 Yeah. One minute to air. We're streaming. Good afternoon. We would like to call the Durham City Council work session to order on this the 21st day of April at one o'clock. We are here in our first floor council chambers in City Hall Plaza. We'd like to welcome those of you who are joining us today in person as well as those who are joining us remotely. Madam Clerk would you please call the roll. Mayor O'Neill. I am present. Mayor Pro Tem Middleton has received an excused absence for this meeting. Council member Caballero. Here. Council member Freeman. Present. Council member Johnson. Here. And Council member Williams is running a couple minutes late. He'll be here momentarily. All right. We'll go ahead and get started this afternoon and our first order of business will be any announcements by council. All right. Council member Johnson. Thank you. Thank you, Madam Mayor. Just wanted to remind everyone that the deadline to register to vote for the primary election is tomorrow April 22nd. If you are not registered to vote and you don't register by that deadline you can still vote. You can do same-day registration and vote early during the early voting period. But if you want to register and vote on election day you have to register by that deadline. Thank you. Thank you so much council member Johnson. Council member Freeman. Thank you. And may I follow by council member Caballero. Thank you, Madam Mayor. And that does bring to mind that early voting will start next week Thursday and that is phenomenal. I did want to just take a moment and acknowledge that the Equitable Food Oriented Development Partnership conversation is occurring at Duke World Food Policy Center with communities in partnership and Duke Samford School for Public Policy. And I wanted to just take a moment and welcome Dr. Jules H. Barana. I'm messing the last name up. Our USDA Deputy Secretary of Agriculture for the USDA being here today in time. Thank you. Thank you council member Freeman. Council member Caballero. Thank you. Good afternoon. I just wanted to flag for council members and the mayor. Laquisha and Rachel have worked diligently to find a time for everyone to be able to meet around ARPA. And there should be a tentative invitation on your calendars for Tuesday, May 17th from 2 to 3.30. Excuse me. I'm sorry. Wednesday, May 18th from 2 to 3. And so I just wanted to flag that. Again, it's Wednesday, May 18th from 2 to 3. Thank you so much for that. Just want to get a shout out this afternoon to Lincoln Community Health Center. I was over there about an hour or a half hour or 45 minutes earlier today. That is a great operation. They are doing a wonderful job over there with nine sites. And I just wanted to give a shout out to all of those heart-working folk over at Lincoln Community Health Center. I also wanted to mention to folk that I did. I am starting a tour of small businesses. I did some of that on yesterday. I spent about four hours with Susan Rainey. We toured some businesses over in the Lakewood Shopping Center. I met some of those business owners over there and went to East Durham to meet some of those business owners over there. So we give a shout out to them. Hopefully coming soon, I will be going across the city to meet with various small business owners and not going to say that I'm neglecting the larger ones. We're just starting there first. So giving a shout out to all those folk. And thank you all for your hard work in the Bulls City. Recording in progress. We recognize our city manager for any priority items she may have. Good afternoon. Madam Mayor and members of the Durham City Council. I do have a couple of priority items for you this afternoon. Agenda item number 12. The Upper News River Basin Association, UNRBA, fiscal year 2023 budget is a 20-minute presentation that will be made today by staff. And the second item is agenda item number 19, Forever Home Durham. Fiscal year 2022 update is also a 20-minute presentation. And this is a supplemental item that was added for your agenda today. Thank you, Manager Page. You have now heard the manager's priority items. May I am ready to entertain a motion to accept those? So moved. Second. It's been moved by Councilwoman Freeman and seconded by Councilwoman Johnson. If we have a voice vote today, that will be fine. I believe I'm looking at my attorney to make sure that's fine for a voice vote. All those in favor, you have the sign of saying aye. Aye. Aye. All those opposed have the same right. Hearing none, that motion passes unanimously. And we say good afternoon to Councilwoman Williams. You have now diversified us a little bit. Presence today, sir. All right. Now we're going to turn to our city attorney and to recognize Attorney Ray Bird. So glad to see you back here. You know, I just have to keep saying that. Good afternoon, Madam Mayor. It's good to see you as well. Good to see you all members of City Council. The City Attorney's Office does not have any priority items today. However, I would like to take a point of personal privilege if it's okay to introduce the newest member of our staff, Carlos Hernandez. If you could come up to this left turn really quickly. Carlos is a new assistant city attorney who joined us on April 4. And I just wanted you all to put a face with probably a name you're going to be seeing quite a bit because Carlos is going to be the primary council addressing our ARPA grant funded contracts that will be coming forward. He's also going to be the new general council for our community development department as well, which is quite busy. And then he will be working collaboratively with Fred Lamar, senior assistant city attorney who's going to be a team lead for contracts, real property group within the office. So Carlos, would you like to introduce yourself? Yes, it's a pleasure to be here. Good afternoon. Thank you for having me. Carlos Hernandez. I'm raised here in North Carolina since the age of four, made Durham my home in 2007 when I studied at Central School of Law. I graduated there and worked for some local firms until I started my own practice about 10 years ago, focusing mostly on the underserved Hispanic community of the triangle. I have a decade long relationship with El Centro Spano and other nonprofits in the area. And I look to hopefully bring that experience to help Durham continue to succeed in its goals. Thank you so much, Carla. Welcome. We're always happy to see a legal eagle. I know you come well prepared for the job. And thank you for applying and thank you for bringing another legal eagle aboard. We look forward to working with you. Thank you. All right. We will now turn to our city clerk to see if she has any priority items for today. Good afternoon, Madam Mayor and council members. I did want to request that item 14, the Durham Vaccine Equity Project, be referred back to the city clerk's office. I'm sorry if you would repeat that again. I would like to request that item number 14, the Durham Vaccine Equity Project be referred back to the city clerk's office. All righty. I'd like to make a motion that item 14 be referred back to the city clerk's office. Is there a second? Second. All right. It has been moved by councilwoman Freeman and seconded by councilwoman Caviarra that this amount will be referred back. We're ready for a voice vote. All of those would sign by saying aye. We'll vote by saying aye. All those opposed have the same right. Hearing none, that motion passes. Thank you. All right. Now we will move to our second order of business today and that is to read the administrative consent items and we will then follow that with reading our departmental items, reading our presentations for today and reading our public hearing items so we're going to read and also our citizen matter so we will be reading through the entire agenda at this time. The first order of business on the administrative consent items is the approval of city council minutes. Item number two, the human relations commission appointments. Item three, building permits and inspections, performance audit March 2022. Item four, to select applicants for the at-large council vacancy and forward to the interview stage and I believe that has been pulled by Ms. Brunda Pollard. Item five will be the appointments to the civilian police review board. Item six, the city county planning department FY23 work program. Item seven, a fuel surcharge for taxi cab operators. Item eight, master service agreement to city CITI incorporated for 2022-2025 on-call supervisory control and data acquisition SCADA services. Item nine, the March 2022 bid report. Item 10, refunding of general obligation bonds series 2012-A, 2012-C, 2012-D and issuance of general obligation refunding bonds series 2022. Item 11, contract SW-86C, request for qualifications for inspections for PW street maintenance repairs. Item 12, the upper noose river basin association FY 2023 budget. Item 13, utility extension agreement with pocket partners LLC to serve rose walk club boulevard. We are now turning to our presentations. Item 14 has been referred back and we now turn our which is Durham vaccine equity project and we now turn our attention to our public hearings. Beginning with item 15, closing of New Kirk street in portions of May street in Sanders avenue. Item 16, closing of unnamed alley off east Lawson street. Item 17, consolidated annexation Griffin place. Item 18, the limited obligation bond series 2022. We have presentations at this time on the agenda which will be item 19 forever home Durham FY 2022 update and that will be what I have my madam for our entire agenda. Madam mayor manager here's what I have for the pool of items. We have a pool of item number four pool by miss Brenda Pollard and then we have presentations and we also have two citizens who will be speaking for us or with us today to us. Mr. Jesse Gibson. Mr. James Chavis will be speaking to us as well and we will have those two presentations which will be the upper noose river basin association and we also have a presentation of the forever ever home. Is that what you have as well? Alrighty now we will turn to our citizens for their opportunity to speak with us today. We will have Mr. James Chavis who will have three minutes to speak to us and he will be followed by Mr. Jesse Gibson who also will have three minutes to speak to us and thank you both for coming in person today. Good afternoon to the mayor and city council members. My name is James Chavis. My address is 2813 Ash Creek apartment B Durham of Kalana 27703. I come to speaking to you all today because there is still racial prejudice and racial doing in the city of Durham and it's not just started. It has started back and two of you the mayor and one of your council ones are not aware about this problem because you wasn't here to vote on it or have anything to say about it but you're going to be knowing about it and you need to be updated and it goes back. Everybody do not know that who wrote over there is part of a black slave land and that land was bought by Durham and we're talking about the road is scaling. Well it comes to pass to us and it started way back then and Ms. Freeman knows because she was a part of it that when long metals start breaking down we asked Durham Park and Recreation to go to the CIP money and get it to fix it all the way back up but they only passed it but then during this COVID time they found out there was money in there to go over there and buy that land and they bought it without any of us citizens knowing about it and this is in pattern one district one which I represent as the co-facilitator now. So I want you to see how it makes us feel that work way back then to try to keep long metals up to par and how our own some of our still prejudice white folks go and buy their property what was slave worked on without even letting us not only that once they bought it the community over there asked it to be named Merckmore they still have not got their reason why they did not name it Merckmore the Pat even asked we still haven't got their name you see how racially things are done and why I'm calling ratio Luke who's in charge Wade is in charge and he has been approached with this I'm black and he's white so you can see why I'm calling ratio you may not like it but guess what it's what it is number two is we just got out to find out that long matters is ankle hoops with this project but guess what we don't know how but we met try I tried to meet with Jack eternal and she's supposed to came to the Pat meeting this past surge and to bring us some information but she told a lie on me and I'm not going to accept it because if you lie on me I'm allowing you back thank you mr. Chavis and I wish before I quit I like to set up a townhouse meeting and for the three-seat council I mean two-seat council and the mayor I hope y'all can attend because I'm this until this can be corrected we still black folks gonna be looking at slavery from others thank you mr. Chavis mr. Gibson you will have three minutes as well thank you thank you mayor and counsel I'll be brief I won't use the entire three minutes my concern has been and will continue to be that you find a way especially with the city attorney to enhance the functioning and monitoring of the city citizen review board I understand that North Carolina statutes impose the sublimitations on what it can and cannot do but nevertheless I think it needs to be strengthened because we know nationally state and local wise that internal affairs within the law enforcement city agency tends to be biased in favor of misconduct in terms of investigating local officer and supervising administrator administration of justice with respect to arrest and detention of Durham citizens so I am asking the council to review model citizen review local ordinances in North Carolina and state to see how we can strengthen the citizen review board to do a more effective review of citizen complaints against local law enforcement I respect the police department administrators and officers on the street who put their lives on the line each day to protect our safety however there are renegade policemen police officers police women who don't follow the guidelines and stipulations imposed on them by North Carolina state law as well as city policy so I'm encouraging the council to look at the its current citizen review board and find ways to draft and approve policy that are more equitable to citizen complaints against law enforcement so I would like for you to report to the PAC and to the community within the next 60 days a review and outcomes of the current citizen review board as it's presently constituted as well as the policy to see how you can come up with more policies and guidelines that will promote actual review of citizens complaint against police misconduct thank you thank you mr. Gibson we appreciate your comments today I do want to take note on item 17 we have Ms. Wanda Adams and Ms. Pamela Andrews who are in I think on zoom and have requested that this item be pulled we are having presentations on those two items today um I'm sorry public hearings on those two items today okay go ahead and tell it I'll ask our attorney to address how it's supposed to be handled that way I won't get it wrong thank you madam mayor it did not item number 17 is a public hearing and the council does not receive comments at work sessions regarding public hearings because you will receive them when the matter is heard so we're not going to have exparte communications outside the public hearing okay so they would need to return for comments on monday on monday when it's heard when it's heard Ms. Allen and Ms. Andrews if you're still in the queue if you would acknowledge by the raising of your virtual hand that you have heard that we will be able to receive your comments if you return and sign up on monday evening may whatever the first meeting may second may second correct and I will also add that the planning department did catch that these individuals were trying to speak today and they reached out to those individuals to let them know that comments could not be received at the work session okay all right uh do you see them in the queue just in case madam clerk they are okay if you would miss allen and miss andrews if you would just for the record raise your virtual hand that you have received that information that you will be able to speak on this matter on may second at the seven o'clock meeting and they would need to sign up for that particular um session to do so is there a particular sign up madam clerk that they have to come forward so we will make sure that they have all the information that they need to do that we will ensure that they have their that information madam mayor okay they are not raising their hands at the moment they did raise them girl good afternoon um madam mayor members of city council karmisha walla city manager's office we also have a gentleman here in the audience who also had interest in that particular public hearing so the public hearing that that's being referenced is scheduled for the may second city council meeting and the agenda for that meeting will be published on thursday i'm sorry on yeah on thursday april the 28th so at that point anyone who's interested in speaking on a public hearing item on may second will have the ability to register via the zoom link that will be located at the top of the meeting agenda or there's also the option to come in person and sign up on may second a day of the public hearing thank you miss wallas we appreciate that all right we will now return to our pooled items and we have one pooled item and one speaker for that item that is item number four to select applicants for the at-large council vacancy and forward to the interview stage and miss paulette i would recognize you at this time for your and you have three minutes am i unmuted yes ma'am we are able to hear you thank you this is brenda paulette in 1902 cedar street doral north trellina uh it's a personal privilege thank you madam mayor and the city council members i want to thank you first for your leadership i want to thank you for the protocol and the process and the leadership for those in the city to apply for the vacancy and that is why i wanted to speak today i won't take more of your precious time but as a citizen for 36 years uh it's been i've been humbled and honored to be able to speak to you today and thank you very much for allowing us to serve our city thank you very much thank you miss paulette we appreciate you coming today and speaking to us virtually i do want to talk a little bit about more of the process to moving towards the interview stage as you all have before you at your desk is a um a uh a total of votes received for those applicants that was provided to us by our clerk i will ask that you review those and we have a discussion as to how many people you would like to interview from this list um meeting are we moving towards the top four persons the top three persons if you take a moment to review and then we will open the floor for discussion amongst all of us councilwoman freeman thank you madam mayor i do believe in the past we've done the top three to five was it and so just looking at the way that the breakdown is the top one two three four top four have at least four votes and i think that that would be that would probably be the best way to kind of move forward at least you know noting if you had four folks on the council that's a majority um we can move forward with those interviews councilwoman johnson i know that you um and may approach him here that these these proceedings so i would ask for your comments next sure thank you madam mayor i think councilmember freeman's suggestion of interviewing the top four candidates uh is is good and i think we'll have um we'll have plenty of time in the meetings that we scheduled to have thorough interviews with those four folks councilwoman caviaro i look to you as another senior who's done this before another senior councilperson who's done this before for your comments yeah considering that all those all four of those folks have a majority i think that's probably the cleanest and we're not trying to swap trades or we need to move other folks forward councilwoman councilman williams i'm sorry it's me and women up here today now look to you and get your comments sir i may approach him harry back please no i i'm i'm in agreement that's fine all right i think we have a unanimous decision today um uh moving forward with the four top candidates uh if you were all just signed by saying i so that we have it verbally for the record all those signed that we interview the top four uh candidates would you sign by saying i i any opposed no so we will interview the top four vote getters and um madame clerk i believe that you indicated that you would um announce those now thank you madame mayor the top four applicants the first is dr monique holsey hyman the second nate baker the third is shenquah nicole digs and the fourth is henry c mccoy jr are we all in agreement those will be the top four names thumbs up thumbs up thumbs up all right all right now the process after that i'll turn it back over to councilwoman johnson to give us a a preview of where we're going next uh sure so um at the our next meeting that we scheduled for interviews i'm sorry i can't remember the date um right now maybe the clerk has it handy may second may second um we will invite the candidates to be interviewed um right at 4 p.m we should decide uh if we want them to be in person or virtual um question and we've got um two hours scheduled for interviews and four candidates um so we'll be able to do 30 minutes with each candidate and then did we decide to vote oh right and then we're doing a public hearing on tuesday the third at 6 p.m so then the candidates would be invited to bring folks from the community who support their candidacy to speak at a public hearing um before the council and then we would vote on those folks at the next work session was that correct on um thursday the fifth at 1 p.m and they could be sworn in immediately if we um if we choose apologies sorry i i think that swearing them in at the work session is probably the best way forward to get them a seated as quickly as possible if folks are comfortable with that i am comfortable with the thumbs up in about a night yeah that then they have the opportunity to hear the work session items before they're expected to vote on them at the next meeting so i think that yeah it's reasonable um so yeah i mean if we're if we're all still good with the schedule i think the only question is whether we ask the candidates to be in person for interviews on monday the second since we meet in person right now my preference would be that they interview in person but that's just me i'm thumbs up with that's me too thumbs up for the man all right madam mayor i have one other clarifying question of folks with the public hearing are we anticipating um folks coming in the past what folks did is that they ask supporters to come each supporter got a few minutes uh and we kind of maybe capped it per applicant so that there weren't 50 people for one per you know so we weren't here all evening just to be candid um so we will have to determine at that point how many speakers each applicant is allowed and also um if we want that public hearing if we want folks on zoom or if we want them here or is it up to each person how they want to proceed i'll turn to councilwoman johnson for comment on that sure my recommendation would be to have the public hearing hybrid so have folks be able to come in person or on zoom um and to you know have a maximum since we have four candidates and say we give each speaker three minutes we probably don't want to go more than two hours so have a maximum of maybe eight people that could speak on their behalf does that sound reasonable to folks thumbs up so they could each bring up to eight community members to support their candidacy we didn't or i couldn't hear you we couldn't hear that but i was gonna say or they could at least do 10 people for two minutes but yeah sure i mean we could say you have 30 minutes and you can divide it up however you like sounds good to me yeah and get a little bit more flexibility or we can you know or we could say three minutes maximum 10 people something like that i'm okay with either way i'm just looking for the bridge i think the maximum 10 people 30 minutes max times 30 minutes max people 10 and they can mix it up how they like sure okay that sounds great i think our clerk has has her hand raised for comment as well yes thank you madam mayor i did have a question or a point of clarification for tuesday may third at six p.m. it was originally discussed that council would make their selection that evening did you want a couple days to think about it and then make your selection at the work session is that what i'm hearing i'll turn to council some thumbs up for a couple of days to think about it a couple of days to think about it thumbs up great thank you thank you yeah so so we'll make the selection at the we'll put that on the work session agenda and then have this wearing enough the work session as well so just to make sure okay go ahead and then i'll ask my question go ahead oh thank you um just to to if the madam clerk can also just alert that those that those four interviewees should be present at that work session so that they know what their responsibilities are through the process thank you so councilwoman johnson i'm going to look to you to kind of summarize what we've said so that the public is clear will do so our next step is that we will interview our four um top candidates at four p.m. on monday may second um we will then at our have a public hearing on tuesday may third at six p.m. where each candidate is invited to have residents community members speak on their behalf they have 30 minutes total for those residents to speak and may bring a maximum of 10 community members to support them and those community members are welcome to to appear virtually or in person for that public hearing then two days later on thursday may fifth at one p.m. at our work session we will vote on the appointment and that the our newest colleague will be sworn in at the beginning of that work session so that they can begin their duties one should um are we asking residents who are coming to speak in support of the applicants to register with the city clerk or are we expecting them to just show up madam clerk which would you prefer i prefer the people um register in advance do you um have a preferred method for that do you want to set up a a system online or something i'll set up a system okay yeah i think the virtual will be fairly easy to to coordinate and then um i'll coordinate with the in-person speakers okay so so yeah i mean would you like each candidate to send you a list of their speakers or something like that okay that would be great okay um we can communicate that to the candidates who is communicating to the candidates i will great madam clerk could we also just give them a deadline of when they need to register their folks for that sure so that folks know you know get your get your people registered by whatever date works for the clerk's office absolutely thank you so much and i know that it's on your radar but i just want to make sure we state it clearly that uh we should make sure translation is available madam clerk could we have interpretation for both the interviews and the public hearing it's been arranged thank you awesome thank you so much and just to make sure in case they are hearing dr. monique hoseley hosey hyman mr. nate bakewell mr nicole nicole diss and dr. mccoy our clerk will be in touch with you to give you those updates and so that you will have plenty of time to get ready for the next step of the process i'd also like to thank counsel woman johnson and our mayor pro tem melton for their work in leading us through this part it's been a smooth ride and we really really appreciate that and we also want to appreciate our clerk who keeps us moving forth in this process as well so thank you all for job well done so far it's been it's been a smooth process so thanks and we also have to thank all of the candidates out there we had a lot of interest from citizens all over durham we had a total of 21 as i moved out and about i've got we've gotten calls we've gotten comments on email we've had we've seen people in person so the democracy in Durham is vibrant and doing well and so we thank you all who have participated thus far in this endeavor and we ask that you continue to do so as this person will be joining joining us in doing the people's business of Durham so the more people that we have of the 330 thousand plus involved in this process the more voices makes for a better council so thank you all to the Durham public out there at large for your participation all right i think now we are ready to move to our next item of business which will be to hear our presentations am i correct okay and we have two presentations i believe this afternoon and so we're just going to call both of those so just so that you know what's coming the first one is item number 12 which is the upper news river basin association un rba f y 2023 budget and then we will also have a hearing we followed by a hearing on from the 19 on the which is i'm sorry a pre presentation i have to keep remembering that these terms are uh uh legal terms of art so but we will follow that with a presentation item number 19 which is forever home Durham f y 2022 update so that they will be ready and we're now ready to hear item 12 and i think it's our research person is michelle michelle woofolk yes good afternoon uh council members can you hear me yes we can great um my name is michelle woofolk i'm with the public works department here to provide you with an update on the upper news river basin association activities tell you where we are now tell you where we're going to be going in this year this agenda item also includes a resolution that you will be voting on in your may second meeting so i'm going to try to share my screen now and you see the presentation not yet i'm going to try that again we see it now great okay excellent all right um so this is a relatively short presentation i am going to be going backwards a little bit in time because this process has been going on for more than 10 years um so some of you may not be aware of of the upper news river basin association what's important why they're doing what they're doing um some of you will be aware of this particularly those who've served on this board before so the reason for the falls lake nutrient management strategy which is the whole point of the upper news river basin association right now is that uh there's excessive algae in falls lake um there's also excessive turbidity in falls lake most of the time you can't see algae in the lake it is always there um but you can't see it however when algae is excessive you can sometimes see it um it might be a visible surface scum like you see in the upper left hand corner it might be a green tinge to the water like you can see in the bottom right hand corner it might also look to be like a green paint in the water and the paint might even clean to the shorelines um all of those would be indications of excessive algae in the water most of the time as i said it's not readily apparent even if the levels are really high these two pictures that i'm showing you are of falls lake and they're looking up into ellaby creek as the creek meets the lake um rather than measure algae directly the state tends to measure chlorophyll a in water and chlorophyll a is just the the pigment that is used to create to um for photosynthesis in all plants including algae the state has a not to exceed level of 40 micrograms per liter which i've noted on the slide for chlorophyll a in lakes falls lake particularly upper falls lake which the city of Durham drains to exceeds that 40 micrograms per liter every summer um so this is a continuing issue just really briefly about the upper news river basin association uh this is an association of local governments that have gathered together to work on problems in the upper news river basin um right now the entire focus is on falls lake all the municipalities that are part of this uh association are listed there as well as the counties that are a part of this association and the south granville water and sewer authority which does water and sewer for um granville county the only jurisdiction that is in the watershed that is not a member is the city of rocksboro the falls lake rules were adopted in uh 2010 and became effective in january 2011 uh as you can see here the uh the rules are pretty comprehensive they are designed around the sources of nitrogen and phosphorus in the watershed um nitrogen and phosphorus are the two elements that the state controls to try to bring algae levels into control as well so all of our rules are are targeting reductions of nitrogen and phosphorus in the sources so the other thing to note is that the strategy while it encompasses all of these different types of sources of nitrogen and phosphorus to the lake um the strategy was split into two stages because the the hurdle for meeting all of the rules was was fairly high so here i'm showing um the costs so as part of the rulemaking process at the state level um the state has to do a fiscal note before the rules can be approved and these are the costs that were provided in the fiscal note so these are costs from 2010 obviously inflation acts on these costs so they would be much higher in today's dollars uh i've crossed through the stage one costs because the integrate the interim alternative implementation approach the iaia replaced stage one so those costs are probably not well they're not going to be 605 million any longer that iaia changed how stage one would be complied with by setting a fixed dollar amount for east jurisdiction i will point out that the iaia is one of the reasons why the un rba is a good organization to be part of that idea for that more cost effective way to deal with stage one came from the upper news reverberation association communities and was forwarded to the legislature by that organization so that is one very clear example of the benefit of being part of the un rba however the stage two rules are still in place and the fiscal note estimated that meaning stage two would be about 946 million again in 2010 dollars so it would be more now they also estimated that a majority of this cost would be borne by the city of durham so um the un rba hired a consultant uh quite a ways back now 2013 um to try to take those costs and make them a little bit more real because those are big numbers and you you can't really think in terms of 900 million dollars at least i can't so this slide shows kind of the results from a public work standpoint so this is more of a stormwater standpoint uh there are additional costs and challenges associated with wastewater treatment which if you would like to know those i'm sure water management can give you a presentation about those as well um so looking at this slide by itself the stage two costs of 1400 dollars per household per year and that was estimated i believe over a 30 year time frame um would be needed to to implement everything that all the jurisdictions would need to do so that's not a durham specific cost that is a cost that is for all of the households in the watershed so that would include butner and pre more etc it also estimated that as a as a group we would have to implement a thousand stormwater control measures per year you've seen multiple presentations by now the south lrb stormwater control measure so you understand that getting even one in the ground can sometimes be quite challenging um so logistically that is is just not something that we can do um even if we had more staff and then the last slide or the last picture in the bottom right hand corner the most important part of that one is that we would have to retrofit nearly every acre of existing development in the watershed um again that is the biggest hurdle for the city of durham as the most developed city in this watershed um so all of this additional information which was generated by the un rba contractors and this was generated after the adoption of the rules further justify the need for a reexamination of the rules as they are now to something that's more workable and that gets us the result that we want so that is the purpose of the un rba and that is what they are working on now so transitioning from the history of why the un rba exists uh this is a timeline i get try to give you a timeline every time i talk and every time i submit an agenda item so that you'll know where we are um we are in the calibrate lake models process um we have finished the calibrate the watershed model process and i'll talk a little bit more about that in a minute uh the un rba has been really grounded in doing a new reexamination a new set of rules based on the best science that we can get so the timeline that you see on this back to 2011 which was when the rules became effective um is the amount of time that it's taken the un rba to figure out what kind of information we needed to make those scientific decisions um scientifically based decisions to get that information um monitoring the lake is a time consuming process so we can't speed up that time we have to monitor it you know as as time moves forward and then doing the analysis also takes time so we're we're probably about 40 through the analysis right now um right now because we're in that last or that first pink box which says calibrate lake models that's really the last stop in the science evaluation so once we finish that we will be moving completely to policy decisions and using those tools that we've developed to try to help us make make a make a new strategy and make the new decisions so since 2005 2007 2005 and 2007 um is the period that the existing rules are based on so because we have to monitor whatever rules that we make are derived from that period that we monitored the state monitored from 2005 to 2007 if you were here in that time you'll remember that both 2005 and 2007 were pretty nasty drought years so the strategy that we have right now is based on a period that had bad drought conditions um we did also have a couple of tropical storms in that time so not abnormal but not normal either but since then nitrogen that has been applied to the watershed has gone down as has phosphorus the primary reasons for these decreases are um stone mortar control measures small ones as in the form of rain gardens and similar types of devices that have been installed in the watershed in the city of Durham as well as watershed wide loss of farmland um so as that farmland is being converted nutrients that are being applied to the land is going down atmospheric deposition so nitrogen that's coming out of the air and depositing on the land or on the lake has also gone down that's based on federal actions and treated wastewater discharges of both nitrogen and phosphorus have gone down that is for all of the wastewater treatment plants in the watershed including the city of Durham they have all not only met their first goal their stage one goal they have all exceeded their stage one goal so here's some results from the watershed analysis um and these are based on the period that the un rba monitored so these are based on 2015 to 2018 a four year period the sources that you see listed here forest agriculture urban are the sources are actually land uses because that is how the model gives us our sources the only specific sources that we have here are the major wastewater treatment plants which of course come through a pipe so as you can see here in the top left graph nitrogen is primarily from forest that is the biggest contributor with agriculture and urban falling behind those two major wastewater treatment plants as i said before have done a lot of work have reduced their nutrient loads their nitrogen and phosphorus loads so their place in this graph has really dropped down a lot since the 2005 to 2007 period um the bottom right hand corner for phosphorus in the streams um after a rainfall that is actually carrying nutrients with it primarily phosphorus and taking it down to the lake and then urban and agriculture are about the same for phosphorus so there's another way to look at this information um past strategies for nutrient control have have really considered forest loads as as the best that you can get so if we are treating um nutrients that are coming from the city uh coming from brightly square from that previous photo our goal is always to get brightly square to behave like a forest to hold as much nutrients as a forest can hold so that is actually considered a a land use or a source that is not controllable so for getting forest to remove nutrients has in the past been considered something that we can't do um getting unmanaged lands in general are considered things that we can't make a reduction from um so that leaves everything else to get a reduction from so if forest is removed for example for phosphorus that means that everything else that the humans might have control over only affects 56 percent of the load that of phosphorus that reaches the lake and if we were super humans and we could reduce every single one of those other categories completely down to zero the best we could do is still 56 percent so that is a big deal to us because the existing strategy has a 77 percent reduction of forest so of phosphorus sorry so that eats right into that forest load which we already have said we can't control so this is the kind of information that we need to be getting from our tools to help us make better decisions um and those are preliminary results or those are our early results we are still cranking through all the numbers that we've gotten so there will be lots more results that would be put out for the remainder of 2022 and early 2023 so those are the kinds of things that we'll be getting in the unrba so here's the summary of the budget excuse me this is a slide that you see before i've broken out kind of where the budget is going the things that increased over last year are the executive director and services category and the communication budget which was bumped up another 20 000 because we have information now that we need to get out to the public here's a a graph that shows a historical change to the budget since fy 2018 um there actually hasn't been a huge increase to the budget about 170 000 in total so as staff from all the jurisdictions start working on a new strategy there is some consideration already happening to guidelines for this new strategy and what i've done here is i've put some examples of guidelines that we might be looking at um some of which actually that we're already looking at as we move forward because the negotiation process is going to happen quickly and it's going to happen continuously over the next year um as we talk with the other jurisdictions and with the state to try to figure out what what a new rule package might look like um so if you have comments on this slide on on other examples for guidelines i would love to hear them uh you can also let the manager's office know and they can forward that information down to me if you have comments on other guidelines but these are just a starting point for where we think we might want to be as we're thinking about negotiating with the other jurisdictions i will be talking to the environmental affairs board about this later in the year um as i bring them up to speed so that they can also weigh in on guidelines and maybe look at things in a little different way than i would look at them as a technical person or that your team would look at them as a technical as technical people and that is all i have for you today the names here are the members of your Falls lake team um Reggie Hicks myself don't know tool from the city attorney's office and sandy wilbur and joseph smith from public works thank you thank you miss wilful i'm always amazed by the expertise uh and knowledge base of of our city workers and once again um you know i'm learning a lot but i i do have a couple of questions which may be elementary i always say that i'm i'm in kindergarten a lot um in this role and once again today i find myself sending in kindergarten class and just need some basic um terminology and some basic explanations uh to kind of catch me up so um just wanted to you know we have an overabundance of algae i understand in Falls lake and just wanted to ask you and this is like i said elementary question why is that bad or good and then there was another terminology that you use that i just want to make sure that people understand and you're talking about nutrients because in my in the natural state when you talk about nutrients you think that's a good thing and i don't necessarily know that that's the terminology that we're using today that it's good or bad and then when you talk about so and you know i know you i'm just trying to give you the questions and i see um councilman um williams who's a newbie just shaking his head saying yes ask these questions and i'm going to ask him to chime in as well so then you know we have Falls lake and which covers a couple of counties so if you could just give us a background on how Durham is connected to this um you know we know we sit in that but just just our jurisdiction in that arena and and how we are going to um to deal with the strategy in terms of the money is just so we'll have some kind of way of focusing uh what this means in the in the picture i think you showed all of the counties and how falls lake kind of falls into that arena just if you could just give us some elementary take us to elementary school or kindergarten and bring us up i think that might be helpful for us to kind of jail um jail some of it uh did i miss anything councilman williams that you might want to add nope i appreciate you uh asking to bring that down from 30 thousand feet great um i think i've got all those down so so if i miss one please just let me know um so why is algae bad was your first question and algae by itself is not bad we we want algae we need algae in in the in the environment is the building block of all of our food um regardless of if you're a vegetarian or an omnivore um algae only becomes bad if it is if there's too much of it and there's a couple of things that happen if there's too much of it um algae there are lots of different kinds of algae there's there's more there's thousands of different kinds of algae and most of them are not harmful at all to anything that we would be in contact with some of them cause problems with taste and odor and drinking water so when they become excessive and they are the right type they will cause problems with drinking water taste and odor some of them will um lead to the formation of other bad chemicals which i i don't want to explain because i don't think i can explain it i need water management to help with that um but other bad chemicals that could be formed in our drinking water supply so we we need for algae to stay low or those specific kinds to stay low for those two reasons um in terms of ecological effects too many algae um when they start to die will rob the water of oxygen and fish one of our sources of food and one of our great sources of recreation and relaxation will die when there's not enough oxygen in the water um so that is an ecological effect of of having too much algae in the water more recently um and when i say recent i mean kind of 20 years time i have gray hair i don't know if you can see that i've been here for a while but more recently in the last 20 or 30 years we've started to see the algae make toxins in the water so um so we have to be a little bit more careful about letting your dog drink water when you're out walking next to a lake um we have to be a lot more careful about treating water to make sure that if there are toxins in the water we can take it out and those toxins are often formed by algae um so those are a handful of reasons why too much algae is bad remembering that some algae is necessary and is good um we're just trying to keep it low manageable and not cause any of these different kinds of problems um are there any follow-up questions to that no ma'am thank you teacher uh so your second question was about using the term nutrients and you're right um it is something that we it is a term that we use for things that we need to survive um and we also need nitrogen and phosphorus to survive as human beings um but but the control of of nitrogen and phosphorus well let me put this a different way uh if you think about your garden you are always putting nitrogen and phosphorus on your garden or you are sometimes putting nitrogen and phosphorus on your garden so that you can get the harvest that you want uh so that you can grow the plants that you want you can grow those big juicy strawberries or those yummy tomatoes whatever it is that you're growing so those plants need nitrogen and phosphorus in this area they probably don't need very much phosphorus but you would you probably would need to add some nitrogen to your soil um algae are the same kind of plants they grow really well when there's nitrogen and phosphorus available they they are plants um so they are nutrients for algae and the way that we want to control how much algae we have is by giving them less food essentially so um it is kind of an interesting term it is the industry term for it nutrients but you're right we all think of nutrients as things that we need and it is actually things that algae needs too and what we try to do is deprive algae of what it needs so we won't have so much algae does that make sense yes ma'am you're doing a great job thank you okay uh the third third one that you said was how how is Durham connected to this watershed um other than just the map that shows um the city sitting inside of the watershed so every time it rains we'll start there uh water that runs off of the land goes into our creeks I will use Ellerby Creek as the example because I'm sitting in City Hall and City Hall drains to Ellerby Creek um water from here will drain to Ellerby Creek and then make its way down Ellerby Creek to go to Falls Lake that is the case for all of the city that's in this watershed um any rain that hits land in this watershed in the city of Durham is going to make its way to a creek or a river first and then make its way down to Falls Lake from there it continues on until it gets to the ocean um so that is one way that water in Durham um is connected to Falls Lake the other way is that uh groundwater in in the watershed so if you have a basement that you have to regularly pump out um that is groundwater that's getting into your basement and groundwater is also moving throughout the city it naturally will come up in places along our creeks again so when we do have really dry weather the water that you see in the creeks is the groundwater everything that we do on the land affects what's in the groundwater as well so that is another way that the city is is connected to water that makes it to Falls Lake um anything that comes out of the air that drops onto the city um doesn't matter where it started if it drops onto the city lands and that is also one way that nutrients are coming from the city of Durham and makes a connection to Falls Lake I think I answered that question but please let me know if I didn't you did thank you you did so and I think those were all the questions that I had so thank you so much for that that that kind of puts it in a context that are you fine councilman Williams yeah that was really good I appreciate it yes thank you so much and thank you all for your patience I know you all have some familiarity with this but some of us are still playing kind of catch up so we appreciate you today your expertise and most definitely for putting it in a context for us to to understand so thank you miss Wilford we appreciate you any questions for the for other than the ones that I hear all right councilwoman I don't have a question I just wanted to say that the staff that sits on the UNRBA is as excellent we were in excellent hands I was the liaison there for several years and I just wanted to thank Michelle for her presentation today great I enjoyed that all right all right now we turn to item 19 for ever home Durham FY 2022 update and our research person is Mr. Reginald Johnson for this matter Mr. Johnson you have the floor thank you thank you madam mayor madam mayor members of city council greetings I'm Reginald Johnson director of the department of community development glad to be here this is a presentation I want to share with you update on forever home as well as some other work that the community development department is doing normally we would do part of this during the budget process but this year we elected to have a part of a work session so here we are and we're glad to be here I'm joined for this presentation by Karen Lotto who's assistant director as well as Terry Porter Holmes and assistant director and I'm also representing the many on the the community team community development that works for you to create and preserve affordable housing and works to as best we can to end homelessness and many are watching watching now and so what I will do is share my screen as for my presentation and we do see it thank you okay beautiful beautiful beautiful so this is our presentation what I'm going to do is talk about a little bit about the affordable housing challenge that we have been doing in housing affordability I'll also share some of the FY fiscal year 21 22 highlights I'll talk about the FY 22 23 priorities which there are some for us as well as the challenges that we have and then I'll step we'll stand for for questions so in terms of housing affordability then this is something that we all unfortunately have seen become familiar with and know all too well that according to realtor.com is one example the median listing price home price in Durham is 365 thousand dollars in February 2020 that's up 23 percent from the year before which is significant and then you can see the rental homes the average rent has skyrocketed I'll use the term skyrocketed dramatically in the past year even for Durham in particular but around the country as you may have heard and well no so we're not the only ones experiencing this increase but it has been dramatic and in terms of increases one of the things that brings us to this conversation is the the cost burden for renters in the households and what we mean by cost burden the the rule of thumb according to U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development is that a household where the ownership or renting should not spend more than 30 percent of their household income in terms and on housing cost mortgage and insurance or rent and utilities if you spend more than 30 percent you're considered a moderate cost burden the household is and then if it's 50 percent or more than one is considered to be severely cost burdened if you're spending more than 50 percent of your income in on housing costs what this chart reflects is the city of Durham went to households by income in housing cost burden you know if you look at the one axis the x-axis you see the number of households then you also see across the other axis the income AMI and so at the 100 percent AMI you can see that there's green that means that persons are not typically not cost as many not cost burdened but as you go down in income moving to the left you begin to see the lower the AMI the lower the household income the more persons that you have that are moderately cost burdened which is in the blue and then persons that are severely cost burdened which is in the yellow yellow orange depending on your screen and you can see when you're talking about 30 percent or less those persons are severely often severely cost burdened and we have several thousand of those in our community households that are severely cost burdened when you look at compare that with the other information that is shared with you it gets pretty significant and challenged and we talked about that we just talked about renters but now we'll talk about home house cost burden owners households and Durham these are persons who own a household similar story not as pronounced as with renters but you can see those that exceed 100 percent of their median income typically are not cost burdened but as you lower the AMI you begin to see even for home ownership those who are 30 percent below for example typically are significantly severely cost burdened and as a reminder that's 50 percent or more of the household income in housing cost this is a snapshot of availability of affordable units in marketing in Durham this we took this snapshot actually in February it was dated February the first and this is a slide that reflects that were on that day there were 33211 apartments for rent in Durham according to apartments.com and of the available apartments 114 or 4 percent had a monthly rent of less than $900 per month and you can see where those are and the number of those and all of those were one bedroom units have used this slide before in a couple of different presentations and and finally on this segment why we've why we've and you know at the table and having this discussion and why city assistants required and why do we do the things that we do well the best example which is a little basic shows the difference between the creation of market rate and affordable housing both of those bars they're the same height which means and reflects that the cost is generally the same the major parts of of creating these housing is the same between market the things people talk about in terms of amenities those are on the edges but the general foundations instructions are the same but many of us you know no persons who rent housing for for extra income and what they do is they charge enough in the rent or if this is their business they charge enough in the rent to be able to cover the operating expenses any debt that they have and have a return to the investor profit as we call that's a basic structure of our market but when it comes to affordable housing one realizes that the rental income is based on the person's income not what the market says or what they can pay and so therefore one is not getting the rental income to pay for all of the cost of equivalent to what's on that bar you're only getting enough income income coming in to pay part of what's on the bar and so there's the need for a subsidy and that's where the city and other tools come in is that because the bars are relatively equal we have to subsidize to create a situation where persons can only pay part of their income and not be cost burdened and so that they don't pay more than 30 percent of the income because the income is limited into the structure so that's the basic piece of why we're here and why we provide the opportunities that we do in terms of partnering with developers and other nonprofits to produce affordable housing so the FY 22 highlights we've been able to implement a forever home Durham program and provide a covert response and do some other things as well to keep work going despite the challenges that we've had with the the changing economy and the growing need of affordable housing in our city one of the things that we did was just to refresh uh was create what's now known as forever home Durham this is basically a five-year multi-year investment the totaling about 160 million dollars the cornerstone of which was a 95 million dollar affordable housing bond and there were several goals with this bond as well as the 65 million dollars in existing city and federal funds we wanted to build 1600 new affordable rental homes and preserve 800 affordable rental homes provide 400 affordable home ownership opportunities the first time home bias move 1700 persons homeless persons into permanent housing help 3000 low-income renters and homeowners regain or improve their homes and create at least 130 million dollars in contracting opportunities for minority and women-owned business enterprises mwbe's this is a list of the projected uh uh plan that we have that we we shared when we designed the affordable housing uh program now we call that a forever home Durham and this suggests to refresh to the various uh categories and the amount that we projected that we would estimated that we would seek to spend in each area in order to reach those goals so one of the things that's important uh is to as i talk about this slide to uh acknowledge the funding sources that went into that slide and there were uh some funding sources but there's not all of the funding sources that are available to community development but the the the funding sources for community forever home Durham include the community development block grant with cdbg the u.s from the u.s department of housing urban development we did that for five years worth of funding that's from f y 19 to f y 2024 uh also the home investment partnership funds from the home program that was the same time period uh the emergency loose solutions grant uh esg and then housing opportunities for persons with aids a hopper and then the dedicated housing fund for five years and then the affordable housing bond these are the sources that made up the uh plan for forever home Durham conversely there are some funding sources that we have that are not within forever home Durham uh one of those is the federal entitlement funds prior to f y 19 when four have a home Durham uh began this is include cdbg home esg and hopper and we had programs and projects that use those as funding sources as well as an associated program income with cdbg and home and that's where we've loaned money out previously and that money comes back in uh to us uh as persons make payments that's what uh program income so prior to 2019 that's not included not also not included also also not included dedicated housing fund prior to uh 2019 and so we had projects that were included in scope uh under contract and using those funds uh since the creation of dedicated housing fund that's not included forever home Durham as well as bond program from any year including the during the period of forever home Durham uh which is the income received from the repayment of past affordable housing bond referenda we have two maybe three previous bond referenda that we've passed over the past 20 25 years where we've loaned money out and persons are making entities uh and people are making payments and so we use that in uh in program that income uh each year and so we don't that's not included in forever home Durham so this chart reflects the uh progress to date uh since we started forever home Durham we have here the goal uh that I just refreshed and then what's in the pipeline means that that's where we have been uh discussions and negotiations with developers to create units and then under contract means there's actually an executed contract and then completed means that it's been completed and uh someone is is is there living in there and then the total and this is the remaining balance against the goal so for uh rental units created uh the total we had a goal of 1600 in the pipeline uh 484 under contract is 178 and then as a total of 662 which leaves us a balance of 938 uh for rental units preserved the total is eight goal is 800 uh in the pipeline is 42 under contract is 219 which a total of 261 that leaves us with the balance of 539 home ownership opportunities uh 400 uh as you know we just started the uh uh program uh last last month so we don't have anything to report uh they're just yet there and homeless persons in permanent housing 1700 so this changes from units to serve to people uh and completed we've already serviced uh 838 persons and we have 180 138 persons total with the balance remaining 100 862 and then low income houses stabilized the goal of 3000 we've completed 100 1288 persons and then we have a balance remaining of 1712 this does not include these rental units that we're talking about does not include the last rfp that we just issued as we're going through a process on that so this doesn't include those those units so the financial overview and this is uh partly reflected in the document of the big document that's that's attachment the federal home durams fy 23 budgets is approximately 38.5 billion dollars and main increases include uh the drivers include increased budgets for multifamily projection and preservation neighborhood stabilization and homeless services the big document that you have with the financial overview is uh made composed of the actuals that we've spent to date on forever home natural funding and then uh the projections of what we will project to spend over the next uh three two years two and a half years this uh chart reflects the forever home durable mental housing development and preservation um i won't go down each of these but uh you can see one across top the name of the project the developer so dorm housing authority in laurel street residential is on the first one that's rehab or new construction this is new construction in a number of units and then you see the status uh which is under contract the construction begun has begun uh elizabeth street which is also dha and laurel street is their developer that's a 72 units new construction that's in the pipeline using definition we still have conversations with just in the meeting yesterday uh though we have provided some money to uh them for that project we're going to have to bring some more uh funding to the council to help them to be able to proceed with that project then you have others that they're working on in a pipeline commerce street family commerce street seniors jj henderson uh retire rehab which is under contract well the construction is going on now many of you know that um and then we have ashton place which is a the developer's dh ic and self-help that's one of uh our nine percent city's nine percent uh tax credit projects as a new project 51 units in the pipeline then uh we have hardy street which one all was one of the projects selected from a previous rfp 132 affordable units is in the pipeline uh crescent street apartments uh used to be called fairington road a laurel street residential is the developer that's 82 units then we have some others brine place uh the lofts at south side which you approve the commitment letter but that will be going into competition uh for this this fall well this summer and we hope to be successful in the summer and that will be another 100 units um then we've talked about ross road previously we've come to the council uh east durham rental rehab uh with dclt 12 units in the pipeline harry is placing fits pow the ones that are in blue uh we separated those out as i just reflected in the slide those are the the projects that are part of the rfp that was just issued uh this year that is going through a process protest process but i wanted to list those and those are highlighting blue as well as the number of units uh that those will produce this slide reflects the additional activities that are not included in and forever home durham funding remember i mentioned that the funding uh uh part of the funding is in forever home durham that we administered in this funding uh that's not and so these are the prime uh projects that are not in forever home durham where we use uh other funding one was laurel oaks which is dha that's 30 units that's completed uh we provide some additional funding to more ring road which was a rehab project that's uh construction has begun i think it might be almost completed more ring road will it street phase two uh uh dh ic and self help uh that's completed many of you attended to ribbon cutting this is uh one of the reflects the question that uh council may approach in middleton asked uh about uh will it street and it's reflected in here and as i shared with uh email the funding for this will it street was part of f y 18 funding that the council approved so it's not technically in forever home durham the question he was asking was should this be included we wanted to include it because of the the work that was ongoing we can but in what i needed to do for metrics purposes is make sure that matches the metrics with the money and so that's reason is in uh not in the the count right now then one has the grant street project with dcl t uh southwest uh central durham teen uh with dcl t which use cdbg and home funds and then you have a list of home ownership opportunities that are in the pipeline and under contract to produce additional home ownership in terms of the n wbe contracting the current addressable uh spending is basically just under 25 million dollars the n wbe addressable spending is a seven and a half basically seven and a half and you see the breakdown thus far with black and african-american expenditures uh mwb is hispanic latinx and women owned businesses in terms of the homeless services uh just just a reminder that community development department and part of our work we serve as the lead agency for the durham county homelessness continued care which includes staffing the homeless services advisory committee preparing the annual funding applications for the state of north carolina and the u.s department of housing and urban development preparing annual reports for uh hood including the point in time count the larger two new systems analysis housing inventory count and the hot war caper which is basically a report card that we report uh to the public and to uh the u.s department of housing and development housing and urban development i would support entry point durham which is a front door to the homeless system um in f y 2021 uh 31 percent of the persons experiencing homelessness who contracted contacted coordinated entry were diverted to homelessness without entering any emergency cell too uh in partnership with durham county we fund the unsheltered coordinating agency or uca to provide street outreach and encampment response and support the emergency center emergency shelter operations and rapid rehousing and several our partners helped with that including families moving forward urban ministries housing for new hope and project access in terms of neighborhood stabilization under federal home durham we uh expanded the minor repair uh program that was launched with city and county funding and habitat for humanity was awarded a two-year contract to assist 80 low-income seniors as over age 65 or disabled home numbers with repairs habitat also provides application intake for the city substantial rehabilitation program and home consortium rehab and with the home consortium funds that's how we're able to go into the county and that's for part of the u.s department of housing urban development funding we're in the third year of the city funded eviction diversion program which is completed resulting in 660 tenants uh 70 percent of the cases were closed preserving tennessee the long-time homeowner grant program completed in f completed for the f y 19 tax year and in the process of the f y 20 tax year which includes the addition of wild town neighborhood that the council added last year and then the down payment assistance program was launched launched in march of this year the program will provide up to 20 000 in down payment uh and closing cost assistance to homeowners with incomes uh less than 80 percent am i and community home trust was selected as a program administrator in terms of covid response we did not include covid response as part of uh forever home durham but it is a significant part of the work and time that we have done over the last two years but definitely over the past year uh there's no question about that uh as i've shared the amount of money that has come through to us to to get to give to our community and the rules and changing rules and regulations a lot of ongoing have presented uh one of the challenges but one of the things we've been able to do with the rent relief program over 2700 applications were received in the space of 28 days uh 450 funded today with an estimated 450 more to be funded before the funds are depleted uh application processing expected to be completed in may of 2022 the second year of non-congregant shelter support including both hotel and white flag shelters um where that's part of the covid response and just to reminder the white flag is when the temperatures get below 32 that's considered white flag and all those who are unsheltered uh there are extra places for persons to go uh in our community and working to keep that stabilized even in the midst of covid uh took quite a bit of effort on our on our team and with our partners the second year of the expanded emergency shelter and rapid rehousing funding using federal pandemic relief funds and then the joint uh community development officer economic workforce development partnership to provide assistance to micro businesses impacted by the pandemic and then the city of Durham public schools uh partnership to address covid learning loss with four uh low income schools uh in the in Durham uh it was actually going well so and the priorities for FY 23 uh which are significant uh in terms of rental housing we're going to uh continue to move rental projects forward uh including uh projects that would in partnership with Durham Housing Authority and that's complete construction and two projects on JJ Henderson site that's a rehab and the new construction and begin uh construction of three replacement housing projects for the DHA Liberty Street site we're also going to begin contracting for project projects awarded fundings during the FY 22 RFP and the law set Southside uh that's contingent upon the Southside Southside receiving low income how tech low income housing tax credit awards I would mention that uh we did receive uh McCormick Baron sellers our did receive a perfect score for the site score for the law set Southside phase three and actually uh we received the highest score for walkability projects but that doesn't guarantee us a mean that we will be awarded but uh I would rather have those uh in our hip pocket did not have those uh scores as we go into the uh competition so that that does both well but we'll see in an august in terms of homelessness uh with those uh priorities that are to maintain support for the homeless system and providers uh expand the system planning efforts including the planning for home uh ARP funding uh expand technical assistance opportunities for providers and transition from pandemic operations to the new normal so as we did transition to pandemic and have uh non congregate uh shelters we and the pandemic is uh we pray and hope coming to an end we do need to look at what the new normal will be uh not sure what that will be uh but we need to begin transitioning in our transition for their forever forever what that will be um then in terms of neighborhood stabilization uh we'll successfully manage the current programs including the down payment assistance the eviction diversion the amount of repairs substantial rehab and main uh tain expanded support for a small scale production move the current projects forward and issue a new RFP for neighborhood stabilization funding in these small scale uh projects the challenges the challenges uh we have are are significant one is the and i'm going to spend a little time here a significant uh continue growth in construction costs according to the national association of home builders the cost of building materials is up 20 percent uh in early 22 from the year before then we also uh uh having a challenge with interest rate volatility the the rising interest rates for projects that have not closed and a lot of projects that you saw in the pipeline that uh that this have not closed yet and so that's significant because you know even 30 days interest rates do increase and increase in pronounced ways and that can produce additional gaps which means there's additional subsidy meeting going back to the chart that i had um the third chart in this presentation of course the workload capacity with the community development team developers and providers so it's just not the the workload for community development but our pipeline and the people can do the pipeline have have limitations as well uh one of the things is the termination of the hood uh lead remediation program uh this is a challenge we uh took on this program from another department had applied for it and we uh we were appointed to minister the program but we needed to change the program to be within the guidelines for what was accepted uh as the proposal and what the funding is presented a challenge and we're going to basically run out of time before we're able to uh comply with all of the elements of the program and then six uh recapture of the North Carolina neighborhood stabilization program NSP funds to the tune of about six hundred and seventy five thousand dollars uh this funding was NSP stimulus money that was awarded under the Obama administration that we use for south side uh revitalization project and this is one of the uh funding sources that we used and as it turns out they weren't clear on the rules we weren't clear on the rules and we're ending up having some funding recaptured all the time we've been working with them but at the end of the day we are going to have some funding as recaptured it's not part of farewell home Durham but this is one of the the the challenges uh that we have we are going to be able to accomplish that one of the things that I will go back to in terms of these challenges in terms of the construction costs um this is I'm going to talk about this later in the summary uh but this is going to be a major challenge for us those number one and number two because we have several projects that uh have not closed that are under tremendous pressure and for example uh just in the case of lumber you know 100 uh uh foot uh lumber uh cost about uh 350 dollars for from 27 to 20 2022 was 300 dollars 350 dollars in the past year it's been the same amount it's been about 1400 dollars which in March is about 1300 dollars and so those are just reflective of the cost increases that are real and then in terms of interest rate volatility you know some of our projects are facing what I would call a double whammy because you know as everyone knows the interest rates are volatile and these projects have not closed and the longer they go without closing the gap can become increased because the interest rate is rising and so that's another piece that I would uh share in terms of our challenges uh also and the nature of just the nature of development projects and this is particularly uh subject to the the negotiation for the housing authority but the changing deal structures the layout financing with multiple regulations for different financing sources and the changing project timelines can result in delays which can be impacted by the interest rate volatility and um you know there's the truth to the the the old adage of the time is money and then subject to the COVID impacts still which is general contract availability uh subcontractive availability supply change disruptions which is one of the things that include is impacting the cost of a lot of the goods and then just overall project schedule changes so in summary I would say that we are making progress I will also share that there's not enough progress to meet the need which is being exacerbated by the current economy and the housing market um challenges are present particularly with those projects that's not closed that I've just talked about uh we must assess the point at which we cannot provide sufficient additional funding uh placing projects in jeopardy of not proceeding uh but that's uh something that what we do have to evaluate our goal and our recommendation is that we do what it takes to keep these projects going because at this end based on where we started with this presentation we our community is definitely in need of the units we need the units these units that will be subsidized for 30 years uh at least to produce uh the affordable housing we we've just got to have them uh and so our recommendation is that we do what it takes to be able to produce uh those units and keep these projects going so this is uh mayor uh that's a lot uh that I've shared with you a lot of detailed information but uh this is the report from your community development department on what we've done and accomplished for FY 22 and what the prospects are for FY 23. I stand for any questions. Well thank you Mr. Johnson that that that is um a lot of information I have seen I saw them sort of the bulk of it at the crime cabinet so I did have the opportunity to get most of my questions out you know I'll have a couple of but I'm going to open it up for questions from my colleagues we have not had the benefit of seeing this first um so I know that um council woman D. Geronofrimo was at that meeting as well so I'll start first with councilman Williams you have the floor. Thank you very much um I think the first was regarding the uh the dialogue with Mayor Pro Tem Middleton and you Director Johnson um I I'm still trying to get a little clarity on that because when I look at the slides I see Willis Street are we saying that it is included or is not included uh right now the fiscal year okay so the question that is answered for right now based upon the financials this is a financial accountability financial accountability is not included and it's not included because the funding was not part of the 159 million okay so forever Durham is the 160 and yes it's 160 absolute 160 and so for for measurement we and for for you to see in the public to see we need to show what did uh what is projected for the 159 to obtain so conceptually it's included but thought financially it's not that's that's correct we can include it in the count okay but you to be able to evaluate it and if for us to study value we need to be able to compare apples to apples okay good good I think um from personal experience and what we're experiencing here uh the challenges that you're facing is that we're facing is what stands out most to me um so I guess my main concern is how are our programs measuring up with this market uh being the way that it is um because I'm not sure $20,000 for the down payment is going to do much in this in this market so how are we what type of adjustments are we forecasting so one of the things that we're looking at with the program if you remember just over we received a thousand applications already uh we're in the process of evaluating those applications we wanted to give it some time to see because one of the pieces is not just the amount of money the question is whether the persons can find a product uh house uh that they can purchase both from what what we just shared and so we want to spend some time with that so we can come back and evaluate after a period of time but we may have to make some adjustments we're open to that but of course um if you increase the amount of money that means less people served and you know you have to evaluate those things and what's the what's the balance gotcha um do we know the rate or volume in which we're building a Durham units for purchase rather than units versus units for rent so I don't have that information I would have to possibly talk with the planning department to get that that type of information I don't have that information with me part of my program okay so you ask what's the number of houses that are being built and and I can't tell you I don't understand me council member William so you're talking about in our forever home program or our affordable program or you're talking about in Durham in general because I I picked up I'm not really sure which question you were asking got you so uh well I don't know we probably have the general question because that's the market in general but um in our program that we're facilitating so I think that that is something that Reginald and his team can can provide his follow-up okay and and the tea leaf with that is reason why I'm asking because I know we're building a lot we're building a lot in Durham but we're building um I don't know if the the building that's happening in Durham is diversified enough for the demand and and that is what's scaring me because the market is all over the place right now and um we talk about affordability enough but I do understand we have to build at every level so I'm just asking those questions or seeking that information to uh sort of you know determine the efficiency or the impact of the programs that we do have in our in our you know within what we can control and what we can facilitate so thank you councilwoman um thank you Reginald thank you for the presentation is sobering I know we're doing some really excellent work and I know that you all have the housing industry in general just has some really uh intense volatility now do you have a sense of as interest rates continue to increase I know that affects us negatively but is it also then possible that it slows down the housing market because not as many folks are going to be entering into the housing market with those interest rates so I would say uh for us here in Durham to be honest I would say no because remember we have uh on the market rate side now you know our work spends on time on the affordable side but on the market rate side is kind of kind of simple going back to the chart that I just shared with you about the producing the market what they just do is raise the rents raise the prices and I'm I don't want to say unfortunately but we have new industry coming in new people coming in and they're paying the whatever the market says so on the market rate side uh that that's a challenge before us and it has an impact so I don't know that it slows people down uh from coming to be to be quite frank about it that what it does have is a dramatic impact on the affordable side because there's no production of units that as council member just mentioned uh there's a limited number of functions uh the units that are produced on affordable there's a need of more subsidy remember the subsidy slide that I just talked about that's a limitation on the funding and pressure on the funding that we have because you you you can't produce the affordable housing uh without the the subsidy to make up the gap so I don't know if that helps you with your answer but that's my uh prognosis thank you and then are you all keeping up with there is rumbling that we are going to see some and maybe not here but in other places in the country slowing down of the of the housing industry in general because the prices are just getting so high Durham is not the only community facing this issue so are you all keeping up with those those indicators at all yes we are keeping up with those indicators uh if you think about the affordable housing uh market you know a lot of times we make progress when the economy is down because funding is cheaper I mean things are cheaper uh but we know we'll see what what works uh but just in the cyclical nature of it uh some of our best times are in the down times for the production of affordable housing because others aren't working and they need work thank you appreciate it go ahead councilman director johnson um I don't want to I don't want to use this as a scare attack to the public but I I know if not saying it doesn't change the reality but um if as as we're projecting about what's to happen what's about to happen with all of these companies that are coming to to the triangle I in regards of you know I guess I'm trying to I I want to see when the market is going to pop because we really kind of need that to happen but at the same time I'm wondering what we need to do policy wise because I know financially and volume wise we can't keep up we can't really compete but when apple you know when their shovel touches the ground and they start to bring 14,000 jobs here when um when you know Nike comes and Google comes and grail and grain and all of these corporate companies when we're looking at close to 20 to 30,000 jobs six figures injected within five years of the triangle that's a little different than what's happening across the nation and I I'm a little scared so I think you know because we can't keep up financially and can't keep up you know volume wise with building enough um I think the only other approach is what how creative can we get policy wise so uh that I I don't know if that's this department or or where we go and look to explore those things but um I'd like to entertain that I think as a second part of that I think one of the things that the general public struggles with in this arena is we're watching apartments um and housing being built you know everywhere especially in the downtown area and then you had a stat that showed 3,000 and some are vacant units of that only 100 and some are with one bedroom at $900 and most people will you know question what where where does the city what role does the city play in this in the control or not control of the building because you know of the building of it um because they're definitely an imbalance and most people will you know when I'm out it's like well well how do they get to come in and build all these um houses and we know that they're building and you all keep approving uh more of that knowing that there is this imbalance so could you kind of explain you know how how that happens and what we can do about it as a city as the as a city board um a policymaking board and then within the planning department itself and that that may not be something that you can answer totally but I know that's what I'm getting a lot is how how is this happening knowing that we have this imbalance right so um mayor you asked an excellent question I do get the same question uh as well in the fact many persons who know um what type of work I'm involved in ask me why am I creating all these apartments downtown uh and so then I have to uh share with them as it's part of your answer is that uh in terms of uh our zoning you know and this is not in in my area but it is permissible and it does uh people can do that and economy speaks to when there's demand somebody can go and get a loan and produce a building uh you know in terms of what we can do is look for more innovative ways to uh produce more affordable housing I would say that even with innovation it does require money because the fundamental principle the fundamental is you're not going to have enough income to make it work to build the building so how do you get around that and it's going to require some money uh at the end of the day to be able to to to do that uh but in terms of the the direct answer uh that's the the the purview of the government to to the local government to uh grant permission but one of the things that we're challenged with and a government has to be careful about is if one limits it it makes the problem the challenge worse not better because you're limiting the supply and that stone can force the the the prices even further than than than what we have now so it is a balance you know we we're going to look and commit to trying to look at ways to be more innovative in getting more affordable housing and working with the planning department in terms of tiny houses but there's an economic issue to tiny houses and those types of things uh which may be able to lower costs but you know banks don't necessarily finance those and so one of the things we can look at is how we can get the the market to be able to to come into that arena so it is it is complicated but I think you know we can try to find some other ways to meet the challenge but the direct answer to your question there the free market has to has has a role to play in a major role to play in all of what we see here thank you mr johnson uh councilwoman freeman you have some questions yes madam mayor and um because I did have the opportunity to see this presentation I have about eight more questions but I won't ask them just this second what I will say though is I think it's important that we have this dialogue and that we go a whole lot deeper because when I brought it up the first time before the bond passed it wasn't heard you cannot just talk about affordable housing it is a limitation because it's only housing there has to be a conversation around income if we're not going to talk about how we increase folks income it's not going to matter our metropolitan area uh average area of income is far and above what folks make at minimum wage 40 hours a week and so we know the pain that folks are feeling I would I would would I would like to push in on and the questions that I did ask um director johnson at the meeting were around making sure that we're not just talking about equity we actually have to implement and so that means making sure that that 130 million circulates not just through to black and brown businesses but actually local black and brown businesses and that means building a pipeline so as we talk about transportation and the commuter rail it's the same conversation there's architects that are involved there are engineers that are involved there are designers that are involved there are artists that are involved who are they how are they playing a role in this as we see the projects come forward and it's disheartening I'm not even going to say I understand how the process works RFPs are RFPs the way it's set is how it's set but we have to be really creative about how we engage our community in being involved on the front in the back end not only do they want to live in it they want to build it so on that that's on one side on the other side there are folks who are not going to be able to produce income they are retired they are folks with disabilities that do not allow them to work and if we are going to develop a system that supports them acknowledging how this hardship is being created based on the market then we've got to be real serious about what public housing means and how we use it and who's in the units and how long they stay in the units and what rates they pay so these are these are really like we have a lot of land and in that meeting I mentioned that if we're not talking city county and school land that is owned throughout this this whole county we're going to miss the opportunity we don't have a lot of time but we have the funds we have the council we have the leadership to get it done but we're not talking about it yet and so I appreciate our mayor and chair howerton bringing this forward at the crime cabinet I look forward to the name of the crime cabinet changing to something more positive and I look forward to actually having this deep dive discussion about what we we need to do to do this work so I'll leave it at that and I will make sure that I let reginal Johnson know that I need to have a I need to have a session because I need these questions answered and I'll bring it back so it doesn't take ever thank you councilwoman freeman and and I agree with you totally the reason that it came to the Durham crime cabinet and we are going to consider a name change I think we do need something more positive something on a resiliency level and so we we're inviting that discussion but we're going to stay in that housing vein in the crime cabinet part of in that commission because one of the quotes that I heard recently is and that I agree with is that the social determinants of health which would include housing are the same as the social determinants for crime right it's one and the same so it's it's interest we all know this it is intricately linked with if you do not have a stable place to live everything goes off the rail at that and what I can't um what we can't keep doing is having these um what I call the gnashing of teeth and the ringing of hands moments where we're like we're paralyzed and we cannot move forth our reality is that we are growing city people are attracted and they're coming they're out we already know that but at the same time we have to be very intentional about not leaving any one behind so as we talk about it as a council one of the things that I think that in my experience in this arena in this short time is that there are lots of groups out there who are talking about different parts of it but it's just joining so you kind of get frustrated and trying to figure out how you encompass that into one conversation so that we can go deeper and have a a conversation for us to have um so that we can go deeper as a group in in it and then figuring out how we can direct you know our our community with with one kind of uh one kind of goal uh in mind in this arena so I invite you all to help help think about does that look like a task force that does that look like a series of town halls or something but some way we have to be able to at least from my vantage point is to get ourselves where our knowledge base about who's doing what out in that land and and and then to look further than what's going on in Durham because certainly we're not the only one that's grappling with this so I'm always one that looks forward to talking with other people in other cities who have um dealt with the issue or who are dealing with the issue so we can get ideas and be able to kind of move the conversation forward the other thing so I just put that out there and I know you come but for Mr. Johnson in particular on the home ownership piece that program that has has just opened one of the things that I've heard from some folks is that you know that people want to own a home but they get really afraid about that process are their community service organizations that are people who can actually you know you almost need a mentor a hand holder to help you navigate some of our folk who are who are looking to be a homeowner some of them may not even have the benefit of computer skills so are there organizations or folk out there that we can point people to to say okay we can kind of help you navigate you know what that world looks like and be able to kind of walk you through so I would say mayor yes there are there for home buyer classes uh and actually as one goes through our program you do have to have a home buyer class one uh the purds just do do know that our mortgage attend our program can be a second mortgage program or down payment assistance but one still has to to get a a first mortgage from a traditional lender and so what you're asking is how do you get to that first step and there are home buyer classes in our community that are being provided and we recommend those okay are there ones like you they would go to one at Durham Tech are there specific organizations that you could speak to today that people out there those thousand people who have applied can already can go ahead and start you know looking for your you the first step it sounds like is you need to get in a home buyers class so are there specific organizations that they can go and get those classes from that you can speak to today so so may I let me I don't have them right now the current list I'm gonna ask miss Lotto she does it's not we have to provide it on follow-up okay if that will be helpful to at least help people get started um good afternoon mayor um Karen Lotto community development department um just to follow up the the first step in our program is actually to get a pre-qualification so this means that the household needs to both go through the income determination process um through our vendor community home trust as well as then to go to one of our approved lenders and get a letter indicating that they are pre-qualified for a mortgage once they have that then our vendor offers um home home ownership preparation classes and financial counseling that is one of the services that the city is has engaged them for and there are also vendors other vendors in the community provide that I would I would need to follow up with you to provide that list but it is built into our program that financial counseling is built into our program so that would be their second step after they get pre-qualified and then their third step is actually we hope them finding a unit and then we go through the loan closing process for our second mortgage thank you miss Lotto and is that spelled out on the in your home in the program it actually will walk them through like baby steps like the kindergarten steps like do you need to be pre-qualified and this is what you do to do that and it refers to so look on the website everybody out there um and you'll find the directions and if not you see we have folk who can help you um to navigate it thank you for that and I can think that um councilman Williams has some additional thoughts just uh just a comment I appreciate councilmember Freeman for saying what I'm always preaching everyone who applied for the city council vacancy everyone on this council including myself and everyone I talk to in the community including an entire coalition we all talk about affordable housing but we do have to build at every level but we are talking about building units or creating units when there are over 26,000 job vacancies in this city over 26,000 job vacancies and I'm I know this is a popular to say but we have to also put some put some conversation and focus on getting folks access to those jobs as well we can't just try to build we'll never build enough ever so I I hear a lot of advocating for things that have gotten folks where they are and when we keep doing that we are advocating for them to stay where they are although we may mean well so we have to do it has to be a both end we got to build you know more units but do know that when we're building for ownership we're building and we're generating more revenue for the city to be able to take care of the social issues that are extremely pertinent but we also have to build units to rent as well so we can make sure that we not only take care of the transient population but also the population where we need to meet that affordability but part of creating affordable housing is creating access to opportunity to allow folks to be able to be economically sustainable and independent so I just wanted to continue that and put it out there we have over 26,000 job vacancies in this city over 400 in the city itself government and we need to also talk about how we're going to activate those so thank you and I invite us to begin the conversation now because that that when you move people into livable wages and wages where they are thriving rather than surviving but not surviving you know that changes the whole conversation so how can we as a the policymaking board and the leaders begin to you know kind of look at in my next my mind that's looking at it holistically so how do we begin to do that in a real way and be intentional about that process Madam Mayor if I might I would say that I think your idea around the town halls is a great first step that might lead to task force or committees or what have you but I think that just kind of going through the process of hearing from property owners and renters I mean as I feel like the the whole tenants bill of rights stalls it's hard to to have the discussion not knowing what the rents will be or if folks will even be able to afford to live in this city and so we've got to have all encompassing conversation with everybody involved in housing and that doesn't and that has to include advocates for veterans advocates for people with disabilities advocates for seniors advocates for folks with sickle cell like we've got to make it a very all-inclusive conversation that makes sure that we're not missing any any set population within our community I mean even even acknowledging how are our folks in the refugee community managing I mean this is this is impossible so I think that the town hall would be helpful to at least like kind of gather some feedback from residents in our community and then we could move forward with some of the more you know folks who do this work conversations and then go from there Councilwoman Cabera I'm coming your way for some some some feedback some thought I don't have I mean I think that I think just to be candid I think we have a lot of the solutions I think we're prevented from implementing those solutions because of preemption and state law I mean I think that we can all come up with many things many communities have inclusionary zoning they have real estate impact fees they have all kinds of tools that help their local government maybe not solve the problem but at least have a more aggressive be able to have a more aggressive approach and so I mean I'm going to say it folks want a different outcome it's not our delegation that's causing the problems you want to volunteer some time it's not just in Durham go knock some doors up for candidates around who will help us with the different political landscape I mean that's just the reality I think we can all come up with lots of solutions I think many communities across this country have come up with some really innovative things but if we're not allowed to do it by statute we're going to keep hitting this wall so I guess for me folks want to know what they can do this primary season your your your Durham delegation is is is very much in line with the values of this council I would not say that that is an accurate reflection across the state and to that point uh madam mayor I would say that it might not be that we have to work through because I mean I feel like that's a process that works really slowly it may need to be direct and maybe it's a lawsuit I do want to say something because there is I do have a there is some hope that I am seeing and I know these are conversations that are happening in JCCPC and I've been you know banging the strum for a long time we know we're not going to be able to fill build all of the affordable units on government money but we can create processes especially with our local builders who have we know have a lot of interest in and we're seeing it we're starting to see different zoning cases where we're we're getting a lot of interest from local smaller developers and how can we work together so that we can do some of this market rate housing I know that there's limitations because uh and I'm gonna the the last zoning case we saw was really really large they were able to include some of those affordable units because it was so large but I think there is opportunity there to continue that work to continue working with um our development community here around some of these things so that we can create a pipeline you know if you're willing to put affordable units on your house do we moved you through the process faster I mean through your development project do we move you through this process faster so I think we do have there's a lot of opportunity there to have a good conversation and outcome Councilwoman Johnson coming your way thank you Madam Mayor um appreciate the presentation it's it's good to see the progress that we're making and um you know I I of course share our everyone's concerns about all of the issues that we're seeing in the market you know the 400 home ownership opportunities with you know media and new home prices over $400,000 you know it I feel like there are a lot of a lot of the goals that we had when we devised this program have been made increasingly challenging um by the economic realities that we've faced over the last few years and a lot of it feels I mean the the scope of the problem we all accept the scope of the problem is beyond what we can do um as as a government um and honestly I think the scope of the problem is beyond what we can do as a community this is an issue like this housing crisis is national in some sense and you know it's it's global like we are we are one community among many who um who is really a really struggling with with these issues and while we can certainly do good work and make a difference um a real solution to this problem is going to have to come from higher levels of government either in the ability to regulate the housing market more effectively in order to ensure that lower income people are being served and that the market isn't only serving those who can most afford to pay which is what markets tend to do on their own um or with the funding to provide um to provide massive amounts of publicly subsidized housing so that people who are currently unable to access housing on the market are able to access that publicly subsidized housing um and I I'm really proud of our city I think we are we are doing our part um we are doing what we can within the bounds of what we're allowed and we pass the biggest housing bond in the state's history ever like it is we we are we are making a concerted effort to um to make a difference in this arena and it's nowhere near enough um and I think that we and you know and the conversation is just so much bigger than us and it just feels like we're always working on the margins you know like we can what and and when 160 million dollars feels like you're working on the margins like this this problem is is something that our federal government is going to have to address in the very near future or our entire country is headed for um for an even deeper and longer lasting crisis and so I you know it's kind of like a like from from the point of view of the city of Durham I feel really good about what we're doing I feel like we are you know we are making a difference and we are doing what we can but we really really need a higher level of intervention um and I think you know regulations at the state and federal level an investment at the state and federal level is what's really going to um is what's really going to determine how and when we get out of this and and the same with wages honestly like the way you get people to pay workers more isn't asking nicely it's by raising the wage floor um and so you know all of the efforts at the state and federal level to raise the minimum wage are really critical and we've already gone beyond you know like we we've been fighting for $15 minimum wage now for more than 10 years like now that's outdated you need $25 an hour to afford housing in Durham um so again it's it feels like the economic pressures that we are under are are so substantial that the the interventions that we can make are just never going to really get to the crux of the problem and are never really going to present a holistic solution we need more power and we need more money um and I think I mean and we do advocate with our delegation and with our you know with our federal delegation for both of those things um and we need to continue doing that and other cities need to continue doing that because this is yeah this this is this is a national problem and it's going to it's going to need a national solution for us to really move to where we need to be housing is a human right and it should be guaranteed that should be just the basis of policy and it's really you know it's really disappointing that we can't that in the in the richest country in the world we can't provide people with something so basic as a place to live you know the one thing I like about and I'm coming back to you um councilman Williams but I just gotta get this part out when I think about the racial equity task force that is to this type of problem has been a problem going on for 400 years but this city was innovative and enough to sit down and convene a task force and put it in writing and articulate a vision in my mind we need to do the same thing with this arena taking note that it is a national issue but once you start to document things um and and I agree with what you both are saying but until you document it and putting in writing for people to see it and know it they can discount it you can't discount the city of Durham could no longer discount racial equity or inequity because it was there it was articulated and we had goals and plans and we still do that we abide by today in my mind this is going to have to be that kind of thing because it it may come to some of these issues um that you both have suggested councilwoman Freeman and that all three of you have suggested that but we are we need to articulate it these are the things that we can control these are the things that are going to have to take a national movement these are the things that we're doing so that's that's I think at least and we are pioneering when we did that racial equity task was nobody in the country was doing that nobody we were getting calls from Alaska and different places where they they know that that was pioneering work and so that's the kind of innovation that I think we need to do because housing is a basic right and we have enough experts in this area where we can articulate it in a living document um to at least provide a pathway councilman Williams those are just my my initial thoughts yeah really uh really short comment here I and I don't want us to get too deep into you know uh committee work well I guess this is a work session never mind um I I think this will probably be through the office of economic workforce development but as an employer uh I I don't have us other than indeed.com I don't really have an actual um place to post or or a concentrated place to post the positions I'm hiring for and I think one thing we can do we could you know as a city you know one idea may be sponsoring uh just a centralized virtual location for job availability and that is uh from our chains all the way to our local businesses but preferably on our local businesses because there's a higher percentage of the of the dollar that stays local when you shop local so it's in our best interest to really strengthen our local economy um for you know for the overall community but yeah if I mean I know that the Durham Small Business Coalition I'm one of the founders of that it's a it's a group of just employers across the city we have over 200 of us in that group whenever one of us are hiring you know uh we post in that group hey if you know somebody looking for this or that and it's a myriad of businesses uh you know let me know you know and then then we have the the Durham downtown food and beverage managers and owners restaurant owners basically hey anybody anybody have an access you dish you know anyone has a someone that's looking for a dishwasher position or a cook position or general manager position and in this in this in regards to wages in Durham the small businesses are paying really good wages as a matter of fact if we pay much more we're going to be going out of business so we have to be really really careful about having a wage only conversation that actually think about how do we raise the tide how do we rise to tide so that we're not suffocating our local businesses to the point that we're running them out of business but we also have to make sure that we're you know paying folks decent so there there's a lot of creativity that we can take on in the private sector if we could have a really good partner you know and that's part of the reason why I'm sitting in the seat today to be able to have those type conversations and have both perspectives with it but yeah I will I would love director pedigree of you hearing me in actual space where folks who are employers in this area can say hey here's the information on the job or at least create a template here's the information I'm looking for this and then we have these 26,000 job vacancies in Durham may not be that many but folks can say all right I can go to the city of Durham and I can apply for a job all across the city whether it's in the city government or in the private sector but that's in our best interest thank you the woman Freeman thank you madam mayor and I appreciate um councilmember Williams suggestion I think it's a good idea to have a centralized location uh similar to our youth works conversation I think those businesses that partake in that should also be in partners around that as well I just wanted to raise the point um just acknowledging we are still in our budget season and I think it's um probably uh just just in thinking through that we're talking about community development and community development I feel like is is very good or filled with staff that's specifically focused on grants and federal funding and the bond and I don't know that there's a planner in that department but you'd have to correct me if I'm wrong someone who is actually kind of leading out into how we're having this conversation around an open space planner um someone who's in our you know just looking at the landscape and trying to figure out how how across the board all of the different initiatives all the different um you know partners all the different ways in which funding is coming through how does community development directly connect to that and the same thing in our workforce and economic development partner who is doing that how is that happening is there a regular meeting that folks can attend to pour into that conversation I know as an organizer um in the faith-based community we have regular meetings that people can just show up at and offer an update and that often is a is a good way to connect multiple resources to one problem or you know someone could raise the issue where is that happening inside of our city government how is that happening inside of our city government and I'm not saying that's like it's all staff like staff talking to one another it's really staff and community in a similar space around what our community development future looks like so if we need to study that I understand that's the way that you know the city operates you need to study everything we need to hire a consultant and you know set up a RFP so that someone comes in and tells us exactly how that works I would think that this would be the time to have that conversation before we pass the budget and that's all thank you well I'm going to challenge us as the council by our next work session is to come up with your list of asks um in terms of I guess what the questions are that we want answered you know is it and what from what venture from what branch for instance what would you want to happen from the federal government level where where is that bug what do you want to happen within city government what do you want to happen from state government what do we want to see from um just if you had a perfect world to kind of give us some points where we can begin to dig deep and to figure out whether that looks like a task force whether it looks like town halls where we're getting our answers and where do we see the the roadblocks just a brainstorming session for us so that we can begin to kind of drill down and understand and who and what we're going to task with whatever it is we're looking for sort of your visionary kind of approach so just just spend some time in that space so that next time we have a work session we can just brainstorm about what it is we want to kind of formulate to help take us from where we are now to where we want to go and what are the roadblocks that we see that we may need to help get our community to help us to understand you know I don't know that people know nationally or locally what inclusionary you know we know there are a lot of people that do know but they don't understand how that impacts what we're able to do right so if we can begin to brainstorm just within our own knowledge base I think then that will provide us um we get on a framework to who we're going to ask to sit at the table to help us navigate and just come up with your list of asks. Councilman Williams you came up with some great points about a centralized location whatever else you can think of in that vein we all know those kind of those things that we would like to see and let's just let's just plan plan to have some dialogue where we just kind of will we actually we don't kind of but we actually brainstorm so that we can come up with the framework for moving us forward recognizing that we're going to have some limitations but at least we will lay out where they are and the folk in Durham will know what they are and why we have to move a specific way or not move in this specific way so does that make sense for everybody okay so that's our homework assignment so we can just we're just going to brainstorm and just just talk about it talk through it try to um and I know um Ms. Wallace is real good to kind of organize so if you can help us be able to organize how that will play out you know whether it's somebody being a scribe or just to give us some some place to start from. Councilwoman Freeman. Thank you um professor madam mayor I I appreciate the I mean it's probably been less than 30 minutes that we've been having this discussion and it feels a whole lot lighter in acknowledging that we have to figure out a way forward. I think the frustration levels of not just us as a council but people in the community around what affordable housing looks like and how inaccessible it is is overwhelming and I want to appreciate you you making this time today um for us to have the discussion and to think of ways to move forward thank you. I think that's part of our charge and we all are good at that um we we've had some pioneering efforts but you know we have to start somewhere uh and so just kind of getting it out of our heads and acknowledging our frustrations and where we see the roadblocks and we doing that as a group will give us a framework to move forward and that's that's what we've been elected to do we're not miracle workers but we are charged with thinking and being visionary about what we want this city to be and I think that you know we need to take the time to do that to just get it out of our own heads and begin to put it in a framework where we all know where we're going. So there we have it I think that that was that that's good stuff today that that's what you call democracy at work I appreciate you all so we're going to move now to our next sort of business which I'm going to turn it back over to madam clerk for an update on our boards and commission. Thank you madam mayor we had one um board and committee that was up for nomination and it is the human relations commission the appointment for uh the human relations commission category of african-american person we did not have consensus on that there were three votes for ebony sneed two votes for darcel dillard and one vote for angela c jimerson and I was wondering if somebody would like to switch their vote if you could tell me if I'm one that could switch I would switch to ebony sneed that's fine you'll vote for ebony okay thank you and then the other person category that was split between um three council members and another three council members for advertising um three chose hailey thompson and three chose re-advertising madam clerk have we had that one re-advertised already or no I couldn't remember I'm fine with flipping mine to re-advertising to get us forward but I couldn't remember if that was one that had we'd already kind of tried that I would have to check on that but um I will contact lola and then um I'm fine with flipping my vote to re-advertising oh you're okay with that yeah I'm fine all right then we'll re-advertise thank you that's the end of my report thank you madam clerk all right at this time we are moving on to our next uh item of business and that will be to turn down city manager is that right thank you madam mayor members of the Durham city council uh for your meeting on may 2nd I have the consent items 1 through 13 and gba public hearings items 15 through 18 thank you city manager paid I'm now ready to entertain a motion to settle our agenda 2nd to move by councilwoman covergera seconded by councilwoman johnson uh the we will have a verbal vote all those uh what signed by saying aye if they agree aye aye all those opposed have the same right hearing none that vote passes unanimously are there any other items to come before the council today madam mayor I heard from lola she was saying that position for other person has been re-advertised twice that's what I remembered which is why I I went with that all right I'll I'll change my vote for the individual who applied and me too okay all of what I think I will I definitely will all right thank you very much thank you if there are no other items to claim claim us okay I due to my tardiness getting here I just wanted to say uh because I missed the opening announcements tonight on abc 11 I will uh join a few other community members to talk about uh just some some of these deep issues that we discussed today actually uh how timely uh and I invite my colleagues to tune in and community tune in and join us on the dialogue around just some of the major factors that are impacting the community at uh 6 30 tonight live thank you so much for your advocacy on behalf of the city of Durham we appreciate that and I definitely tune in all right everybody it's been great work uh we will adjourn this meeting on the 21st day of april in the bull city at 3 39 bull city straw we are here by adjourn and I speak properly