[2:27] Hello everyone. It is 6:00. I'd like to
call this meeting to order. Thank you
[2:31] all for attending.
We are going to uh start out with a poem
[2:39] that Dr. Sterling would like to read and
that will be in lieu of our prayer
[2:43] tonight. So, if you just uh give her
your attention for just a couple
[2:47] minutes. Dr. Sterling?
All right. Good evening.
[2:50] All right. The title of this poem is The
Legend of the Sand Dollar.
[2:55] Upon this odd-shaped seashell, a legend
grand is told
[3:00] about the life of Jesus, the wondrous
tale of old.
[3:05] The center marking plainly shows the
well-known guiding star
[3:10] that led to tiny Bethlehem the wise men
from afar.
[3:15] The Christmas flower, poinsettia,
for his nativity, the resurrection, too,
[3:21] is marked,
the Easter lily see.
[3:24] Five wounds were suffered by our Lord
from nails and a Roman spear
[3:30] when he died for us upon the cross.
The wounds show plainly here.
[3:37] Within the shell, should it be broken,
five doves of peace are found
[3:43] to emphasize this legend.
So, may peace and love abound.
[3:49] May Christmas season be filled with many
blessings for you and your families.
[3:54] Thank you.
[3:58] Thank you.
All right. Uh can I ask you to stand for
[4:01] the Pledge of Allegiance, please?
[4:06] Pledge of Allegiance.
I pledge allegiance to the flag of the
[4:09] United States of America.
And to the republic for which it stands,
[4:14] one nation, under God, indivisible, with
liberty and justice for all.
[4:29] Okay.
Um agenda approval uh is there a motion
[4:34] for the public hearing agenda approval?
I move to approve the agenda for the
[4:39] public hearing.
Thank you, Tina. Is there a second?
[4:43] Second.
Thank you, James. All in favor, please
[4:46] raise your hand.
Great. Uh abstentions?
[4:50] All right. We've got one.
We've got one item on our public hearing
[4:53] agenda this evening. That's the
comprehensive plan 5-year update for
[4:57] 2025.
Uh
[4:59] Jennifer, could you confirm that notice
has been given?
[5:02] Yes.
All right. Then I'll hereby open that
[5:03] public hearing, and I assume uh Jerry,
you're going to report on this. All
[5:07] right, Mr. White Dr. White.
Yes, thank you.
[5:10] Uh good evening, Mayor and Council. Uh
this is a public hearing on the
[5:13] comprehensive plan 5-year update. Uh we
do this obviously every 5 years. The
[5:18] city also annually updates its
comprehensive plan to
[5:23] uh deal with its short-term work
program, or also called community work
[5:27] program,
and also the capital improvements
[5:30] element for impact fees. Uh so, tonight
is uh the state rules require that we
[5:36] have a hearing. Um
Planning Commission had one at their
[5:40] last meeting, um because they're engaged
in planning as well, of course.
[5:45] And uh this is the second of an initial
public hearing.
[5:50] The purpose of it, it may seem a little
odd. Why are we having a hearing? We
[5:53] don't have a new plan or haven't talked
about anything new yet. Uh but the idea
[5:58] is that we'll tell the public, we'll
inform the public
[6:02] of the process that we will follow and
also um
[6:06] give them an opportunity to initially
say, "Here's what I think some of the
[6:09] issues are.
Uh please consider this or that in the
[6:13] update." So, um I'm going to go through
with the the first one is the purpose of
[6:18] the
of the meeting, which I've basically
[6:20] explained um all of that. We will um
we'll listen to anyone at the end of
[6:25] this presentation, which shouldn't take
me long.
[6:28] Um and then we'll see if anybody has
comments.
[6:32] Uh the next one is what is the
comprehensive plan? I think the council
[6:35] knows, but for the benefit of the
public, it's a
[6:38] 20-year guide to decision-makings. It It
uh decision-making.
[6:43] It guides our decisions with regard to
zoning,
[6:46] uh rezoning decisions,
variances, conditional use permits,
[6:52] preliminary plats, and so forth. It's
not a legal document per se, but we do
[6:57] reference it in zoning ordinance, and
it's one of the guiding uh principles
[7:01] behind whether we approve a rezoning
or don't approve it.
[7:07] Uh it has vision a vision statements,
goals, and policies,
[7:11] uh which we also look at. The most
important piece probably is the future
[7:15] land use plan. You can see that pictured
here.
[7:18] Uh we most recently amended and updated
this plan uh just a few months ago.
[7:24] Uh to in order to uh bring the base map
up to date, to put annexations on there.
[7:30] Uh we've got the um the new projects
that we have annexed in, including
[7:35] tribute, and also the uh the Providence
Group's
[7:38] project called Aberdeen. Um so,
um
[7:43] the comprehensive plan is it has a
five-year program which is supposed to
[7:49] tell us everything major that the city
wants to do in the next five years to
[7:53] implement its plans and policies.
And of course we do annually update the
[7:59] comprehensive plan with regard to
the impact fee program and also the
[8:04] community work program.
So briefly, uh, just so you know the
[8:08] components that are going to be in the
comprehensive plan and that are in the
[8:12] plan
now.
[8:14] We've got a goals
element which is vision, goals, and
[8:18] policies.
We have what's called a needs and
[8:20] opportunities element. The state likes
to see us
[8:24] put in a somewhat succinct fashion what
is it that we really need to focus on in
[8:30] the next five years and that's your
opportunities.
[8:33] Your needs, they also call this your
your SWOT analysis.
[8:37] Most everybody knows what that stands
for, strengths, weaknesses,
[8:41] opportunities, and threats.
Uh, other elements, uh, the work program
[8:46] as I said, there's a broadband element
that's not really much of anything.
[8:51] The capital improvement element I've
already mentioned. Uh, we do not have to
[8:55] have an economic development element but
we do have a land use element and that's
[8:59] required because we have a zoning
ordinance.
[9:02] There is no housing element required
either. Um,
[9:06] only for, uh,
cities that have community development
[9:10] block grant entitlement money do they
have to have a housing element. Uh, this
[9:15] is not to say that we can't have housing
policies, economic development policies,
[9:21] environmental protection is not an
element but we have environmental
[9:24] protection policies and so forth.
Moving on, the process that we'll
[9:29] follow, um,
this is the first step of, uh, several,
[9:33] uh, these public hearings.
Um, planning commission held theirs in
[9:37] November. This is uh, December for the
city council. Uh, we have appointed a
[9:41] steering committee.
Uh, they'll meet. Uh, it's up to the
[9:45] committee itself how many times they
want to meet, but we envision five or
[9:49] six meetings over a five to six-month
time period. We can also, uh,
[9:55] add on other public participation
efforts. I've got that shown here a
[10:00] little bit later. Uh, I'll cover it
briefly. Uh, recommendations will be
[10:05] made by the steering committee and the
planning commission around the middle of
[10:09] the year 2025. That's June. Uh, we'll
have review by the Northeast Georgia
[10:14] Regional Commission and the state once
we've submitted a draft for review and
[10:19] then we will all of this process will
end with adoption no later than October
[10:24] 31st, 2025. That's the city's qualified
local government status deadline.
[10:31] Uh, the rest of this, uh, steering
committee, um, listed on the steering
[10:36] committee. Next slide is, um, Uh, we've
got four members of this council on the
[10:42] steering committee and that is by
design. One might think, oh, we need
[10:45] citizens to do it, but the idea is that
the elected, some elected leadership
[10:50] needs to have
uh, way in on it and buy into the
[10:54] process. Otherwise, they're not going to
vote for it when they get to, um,
[10:58] see it later in the year. Also, we have
a planning and zoning commission and,
[11:04] uh, members, two members of the planning
and zoning commission are on there as
[11:08] well as
one resident, one business owner. Then
[11:12] we also have stakeholders. We, uh, need
to identify and interview stakeholders.
[11:18] These are people primarily with a big
stake, uh, like major property owners
[11:23] obviously have a lot to, lot at stake
with the land use plan and so forth. But
[11:28] these are some others that we may as we
go along, we may uh identify and talk
[11:34] to. And the And the mayor and council
have already given us
[11:37] a list of a few people to talk to, which
we will.
[11:41] But, there may be others as we go along.
Um next is uh various techniques. Um
[11:49] we have a pretty good plan in place
right now. Um we don't need to recreate
[11:53] it from the ground up, but at the same
time we can decide
[11:57] other things that we might want to do to
gain participation. I've mentioned the
[12:02] um initial hearings in the steering
committee and stakeholder interviews.
[12:07] We also will have final public hearings,
and then we can also
[12:11] have something else if we want to.
For example,
[12:15] um if we feel like we need a
questionnaire to ask the public for
[12:19] input on specific things, we can do
that. As you know, we've already been
[12:24] doing that of some sort. The mayor,
other council members have been
[12:28] um asking for
uh opinions about new restaurants,
[12:33] things like that. If you remember uh
uh the late Mark Coyman, who uh did some
[12:39] analysis of countywide surveying
information. We have a lot of
[12:43] information, so I'm not so sure that we
need to do
[12:47] a questionnaire, but we can. And we'll
rely on the committee to tell us what we
[12:51] think uh the best approach is to
community
[12:55] participation will be.
Uh next is the um
[13:00] meeting contents for meeting uh for
meetings of the steering committee.
[13:04] Uh I won't go into this, but this is a
suggested breakdown for how we might
[13:10] tackle the um
the subject matter by going through and
[13:15] talking about background and educating
the group, and then talking about plans,
[13:21] policies, and vision, and goals, then
talking mainly about housing, land use,
[13:26] community facilities, community work and
then just review of the document itself.
[13:31] Then uh finally um
this is going to be a little hard for
[13:35] folks to see, but we've got population
projections here, and I think
[13:40] everybody realizes how fast we're
growing here, which makes this effort
[13:44] all the more important. Um by the year
2024, we will have a combination of
[13:50] population employment that is something
like 23,000
[13:55] people.
Um about 18,000 of that will be
[13:58] household population, and employment is
projected at 4,366
[14:04] in the year 2044.
These and then the second table there,
[14:08] table two, shows you the net increase,
which is
[14:11] substantial. I mean um
over today's estimated population, the
[14:16] city of Houston's going to
add 12,000 people. We're a town of
[14:22] 6,600 or so now, and we will be
um
[14:26] well over um
well, we'll be up to 23 uh let's see,
[14:32] 18,000.
A total increase of 12,000. So,
[14:37] with that said, uh we want to open it up
to the um
[14:41] public for any kind of questions that
they might have. If they have thoughts,
[14:46] um the city attorney will run this part.
If there's anyone who'd like to speak,
[14:50] we'd want to uh recognize them at this
time.
[14:53] Thank you, Mayor and Council.
Thank you. If anyone wishes to address
[14:57] the uh comprehensive plan, please raise
your hand. I'll call you up.
[15:01] All right, do y'all have any questions
for Scott White or anyone?
[15:05] All right, then I'll close the public
hearing, and that's the only item on our
[15:08] public hearing agenda.
Thank you, Jerry.
[15:12] Thank you, Ben.
Uh Ben, I have this for you if you need
[15:16] it. That that last page. You're welcome.
All right, uh we are going to I'm going
[15:22] to call the order of the work session.
Uh and I'm going to ask if there is a
[15:26] motion for agenda approval.
[15:30] I make a motion to approve the agenda.
Thank you, Dr. Sterling. Uh second,
[15:35] please.
I'll second.
[15:36] Thank you, Tina. All in favor, raise
your hand.
[15:41] All right, we're going to do reports by
mayor, council, and staff. Uh I'm going
[15:46] to go ahead and start this time. I just
have uh three things to report from the
[15:50] mayor's desk, if you will.
Um this is just to inform and keep them
[15:55] keep the community informed as I as you
know I like to do.
[15:59] Um I want to let you know that I have a
made an official letter
[16:03] to GDOT uh requesting that they reduce
the speed on 53
[16:08] from
um Jefferson
[16:12] Street all the way to Crystal Lake,
which is just about at the end of um
[16:16] Twin Lakes. So, basically, this whole
downtown um it it it is an official
[16:21] letter now. It's a um I am asking for
official in input from them. And again,
[16:27] it's to reduce the speed down to 35
throughout the whole city.
[16:32] Um the second thing I wanted to inform
everybody, which is seems to be the
[16:35] topic certainly on social media and
certainly on my phone
[16:40] I know Jennifer's phone and many of you
other phones is Georgia Power.
[16:45] Um I have reached out today
um with the help of some other people,
[16:51] and I have spoken to the uh region
Northeast Georgia regional executive.
[16:58] He is coming to Hoschton on Tuesday with
his um let me get you the right title
[17:04] for that.
Excuse me, I'm sorry. One second.
[17:13] With his power delivery manager.
Uh they are meeting uh, meeting myself
[17:18] and Jennifer here uh,
next week and we're going to talk about
[17:23] the outages over the last 24 months in
the city
[17:27] which
by all records is around 22 outages and
[17:32] also mitigation going forward. So,
um, I will of course update everybody
[17:37] after that meeting.
And thirdly, uh, Dr. Whites talked about
[17:41] it. Uh, as you know, I do love surveys.
It's very helpful for us to figure out
[17:47] what you want and how to move forward.
There is a survey out now. Um, if you
[17:53] recall
about a year ago, the late Dr. Mark
[17:57] Koeman Koiman came in here and he
he gave us our survey results that he
[18:03] did in the county.
And part of that survey was, how are
[18:08] your elected officials doing?
And the results
[18:12] a year ago were not good.
And I promised the city that I would
[18:16] rerun that portion this year. So, I have
put that survey together. It is out
[18:21] there. The traffic's been low
and I think it's because of the
[18:25] holidays, but I'm asking you,
um,
[18:29] if you haven't, go look at the survey.
It's on social media. If you can always
[18:35] get it through me or through Jennifer or
any of our team. Um, anyway, so, we I
[18:40] will give those results in January of of
how we're doing now versus 1 year ago.
[18:45] That's all I have. So, I'm going to
start over here with James. James, do
[18:48] you have any updates?
Um,
[18:52] not really any.
Been busy at the cemetery.
[18:56] What else do you want to
That's a good thing and a bad thing.
[19:00] Good thing and a bad thing.
Yeah.
[19:02] We're selling lots, so that's a good
thing.
[19:04] I picked out my place, by just so you
know.
[19:07] What's that?
I picked out my place.
[19:09] Oh, did you?
Uh-huh.
[19:10] Yeah, it's all marked up and everything
now.
[19:15] Scott,
what you got?
[19:18] Um first and foremost um
we started we did the Jingle Mingle last
[19:23] Friday. I want to thank everybody who
participated. Uh special thanks She's
[19:28] not here. Where's Tiffany?
Special thanks to Tiffany
[19:32] um
for helping pull it off in the last
[19:34] minute. Um
we probably had about 300 people show
[19:39] up. We were lucky enough to send seven
car loads
[19:45] between
trucks and car loads of
[19:48] toys, clothing, blankets, pajamas,
you name it. I think we've got it up to
[19:56] Mill Springs, which is south of Lake
Lure, North Carolina. Um
[20:01] we did a
fundraiser a little bit with the 358
[20:05] Club over across the street, raised some
money there. Um we bought some stuff
[20:10] with it over at Got to Have It. I want
to make sure I try to touch everybody
[20:14] cuz touched everybody the other day, but
um there wasn't many people here. It was
[20:18] sponsored originally by Rock Hard. Um
there were 23
[20:23] businesses that participated. We also
did at the same time as the Whistle
[20:27] Market.
Um like I said, there were about 300
[20:30] people that showed up.
Uh we had the we had the trolley.
[20:34] Probably only thing that we got to look
a little bit better if we use the
[20:37] trolley in the future that comes around
a little faster. A lot of people missed
[20:41] out on it. Like I said, same time we had
the Whistle
[20:44] Market, had about 20 vendors out there
for that. Um various food trucks up to
[20:50] selling clothing and pottery.
Um
[20:54] we're going to send up again on the
about the 19th or the 20th. I think some
[20:58] of my neighbors are going back up.
They're going up this time to Swannanoa.
[21:02] So, if people still have some, I've been
contacted on Facebook from people
[21:07] wanting to bring some more donations up.
I know that Caddo has trying to get a
[21:11] hold of some air
air pods that
[21:14] that would be less expensive so that we
can buy some more of those to send up
[21:20] because they need things for really
between kids 15 and 12. The problem the
[21:24] biggest problem is is that we don't need
like $100 air pods because there's not
[21:29] like one we probably need for 30 to 50
kids. There are last time we sent up for
[21:35] like 500 children whereas what
that was in the need for it. I think
[21:41] they did it last night. I do not have
pictures but pretty sure last night they
[21:45] had like a a Christmas for the kids up
in Mill Springs. Um it was a blessing
[21:50] really honestly. Uh a little too many
tears. The mayor was crying. My
[21:54] neighbors were crying. Uh it's not
right. You all don't need to make me
[21:58] cry.
Um but we are lucky enough to do it. I
[22:01] can't say enough about the city. I hope
we continue in the future that Jingle
[22:07] Mingle becomes our community helping
others.
[22:10] Whether it's internally in Jackson
County or externally like it was this
[22:13] time.
Um
[22:15] Christmas is a time
of giving. We're working on hopefully
[22:20] getting our
and I can make this announcement maybe
[22:23] Fox News will hear this. We're hoping
that
[22:26] we had the mayor um
actually
[22:30] was able to get a little video a little
interview. Um they're asking for
[22:35] Christmas light stuff. We lit our
Christmas tree that night. I know next
[22:38] year we are moving it up. The days going
to move up. We're scheduling events much
[22:42] earlier.
Um kind of got that hopefully we'll have
[22:45] that out by the end of January that the
whole event list for the whole year. Um
[22:51] so that's the first step. Second thing
that we're all going to do is um
[22:58] Ben I'll give you a copy of this before
you leave.
[23:00] We we going to start
2025 January 16th
[23:06] which is a Thursday.
Mr. Clark, I hope you show up as a
[23:09] business owner in town. Um be 2025
Wharton Business Networking. The first
[23:15] time, I know in the past they've had a
little coffee and conversations, but we,
[23:20] the mayor and myself, will be out there.
It starts at 7:30 in the morning. It is
[23:25] for business people. Um for as many
business owners as we can.
[23:30] I'm working with Jen to get an email out
to all the businesses in town.
[23:35] Um we're calling the first one
Excuse my little bit of words here, the
[23:40] BS experience.
To future growth. And BS doesn't stand
[23:45] for what you all think it does, but it
does stand for the ability to come in
[23:48] here
um for lack of a better word, a
[23:51] little bit to us, give us a little bit
of feedback from what we haven't done
[23:54] right in the past.
Some of the stuff we may be able to fix.
[23:59] Maybe we can learn from some of the
stuff.
[24:01] I won't have any say in it. I wasn't
here
[24:04] 10 years ago, so when somebody tells me
somebody didn't get an email back 10
[24:07] years ago,
I'll apologize and move on. So, um we
[24:11] have an agenda. We're hoping all the
businesses can get involved. We would
[24:16] want Wharton to feel like, you know,
keep a small little piece of heaven is
[24:20] our mayor has been talking around
saying.
[24:22] And get our businesses involved very
much so. Um we need to get to support
[24:26] the small businesses as the growth keeps
on coming here.
[24:30] So, that will be on the 16th 7:30 in the
morning. It will be in here.
[24:35] Um so, hopefully Ben, you can get that
out in the newspaper for us, too.
[24:39] Um for the local businesses.
And the businesses uh you've spoken to
[24:43] have been extremely responsive to this
idea, correct?
[24:46] Oh, 100%. Um
actually we have a meeting tomorrow one
[24:50] business you and I myself. Um I
It was amazing to see how many
[24:54] businesses came
and helped out with the jingle mingle.
[24:59] I just it was amazing to see. So,
I think they're all excited. I think
[25:04] we're getting really now we've got we'll
see later on in the agenda there's two
[25:08] business owners.
Um one sitting here, one one that's been
[25:12] the longest business owner in Houston.
We'll be uh trying to you know we're
[25:16] going to look at them as BM DDA members.
I know there's a third one that we're
[25:20] going to meet tomorrow yourself and I
that would like to be on the DDA also.
[25:24] Um so it's
good thing.
[25:28] So.
Thank you, sir.
[25:29] No problem.
Thank you, Sterling.
[25:31] Okay. Good evening.
Uh I don't have a report, but I am still
[25:38] uh promoting the mayor's reading
program.
[25:41] Uh I've been to uh
West Jackson Elementary and I've done
[25:47] many lessons on local government and if
you look in the back, uh you can see uh
[25:53] the end product. Uh I mean I talked to
the kids about uh local government. I
[26:00] went a little beyond and talked about
state government, but kept it small
[26:05] because
I'm talking to kindergarten kids. But uh
[26:09] we talked about the mayor what the mayor
does. Is the mayor uh guy or is the
[26:14] mayor uh girl and I got all kind of
answers, but what we came up with that
[26:20] mayor can be a male or female.
And uh
[26:24] so uh they uh created their puppets and
I have two more classes.
[26:29] Uh I've emailed uh
uh one of our officers uh
[26:37] is Officer Emerson. Yes, I emailed him.
And he's he said he'll be delighted to
[26:43] go over
uh and I'm going to email some other
[26:47] council members and
uh their spouses. Anyone who would like
[26:52] to go over and read to the kids, they
really are excited about us coming. And
[26:58] knowing that uh
the mayor running the city is not just
[27:04] the mayor, that she has many helpers in
doing that.
[27:08] So, if anybody would like to volunteer
to read, uh just uh let me know. Come
[27:14] here to City Hall and just leave your
name and number and I'll get in contact
[27:18] with you.
Thank you.
[27:21] I did hear uh
a rumor that there's somebody in the
[27:26] audience that loves to read to children.
So, hopefully
[27:33] James, do you want to hear from Mr.
Yeah, that's who I'm talking about.
[27:38] Yeah, yeah, they do.
J.D. Brown, everybody. Just wanted to
[27:43] let you know.
Tina?
[27:47] Um just a quick rundown, I guess. There
hasn't been a lot of activity, but um
[27:51] the Oak Street Park is in the budget for
next year, so I need to get that RFP out
[27:55] there.
Um I have a funny feeling it'll probably
[27:59] be a two-phase project. Um
but that's on me to get the RFP out
[28:03] there with my
dreams and see how far we can go with it
[28:07] in 2025. Um the first reports on the
Mulberry house um came back and so we've
[28:14] got to move forward on RFPs to get that
demolished. That opens up a space in the
[28:20] Mulberry Park project that I have some
ideas for that will um
[28:25] be added to that project, but that again
is just future thinking and planning.
[28:30] Um we voted to accept the matching
grant.
[28:34] So, I don't know when that'll be
disbursed or when actual movement will
[28:37] take place on the
park, but
[28:40] we're making progress. It's not entirely
visible right now, but we're making
[28:43] progress.
Thank you, Tina.
[28:47] David? you.
Mayor, thank you. Um
[28:50] short and sweet, we got three projects
I've I've been working on the last since
[28:54] the last meeting. Uh one of them was
with the public works director, Jamie
[28:58] Wheeler. We've been driving the city
looking at streets, uh
[29:01] which ones we want to repair. We have an
LMIG coming up very shortly, so we're
[29:06] going around seeing the best way to
spend that money and what we're going to
[29:09] do, and we think we have a proposal for
the city. Uh also working with Jerry
[29:14] Hood um on city wells for the future.
Looking at positioning, where we want to
[29:20] go, how much water we can get, uh
because it is the least expensive kind
[29:24] of water we can possibly get, so
we're probably going to go out and tour
[29:28] tour some places um
next week and the week after and have
[29:33] something for the city by early next
year.
[29:37] And then finally, as you well know, we
did a GMA capital survey.
[29:42] Um so we'll be turning that in to to the
GMA very soon.
[29:46] Other than that,
thank you.
[29:50] Jennifer, before I go to you, I just
want to make one more comment that I
[29:53] forgot to mention. Um just wanted
everybody to know that Barrow County um
[29:58] at their last council meeting
last meeting, they also approved our
[30:03] water agreement. So, that's been signed
by both parties now. Just wanted to
[30:07] close the loop on that.
Jennifer.
[30:10] Thank you, mayor. So,
uh we have been um just like as Tina
[30:14] said, we have uh there's a lot of things
going behind the scenes that we are
[30:18] working on that we are looking forward
to um
[30:22] presenting to each and every one of you
in 2025. A few things that I have that
[30:27] we have accomplished this uh month is
the city uh mayor and council uh
[30:33] approved, you know, purchasing um the
land for the future city hall and police
[30:37] complex that's on Peachtree Road. We um
have signage that we have has been
[30:43] delivered today.
So we are in hopes that you will see
[30:47] that signage on the property. I'm not
sure if they're going to be able to do
[30:50] it tomorrow because they have training,
but we will have it out next week.
[30:54] Um
so that y'all can see exactly where our
[30:56] property that was purchased will be.
Mayor and staff have been working on the
[31:02] golf cart ordinance and we should have
that to you all very soon.
[31:07] Mayor Martin and myself has met with
Matt Ruppel. Matt is
[31:13] Mr. Ruppel is opening the Pasta Master
next door and he is also working for the
[31:19] future
development of the garden which is at
[31:22] the 29 West Broad Street facility. So
we're excited to work with Mr. Ruppel on
[31:27] those two.
And then also
[31:31] Mayor Martin
Councilmember Dave Brown and myself met
[31:37] with
amongst some of our other staff members
[31:41] met with
the MPO. We are continuing to work on
[31:45] the master traffic plan for the city of
Hutchison. So we are excited about that
[31:51] and it was
approved and by the state. So we are
[31:55] excited to work with them closely with
them to get that moving.
[32:00] We are continuing to well I had this in
my report but I believe that the mayor
[32:07] and Councilmember Scott Quarter has
worked on the logo for the South Tower
[32:12] at Joe Pena and um
and I believe that they have submitted a
[32:17] final a final logo. So
lots going on.
[32:22] Yes, we're waiting on a couple more of
the logistics to go with that, but we
[32:26] are excited that things are moving. A
lot of our capital improvement
[32:31] infrastructure is moving. That's things
that y'all don't normally you wouldn't
[32:35] see, but it is moving and we're we're
excited about the
[32:39] the the improvements that are happening
in the city.
[32:47] Also, if you look online um in our in
the packets, I try to update everybody
[32:53] on what the ongoing projects are for
2024 and 2025. So, you can look there.
[32:59] Um we have three that are completed. The
water booster pump, I did put completed,
[33:04] but we there's a couple of little things
that we're tweaking on that. And so,
[33:07] we're hoping I talked to our engineer
today, so we're hoping that we can get
[33:10] those couple things tweak tweaked so
that we can get our
[33:14] um tank uh across from the fire
department um active. And then our Broad
[33:19] Street paving, which is right in front
of our Mulberry Park, is 100% completed.
[33:24] And if you've noticed um there is
parallel parking now.
[33:28] Uh so, uh there you know, there's always
a need for parking in downtown. So, we
[33:32] were we were thankful that we were able
to
[33:35] uh implement that as well. And then
um
[33:40] the waterline upgrade phase 1B is 100%
completed, and it was under budget. We
[33:47] love under budget projects. And so, that
is 100% done, and we will be working on
[33:53] phase two uh next year. So, uh you'll
see that come back uh in front of you uh
[34:00] after we um make a complete bid. Uh
also, there's public works department
[34:05] monthly meeting uh our monthly reporting
here. There's the building department.
[34:10] And uh the police department, and uh the
city planner's uh report. And so, uh we
[34:17] do uh encourage you to look at those and
see what each department is is doing and
[34:22] how busy we truly are in the city of
Houston.
[34:26] Thank you, Mayor.
[34:30] Thank you, everyone. It certainly
is a busy town and a great place to be.
[34:37] Okay.
Um let's go ahead and go to item number
[34:41] one, old business. This is resolution
2024-54.
[34:45] I'd like to call on uh Dr. Weiss for
this, please.
[34:50] Thank you, Mayor. This is a loose end
from a prior agenda. Uh we had several
[34:56] lift station properties that are being
dedicated to the city. Uh we've accepted
[35:02] several of them, but there was one that
we had a an issue with with regard to um
[35:08] proper legal description and and uh
showing the lot in the public records
[35:14] that had not been done. So, we had to um
get a
[35:18] an amendment to Cresswind phase four
final plat to show that that lot, and
[35:23] now that's been done. And the applicant
has given us the
[35:27] uh a deed, although it's not the right
kind of deed. The um city attorney has
[35:32] told us that we have to have a a a
warranty deed rather than a limited
[35:37] warranty deed. Uh but in any event, the
there's a resolution for your approval
[35:42] that will accept uh 0.235
acres of land, which is
[35:48] improved with a sewage lift station, and
we recommend that you approve that
[35:53] resolution
in your voting session next um whenever
[35:58] that's coming up.
Tuesday.
[35:59] Okay, Tuesday.
And then uh we'll make sure that that
[36:04] uh the the uh deed will be in the right
form for acceptance and recording. So,
[36:10] that's the recommendation for approval.
I did talk to Jen about this today. Um
[36:15] she's been working with them, and she's
very confident that we'll have it before
[36:19] voting on Tuesday, or they are, right?
Um yes, we won't vote without it.
[36:24] Yeah, okay.
Any questions?
[36:29] I have a question, Mayor.
If I may.
[36:33] Yeah, sure.
When do
[36:36] At what point does the city take over
the maintenance for these lift stations?
[36:40] Is it when we get the land or is it
before that?
[36:45] It's well before that. It's when they
when they propose the final plat. When
[36:49] when we approve the final plat, they
dedicate the roads and they the water
[36:53] lines and sewer lines and if there's a
lift station a lift station at that time
[36:59] that doesn't mean that they dedicate the
land underneath the lift station, but
[37:03] the physical plant of it it's dedicated
once the final plat is approved.
[37:08] Okay, thank you.
[37:11] If they have a hiccup in getting us the
right deed, I'm comfortable if y'all are
[37:15] with passing the resolution and Jerry
I'll make sure the deed's in the correct
[37:18] format. They've given us the correct
format in the past. I There just must
[37:21] have been a little trip up in the
lawyer's office or something, so
[37:24] uh I'm fine with that if y'all are. It's
up to y'all.
[37:27] Okay.
[37:30] Is Is this the same lift station that
there was questions about as far as the
[37:34] fee being paid by
the developer?
[37:39] When when it came online and when we
accepted it.
[37:43] That I don't know. Uh I can't remember
which which one is which. All I can say
[37:47] is that for
you know, the um
[37:50] the lift station maintenance fee that
was passed in I think it was April or
[37:55] May of 2023
for all of those that were
[37:59] dedicated after that date, we got um we
got the maintenance fee and if if we
[38:06] didn't get it, then it's because we
weren't able to get it from them.
[38:13] What's the fee on the maintenance?
It's based on the horsepower of the uh
[38:18] of the um engine the motor in the pump
station.
[38:23] Uh it ranges, I think, from $150,000
[38:31] Thank you.
You're welcome.
[38:35] Any other questions on this?
[38:39] Okay.
Uh we'll go to new business. Uh this
[38:42] authorizes the city to initiate a
rezoning request C-24-04
[38:48] uh for 11.25
acres of property. Uh Dr. Weiss, would
[38:54] you like to speak to this as well?
Yes, thank you, Mayor. Uh
[38:57] uh staff recommendation is that
you go ahead and authorize us to
[39:02] initiate the rezoning of the property
that the city just bought. It's about
[39:06] 11.25 acres.
City Manager outlined the purpose of
[39:10] that is for uh
among other things, for uh
[39:14] police complex and a new city hall
complex. And the property is, I think,
[39:19] it's zoned R1 right now. It's zoned for
residential. Um
[39:24] city uses can go in any zoning district,
and so it's not absolutely essential
[39:29] that we rezone it, but uh just like when
we did the Mulberry property and we
[39:35] wanted to put a parking deck on that, we
rezone that to
[39:38] highway commercial, because that's where
the park a parking deck should uh should
[39:43] be. And so, this is going to be an
institutional piece
[39:46] of property, by and large, so we're
recommending that you initiate the
[39:50] rezoning to from R1 to institutional.
And if you vote on Tuesday night to do
[39:56] that, then it will go uh we'll prepare
the application.
[40:00] Uh the legal ad this would it's not
approving the rezoning, that's merely
[40:05] initiate authorizing the initiation of
it, so we go through the process of
[40:10] public hearings
uh first to the Planning Commission,
[40:13] then to the City Council. So, it's not a
it's not a done deal. You're just saying
[40:18] let's start the process.
And uh we think it's a
[40:22] uh as good a time as any to go ahead and
get started on that. It relates to the
[40:26] second item which I'll hold off talking
about till we get there.
[40:30] Okay. Thank you.
Council, any questions?
[40:37] All right. Uh so we will go to new
business item number two. Uh this is to
[40:42] authorize the city to initiate rezoning
request Z -24-05.
[40:47] Uh go ahead, Dr. White, please.
Thank you, uh Mayor and Council. Um
[40:51] this property uh you
this project, The Enclave, was approved
[40:57] by the City Council in 2021. Most of
you, I think, or all of you were not
[41:01] on the uh maybe James was here, I think.
James was, but everybody else didn't, so
[41:07] you may not know all that much about the
project, and that's why I wrote a uh
[41:11] five-page memo for you to have the
background information so that in case
[41:17] you had a lot of questions about that
project, um that we could maybe answer
[41:21] them and speed up the the uh
deliberations tonight. Uh but basically,
[41:26] the recommendation is that you authorize
the city to initiate
[41:31] a rezoning request which would change
conditions of zoning approval on the
[41:35] Enclave project. And
the million-dollar question really is,
[41:40] well, why don't you just have the
property owner do this? Why does the
[41:43] city need to do that? And we we don't
have to do it, but this property is
[41:48] abutting
the property that we just talked about
[41:52] where the city wants to put a
city hall and a police complex with uh
[41:57] parking for downtown and help create uh
a new basically a new downtown with a
[42:03] main a main street style uh downtown.
It's very, in my opinion, it's very
[42:09] exciting that we have this opportunity.
I had worked with um Dr. Kumar and his
[42:15] group uh when he asked for my advice and
I gave him a lot of advice and he took
[42:21] all all of my advice when he put
together
[42:24] the plan and that the council uh adopted
it. For his project, it's 225 units and
[42:31] you may
if you read the memo or if you looked at
[42:34] that or maybe remember the discussion is
that initially it was going to be
[42:38] condominiums. Uh but they ran into
trouble with financing that and so uh
[42:44] council approved a modification of
conditions to make those apartments. So,
[42:51] to make a long story short, the the idea
here is that and and the council, the
[42:56] mayor, and other council members in
addition to staff were in
[43:01] discussion with Dr. Kumar and his group
about coordinating these two projects.
[43:08] And uh
with there's there's a lot of power in
[43:11] looking at these two
projects as one or at least in
[43:16] coordination with one another. And
ultimately, I think one of our
[43:19] objectives is to get to the point where
we adopt prepare and adopt a
[43:25] development agreement to basically
jointly
[43:29] simultaneously develop both of these
tracks and that that in itself comes
[43:34] with some other issues we can talk
about, but uh basically tonight we want
[43:40] you uh we or we want you on Tuesday to
authorize the initiation of the request
[43:45] and uh
I didn't answer my question, which was
[43:47] why should the city do this rather than
the um the applicant. And that is the
[43:53] with a big project like this, first of
all, they're not trying
[43:57] to get more density or more units or
anything. Basically, what they're trying
[44:02] to do is
flip the land uses and we've got on
[44:05] there on the screen there
their approved master plan and it shows
[44:10] that all the commercial is up there on
Industrial Avenue.
[44:14] And the apartment buildings are to
south. And basically
[44:19] as soon as Dr. Kumar and his group
realized that the city was going to buy
[44:24] this property the property to the south
they saw the opportunity to
[44:30] really put two and two together and
create a critical mass that could be a
[44:34] downtown Main Street um area with
commercial buildings and so
[44:40] he Dr. Kumar said, "Well, why why don't
we flip the
[44:45] um apartment units, put them closer to
Industrial, and move the
[44:50] uh some of the commercial, not the part
that's the little block over to the
[44:54] northeast. That's going to stay exactly
like it is, but let me go ahead and
[44:58] switch, if you will, to to the the other
um the other piece. And what they what
[45:04] the idea was that they'd move the
apartment buildings up closer to
[45:09] Industrial Avenue and drop the
commercial
[45:13] most most of the commercial part of it
to the south. And then we would that
[45:17] would be adjacent to the city
property and then
[45:23] um
I don't want to get too long-winded
[45:25] here, but suffice it to say that this
this plan the um Kumar's group uh
[45:32] actually did some land planning for us.
They took the
[45:35] concept plan that I had put together on
how I thought it ought to lay out, and
[45:40] they put not only did they put it
together, but then they put they added
[45:44] to it with a parking lot. They showed
how the parking lot could be developed.
[45:48] And so um
this is uh we want you to initiate this
[45:53] uh the the Kumar project because
um again, I haven't answered the
[45:58] question I posed, but um the the reason
for this is that
[46:03] we want to express to the public that we
are
[46:07] in a cooperative mode with this
developer that they're right beside this
[46:11] property and that we have mutual
interest by working together we can save
[46:16] money uh and we can get our project
completed faster. We want to move fast
[46:23] on our project. We know the city manager
will tell you that we need this
[46:27] uh we've already outgrown city hall and
so we we would like to see
[46:31] this whole thing happening as soon as
possible and now we have I'm excited to
[46:36] say that we have an avenue that we would
not be able to
[46:40] proceed with on our own. I don't think
that we would have the initiative and
[46:44] the alacrity to move ahead with some of
the stuff but if we have a
[46:48] another developer who's experienced in
doing this and
[46:53] has a good idea and will work with us
then um
[46:56] I think we have a real win-win situation
and that's why
[47:01] um we want to express to the public that
this is a this is a a good project to
[47:07] work with them with. It doesn't mean by
initiating the request that we're
[47:13] obligated to approve it. You still go
through the process. So it's not an
[47:16] approval um but it is um
it it's going to take some of the heat
[47:21] off of the owners
of that property and
[47:25] from having to defend it as
for example we don't want to re-litigate
[47:30] the issue of whether 225 apartments are
okay on that site. And if the applicant
[47:36] does that they're going to be suspicious
of what their motives are. They're going
[47:39] to think they're trying to change
density and units and everything and
[47:43] and so I it
I would agree at least that it's better
[47:48] for us to initiate that and we'll do it
at the same time with the cities if you
[47:53] if the council approves it.
Um so I think that that's really
[47:58] everything that I needed to say. Um,
maybe one other point. Um, we do think
[48:03] that we want to recommend
a development agreement on the part of
[48:08] this developer and the city. And we have
started some discussions with the group
[48:14] and by the way, Dr. Kumar and his team,
Pablo and Joe from uh, planners and
[48:19] environmental
um, consultants are are here tonight. I
[48:24] don't think we need to call on them, but
at the
[48:26] council's leisure or discretion, you
could call on them to um,
[48:32] answer questions about it. But we
ultimately want to get to um, I think to
[48:36] a development agreement and uh, there is
the opportunity to
[48:41] square off this boundary. There's an odd
uh, diagonal boundary between the two
[48:47] properties and it would be very much
advantageous to both if we could square
[48:53] that off. So, we've been talking about a
a 1 square foot to 1 square foot trade
[48:58] of area between the two so that it would
be if we're trading
[49:03] property the same amount, then perhaps
that's not takes away some of the issue
[49:08] and um, so we're looking at that and the
the the group has been everything I've
[49:13] asked them to do, they've funded it.
They funded the
[49:16] the master plan putting the this
concept onto paper
[49:22] drawing out the parking lot and then
when I asked them about the the boundary
[49:26] line adjustment between the two, they've
already done that also. So, I feel like
[49:30] we've got momentum and um, we've got a
real good thing to
[49:35] pursue here and I'm really excited about
it. If the council will proceed with it,
[49:39] we'll um, initiate the zoning and go
from there and then we'll work on a
[49:44] development agreement. Um, I do know
that the city manager has shared with
[49:49] the city attorney the idea that we want
to do a development agreement and he has
[49:53] posed uh, a couple of procedural things
that we didn't think about that are not
[49:58] insurmountable, but they may require us
to do things like um an appraisal, for
[50:03] example, um on the property before we
do anything and um
[50:09] the assumption also is that we will have
the same
[50:13] uh engineering team for both projects
and the same development team.
[50:19] Uh and in order to do that, I understand
from the city attorney that we have to
[50:24] uh we may have to still go through a
competitive bidding process. We can't
[50:28] just
decide to award something. It's got to
[50:31] go through the proper procedures. And so
we will do that and the expectation
[50:35] would be that that that group the group
that
[50:39] Kumar's group wants it will will be the
most cost-effective because they're
[50:44] doing this other project and they'll be
able to save we we estimate they
[50:49] estimate uh
savings by working together of 200 to
[50:53] 250,000
dollars for both groups. That's split
[50:57] between two property owners. So anyway,
enough said. I've more detail than you
[51:02] probably need. If you want to know more
about the project, it's listed uh
[51:06] described in the memo, but I'll be ans-
able to answer questions if you have any
[51:10] about it.
[51:15] Council?
Just for clarity
[51:19] which you covered this, so I admit that
I'm asking something that I think you've
[51:23] answered, but I wanted to be sure.
Um
[51:27] no increase in the number of units.
That's correct.
[51:30] Still 225.
Correct.
[51:32] Still class A apartments.
That's right.
[51:36] The total height of 75 feet and five
floors has already been approved. That's
[51:40] not an increase.
That's correct.
[51:42] And so the only change it just says a
change to conditions.
[51:47] Um and I apologize
I didn't get to read your whole report
[51:50] like I normally do.
The only condition is literally the
[51:54] layout. That's the only thing that's
changing.
[51:57] Yes. Now, as we go into it a little bit
more, by the time you get to this, uh
[52:02] there may be a little bit of other
refinement to it. Like, for example, um
[52:09] the you're right that the only major
change to it is flipping the land uses,
[52:13] but also
it means something a little different
[52:17] now for Industrial Boulevard, for
example. When that was going to be a
[52:21] commercial corridor, it probably needed
more um improvement than it it would we
[52:28] put some improvement requirements on it.
And now with it being um
[52:33] more of a residential corridor, it may
be that we revisit some of the
[52:37] conditions. There are There are some
tweaks that we've talked about with
[52:41] conditions, but they're not um
they're not of substantial public
[52:46] interest, if I can put it that way. I
don't think we'll we'll
[52:50] we'll make sure that you realize any
kind of changes that we that are
[52:54] proposed to the conditions. There are
some others besides just flipping it,
[52:59] but uh but they're not uh there
shouldn't be anything that's um
[53:03] objectionable, in my opinion.
I know 53 is a state road, but are there
[53:08] going to be deceleration lanes or light
there
[53:11] that we know of?
At 53 and um
[53:16] Industrial.
Industrial?
[53:18] Huh.
I remember what the state study, if you
[53:23] um we had a presentation at the planning
commission about that about what the
[53:28] state recommended. And oddly enough,
they recommended in their study
[53:33] the 53 and 60 corridor studies,
um
[53:38] they recommended that that road, that
Town Center Parkway, be rerouted to come
[53:43] down a little bit to to intersect with
industrial, which I think is totally
[53:50] That was just a plain sorry but a bad a
bad idea. I don't think it's going to
[53:54] happen. It would take it would take a
million dollar probably piece of
[53:58] property out of play from development
all together. So
[54:02] I think there'll be something there. Um
I think it was calling for a traffic
[54:07] signal ultimately at that intersection,
but that was as re-aligned. And now with
[54:13] that if that's not aligned
uh
[54:16] I don't know. Luckily we have a
transportation plan on its way that we
[54:21] can begin to address some more of that
and give our get our own opinion as to
[54:26] what we think we want at that
intersection.
[54:30] So that doesn't need to be in the
conditions.
[54:33] No, I I don't think it does. Uh we
didn't address it. Uh we didn't call for
[54:38] a traffic signal. I think we called for
improvements.
[54:42] Uh there I'd have to look at exactly
what the conditions were, but we had
[54:46] 16 conditions.
Yeah, 16.
[54:49] So that's what it was be that's that's
remaining the same right now. We just
[54:53] don't have them listed yet, right?
Yeah, the conditions will remain more or
[54:57] less the same. There are there may be
four of them that have uh that may have
[55:03] a uh some slight changes to it that the
the applicant wants.
[55:08] Uh but mainly the main one is that it
requires the site plan to be in
[55:13] substantial accordance with what was
approved. And my determination as zoning
[55:18] administrator was
you know, even if you're not changing
[55:22] the land use, but you're flipping the
way they are laid out on the plan that
[55:26] that that's a substantial change. And so
I was un- unwilling to say, you know,
[55:32] we'll just let you flip your site plan
over. That needs to come back and be
[55:36] modified. So that's what
one of the main reasons why
[55:40] why we would be doing it.
Dr. Weiss also says 60,000 square feet,
[55:44] roughly,
um commercial non-residential. That's
[55:48] the same number that we were
That's the same number that it will be.
[55:51] Correct.
That's good.
[55:53] It's really good.
[55:57] Jerry, does do the plans in anytime show
what White Street's going to do? Can
[56:02] White Street come all the way up to uh
Peachtree Road?
[56:07] Uh
well, no, we weren't going to extend
[56:11] White Street as a road. Although, but
but the plan here, if you look at what
[56:15] we have, if you'll scoop that up just a
little bit, the um we are proposing, in
[56:21] essence, I'm not calling it a a public
street or even a street, but we would we
[56:27] would develop part of the agreement
would be that we would develop our part
[56:32] of that road, if I can call it a road or
a major driveway, and that would also
[56:36] provide access to the Enclave
development, and it would if if they're
[56:41] able to start from our end and access
through our property to develop theirs,
[56:47] then that has certain major advantages.
So, there would be a connecting way to
[56:52] get through there, but where White
Street is, we want that to be our
[56:57] multi-use path or our life path, as
Jennifer Harrison likes to call them.
[57:03] Uh so, we're you know, we've got the
opportunity to
[57:07] extend the path that we have now
through our property, we build that, and
[57:12] then Kumar Kumar's Enclave development
with conditions of approval will have to
[57:18] build the rest of it, and then we
connect to White Street, and then we
[57:22] have some decisions we can make in the
comp plan about what do we want for
[57:26] White Street? Should it be a one-way
street, or um
[57:30] do we want to put a
uh
[57:33] a bi- a bike lane or multi-use path on
it? We've been talking about how we cut
[57:37] over through our well site on White
Street, and then that gets us to the
[57:42] park, okay, to the Mulberry property
that we own. So, it's very exciting to
[57:48] think that we've got a an ability to go
all the way from Cresswind and Publix in
[57:53] Twin Lakes PUD, cross Peachtree, come
through the subdivision there, and come
[58:00] through this property, come through
Kumar's property, and come to the
[58:04] downtown, come to the new park that
we're going to build, and it's just it
[58:08] really ties it all together all at one.
And we don't have to wait for one to
[58:12] happen over the other because we're
going to choreograph the development in
[58:17] a way to where it happens more or less
not all of the Kumar development, but
[58:21] all and not all of ours, but at least
the fundamental parts of what we need
[58:25] will will go in place at the same time.
So, has the
[58:30] city or the developer done a traffic
study on any of this?
[58:33] No.
Not required or
[58:36] I mean No, we don't we don't require
turning loose what, 500 cars?
[58:41] Um,
well, let's see.
[58:45] I'm not sure what the trip generation
ultimately is on both of them. It's It's
[58:49] a lot of traffic, but we're also going
to distribute it a lot of ways. It's
[58:53] going to go out 53, it's going to go out
Industrial, a little bit of it will go
[58:58] out on White Street, and some will go
out on Peachtree Street. Uh,
[59:01] so, it'll get distributed.
And if you um, Jan, if you'll
[59:06] right there where our complex is, you'll
see that the road, the connectivity,
[59:11] will come on Peachtree where the red
light will be as well. So, that will
[59:15] help flow there.
And again, we're all you know, we're
[59:18] we're all always working on connectivity
with
[59:22] getting you out of your vehicle and into
a golf cart
[59:26] Um, that you can still live, work, and
play and um, hopefully
[59:31] do it with a golf cart. So, we're trying
different We're We're working on
[59:35] different ways so that it does um,
decrease the traffic on 53.
[59:41] Now, if I can add one more thing about
the um,
[59:43] the parking lot, the beauty behind this
is that that's a lot of parking. That's
[59:47] more than the city.
Uh, I think it was uh, Joe, you remember
[59:51] the number 200 and something spaces?
270.
[59:55] 270. Okay, so that's a lot of spaces and
what what we envision was that the um,
[1:00:02] the downtown, this area, Main Street at
night, you know, City Hall will be
[1:00:07] closed, but we've got a big parking lot
that can overflow and and handle
[1:00:12] uh, a a good bit of downtown traffic.
And um, we would we would agree to
[1:00:19] um, allow for or lease or something
um, the
[1:00:25] Kumar's project, the that project to be
able to use some of the parking that
[1:00:29] we're Not all of it, but some of it. Um,
and there may be some compensating
[1:00:34] exchange for being able to do that, but
we'll
[1:00:37] figure all that out in a development
agreement.
[1:00:40] And if you also notice um,
Tina, there's more additional park.
[1:00:45] Mhm.
And there's also um, something that they
[1:00:48] um,
and this is an option, but the Civic
[1:00:51] Center uh, and another another way to
um,
[1:00:56] the community to you know, the
community, the citizens to enjoy as
[1:00:59] well.
Yeah, the point I'd make about that is
[1:01:02] that I had initially drawn it with small
commercial buildings to get a a bigger
[1:01:08] commercial mass for downtown and the
bottom line is it really that part of it
[1:01:13] really doesn't matter. Let's not lose
sight of our focus is to get City Hall
[1:01:18] and police in there and we've got plenty
of land to put parking lot and then
[1:01:22] extra space for whatever that may be.
Kumar makes a good argument that we
[1:01:27] really ought to reserve a space for for
a civic center.
[1:01:31] And so we've got it's drawn with a civic
center and a small commercial building,
[1:01:35] but I would
argue let's not get bogged down about
[1:01:39] the future uses of that part of it.
That's less important. We got plenty of
[1:01:43] time to think about what we're going to
do with that. We'll just install
[1:01:47] utilities that'll be good for whatever
goes there.
[1:01:51] So the 270 spaces is just on the city
property. It's an addition to the
[1:01:56] parking for the apartments.
That's correct. They'd have their own
[1:02:00] the
Kumar project would have its own parking
[1:02:04] and they would meet their code, but it
would be um
[1:02:08] it would be basically shared parking.
It's our parking, the city's. Um which
[1:02:13] we can use, but they they would be able
to use if we come to agreement for them
[1:02:19] to
use it in after hours. It's kind of like
[1:02:22] land use sharing. It's not you it you
don't need to use it at the same time.
[1:02:26] After after 5:00 is when the restaurants
will get busy and
[1:02:31] if we have any drinking places in there.
That will be time for
[1:02:37] people to go.
Just 270 and how many are yours?
[1:02:42] How many does the city control?
No, uh
[1:02:44] Parking parking.
Yeah, so on the residential side they're
[1:02:49] required to have have 413 spaces. And
that's provided on the residential side.
[1:02:55] Okay.
And so the only parking that's shared
[1:02:57] between the city
and the other property are some
[1:03:01] commercial spaces.
So all residential
[1:03:04] are on the residential side. There are
some commercial on the residential side.
[1:03:08] How much is that?
Let's see.
[1:03:13] Commercial parking required
We're providing 175 commercial spaces
[1:03:20] and 100 of those are on the city side.
You were going to provide
[1:03:27] 55 on your side, correct?
[1:03:33] And uh the one other thing that um
city manager asked me, said, "Well, you
[1:03:38] know, look at all this parking." Said,
"Do we She said, "Do you really Do we
[1:03:43] really need to build a parking deck?"
And I said, "Well,
[1:03:47] you might not. I mean, uh that's a lot
of that's a lot of parking. I wouldn't
[1:03:51] say no to the others, but it it very
well could be that this helps us
[1:03:57] build a smaller deck or defer the
building of a parking deck or
[1:04:03] you know, it gives us better options.
[1:04:08] Well, could you repeat that last part
that you just said?
[1:04:10] It gives us better
By doing this, if we if we build a
[1:04:15] parking lot of this sort, it gives us
better options for
[1:04:19] what we were proposing before with
Mulberry. If we were to do maybe we
[1:04:24] don't have to do a parking deck or maybe
it's not as big and expensive as what we
[1:04:32] thought we needed. Or maybe it can come
in later because then we we've satisfied
[1:04:37] the requirement. It just gives us more
options on that Mulberry property to not
[1:04:44] make that um
we don't have to commit to what we
[1:04:47] thought we were going to have to commit
to do there.
[1:04:53] Any more?
Any other questions?
[1:04:56] We Thank you, everyone, on that.
Okay, moving on
[1:05:02] moving on to uh number three, GDA board
members.
[1:05:06] Uh we have one here. The other one uh
uh is not able to be with us today. So,
[1:05:13] we do have Mitchell Clark here.
Mitchell, do you want to just stand up
[1:05:15] if you don't mind? Just so everybody
knows who you are. Um,
[1:05:20] the DD
the DDA has already approved and it's
[1:05:23] for our team to approve on Tuesday. He's
here to answer any questions if council
[1:05:28] has any.
[1:05:33] Mr. Clark, how long have you lived in
the
[1:05:36] You what?
I didn't know I was going to be asked
[1:05:38] that question.
Oh.
[1:05:39] You been in the community how long? A
long time.
[1:05:42] A while.
Just to share with everybody.
[1:05:44] My name is Bill Pierce. I was raised in
the church.
[1:05:48] I was in the old church.
Seen a lot of changes.
[1:05:52] Right.
A lot of changes.
[1:05:56] Raising my children
[1:06:00] a lot of changes.
[1:06:03] Now, I'm a believer.
Dr. Kumar.
[1:06:05] Yes.
I can
[1:06:07] I was part of the trick or treat last
year.
[1:06:10] The trick or treat last year and the
council wants to do it this year.
[1:06:13] And he was part of the real estate and
he has had a lot of you know, take over
[1:06:17] the um,
the um, aspect of DDA
[1:06:21] small business owners
[1:06:27] And he also, I just like to make a
comment, too. He also approved for his
[1:06:32] building, which is, uh, we'll call it
the Slice building.
[1:06:35] It's got beautiful Christmas lights on
it now and you know, we thank you for
[1:06:38] doing that with with us.
[1:06:42] Any questions?
Okay, the other candidate who was not
[1:06:46] here today is Mr. Maddox who owns
Mission Hardware. Uh,
[1:06:49] if you went to the gala, you met him
then.
[1:06:52] Uh, if you've been to the hardware
store, you know him.
[1:06:55] And he probably knows you. Um,
unfortunately, he's he's not here, so
[1:07:00] you can't ask him any questions, but do
you have any for Dr. that Dr. Kumar
[1:07:04] could answer?
[1:07:08] Well, I have no questions.
that I may I can watch for Mr. Mayor
[1:07:13] Madam. He's been
too long
[1:07:16] and he represents the small business. We
have all the big box coming to the town.
[1:07:22] Suddenly, we want to keep all the
networking of all the small businesses
[1:07:26] and also the corporate
taking the initiative. So, we want to be
[1:07:30] close to the community. So,
Mayor has been a plus for the manager.
[1:07:37] How long has the mayor been here on the
board?
[1:07:40] He's older.
Actually,
[1:07:42] He's older.
I was going to say he's older, right?
[1:07:46] Any questions? Any
Anybody? Okay, great.
[1:07:50] All right, let's move on to item number
four. This is a personnel policy update.
[1:07:56] Uh paid time off. I always like paid
time off. I'm going to defer to Jen to
[1:08:00] talk about this.
[1:08:03] Um thank you, Mayor. So, the real
changes that you see um proposed in
[1:08:08] front of you would
Presently, employees are allowed to cash
[1:08:13] out PTO a maximum of four times per
year. Um the finance payroll department
[1:08:19] has asked that we reduce that the number
of times that employees can cash out um
[1:08:25] accumulated PTO to two times per year,
once in the first six months of the
[1:08:29] year, and once in the second six months
of the year maximum. And also um it's
[1:08:35] been requested just to keep the budget
in check and also I guess encourage
[1:08:40] employees to actually use PTO for
vacation time or just however they need
[1:08:45] to. Um it's recommended to reduce the
number of hours that employees may cash
[1:08:51] out from 80 hours per request to 40
hours. So, currently the minimum is 20
[1:08:59] hours um that they would need to
request at a time and that remains the
[1:09:04] same. So, it would just go from
They would be
[1:09:09] Sorry. They'd be requesting um between
20 hours and 40 hours per check. And
[1:09:14] then that helps keep the budget where it
should be as far as employee um pay and
[1:09:21] reducing the number of times helps
keep Tiffany less busy.
[1:09:26] Yes.
And and and calm.
[1:09:29] Yes.
Helps keep Tiffany calm.
[1:09:31] good.
How many employees for the total total
[1:09:35] city?
Um,
[1:09:37] we've 18 at the moment.
18?
[1:09:41] Um, we do have a few open spots
currently and then there are a couple
[1:09:45] new spot positions opening up in 2025.
[1:09:51] Looking for a job, James?
Nope.
[1:09:53] Okay, just sign it out.
Watching the
[1:09:56] money roll out.
Yep, that's the approved budget that we
[1:09:59] just done.
Mhm.
[1:10:02] Uh, any other questions?
Okay.
[1:10:06] Uh, we'll move on to item number five.
This is the water and sewer connection,
[1:10:10] also known now as system development
fees. Uh, we
[1:10:15] this team in our retreat in September
uh, requested
[1:10:21] um
that our city look at our current fees.
[1:10:26] Uh, specifically we wanted to look at
uh, sewer and water fees. Uh, we have
[1:10:31] now gotten some data back that um our
fees are low. And so, um we'll go
[1:10:37] through a couple of changes on the fees.
On the water fee uh, we currently are at
[1:10:42] $3,000. We are going to 4,600
if approved on Tuesday.
[1:10:48] Uh, the sewer fees we are currently at
6,000. We are uh, going to 8,800.
[1:10:55] Uh, I would like to explain a little bit
about that I just so you understand it's
[1:11:00] also in the letter page four of the
letter that we received with our packet.
[1:11:08] For us to go to a 2.0 as we all know is
about 51
[1:11:15] million dollars
and in order for us so really what that
[1:11:19] means is
per gallon it's 35 dollars and
[1:11:24] 17 cents and we
we are not going to make the citizens
[1:11:29] that live here
pay for that. We really really want
[1:11:32] development sorry developers sitting out
there.
[1:11:36] You have to help us pay for that. So in
order for us to do that we have to raise
[1:11:40] these these fees.
David did I miss any major point there?
[1:11:46] Thank you.
Anybody have any questions about that?
[1:11:53] Okay, great. Um
[1:11:59] If anyone wishes to address the mayor
and council this evening about any
[1:12:01] issue, please raise your hand and I'll
call you up.
[1:12:05] Seeing no hands I'll turn it back over
to you Madam Mayor and we do need
[1:12:07] executive session for real estate and
litigation.
[1:12:10] Okay,
before I ask for a motion to go into
[1:12:12] executive session I just want to make
three quick announcements and and then
[1:12:16] I'll make the motion, okay?
Um upcoming events December 17th is our
[1:12:21] voting session that's next Tuesday the
18th is the planning and zoning
[1:12:26] which on that agenda is conditions for
plan of the a daycare.
[1:12:34] Um also December 19th
that's community conversations. I really
[1:12:38] want to try to get that out there people
to attend that is on mental health
[1:12:42] awareness
and Judge Ben Green who is our
[1:12:45] magistrate judge will be doing that with
also Jessica Green and
[1:12:52] we will have a special guest Zachary.
He's a young teenage gentleman who has
[1:12:57] gone through this and is on the other
side and he has a beautiful story and I
[1:13:02] really hope that you,
your family and the community is able to
[1:13:06] attend that.
It's also the last day Judge Green will
[1:13:10] be with the city of Hutchins.
So we also want to thank him for being
[1:13:15] our judge over the last
How many years? Two years.
[1:13:21] Okay, with that I'd like to make a
motion to go in executive or real
[1:13:25] estate. Is there a second?
I second.
[1:13:29] Thank you. Who seconded? All in favor
raise your hand.
[1:13:32] All right, we'll be back shortly.
[1:13:47] You don't want to email me.
[1:13:55] Yep.
[1:13:58] I'll be going down the road.
[1:14:03] If you're charging that, that's okay,
but if you don't have pressure
[1:14:07] We don't have water pressure.
[1:14:12] Oh.
[1:14:25] Exactly right.
Why shouldn't they pay?
[1:14:29] We're only paying out.
[1:14:43] No.
[1:14:46] You going to take that to JJ. What do
you got in your pocket? Okay.
[1:14:49] We They're so far down the road.