 City Council District 3 now. I know a couple of you were saying hold up. This is not District 3 But it is now we are so excited to have Woodland Park in all of the VA neighborhoods in District 3 So thank you. Thank you for coming out It's so important for us to to get together to really put to put out there What our vision for our neighborhoods and what we're doing here on City Council together and communicate that to y'all So that's what tonight is about. Thank you to the mayor for putting these together in each district Look around to our staff. I want everybody to give a little clap to our staff Planning code everybody's here tonight And we have some elected officials here tonight as well, and I'll let the mayor Talk about them. Okay. Absolutely Councilman County Councilman Shaquise Newton is here tonight. Say hello to the councilman And state representative Heather Bowers here tonight For those of you all that I may not know I'm oddity bustles I'm one of the at-large council members on council with my colleague Councilman Duvall We are very excited to be here today Mayor Rickamon has put together a series of town halls to provide an update on the various projects and Things that we've been working on one of the things I love about the mayor is that he is someone who? Really wants to work together and what you're going to see is that these projects are very much a result of Council working together bringing together our different perspectives in order to Find the best solutions for the different ideas and problems that we're trying to achieve and you know Despite our disagreements at times I think one thing that we all have in common is we really want to see Columbia be the best place to live work and play and I think that energy that the mayor brings about how excited He is about Columbia is very much contagious. So Councilman Duvall, would you like to say anything? Glad to be out in district three New district three out here. I told John that I thought I was at home when I made the turn on to the road Because I usually come out here for the national night out Because they have a great national night out in this area out here So delighted to be back with them. Yeah, you have a full house today So with that I will pass it over to Mayor Rickman to start our channel. Well, thank you It's great to be here. Thanks everybody for being here. We're trying something different We're a set of having a state of the city We've decided to go to each district and have a town hall and have some discussion and kind of fill you in There's so much if you've been watching the screen while you've been sitting here We there about a hundred and fifty different things that are happening in the city All to improve the quality of life here in the community for everybody and we're so excited about it But part of this is about engaging and hearing more some of you submitted questions Some of you may some submit some questions Afterwards that we'll get back to you and obviously I'll hang around after it to have discussion We'll be here just for the next three hours. So just sit back and relax. No worries This is a lot of information y'all and then be honest with you But it's it's it's very important and it's very exciting for us to be here and talk about it because I do I wake up every day I feel very blessed to have this position and I realize how much our community has to offer and one of the things I love is telling our story something we haven't done a whole lot of if it's recruiting businesses It's recruiting officers if it's out trying to figure out how we can take what other people have done and Bring it to our community so that we can have some of those great attributes that some other communities have and take great ideas As somebody told me a long time ago. The best ideas are stolen not borrowed. So We'll keep that trend going across But I also want to know that we're here together and I think Dr. Odyssey said at best. We are working Council who's really tried to put together the best foot forward to about the quality of life That's investing in our city and every aspect from our employees and the technology Into training making sure that we're doing everything we can to provide service to you all our customers Because that's who you are. Are we where we want to be yet? No, we're not But we're getting there and every day we're improving and we see improvement all the way across the board I did want to take I know mr. Brennan had asked y'all to give a clap But I would love all of our senior staff and staff that are here to stand up Just so feet folks can recognize you and just take a minute to thank y'all again for supporting And I say that because we have everybody here from David Hatcher with code enforcement Krista Hampton from our development department Sheneek Belton from our chief of staff our south region captain captain P. J. Ben lusky our Chief where's our chief? He's somewhere in here. Oh, he's on the phone. He's working. See he's working for y'all all the time Obviously our city manager Teresa Wilson Pam Benjamin assistant city manager Clint Shealy our assistant city manager who is over Utilities so all those phone calls you're calling me about water. There he is right there But now I'm glad to see y'all all here Chief snuck in the back there chief Jenkins our fire chief and we're Henry. There's Henry back there Henry is head of our parks and wrecks Who's doing an incredible job? So we're excited to have everybody here in support, but we're probably gonna start this evening talking a little bit about citywide initiatives kind of break it down and then go straight into our districts But I will will tell you that we we followed through with what? Mayor Benjamin started which is we are one Columbia. We believe that we're one Columbia and we're only as strong as all of our pieces and we want y'all to be part of that We want you to be part of the puzzle and you all have a role in that We'll get into that a little bit later But every business every public service neighborhood district law enforcement firefighter government official School church citizen are part of our city We can't talk about one without the other and we are all part of the united team to achieve progress and success for our city It's our job at the city to lay out the groundwork And we got together as a council and made some strategic decisions and those decisions were really about Investing in the city and we say that a lot because we really mean it We've really invested in our employees Invested in technology into our parks and continue and looking at innovative ways that we can do things differently Being at the US conference of mayors. I understand more and more that partnerships are important collaboration is important We cannot do the things that we need to do to improve the quality of life here without thinking differently and Talking about how we work with the federal government How we find the right partners to help us go after the grants all the money in Washington is not formula based It is majority grant based so thinking strategically. How do we go after that? How do we leverage it here at home? But bringing ever to everybody together in partnerships if it's relocating railroad tracks if it's looking to the future Working with Richland County on a possible new penny sales tax Focused on roads in my opinion, and I know there's a lot of discussion to be had but in a community where 72% of the roads are owned by the state and we're not getting funding for it We got to be creative How do we create other ways to take care of the most important means the number one complaint? We get roads and 72% so 492 miles in the city of Columbia By the state so working together through different avenues to focus on what's important And and we'll talk a little bit more about that a little bit But just so you have an idea we could redo every road in the next 10 years if we had that funding source And it's something to think about but we're not there yet, but it's it's part of it But we need to bring it together Continuing to do work on our existing infrastructure new services new approaches when we started The first February we're in office. We were about 6,800 work orders behind We've dwindled that down to way under 3,000 and part of that is is talking with our staff We learned that our own procedures were getting in our ways from getting things completed We also realized that we needed to hire third-party Partners small businesses in our community to help us Let us do what we do best and you help us fix those gaps where we're losing and that's Working with those small businesses, which is a win-win for us because if we're working with small businesses That means they're growing here. They're investing here and guess what they're giving back here, and I think that's so important We continue to work on community led initiatives off the ground so many a lot of suggestions that we're getting are from dialogue People come in and sitting down and having conversations making suggestions Pointing out things that they may have seen in another community and say why not Columbia and I agree with that Why not we should be the number one city in South Carolina? And that's where we're headed and we're gonna continue to do that But we can't do everything and nor should we and I think part of that is is why we're Continuing to create these opportunities where we're taking the lead, but partnering that's homelessness If it's violence prevention If it's working with other agencies to attract businesses So one of the things you'll see is that we're meeting mayors are meeting on a quarterly basis With each other to have dialogue. How do we support each other? You know Scout wouldn't be here at the state and The county and the city all didn't work together Took all three of us to make that kind of investment happen But for us to attract more people we shouldn't be territorial it shouldn't matter if they go to Lexington They go to Blythewood. They go to lower Richland or they go to West Columbia or Columbia We're all gonna benefit because people are gonna move they're gonna come visit our restaurants. They're gonna come see our retail They're gonna do business downtown. They may live in our neighborhood They may live in another neighborhood, but they're here in the Midlands And I think that's an advantage because collaboration is was one of our negatives as a community And now that's changed because people are working together You know, we'll talk about things today like Finley Park the Vista Greenway Riverfront Public access finishing some of those outstanding projects we talked about but also things like marketing How we're taking our message and showing people who Columbia is and why they should move their business here collaborations with the University of South Carolina Benedict and Allen and Columbia College and Ciu and Lenore Ryan because all of their graduates and their Alumni have key positions in multinational businesses We should be using that connection that they have to get them to bring pieces of their business here if it's back office If it's cyber security, is it a subsidiary company? Is it somebody that's tied in how do we attract those folks and part of that is us going to them and telling them We want you in Columbia, South Carolina We want you to be part of that in this community and we want you to invest here So we'll be continuing to do that. Obviously, we're going to give you a snapshot I hope you picked up one of the pamphlets up there. There's a lot of information in there About the investment that we had and the things that we're doing But at the end of the day, we're looking at the city's work and we see everything being part of the puzzle And so let's talk about public service services and essential functions City of Columbia departments are consisting their work to make sure we have a see safe clean enjoyable and accessible city Why is that important because those are quality of life? Number one reason why people are looking to relocate or be part of a community or stay in a community is they want it to Have a great quality of life. They want to have entertainment. They want to have safe roads and streets They want infrastructure that sure and I think we are doing that every day to make sure that we have the best community You know public services extend by everybody thinks we just do water But we do so much more 9-1-1 streets billing animal services municipal courts planning and zoning community development parking Economic development Small business opportunity. I mean the list goes on there's 17 different departments doing things to improve the quality of life For our residents and our businesses and you got to do both because you can't have one without the other We also maintain the largest municipal water system in the state and we've had so many advances here You know, we've obviously we change all our meters hundred fifty thousand meters across to the digital Part of that is really so that we can monitor the use much better But also we can respond to people and give them alerts when there are leaks and other things. Are they all perfect? No Look, we're still human. There's still factors in there, but we're continuing to improve But everything we're doing is providing much better service and much more information to you our customer We decreased the wall time call time. We had like 1500 calls a day Sitting down with our call team. We said hey, what do we do to improve this? Well, the answer came for our employees is let's bring in our night weekend folks To Monday through Friday where the majority of our calls are let's you utilize a call service for late night and weekends So that we can address when the majority of people are calling and we can focus on those emergency calls We can get people in and out less. So we're down the list of two minutes On wait times. We we were around ten minutes at one point people were getting very very frustrated But listening to our employees and then taking action and that's what working as a team has done With all of our our city administration council working together. All right. This is a priority. We want to get it done Let's focus on it We talked a lot about The work order backlogs, but that also flows into sewer sewer overflows the investment that we've made in our infrastructure to reduce overflows Making sure that we're taking care of our environment around and I have to throw in a plug Y'all we're the only city in the state of south carolina who received gold status lead gold status by the u.s building Committee and I think that's an incredible stature because there are only 16 cities across the whole country To get to that level and we were that and I was very proud to go to washington To have that discussion and be on a panel because I think people were amazed that a small city per se In a in a in what they Persumed his rule south carolina was so progressive, but it's about quality of life If you look out the the points and the markers in there. It's about the green space we have It's about the tree canopy It's the things that we're doing to reduce the fact that we did a heat study We're 18 degrees higher than we should be so the trees the 500 trees that we're planning this year Looking at covering roads and all the roof whitening and the things that we're trying to do to reduce that Why is that beneficial? It's health makes our community healthier. It also reduces our power needs So for all of our residents it helps all the way around so one step at a time We're getting there our goal is to be at platinum. I want to be the first city in the southeast to be platinum I think we can do it and I think we have the staff and the committees that are working together our c-pack climate protection action council Who's given us a pathway? How to achieve more and more how we're getting more renewable energy But a large part of Of all of this is us working together and continue and I will keep on harping that this is a we tour We do this together the only way we're successful is that we all continue to work together Will did you want to add anything? I tell you infrastructure investment you're we're sitting in district three where We are playing catch-up with our our drinking our wastewater and our storm water. So To my colleagues, thank you for the investment and in the rosewood projects and the shandon storm water projects and the many more that are In the pipeline that pun intended. That was a terrible dad joke. I apologize, but 28 million dollars in drinking water for our rosewood neighborhoods. There's still Neighbors and residents customers with brown water. We're getting rid of the rosewood tea Over time we're doing that. We're invested. So three phase approach We're about to put the fourth phase on the board to to get a price on that design. So please support Elected officials who support infrastructure. All right, that's that's my my biggest Take away from this segment It's important. It's very important and also To see where our customer service Platform has come in the three years I've been on council is amazing and that is a commitment by Mayor Benjamin may recommend to really invest in people In the process. So making your interactions with your city city departments A pleasant experience is something that we aim to do and I think we've made great strides in the past three years I just have one thing to add I want to go back to the water Columbia water and the mayor mentioned that we've put 150 000 am I meters out All of you I'm sure on the Columbia water system And if you haven't done so already download the eye on water Out that that app will tell you if you have a leak And it's the first thing we go to when I get a call From somebody saying I've got a high bill We can go into that thing and tell you for every 15 minutes how much water you've used And and some of the pros that the Columbia water can even analyze Well, that's the signature of a toilet leak They can tell that from the amount of water that's leaking. So use our water get it downloaded to your app I will add with water. I think it's important to know that we are you know We're finally gotten through furkan femur and we're in the process of getting to be able to start working on rebuilding our canal But through that process, we also got granted money to build an alternative water source So that if we ever have a 2015 episode again, we don't have to worry about where our water source is coming from We are going to have a direct line into the broad river, which is so important. That was a 42 million dollar Boost for us as a community, but it also Which is great. It allows us to build another platform to connect more greenway So once again, it's kind of a win-win all the way around for the community But a large part of our responsibility is around public safety police fire Public safety is everything from our code enforcement To our office of violence prevention But public safety is also our investment in technology cameras lights LEDs being changed cleaning up sidewalks and cutting trees that are blocking lights and so forth to make sure that we have a Safe pathway for everybody through our community This year the columbia police department released its gun violence assessment and action plan This information was the same that these national organizations Bring to the table except we did it in-house because we have the talent and the technology and investment that we made internally so we have all the data and so that made for our office to to have the office of violence prevention with trayvon form To be a reality for him to have the tools and the technology now to sit down. All right. We got the data set All right, let's bring the partners together So continuing to invest while we're playing quarterback Not necessarily being the whole team or the whole source And so we're so excited about those efforts that they're doing investing continuing into our officers obviously Pay having a step-up program upping our take-home cars Trying different programs to recruit recruit is the number one Issue that we have as a community as most communities today Getting people to go back into law enforcement. It's tough Every time an officer steps out of that car He's having or she's having to be absolutely perfect And i'm going to tell you having an opportunity to ride with some officers and seeing what they go through I just I can't tell you how proud I am of our police department our police chief and and at that point I really like y'all to give these guys and ladies around They really are working double time in a very hard position And if you've seen some of the interactions that they have to deal with and how they handle it with dignity And how they do it with compassion I have to tell you seeing an officer deal with somebody in a domestic violent situation And focused on the kids first and foremost to make sure that they can deal and get them comfort and help them Get through that as they sort out all that's going on at night with blue lights flashing and other things going on was amazing And I I can't be more proud of our our police department. I've put them up against anybody But the efforts continue to go in there as we continue to invest in there We've talked about investment in their in their salaries technology, but also making sure they they have mental health These guys are stressed and put through more situations than anybody else and you don't think about what they go through You know if they're having to witness the things that that we all don't have to see And how that it has effect on them and their downtime but continuing to invest in there the technology Making it easier and I'm hoping that we can work with our representative I know Heather rower has been very supportive of everything we're trying to do But we got to get red light cameras and speed cameras We need that extra technology to help our officers And get rid of some of these unnecessary accidents and In these intersections slow down the traffic in school zones and work zones so that they can focus on the real crimes And not being tied up Using that technology to our advantage and for some reason it's it's been a battle at the state house But we're going to continue to fight to give them the tools But that also means that we also have to use the tools for judicial reform folks We got to support our officers the catch and release programs not working We can't continue to arrest and release the same people They're coming back into our neighborhoods. I'm a big believer in its second chances But fourth fifth sixth and 41st is not an excuse We got to change that and that's working and supporting them with that is so important We launched operation hope and order this year and hope and order really was Working with our crisis team our pathway units. These are clinicians that are embedded in our police department Hiring private security also to help As we tackle a lot of the issues around the unsheltered And and some of the petty crimes false alarms and things so that we can make sure our officers are focused Where they're best needed and let us Work with our clinicians to make sure that we can get folks to the help they need and the wraparound services They need so that they're not in jail for 21 days get back out and we start the whole cycle over This is not helping those folks in need and we got to have a little push there But hope and order is really trying to take both sides sticks and carrots I hate to use that term, but the reality is is coaxing people into a program Being able to touch them and instead of them being arrested or or left out Somewhere camping out getting them into one of the programs that we've put together Code enforcement over 8,000 inspections 20 demolitions. We got about 40 more demolitions to go As we make those demolitions we're going back and working with builders and mortgage companies to put home our ownership Back in our community very focused in several pockets of our City we're starting in the Belmont neighborhood where we'll put Roughly about 12 homes in a pocket park in an area where we've had lots for over two decades And now trying to get home ownership and building that neighborhood back one one house at a time Working with with code enforcement and others on a project at the University of South Carolina called the ambassador program And part of that program is is to work with the student population about parking About making sure they're good neighbors and having an interaction so they have a one-on-one Person to touch with but they also understand How it's supposed to work how you live in a neighborhood side by side and Knock on wood I think so far. We we've gotten a decent start. I don't I won't say everything's perfect But we're going to continue and if that program Works then we want to expand that because we have more neighborhoods that are bounded by other colleges and universities But having a pilot program to see how it works. It's a good way for us to have that interaction with all of our residents Um, did you want to add anything? Yeah, I just want to commend our our our staff and our willingness to to get innovative and Look for technology to help streamline our operations when you leave here You're going down old woodlands You can look up and see the white cam with that big beautiful blue light There throughout the city and it's that type of technology investment that we've made to really help out our team and streamline efforts And I would just add that this council has been I think very vocal about ensuring that our Public safety teams have all the resources that they need while at the same time Developing solutions that are community led and community based whether that's giving out free gun locks and helping people understand How to safely secure their firearms or whether it's being the first city in the state to pass an ordinance that requires the reporting of a lost or stolen firearm because we know that that's typically how People that are going to commit violent acts get access to guns. It's from someone's car It's because it's stolen or or someone forgot to that they had left something behind and you know It was taken out of their car And so we are going to continue to address violence in innovative ways, but I think We can't do it alone And it's going to require the community all of you The organizations that have been on the ground doing this work for a long time to work alongside us I think the office of violent crime prevention is a great way to convene and learn from each other And we'll continue to have open ears to understand the ways in which you all think that we could address violence more effectively I just like to second what the mayor said about I'm knocking on wood about how smooth the usc opening of south campus has been Lynn Shirley and the other two presidents from those neighborhoods have worked for over a year With the university knowing that this event would happen and I was a naysayer I didn't think that the university could pull it off, but so far it seems to be working fairly well Got a little work to do however. We're there We're getting there and I think but part of that is is working together Collaboratively to address the issues and try new things. Look, we're going to continue to try things Not everything that we do is going to work, but we're going to be thinking outside the box To try to achieve what we hear back in the feedback and a lot of what we're doing is feedback that's come to us from the community I mentioned the office of crime prevention. Obviously, we have funded that and we're so excited about the initiatives They're working there, but we've done other collaboratives. We collaborated with richland one richland one had a program called jobs for america graduates And it had it only at Cca johnson And it had about a 92 percent sex success rate What's great about this program is that it focuses on 50 to 60 kids that probably Wouldn't make it to graduation And they start in their freshman year and they follow that student all the way to their freshman year of college They make sure that they're in school that they're participating They're getting the help that they need in tutoring and other and what was interesting about this the governor put out Basically a challenge to the first 25 schools that would sign up He would pay for 75 percent of the first three years of the program so Called up richland one We went ahead as counsel and said we'll pay for a part of it richland ones gonna pay for part of it We signed up every high school in columbia said now we have an opportunity and it started this past january We're now every one of the high schools in richland one has that program What's great about it is that could be 500 to 600 kids That could be affected by this program that have a chance To change their life and their direction of their life to improve It's just one step of working closer In a collaborative effort to improve the quality of life Is it the only answer absolutely not but if those are five or 600 kids That don't get in trouble. That's five or 600 kids less That we're focused on violence prevention Because we know people places in behavior are the three points of information. We already know We're focused on the preventative the intervention And I unfortunately at the end of the day law enforcement plays a part of that role too But we're focused on that and so that encompasses everyone that encompasses our schools that churches our community This is a community issue. I think you'll hear our chief say it You'll hear our sheriff say it. They're working in collaboration together on addressing it But we've seen a projection in violence both in domestic And gun violence and we're going to do everything we can And there are folks who said we shouldn't get involved in this, but how can we not get involved? It affects our community We have to be involved. We have to be part of that puzzle, but it takes all of us But we'll continue to think of innovative ways and ways to to continue to move that effort Obviously, we could not survive without our fire department Chief fire. Thank you all for everything you do As you know, this district scene. It's uh, I had some some issues in fire And these guys were right here in a collaborative effort even for jackson working together here Especially when ham and school was on fire They came from everywhere and got it before it turned into a much larger disaster there is But our fire department does more than just come and put out fires. They do inspections They inspect every building every hotel every school They work with communities install smoke detectors fire alarms And they do that. I think they did over 250 this last year. They've inspected obviously every school But we're investing in them too. We invested in a advanced Program for pay so they know what they can make Over a long section in each position so they can chart their own course but made it competitive for them To stay here and compete on a salary level But also a quality of life because I do think we have one of the best fire departments Investing along with the county on second bunker gear Making sure that they have all the safety and tools that they need But our next step is new firehouse Having a new fire station over By the olympia area where we have a gap and we're working on moving the train But that's not going to happen overnight. So we got to make sure that we get Folks the safety and they they're protected equally continue to invest in each one of those houses with clean up rooms Looking at how we go back to our firehouses improve the sleeping conditions The quality of life that they have inside that continue to go after that with equipment Working with the county to ensure that we have the right funding Needed to keep Our our firefighters safe and our citizens safe But these guys are the first ones who go to a wreck making sure that they have the tools and the technology to be the First responder that they are You know, I would prefer them not going to every wreck and that we have Long term that ems and fire are in one place so they can dispatch out of there But right now we're working in tandem And to make sure that somebody's there when those accidents happen That's why we have to go with the first responders, but they're there We just had fire prevention week here in this room this weekend With a big parade through this neighborhood in this district with lots of kids here firefighters here talking about how important fire prevention is And you know, it's so important that we continue to teach people because a lot of the fires are accidents And what we don't want is more accidents. We want less accidents We want to continue to have a safe in a community Our homeless initiatives We have focused on homelessness this year working with our unsheltered And really trying to address the issue Because it's growing and it's having some adverse effects on our community. It's not healthy for our homeless Our unshelter, it's not healthy for our residents. It's not healthy for our businesses So we we decided to do the pallet home the rapid shelter We put 50 pallet homes up And we did that because we wanted a place that we could start getting folks into an individual situation Where we then could get wraparound services to them So we could help them then get to more permanent housing with wraparound services None of it works if the wraparound services aren't there And what we've been doing is just simply not working anymore We've been doing the same thing for 20 years and I will tell you they're more unsheltered right now than we've ever seen before They're in every corner of our community. They are not in just in downtown They're on 77 they're on harbison. They are at forest drive They are in every corner of our community And we've got to get those folks into getting help And to just long for long term We want to build a a hope center And a hope center is a single location that provides all the service We've been working hand in hand with dmh with the governor's office to to start to formulate an all off concept That we could then bring together with all the partners in it So think about a center where you had urgent care. You have physical therapy. You have behavioral Therapy you have the mental health services. You have classes. You have dining You have pantry But you also have dentistry you have dmh and dmv and dehec all having a Participatory role in that because right now When an individual has to go get their license or id which is the key to getting all of your benefits It takes one volunteer on those four hours to take one person to do that Imagine what we could do if we had everything in one location And you were doing it on a couple days you could get people their services And find out where their benefits are and what they qualify and if they don't figure out how we get them qualified All in one place along with housing We need housing in four categories folks. We need we need temporary housing which we call rapid We need transitional and when I use the word transitional I'm using it lucy that folks that are waiting to get From a from a voucher that they qualify into housing because sometimes it takes longer to get a unit For those individuals we need mental health 37 percent of our unsheltered in our community is mental health Probably an equal amount or maybe greater is addiction So then the fourth piece of that is having addiction working with laredak Working with dmh to help handle that and each one of those Housing components has to have different elements to it depending on what We're having if somebody is in mental health. They have to have different colors. They can't have metal They have to have wood All of these things that we've learned from these other communities that are doing these type of projects If it's in gamesville or houston or our other cities That are working but getting people into individual units allows us to get the one-on-one and get them the help they need Um, you know, there's probably 10 of that population that we may never be able to help because they just are Are going to choose not to do it But it's not going to be because of a lack of us trying to address that issue We spend right now 40 million dollars on homelessness as a community 103 different providers. We got to bring folks together and collaborate We got to do more with milestones and objections In ways to hold us accountable We need to make sure we're making a difference and we're not just enabling homelessness And I think it's great that people want to feed and provide and do all that But if it's not helping someone get out of it, then we're just enabling it and that's not solving a problem either That's just extending that problem But we've had some great success with the rapid shelter. It's for what we've gotten over 30 people from there into I think uh, the new number yet the other day was 32 when it's miss manager 32 So we're excited about making that difference. We are making a difference because this doesn't happen overnight It's usually 90 to 120 days to get that individual Into the next level. We're going to continue to work together as a community Dr. Oddity Bustles was our our homeless task force. I'd love for you to add to that Well, councilman Brennan and I um, we worked together on that committee and it was really important for us to understand the root causes of Homelessness and before we did that I think it was also especially important for us to define what homelessness meant in the context of what the city can make a difference, right? When you think about homelessness, there are so many different factors That play into that and the city can't do it all but we can certainly do our part And so through that process of meeting with providers meeting with business owners meeting with experts in on housing and the judicial system We identified several different potential root causes that we then attempted to address through our rapid shelter You know looking at ways in which we can improve our outreach So one example is there while there are 103 providers that are doing some sort of work in this With this population no services exist after 5 p.m And I'm sure you can guess that we typically get calls for service at 5 p.m When people are interacting with maybe someone having a mental health crisis or an addiction crisis, you know On main street or in the vista And so these were the hard conversations that I think we had to have to help people realize that It's not any one person's fault It's that we're continuing to do things kind of status quo and in silos And it's not making as big of a difference as it can So councilman brun and I have been looking at ways in which we can change how our services Within the city are funded. We're looking at Additional federal grants or opportunities that are coming down the pipeline to help support some of the work that we're doing And I think we've both been very very vocal about the fact that We have to have accountability and outcome measures built into our overarching plan People have to work together and not just take their little piece of the pie And they're you know sub population of those that are unsheltered and continue to work without really realizing that Everybody has to make things happen together in order to make a difference. Absolutely. Absolutely. I hope I hope everybody can see We're trying and and truly we are invested in this process We are going down a road where we want to we want to Put the blueprint together to show the gaps of homeless services Homeless funding and go to the state department of mental health go to a HUD and say this is if we circle this up This could this could be the ultimate delivery of homeless services So We're out here on island We are invested in trying to put that blueprint of passionate compassionate services together for our unsheltered So I think we've got some wonderful successes over the past year and a half that the pallet shelter has been there But we have a lot of work to do This council is not scared to do that. That's what that's what i'm thrilled about But we're also investing heavily on taking advantage one of our greatest assets that we've kind of Missed out on for a long time our riverfront and through partnerships and extensions With working with dominion energy. We now have 200 acres that we have access to so we can help expand going to work with ermo recreation commission the mongo foundation and others and long-term plan you'll be able to go from downtown On a bike or walk and go all the way to the dam and back And then you come back and you spend a little time at the zoo You can cross over elmwood into elmwood park and ride over to bull street and catch a game And then you can take your bike or walk back downtown and never get in a car Connecting those those pieces finishing that greenway taking advantage of partnerships And opportunities to work with the river alliance and other folks to put those pieces together the investment that ermo Recreation commission's doing the mongos what they have invested to get us that a 20 to the dam piece Opening that up met with the jordan family who now has some property both on the broad river And on the soluticide allowing us to connect in there opening up more opportunities Where we can take advantage for of the tourism point but the recreational point and the asset people want more green space More access to the river more points for you to put in a kayak more places to wrap Maybe you just want to hang a hammock hammock up down the trail and enjoy the sounds and the beautiful Sites of the river because we have something a lot of communities don't have we have class 2 rapids And we have spanish moss. We have water lilies. We have heron otters We have striper trout everything that the people want to take advantage of but we we've kept the river Like a hidden secret for so long and the investment by the boy foundation with boy dylan coming online the two Actually, I think they're up to three bridges now that they're supporting In our community and then working with the gen yard family to open up william street that's 63 acres there Get get the residential and the commercial piece lined up so that we know where the future Taxes are coming from from there so that we know we have the funding source to support a riverfront park That becomes into the gateway of our community, which i'll add is part of district three Excited about that the second i feel like i'm spending a lot of time In the uh the rebounding of uh of district three But but excited about that because for 15 years we've been talking about it and it's actually happening the william street extension Is underway? We're about 30 on the construction documents So it's going to happen. So now the planning is going and the gen yard family has become an incredible partner charlie tombs and i have to give him Um just props his idea and his vision of what it's going to be like It's going to be what people are going to go they're going to go wow They're going to see what we already know, but they're going to see it in a different light And we're going to be able to actually use it for the benefit of our community as a whole But it wouldn't happen if it wasn't about partnerships sitting at the table and working together and i'm so excited about our continued efforts to collaborate with everyone Obviously public works department. We've completed and launched so many initiatives across our infrastructure and to beautify our Our community community and neighborhoods You know everything from the 500 trees that we're planning in the roadway working on some beautification projects We're not there yet because we still got a partner as we mentioned 72 of the roads are owned by dot So partnering this summer we did a partnership richland county city of columbia And dot work together to work on a couple gateways how we can improve those gateways making sure that those roads are repaired and Cleaned that there's not tomato plants growing up on u g street as we have guests coming into our community getting that dead grass out Repainting those medians and those the yellow lines and make sure that people know that we care about our community But we can't do it all alone so partnering with garden clubs and other folks and and getting going after grants More grants to plant more trees looking at different ways to plant trees We're working on a project with dominion That another community did where they put these bamboo Kind of gates over the top of the trees so the tree grows out instead of up So we don't have to butcher them every time we have the lines Which is you know something that that we're working to improve. What can we do around? We can't underground everything And in a hurricane prone state We have to have the balance because underground takes twice as long to repair But we also don't want every tree to look like it. It's it looks like an l shape Or a u shape working on that together, but continue to make an investment in the beautification And through partnerships because it does add to the quality of life Making sure that that we we take advantage of love your block programs that we put back in to allow communities To get grants for beautification if it's signs or plans Working with our gateways. We are working with the midlands leadership group. Dr. Bussells has been working on that program Along with all of our surrounding counties. So all the gateways have beautiful ways to entrance I mean you think about you come in on 126 There's nothing welcoming you to columbia Now having a great welcome of that with nice plants and nice entranceways on those interchanges as you come in People see the pride coming in on 378 from the beach coming to our community Clean, you know making sure that they were investing looking at You know, what are the opportunities for us to use different types of vehicles to pick up trash and get it cleaned up Sumter and orange burger working on a program by taking a It's it's like a vacuum truck, but it actually flows across the median and cleans up all that trash So that they can keep those those entranceways clean Working with our our mill. Yeah, we have the largest training base 60 of all military trained here 45,000 recruits 6.7 billion dollars 255,000 family members come here to visit We want to make sure those gateways are beautiful for when they come But we are sitting that's blessed with nine gateways And we can say we're cursed with nine gateways as well to maintain But they're all very important because we want growth in every one of those gateways It shouldn't matter if it's north main or monicella We have to work with our partners to ensure those gateways all look the same So wherever you come through our community, it's exactly the same We talked a little bit about our lead and our goal certification and and i'm so excited that we have gotten that Anybody want to add anything to It's it's about pride in your community, you know and when when you see litter you can't unsee litter and City manager Trisa Wilson's heard me, you know go to bat to say we need more money for litter pickup You know Do t don't give us any as much money as they should or service our roads as much as they should when it comes to litter and beautification So it's it's the approach of this council. We're going to bootstrap it and go find the money So taking it on and really having pride in our not just our gateways But our our major thoroughfills our community roads That's where we need to get creative innovative and continue to partner like the mayor says to really take pride in all our communities And in addition to that, I think we're also willing to and have gone to the state and had some conversations about potentially increasing the fine for littering To really incentivize good behavior and keep our community clean And so continuing to find those partnerships on a local and state level as well to make some changes around beautification Absolutely. We are not a dump ground. We are the capital city and we need to look like the capital city Mr. Devaughan can I pitch one in yeah I think y'all can see the excitement the mayor has with this this development and all the council has with this development From William street to the river to the repair of the canal to the to the The trail systems that will be connected throughout the city of columbia and in the midlands And I want to leave one challenge for the returning council members Harbison state park has 18 miles of paved trails or prepared trails in harbison We are about four miles from harbison on our rail system now And Sometime in the near future. I want us to connect to harbison to put that 18 miles into our bank of trails I can see the midlands of south carolina becoming uh What you call an eco Eco tourism eco tourism to come in here to To run the trails we can have marathons on the trails in the midlands of south carolina Challenge Only if you start playing pickleball Pickleball of course on every turn right Howards our uh pickleball champion, but we found out after all the Get pushing and pushing that he doesn't even play yet So we're we're thinking maybe that's what we need to get him a set a pickleball set for uh his retirement so that He can pick up the game But it is important because the the the tourism especially around the river and others so important because we get 16 million visitors here folks 15.8 million visitors last year That's a lot That's a big number. Myrtle beach only gets 22 million The difference is is that we're only getting about five and a half to a little under six million spending the night So the more activities we have the more at things that are going on here concerts cultural From our riverfront to our art festivals The more investment the more money we're getting back people in hotel stays spending that money in our restaurants and retail And drawing more people to our community. We're getting them. Let's get them to spend the night and be more part of our community Obviously one of the big projects we're working on is the modernization of rail and folks in 1905 There was a book written about the modernization of colombia And there are two things in there that we're working on right now One is finley park because they called for a central park and obviously Redoing finley park and the other is moving the rails. So 120 something years later. We're moving forward. Believe it or not We've secured funding from the state We are applying for multiple grants through the federal government Working with our dot partners taking advantages of our Relationships in washington to really go after that we didn't get the mega the info of this round But we had a debrief With dot on those and so we learned what we needed to improve in our application So we were applying we were encouraged to apply again But we're meeting with the build america bureau and other folks to look at how we can be creative Because if if we are able to elevate assembly street And get rid of 15 other crossings. We're in a community. It has 60 crossings in its city What it does for safety what it does for the ability for assembly street in those neighborhoods and on down This goes all the way to lower richland. It opens up communities For growth, but also it keeps them from being disconnected Because right now they are safety reasons Police fire how many times you've been caught by a train and you can't get through well Think about if your house was on the other side of that that's why building that new fire station is so important But elevating the other reason is is the automotive industry is benefiting our state It's become a major economic play But what done with that between the inlet port and our port system is increased rail traffic in our community by 47 And the projection is to get much larger And that's before scout even comes online So understanding how important it is for us to address this issue now Before it increases i'm very happy for our partners in the upstate in the low country For all the money they're getting but all we're getting is the pass through we're not getting any Income off that so we need to make sure we protect our community Along with that we are investing in the quiet zones and this was a project that was brought to us And partnered by senator harpool in and we're hoping we can get it fully funded and that means in Changing the safety increasing the safe crossings of our rail downtown Why is that important because once we've done those enhancements for safety that means bumping up making sure that we have The blocking new gates and everything to keep people from crossing Then they'll quit blowing the horn when they go through town Which I think would be pretty nice for some of because I do get a lot of those phone calls Why are people blowing the horn at 5 a.m. And 2 a.m. And 11 p.m But if we can change some of that and also enhance the safety of the crossings in our community Once again improving the quality of life. Did you want to add something? Yeah, I just wanted to Put a historical point in here that uh 1905 study that the mayor was talking about was done by the onestead group That did the biltmore house in ashville And it also said that one of the things that the city of columbia needed to do Was take the bottom of those five streets that went downhill and make a large lake Hence five points So they recommended that five points would make a great place for a lake and as we have spent the Millions and millions of dollars they'd probably write in 1905 Well 120 years later, we're still learning that's what we're getting there Obviously the next piece for us is our investment neighborhoods and communities the heart of our city Our parks and recs department investing in there obviously finley park the crown jewel With its investment. I have a lot of people say well, what's going to be different about it a lot of things Number one, we're actually going to have folks there park rangers others being part of that our park that park never had ownership If you look at our parks in the healthy parks They all have ownership this park has ownership all the time The parks that have ownership and that's what you see in other cities ownership maintenance Having a crew there making sure it's safe and lit but Being able to activate it having the outdoor Exercise ability there the walking trails in a center of the city are very important Especially as we're continuing to grow with residential downtown Having components for our our children new water features keeping that iconic but adding more to it So it's enhanced using the right quality of plants So there are no Pockets that everything feels safe and open a new amphitheater that can be used from everything from Shakespeare to concerts Reactivating that bringing our communities together and we're so excited about that crown jewel And I think you'll you'll be excited about it When we get it open here in the next 20 months, uh, if we can push mr. Simons, baby earlier We've invested in high at park and baseball we had, uh Asia wilson used her foundation and others to make get us Redone the basketball courts with art but Getting them and what's great about it is the story about what asia did Brought nancy Lieberman to the table nancy Lieberman is the first female coach in the mba And nancy has a foundation and I met her at a meeting And I started to tell her about the projects that asia did and how great it was that asia continues to give back to our community Besides being the mbp of the playoffs and all the great things that she does an incredible role model And nancy sent me a letter and said i want to do i want to build a second second one as part of my foundation I want to bring it y'all figure out where we're going to do it I want to do it but you guys i want to do it in a challenged neighborhood Because when I was a kid I had to travel to a public park to learn how to play basketball And if I had not been there And learned how to play Hardball as she called it and she would have never been on two national champions She had never been in the women's mba and she would never been the first female coach in the mba She goes I I can stay toe to toe with every one of those guys But it's because of what I learned in a public park and that's what she's doing in investing But that's opening up more opportunities. We're applying for more grants. We're Playing for four grants right now to do an outdoor exercise In every district so a plaza that has built-in equipment so that we can do it part of that as our overall for a healthier community We want to do the blue zones We want to make sure that we're doing an assessment of a partnership with richland um Memorial to bring the blue zones if you don't know the blue zones is it's targeted areas across the globe Where people's life expecting so you're getting closer to an hundred We want to be that community. We want to do a community assessment and say what can we him do to improve the quality of life for all of our citizens We've invested A hundred thousand dollars in computers so that there's public use in our parks Access to Wi-Fi and our recreation centers sports clinics over 500 youth Over 1400 kids this summer in summer camps We took a library at one of our parks facilities that flooded and turned it into a neighborhood incubator So that startups have a place to go and start in their own neighborhoods So we're bringing things to the areas where we know their opportunity and there's incredible people there And we need to be partners with them. And this is how we're partnering Obviously, you know, we have programs on an average of 400 seniors per month But everything from bingo to special events to trips in a growing exercising Population in our seniors continuing to push warning people to live longer But our efforts got to continue to invest in our neighborhoods Love our block grants 12 neighborhoods that applied for that money doing cleanups 130 units and 20 units we've repaired with community block grant It's 130 150 homes that we were able to use block grant money to improve if it was weatherization fixing roofs Redoing electrical making a difference in people's lives so they could stay in their homes Leveraging those assets that we get from the feds But working with our community partners to continue to make those investments People like the boy family who are investing $7 million a year in our community For outdoor boyd island art innovation center where they put a million dollars in for tech Looking to expand that investing in our riverfront paying for three bridges, which is probably 6 million in alone Continuing to make that investment For the betterment of our community Obviously Food insecurity big discussion Been talking about it We're so excited because now we've invested in one of the projects that came out of our food policy committee Which is a trailer which will be working with tom creek's farm To bring fresh food and vegetables straight from the farm along with meats dairy products Two neighborhoods, but we're not stopping there. We're going to launch this month A project with instacart using today's technology 99 of our city can be delivered to you But getting free access to folks both on medicare and medicaid Who have a challenge to get to a grocery store? We've got a bank who's willing to work with us to make sure those folks can have bank accounts and the things they need to If they need to do it electronically We've got a partner who's going to give kindles for those folks who don't have Electronic device so they can order but the great thing about the instacart program is instacart so excited about it They want to roll it out nationally after they roll it out here That's a columbia south carolina project. It's getting no variety. We're solving a problem using technology Is it going to solve all of it? No, but can it help us get to the next level? Because building a grocery store and not being able to keep it open It doesn't work today We've tried it here. Spartanburg just went through their second time where they invested as a community $900,000 into a grocery store. It didn't make it 12 months We can't afford for another grocery store to close Because if it closes twice in an area, it'll never go back. So let's try something else. Let's build up Let's continue to build up those neighborhoods get the density And the ability to show them that that store can survive on its own and it will get support from the community We're trying different things once again a different part of it Not only did we invest in our neighborhoods in our community, but we're empowering our city workforce as we talked about salary market adjustments for all of our our employees Making sure that we have the step up plays. We talked about plan for our fire and police leadership development and training I had an opportunity to meet all of our hourly employees and I want to do it again I learned so much from them. I learned some of the things that we're doing to get in our way and not allowing us to provide Great service, but also pointing out what they've learned from other communities around what we could do to improve service Listening we're doing more listening is uh, it's someone's grandmother used to say you have two years in one mouth Listen more talk less. That's what we're trying to do even though I'm talking a lot tonight But I'm trying to fill you with all this information Uh, obviously our leadership development support but we got to invest in our employees and give them the tools to to grow We need to have the future administrator the future mayors the future ACMs future police chiefs here Investing in new technology so we can communicate. We're working through with a group So that we can communicate better and more instantly and quicker to you with information that affects your neighborhood So we don't have to blast it to the whole city or weight on media that we can send it to you Block by block so that if something's going on, you know instantly and we can make sure we're taking that feedback that we get From you to instantly and tracking it So when you call in the future and you want to know about that pothole or that water leak somebody can tell you We're waiting on pups. We're waiting on this and it's scheduled for this week next week two weeks from now And that it's in the pipeline that it hasn't got lost taking advantage of the technology that's out there to improve the city's Efficiency we're focusing on consolidating all of our offices Selling close to 17 properties across our city putting them back on the tax roll What what's great about that a it gives us an opportunity to use those properties for To get growth more growth in our town putting them back on the tax rolls But it also gets our employees working closer together departments within buildings with each other making sure things are getting done The communication the collaboration And then our third piece obviously is economic development, you know, we had an incredible last year We did almost 600 million in development in columbia our hospitality and business districts are growing This month we had more women owned businesses open in our community than we've ever had It's actually the predominant business that grew in this community And that's incredible because that means we're doing the right thing. We're getting people to make investments We've had over 900 New licenses just this year. We had over 1300 over the last 12 months. That's new businesses. That's not renewables. That's new businesses small and large Opening our community taking part in it because they they understand our community supports them We're actively recruiting restaurants and retail. We're meeting with housing. We need 16 000 units of housing We're meeting development teams that do good projects that maintain projects And that they know how to mix market rate and 30 median income in the same units growing downtown One block at a time making sure that we have workforce and attainable affordable Housing is part of all of our needs embarking in the imagine study This is a study of partners with the realtor association to really examine what our future needs are Greenville embarked on this and it's interesting Greenville's most needs in the future are townhomes condos and apartments quarter plexus duplexes not single-family homes. Why? 85% of the needs are really basic around baby boomers downsizing single mothers with no kids at home And millennials who are not interested in traditional home ownership want smaller units more compact That's where the future higher density is what we're looking at And so we're having to figure out how we integrate that in our community And using that study to make sure that we're addressing the 16 000 units we need Obviously, we continue to see growth in bull street More more housing going there more buildings going in slowly, but surely it's growing up We we see investment We're going to have over two billion dollars worth of investment going on in the next 18 months in our downtown through For downtown living through businesses building and relocating class a office But we also have to look at what do we do with some of the old office? How do we take those and incentivize those to be workforce housing so we can keep our Keep employees downtown so that we make sure our workforce is here and they can afford to stay Not like other communities where they're pushed out We want to make sure that we have our core community in every part of downtown and that's what our goal is Um, obviously scout motors big deal. That's 4 000 jobs. That's major investment Why I think it's so incredible because when I called the mayor of Chattanooga, Tennessee I said, how is vw been as a partner? He goes, they're involved in our schools. They're involved in our arts. They're involved in our restaurants They everything that they can do to invest in our community. They're doing it. They are part of our community And he said the best thing I learned about vw and I've never forgotten this. He said every plant that they built They've never closed one never closed a plant So when they come here, they're invested. They're part of our community and that's good for all of us Obviously our office of business opportunity And economic development are being supporting of the small and existing businesses in our in our area We say we did 50 ribbon cuttings. We did really about 70 It's just been amazing The businesses are growing and it's a lot of it's incubated out of covid Which is amazing for all the headaches that we dealt with the pandemic so many good things have come out of that And it's also opened our eyes where we have gaps and what we need to feel and what we need to correct We've hosted we've helped I think over 5 000 small businesses through this You know we invested and and worked individually with over 200 small businesses Making sure they understand what's available to them If it's it's grease trap credits If it's the ability to get away without having to pay for a sewer expansion fee So that they can turn an empty retail space into something That's that's paying taxes and hiring people in our community If it's working on how to navigate how to start up the business get through the license Make sure they get the right permit so they have no delays because time is money Um And that's just a snapshot of all that's going on there along with all the recruitment trips that we're doing but Will you want to add to that? Let's keep it going. I'm feeling inspired. This is This is amazing Now you can really see the fruits of all this labor and five points with the small businesses that the hospitality districts it's it's an exciting time to uh to be an entrepreneur in in columbia right now we have gone out of our way to Get rid of the hurdles to starting a business here in columbia. We have a new business liaison manager greg williams He's he's very great at uh putting out fires for that path to entrepreneurs To to work with with our city So just just very exciting stuff going on in the world of economic development and you know look forward to to Many more exciting projects announced here in district three soon So we're talking a little bit about district three Um, just go through some of the as will mention You know the rosewood area water system, you know, 35 million dollars. We're investing The east rocky branch wastewater improvement. That's 24 million dollars that we're doing the grandby park canal improvements 600 we're redoing owens field, you know investing almost 1.5 million dollars to improve Use soccer and the ability to have fields that are in great shape with irrigation Not a rocky thing. We're not only that but our community that's involved in rugby and other sports can have these multi-purpose fields To really utilize what is an incredible park but taking the time to do that Continuing to invest, you know in the tennis center and refurbishing there, which is such a great asset Continuing to invest in melrose park. It's pad and it's it's a playground the new splash pad that's coming We got maize park getting a major overhaul A park that has been there for so long, but now Getting a whole new Redone with pickleball new tennis courts new playground equipment We're having more and more young families moving back downtown So we need to make sure that we have those amenities but a place that you can go and enjoy We're going to continue to invest in every Park obviously the void foundation and we talked about their investment what they're doing with void island the void innovation center Hollywood rose hill hent and grant and melrose melrose heights Took love your block grants. They use that money and invested and use it Annual cleanups. We're continuing to support that with clean the midlands You know, we've had if you look at all the businesses Up and up in district three from all good books the flying biscuit Is sour and salt? And sweet ggs moved down there Ruby sun shines getting ready open. We're meeting with actually a restaurant group tomorrow to show them three sites In town, we've got folks from charleston now looking at our empty storefronts and going we want to be part of columbia because columbia has proven it supports small businesses and and and that is a telling tale for people We're continuing, you know with verb columbia student housing project You know, we're still getting investments stay credit union expanding 27 million dollars 100 new jobs So we're so excited about what's happening Anybody want to add anything to that? I just think that the energy is pretty palpable in terms of wanting to bring growth and improve the quality of life I think district three is an amazing example of where that's happened and how we're continuing to Build in that density, especially in five points and some of our other entertainment districts within this district and just looking forward to what's to come I think councilman brenda and I serve on the economic development committee with councilman brown and We love all the projects that are coming our way people want to invest here and we hope that that continues So we've covered a lot and literally folks that we can sit here for another an hour and a half if you want and Talk about all the stuff, but we broke it down into multiple pieces But when we talk about you know three main pieces economic development public services neighborhood and community That's where we're focused, but there's a fourth So I want y'all to look under your chairs There's there. There's a piece on the floor under your chair. I'd like you to pick it up That's a puzzle piece. Okay, so you're our fourth piece So you're a part of the puzzle And if you notice a puzzle It fits in and creates a bigger picture It also has multiple sides and it connects multiple ways. So I want y'all to think about How are you going to be part of our piece of the puzzle? What are you going to do to help us make sure that we're getting to Achieve what we want, which is to be the number one city in South Carolina That's focused on on quality of life is number one across all neighborhoods all corners We're all part of the puzzle and we're we're embarking on that trade And I hope that y'all will think about it and I wish I could claim that I came up with this idea But I actually barred it from my pastor She put this on us and it what it but it was incredible because what it did is made people start thinking about How I can be part of my community how I can continue to be part of that You know, we talk a lot about being open for business, but we're really open about ideas. We're open for critiques I take criticism as a compliment And I say that sincerely because if you didn't care you wouldn't tell me you would just post it on the And that would never help me fix something or help us fix something or staff fixing So when you call and somebody goes well, I hate to complain. You're not complaining. You're actually helping us Because if we don't know about it, we can't fix it So be part of the puzzle think about how you're going to be part of the puzzle and know that we're open to share ideas We had some questions. I wanted to answer them before Everybody runs off to dinner Nancy I have some questions from you Um You want to talk about the panhandling especially at 77? and um As you know, we continue to try to address the issue The best we can um 77 was a challenge for us for a while with all the encampment scdot did now Sign along for our police department. So they have the ability to go And remove people from trespassing in that area. We didn't have that ability before A lot of the panhandling that you see and I just want you to know that are folks that are coming and going out of our community Most of them aren't homeless And we know that because our our new district manager at the garner's ferry not the garner's ferry. Excuse me forest drive walmart tried to hire all these folks literally went and stopped and tried to hire everyone And he offered him 16 50 an hour to start and they told him he they make 220 dollars a day seven days a week Tax-free they were good um We're trying to change that we're doing the best we can but we're very limited because Some of it has to be aggressive and they're not being aggressive and there are others But we are doing things to address it especially by using shopping carts and other things that they may take From the area to use as a way to get them to stop Doing that but aggressive if somebody's aggressively panhandling you need to call 911 If they're panhandling let us know We can move them along, but they're probably going to come back after we leave We're trying to do the best that we can but it is uh, it's not a great reflection in our community And we know the majority of those folks aren't aren't really in a situation To know a lot of our other unsheltered are Um The woodlands park mural sign. I think you saw it's actually being I saw saturday when I was here. They actually got the footing board. So it's coming Long time coming. It was a vendor problem To you for you to know but it's coming And I'll have to get back to you on where we are with the renovations here because I don't know where they are Unless henry, do you know Off the top of your head So it's coming in our next fiscal year is a master plan So we'll get some details and share that with you so you can share with the neighborhood Um, what's the status of fate of bike lines funded by the penny sales tax? Um, we're trying to put the ones in we can Um, there's a lot of questions around a lot of the leftover money So I think having that conversation with our colleagues at the penny sales tax All right, what's left over what can we go ahead and do we're looking at Incorporating where we can bike lanes is part of our our future projects and coordinating that with dot We have calhoun street and a couple other streets being done Our biggest focus really is to get the the trails finished So that we can get a lot of those folks off the main roads and really safely traveling across our community Without having to deal with traffic But we'll Carl I will get information to you on that. I don't have the full status, but I will get it for you Harrison Made the comment About recent speeches by folks from outside our city Regarding our homeless population and kind of telling us what we can do and can't do in our own community and Wanted we need y'all to join us in that discussion folks We are getting pushback from a lot of folks on trying to change things We wanted to centralize feeding so that we could make sure that people who are providing a meal Are providing in a place that has ac bathrooms a kitchen tables I mean, I think trying to do something in a dignity way, but the pushback has been incredible from organizations But we're getting every week at council folks coming from Atlanta Gastonia Greenville Myrtle Beach Atlanta Telling us what we should be doing and that we shouldn't prevent people. We're not preventing anybody from helping We're trying to make it work where it's better and it's not such It becomes less. It's not safe or healthy for people to Continue to be provided meals and other things where they are and not getting help and not getting out of it We're enabling that and that is not a good thing and And we appreciate it because it's a it's a very hard subject and we all want to do the right thing But we also can't just allow things to just People to do whatever they want to do the world's built with law and order or hope in order And for us to be able to get people into the help we need There has to be some guidelines around it and we got to work together and I appreciate y'all pointing that out because We've been taking it pretty pretty good Once again, I think I know that we're we've talked a little bit about dealing with the panhandling beautification There is no current funding for the beautification as we talked about but that's where we're trying to partner with richland county and also working with D.o.t. To work on these gateways and I will mention, you know, there's a lot of discussion around the future of the penny Obviously the penny has brought in more money than everybody expected And talking about do you extend it and and this is something food for thought that we all need to think about We have to fund the transportation system some way So whatever we do we have to make sure That folks who need public transportation have it and it's steadily funded But I will tell you That for me personally, and I'm not speaking. I'll let everybody kind of make their own comment on it I would be in favor of extending the penny sales tax if we did it in this way That a third went to the transit system so that we know it's funded and that it can expand and it can be thinking In the future how we continue to grow that in a more effective and efficient manner And that the city and the county each get a third For roads and sidewalks only No specific projects no university projects No individual projects strictly to do it and I'll tell you why we've sat down with our staff And we know that if we had the funding source like that we could fix Every road in columbia in a 10-year span but That also gives us money to help deal with some of the shortcomings that we may have with the state So when we talk about beautification In our gateways we talk about extra cleanup Making sure that that state roads and the city roads all look the same in our community And that's where we need to go but we need to have that discussion as thing. I just want you to think about it And I think there's a way we can do that That it goes into a fund and it completely stricts just for that And I think that's how we deal with the future Of our transportation and our roadways and our sidewalks because we still have plenty of areas that don't have sidewalks And we got areas that need replacement of sidewalks and lord knows we got plenty of potholes We need to keep filled and we want to improve As a community I think that was all the questions that that we had that came in We do have Comment cards if somebody wants More questions, but sir if you want to ask i'm glad to answer We're working on we're not we're not where we want to be but it is getting better And that is because we're working together as a staff the Well, the reason you have homelessness in a park is because there's nobody there When look we failed at finley park There's nothing else that we can say we did not maintain it over the last decade like we should we didn't prepare for the cost and everything We're going into this totally different. You're actually going to have park rangers that are stationed there So the old restaurant there is getting renovated. So you have park rangers and maintenance crews there You're going to have all these activities going on So you're not going to have a population that are going to be staying there and sleeping because if you go Go to san francisco go to portland great examples You go to their public parks. Guess what's in those public parks people families picnicking Guess who's not there the homeless because it's activated We have to maintain it and we have to activate it and so all our plans are around the activation And now that we have more people living downtown and we're seeing that growth That's how you're going to do it by keeping it activated Constantly keeping folks in there working for beautification working on outdoor exercise Having yoga in there having plays events It is going to be our signature park again You remember the glory days when we had the concert series and we had the movies and all of that Look, we can be outside nine or ten months of the year. So we have a great opportunity. That's how we're going to deal with it Thank you all for being here. I'll hang out and answer any questions Thanks for taking the time