 Delighted to have those of you with us who could join this meeting today. Erica, are we live? Yes, sir. We're good to go. Okay. All right. We have Lyle and Rebecca and Sabrina and myself and we'll soon have Ellen Cooper. So that gives us a good form for the for the day's business. The only presentation that we have on the agenda is going to be a wonderful one with lots of good news from Chandler Cox of the Hughes Development Corporation. And Chandler, I'm looking forward to your presentation. And if you want to share your screen, we'll get right to work. Great. I appreciate it, Councilman Duvall. It's hard to believe that our last meeting was February of 2020. I was just looking back at the agenda as we were at Merrill Gardens, did a tour there and then had a little bullshit update. So a ton has happened since then and really excited to share some great updates with everybody. But first and foremost, I'd like to introduce Janie Quinn, who is a new member of the Bull Street team. We hired Janie as our new district manager in February was when she started. So she is our first full-time Columbia team member and really, really thrilled to have her on board. She also has a ton of great experience in ties to Bull Street. She was at downtown church when they built their building and has done a little bit of everything there. So brings a ton of experience and expertise to our team. So wanted to have Janie on this call today to make sure that everybody got introduced to her as well. Welcome, Janie. I've already given you credit before the meeting started with everything that channel is going to say today. So you take good credit back. Where is your office? Where is your office going to be located? We're building something right now in the first floor of the first base building. So I'm in Soco right now and I've been working up here with a lot of fun folks, but we'll be hopefully by the summer in an office down in the first base building. Very good. Very good. All right. Can you guys see my screen now? Yes. Yes, perfect. Well, I love to show this map. This is just sort of the general update of the master plan of Bull Street. I think everybody's probably seen it a hundred times, but it's always changing and evolving and moving. So this is available on the Bull Street website. If anybody wants to dig into it a little further. And I thought I would really start with kind of a timeline of events of what happened since the last time that we were together in March of 2020, or I guess in February of 2020. So March of last year, we announced that Iron Hill Brewery was going to expand in their South Carolina locations to Bull Street. So this announcement was made last March and is in the works with design. We had a little bit of a COVID slowdown with them as they sort of navigate as all restaurants did through the pandemic, what that exactly looks like, but really excited to say that we are on track with getting this project still built and open probably next year. So excited to have them at Bull Street. That will be on Bull Street next to Starbucks Starbucks. Yes, all right. Well, it'll be right at the Bull and Matilda Evans intersection on the Elmwood side. So right there at that brand new intersection. In June of 2020, we started construction on Starbucks, which is our second national retailer to be announced. This was a picture of that construction as it was ongoing in July of 2020. The initial demolition and grading for the future University of South Carolina medical school campus was complete. So this is a shot. You can see where that grading has been done. Those were two buildings that were demolished by the university in anticipation of the medical school and the health science campus moving there. So that's Hardin Street over on the right side of your screen and the public park is what's in the front. Last time we met, we were at Merrill Gardens. I think taking the tour of this facility and the first residents moved into Merrill in July of last year. They are now at least 50% least. I haven't gotten the recent update, but that was a couple of months ago. So they've been ahead of what they projected as far as the pandemic goes and excited to have people at Bull Street there, especially living right across from the park and know that they're really excited for baseball to come back to. This is another picture of Merrill Gardens in their rooftop units. If you guys remember seeing those. In August of 2020, we opened REI, which was our first national retailer announced at Bull Street. And they have done really, really well. We're super excited to have them at the campus and all the things that they bring along with it. As part of REI's construction and along with a lot of other things that were going on at Bull Street during the past year, there's been a lot of infrastructure improvements going on. So I've got a little slide later that'll show you what some of those infrastructure improvements have been, but a major two major pieces were done in conjunction with REI. One was the extension of Freed Street, which is the third baseline of Sacred Park extending their intersection of there and voice all the way out to Bull. So that was our first finished intersection, brand new intersection out onto Bull Street. Now we have two completely finished intersections and working on a third when Bull and Elmwood is redone as part of the Richland Penny Program Project. The other portion that was completed in conjunction with REI was the Boyce Street extension. So that is the intersection right in front of the Sacred Park Stadium at Freedon Boys all the way out to Colonial. That had been a temporary drive for a lot of reasons mostly for baseball during its first four seasons, but that was finished while we were during the pandemic and is completely open now. In September of 2020, the second phase of Town Homes was complete at Town Park at Bull Street. This is the 28 unit Town Homes complex, basically behind the Babcock building in between that and Barnwell Street. So we had finished phase one in summer of 2019. All of those units are now sold and occupied. Phase two are two bedroom, two bathroom units right here along Calhoun Street. That has been completed in September and three of those units were sold. And then construction is going to start on more three bedroom, three bathroom units summer of 2021 right up here along Fink Street. So this is an image of one of the there's only one unit left in the second phase of Town Park at Bull Street. Those two twos that we're really excited about. In October of 2020, we announced a brand new office and retail project called West Lawn at Bull Street. It is a cross-limited timber hybrid structure. The first one in Columbia, one of the largest in the state of its kind. And Robinson Gray, the law firm in based in Columbia, was announced as our anchor tenant. So they will take top two floors here. We've got an awesome roof deck that their managing partner has offered to host everyone at at the groundbreaking. So we'll look forward to that in April of 2022 when that building gets finished. So we have about 37,000 more square feet of office on the second and third floors in about 13,000 feet of retail on the ground floor there. We're also doing a bunch of other infrastructure in conjunction with this project to extending Matilda Evans Street up there. There's an alley that goes along behind this building, additional parking that's happening out Bull Street. So a lot happening sort of in the front 30 acres, which has been our major focus for the past few years. Also, this is another image of the West Lawn building. So you can really see a great a great shot of that rooftop and why it's going to look like this is Freed Street on the bottom or right hand side of your screen Starbucks right here. And this will be Iron Hill at that new intersection. One of the other big things that we've talked about a lot at the Bull Street Commission. And and I know everybody has been really curious about is the Babcock building. So in September of last year, we had a devastating fire. I'm sure you all remember seeing this on the news. But due to the incredible work of Chief Jenkins and Columbia Fire, all the areas that responded to this fire around the building was able to be saved and actually started construction in October of 2020. They've received their key funding in December and they have been off to the races ever since. So this is a long construction period to get this building 254,000 square feet renovated into 208 different apartment units, but they will turn over in phases with the first units planning to be occupied first of next year. So we'll start basically on the Calhoun Street side and start turning over phases of the Babcock building to residents starting in about eight months now. This is another image of the Babcock building project. They've got some great courtyards that are being set up kind of within their campus saving as many trees as they possibly can. They're doing a full historic renovation on this project. In January of 2021, we opened this new Starbucks at Bull Street. Again, that was the impetus for a new traffic signal at Bull and Matilda Evans Street. If you guys remember it used to be called Williams Drive, but had to be renamed in conjunction with getting it to be a public street and with the E911 system. So we were excited to be able to do that and name it after Matilda Arabella Evans, who is a historic figure in Columbia's history. African American was a great educator and I'm sorry was a in the medical field. Thank you. So played a great role at Bull Street and other places and so we were excited to be able to name that for her. We also announced that we were going to be hiring a district manager in January and it didn't take us long to decide that Janie was the girl was going to be our was going to be our new team member. So she joined us in February. Also in February, the Columbia Fireflies announced their new affiliation with Kansas City Royals and announced that they were going to have a 2021 season. So I talked to John Katz last week and he had the countdown ready for me when I asked. I think it's May 11th, Gregory, if I'm not mistaken. So we are on the countdown for baseball, excited to have them back for their fifth season as a Royals affiliate. In March of 2021. So last month, the USC Board of Trustees voted to move their medical school to Bull Street. So another step in the right direction there. After we had done the demolition and grading of this project, they'll continue to see movement on this campus as they work toward moving the medical school here. Also in March, we had the groundbreaking of the West lawn building. So you can see REI in the background, Starbucks behind these guys. You probably recognize this guy right here in the middle. Our chairman, our fearless chairman of the Bull Street Commission. So this is again the cross laminated timber hybrid structure, something totally different for us, totally different for for Bull Street and excited to do that. Number of other things still ongoing. The public park has been open, sort of unofficially, I suppose, for months now, and I know has been getting a lot of use. But that park is also officially in its naming process. So Councilman DuVall, along with Councilman McDowell and Davis have been working with Robin Waits at Historic Columbia and Professor Bobby Donaldson at the University of South Carolina to recommend a name to Council and we are hopeful for a naming ceremony and official opening before it gets too hot this summer. So lots of other things in the works. This is the Bull Street dog park as well. I think this has been one of the most successful pieces of the park. There are often a number of people out there in using this. So a great addition to the Bull Street community. And this is a quick snapshot of what I was mentioning earlier. A lot of infrastructure work that has been ongoing during the pandemic. So these are the extensions of Boyce and Freed Street that were opened in conjunction with REI here. This is the new Sable Street and Matilda Evans. This is a brand new traffic signal at the bottom of your screen that opened in conjunction with Starbucks. Right now we've got a lot of infrastructure working on connecting that those new pieces up to Pickens Street and really up into the heart of the retail district here. Also this yellow snapshot we just opened last week the Saunders Street extension. So for the first time we've got a brand new street extended all the way out to Pickens and you've got a great new way to get in from the Bull and Elmwood intersection. If you come up toward Babcock go down Pickens that will connect you right through. So as we do a lot of this work here we're working on making sure that the connectivity throughout this site is is still functioning well. You can get in sort of through all three entrances. And the last big piece of that is we are putting the final lift of Asphalt down on Gregg Street. So you'll see another well feel like a brand new road right before baseball opens. That should happen in the next two weeks as well. So you can see how much dirt has turned on this site and this is a little bit of an older image. There's there's no Starbucks that's here. West Lawn hasn't broken ground yet but you know everything at USC all the stuff in the front 30 acres it's going on really has been a lot of activity over the past 12 months and looking forward to getting everybody back on site rather than just on Zoom to see the progress that's been made. So we're sort of back to the to the master plan. Happy to answer any questions or elaborate on anything that no one's curious about. Let me give the commission a little briefing on the naming of the park since the commission of the committee met last week. We're going to recommend that the park be named after Page Ellington. Page was an African American who was enslaved in Rockingham, North Carolina. He was sold to an owner in Columbia in the I reckon mid 1800s. He became a very good brick mason. He taught himself to be a master brick mason and was befriended by Dr. Babcock of course who was the driving force for the development of the mental health facility on this big piece of property. He actually built several of the buildings and was sort of an architect so he designed and built. The one that I'm fairly confident that was one of his construction projects was the Parker annex which is still standing and and used by the Department of Natural Resources on the Bulls Street property. He also built the steeple on the First Preparatory and Church. It's not the one that you see now but the original steeple on that church. He built a house down in below Finley Park on Arsenal Hill on Blending Street that is still standing. It was his house and was instrumental in development of several churches in the downtown area. He served in politics during the Reconstruction time and was sort of a a Renaissance man for the late 1800s. He was a unanimous decision of the commission but we also had I think we had a list of 15 names that were very much in contention for this honor of being named the park after them. But what we want to do is name it after Paige Ellington and then put wayfaring signs like you see on Main Street on Columbia 63 project to honor some of the other families. If you look at the that's the top left side of the diagram that Channel has up right now. All of that was a plantation owned by Mr. Wallace and we have several families African-American families that were enslaved on that plantation that became stewards and some of their children became doctors and teachers and other things after the Civil War and all of those need to have honors on the Bull Street either in the park or somewhere on Bull Street. Channel mentioned Mathilda Evans there's another street that you've named also and I can't remember Channel the other street but it's you've named another one. Yep it's Septima Street after Septima points at Clark. Okay she was another one of the ones that we had on our list to be named. We're discussing with Robin Waits some sort of marker that can be put on some of these other things to explain why Mathilda Evans has a street named after Septima Clark also why she would have a street named after. So those things I'm not sure if it's on the agenda tomorrow but it will soon be on the agenda for the council to approve that name and we will set a date for the groundbreaking for the start of the park the 20-acre park that's so beautifully done down there. I had one question that you didn't cover Channel. Please. Behind REI there are two large trailers or looks like prefab buildings what are they being used for? They are so those are construction trailers that are being used for the West Lawn Office and Retail Project and then also the parking garages. Okay okay and one of the parking garages is going to go between the remains of the Williams building and the West Lawn building. It will actually go between the West Lawn building and Starbucks. And Starbucks. Yes sir. Can you point to those cameras? Yeah there. This is one of the parking garages that will be built in conjunction with a lot of the ongoing construction out there right now. The other is this freed street parking garage that will be used to be able to use it a lot for baseball, for office parking, or the apartment project that's planned for right across the street there. So got two parking garages under construction now as well. Good. Anybody have any questions of Chandler? Chandler. Yes sir. A couple of questions and I think you told me this before and I just forgot it. The general timing on the build out of the medical school and the other one is is Prophet Dixon still around on the apartment piece or has that that gone on? I'll start with the med school. So they are doing their own development of that one while. From what I understand they're hoping to have a development team in place about this time next year to have their drawings done and work with their contractors at. So I don't know the exact timeline of when they're going to start that construction but hopeful that it's in the next 18 to 24 months. And the Prophet Dixon project is still in the works so we're hoping for a summer construction start of that. Okay. And when they build the medical school is it going to come in phases or is it just going to come in one big bell swoop? It will start with the medical school and then the plan is for them to move their health science campus there as well. So later date would be um school nursing school public health school of pharmacy. They'll also probably have a pretty large research component um in addition to those four you know sort of educational components. Liles about two weeks ago the board university board USC board approved I think it was four and a half might have been four million dollars for the design portion of this project for the USC project. I was glad to see him put some skin in the game. Absolutely. Councilman DeVall if I can add a little bit I'm gonna actually ask Gregory to add we are going to schedule a media tour of the Babcock project. So I wanted Gregory to give a little information about that effort. Thank you Missy. Yes we're we're trying to uh it will be this coming Friday we're doing a heart hat tour of the Babcock building and actually right after this I've called with the developers Clackin properties to sort of coordinate the route and where we'll have everybody meet to do the tour out there but it's basically a heart hat tour for the media the mayor it will be there and all and basically show be able to show what's being done out there and actually the the great progress that they're making is actually Chandler said it's due to have occupancy and virtually eight months for the first phase of the project out there so they're they're making great strides. We uh at the same token we're hoping to be able to kind of show the the fire area and how they're repairing repairs are being made to that and again the replacement of the dome there should be information given about that which it will be replaced on that one and like I said that will be coming up this Friday. That's big news have they cleaned it out? They're they're in the process of cleaning that out they they hold dumpster out of dumpster load of burnt debris out they have been working with the insurance company and with HUD it's been sort of a slower process and they were hoping for but they are making great progress on that if anybody has had a chance to see on the drawing on the left excuse me the right side there the parking lots that are along Calhoun Street have actually already been put in place the curbing and the paving is in there. Contractors will actually use that as staging area but they're making great progress they really are. What about the Soho building and the Laundry building and and those that were uh I know we've had some movement on that. Tim will you want to take the laundry? Absolutely. Well I guess Soco too is in the bakery building so that's where Janie's house I see that she's there now in one of the conference rooms and so they've been fully occupied since I think September of 2016 when they opened Soco's been there and then the laundry building was sold to a local developer Todd Avant early last year who is working on stabilizing that building right now. He's going to do a full historic renovation on that project as well. They are working on replacing the roof right now getting it watertight putting in new windows um and are are working on what that use is going to be probably some additional creative office and some kind of retail um or restaurant use. I think both of those buildings were done by Paige Ellington but we can't say that yet until Dr. Donaldson goes to Caroliniana Library and looks in in some of those boxes that are referenced in Dr. Babcock's book. That's great. Missy you got anything else for us? Do not Councilman. Any members of the commission or anybody else have a question for anybody? Good. Okay Chandler this is Rebecca. Yes um at least my neighborhood won't stop talking about grocery stores which is very valid um and and I keep having people say well Becca one is going to come to Bull Street. You know I know we've always talked about how it was a desire if we could stack a grocery at Bull Street um that would be lovely and I know the Noma neighborhoods would lose our minds. So I mean is that has that progressed at all are there any updates on that or is that all just fun neighborhood rumor? No updates that I can share at this time but it is definitely on the on the on the wish list um something that we're working on because we agree it makes all the sense in the world as we continue to add residential um the neighborhoods around obviously need and want it so um it's it's certainly something we're working on but nothing to announce at this point. Cool cool and I want to say like I'm really loving the new light. Good you know I use it I like it thank you it's really long okay like obscenely long so I don't know if it gets triggered or like what um but uh I watched like a funny situation where all these cars were like I'm gonna turn right and of course as soon as they all did it change it changed but um but otherwise like I mean I love all the infrastructure changes um and the layouts great and easy um that's where I think I appreciate the feedback we um we are always looking at that light too Gregory can attest um and if I don't know if Robert Anderson is on this call but there's always there's always some fiddling that needs to go on when you put in a new light to make sure that the timing's right so it's it's something we're certainly keeping an eye on yeah I mean because the Starbucks is open yeah it's been great. I've been to Starbrick several times and they they are busy. They are busy but they're so lovely it's been great to have. I did not mention this earlier but there is um a really cool mural on the side of the Starbucks I don't know if anyone has seen but it is um South Carolina and Columbia theme so you might not pick that up exactly when you look at it but if you go look really close there are um palmetto fraud that are you know part of the state tree the flower that's on that is the yellow adjustment flower from the state flower so um it's a really cool mural that will get sort of a bit of more of an explanation of its significance in public art um that has not been has not been put up yet but something that is forthcoming. And Chandler I could like to mention just engage since you brought up the flowers uh Hughes Corporation has Hughes Development has been kind enough to donate the use of the land beside REI for the planting of wildflowers like we're on Maine and Elmwood there so over the next number of weeks uh provided we get a little bit of rain should be some beautiful wildflowers blooming there. That's why we have a fire department Gregory. Go sprinkle. Chief Jenkins may disagree with that being the reason. Any other anything else for the good of the cause? All right we will adjourn the meeting and try to be more regular in our um scheduling of these meetings as we get back to whatever the new normal is. Thank you for your attendance today. Thanks guys. See you. Thank you. Thanks everyone. Yeah thanks y'all.