 Good afternoon, Mayor and Council. I am Greg Simmons. I'm the assistant director in transportation and public works responsible for the stormwater Management program and so last fall we reported to City Council on the status of our initiative to update our master plan via an informal report and a brief of the council infrastructure and transportation committee and some here this afternoon With Jennifer Dyke who's senior planner in TPW stormwater was the project lead for this initiative to report the outcome of that We feel like we've had a very successful process and we're excited to share the results with you And this is in anticipation of an M&C which is scheduled to be on your agenda currently on May the 1st Which will recommend the result approval of a resolution to adopt the stormwater master plan and incorporate it by reference Into the city's comprehensive plan. So the way we're going to proceed I'm going to briefly just kind of refresh everybody on the program background who we are what we do how we do it That's the context out of which our master plan update process came and also as a part of that program background I'm going to take a moment to respond to some of the recent questions and concerns about the development review process and drainage Then we're going to move forward and talk about the goals that we set out as we did the master plan update process At that point Jennifer will come up and take over the rest of the brief She'll share with you the things that we did to try and make sure that what we were doing was fully informed by the stakeholders And also to share with you the major outcomes of the strategic plan update We won't have time to go into a lot of the details We just want to hit the highlights that came out of that and then talk to you about how we plan to move forward with that So let me talk a little bit about the program background So prior to 2006 when the stormwater program as we know it was established The only things really that the city was doing relative to drainage issues in the city was just a part of TPW Streets both on the maintenance side and the capital improvement side It was almost exclusively a reactive sort of program just responding to issues as they came up had very little resources No real strategy associated with it Consequently we had increasing drainage problems in the summer of 99 There were a series of flood events that led for the first time to discussions On the city staff and the city council and the community about putting together a structured well-funded Intentional strategic program to address drainage issues in the city of Fort Worth Nothing much came of that though until summer of 2004 when again a series of flooding events including tragically some fatalities Led the mayor and the council to direct the city manager to establish a citizens advisory committee To work with the city staff to look at the drainage issues trying to determine how the city should respond To the drainage issues in the city of Fort Worth about a year later There was a recommendation that came the city council to establish a fully funded intentional strategic stormwater management program Funded through a stormwater utility fee revenue those revenues began being in Collected in the summer of 06 and that's kind of when the stormwater program began and as we started initially We were focused on several things first of all we needed to understand what we were dealing with there was very little readily accessible Information that could be used to really guide and optimize a program to address the drainage needs That's both on the maintenance side understanding the system We had as well as the flood risk side understanding what sort of drainage issues we had around the city and what could be done to address So a lot of resources and a lot of time and effort were spent in those early years Just trying to understand what we were dealing with on the maintenance side again We were exclusively reactive before that and everybody knows and understands that any sort of maintenance program is much more efficient and effective Being proactive and so that was an initial focus was to move from reactive to proactive on the flood mitigation side Though we didn't really understand the magnitude and the nature and the overall scope that it was going to take to address Drainage issues in the city. We knew it was really big when you it was going to take a lot of money It's gonna take a lot of time and it was not going to be Affordable to be very aggressive in addressing those things So we set as a goal to have a moderate capital improvement program to address drainage issues in the city Knowing that we would not be able to fix everything in short order some things We probably won't ever be able to fix We also recognized that we needed to do the best we could to warn people of flood hazards that would continue to exist so that they Could protect themselves and finally Recognizing the amount of private development the impact that private development can have on drainage issues We knew we needed to have a very good program to assess private development make sure that it was complying with city drainage standards So that led to a program Very simply stated that is setting out to protect people and property from harmful stormwater runoff and the way We think about what we do is around four functional areas pretty straightforward. We maintain the system Again, we try and assess the hazards that exist out there have a capital program to mitigate those hazards as much as we can afford Those that we can't mitigate we try and warn about so people can protect themselves and again on the development review side We try and make sure that private development complies with our drainage standards such that it minimizes the impact It has doesn't make things worse from a drainage standpoint So these four things again are the sort of thing that as Jennifer makes the presentation You'll hear about these four program elements what we're doing what we intend to do major Outcomes in each of these areas from a strategic basis as we move forward Just to give you a little size or a little scale on our program our budget this year is about 39 million dollars However, you'll notice that two elements of it the debt piece Which is to service the debt for the revenue bonds that we've sold from 2007 to 2012 is about 23% of our budget Corporate support which is a term that we use to refer to the payment that the enterprise fund storm What a utility like other enterprise funds make to the general overall corporate needs of the city things like payment and lieu of taxes street Rental fee administrative services fee also in that element is the amount that we pay with our partner the water department to run our billing system So when you look at our 39 million dollar budget about 40% of it is on those two things So when we talk about our strategy we talk about what we're doing going forward We're talking about about 23 million out of that 39 million that we have to work with So I want to take a moment the second at this point as I mentioned to address very briefly a little more detail on the development Review side since there have been some recent questions and concerns just tell you what we've been doing what's going on with that It's obviously be been something that's been questioned a lot There have been a lot of concerns over the years We feel like we've made a lot of progress just want to briefly tell you how we see it Obviously, we're always like every piece of the development permitting Process trying to balance things we want to be flexible We want to be responsive while we're trying to make sure that development complies with standards Those things are somewhat intention flexibility and responsiveness can work against timeliness can be very costly So we're always in the business of trying to balance these things together And so we're working very hard on that we think we've come a long ways and made a lot of improvements But we're continuously seeking to improve in that in one way that we try to keep Feedback loop going so that we're not just assessing it from our standpoint We've got a couple of very good forums for doing that the monthly development advisory committee includes a report from stormwater as well as the other elements of the Development permitting organization in the city we get good feedback from there We hear about issues from them We get opportunities to dive into specific things and we've had a lot of good fruit come on that interaction in In addition to that group we established about three years ago a group that we refer to as our stormwater liaison committee So this is a smaller group of developers developer engineers and people in the building Industry that we meet with on a quarterly basis for three years now to talk specifically about the drainage review process And again, that's been a very fruitful process It's it's unearthed a lot of things that we can do to work together to partner together to make this more effective and more Efficient for everybody the overall feedback we're getting from those venues and forums is pretty positive We're not perfect. We haven't arrived But overall I think we've established a good rapport a good level of credibility With the community and that it's bearing out in the progress. We're making we also have regular newsletters and training sessions We just sent out a newsletter last month this again allows us to communicate things to the community and to solicit input from them and again those sorts of things lead to opportunities to improve in In 2017 our customer satisfaction rating on the surveys that we send out Every time we complete a piece of the drainage development review process overall was 4.3 on a scale of 1 to 5 That doesn't mean everything was good. There were some criticisms There were some low scores and when those criticisms and those low scores happen We reach out to the applicant we identify what the issue is we work with them to learn from them to educate them And again, it's been a really good opportunity for us to learn and grow and improve and help the community Understand our process and I think council may recall and last fall We actually the drainage review process received an award from the greater Fort Worth builders Association for the progress that we had made in Our program and so that was very gratifying again doesn't mean we've arrived Still got a lot of work to do always will but that was a good sign that we were headed the right direction a couple of Specific things that we've been doing recently We heard some questions and concerns about our lot grading standards and single family residential So we established a task force of developers and developer engineers. We worked with them We came up with some agreed upon revisions to our process and standards that newsletter that went out last week announced those those common Agreed upon revisions to our standards. So that was a successful process and finally one thing that we're doing right now We have commissioned an audit of actual reviews So we took 20 of the reviews that were completed in 2017 that Experienced the longest most complicated review process We asked our liaison committee to pick an engineering firm to review these things to audit We picked an engineering firm and we picked a developers engineer We didn't want to pick an engineer that worked for us. We picked a developers engineer We gave these reviews to them and we asked them to look at them to audit them to identify The most common reasons for these things experiencing protracted reviews the outcome of that We expect in May and we're really looking forward to that because again We think that'll give us a good opportunity to figure out what when things are taking long what's making them take long What's making them expensive? What can we do collaboratively with the development community to make this better? So we're working very hard. We really feel like we've got ourselves in a good position We feel like we have credibility with a community and we're looking forward to continue to work on that I really encourage mayor and council members when you hear questions or concerns, please let me know about those Please identify the people who are concerned because I assure you all reach out to them very quickly and very directly to identify their issue So I just stopped briefly at that spot on this particular topic before we go forward with the rest of the brief and see if There's any questions or comments about this issue Thank You mayor Greg I Appreciate the information you've given so far. I know for my particular council district I have probably I've been a bug in your proverbial ear a lot over, you know flooding related issues and stormwater related issues in my district I do very much appreciate your responsiveness Jennifer's responsiveness and all staff involved One question about the 1.5 million dollars in warning. I know that you and I have talked about that a little when it comes to Repair and maintenance of existing warnings Signage and and other measures could you elaborate more on that? Sure, and it actually might be could we hold that question to the end? That's why we got more to unfold about the bigger picture and we can come back to that But I wanted to stop here at this point and just see if anybody had any questions specifically about our developer review Process so yeah, I think like that, but just one comment also. I do appreciate you having in place that committee, you know of Residents, you know stakeholders there, you know, I I appointed someone there And they've been very positive in their feedback to me over the course of work and considerations you've given so I do appreciate that Thank you others Okay, Jennifer and see what else? Okay. He's generated Right, okay, so back to the master plan update process as we started this master plan update process a little over a year ago We had several goals again We had learned a lot of information in the early years of the life of the program It was really time to take stock of that integrate it get input from others on it figure out What it told us about the future and how to move forward in an effective fashion and of course the main name of the game is to try And take the resources we have use them most effectively to address the community needs So this was a good time to take stock of our program Line it up against the city strategic goals hear from the community about what they were looking for and make sure we were moving Forward to apply our resources to the highest priority needs throughout the city and as we do that of course like everybody else There's always going to be gaps There's always more good things that we would like to do than we have resources to do them So we want to understand those very clearly we particularly want to prioritize them against each other because we want to be a program That's in a place that when the call comes to increase the service level in any given area We already know what we're going to do we know how to move forward with it So this process gave us a really good venue for reviewing that and understanding that Another thing it gave us an opportunity to do was try and get more consistent and standardized About a series of challenging issues that kept coming up Jennifer will talk more in detail about those four issues as she gives the presentation But we were dealing with some challenges They kept coming up and we didn't really have policies that had been well thought out that were intentional that been Invented with the right people and so we wanted again to use this process as an opportunity to look at those things and move forward We wanted to have something that we could use to adapt and move forward for the foreseeable future in the program And again We wanted to end up with something that our stakeholder group could put their thumb on city council would endorse and really would Got our program for the future so at this point I'm going to ask Jennifer to come up and take you through the rest Of the presentation. I just want to take this opportunity to recognize Jennifer. She's been the project lead for this It's been a really really hard complicated thing. She's done an absolutely tremendous job And it's her professionalism and her excellence that have led to a really successful outcome. So thank you Jennifer Okay, so as Greg mentioned earlier, we really wanted community feedback on this So the process that we came up with for our master planning process was really focused on getting community engagement So we started with really first city engagement So we coordinated with these groups on the screen to make sure we were hearing from more than just storm water We didn't want to work in a silo and then also so we didn't reinvent their wheel We reached out to these communities on the screen and we did a peer community review We identified cities that were comparable to Fort Worth and facing similar Circumstances and challenges and we use that information to help verify and validate our own internal program assessment and inform our planning process And so then in addition to the internal and the peer community review really the heart of our engagement with our was with our stakeholder group and so we had council appointed members and We wanted to get full community representation since we were coming up with our full program master plan And then also we had ad hoc representatives to make sure that we had representatives for all the different storm water rate payer categories And so we had a really Intensive engagement process with the stakeholders We had four stakeholder meetings that were open to the public over a ten month time frame And a lot of back-and-forth coordination with the stakeholders during this period in addition just to those meetings And so I wanted to take a minute and recognize that we have a few stakeholders here Supporting us today, and if they could stand up. I know So we got David mother all we've got Lee nickel and is rusty still here rusty puller Okay, he's hiding right there. So I just wanted to thank y'all for your participation So ultimately the stakeholder group Endors our planning process and then the outcomes that we'll be presenting to you today in the master plan. So we're really excited about that So then in addition to the stakeholder engagement the public was invited to attend our stakeholder meetings and they could Talk and verbalize comments at the end of the meeting and they filled out comment cards as well So we use that information. We also had a Website we still have maintain that website where we put our meeting notes We put PowerPoints and even put some audio from the meeting So if somebody missed it they could actually listen to hear what they missed and we have the report up there right now the drop report Then we just to we also we advertised for those meetings really using social media next door as well As we had an email distribution list for people who had expressed interest in stormwater projects in the past So now I want to talk about our program major outcomes our master plan outlines a strategic direction for our programs next 10 years and Really, that's considering the challenges that we identified with our internal and in stakeholder Engagement as well as the feedback that we received and so first I want to talk through the major outcomes for the four program elements great talked about we maintain we mitigate We warn we review development And then I want to talk through the major outcomes for the policy needs that he mentioned that we one of our big reasons For doing the master plan update Our first program element is our maintenance program and our master plan identified several Initiatives regarding the maintenance program, but the most significant initiative was on storm drain rehab So when the storm water program was started our initial focus was almost solely on flooding and erosion mitigation Projects and so now we need to ensure that a prominent piece of our program is really focused on storm drain rehab We have over 60 miles of chant of storm drain lines that are over 70 years old And so the storm drain rehab will reduce the likelihood of large-skill failures and make sure the storm drain system continues to function as it's supposed to So the big thing with this though is it doesn't provide any flood reduction mitigation benefits Storm drain rehab is very expensive, but it's so much of a top priority that in the future We're going to be shifting some of our funding from flooding and erosion mitigation projects to storm drain rehab projects So our second program element is our mitigation program and our current budget is roughly 11 million dollars a year on these capital projects But our mitigation needs far exceed our resources and we know we have hundreds of millions of dollars of projects Where we need mitigation for flooding erosion and and storm drain rehab And so much of what we've learned about our drainage system and needs around the city for the first ten years of our program Has really given us this objective way to look at our needs and prioritize What we need to do and so we can look at the benefits of all our different projects So we're going to be using this information in the future to refine our project prioritization To make sure that we're using our resources to address the most critical needs and then also because of our limited resources Using this project prioritization We want to make sure that we're looking at smaller project execution and when we need to look at big projects We want to consider partnership opportunities and then look at the different pieces Fasibility of those projects and look and see if each phase can have significant benefits by itself So our master plan update will direct our future five-year CIP and our CIP identifies prioritized projects necessary to advance the purposes of the master plan and so on the screen These are just some highlights of some of our projects that are currently underway or they're going to their plan to begin this calendar year so our Third program element is our warning program and as I mentioned we can't mitigate all of our hazards It just costs too much and so because of this we need to make sure that we're effectively warning the community about our hazards As more and more advanced information becomes available We want to make sure we're taking advantage of this information and providing the community with more real-time Reliable warnings of flood threats and then also we want to take a broader view of stormwater warnings by Communicating about the channel erosion hazards as well So the last program element is our development review program and the feedback we received from our stakeholders in our master plan update Process was that our current level of development review was appropriate However, we did hear from several stakeholders from plan commission and from others in the community Concerns about the potential adverse impact of private development Specifically in areas that were already flood prone And so I'm going to talk about this in a few more slides when I talk about the development review policy need But right now for the immediate Future our plan is to maintain our current level of development review and look at the possibility To refine some of our regulations in specifically flood prone areas So those were the strategies associated with our four program elements now I want to talk through the Major policy needs they're listed up here on the screen and so Since the program started the chat we've had a challenge of every time something comes to this We didn't have a specific Policy and so we didn't we weren't able to standardize our decision-making So we needed policies so we can move forward and have a consistent approach for how we handle all of these issues in the future And so the policy the master plan identifies these policy needs It does not identify these specific policies Those are all going to be an outcome of the master plan and each policy will have a separate engagement process focused on that specific policy That's then developed into a vetted policy that's brought forward to decision makers for review and then implementation So our first policy need is for a local floodplain policy And I want to explain what I mean about local floodplain and using just one example here in the TCU area So everywhere in the city of Fort Worth drains into some kind of stream or channel that drains into the Trinity River So this is just one example here in the TCU area it drains north into zoo Creek And there's around 300 of these drainage areas in the city of Fort Worth FEMA maps the floodplains along larger streams across the country and so they map it along zoo Creek It's considered one one of the larger streams And so if someone were to look at a FEMA floodplain map, they're going to see this area in red So unfortunately The city has these local floodplains like this area that you see blue where the flood hazard is just as real in the FEMA floodplain And these are unknown to many people in the city for earth, especially newcomers that move into an area So what we're saying is even though it's not a map on the FEMA floodplain map It's still a floodplain and there's still risks that are just as severe And so these aren't shown on FEMA floodplain maps and There's most of the people in the city of Fort Worth that have reported flooding to us are actually in a local floodplain They're not in a FEMA floodplain and the city has no special Regulations related to drainage in these local floodplain areas like they do in FEMA floodplains So the stakeholder group agreed that we need a local floodplain policy and a policy once developed approved and implemented will improve the Identification communication and planning for local floodplains and determine if and how Local floodplains should be regulated and considered during the development review process And while our master plans identified a need for the policy again We don't know exactly what the policy is going to look like but our report outlines key policy Considerations that will need to be taken into account when it's developed And this is actually going to be one of the first policies that we're going to start kicking off developing this year and we've come up with a process to come up with a policy and embed it and It's going to involve a group a small working group of stakeholders with city staff Balanced interests so we can come up with a Focused engagement really on what this policy should be and then we'll make sure that we're keeping council involved of this effort And so our goal is to come up with a policy recommendation by early next year So our second new policy need is for our private property channel erosion policy And as it sounds private property channel erosion is just erosion that's happening along streams or channels Where the city has no ownership or maintenance authority and oftentimes the owners don't have the resources or knowledge to know What to do about this erosion? So here too the stakeholder group agreed that we do need to have a policy regarding how we handle private property channel erosion And the policy needs to address how we deal with current Issues that are happening and then how do we try to prevent them from happening in the future and just like the local floodplain policy again? We will we'll go through a separate process to vet our policy recommendations with the separate stakeholder group and then bring those recommendations to the decision-makers for feedback and implementation So our third new policy need is for a voluntary buyout policy So oftentimes it's really cost prohibitive to mitigate flooding or erosion with these large-scale drainage improvement projects And so voluntary buyout is just one mitigation tool in our toolbox Buyout can impact neighbor neighborhood integrity though because it leaves gaps in a community And it does improve it does remove taxable structures from that community However, the vacant property can often be used to help reduce And mitigate flooding or erosion to other property owners in the neighborhood And it can be designed in a way that can add value as an amenity to that neighborhood And so here too like the other two policy needs The stakeholder group agreed that we need some kind of policy to tell us direction about under what circumstances we consider buyout as a mitigation tool and Like the other ones the effort to come up with this policy will be go through a vetted process to come up with recommendations That's brought to the appropriate decision-makers For feedback and implementation So those first three policy needs work for brand new policies So the last one is actually a potential refinement to our existing development review policy So as I mentioned earlier when discussing the development review program element We've been hearing concerns more frequently about the potential impacts of development on flooding and erosion especially in areas that are already flood prone and both residential and commercial property owners Contact us fairly frequently Because of their belief that new development has caused flooding or erosion and increase that on their property In early 2017 the plan commission asked us to look into what we refer to as the cumulative impacts of development And what we mean by that is that even though one single property might show that their development does not have impacts The impact of all the new development can have impacts in the immediate area as well as further downstream And so while the standards that we're using here at the city of Fort Worth are consistent with many other cities Both in the area and around the country the concern about cumulative impacts is real and valid And it's worth further evaluation to determine if we should be revising our standards To consider cumulative impacts while we're trying to maintain a flexible and timely review process So given all that the policy direction for a development review coming out of the master plan update is really to seek to find ways to reduce the risk of flooding due to development in flood prone areas and Properly account for the impacts of cumulative development and then look at the possibility that development incentives Could be used to work with developers in the city working together to try to mitigate flooding Especially in these areas that are already flood prone And so like the other three policy needs will have a separate engagement effort for this as well Where we flesh out a fully vetted policy that's brought forward to the appropriate decision-makers for review and feedback So we're almost at the end implementation Obviously, we want to make sure that our book doesn't just sit on the shelf We don't want our plan to sit on the shelf And so the purpose is we have had a stakeholder group since our program was formed in 2006 So we revamped that stakeholder group and we're going to be working with them as we start fleshing out all these policy needs and talking To them about these initiatives, so we'll have that accountability and we'll have working groups We also want to make sure that our master plan Strategies are driving our annual business plan So we'll be doing that and then obviously beginning the implementation of the prioritized initiatives And this is going to be a 10-year plan So we know we can't just suddenly do all these 13 initiatives that are identified in the master plan tomorrow But as our resources permit, we're going to be moving forward with these initiatives I didn't talk about them all today Only the key ones, but there's 13 initiatives that are highlighted in our master plan And as mentioned earlier, we're going to be kicking off the local floodplain policy the first one this spring So with that As Greg said, we're planning to have our MNC on May 1st for council to adopt the master plan and have it incorporated by reference Into the city comprehensive plan Any questions or discussion Carlos? Thank You Jennifer One question about the real-time warnings. Could you elaborate a little bit about that system? I know that there was a grant involved I think if I remember correctly how far along are you in that and how accessible Would that be to your average citizen? Okay, so I believe that we we're actually pretty far along I think we're planning to finish up maybe by the end of either this fiscal year calendar year And so what we have been doing is updating our How we wouldn't when all the flashers respond? They all came to one tower basically so all the information So we actually are put in a second kind of tower to gather that information once So we make sure that we're really getting all the information that's coming in and then to we're working on some websites that then will someday be Hopefully within the next couple years Or sooner be very public friendly where people can go online and see that information Real-time so they can make decisions about when they leave or when they leave the office or what direction to take another idea is we've talked to Like the ways app can we give the ways app and let them know when there's roads that are closed where there's flashers So someone knows right away when they're going out and they're being redirected and they don't just end up at the flooded road So that is moving along. I think all we have left is one of three public meetings That's what I wanted to hear and you know certainly real time is a way to go Yeah, as much as Texas weather changes and how many people are traveling on our roads You really need to know as quickly as possible. Thank you both Dennis I once once again commend you for More than anything else your patience Both of you and in dealing with this. This is becomes a real Heartburn issue for those residents that that whose homes as you know as I know get flooded ankle deep in water in their living room Or knee deep even some cases but Some of these policies that have made a significant change in How you do business over the last five six years, especially with that with the I swim program and and how we have massage that that Requirement to the point where it's almost Flexible, you know, it's it's it's really working And the warning system as Carlos said is right on target the hazard mitigation Issues have been very creative and I applaud you for that as you know, I've told you that before I think that this voluntary buyout policy and the hazard and cement hazard Mitigation is is going to make it in the absence of the fact that we don't have unlimited dollars to throw at this problem So that's that's what's going to make this stormwater management and great Asset to the city at some point in the future Thank you. Thank you both for this You know, we've had lots of questions about stormwater through the years I do think that we're making good progress And I think your partners in this really do too and it was critical that we see where this is going forward So you really have worked hard and developed a better Easier more efficient program for everybody to use and I think we've still got work to do but we're a long way down that road So thank you for the update. Appreciate it