 or what is, you know, recommended. Recommended, that's right, I can see you. Good evening, everyone. I call to order this meeting of the Durham City Council on March 21st, 2016, at 7.02. So we have a moment of silent meditation. Thank you. Now we will have the Pledge of Allegiance led by representatives from Jack and Jill. Of America. To the Republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Mr. Davis, would you tell us who they are? Yes. Their names? Oh, the names of them. There are several people from the Jack and Jill organization. The pledge was led by Ms. Felicia Robinson and the younger person there is Ms. Christina Burton. People leading us. Madam clerk, we have roll call. Mayor Pro Tem Cole McFadden. Present. Council Member Davis. Council Member Johnson. Council Member Moffitt. Council Member Reese. Here. And Council Member Schwell. Thank you. We have several ceremonial items and I will begin those now. The first item is National Community Development Week proclamation is Mr. Reginald, Dr. Reginald Johnson. Thank you Reginald for all the work that you did. And it reads, whereas the week of March 28th through April 2nd, 2016 has been designated as National Community Development Week by the National Community Development Association to celebrate the Community Development Block Grant known as CDBG program and the home partnerships program. And whereas the CDBG program provides annual funding and flexibility to local communities to provide decent, safe and affordable housing, a suitable living environment and economic opportunities to low and moderate income people. And whereas the home program provides funding to local communities to create decent, safe and affordable housing opportunities for low income persons with over one million units of affordable housing haven't been completed nationally using home funds. And whereas over the past five years, the city of Durham has received a total of $8,819,439 in CDBG funds and $4,279,175 in home funds. And whereas the city of Durham has used CDBG and home funds directly or in partnerships to address issues surrounding homelessness including veteran homelessness to promote home ownership opportunities for low and moderate income households to develop hundreds of affordable rental units for low and very low income households to provide repairs to homes of very low income seniors to help revitalize neighborhoods and to leverage millions of dollars in additional public and private investment within Durham neighborhoods. Now, therefore, I, William V. Bill Bell, mayor of the city of Durham, North Carolina, do hereby proclaim March 28th through April 2nd, 2016 as National Community Development Week in Durham in support of these two valuable programs that have made a tremendous contribution to the vitality of the city's housing stock and the economic vitality of our community. Reginald. Thank you for all the work that you've done to lead us to be, I think, the best community development department in the United States of America. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor Propeer. Thank you, Mayor Pro Tim, Mayor Bell, members of city council. The Department of Community Development truly appreciates this recognition for this National Community Development Week on the basis with this proclamation. Community Development Week celebrates, as Mayor Pro Tim shared, the work that goes on with the funds through Community Development Block Grant, as well as the Home Investment Partnership funds. The city of Durham, and this week, gives local governments the opportunity to showcase and highlight the responsible stewardship of these funds. These funds have, in the case of Durham, been used to have two projects in particular that I would highlight. One is Denson, one project which is for Home Formula and Homeless Veterans that has received state and national recognition. We've also received state and national recognition for our work in the South Side community with the Home Investment Partnership as well as Community Development Block Grant funds. So we've been doing very well in Durham. This particular year, National Community Development Week is adding a new component. We're adding young people, Mayor Pro Tim, to participate. We're actually including the voices of young people through an essay competition, asking the question, what does community development means to me? Mean to me. And also during this week, the members of the Citizens Advisory Committee, and we have some here, if they would please stand, will be joining Community Development, thank you so very much. Will be joining, they will be joining with Community Development Department staff to serve food at Urban Ministries at part of the Community Development Week and serve breakfast. So we just want to thank the City of Durham for all of the support. We want to thank the Citizens of Durham. Our intention at Community Development is to keep on doing the positive work and impact that we do for our community. And that's the goal that we have. We have Thomas Poole, I don't want to start calling everybody's name, if you just call out your name. That's right, Thomas Poole. Proclamation is a very special one. And I'm almost in tears as I do this. It's a proclamation honoring Kala Desiree Newkirk. Please come forth, Ms. Newkirk. Let's give her a round of applause for having me. And it reads, whereas Desiree Newkirk was born December 6th, 2005 in Durham, North Carolina to Eric and Monica Newkirk and is the granddaughter of Revan Lorenza and Hattie Johnson, Darlene Newkirk, Edward and Lily Lamb and the goddaughter of Dr. Aura Dion Brown and I am for adopted grand godmother. And whereas Kala is a 4th grade student, would the parents and grandparents please stand while I do this? If you were able to stand. Whereas Kala is a 4th grade, yeah right. Where as Kala is a 4th grade student at Durham Academy in Durham and a member of the Orange Grove Missionary Baptist Church. And whereas she participates in various extracurricular activities in clubs such as chess, radio and service, lacrosse, basketball and a competitive swim team member at the Durham's Jewish Community Center, just to name a few. And whereas Kala realizes there are people in her community in the world who are less fortunate than she. It is for this reason that she has willingly devoted certain segments of her time to community service to uplift and empower others. And whereas she is an active volunteer at the Durham Rescue Mission where she donates books that she collected and helps serve food to mothers and children in need. And whereas Kala along with classmates of Durham Academy helped prepare meals for 113,000 people during the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. day of service with stop hunger now. And whereas she impacted the life of a homeless man whom she saw walk in the streets of Durham without shoes. After enlisting the support of her parents, Eric and Monica, Kala located the gentleman by canvassing the streets of Durham to present him with shoes she had collected and they fit too, that's so amazing. And whereas on Valentine's Day, Kala set her hands and heart to work by gathering personal hygiene supplies and distributed them to individuals currently without homes in Durham. And whereas Kala derives a genuine sense of joy from visiting the sick and shut in with her grandfather, Reverend Lorenzo Johnson, during these visits she graciously offers prayers and encouragement to the confined. And whereas Kala was honored on March 19, 2016 by the Ebonette Service Club as a special youth honoree devoted to a life of service, the first in the history of that organization. And whereas Kala was given the honor, now this isn't a real thing, right? Kala was given the honor writing the letter of recommendation for Durham's very own Mayor Pro Tem Corco McFadden who believes that Kala's affectionate and inspiring letter was the reason she was elected to serve on the National League of Cities Board of Director. I really believe that. Now, therefore, I, William B. Bill Bell, Mayor of the City of Durham, and on behalf of the City Council, do hereby proclaim tomorrow there's not enough time left in today. March 22nd, 2016, as Kala desirate New Kirk Day in Durham and hereby urge all citizens to take special note of this observance of a young child. Kala is a role model for our youth and our adults and a treasured asset to our community. Witness my hand in the corporate seal of the City of Durham on this the 21st day of March, 2016. I would like for the village to please come up. I think Kala has, is someone from her school? Folks from Durham Academy. I need the whole village right here. Kala, and I have another, I have something else for you. I have a certificate of, oh, this is wonderful. It takes a village. I have something else for you. This is from the U.S. House of Representatives. Certificate of special congressional recognition presented to Kala desirate New Kirk in recognition of outstanding and invaluable service to the community. March 19th, it was done by G.K. Butterfield. You met him. You remember that? Thank you. I'll see your remarks. Wow, this is amazing. I am so grateful to receive such an honor for work I believe in and for service I encourage all to take part within our community. I first must thank God who provided me with so many people who care and support me in everything I do. To my parents, Eric and Monica Newkirk, my grandparents, Reverend Lorenzer and Hattie Johnson, Darlene Newkirk, Edward and Lily Lam, to Dr. Dionne Brown, my godmother, to all my family members and friends, thank you for your love, inspiration and support. My orthodontist mentor, Dr. Hart, my pastor, Pastor Dickerson in his absence and to my wonderful school, Durham Academy, thank you too for being here and investing in my life in such a special way. I love each of you. This honor is something I never dreamt of receiving. Working in the community and helping others is what I simply enjoy doing. My parents, as long as I can remember, allowed me to volunteer at the Durham Rescue Mission, helping to prepare meals for the women and children who were in need. Even though my parents started out making this requirement before each birthday, it never felt like work to me. They would not allow me to receive any gifts until I gave first to others. I was so excited. Last year, when the children at the Durham Rescue Mission surprised me with a birthday party and cake, I thought this was so cool. I'm very passionate about helping the homeless every chance I get. I do not feel like many people notice them and they are many times overlooked. I'm committed to help change this within our community, to let them know someone does care about them and their lives do matter. I would like to say thank you to the Durham City Council, our wonderful Mayor, Mayor Bell, and to the best Mayor Pro Tem in the world. Whom I love with all my heart. She inspires me to do more and I am grateful to God for placing her in my life. Ms. Cora Cole McFadden, thank you for everything you have done. I love you, Ms. Cora. The last proclamation, meals for Will's month proclamation and Gil, do you come for it? Oh, Gil is over there. Good evening. In the proclamation reads, whereas on March 22nd, 1972, President Richard Nixon signed into law a measure that amended the Old Americans Act of 1965 and established a national nutrition program for senior 60 years and older. And whereas Meals on Will's America established the March for Meals campaign in March 2002 to recognize the historic month, the importance of the Old Americans Act nutrition programs both congregate and home delivered and raise awareness about the escalating problem of senior hunger in America. And whereas the 2016 observance of March for Meals provides an opportunity to support Meals on Will's programs that deliver vital and critical services by donating, volunteering, and raising awareness about senior hunger and isolation. And whereas Meals on Will's programs in Durham, North Carolina have served our communities admirably for more than 40 years. And whereas volunteers for Meals on Will's programs in Durham are the background of the program and they not only deliver nutritious meals to seniors and individuals with disabilities who are at a significant risk of hunger and isolation, but also carrying concern and attention to their welfare. And whereas Meals on Will's programs in Durham provide nutritious meals to seniors throughout the city of Durham that help them maintain their health and independence, thereby preventing unnecessary falls, hospitalizations, and or premature institutionalization. And whereas Meals on Will's programs in the city of Durham provide a powerful socialization opportunity for millions of seniors to help combat loneliness and isolation. And whereas Meals on Will's programs in the city of Durham deserve recognition for the contributions they have made and will continue to make to local communities, our state and our nation, they are therefore I, William V. Bill Bell, mayor of the city of Durham do hereby proclaim March 2016 as March for Meals Month and urge every citizen to take this month to honor our Meals on Will's programs, the seniors they serve, and the volunteers who care for them. Our recognition of and involvement in the national 2016 March for Meals can enrich our entire community and help combat senior hunger and isolation in America. Witness my hand in the corpusill of the city of Durham. William V. Bill Bell, mayor. Thank you so much. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. I would like to ask my staff to please stand up in the back. So no one in America dreams of growing up being hungry and alone and homebound. But the sad truth is that in our community, nearly one in six seniors do not know where their next meal is coming from. Many of them are isolated in their homes. You might not know that they even live in your neighborhoods. Meals on Wheels in Durham is delivering food to over 500 people every weekday with the help of many volunteers. Everyone sitting in this room could be a Meals on Wheels volunteer. And I hope you'll think about helping us feed those people. Thank you very much for this proclamation. This has really been a hard-warming prelude to our order of business tonight, because we have actually shown what Durham is. This is Durham. We care. And we show that we care by helping others. Thank you. Well, thank you, Mayor Pro Tem. We move on to first announcements by members of the City Council. Are there any announcements? By recognizing Councilman Davis. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Of course, our pledge was led by two members, an adult and a student member of the Jack and Jill of America Incorporated. But I'd like to also recognize that there are several other adults and young folks from Jack and Jill who are in our audience. And they came because they are very interested in the young people learning more about the policy-making aspect of the Durham City Council and the whole governance structure of the Durham City Council. So I applaud them for being here and applaud all of the wonderful programs that they honor and have here in Durham, North Carolina, as well as nationally. I was able to go to one of those events recently when they had what they have every single year, which is called Carol Robertson Day. And Carol Robertson was one of the four little girls that were killed in 1963 in Birmingham, Alabama. And Carol Robertson was a member of the Jack and Jill organization, so they deal with the legacy of her memory as well as the whole idea of teaching the young people about the history of the civil rights movement. So there are members of the Jack and Jill organization here, and I'd like to ask them if they would stand and be recognized. Thank you so much for all of the good work that you do on behalf of the boys and girls of this community. Thank you so much, Mr. Mayor. Councilor Davis, are there any other announcements? Councilor Recognizing Mayor Pro Tem. That's about out of steam, but I do have to share this. I attended an event at Pruitt Health Hospice on Saturday. And the name of it was Life is a Dream. Heaven is reality prom. It was a reflection of the dreams of some of the residents who are in hospice care. There was one resident who dreamed of going to a prom. And so they actually fulfilled this dream for her on Saturday. And she was dressed in her evening attire and had a crown on, and she actually had an escort who's also in hospice care there. And so they made her wish come true by having this prom. So I thought it was very nice. Any other announcements? If not, maybe I should just announce. I haven't had an opportunity to attend the Duke Durham Health Summit this past week, which is over at the Millennium Hotel. And I would say we've had these summits for quite a while. But the latest one, I think, was very, very engaging. And hopefully we will be seeing some of the results of that pretty soon. And I want to congratulate Dr. Eugene, Chancellor Eugene Washington for his leadership and Health Director, Gail Harris, in the work that they did and help them pull that summit together. And of course, Mary Ann Black was a part of that as always. We'll move the consent agenda items. Consent agenda items that can be, I'm sorry, prior to that, I was about a city manager. Thank you, Mayor. Sorry to interrupt. Good evening, everyone. Two priority items this evening. Agenda item number six, the FY 2015-16 amendments to the budget ordinance and grant project ordinances and resolution. There is a memorandum that has been added to the agenda material to describe how the HIDTA grant funding has been spent. And then agenda item number 13, the revised ordinance to promote equal business opportunities in city contracting. Section 2 and 3 of the ordinance has been revised to accurately define the effective dates. Those are my priority items. Thank you. Move the manager's items. It's been a proper move in the second, Madam Clerk. Will you open the vote? Close the vote. It passes 7-0. Recognize city attorney for any prior items. Thank you, Mr. Mayor, no priority items. And likewise, the city clerk. No items, Mr. Mayor. In case we move the consent agenda, there's an agenda where an item may be pulled by a member of the council, a member of the public, and we'll discuss that item later. Otherwise, it could be approved with a single vote by the council. I'll read the heading of each item. Item one is Durham City County Appearance Commission appointments. Item two is the Durham City County Appearance Commission reappointment. Item three is the Human Relations Commission appointment. Item four is dependent eligibility verification performance audit, December 2015. Item five is the Council Payable Performance audit, January 2006. Referred to prior to having been city manager on item six, FY 2015-16 amendments to the budget ordinance and grant project ordinance and a resolution. Item seven is a resolution providing approval of the financing by the housing authority of the city of Durham for briar green apartments. For purposes of section 147F of the Internal Revenue Code, item eight is site preparation and public improvements agreement with McCormick Baron Salazar Development Inc. for site preparation infrastructure activities in Southside, East Phase II. Item nine is Department of Water Management, Miss Lake Facilitude Expansion Program Management, Heary International Inc. Item 10 is acquisition of Durham Convention and Visitors Bureau Facility. Mr. Mayor, can you hold that item, please? I recognize Councilman Rees to pull that item. Item 11 is downtown loop water line replacement and water meter upgrades. Amendment one with Kimmel and Horn and Associates Inc. Item 12 is North Durham Water Reclamation Facility Control Panel Updates. Item 13 is revised ordinance to promote equal business opportunities in city contracting. Item 14 is a resolution authorizing the execution delivery of a second notice of extension to the DPAC deed of trust to extend the lien to additional premises. Item 15 was the Managers' Barge Item, proposed 10-year lease with Liberty Arts Inc. for Arts Pavilion at 505 Riggs Bay Avenue. Item 16 is proposed acquisition of four parcels located 906, 908, 910, and your Avenue and 201 South Elm Street for the Edgemont Park Capital Improvement Project. Item 17 is consultant contract for police and fire compensation study. Item 18 is ordinance amending city code 62-126 and 62-127, warranty and repair security. Item 19 is small scale residential storm water control measures in Durham. It is 21 to 24 items that can be found on the general business agenda as public hearings. Item 28 is the Durham Workforce Development Board appointment. That concludes the consent agenda items. Recognize approval resolution to adopt the consent agenda with the exception of item 6 and item 10, with the exception of item 10. Madam Clerk, can we open the vote? Close the vote. It passes 7 to 0. Thank you. We'll move to the general business agenda public hearings. Item 1, 21 is public hearing on the installment financing contract and adopted resolution authorizing the negotiation of an installment financing contract. Good evening, Mayor Bell, member of the council and my manager Bonfield, Chad Cowan Finance Department. The purpose of this public hearing is to receive public comments regarding the execution delivery of projects to be financed pursuant to section 168-20 of the general statutes of North Carolina public. The notice of this hearing was published in the Herald Sun on March 1st. This is a public hearing. You've heard the staff report. I would ask for some of the comments or questions by members of the council. Recognize Councilman Schuhl. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I have a couple of questions. On page 2, the description of the interest rate, 68.5% of one month LIBOR plus 0.37%, 0.37% of what? You know what I'm saying? Of 1%. So it's going to be 1% would be 1.00. This is 0.37%. OK. And so LIBOR, I'm still not quite clear exactly what that whole sentence means. LIBOR is a floating short term rate. I know what LIBOR is. So it'll float up and down. So it's 2 thirds of the one month LIBOR rate plus 37 basis points. So if one month LIBOR was a percent, it would be 0.67% plus 37 basis points. All right. And so what is the effective annual interest rate now approximately? I know that LIBOR floats. But what are we actually talking about? 0.664% would be the effective interest rate, including the 0.37. Yes. OK. And am I understanding this that in a way what we're doing, this is kind of just in time financing. That is to say, we have the authority to borrow the $95 million, but only actually draw down what we need, sort of like a line of credit. Exactly. Thank you. Again, this is a public hearing. Are there other questions by members of the council? Is there anyone in the audience who'd like to speak on this item? Any questions, comments? If not, let the record reflect that no one in the public asked to speak on this item. I would require a public meeting to be closed. Matters of fact, for the council. The proper move is second. Madam Clerk, would you open the vote? Close the vote. Passes 7 and 0. Thank you. We've moved item 22, zoning, map change, Farrington mixed use, Z-15000009. Good evening, Steve Madlam with the Durham City County Planning Department. This item was continued from the council's meeting on February 15 of this year. Zoning case Z-150009, Farrington mixed use is a request to change the zoning designation of a 19.95 acre track located at 5708 Farrington Road, which is between Rutgers Road and C-54 from office institutional with a development plan and residential suburban 20 to a mixed use with a development plan. At your last meeting where this was considered, the applicant did make two additional commitments that are included in your staff report. There have been no additional changes beyond that. I'll be happy to answer any questions from the council. This is a public hearing. The public hearing is open. You've heard the staff report. I would ask first of the questions by members of the council of comments. We do have persons that have signed up to speak on this item. I will call the names and then tell the amount of time we have. So I want to make sure I have persons in the right order. Margaret Miller as an opponent. Debbie McCarthy as an opponent. Becky Winder as an opposition. And I'm not sure where Spencer Bradfoot is. Is Spencer here? Opposition or? OK. And we have Rosemarie Kitchen, is that correct? Rosemary Kitchen, OK. And you have questions only. Is that correct? OK. And we have Ken Spaulding and Deb Anderson as proponents. Now, is anyone else that wishes to speak on this being a public hearing whose name I did not call? That being the case, the opponents will have 15 minutes. The opponents will have 15 minutes. And that is three minutes each for the opponents. And if we see we need more time, we'll move that. So I would first ask the proponents to come forth. And I've called Ken Spaulding and Deb Anderson. And I'll leave it up to you as to who comes first. Good evening, Mr. Mayor and members of the council. My name is Ken Spaulding. I represent Wood Partners, the applicant in this matter. As you recall, we did have an exhaustive discussion at the last meeting. And this was deferred for us to be able to hear and have the consultant of the affordable housing be able to give their report, which they have done. As you are aware, the city has not enacted yet the actual policies, guidelines, and tools that would be used for it. However, what our developer has done is that in our effort to make sure that we meet the policy goal, I think, that resolution that was a goal that you all made regarding affordable housing, we wanted to make sure that we ourselves would move in that direction and would actually have affordable housing. We will set a precedent for Durham for private developers on affordable housing. Not only that, we are being proactive in regard to the design district standards. We're being proactive in regard to making sure that we have met and will continue to meet all of the consistent and be consistent with the UDO, the comprehensive plan, with all of our policies, regulations, rules, and ordinances of the city of Durham. Also, we are being very consistent with the light rail transit considerations. As you all are well aware, the city and county of Durham have been leaders in regard to light rail transit. When I was on the state board of transportation, that was an issue that was in front of us then that we were moving forward on. You all have moved subsequent to that time to where I think you have what's called a transit, sales, and use tax that we are being taxed every day for the purpose of being able to have light rail. We certainly feel that light rail is important. Our plan meets the qualifications for addressing the needs that light rail has. Our plan is one in which we are actually of what the private sector needs to be doing around light rail areas. I want to say to you tonight that I really think it's important that we do look at this not only about the affordable housing, not only about meeting all the plans and the ordinances, but also about the fact of light rail. There is presently in the General Assembly some moves to cut back on light rail for the city and county of Durham. Durham has moved forward with Orange County. Durham and Orange County now have been met hand in hand with Wake County. And we have been taxed for this. And I think that it's important that we be able to have plans that show the private sector is investing into our light rail aspects as well as what you are doing publicly. So I think that's important for us to consider when we have a plan that meets every requirement of the city of Durham. The taxpayers are going to benefit with $1.7 million. I think you would ask about road improvements before, which we're going to get that we would not have had. These are being paid for not by the taxpayers, they're being paid for the private developer. And we're keeping it a level service of D. We also are being able to bring forward about $150 million of tax revenue base that will be able to be of some benefit, I think, to the city and the county as far as what will be done with the best use of that property. I think they're presently about a number of acres where they would have about 28 or 29 private residential homes that could be built in the subdivision or built residentially there that they have from the current existing zoning. Here, we will be able to have a better use of that property to be able to have it to meet the needs of light rail instead of single family homes. I also want to say that the neighbors, we've met with the neighbors, the adjacent neighbors, the neighbors that have been impacted the most, as well as those neighbors who are driving up and down 54 and Farrington Road, where we're going to improve that road capacity. And I want to say that the neighbors all pretty much generally all have been in favor of this after we met with about 50, 60 people in the beginning. And there might even be someone here tonight that had met with us and even talked with us again tonight, and they feel that we have really worked hard to be able to meet their needs. We've changed the building arrangements around. We've changed a number of things to be able to make it compatible to them since they are living there. And this is impacting them directly. So I want to conclude by saying that this rezoning is completely right by Durham's goals and standards. And they have addressed both the office and mixed use aspect of it. The residential aspect of it. We put an investment in and the road improvements. It's going to create jobs, a good tax base, and positive living experiences for people in Durham. Again, we are precedent setting as relates to affordable housing in Durham. We're leading the way when it comes to light rail in Durham as far as building and having our rezoning and private sector involvement there. So I think we are meeting all the needs of our community. I think this would be a plus for the city of Durham. And it would certainly show that developers who spend two years working with staff to try to come up with a good product that meets every requirement of this city and this county, I think they will tell you we have done that. Thank you, Deb. Smart, bringing my water this time. Good evening. Hi. Good evening, Mayor Bell, city council members, and staff. My name is Deb Anderson. I'm a developer with Wood Partners. Joining me tonight are the Wood Partners Development Team, our attorney, Ken Spaulding, our land planner, Bob Zoomwalt of McAdams Engineering, and our traffic engineer, Earl Llewellyn of Kimley Horn Engineering. I'm really happy to be here tonight. I don't know if you'd expect me to say that, but I'm really happy to be here tonight. Over the years as a developer, I've learned it's pretty easy to bond with the various properties that you hope to develop, but this rezoning carries special significance for me and for our team. I first met with the sellers of the Farrington property in the summer of 2014. I went and looked it up today. I went back in my email chain. Over the months that followed, we built a great consulting team, no less than a half a dozen or more people that have helped us over the last 20 months. With that team, we spent time meeting and discussing our project with the adjacent Woodland Acres neighborhood, as well as neighbors on Celeste Circle who have stormwater concerns, and throughout the Lee Village area. We then worked with planning and transportation staff and other departments, but primarily with planning and transportation, and also outside agencies like NCDOT to design a rezoning request that met all of the city's adopted policies and programs, while also voluntarily stepping up to the Compact Neighborhood Tier design standards. And for the past many months, and this is what has been surprisingly a really good experience for me and for our firm, for the past many months, we have moved into a collaborative space with the city and affordable housing advocates to find a way to contribute to the important city goal of providing affordable units. Our discussions have been challenging, both my discussions with folks here in Durham and my discussions with my company based in Atlanta and with partners from various parts of the United States. Those discussions have been challenging, but fruitful. And ultimately, our rezoning proposal has improved as a result. We are volunteering to develop 20 units of affordable housing for the city of Durham. We do this as a sign of good faith in advance of the city's approved program and without the city's financial support. Karen Lotto recently presented her findings to the city. In those findings, she asked the city to consider the goal of creating 300 new affordable housing units across all the design districts in the next five years. Our 20 units will contribute to this goal and our units will be in place and functional within her stated five-year horizon. We have also agreed with a coalition to make a good faith effort to cooperate with local agencies, working with persons needing affordable housing, to ensure the greatest chance of locating and placing eligible residents in our units. In summary, the last 20 months have been a journey. A journey that culminates tonight. I will close by stating one more time the merits of our proposal. The Farrington Road rezoning is a high-density development near future light rail transit. We have designed vertically integrated mixed use that incorporates urban form-based principles as similar to the city's existing design districts. We're completing $1.7 million of roadway improvements to the surrounding infrastructure, and I know we've said this before, but I'm gonna remind you that three of the roads we're improving, two of the roads we're improving are currently one-lane dirt roads in the city of Durham. Those will become two and three-lane sections with bike paths and sidewalks, obviously of great benefit to the people that live there and we'll also be helping them capture and funnel their storm water. We're gonna be adding over $150 million to the tax base. I know that you know, but I'm going to remind you that a penny of that, of every dollar, goes towards affordable housing as well, and that's an ongoing, annual contribution to affordable housing in addition to our units. We'll be constructing new water, new sewer, new storm water infrastructure around the site and offsite to connect to other folks. We will be creating the first new multi-family rental housing stock in Southwest Durham in quite a long time. I think the most recent garden apartments are around the mall. And last but not least, we'll be providing the city with 20 new affordable housing units. I'm really pleased to also have neighborhood support for this project. It's a really rare thing for an apartment developer to have neighborhood support. Generally we come here with that after working with them, but this group that you're dealing with in Lee Village really appreciates high density and that's a unique thing. They're very much excited about this project coming forward. I know in my heart that our firm and our entire consulting team have done our very best to meet or exceed the goals of the city of Durham and I hope you will agree. Thank you. You're welcome. I would now move to the opponents of the proposed rezoning. As I call your name, if you can come to the right podium. Margaret Miller, Debbie McCarthy, Becky Wonders. I just was handed a card, Sabrina Davis. Miss Davis here? I assume Miss, is it Sabrina L. Davis? Is that person present? Oh, I'm trying to determine if she's a proponent of the proposal. Well, while you find that out, we can go ahead and start. You have three minutes. Thank you. Since North Carolina cities are forbidden by state law from requiring developers to include affordable housing and yet that 15% of affordable housing is Durham's goal, I want to urge the council to hold off on any piecemeal approvals until they have all the legal ducts they are permitted in a row to create a planned community at Lee Village, an entire planned community, not just a plan for the acreage that one developer would develop. I urge you to hold off on this rezoning request until you can assure yourselves that Durham will have not only affordable housing around the Lee Village like rail station, but also that there will be things like grocery stores and drug stores for people who can't afford cars, who can't afford to drive to a grocery store and that those grocery stores will be affordable to the residents that you are providing affordable housing for. I wonder if perhaps it would be possible to hold off on rezoning requests approvals for developers plans until multiple developer requests are on the table and you can compare those requests. If we are going to spend so much of our tax money on light rail and gobble up one of the last lightly developed areas in Durham for Lee Village, let's do the best we can to make a planned community that will provide housing affordable to most of our residents. Thank you. Next is Debbie McCarthy. Good evening, Mayor Bell and members of council. Appreciate the opportunity to be here tonight. I live at 4517 Trenton Road have for 30 years representing Farrington Harp Neighborhood Association. Whenever there's a Farrington item on an agenda, I sort of feel duty bound to come and speak up for this remarkable piece of Durham County that I love and that I've called home for 30 years. The Lee Village Compact Neighborhood Tier is a really unique opportunity in Durham. It's more than 400 acres of land that is sort of a blank slate and what becomes of it is really largely in your hands. So I would encourage you to be thoughtful and careful about what happens there. I would urge you, as Nixie said, to think in terms of a cohesive development, a plan that would include residential, retail, office, green space. We know there's going to be a transit station there. We know there's going to be denser development than we normally have seen on Farrington Road. We accept that. We would love to think there might also be a romp at that location. Within those 400 acres, you could buffer that facility and you could save Lee Farm Park to the north, which would be inundated and drowned by the romp if it stays in the current location. Mr. Shull can speak to that based on the slides he saw at an MPO meeting last week. I'd encourage you to think in terms of something like Meadowmont. Generally speaking, I wouldn't say I'm a big fan of Meadowmont because I don't like the fact that they shove the rail line out of their neighborhood and into Downing Creek. I don't think that was fair play, but I will say that Meadowmont is a cohesive development. It's attractive. It does have apartments and homes and office and retail and restaurants and businesses. It is, and it also has, interestingly enough, a senior center in an elementary school. It's sort of cradle to the grave, almost like a small city, but very aesthetically pleasing. Why couldn't Durham find the developer of Meadowmont, bring him to Lee Village, say, look at this 400 acres. What could you envision here? We could have something every bit as lovely as Meadowmont, but with a special Durham feeling for affordable housing. I don't think Chapel Hill has done a particularly good job in that regard. We can do better and Durham can do better. I'd like you to think about the fact that the densities being envisioned in this proposal are really, really intense. I've heard five to 600 units, five to 600 units. That's more than twice as dense as what's going on on Ninth Street, the other compact neighborhood tier. This really is sort of out of sync with reality in terms of the intensity of the development. I think the traffic implications would be very difficult. Someone mentioned we'd stay at a level of service D that's nothing to be proud of. After a development proposal, you should improve your traffic status, not decrease it, or even stay the same. So please don't put the cart before the horse. Don't do a piecemeal approach to Lee Village compact neighborhood. You can redo the entire UDO in a way that will be a real beautiful gem for all of Durham to admire and for all of us to support. Thank you. Welcome. Becky Wonders, and did Miss Davis come in? I just need to know, are you speaking as an opponent or proponent of this item? Opponent. Opponent. In that case, I'm gonna add three minutes to the proponent's time, and if you're coming in, that adds three minutes to the proponent's time. Becky Wonders. My name is Becky Wonders, and I live at 1304 Seton Road. And I appreciate the difficulty of the decision that you have to make here. Before you make it tonight, I asked you to ask yourself three questions. And the first one is, should the council grant exception to the UDO density requirement of 18 units in the suburban tier mixed use properties, allowing 25 to 30 units per acre as requested by this project? Council has the authority to approve or deny rezoning, and there is precedent for letting properties in suburban transit areas to develop under compact neighborhood standards. However, tier boundaries and UDO standards represent the views and work of hundreds of Durham citizens and should not be overruled lightly. At its February meeting, the Planning Commission voted against approval of the Lee Village Compact Neighborhood because we think that the existing compact zoning standards that were developed for urban areas of the city need to be reviewed before they are applied to suburban location. Secondly, is this development right for Durham and Lee Village? This is a very big development, as Debbie McCarthy said, 50% more units than the largest of the new apartments downtown. It will add an intersection to Farrington Road between Cliora and Rutgers, an intersection that is added at the D level, which makes three busy signalized, unsignalized intersections before you get to the, in the half mile before you get to the congested Farrington Highway 54 crossing. I submit that the community may be better served by residential development to the interior of the neighborhood, closer to the proposed rail station and farther from Farrington Road, and also that several smaller developments by local developers might generate more jobs and other economic benefits in this large project by a big national development company. At any rate, the community deserves a chance to complete the compact district planning before development of this scale is approved. And if the having, it's good that the developer is providing this infrastructure, but it's going to be oriented towards the location of this property and not necessarily in the optimum place that will benefit the whole region. It would be much better to have a full plan and know where the infrastructure should go before people start instead of doing it piecemeal. So if your answer is to the previous two questions, turn out to be yes, you will need to consider how will the city meet its affordable housing goal without significant contribution from the private sector. And 20 units is good and it's good to the precedent, but where will the people live who mow the grass, clean and maintain the buildings and assist the doctors in the offices? Thank you. You're welcome. Spencer Bradford. Spencer Bradford, 1613 Acadia Street come as a participant on the Coalition for Affordable Housing and Transit and director of Durham congregations in action to encourage the city council to use this rezoning tool to work toward that 15% affordable housing goal we have for the transit stops in our community. We heard a report from Karen Lado earlier this month that was alluded to that described just how much of an uphill struggle we're facing in the coming years to be able to close that affordable housing gap to reach this goal that we have. And while we appreciate the effort of the developer to increase the number of units up to 20, that's still a far away from the 15% goal out of 600 apartments that we needed to work toward for this. We may be, the number that they've committed to may get us a few steps closer toward that goal that Ms. Lado set for us for the coming years. But what we're concerned about is that while it may move us a few steps up that goal, it's gonna increase the degree of incline that we'll have to overcome in the coming years as we go up. This development is going to take up most of the area for housing development in that part of Durham around that transit station. It's going to increase the burden that our community will face on other developers and in other housing providers to reach that 15% goal around that transit stop. This is a singular opportunity to exercise real measure of influence by this body on the direction of affordable housing around that stop. And we strongly encourage council to use that, thank you. Welcome, Ms. Davis, Ms. Davis. Good evening council, good evening ladies and gentlemen. My name is Sabrina Davis and this is my son, Joseph. This is Joseph. One of the Durham residents who opposes this. Yeah, well I'm gonna make it brief and let you know that there should be opportunities for affordable housing for all Durham residents. The goal really is to supply the demand of folks that live here and not all of us make $60,000, $70,000. Very personally, I moved here in 2009 with the opportunity to grow and to start a life and start a family and then I had Joseph and like I said, being a stay-at-home mom and a small business owner, these things, having affordable housing, these things are very, very important to us, so. I'm gonna put him down so that I can actually. Don't take that away from me. You know, I love Durham. When I got here in 2009, this was a great place to grow, work, play, start a family and the goal really is to stay here, to live here. Right now, I'm an unemployed master of public administration degree holder and a single mom who would really love to live here in a place that's safe, close to public transit and so that my son can grow and can attend Duke or UNC or Central, but specifically, I say this for the long-term goals for Durham. This is the future. These are the things that you decide on today that affect tomorrow and if we're not paying attention to our future, we would put things up that are irreplaceable, that block growth. And that's my heart string, so that's why I'm here today speaking to you all, so that I could just plant a seed to let you know that affordable housing in Durham can happen. This is a place for opportunity and that's why I came here and to just, to have a few small apartments or our townhomes or houses available, you just wouldn't be right, Justice, so I won't take too much of your time. I thank you so much for your patience and hopefully you will vote to expand opportunities for Durham residents that are low-income and thank you very much. Bye-bye. Rosemary Kitchen said she had questions on me. That is one hard act to follow. I am Rosemary Kitchen. I live at 6702 Glen Forest Drive in the Falconbridge Single Family Home part of Falconbridge and I am here because I'm always vocal about what's going on locally and I also have a relatively short-sighted question about this. First of all, I'm glad that this project has come through zoning and is now in front of City Council. Secondly, my concern coming here tonight was to make certain that the accommodations that were made for the originally planned two eight-story buildings for medical purposes, the improvements for the intersection of 54 in Farrington were still part of the overall plan and I am assured that that is happening and now I hear that the plan to improve the roads have gone from 1.1 million to 1.7 million, some of which are gonna be spent on those unpaid roads but I think probably more is gonna be at the major intersection. I also was glad to learn that there is gonna be pedestrian consideration for those people coming off buses to go to medical appointments so they'll be able to cross the street safely. So I think it's a good development. I see it as part of, as a small part of what I understand is a much larger lead village project and I'm not here to speak to that tonight. Since my concerns about traffic and being able to get in and out of my neighborhood with the new medical buildings and possibly the apartments coming along have been allayed and I've been assured that these are gonna be gone and because I always respect what our Mr. Spaulding counsels with his clients, I just wanna say I hope that you consider the short term as well as the long term implications of what's going on at the worst intersection in Durham County. Thank you. How much time left for the performance? Six minutes. You have six minutes if you choose to respond or complete your, so you don't have anything else to say. That being the case, I wanna make sure you do have something to say. Just one part, I think that they were talking about at the last meeting the same thing that came up about the size of this development as it relates to lead village and I think out of the 400 acres, we are 20 and that's about 5% of it. So the impact, I think, is a normal way that developers do developers. Most of them don't come and do 400 acre developments at one time. Thank you. That concludes the comments by the proponents and our opponents unless, remember the council chooses to ask a question of them. That being the case, I'm not gonna close the public hearing yet. I'm gonna bring it back before the council for any comments that any of you may have or questions you may have. I recognize the Mayor Pro Tem and Councilwoman Davis and Councilwoman Johnson. Just very simply, did you present anything to us that you did not present to the Planning Commission? Yes, we did not have affordable housing units when we were heard by the Planning Commission. Since then, we have proffered the affordable housing units. Is there some reason that you did not share that information with them? Yes, at the time, I did not believe that our company would be able to do it. We have developed affordable housing across the country in 23 different communities, but only in communities where there was an adopted program in place where we could follow a set of rules and implement a program that the city had pre-approved and at the end of our implementation, we would be able to be certified on an annual basis as complying with that program. Because Durham hasn't approved their program yet, we really truly believe that it would cause significant issue for our firm, for our investment partners. And for what it's worth, I heard everybody loud and clear. We spent a lot of time talking with Planning Commission members after those hearings. We talked with Coalition members after those hearings. And we've just worked really hard to put a good foot forward and hope that this will work for us. One thing you will remember is that we've offered the affordable housing units in our second phase, which we believe is a win-win. It enables me to give you the units you want and hopefully Durham will have its program in place by then, which means that I have at least a hope of getting an annual certification letter and being able to kind of check the boxes and prove to our investors not the least of which is the banks. We get a construction loan as you would if you were building a house or buying a home and they need to know that we have done everything that the city has asked us to do and they need that in writing from the city. So we were hoping that by our second phase, the city would have their program approved and that would be helpful to us. It would make what we're offering here. It would kind of make it really good for us. So does that mean you would do additional affordable housing? You've already a profit, 20. The 20 units are in phase two. And we believe that that is a significant number given what developers have volunteered to the city in the past. I guess given from even from where we started, we thought that was a really a good faith effort. And if I could try to do some rough math, if the consultant has recommended 300 units over all of Durham's design districts in the next five years, we have roughly at this time, we have five potential design districts. That would be 60 units per design district. And for us to provide you with 20 of those would be 30% in the Leavitt Village Design District. And so I think that number has even more meaning. Granted, I know it's not 15% of the entire project. The math just doesn't work for that. I don't think any developer will be able to bring you that. I don't think many developers will top what we've done. And I would go of note, we are a national company, but I've grown, I grew up in Durham, I live here. I've lived here and worked here and developed here with this company. We've been building housing for Durham residents for over 20 years. And I love where Durham is at right now. My son is 21. He wants to come back home after college. He wants to come back to Durham. Raise your hand if you could say that 20, 30 years ago. I mean, seriously, this is an awesome place. So we're just doing the best we can to try to meet a lot of people's goals. There's a lot of competing interests here tonight. And we're trying to be helpful. Thank you. Recognize Councilman Davis. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. My question is to the planning staff, I guess. Mr. Minton, could you give me some idea, give all of us some idea about how long it will take before we can approve these design districts, particularly the Lee Village design district? So generally whenever you're working on a holistic evaluation of a design district, that on average will take anywhere from three to five years from initial beginning to the time that you actually have the district defined and actually implemented on the ground. Councilwoman Johnson. I had some longer comments. If anyone else has questions, they could jump me. No, okay. So I wanted to take a step back and talk a little bit about the reasons that we have this affordable housing goal for transit areas and the ways that I think we can reach towards that goal with a broader view towards the entire development process in the transit areas and building these compact neighborhoods. And so the reason that folks wanted the goal of 15% affordable housing in the transit areas being affordable to families at 60% AMI is not just because Durham needs more affordable housing in the city as a whole, which is true. It's because these are the most critical areas to ensure that we retain affordability as the light rail line is coming in. And that's for a few reasons because low income folks are less likely to own vehicles and they need the access to the transit. But it's also because we wanna prevent the light rail from becoming a vehicle for displacement of low income people in that corridor. Like as we have heard and as many of us remember another transportation project in Durham did back in the 70s, the construction of 147. So I think that we need to be very sensitive to that history and making sure that when the city is doing projects like this that we are really thinking about how to involve the community and make sure that we are really building by creating inclusive mixed income neighborhoods in these areas that are going to become and really as we're seeing now already are highly desirable for development. And so without our intervention, these areas are likely to become very expensive. And so I think that we all agree us and the folks who want to develop in these areas that if we don't provide the structural programs, the environment, meaning tools and incentives that developers can use to make this happen that it won't happen. We're not going to see 15% affordable housing offers from developers. I think the maximum that we've seen so far has been 2% or less. And I don't want to discount those offers. I think that they are very important. And I understand that it is very difficult for developers to make that happen. I think that that's really the problem that we're facing is that while those efforts are important and we appreciate them, they're not enough to get us to the goal that we set. And I think that we need to continue to keep our eyes on the prize in that way. We set the goal because that's what we want. The market, the private market has no problem providing density, which is the other thing I think we want very much in these compact neighborhoods because denser development is more profitable anyway. What we need to figure out is how to make sure that we are building mixed income communities in the light rail transit corridor. And I think that we need to take the time that we need to really make sure that we're doing this right and that that happens. And I had specifically at our last meeting asked to wait until we got a report from Karen, our affordable housing consultant about specific suggestions for programs that we might be able to apply to this situation and other situations to see what her suggestions were. And it turns out that she does have a suggestion that's very relevant to this question that she and other concerned members of the community have suggested that the reason that our density bonus doesn't work, which is one of the primary tools that we have right now to leverage affordable housing is that we set our base density too high so that developers have no incentive to apply for the density bonus because they can already get the density that they want without providing any additional affordable housing or any other public goods that we might ask for in exchange for a density bonus. And so what she is suggesting is that instead of setting the density as we have previously in our compact neighborhoods that we set our base density lower and then we can use the affordable housing, providing affordable housing as an incentive for developers to get additional density if that's what they would like to have in that area. And so my concern is that if we approve rezonings like this on a one by one basis rather than taking the time we need to rezone the entire area that we're giving away that potential incentive to get the kind of development that we want that's not just dense but is also mixed income inclusive accessible development in these areas of the city that are most critical for us over the next few years. And I think that if we don't get it right now we can't go back and do it over again. We have to have a comprehensive effort on the part of the city now or I think we end up with density but not accessibility. And so what I feel like we should be doing is taking a step back and really looking at each of these areas bringing in the community and planning them as a whole. I wanna make sure that I think that these concerns about equity are just as important as the other goals that we have in the transit areas. And I don't want that to take a backseat to our other desires and have it be something that we can deal with later after we have everything else figured out. I think that we need to incorporate our desire for equity and for inclusiveness into the plans and particularly around these areas. So I know it's gonna take a long time. The light rail though is 10 years out. So it's going to be a while before we're even talking about whether people in these areas can get to light rail. And also I feel like we are the people who control at least one of the aspects of how long it takes which is how much resources, how well we resource the folks who are making these decisions. And if we need to assign additional resources to the planning department or bringing consultants to make that happen, that I think that's something that we on the council can move toward. But I think it's more important to me that we do this right and that we make sure that these concerns are addressed and that we are able to do it more quickly. Thanks. Thank you. Thank you. I recognize Councilman Moffitt. Thank you. I've got some thoughts now and I'm gonna may have some more later. I wanna say that this is probably, I spent a lot of time thinking about planning and zoning issues. The six years I spent on the planning commission, the time that I've spent on council and I've probably spent more time thinking about this project than I have about maybe any other projects that I have heard. But I do have some questions I wanna ask staff about. There's three things that I think about on this right now. Traffic capacities, the planning of our compact neighborhood tiers and affordable housing issues. I wanna start with the traffic capacities. So I'm gonna ask Bill, now I will say that I've made an effort not to catch staff by surprise. I'll let them know I'm gonna ask them these questions. And so Bill, I've heard that the limited capacity in C54 means that if we approve this project that it will limit further opportunities for development in the Lee Village compact neighborhood. Can you speak to that? That is, what's your opinion of the limits that in C54 imposes on development there? And whatever those limits are, should be zoning in the Lee Village area be put on hold until the compact neighborhood tiers fully developed? Yes. Bill, judge, transportation. I'm gonna answer the second part of the question first and I think ultimately that's council's decision and that not necessarily staff's. So the, but so far as the available roadway capacity, the intersection of NC54 and really most of the intersections there along 54 are basically operating right at level service D now that there's not much available capacity. The proposed rezoning does have a number of roadway improvements, particularly at the intersection of NC54 and Barrington, which are essentially the same improvements that were required of the Carolina Crossing development, which has been included in with this rezoning request. Those improvements will provide some additional capacity, but the proposed development will end up using most of that capacity. So we end up back at the level service D. So they are mitigating their traffic, but they're not providing excessive capacity that could be used by other developments. So in order to address that issue, the city and the state work together to develop the NC54 I-40 corridor plan a number of years ago, those have a number of recommended improvements that are a little more long-term, such as constructing grade separation at Barrington and 54, those improvements have made it to the tail end of the state TIP project, but they're still a number of years out. Thank you. Steve, I wanted to ask you to, so I'm gonna, I do, I'm gonna amend my question a little bit. First of all, we've heard some testimony tonight that Lee Village should be reminiscent of something like Southern Village or a Meadowmont, right? Planned Village with, I think the quote was with drugstores and grocery stores. Can you talk a little bit about what we can do to assure that it'll have drugstores or what differences there are between what we can do with Lee Village and what was done with Meadowmont? Sure, Steve Meadowmont with the Planning Department. I think it's important to remember that both Meadowmont and Southern Village were built by a single developer that acquired all the properties and master planned the community, which meant that he looked at all the aspects of what they were trying to create, including residential and the support services in terms of amenities to those residents that they were creating. Obviously with Lee Village effort, it's a much larger area than you would typically would see. The land holdings are under multiple ownership. The current applicant only has this very limited holding. As it relates to how we envision that we're going to create an environment that will be conducive for the market to be able to produce a range of uses, including providing those same amenities as you're familiar as counsel in the Downtown Design District and also in the Ninth Street Design District, we are using a form-based zoning code. The importance of the form-based code is that we're really more concerned about the physical structure that's being created, not the appearance necessarily, but the form and less concerned about the use. We allow a wide range of uses, recognizing that when certain densities of activity reach a critical point, then services will be provided because the market will want to come in and provide those amenities, whether it be drug stores, whether it be grocery stores, whether it be whatever. It's important to remember when you're coming out of the gate and I think Downtown's a good example of that. We don't have a drug store, well we do have a drug store, I apologize. We don't have a grocery store in Downtown. That is something that we hear routinely that people would like to have. What we hear, of course, is that we don't have the density, the roof, the housing units that we need to be able to support that. Obviously, that is changing and it's changing, unfortunately, very slowly. I would envision the same type of environment in Lee Village that you have to start somewhere and I would say that one of the most critical aspects of trying to create that environment is by putting residential units in the future compact tier area to support those services. Thank you, I have another question for you. Which is about the process of planning the compact neighborhood tiers and what I call the sequencing of decisions. Can you share with us your thoughts about the appropriate strategy for moving forward? I mean, should we delay rezonings near the designated light rail station areas until the compact neighborhood tiers are fully developed and approved? Well, let me talk a little bit about the process and I may actually call on Ms. Young to help me out here who is my strategic planning assistant director who deals with this more closely than I. Whenever you begin a process like this, you have to first do, obviously, a quick analysis of what the existing conditions are. Do a lot of public engagement. You need to find out what the vision of the community is not just on affordable housing but also on the land use aspects but also where the boundaries of the compact neighborhood tier need to be. And then also within the compact neighborhood tier you need to decide where the intensity districts are. The core, the support one, the support two districts. That takes time and involves a lot of public engagement and a lot of public comment. The reason I threw out the three to five year window is that is what it basically takes based on our experiences that it took us about three to four or excuse me, four to five years to do the plan for Ninth Street and then another two years to develop the zoning code for Ninth Street because of that very engagement process that I'm referring to. And so it takes about that long to get through that effort. Plus then you have to go through the legislative process of adopting both the code itself and then implementing that code through the zoning actions and each of those are legislative actions that take a considerable amount of time. And so when we use the range, we're trying to capture all those elements. Sorry, I'm avoiding your second question there. I think the one concern I have is that if we act or don't act on intervening requests that are compliant with or as compliant as they can be with our current compact design standards that we're creating an environment where development may go in an inappropriate direction. As you are aware, property owners have the right to, they already have zoning, so they have the right to develop under their current zoning if they so choose. Most of the area in Lee Farm area or excuse me, Lee Village area is primarily low density residential. And it's, in my mind, I think it's incredibly difficult when people start to develop single family houses to come back later on and try to implement the vision of what we're trying to do inside the compact neighborhoods. You know, I think it'd be more appropriate and that's what we've advocated to these applicants that they try to design a project that comes close to being in a compact design district. Tries to mirror it as close as we can not knowing what the final details will be. Obviously in this case, it is my opinion that they have done that. They have checked all the boxes that we've asked them to check as a staff. They have given us the density that we're looking for just so you know that density is consistent both with a design district density as well as in keeping with a gold triangle density thresholds that have been identified as being necessary for the transit system to be put in place. They have designed the site so that they're moving their buildings close to the road. They have designed it in such a way that they can do infill development down the road when the market potentially may support that. They have made some concessions. They've made road improvements obviously to address some of our policy issues. They have done everything that I think is reasonable and therefore staff obviously is recommending this project. Thank you very much for that. I appreciate that. I'm going to pause and let other people speak and I may have something more to add later. First of all, I guess in terms of affordable housing, the 15% goal, I think we need to realize it was a goal. It wasn't a thing in concrete that it had to be 15%. It was a goal to achieve. The whole idea about bonus densities when that first came up years before some of us won some of you won this council, I raised the question with the planning staff that the goal had been set too low. So you're never going to get developers to be able to take advantage of any bonus densities with that low level because they can build with it. So that's not new news. Now, while we haven't moved to try to lower the base, you have to speak to others because I'm not on the planning staff. I'm not on the planning commission. I'm not on the joint city county planning commission. But I've said over and over again, the tool we have in terms of bonus density with the base set as it is, you're never going to get developers to come in and do anything. I've had some exchanges of emails which I know my colleagues have been copied on with some persons who have suggested that we do it nobly. That might be one of the ways we get it done. But no details. No details at all. I don't think this council, I don't think planning commission, I don't think the joint city county planning commission has to have a sense of urgency to get something done. I'm not criticized. I'm just saying the fact if we're really serious about this the whole affordable housing piece, especially around transit agencies, you know, I think that should have been a priority early on to get something done. I don't think we need to penalize developers who have done all that we've asked them to do within the context of what we have to say, oh, wait, wait, but we still want 15%. We still want 15% and we aren't giving them anything to get to the 15%. The only way we're gonna give it to them is put some dollars in it. You might not want to hear this, but the fact is it's a gap. It's a gap between what developers expect to get with their rent. When you start telling them rent it for less, somebody's gonna have to fill that gap. Unless this council is willing to come up and fill that gap, I think we're doing the service not only to the people out there that want all this 15% goals and even the development community. I think what we need to do, and I've said this, we really need to be talking to the development community. We really need to sit down with them to let them tell us what it would take to develop these transit stops with a goal of 15%. I mean, that's not the way we're gonna get anywhere, unless we are prepared to say, okay, we'll fill that gap in terms of what's needed. So I just think we're doing ourselves a disservice. I think we're doing those people out there who have opened this goal to 15% of disservice. I think we're doing the development community of disservice to place these type of demands on them when in fact we're not moving with sense of urgency that it appears people say they want. I don't know the details of what it takes, but I know if it's a priority, it would have been at the very top. And we would have had a program for a tool for doing affordable housing. So I'll have something else to say, but that's where I am right now. I think as much as the affordable housing report that was done, we know that we're gonna have a special session to sit down and go through that. This is a very small portion of a site that we're talking about. It's not one developer that has control of the total site. If it was, we could be talking in a different tone, but we don't have that. It's a very small portion. You have a developer that is committed to providing 20 homes. And granted, we know what that percentage is. It's not 15%, but it's certainly not 0%. And to penalize them to say, wait until we get a compact tier developed, which is three or five years. Wait until we get these tools developed, which I don't know when it's gonna happen. It's just unfair. So I'm gonna stop and yield to the rest of my colleagues, but I'll probably have something else to say. Our house comes from Davis. Well, thank you, Mr. Mayor. That was the reason I asked Mr. Midland about the time period that we would have to wait before the design districts were completed. There are road improvements. There are issues of housing, even though affordable housing, even though it's not at the level that our goal is, as you just said. There are issues that I think are very important, including the tax base that will come. Being close to the light rail station, even though that's down the road, I just think that this particular set of developers and their representatives have done a great job of trying to reach where we are and trying to make sure that the issues that we have presented to them have been dealt with. I do have a concern about the whole district, not only here, but also in the Austin Avenue area and all of the design districts across the city. But I believe that we cannot wait to approve every single district, every single proposal that comes from developers until we have gotten all those design districts dealt with. So even though I have dealt with a lot of issues, a lot of people have called, a lot of people have emailed, the concerns are very legitimate, valid, but I think that I will be voting in favor of this proposal. That's Councilman Schuhl. I have a question for planning staff. I think Steve or Sarah. We have a proposal from our housing consultant for a density bonus for affordable housing. And can you talk about the length of time you think it would take to develop such a tool that would, having the kinds of discussions with developers and community members and so forth that you think we might need? Sarah Young with the Planning Department. Yes, we currently have a draft text amendment to make some revisions to the design districts currently underway. We are right now starting to work on how to incorporate what Ms. Lotto had proposed in her report in that very amendment. Schedule for that amendment was to culminate basically a year from now, so hopefully we would have something adopted on the books in a year. However, I can't say once we go back out to the public with a revised approach on affordable housing, how much time that would potentially add to that year from now. But very conservatively, a year from now we would hope to have something on the books. And you're also working on the borders, the boundaries for the design districts, is that right? That's correct. And you've, I'm not on joint city county planning, but I believe they've seen a draft of the borders. Yes, so those borders are for the compact neighborhood tiers and for the land use. So that sets the stage to then come and implement the actual design district zoning districts. Okay, and when do you think that those boundaries will be adopted? Do you have a sense of that? They are scheduled to be presented at one of your work sessions in May. So within a year or more, conservatively, you will have, we would have the bonus, the density bonus tool and the boundaries for the compact neighborhoods. And could a developer at that point come back to ask for a one-off rezoning to be in the compact neighborhood district? And ask for the density bonus for affordable housing? Certainly. They could. How would the department view that? I know you wouldn't have the exact, maybe that's too difficult a question because you wouldn't have the exact development in front of you, but do you wanna offer any thoughts on that? Maybe Steve does. That's an excellent question. I think that the short answer, and not to belabor this, is that we would view it the same way we would at any other petition rezoning request. We would evaluate it, make our recommendations based on the policies and the adopted ordinance. It certainly, as Sarah has indicated, it's certainly possible to do it that way. And so it might not be your preferred way because you won't have the entire underlying zoning mapped out. Help me with my terms here. So yes, you're absolutely correct. Obviously we will not have had the opportunity to complete our work on developing the full palette of ordinance provisions that potentially would be applicable in the compact neighborhood itself. It's important to remember that all of our compact neighborhoods are different. They have a different character. There are different issues. And as we begin to work through them, our regulations will have to reflect those issues that we'll be working through. Our preference, of course, is that we do it holistically, certainly. But we just felt like this effort we have underway already on the design district update afforded us an opportunity to deal with, I hate to use the term low hanging fruit, but I'm gonna use that term here, with the affordable housing density bonus question. I mean, the biggest issue that we have as a staff will be trying to figure out, as the mayor rightfully pointed out, what is that threshold, that roof that we need to meet in terms of what is the maximum density allowed without doing affordable housing? We would, I will go so far as to say we are differing. We don't believe in the overlay district approach. We feel it's an antiquated zoning process because we use form-based zoning. And we feel like that is a better form to capture that. And so we would probably do it as an entitlement that if you want the density, you can have it above that threshold if you provide the affordable housing. So you don't have to ask for additional entitlements. Thank you very much. I would, thank you. I'm left out of here, please. Mr. Charney, I know that you wanted to stay out of this, but it is your job to advise us on what we can require and what we can not require. So I think the conversation has been good. The speaker, for the opponent, I think the, you're welcome. Thank you for the, that was deep. As the speaker noted before, the ability of the city to require it without some sort of contribution or skin in the game, if you will. We don't have the authority to do that. And I think that's been instated. Someone cannot deny their space door, they're not meeting a 15% call. That specific question, but you have discretion as in any of your zoning cases to approve or deny, but you can't deny with the sole basis of you didn't meet our affordable housing requirement. I was going to add some more comments. I was having heard from other members of the council, so I can hold my comments if you want to speak. And councilman Schuylen, I will hold my comments. Councilman Moffitt. Councilman Schuylen. So this issue of the affordable housing I really struggled with, because first of all, when we passed the resolution, I worked on making sure that the resolution, as it was first presented, was a 15% affordable housing across all the rail areas. And I worked with others, my colleagues, to make sure that it was for 15% in each of the rail areas, not concentrating it in one place and leaving it out of another. I really believe in affordable housing, the need to have affordable housing across the city, have it close to services, make no mistake about it. But I also don't think, so there's a basic economic issue here, which is somebody has to pay for it, okay? And if we think that simply, that it's gonna be paid for by density, then what we have to realize is, is that the rent goes up in all the other units, making them less affordable. And so there's a basic economic issue. It's what the mayor referred to as the funding gap. I totally, and it's what we've been hearing about. And the problem I have right now is that we're looking at a rezoning application and talking about affordable housing strategies without our affordable housing consultant present and in that conversation. And we're gonna have that conversation soon or a conversation about affordable housing. But what my own sense is, is that where we're going to get to the affordable housing that we want is when we're willing to put public dollars into private investments. And until then, the funding gap simply isn't going to allow for affordable housing. And I will want to hear the economics more closely, but I don't believe that what we're dealing with are developers who are making unlimited amounts of money and can simply leave affordable housing in our stocking. And so that's my struggle right now is we're looking at some affordable housing units here and we have to decide whether or not we want to start the process or whether we want to exactly what we want to do. But I'm struggling with this in case you couldn't figure that out. Thank you. That's Councilman Schuyl. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Let me just couple of different things. I was, in many ways, I think that what we have in front of us is the development that, in many ways, is something we want. I agree that, I mean, first of all, one of the things about affordability is that it relates to supply and demand. I mean, it's adding 600 units. One of the big problems in Durham that we have is not enough supply. It's one of the reasons that housing prices are higher. I believe that it is transit oriented in many ways. It's in the right spot and it has a lot of, it's designed in a way that it could be further densified. And it does attempt to design to the standards of the current design district that we have. It does add a lot of road improvements. And I will say that the developer and the developer's team have been, I would say, extraordinarily communicative and responsive. And it does add 20 affordable units in the second phase and all those are really good things and not to be discounted in any way. And I wanna endorse Don's comments about the fact that I don't think that, I know that we hear all the time that developer, I've received 10 emails saying developers ought to be providing the 15% affordable housing. That's not the way this is gonna happen without some public subsidy. One of the options for this sort of public subsidy, one way to get at it is a density bonus. And we're now doing a couple of things in the city that I think are really important. One is we are providing, we are working to provide a density bonus that works. We have the recommendation from our housing consultants and that work is underway as Sarah Young discussed. And at the same time, we are doing the compact design district boundaries and then filling in those boundaries with the other kinds of things that Steve Medlin talked about. The developer rightly points out that we don't have a city program for them to sign up with. That is to say they can receive the kind of certification they want or anything that will support them in their attempt to build more affordable units. And so all the units that they've proffered are units that they're taking out of their pocket. But what I see now is that we are moving towards this density bonus. And we're moving, I completely agree with the mayor in the sense that a lot of this is on us in terms of the urgency. But I will also say that the markets change really, really quickly around us. And I don't think that any of us could, I didn't really foresee it. And I know many of the rest of us didn't as well. The speed at which the market is changing. It's easy to say. And I talked to Steve Medlin about this today and Steve said, I wish we'd done this, started this planning earlier, 2007, 2008. Well, we were cutting staff out of our planning staff in 2006, 2008. We weren't thinking about this. And so it is true that more foresight would have been good. But we are where we are. And we are now I think with some level of urgency pursuing a density bonus that we hope will work. And the creation of the comprehensive neighborhoods, the design districts, transit oriented design districts. So I think that as I described a month ago, I believe when we were here together, I think that the danger in denying this for me is that the developer has an underlying by right ability to develop this land for single family homes. And that those single family homes would be at two homes an acre. And I think what Steve Medlin says is very true, which is once you have single family homes, it's really hard to develop density next door. We're seeing that right now in some of the some of the reasonings that are coming to us. And so the question is, if you were a developer who owned that land or rather the underlying land owner, not the developer, and this didn't pan out, would you, we'd be making a bet if we deny this that they're not going to be developing this in single family homes, which is not what we want in this area. So for me, I can very well understand those who vote on either side of this question. And it's been a very, very hard one. Where I do think that given the fact that we have the boundaries underway, that we have the density bonus underway, and that we can, within a year, or perhaps a bit more, provide this developer or anyone else in any of these design districts, presumably, where we've drawn the borders and provided the bonus, the ability to come back for a one-off rezoning, with the density bonus available to them. I think that is a good thing to be able to offer these developers. It's not too far down the road. And so what I would say is, let's do that with all the urgency we can. Let's do the comprehensive neighborhoods with all the urgency we can. And then say to these developers, and then the others, come back when we have the density bonus, and we will look favorably at that time upon what you're up to, because as I say, there are many, many good things here. But I think we have the, we're doing the work on the density bonus, and we're doing the work on the comprehensive neighborhood boundaries. And I think we ought to wait until we have that in place before we approve this, rezoning is like this. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Rick, recognize Councilman Rhys, please. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. You know, on law and order, when the judge hands down a verdict, and the judge does a lot of, well, on the one hand and on the other hand, and then they make you wait for a verdict. I was a prosecutor for a number of years, and those were the longest moments of my professional life. So I'm gonna dispense with that, and then talk a little bit about some of the issues surrounding this rezoning. I intend to vote against the rezoning tonight, despite the hot, wait, please wait, please wait. These folks have worked incredibly hard to put this in front of us, and they deserve their time for this, this council. In addition to the things that have already been said that are positive about this particular development, I wanna piggyback on a couple of things that Steve said. First of all, this isn't just any 600 units in a market where we need rental units. It's 600 units in South Durham, where we haven't seen new multi-family housing in a generation-ish, maybe a little less. It's also not the kind of luxury downtown development that many of us decried in the recent election. This is market-priced multi-family housing in a part of Durham that needs it quite badly, I think. The other thing is these, I don't wanna sell short the proposed roadway improvements when I described this particular project to my wife. That was near the top of the list of things this project would be good for, and she stopped me right there and said, okay, that's enough, I'm for it. You know, the other thing is these developers have really, as Steve said, gone into their own pocket to put on the table a number of affordable units that no private developer and a multi-family development has ever put forward, which is to say more than zero. And I know that you had to fight your home office to make that happen. And I know there were things that you might have wanted to do that you didn't prevail upon with your national partners. And I just wanna say on behalf of this council and the people of this city, we appreciate your advocacy on those issues. But for me, we have to decide what this process is for. Is this a process, this rezoning process? Is this a process that is designed to further the goals we have as a city, or is it a process that's designed to further the goals of private interests, homeowners, property owners, developers, who, as I said, have gone deep into their own pockets to fund this proposal, have put a lot of positive things on the table. But is that what it's for? I heard someone up here say that they didn't want to penalize these developers at this point in the process. I think, and again, I've only been here 104 days, but to my knowledge, to my understanding, that turns this process on its head. No applicant, no developer, no property owner is entitled to a rezoning. And I think we tend to forget that. We tend to forget that when we talk about all of the good things that these developments and these proposals will put on the table for this city when we talk about the expectations that developers have that if they check all the boxes. Ultimately, what I hope that developers expect, and I think what the people of this city expect, is they will conduct ourselves in these rezoning processes with an eye toward appropriate planning policies, with an eye toward all of the benefits and costs to particular rezonings because there are costs to this one. But well, ultimately we will be guided by an idea of what kind of city are we trying to build? What kind of growth do we want to have? And to my mind, as great as this project is, I could have supported it were it not within the transit zone. I think it brings so much good to the city. But ultimately, if we want the things that we've said we want in the transit zones, if we want the kind of development that we say we want in those zones, we have to be willing, as hard as it is, to look developers in the eye who have worked for years to put something incredibly attractive on the table and say, at this time and in this place, that doesn't work for us. And I don't think it should reduce the credit that this team deserves for putting a plan on the table that would do a lot of good things for this city. But ultimately, to my mind, we have to remember what the process is for. And because of that, I intend to vote against the proposal. Thank you. Thank you. Councilman Moffett. I had some ambivalence about the project until Rosemary Kitchen got up and spoke. One of the things that I have to be able to do when I go home is to be able to go to bed and be able to rest and not struggle with making decisions that I know for my own principles are unfair. I know that, like Rosemary said, and I believe she's a very principled person, I've known her for years and years. Of course, I was in school with Ken, he was a few years ahead of me, but only one year, Ken. And I know that this woman has done everything that she could to try to please us. And I plan to vote for the rezoning because it is the right thing to do according to Cole McFadden. And so that I can sleep at night, not wrestling with. Is it because I am expecting miracles from them tonight or have they gone through everything that we've asked them to do according to the comprehensive plan, UDO, whatever, to make this happen? Steve said that they have done everything they were supposed to do. What else is there to do but to deny them based on something other than the requirements? And that's just not right, that's not justice. We talk about justice, justice. And there is no way that we can get 15% affordable housing on one project. And it's unfair and unreasonable to expect that. And that's just my two cents. And I don't need applause, I'll applaud my own self because I know that I'll be able to sleep tonight because I'm treating people fairly. Can I hear from Ken? I have a quick, okay. Mayor Pro Tem, Mr. Mayor, members of the council, let me just say, I'm gonna basically throw these notes away. We talk about goals of the city or goals of the developer. The goals of the city are the goals that we met, the requirements that you gave us, the requirements that you asked us to follow, the requirements that exist tonight. You know, it's fine to say what great developers we were, how we worked with people, how we worked with neighborhoods, how we worked with everybody to be able to come up with a project that everybody says tonight is a good project except for the affordable housing situation. But you don't have the actual ordinance or you don't have the actual program for us to follow. You are telling developers that you can work for two years with the staff to come up with exactly what the city wants, exactly what the city requires. And then when we get before the council, then you say you did a wonderful job, you met all the requirements. But now we're gonna turn you down because there's requirements that we don't even have, but we'd like for you to have a moratorium on your project. You're telling developers all across this city that there are moratoriums that will be set by this council based on objectives, tools that do not even exist. And I think that's bad policy for the citizens of Durham, not just for the developer, but for the citizens of Durham. I hope you will rethink this. I hope each and every one of you will rethink this because this is greater than just this development. You are sending a message not only, not only just to the city of Durham and its citizens, not just the citizens of us who pay taxes for this light rail transit, but you're sending a message over there in Raleigh. You're telling them that this light rail that we wanna have in Durham and Orange and Wake, that we really don't give the, you can shake your head, but we really don't give the emphasis that we have been telling you because over there they already tried to take away the funding for what we're gonna do. Now the private sector steps forward in a particular project like this and will fix the roads, improve the roads, and also sit right where you need it to be for light rail and that the private sector's done this along with the public sector, but Durham says no. So I just wanna say to you, yes, I'm a little speaking up a little bit, but I'm speaking up a little bit because you're setting a precedent as we tried to set a precedent for affordable housing without the goals or tools for us to do it. You're also setting a precedent in regard to moratoriums in Durham and development in Durham. Thank you. Councilman Shul, I wanted to comment briefly on your thoughts that waiting a year, maybe a little bit more than a year to have a density bonus could make a significant impact on affordable housing in Durham. To have the bonus, you will create incentive for developers, but you will not have solved the mathematics. You will have the right to require them or incent them to give you affordable housing, but you haven't solved the problem of the gap. Just because there's a density bonus doesn't mean we can afford the affordable housing units. Therefore, until the math is right in Durham, developers will not take you up on that density bonus. They will purchase more land and they will build at 10 units to the acre or 12 units to the acre because Durham right now, the rents in Durham cannot support 15% affordable housing units. It just can't. There's a huge gap. So my suggestion would be that is a first step and I'm glad the city's headed in that direction, but until you have the funding in place or the toolbox in place, that density bonus is still hanging out there in the air. It's not gonna cause to happen what you would like to have happen. I believe that your consultant gave you these results. She said that the math doesn't work in Durham right now. The math may never work in Durham right now or excuse me, it may not work for a long time. I just think it's just a small, it's a piece of the process to put a bonus in place as a tool but nobody will take you up on that tool if the math doesn't work. So it's only half of the solution and we'll be no further along when that policy is adopted than we are today. Thank you. Let me, you have somebody who wants to come, go ahead. So I was shaking my head because you're just making it harder for me. It's really hard to vote against a room of people and I'm gonna do it tonight and to have you rail at me and then make it look like you can bully me into it just makes it a little more difficult. That's what I'm shaking my head at. So let me say something about a year. I don't think it's gonna be a year. We take our time, we believe in transparency, we believe in inclusion. Now Chapel Hill got it done a lot faster and then they had to vote and turned out some of their city council and their mayor because that's not the way it should be done. We take our time and I don't think we'll get it done in a year and I don't think we'll have the gap close in a year. Now I think my colleague very carefully enumerated very well how this meets many of the goals of our community and that's why I'm voting for it tonight. I'm not voting for it because somebody deserves it and by the way, developers take risk, Mr. Swalding. They know the risk exists and they build that into their proformas. So that's what the process is and the other thing I'm shaking my head at is we haven't voted, there's nothing to rail at yet and if we happen to say no, that's our right. So given that this meets so many of the goals of the city, given that this does provide affordable housing given that this and the only reason I can vote for it is because ironically it is in a transit area. Outside of a transit area, it would not meet the goals that we want. And so the thing that I hate on a vote like this is I think it's gonna go down four, three and it shouldn't but it will or it looks like it will and that's the way it'll be. Other, I'm getting ready to close the public hearing. I wanna make sure we've got persons on the council that had their say. If that been the case, I'm gonna close the public hearing and entertain a motion on item. So we're in property moves in a second. Madam Clerk, will you open the vote? Close the vote. Someone is. Cor, are you voting? Well, you need to tell them what your vote is. I'm voting yes. Okay. Council member Johnson is voting no. Okay, it passes four to three. Would council member Johnson voting no? Council member Reese voting no? And council member Shul voting no? It's been a problem in moving the second. Madam Clerk, will you open the vote? Close the vote. It passes seven to zero. Thank you. We're gonna move to the next item. Good evening, Steve Medlin with the Durham Planning Department. Again, first I'd like to certify for the council that all public notice has been carried out in compliance with both state statute and the unified development ordinance and that affidavits are part of the case files for both this public hearing and the next public hearing. This next item is a rezoning case, case Z-14-033 Stroll Valley, which is a request to change the zoning designation of a 4.53 acre site located at 5441 New Hope Commons Drive. The request is to rezone from office, institutional and commercial neighborhood to mixed use with a development plan to allow a mix of office, commercial and residential uses. The development plan associated with this request commits to the following maximum uses, 50 residential units, 25,000 square feet of office, 50,000 square feet of commercial. Additional text commitments include a commitment for dedication of right-of-way, provision of accessible pedestrian ramps across New Hope Commons Drive at Hoffler Lane, provision of a bus pull-out concrete pad and bus shelter along New Hope Commons Drive, and roadway improvements along Durham, Chapel Hill Boulevard, Mount Mariah Road and New Hope Commons Drive. Staff has reviewed this request and has determined that it is consistent with the comprehensive plan and all other adopted policies and ordinances. The Planning Commission recommended approval of this request by a vote of nine to zero on January 12th of this year. I'll be happy to answer any questions. Council may have. This is a public hearing matter. The zoning map changed Stroll Valley. The public hearing is open. You've heard comments from the staff. I would first ask for their comments from the council on this item. We have one person that has signed up to speak, Dan Jewel. Is there anyone else that wants to speak on this item, either four or against? I'm sorry. Yes, sir. You want to speak four or against? Okay, if you don't mind, if you can come to the... Okay, if you go to the clerk's office and I mean, the clerk's desk and sign up the car. Let's do five minutes initially and then we'll see where we go. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I shouldn't need that much time again. Thanks for having me. And I mean, my name is Dan Jewel with Culture Jewel TEMS. We're here at the request of the, one of the property owners developer, Mr. Scott Bednaz with us also here tonight are the project architect, Don Tice with Tice Keaster and the project landscape architect, Jeremy Anderson with our office. I'll be very brief. Steve gave you a good overview of the project but what we're asking is for a rezoning from a piece of property that's currently zoned commercial and office with the underlying land use as commercial to mixed use. Why mixed use? Well, Mr. Bednaz would like to create a true modiscale mixed use place where one does not exist today. As you all know, this site sits in the front of New Hope Commons. It's surrounded by Chapel Hill Boulevard on one side, the Interstate 40 off ramp on ramp on the other side, on another side, the back end of the Best Buy store on the north side and mini storage warehouses on the eastern side. So, but what is special about here right now, if you've been out to the Black House or the cafe at Straw Valley, something like that, you know that there's this great, interesting, small scale garden with an old house and outbuildings that creates this magical place. And Mr. Bednaz would like to recreate that on a slightly larger scale. So, what we are proposing is to commit to mid-century modern architecture. That's a commitment on the development plan. We're proposing to create a cloister, a grouping of buildings around a central courtyard. That courtyard will be over the top of the parking. The parking will actually be structured underground so it won't take away from the ambiance and feel of what's going on. And also keep in mind that this is actually a down-zoning from what's out there before. If you look at your staff report, the traffic is actually going down by half from what's out there. We're actually reducing the number of school kids from what's out there. And we're not nearly pushing what we could ask for without even a future land-use map change because this is in an area where we could go up to 53 units to the acre if approved by you. That would be 240 residential units. As Steve said, we're only proposing 50 and 75,000 square feet of office and commercial. So, a very small scale but appropriate transitional project from what is surrounding it to creating a nice place where people would like to be. And that's what Mr. Bednaz would very much like to do. The Planning Commission unanimously recommended approval and we would like you to take that into consideration as you deliberate tonight. And we would respectfully ask for your approval of this application. Thank you so much. Welcome. I have one other person that wanted to speak and support of this item, Becky Winders. Becky, that's what you just signed. Here I am again, Becky Winders, 1304 Seaton Road. And I think that here we have another development that is in a transit area, residential development. And we hope that we're going to get some assistance towards the affordable housing goal here. This is a very different development from the last one in that it is small and a much smaller scale. And it would be really great to see that very underutilized piece of land that we go by all the time, turn into something nice and it sounds like a good project. And also at the Planning Commission meeting, Mr. Joule said that they expected to make a contribution to affordable housing at the rezoning approval stage. And so he kind of rightly said that we, there's another project coming through that hadn't gotten to the council yet. But since we don't have the program worked out, it's hard to come up with a commitment that you can write on the development plan. But I'm supporting this and I supported it at the Planning Commission and I hope that you council people will ask the developer to follow through with this, although we don't have anything legally binding, but we hope that the developer will work with some of the non-profits and would appreciate the council asking him about it. Thank you. You're welcome. Mr. Jim Duar, you had a question, is that correct? Duar, all right. From the three acres on the corner, which is the bicycle chain you may be aware of and Swedish imports. Have the last, pardon me. My name is Jim Duar. My address is 5609 Buck Quarter Road, Hillsborough, certainly. I was born in Durham, raised in Durham, but live in Hillsborough. Now I still have the three acres that we actively use and have for the last 30, 35 years. And our concern is the traffic flow in and out of our back door now is a problem. It's a tremendous problem during Christmas season, from Thanksgiving on until after the first of the year. And I can imagine putting more cars through that street behind us, New Hope Commons Drive, without addressing a traffic signal or something on that corner. I didn't know if there's anything that had been planned for that or not. Hadn't heard anything about it. Also, sidewalks were a big issue when the shopping center, New Hope Commons, was built. They were required to extend and finish sidewalks. And I wonder about this project also. There's no sidewalk behind colonial storage, the building between my property and the property in question. And there's another 400 feet of property I own that does not have a sidewalk, which I thought would probably be required to have that. So there were my questions. What will be done about traffic flow and sidewalks? Do you wanna speak to that? Dan Jewel again to Mr. Dewar's specific questions. We are in fact, at the developer's expense, putting a new traffic signal in at New Hope Commons Drive and Mount Mariah Road. An additional lane will be added there that will actually improve the traffic situation from what it is today. If any of you have ever tried to drive out of New Hope Commons Road onto Mount Mariah Road, you know what a nightmare it is. So this will actually regularize the traffic coming in and going out so that we don't have those problems that we do today. We are not proposing to put a sidewalk along Mr. Dewar's property. There is already an existing sidewalk, as he said, along the other side of New Hope Commons Drive, which goes all the way out to Mount Mariah Road, but we do not control any of the right-of-way or additional issues on there. I hope that answers your question, Mr. Dewar. Okay, let me ask are there others? Yes, sir. You need to come to the microphone, if you don't mind. Shopping Center was approved around the turn of the century. And they took away my front access, as you might know. They blocked our street off and I was at council quite a bit back then. The concern was there could not be a traffic light at that intersection from DOT and Raleigh because it would stack back beyond the traffic light. It would cause a stacking problem. It was too close to 15-5-1 for traffic light to be allowed there. So I don't see how that, has it changed? It's busier maybe than before. Sure. Yeah, Bill Judge of Transportation. The traffic signal for that very reason that you just described is actually almost similar to a half-traffic signal. It'll only stop southbound traffic to basically allow folks to turn left into New Hope Commons. Folks coming out of New Hope Commons will have to turn right and the northbound traffic would not be stopped at all so that it does not back into the 15-5-1 intersection. It's the southbound traffic that is a problem. And I'm misunderstanding something. The traffic traveling out of New Hope Commons, their lower exit where the traffic light has been installed the last couple of years, going up the hill for the Boulevard? Correct, traffic going towards the Boulevard will have to stop to allow folks to come off of New Hope Commons Drive but folks coming from the Boulevard will not have to stop. I think, thank you for your questions. Are there any other comments by members of the council? Recognize Councilor Moffitt. Can I get a representative of the developer, please? Somebody? Ms. Winder's is basing her support on what I understood her to call promises by the developer. Can we get a little more information? You can and I will clarify that. Ms. Winder's asked at the Planning Commission meeting what this applicant would do in terms of affordable housing. And my answer, I believe you could go back and check the tape, was that we will do what the council asks us to do. I would also like to clarify that over the last week or so, we have looked into that carefully. And particularly over the last couple of days, the conversation has come up about the proximity of this particular piece of property to the proposed Patterson Place light rail station. We prepared exhibits, I'll only hand those out if necessary. But this property is actually a little bit outside the half mile radius from the Patterson Place station. I suspect it's included though in the Patterson Place compact neighborhood because the planning department always tries to include large pieces of property such as New Hope Commons and not create donut holes, which this would be. Further, if you actually were to measure along the pathway that a person would walk from Straw Valley down to Mount Moriah Road, then down across the Boulevard and eventually over to the Kroger, which is where the transit stop will be, we're just about three quarters of a mile walking distance. So that's 15 minutes for a person who moves along pretty quickly. Half mile is sort of the recognized walking distance that people will walk without jumping in the car or something like that. But the other thing is, if any of you have ever been out there and attempted to cross the intersection at Chapel Hill Boulevard and Mount Moriah Road, ironically I have, ironically when I was putting out campaign signs for the half cent sales tax to support transit, it took me a full 20 minutes of waiting for the signals to change and that sort of thing to get signs at the four quadrants. And sadly, I think you're all aware, just a quick Google search turned up, there have been pedestrian fatalities at that interchange. So Ms. Winders did ask the question at the Pine Commission meeting, said Dan, how are people gonna be able to safely walk from this location over to the transit station? And my answer was, I don't know. Hopefully someday we can figure it out. But right now, this project is not within what you would consider a walk zone of this future transit station. And for that reason, Don, I've gone on too long, I'm sorry, I'll shut up. The answer to my question was that what you said at the Planning Commission was that you would do what the council asked you to do. Yes. Okay, Ms. Winders, can I see you again, please? The question I have for you is, was that your understanding as well? Is that the, when you talked a few minutes ago about the promises made by the developer to work with nonprofits, was that your understanding? Not work with nonprofits specifically, I just had the impression that this project would try to include some affordable housing and possibly, it would be really great if somebody who worked at Walmart or Barnes & Noble could live and walk to work, you know? Yes, but you know, as a member of the Planning Commission that what they have to build is what's in the rezoning and what's in the committed elements. I agree that's a great goal. I also know that this is a catch 22 that you can't require him to do anything. So, you know, we're just going on hoping that he would work, maybe talk to, they would talk to a nonprofit and see if we could work anything out in a similar way to what is going on with the Rosewalk development that's coming along with a letter of intent to include affordable housing and all. I don't know what that's going to account happen, but it's going to have to be a good faith kind of thing rather than a legal requirement, I think. Thank you. Further questions? Comments? If not, I'm going to close the public hearing and the public hearing is closed, as a matter of fact, before the council. It's been a problem of moving second. Madam Clerk, will you open the, no, I'm sorry, did you finish? No, no, no, no, no, no, no, I think you did. Oh, okay. Will you open the vote? Close the vote? It passes six to one with council member, Reese, voting no? Sure, sure. Sure, voting no, I'm sorry. Okay, I'm waiting for someone to do that. Second. It's been a problem of moving second, Madam Clerk, will you open the vote? Open the vote. Close the vote. It passes seven to zero. The way this thing works is when I say open the vote, the clerk opens the vote, the lights are blinking. When the lights start blinking, then you vote and then you close, okay, okay, yeah, yeah, no, no, no. Let her open the vote, let the lights blink and when the lights stop blinking, then you vote either plus or minus and that's it and then I tell her to close the vote. You want to practice run on this or what? Okay. Yeah, we do, that seems to do. All right. Okay, let's move to item 24, consolidated annexation, 3708, Danube Lane, BDG 1500011, Z1600028. Good evening, Jacob Wiggins with the Plain Department. This is a consolidated annexation item submitted by Reginald and Sylvia Lynch for a 3.41 acre contiguous parcel located at 3708 Danube Lane. If this request is approved, the applicant intends to construct a single family house on the property with hopes of connecting to city water and sewer service. Staff recommends an initial zoning of residential rule falls to the Jordan B, which is consistent with the policy of designating the least intense zoning district based on the size of the lot and the development here. The proposed development has a submitted extension agreement that has been reviewed by Public Works and Water Management and the utility impact analysis has indicated that there is available water and sewer capacity to support the single family structure. Budget management services did do a fiscal analysis of the subject request and determined that the proposed annexation would likely generate a $251 net loss at build out if the request is approved. I'm happy to answer any questions the council may have. Thank you. Thank you. This is a public hearing, the public hearing is open. You've heard the staff report. I would ask for comments. Recognize Councilman Moffitt. Did I, I might have misunderstood you, but did you say that this complied with the policy of the least intense zoning district? Because the memo says the opposite of that. A memo says it's not consistent with the policy. I apologize. That is an error on our half, I guess. Yes, since this is in the suburban tier, the RR. Actually it goes into, okay. What the memo says is that it complied, that it is the exact translation from the county zoning, but that's not the least intense possible zoning, which is actually RR, but this is different. If I might interject, Steve Medlin with Planning Department. The RS20 is actually inside the suburban tier, the preferred minimum zoning district for residential, especially for sites that potentially would be served by water and sewer. So it is consistent with the policy and staff is recommending approval. Okay. So the memo's not correct? The memo is incorrect. All right, thank you. Thanks, Don. Let me ask if there are other questions, comments. If not, is there anyone in the public who wants to speak on this item? This is a public hearing. Let the record reflect and no one in the public asked to speak on this item. I would declare the public hearing to be closed as a matter of fact before the council. It's been a problem to move in a second. Madam clerk, will you open the vote? Will you close the vote? It passes seven to zero. Thank you. Let's try it one more time. Madam clerk, will you open the vote? I'm ready, I'm ready. You close the vote. It passes seven to zero. Thank you. The item that was pulled by Councilman Reese, item 10 on a consent agenda. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. This is about the purchase of the former Durham Convention of Visitors Bureau of Facility. Can I ask a specific question? What exactly are we voting on tonight? Exactly. Good evening, Mayor Pro Tem, Mayor and members of Council, John Greeley, Department of Water Management. What we're voting on tonight is to authorize the city manager in working in conjunction with General Services to negotiate the purchase of the former site of the Durham visitors and connection bureau. And subsequent to that negotiation, would that come back before the city council? Correct. And then subsequent to that, assuming we approve the sale or the purchase, would then the whichever plan was proposed for renovating that facility also come before the city council? Not necessarily the plan, but the construction contract would have to. Fair enough. Thank you. That's all I have, Mr. Mayor. Move the item. Second. It's been properly moved and second. Madam clerk, will you open the vote? Mr. Mayor, I apologize for forgetting that one. It passes seven, is he right? Thank you. Mr. Mayor, I have one other item. And I apologize. I did not bring this up in the last work session. I will not be at the next work session this Thursday. And I don't know the appropriate procedure. Yes, for asking for an excused absence. Second, Madam clerk, will you open the vote? I vote on that, by the way. Yeah. Okay, good. You close the vote. It passes seven, is he right? Mr. Mayor, I apologize for forgetting that last week. Let me, if there aren't any other comments to the council, I do want to take a couple of minutes to go back to this whole issue about affordable housing around transit stops. I know we plan to have a specific meeting to go through the report that the consultant had on affordable housing. And have we decided, have we? Okay, that's on the Thursday. We're going to do it before work session. Now is it this Thursday? Because I'm trying to figure out if you're talking. It's not this Thursday. April 7th. Okay, April 7th. So, the 7th. The 7th, okay. Yeah, okay. I appreciate, and I'm serious when I say this, I appreciate the discussion that we had on this earlier issue about affordable housing on both sides. People were supportive of it. People were not supportive of it for all the reasons that you have. I'm going to be making a very specific recommendation in terms of a process that I think we might want to consider to try to get to how do we really get this tool developed for affordable housing. And I'll do that when we have the affordable housing committed meeting. It might be out of the box, but this whole issue as far as I'm concerned is out of the box. I just think we need to somehow try to figure out we can put it in the box so we can move with it. So, I will have a very specific recommendation as to how I think that we can use the process to get to this whole issue of how do we do affordable housing? I'm talking specifically around transit stops because when we talk about property around transit stops that's public owned land, that's a whole definition. I mean, we can decide how much we're going to put into it and we can require what we want to require of developers, but I'm speaking about properties that are not public owned land that are around transit stops in terms of how we might be able to come up with a tool to hopefully try to get affordable housing around those areas. So, I'm just throwing that out for you as a part of consideration. Are there any other items that we need to come up for us? I'd like to say something. Yes, sir. Yes, ma'am. Thank you for your leadership. All right, Mayor Crotan, good night. Meetings adjourned. Thank you.