 I think that's why we're here. Mr. Brennan. President. Mr. McDowell. Yes. President. President. Here. Reverend McDowell, we're going to say a few words to start this deliberation about bus stops and bike lanes. But I'm glad each person is here today. We've got a little congregation, you know. I don't know, I just take up an offering. I think that's why they're here. You got the wrong congregation. We could be the wrong or the right congregation. Let the ushers come forward. Thank you for being here today and thank you for being a part of this city and thank you for being a part as we continue to grow and advance. Let us bow our heads. O Lord, for a whole presence in our lives, for the ability to move, for the ability for our sitting to continue to prosper and grow, we simply say, thank you. We know that there are hurdles. We know that there are vicissitudes, but we also know that this is not a hopeless situation. We are filled with hope and admiration of what is to come and what is taking place. Bless us individually and yet collectively. Allow your presence to fall afresh upon us. We ask it and claim it in the creator's name. Amen. Well, at this time, we will move forward with city council discussion, the first item being the fiscal year 2023-2024, accommodations, tax committee recommendations. Mr. Hal Stevenson, committee chair is here. Hi, Hal. Oh, my apologies, sir. Yes, sir. Yes. Just one moment for us, Hal. With that adoption, Mayor, we would ask that you won't add Project Tango to the executive session item under what's it under in the last committee that came out of committee economic development. Yes, I think the special of matters is that you can propose an expansion of the business service for five years. Thank you. So that would be our request to add Project Tango to this agenda under executive session. Is there a motion? Just a moment. Second. You got a motion to second. Can you read the as well, please? Mr. Brown. Hi. Hi, Mr. Brown. Yes. Mr. McDowell. Yes. Mr. DeWall. Hi. Hi. Mr. Stevens. Good afternoon, Mr. Mayor. Well, I didn't get to see you. I haven't agreed to you all, but I appreciate what you all do. As the chairman of the accommodations tax committee, we have forwarded and had our meeting forwarded our recommendations as far as the financial part, which I'm assuming y'all have entered packets. And you may have received an email I wrote the day that we met that I sent out to the staff with calls. I might not be able to remember it the next day if I didn't do it. So I'm going to go from that as far as a report and then let y'all add any questions that that's up there. We came, we said, I'll just read it. There was a unanimous sentiment from the diverse committee that was the basis for our recommendations, natural right. There was a little talk about the economy and we wanted to make that statement as a committee. I think we recommended full funding on what they're asked for. Merriam Atria and Lake Murray Country do a great job as well with their organization. As we look through her report, as we noticed that Lexington, Town and County were probably not paying as much as we wanted. So we wanted to make a statement that the County and City of Lexington, Town of Lexington would pay more. I understand Merriam that that is in fact the case. She took that advice and went after them and they have and I'm sure she could have more to say about that. Broke it. We get $20,000 to the zoo. This was a little bit of departure from what we'd normally done last year. We do 85% to experience Columbia and 15% to Lake Murray Country without taking anything from anywhere else. But we felt like with the zoo and what they're doing that it was a no-brainer than asking for $20,000. Finally, you guys just consider a million dollars out of the fund to repay bonds, I believe. I don't know the details of that. That conversation today. The reason that the ATAC committee has really only considered marketing organizations like the Spirits of Columbia or Lake Murray Country is because of the Tourism Expandentary Review Committee. The rules around that are written pretty quickly. We work here and Tina gave us the opinion of city staff and attorneys that you can, in fact, as city council designate to take some of that money. We're not lawyers and that's business that y'all can take on yourselves. But that's why we've been so focused on just those two organizations. We recommend it against, of course, coming out of the fund. We think we live in a fabulous region and that we have got to have money to communicate that outside of the city and in the city, frankly, because we have a tendency sometimes to put ourselves down internally. So we are always, we'll always promote and advocate for more money for tourism, marketing, expenditure. So with that, I'll say one thing that I said in my letter personally, as a property owner in the VISTA, I personally have not had a problem coming up with some sort of help get property owners together to help perhaps pay some of the trade on getting Finley Park upgraded because it will benefit us all greatly down there. So that's just an aside and not only agenda, but I want to know that first one. Part of the benefit of the public house that you mentioned, that debt service, it's the purpose of the H-Tax Fund, the debt service was Finley Park. So just for the public's understanding of that a million dollars, that was what it was for. Yeah, I understand. And I know y'all understand more than everybody in here in the reform. So you know, we don't have a whole lot of power on the H-Tax Committee. So when we make recommendations, we have numerous times had that change to council level and didn't hurt feelings or just it might be repeated. Yes, yes, I expected fully to be done. I know y'all got to deliberate these things and more tell than we did, but we thought it was worth sending that across just for posterity sake. Um, for me, the Jesse Bullets here, he's on the committee with me. I'm not seeing anybody else in the committee. I know it would be more active, which we're talking to Dana and you can see a little bit about trying to be more engaged and more helpful. I'll be glad to answer any questions if there are any. Do you want to have any questions, Mr. Stevens? Thank you. With that, we'll move forward with the fiscal year 2023-2024 hospitality tax committee recommendations. Mr. Matthew Bridges, primarily chair. Nice, Matthew Bridges. I'm the chairman of the H-Tax Committee this year. Uh, take questions you have. They love you. You are. That's the hip thing, Terry. I wanted to thank y'all very much for continuing to trust us with listening to our local festivals and other drivers that will bring people into the restaurants who pay their 2% back. And these events are very important to bring people into the city and to retaining, to keeping them here and getting them into our restaurants. That means that last year we had an odd year, and thank you very much for allowing us to have 2 interviews coming out of COVID. We thought that was very important. We felt that the applications were down from previous pre-COVID levels. And there were 7 organizations that were out of interviews. So 2023 we had 62 organizations funded. This year we were slightly down from that. We do feel that the message was out there. We just have lost some organizations permanently due to COVID and for various other reasons. So we had a total of 57 applicants. And three of those are major entertainment districts. I just wanted to touch on that. I'm sure there'll be questions about that. The committee felt that it was, while they're very unique in their locations and what they're able to do, that we should fund them equally as possible. You'll see that there's 10,000 extra because of our committee guideline for one of them not asking for the level that we funded the other two for. That being said, with 57 applicants, I'm sure there are some specific questions about specific organization. Do you want to have any questions? If you explain to the line, street, allocation, if it was 80,000 a year, do you know what I mean? 60 corrects. If they still have a carryover at the time of our meeting and putting in our recommendations, they still had over 60% carryover from the previous year. So we wanted to talk to you. Matt, help me to understand the Carnegie International Festival. The 2023 was about 100,000, the question of 150, and we're back at the 2023 year. Because of the success of what is taking place in the club, what was the rationale? He keep it at the center. Well, I'm sorry, I'm having to, can't, 57, I'm having a hard time remembering. If I remember correctly, of course, we did spend all the money. Like I said, I'm old, so I'm trying to remember. We do feel like we're doing a good job, but we ended up spreading money across to as many applicants as we could. Clearly, if we had increased them significantly, that would have been 100,000 to 100,000. We would have had to take from other groups. So they're doing a great job. 100,000 dollars goes a long way with them. And did we do similarly with other agencies as we increased one and increased the other, as they're related to the 2023 comparatively to 2024? Did we similarly do the same thing? They're all very unique, with very unique expenditures and needs. So I can't say that we used a good, better approach for each one. All right, that's what I was going to say. Well, I guess the reason I'm asking is that I have been a friend and a tender of Columbia International, in addition to a lot of these other things that are listed. And as you know, I think as you know, that becomes one of the largest kinds of events. I don't have the exact fees brought, but I'm sure it's probably over 15, 21, 20, 21,000. Easily 20,000. Okay, I got it. That's good. Okay. Sir, Mayor. Thank you, sir. Matthew. Yes. Thanks for all your leadership on the H-Hacks. I know that's two or three days of your life that we're very, very welcoming. Let me ask you something. So you mentioned Divine Street and a carryover, carry forward, I should say. Is that carry forward information from other groups provided in our info? We did it when it was reviewing. Any of those, they give it to you, but we know they give it to you. Okay, in your, from what you can remember from the 57 applicants, how many others had carry forward balances? It would be a minority of 20%. 20%. And I would say Divine Street was the biggest. Okay, but didn't you keep that in mind when giving a new number to those other groups that had carry forwards? Correct. That's a great current question we have for each applicant. Did they tell, they give a reason? Was there like an overwhelming reason why there was a carryover? There was no reason given. Thank you. I wanted to know a little bit about this without relying on our research foundation. It's not intuitive to ask how that's connected to the Cobra Center's art season. Is that simply the organization that the Cobra Center is working with to funnel that money through? It's where the university moved to the Cobra Center owner. So that's their overarching administration unit. And that was owned by the university? Yeah. So just out of curiosity, based on what you were talking about earlier, and that had a pretty significant impact on the assets that the university has already. The additional programming that they were going to have this year in addition to, and it was our understanding that their funding has been reduced by the university. And when they moved from the original structure over to this area, their funding based on what that area has to give them. Sounds like our friends at the University of South Carolina Foundation need to give a little money to them considering that they have plenty to buy a property to take it off the tax roll. How much are your organizations to use that center, including the city? I think the only trend I'm seeing going back to the Council on this is almost all of the organizations are getting this increased. So I think we should revisit the Columbia International Festival to see consistency, how we can kind of be a little bit more equitable with that. Is there any way we can differentiate between the Columbia? It is a large part. The ballet, both companies. That was a significant increase in one and decrease in the other. They actually gave the exact same thing, but we're going to talk about that afterwards. All right. Thank you very much. Thank you, sir. You're all right, man. Thank you. Any other questions to understand the fact right now? Some music academy. Can you talk a little bit more about what they were using the dollars for? Yes, multiple concerts. They're bringing in an international artist. They do. They do it at the Koger Center, although I guess they have an ABC program, I think they're called Koger Center. But they do a terrific job and they bring in a wonderful group of performers. Sorry. We're lucky to get in the Columbia area. We don't have any concerns with their content. Any other questions? Will we come in? So the restaurant association, why is it that we didn't recommend them getting the full amount given that those are the folks that generate this funding? Well, we increased them $10,000 from last year. So we didn't give them the 50. Again, we would have had to take that from somebody else, but we did increase them by $10,000. We did not meet the majority of the requested amounts. We did not fully fund the majority of those requests. How many folks applied? We basically funded everybody's salary. We had some that were ineligible, whether it be a gala, a race, or a closed ticketed event. And a lot of the reason why we don't fully fund the majority is because their request was for $4.8 million. We fully funded everyone. We would not have enough money. Any other questions from Council? Yes, the purpose of the discussion is different. Can you expand on that? How does something qualify or not qualify if it's a ticketed event? Given our guidelines that we have created in the past that have dictated what we fund, that's generally not been an item that we would. That could always change given a certain event. Our guidelines for determining these are that a closed ticket event is not going to have the draw and that something open to the public would be. By ticketed, that doesn't mean we don't give money to anybody who charges entry. It's like this club is having the songwriters guild or something. The only people who are going to come are the guild members and their family members. So that's really a closed event as opposed to, you know, I charge you $10 to get in for a big festival. Thank you. Do you have a question? Are you all good? Thank you, sir. I knew it's been a difficult job, but I'm happy to have her. We can continue with a line item discussion. The fiscal year 2023-2024 hospitality tax line item agency request in Missy Cawthorne's absence. Jim and I are going to try to help y'all with this. Jim's going to do his best. I would also like to say to how, to Matthew, to Terry, to pass everything from the committees. Thank you. I know that Tina and staff in Missy have worked with y'all. I know it's a lot, especially for some of these committee meetings to keep coming in, and I know some of y'all have probably been on them in years past as well. It's a huge effort, so I see all this from afar, but I appreciate all that y'all do. It makes it a lot easier for the council. We wouldn't have a budget to hire enough people to do all that, so it is a great service, so I thank y'all. We'll start with accommodations tax. This was presented to y'all. It was in last week's budget, and all the documents that came to y'all on the various different budgets. I wasn't particularly going to go through each and every line item unless y'all would like to, but I wouldn't want to point out. I think the wrong hospitality line item needs requests is where we would be even finished y'all before we do the overall. The line item measures. Thank you, sir. We skipped to almost last. I would argue, this is y'all's show here, so I'm just here to kind of take records and tell you kind of what we have. The total request was the $2,880 for these. Y'all have an available allocation $2,276, but I would add, Mayor, we've talked about this before, maybe several of us, and we just kind of go back. We do have within there, we have allocated $1 million to the violence, so we have talked about splitting that up over two years. So we actually have $2,776,935 to stress. Can you get back to the last line? So the number we actually got is $2,275 for those line item agencies. We've seen what we're going to have some discussion of. Have we decided the, I guess, the order of the Ballard installation, Ballard installation, or is that still being talked about since now that we're splitting it for two years? Part of it, what we can do on Main Street, because that's where the majority of our vents are, we'll only take a partial of that, and I think the next ones will get a five points to reduce the floodwaves to the storm fronts, which I think is a priority. Right now, Layland Street, we have all the, you know, the chemical weapons that we still have to be back for. Well, I want to, so I support that. The way we looked at it, I think when we were adding up costs per ballot, you know, the like five things that we were working out, we could hit those two areas first. One, from a safety, most safety standpoint, and one more with flooding as well, that'll help the merchants. How much, how much is modeling going to help the flooding? Because people drop through, and so we can't get down, create more rain, so it's then a rolling into the storm fronts. So if we can eliminate people from even getting down there, then we have, have a wage preserved that is restaurants that we tell if you continue with water. Yeah, that's your question. Does that, does that mean then that DOT cares for the head? No, that's us. All right. That's our enhancement. Okay. You know, as Will says, they're going to be digging up the roadstone, so there may be some cost savings while what they're doing for us to add those components in. All right. And of course, these are not permanent bullets. They open down. That's what I'm saying. Yeah. Road control. We'll get one for your car. So you're going to have to remote control. Thank you. Any questions for Jeff? So do y'all have a assessment through the line arms? Yes, we do. Do you hear that? Yeah. I think I want to make sure that the questions that we started going through all these. Is that for information only or are we doing like this? I think we can just, I'd like us to go through it so we can vote on it next week to be honest with you. Yeah. The mayor makes a good point. We're not voting on this today. And that's for next week's vote. And we can actually get it done before July 1 works. Now y'all can clap now. So just for clarification, the new number is 2-7? 2-7-7-7-6. We make some slight adjustments. We can get it right there. So that's the one we're going to leave it short. We're going to go, yeah. So we're going to go through the line items. Recommendations for campuses would be number one, the Museum of Arts, age 50, Columbia Regional Festival Association 255, Adventure 450. We have a 200 one, excuse me, 175. Historic Columbia 750. One is Columbia Arts, $100,000 for grant writing, specifically for grant writing. That was council driven decision. And then $100,000 for the Philharmonic. Well, you got that one more time? Age 50 for Columbia Museum of Art, 255 for CMFA, 450 for Adventure, 175 for SC 63, Historic Columbia 750, one Columbia Art writing, and then the Philharmonic out here. The Philharmonic was at $100,000? Yes, ma'am. So where's the funding for hold back for future public safety? That's in the host of talent. That's designated for those three areas that we just got to talk. Y'all good with that? Yes, yes. All right, y'all want to get a hospitality tax committee recommendations? I would be, the two that I'd like to call out is I'd like to have the council consider for the Coder Center, us going back to the USC and asking them to support that. So is your recommendation to give them what they had last year and ask USC to build a gap? Correct. So that would be line item 42, 25K. Need the recommendations of this one. Ellen, you go back and make sure everybody's on board. And I'd like to increase the international festival and meet their needs at around 50. Well, that's a 50% increase that we've got to come up with somewhere. You know, I mean, that 50K, it's only got 15 hours. Look at that per side. What was that per side? She's on item 42. Yeah, I'm looking for it. From 40 to 25. So that gives you 15. Well ballet, my suggestion on the ballet is to have line item 14 and 15 reflect each other 150. So we're just moving. We're making an equal. So instead of 180. Pick up five grand. So instead of 180 and 125, is it ready? 150 each. 150 each. That gives you another five grand. So now you're up to 20. And also another ballet item three. Then for the elderly, could we? The elderly, sir. Item 17, of course. I would suggest we take out the 12,000 for the Lurie Center based on our moving. Condolabation. And other ballet. So can we can we then say it was just number 38? Yeah. Can we get the international festival at 125? That's that's that's the city. That's a 25% increase over the last year. Here to 130. 130? 130. And then that's good to have that come. You're on. I would be able to get that. Yeah. I'm sorry. 30. And the only one. So we've taken out the 12, right? The 30. Yeah. The only other one that I would put out there and I'm not super on up on it. But I do think that if these dollars come from restaurants. Then it should be investing in the next week. So why don't we move that to that and that would give them 50. Well, let's just make it 50 what they asked for. And I'll leave us 4,500. So I have another maybe and this just came up for the committee. So I know that the ATACs were potentially making an additional allocations to the zoo. And then they also requested for their park district zoo and garden appetite. I would recommend not move it 20,000 on the ATAC. Did you not do it? Not do it. Not made. I have to leave it in the hospital. I'll leave it there. I got it. Okay. So. What was the item right prior to that one? Dot to bustles for the restaurant. The Lurie Center. I got the item. I don't know. I already ate the Lurie Center. But the restaurant. Restaurant waiting for access. 26, make that 50, increase that by 10. 50. 26. So the Lurie Center. Lurie would be around 38. Because of the other effort. Where you go? You all good? Yes, sir. All right. We need to recap that or you don't catch it. I think those ladies sitting over there have our back pretty good. Y'all good? You captured it. Didn't you do? Yeah. Thank you. Thank you. Well, also. Jeff, you ready to go down? I actually do got a number. So I have to go back through and Erica. I'm probably going to go over this video afterwards to make sure. Thanks, Alex. Okay. I think there was the other item that we printed for them. But I didn't need that for this purpose. Oh, I have. What's that? This is 60. It was a man. And they only have been extended. Yeah. I'll keep you. Yeah. Yeah. That was it. I'm scared. We've already got. We've already got. We've already got. We've already got. We've got. We've got. We've got. We've got. We've got. We've got. Okay. I want to take it on the air already. We've got it. We've got it. It was already. We have a change in the road. So, we're in ATACs. So what we got here, so the 2.7, I know that there's more money there, I would like us to communicate about a million dollars back and hold it for the next quarter of the next quarter of the year. So that if tourist related items, promotion items come off, they can come back to us. I don't want to... I mean because some of this is carried forward. We have to use it in a period of time. So I would recommend that we give 400 to Lake Murray And then we give 2.3 to the CBB and leave the balance in the account for us to look at at their later date. And say that again, please. Yeah. 2.3 to the CBB, 400 to Lake Murray Country. That's a 2.7 out of that to leave the balance of funding in the account for later date. That'll leave a million. Some of these marketing projects and other things and there does probably be some events that are going to pop up and we need somewhere to get to that. We need to point out that this also includes in special projects, 230,000 for restaurants. Yeah. And 800. We got that right there. 800 is heading to 3,000 for. Where is that? Yeah. Right there. 230. Right here. And it's also on. I'm sorry, we had set a million for the debt service. It's actually turned out we've issued bonds. It's just 873,000. I can find it that I would just want to. I hear the committee's. Wish to learn a little bit more about Lexington. So I would just want to know what the final. Investment from Lexington is for Lake Murray. Given that they do benefit a lot from it. Don't worry. That's all the things. But yeah, I do. I do agree that they need to also invest. When do you think the public facilities project would be up. Up and over. Henry. In the restaurant. Yeah. Very nice. I think Henry has looked at his full spots. I think he's prepared to bring us a recommendation. And I think it'd be something to happen pretty quick. Perfect. Thank you. Jeff. That's right. $200,000. Right. 230. All right. Sounds good. We're still can't, that's all the money. And I think it'd be something to happen pretty quick. Thank you. Jeff, that's right. $200,000. 20,000. That sounds good. Not today. So. Like you have good direction. We do. If you are a good world. My name will work back next week in the second meeting. Budget. So basically, folks, we're pretty much that. I want to thank staff, Jeff, you and Missy and city manager and mayor and all that are involved in putting all this together. This has been an arduous task not only for this council because we've met seemingly for the last six months every Tuesday and it's it's been it's been very it's been very enlightening so thank you all so much for what you've done to make this a lack of a better word a easy read for us thank you all so much and of course after saying that all of you who gave a hand clap