 with wraps that we've allowed. Main Street branded theirs about six years ago and they did that through a graphic designer, if I believe, if I remember correct. And both of these was brought to the city for approval before they were ever placed on there. The Vista has done some branding in the past, but they chose to do artwork on the traffic cabinets in the Vista. And they were also approved by the city. Of course, there was a project a couple of years ago we didn't get pictures of where Earl Wood, Elmwood, Cotton Town did branding in that area through a grant on North Main Street. So these are what we have today. We really did not know where the conversation was gonna go. So we thought we'd throw these out here. So, oh wow. I was like, that's how big this is. It's a piece of art, it's a sculpture of what's going on. But anyway, so what are our current, what's the current structure around this? So, I mean, in other words, right now you're just saying that somebody has to remission. There's none. Right, so there's no structure. There is no structure around this whatsoever. I was hoping you were gonna say something different about this. So. It came out of a vacation and a lot of conversations around our gateways. And we realized and learned from Robert that there's many signs that DOT puts down that are outdated. We had branding that happened during the NCAA tournament which I thought made the city look very pretty, but also there was just more signs added. And then of course, as you know, I've been working with them on getting our Columbia dating center. So that's something that's in the work. But the issue has now become that the mayor asked kind of for a sign audit, right? Just kind of see how many signs are out there and they all started to remove some of the. Seen one last night, so. Yeah, so. So for more full disclosure, just say right now, my company did all the weight buying signs in Columbia, which I think looked great. And I also think it's certainly great. Like kind of heard from the one who had two small and also Ms. Lee wouldn't actually take you where it said there was something. So I guess, I guess from trying to get at is, what's the appetite to allow more freedom within structure for these different areas? So I think that this request came from, I think that this does request. So this is the deal, right? Yeah. And our, I'll speak for myself. My concern is the inconsistency in branding across all of Columbia, which speaks to the larger issue of being able to sell Columbia in a very cohesive manner, right? Whether you have health, economic, development groups, multiple logos, colors, brands. And so one way, especially as we're working on one promoting our flag and our color and the gateways and some of the work that Robert Steve is doing, we don't want to take three steps forward and then two steps back, but I'm still having all of these ad hoc requests come in that look very different than what we're trying to accomplish. So I think the request for this committee is what kind of process do we want to put into place to ensure that all of the signage moving forward has come so consistently, especially if it's in highly difficult. So I agree with everything you said. If there's even one more thing that I think is super important to note, which is that signs have a tendency to last forever. And we even go through this when we do really big major corporations. The facility wants to hang on to every sign that they have no matter how dumb or outdated it is. So the problem is that whenever we do these things, nobody wants to go backwards. Okay, so the only thing that is going to happen is more signs will be cool, we get more signs and then more signs and more signs. And then once the VISTA does it, everybody else in the place is going to want to do it too. So I think the biggest problem is besides signs last forever, so we have no rules, no standardization, no guidance, just special requests, right? Correct. So if nothing else, we would probably meet some rules, standards, and guidelines. So Councilman, if I may, if you'll give us an opportunity, maybe we actually go back and look at some of our peer cities of what they've already done for this and maybe we can develop something through, what they've done is for neighborhood signs or any kind of signage, maybe just reach out into the Southeast, but all over to see what they've done and just make sure that we write a policy that is kind of, maybe somebody's already created the wheel that we don't have to guess at what we're doing if that's acceptable to the committee. So first of all, I am number one on pro-sign, okay? But I'm more pro-messaging than I am pro-sign. So signs without messaging are not good. And I think that's as important for us as what we help people with. And I think you're right, we need to put in some type of any minimal structure around something, I think it could be a good interim programmer and some signage. I think it also leads into the RFP though, right? Like we've already listed the work, the help of potential groups to help us with some of that guidance. So why not go up to this as well? Mr. Chairman. So I think the exact branding request that came to us was painting a planter. Is that correct? How about you? We're painting it for you, I'm sorry, you don't have that in front of you, but it looks like this right here, but you're back to it. Yeah, right. And I agree. It's just two things, the planter and the fact that you're looking at this. Gotcha, gotcha. I agree with us that sign clutter is something we should all take a look at. I know you love signs, Bob. So the good news is that I will address the sign clutter is part of our Elmwood project is we took probably 15 old directional signs off, the old brown ones that have been there for years. So they're gone, they're gone. So we removed every one of them. We did a DOT agreed to allow us to remove them. We did not have to wait on them to remove them. They do have to take them out of their system. So as we see these brown signs, we are removing them. I did see a sign last night in the Harveston area that said, welcome to a capital city picture, which will be coming down also. So we're removing them as we see them. So I guess I was getting to our hospitality districts have very active merchants associations that rely on city, county funding at some level, personal funding at some level. Every example that you've shown us, I think, is the creative use of space. Now when we say signage, I feel like we're talking about two different things. Like this is a great, I mean, this would just be silver to be an eyesore. Probably be weeds going around it, right? Plus no weeds. I think this, the marketing materials for the merchants associations within their hospitality districts is a good thing. And I think it's something that we should work into the overall grand marketing of it. Do I want to see us put more signs up on holes and stuff like that that say, welcome to our merchants and stuff at merchant districts, hospitality districts? I'd like to get away from that. But this creative brandy, I think, is a good use of what would otherwise be just blank space. Like what's the harm in that? That looks good, I think. But we've got to double back with the maintenance of it. And I agree with you. I think that the use of trash cans is awesome. I think that's a great place to have specialized branding to your specific merchants association. But like this, welcome to the VISTA. It doesn't save in Columbia. There's just so many opportunities for our people to sit in for some of the, and when I say gateway, they don't just mean off the highway into some of the entire industry as well. Well, with our marketing RFDL, that's something the professionals should let us know. What can we tell the merchants, the hospitality districts? So from like, what is the standard that we want to see? And I do think it's important, the distinction between branding and signage is important. Exactly. And branding needs to, like you said, needs to align with the branding of the city. And a lot of this is parking garages are a great tip. So the last time I went down to NUSD, as soon as I was with my daughter, as soon as I was ready to be down there, I probably had the parking garage figured out. But if you expected the signs to hit you around, you were in trouble. So a lot of this is the same thing. Even with signage or branding, a lot of times, people do it for themselves. But they got to understand the message, for the people who don't know what's going on, not the people who do know what's going on. So if you want to brand the VISTA, well, if you have somebody visiting from New York, it has to clearly let them understand what the VISTA means. It doesn't do any good. And it doesn't say anything. Right, that's what you're saying. That's not something that we can do right now. No. Those are parameters that we need to put in place for the next branding exercise, for five points, full screen, for this. Because everybody wants to do it. So I'm going to suggest that we spend a little time on this and try to put some structure and organizational concepts around this. And I'm going to be very big on trying to figure out, if you're looking for other people doing it, you can quickly figure out what to do it right now. Listen to me. Wait, so from what you said, maybe. So what you're saying, am I understanding correctly, that you would want to go ahead and push this term? Yeah, I would accept this, if this is a special request. See, I would not. I think that it is an opportunity for us to make changes moving forward. Because you mentioned five points was nine years ago. Now is the time for all of the spaces to be updated. I have no problem if we wanted to move forward, but having creative uses like Main Street did have little light holes and things like that. But actual welcome status, I would not want to do that. I would want to be able to have something. So it's the welcome. Yeah, it comes to this. But this is right here a while needed to come to the committee. Because when it was brought up like a council meeting, now that we've got stuff, it was I was trying to belay that with all the circumstances. It was just that the staff took this request and moved forward. But then we're doing exactly what we've been doing the last X amount of years, where we're just kind of like, OK, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, well, we'll make it better. But we're proving out our request. So then where's the line for us to be a little bit more consistent? Well, that's almost the creeper. So I would even take a stronger stance than this without the algorithmic concept of the business. Because the VISTA doesn't say anything about Columbia, South Carolina. So I mean, what I would rather do is to just, you know, I don't know stuff, but I would rather just say we're saying no in order to put some limited structure around branding within the city. So to me, this doesn't really portray anything of value for color. Yeah, and then we're not saying no. We're saying we're asking you to hold as we are undertaking a pretty comprehensive approach to making things work good. And we want to give you part of that, right? Yeah, I have no problem with that. I mean, I think no one's more proscienced in programming than I am in terms of making a living. So when I do know how these things can get off the rails fast, and I'm assuming that once we brand this, they're going to want to brand a whole bunch of other stuff. This is just an addition to the branding. They've already got VISTA branded everywhere else. So this is on the light pole sign and stuff like that. Come on, like a banner? On the little, what are those? The vertical banners? Yeah. You may. This is throughout. So this is just an addition to the branding that they have already. So I guess my question is there's a lot of different hospitality districts. There's a lot of different aggregate. So by us saying pump the brakes, we're saying pump the brakes on all every hospitality district on the brand itself. Yes, absolutely. One hundred. I don't think we can do that without a proper plan in place because for us to get this plan in place is going to take a while, right? And you see the growth of the Bull Street. It's not going to be the same Bull Street in 18 months. They're going to want brand, brand, brand. Five points is growing. They're going to keep branding as they move after the DOT project. But I think at the end of the day, we all agree. There's a layer of let's all try and bring in this theme of you're part of Columbia, we're all great together. I get that. I get that. But I think we can't do that in the near term. I think what I would say is that I think we can't do that. Yeah, I really don't think this is like a five-year group. I think this is a six to 12-month process to just identify the branding that we're comfortable with. And what I would say is that it would be kind of like a concentric circles of these are things you can do without approval. These are the things that you need. So it's more of a it's more of a it's just it's just so for this room, I would say all of the entertainment district, a guy like me, you must include Columbia's up for attention. And like none of them happen, even Main Street. It could be it could be mainstream anywhere, right? Like these are small things. And I I just think that now it's time for us to start work. So I will agree with you and support you. And we put some age tax money for regaining purposes for each top of the town district. Once we put these standards, make them. Is there going to happen? I don't have any questions about that. I actually think the fact that they get tax money a dollar in the first place gives us a seat at the table to help kind of shape why they are dependent on. But they need to know that we want to be a part of just one brand. There might be some uniqueness to what they come up with. But the standards we want to put in place and I think the one thing to say is this is not just a neighborhood or hospitality district issue. This is also, you know, Daniel Mayer and I have talked about how the airport is branded a certain way. You have all of these places. It's kind of a certain sort of a bunch of different things happening that we want to see just be part of it. Right. So the answer is to your point, if you make a motion, then I will support it. So do you want my motion to include extra hospitality tax? Sure. So what's the first? Yes, the first one's already. Okay, we were a little nervous. I want to treat that. I want to treat it as well. Okay, I think the motion is due as to recommend that the VISTA hold off on, ask the staff to write the VISTA hold off until we get all of that right. All right. Yeah, well, we want to formalize it. But I'd say that we're now asking you to just hold off for a certain period of time. So that we can put some organization that's on the guideline. But do we even need to include that in the motion? We just need to make the motion that we want to go through the process of going to include the branding and presides for the city and the hospitality district. Sound like motion right there, Peter. Well, now I was going to say, I mean, I think part of this purpose was do we need to formalize? Hold on. Do we need to? That's that. On this specific point, I've already told everybody y'all are here. But that's just not what it needs to be. Right, so I think that we need to make a motion to then develop a process that provides consistency and guidelines for how we brand our entertainment district. And I'd say that this could be something that we plan on having to be done by the end of the year. With future consideration of funding. All right, so let me add to that. So next week, we'll be giving you all an update on our PMRP. And one of the main focuses of the effort is branding so that it's all worse and perfectly good. We can take what we want from that. But Robert and others, probably what other cities are doing, we can bring it all together. So Paul's looking at it and we can brand it. We've also considered utilizing what you know what the H tax and possibly some other different funds over the next year for this process. And that it isn't accepted use for a lot of these impact or issues like that. I believe so. Yes. Programming increased visibility and range of people to promote the capital city of our region. And I wasn't saying, you know, like that. But it's a real request to know without taking into consideration that you all have a budget. That's why I did not want her to be assuming or waiting. So when I first sent the request this year, it was wrong to be that I died. That, to me, indicated was very especially because I needed to occur. So I don't think there, but I was pretty clear in my email that first review meeting with y'all was going to be going through a formal process. OK, good. I didn't see a part. So we have a motion? OK. I think it activated. Second. All right. All in favor? Aye. Aye. All right. Working right in the network of another party. And I don't think people are proud of me. And she's wouldn't anyway come to the chair and report that out loud. Yeah, for sure. OK, so are we moving to three or one? I was moving to three. So I think that the, and I can get too dramatic about this. But I think what we really want, maybe in terms of any simplification ahead of ourselves, what we really want is an awareness of what are the current different types of zoning that we have. My understanding is that zoning already into the zoning simplification process. What were those changes? How were they implemented? What has been the difference? So anyway, we'll start a process of we'll call it zoning awareness. And then eventually we can move to potentially zoning simplification. That makes sense to everybody. And Will and I have had some conversations about this. It just seems like there's a lot of layers in Columbia on zoning. Once we get some of this information presented to us, I think it will be for that's true or that's not true. All right, now we're back to one. William, I know you all have some of the specials. Mr. Brown, would you like to add anything to this? Well, can I add something to it? I think this would work nicely into an August review of those initiatives that we put in place, not only for business life, but also for zoning to be more business-friendly. So I think this is timely for us to work in an update. I don't think Krista, but also Brian and his team with some metrics, how we've done maybe a quarter since we made these changes. And I think probably at the August meeting would be a good time for that update. And if there's any expansion on for this, that one as well. This was just a bit better, not knowing the specifics, but just to give some general background. So do you want to make your name clear? And I want to make sure we all have clarity with Mr. Chair on the next step. So that's all I want to say in short. This would be a big part of it. Certainly, and we can potentially have a subsequent meeting, Councilman Brown, to discuss any specifics. But this was just a given overview of zoning and what had been done previously, because we're not having the benefit of working with our previous code, which you all did not. Our new code is a vast improvement over that code. It was not an easy task to do what we did. But it does have a logical organized format. It uses pictures. We always love pictures. But it still is a legal document. It's the law. So it does have to have certain parameters within that. And I was reading here something recently that shorter actually can be more problematic at times, because it's not as clear. And so I actually strive, and Missy can tell you, to be really succinct in my writing, to be clear and succinct. But in a lot of cases, sometimes you just need more information. So everybody's on the same page. Is it to type out that interpretation? Absolutely. So you don't have quite as much discretion. We want to apply discretion where it's favorable, where it's appropriate, provide that flexibility but within certain parameters so that we all have more certainty. Because we know certainty is really one of the goals of the code. Toby, one of the things that I tell people all the time is that I think we all want to be pro-compliance. But the question is, if we're pro-compliance, is that achieving the goals of the city combined to things? I think what we hear a lot is that certain things are onerous or not anti-development but makes it harder to develop. So I guess in my mind, what I would like to do is just have a really good firm awareness of the different zoning by area, the different overlays by area, and the consistency within the zoning or the city. Certainly. Absolutely. And when we had our workshop, that was a goal. Because I think I don't know that everyone has received the message of the improvements that have occurred with the new code. So when we had our workshop at the Museum of Art with the development community, it was still a small bit of the development community. So the word didn't get out as wide as maybe it could have to talk about the improvements. And we're still going through it. But the code is also one, it's the law, and it's a mediator, diverse set of stakeholders. Some of them here, some of them here, and we try to meet in the middle to meet all of those goals. But I do think we could do a good job of getting out the message of the improvements of the code, trying to actually meet all of those stakeholders' goals. So we do think there's a firm. The people who need it know. I mean, in other words, I mean, I'm not a developer. But do you think there's a firm understanding that if somebody says I want to develop this property on Rose Wood, that I would understand the guidelines around what I couldn't do? You can understand the zoning code currently a whole lot more than you could previously. Now, is it still a technical document? Yes. I made the analogy with Missy, you aren't necessarily going to be able to read the engineering regs and be able to develop a piece of property either. I think our regulations are a little bit easier to understand than the engineering regs. But it's still a technical document, which is why we're here to try to help impart that information. So is a whole lot easier now? Should you read it and go do something without talking to us? Probably not. OK, that's a good point that I was going to make. So if someone called me tomorrow and said, hey, I got an idea. I want to develop this parking lot at this time. So the first thing I should tell them is to meet with staff. Take a look at the document first. And then yes, meet with staff. We do pre-application meetings regularly with folks, or our folks will talk on the phone to just go over ideas. We actually highly recommend pre-application meetings for anything other than a small project, because it's not just us. It's also engineering, stormwater, all sorts of other different types of areas that the city touches. I think this was Gregory. Yeah, oh, and Gregory. That was actually my call. You think staff is in Gregory that we're going to, or is it that they've got the phone call? It's our development center. So they are the hub, although they'll be referred in through a number of folks, sometimes engineering, sometimes economic development. Gregory also, Greg does as well. So they come to us, but our development center, which is that hub, Brandon Burnett, he organizes a lot of those meetings to make sure the right people get in there. Mr. Moore, they are very effective. How do you think we can better get the word out for that particular pre-planning exercise? Because it's very valuable for people to understand not only what I can do with my property, oh, how can I? What do I need to do to build it? The zoning and the building codes with the building folks are included. Absolutely. Well, it's very important. Yes, well, for some of them, once you meet a certain threshold of development size, it's required. So because of the complexity and the various areas, so it is required. What we have discussed for this coming year is also having a series of development clinics, which would include a zoning 101 within those as well. To the development community, try to get folks in to have those. And that could even be recorded, put online in case you just didn't want to come and meet with us personally. So that would be another way to get that word out. So do you think it follows the time or the same time that follows the time? To be perfectly honest, we hear more compliments from people from out of town than we do from in town. The question is, how do they know what to do? Our website is actually rather good directing you before you start who to call. So we get those calls from those folks from out of town and we meet with them. Right, so as you say at the very end here, so we've redone our zoning ordinance and the land development ordinance, which is also the subdivision regulations, how you develop land. So the next step is to look at some of those other older documents that govern the development of land, which are some of the design guidelines. So this coming year, we're going to begin working on the oldest ones, which are our urban core. So that is the city center in Inavista. So streamlining those, the older ones, the city center ones desperately need that so you don't have those kind of conflicts that may occur. So that will assist as well. So how many projects do you think needs some type of zoning abatement? That has decreased significantly with our new code. Our board zoning appeals used to have anywhere from 10 to 20 cases per month. We've had within the past year, I think at least two meetings where there were no cases, now we have about five. And that includes special exceptions. So variances are when you're having to ask for an abatement when you can't do what the zoning code says. A special exception is something our community has said. It's allowed, but we need a little extra review. So I wouldn't necessarily call that an abatement. That was a community decision to have those extra eyes on the project. So with regard to variances, it's decreased significantly. That's probably the next thing in the streamlining of it all. You know, because I mean, again, in my business, we tend to have, most of our customers believe that they should get rid of them. All of our customers, they all want to go, yeah, they love variances, you know, and they'll pursue them for years. So a lot of times we try to talk them out that I would love to know some metrics around how this streamlining is going and then I think, you're right, we need to really work on our messaging. I mean, I'd like to understand it because we're going to do the messaging, and I want to be able to do it too. And to that end, for instance, we were still seeing a lot of variances for fence height. And so Hope went ahead and proposed an amendment to council, which was a passed, which was passed to increase that height, I think by one foot. That's been significant because they were all passing. They're all going to Board of Zoning Appeals and they're all getting approved. So instead of making them do that, we passed that amendment to remove that variance. So we do keep an eye on it as well to see if you have too many variances in one area that are consistently getting approved, you probably need to change something. Mr. Brown. You're definitely right. Did I make a comment? Sure. Can we come up there? Mr. Brown and members of the committee, I'm Jim Daniel. I'm a commercial real estate broker with photographer properties. I'm a one-man operation, primarily working in the portions of the city that really are just in the stage of being redeveloped. I think the new zoning is a vast improvement over what we had. The issues I see are several, though. One is I think there may be too many classifications and within some of the classifications, some of the uses for some of the properties that have been listed in a particular classification seem like an over stretch or really sometimes unrealistic. And I would hope in this process we look through that. I get flyers from all the real estate firms in town, the big ones and little ones on properties they've got for sale and talking about the education standpoint. I mean, most of the big firms are still using the old zoning when they send out a flyer. They're not listing what the new zoning is. So the client thinks they're still working in an M1 when they might be working in some other classification. So I think notifications there to the brokers in charge or the agents would be very helpful so that they're putting out the proper information when they start to market the property. And some of the things are new, like no parking was required in commercial properties up to 7,500 square feet. It's too early to know how that's working because it's only been in place a few months now. You know, the purpose makes sense, but the people who are going to this facility, if it's not in a major area like the Vista or some other places like that, need to have access to parking. And I think it's gonna take us a year to sort that out to see whether that particular change is working or whether we need to drop the square footage down to 5,000 or whatever. So, you know, that's an item that I think it still needs to be looked at. But I think the major concerns that I've seen in the projects I work with on this is, one, changes are being made as we go along. And it's hard to follow what those changes are. I know when the legislature changes the law, normally they will have the old law xed out, the new law there saying when it was amended, so everything follows. Now you have to go to a different part of the code to find out what's being changed. So you're looking at this one, and then you're looking at that one. So I would hope, and maybe Krista can help there, but I would hope that, you know, we could sort of simplify it for us who have to try to understand this. I've had a great deal of success working with zoning administrators. The present one as well as the past. They're very helpful. Again, it's an educational process. I think a lot of people don't understand that process. So I hope as we go through this, we will look at a better educational. So we're putting out the correct information on zoning, that the people who are doing the deals know who to talk to, and we have some. Is this the level of understanding that? I think so. I mean, I mean, it's, I mean, when the big guys don't understand and put in their flyers, that the new zoning is X and they're still using the M1 or whatever it was before, doesn't comprehend when this thing's been in existence for a year and a half. But possible, what you're saying, that people aren't developing based on the new? I don't think that's the case. No, I think the problem right now is, in the areas of town I work with is in a developing area. Some of the things they have designated to happen in these areas are really quite complex for what's in that area now. Maybe 10 or 15 years from now it'll work, but right now it's sort of premature to require some of these two and three story work units. But I think it's an educational process for one and some clarification so we can find the changes when we're trying to figure out what's the last record, the latest requirement for this particular zoning go. Thank you. I think there is a need for some education but partnering with the private sector as well, private ambassadors to help us get the word out. Thank you. Thank you. Or not, not the B&M horse that goes, the reference to part of this. What is, I just want to make sure why and what this is that we're being asked to do as we chair. I don't think that there, I think the only thing we're, the only this right now is to look at these changes. And really try to, I'm better committed on this. Yeah, well obviously we've got to do some better. The message is what we've done. I would like to get some metrics on how we think these changes have improved. Where are the improvements? And how can we quantify or qualify those improvements? So, besides just general awareness of what we've done, then there's the level of, what do we think that what we've done has made a certain improvement for people. Does that make sense? It does. It does. I mean it doesn't take away the potential for zoning simplification down the road. But I think right now this is more of an awareness thing that I'm happy to know that we, to be honest with you, I didn't know that we had had a substantive change in zoning. So that you clarify my question, we just want to make sure we're not going down a different path. Yeah, we don't have anything crazy. I think all we're trying to do is understand the significance of these changes. Yes. But Devin, you go back to one. We are number one. Great opportunity funding request. Hey, good afternoon council. Last month came and spoke with you all briefly about the create opportunity program, a information technology training to apprenticeship program, which was started under cyber woven probably about three years ago. That program was initiated with a one-time funding request. City of Columbia contributed $40,000. Richland County contributed as well. That program has since been stood up and Ben Rex owner of cyber woven is looking to transition that program now under the SC technical college system. And so he sent in a request for support letter for $50,000 from the city to help transition that program. I believe there were some follow up questions that y'all had after that meeting, which I provided to Ben and just wanted to give him an opportunity to come in and address those, the questions in regard to what would the city be using the funding for? How was the private sector partners, diesel laptops, colonial life? How are they supporting it? And a few other things. So just wanted to give y'all an opportunity to have that dialogue in person and let him respond to those items. Thank you, Ryan. Thanks. Thank you, Ryan. A couple of quick thank yous. First to the committee for chiseling us in. Second to the city for being one of the early funders back in 2020 that helped us kickstart this initiative. And today I am proud to be here as the newly minted chair of the South Carolina Technical College System Foundation. We are the private sector arm and supporting organization for the technical college system. I'm going to turn the floor for 46 seconds to Roger Shrum, who is the chair of the technical college system that'll give a brief intro to what we're doing here. Hopefully I won't take 46 seconds, but I again, appreciate the opportunity to be here today. And speaking on behalf of the technical college system foundation, each year we're educating 140,000 students across the state in 16 institutions. And right now we're under the close eye of having to train 15,000 people for all the recent economic development activity that's occurring within the state. So we're having to look at new options and new opportunities. And that's what allowed our foundation to look towards Ben's program with Create Opportunity as a new option to see if we could jumpstart development of software engineers and developers. And so we've adopted that program into our foundation and put some support behind it and we'll be working to work with Ben and the organization to further grow the operations outside of just the Midlands and hopefully in other parts of the state. Thank you very much. Thank you, Roger. So your seed investment three years ago spurred a process of developing a rich and integrated public-private partnership where we've raised almost $3 million of funding from federal state sources as well as a diverse set of private partnerships with the goal of broadening the number of people in Columbia who are trained to be software developers. We've created a pathway with no cost to the individual. So tuition is fully funded. There's a $4,000 stipend to support living expenses while the individual is in a six month full time 40 hour week training at Midlands Technical College. They receive a certificate at the end of that six month period as a credential. And ultimately they are placed with local employers in Richland, Fairfield and Lexington counties at the completion of that process in committed two year apprenticeships that guide folks to successful software careers. We source talent from diverse backgrounds. They can, we just graduated a PhD student who was retraining. So a very high level of education. We also source folks who are injured construction workers who can't go back to their primary jobs, recent high school graduates who are not college bound. From there, they go through that process and 50% of our graduates are BIPOC, 40% are women versus 4% and 11% in the field. So we're transforming the workforce. More notably, more than 50% of our folks qualify for WIOA funding, meaning that they're in the bottom two socioeconomic quartiles and we're transforming lives. There is a floor of a $45,000 salary plus health insurance plus retirement for an apprentice. You're required as an employer to give folks a performance review and an opportunity for wage increase at the end of year one. The median apprentice income is just over $52,000. The average person coming into the program is making between $14 and $15 an hour before they begin training. So this is transformative at the individual level. I specifically want to thank Ryan who has been bringing us employers who are looking for talent so that we can help them build their workforce. And we are coming to him and saying, ah, we've got three folks looking for roles. So the city is playing its role of being an interconnected partner between the public and private sector. So long and short, building an ecosystem of support is key that engages public and private partners. The folks that are employing folks in the Midlands or Colonial Life, they have the biggest team, now eight graduates of the program. They have also provided a quarter million dollars of private support for the program. Blue Cross, Southeastern Freight, Department of Employment and Workforce, Beaman Hench, Cyberwhip and Nefron Diesel Laptops and more are actively employing our 28 graduates. We have more than 20 folks starting in September of this year and the next cohort and they will be placed into the workforce next spring. And we also have a number of non-profit and governmental partners providing wraparound services. They range from the Richland Library to Goodwill Industries to Midlands Tech and everything from transportation support to childcare support, all sorts of exciting things to help folks go from a lower earning career to sustainable high earning career. Our goal is to propel the sustainable growth of this career pathway and eventually add additional pathways to additional careers using this same training to apprenticeship model. Midlands Tech has been an amazing partner and that is why we come back to you asking for $50,000 in one-time funding to support this initiative. We think it is made doubly strong by sitting within the State Technical College System Foundation, which matrixes us with all of the state's workforce development resources and continues to deepen the ties that make this sustainable and strong. Appreciate your time and we'll open the floor for any questions. Okay, so, Senator, should we tell you this is a little bit of a handle for me so I want to go out for you? Yeah. So, in three years we're going to be a new city clinic agency. Mm-hmm. So, how long does this request last? But in other words, how long is it important for the City of Columbia to financially invest it into this program? Yeah, so, what we agreed to do last time was tie the seed money to the actual training of humans. So, I think it was eight, we committed to train eight City of Columbia residents and get them placed in the workforce, which we achieved back in 2022. So, in this case, we're pretty open to what the metrics of success are. We do not plan to come back and ask for a recurring support mechanism. We are just asking for, help us lay the foundation as we enter a new home and build a sustainable future. So, this is a one-time $50,000. Yeah. Yeah, Mr. Chairman, thank you so much, Roger. Thanks for coming. That's what all y'all do for preparing the future workforce for us and specifically for our goals here at the City of Columbia we kind of went through with Ryan, and we focused our energies on what we think we can grow and do good at when it comes to small business incubation and, you know, software engineering, small tech businesses are at the top of the list. And it sounds like this is a feeder to help these, what's the word for the builders? I don't know what the buzzword is for. Coders, developers. But the entrepreneurs need the talent. This is an unconventional path that you put together for these people to grow this talent. Let me ask you something, the $50,000, is it fair to say that funding could be considered going towards helping you write grants to go find other money? That's fair. Is that a fair statement? And how much, you know, ballpark? And if we were able, if we come through with this $50,000 grant, what paths and what kind of ballpark amounts are out there for you to go pursue with a grant writer? Yeah, so what we just approved as a board 20 minutes ago, I was racing over here was that we're committing to raise $1.086 million of net new funding this year. And we've had 86,000 of that committed in the last couple of weeks. So long and short, we think we can get a million dollars towards us this year. And we need to scale that to $3 or $4 million next year as we expand this to two or three other technical colleges and make this a statewide network. Because when you look at it, if you take a family from a collective income of $40,000, $50,000 to a collective income of $120,000, the independence that family has, the impact on the tax base, the reduction of dependency on the social services network, et cetera, et cetera, is really healthy. And that's why we're taking this ecosystem-based approach. So we've proven at pilot scale that we can do that. We've proven in employers with eight employees like Beaman Hinge and with 12,000 employees like Colonial Life that this is sustainable and growable. So I think to that point, we know that there's a net deficit of 300 software developer jobs in Columbia right now. We need to fill those jobs. And ultimately, the only way to do that in a way that's sustainable for the Midlands is to train local committed talent from the Midlands. And- I think it's a very important group of future workforce that you guys can touch on stuff. Well, I have a bias, but I agree. Thank you. Thank you, Will. Thank you. It's okay with everybody, I'd like to do some more. Yes, Mr. Shana, make a motion. We enter into executive session for discussion of matters relating to the proposed location, expansion of provision of services and approaching location or expansion of industries or other businesses in the area served by the public sector so I'm very much aware that it's going to be a project that's being done. All right. The motion is taken on there. We say aye. Aye. All right. Let's go. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye.