to be able to fill all of these thoughts with all
[3:11:03] the amazing qualified, uh, candidates. So thank you so
[3:11:06] much for applying and hope to have a great year.
[3:11:08] Yeah, and, uh, do, do echo that. um, thank you all who stepped
[3:11:14] forward. uh to serve College Park, um,
[3:11:17] and this is not an easy job. There's lots of volunteering
[3:11:20] time they need to spend on um, if there is no comment,
[3:11:25] I'll take a, uh, you have a comment? Um, I just, uh, uh,
[3:11:29] also for anyone who, um, uh, who does not receive a, um, uh,
[3:11:33] a spot in on one of these, uh, commissions or or committees
[3:11:37] that the process will begin again in December. Yeah, this
[3:11:40] is not the last time. And consulos
[3:11:42] You have a comment You have a question
[3:11:48] Question, that that's the next item, right?
[3:11:50] All right, uh, we are not going to go to the audience to take a,
[3:11:56] take a, take comments because that was, that actually
[3:12:00] happened in the beginning of the meeting.
[3:12:01] Um, so this is the time to take the vote. All in favor, say I.
[3:12:06] Any he opposed, any abstention, the motion passes.
[3:12:10] So we're done with the action item and the very final one is
[3:12:13] the request for status of the future agenda items. Is there
[3:12:16] an application? Probably not. Then I entertain
[3:12:20] emotion to hold on, hold on, hold on.
[3:12:22] Sorry, I did I just have a question on the future that
[3:12:26] giant items, um, I see on consent the renewal of the
[3:12:30] Acela contract as we're talking about GoGov.
[3:12:33] is that yes, I can explain that um because of the um term in
[3:12:38] which the um ELA contract renewed and in
[3:12:42] order to have continuity, we asked to actually have a six
[3:12:45] month contract. They refused and so we've reduced the number
[3:12:49] of licenses, um, to the what we need, the bare minimum, and
[3:12:53] then we're renewing for the one year, so we have time to go
[3:12:56] from one to the other, but unfortunately we have to renew
[3:13:00] with them because they hold all our data.
[3:13:02] Does that make sense I'm sorry. Interestingly, even
[3:13:05] though we might not be using them, I feel like. Well, we'll
[3:13:07] use them, we'll be using them, um, you know, in July 1st,
[3:13:11] which is when it starts again and so we'll have to use them
[3:13:14] for a couple months, so we can share our experience with other
[3:13:18] Maryland municipalities, uh, we will. And I think it's all
[3:13:21] about timing, right? So we have to really next time we've been
[3:13:24] working on this for the last few months, but it's just, it
[3:13:26] just got too close. Thank you for thank you for
[3:13:30] asking. Appreciate it. All right
[3:13:33] uming Nan, um, I entertain a motion to adjourn. Move to
[3:13:38] adjourn. All in favor, say I. Any, any
[3:13:42] opposed to no extension or council meeting is adjourned.
[3:13:45] Goodnight College Park. So this, the motion was council
[3:13:50] member.