 We are one minute away from air. Livestreaming has started, 30 seconds. The Durham City Council to order at Monday night, June the 7th. And I certainly wanna welcome everyone here tonight, all of our, all of my dear colleagues, our wonderful staff, and so many people who are with us tonight in various ways. We're so glad to have you. We have a long meeting tonight, a lot of good work to do. And so as we gather together to do that work, I ask you to please join me in a moment of silent meditation. This meeting is being recorded. Thank you. Thank you. Council Member Reeves will be coming a little late to tonight's meeting. So I'm going to recite the Pledge of the Flag, which he usually does. And you may join me if you would like. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands. One Nation, under God, indivisible with liberty and justice for all. Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll? Mayor Shul. Here. Mayor Pro Tem Johnson. Here. Council Member Caballero. Here. Council Member Freelon. Here. Council Member Freeman. Present. Council Member Middleton. Council Member Reeves. I'm here. Sorry. Thank you. Colleagues, Council Member Reeves will be here late this evening. And I'm going to ask that we... I'm going to ask our... I just spoke to city attorney about this before the meeting. I can't remember what she told me. Madam Attorney, can you come on and advise me as to how to handle this? I apologize. Hi, Mr. Mayor. So I'm here to entertain a motion to excuse Council Member Reeves for that portion of the meeting for which he's not present. Thank you. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you. Sorry you had to tell me twice, but thank you. Colleagues, I'll accept a motion to excuse Council Member Reeves from the portion of the meeting at which he will not be able to be here. So moved. Second. Moved by Council Member Freeman. Seconded by Mayor Pro Tem Johnson. Madam Clerk, please call the roll. Mayor Shul. Here. Mayor Pro Tem Johnson. Here. Council Member Caballero. Here. Council Member Freelon. Aye. Council Member Freeman. Aye. Council Member Middleton. Aye. Thank you. Thank you, Madam Clerk. Mr. Mayor, may I make a point of parliamentary clarification? Sure. I think moving forward that at the time a member of the body isn't present, if they've already said they're gonna be late, that the minutes would just reflect that at the time the role was taken, person wasn't there, and if they show up during the meeting, I think a simple addition to the minutes would reflect that they did eventually arrive as sufficient on the parliamentary proceedings. I don't think it rises to the level of a body needing to take action for some of this being late, particularly when they telegraphed it. Just wanted to make that point. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you very much. I appreciate your parliamentary knowledge. Thank you. Colleagues, we'll now move to our proclamations and ceremonial items. And we've got four really great items tonight. And I'm excited to read the first proclamation. Madam Clerk, can you make Tom Miller available to be seen and heard? Mr. Miller, are you with us? I believe he is. I am. Thank you. Colleagues, as you all know, we have many, many people that serve us on boards. I believe we're up to close to 200 people that we appoint. Not sure of the exact number, but it's many. And many people, we have many people that serve for significant periods of time and do so much great work on our boards and commissions. But tonight I'm recognizing with this proclamation someone who I think has rendered particularly spectacular service to our community in his role on the Planning Commission, Mr. Tom Miller. And I'm going to read this proclamation. I think it speaks for itself and talks about the reasons that we're honoring Tom tonight. And Mr. Miller, after I finished the proclamation, if you would like to speak for a couple of minutes, we would be happy to have you do so. So here's the proclamation. Whereas Planning Commissioner Tom Miller is stepping down from his service on the Planning Commission due to the expiration of his second term. And whereas Commissioner Miller has served with distinction on the commission for the past seven years. And whereas Mr. Miller has served and continues to serve, the Durham community in capacities to numerous to name, but including his years long service as co-chair of the People's Alliance PAC, his decades long devotion to historic preservation in Durham, including his frequent services and officer of preservation Durham, this particular commitment to the restoration of Durham's historic African-American cemeteries is critical role over many, many years as a leader of Durham's Interneighborhood Council. And whereas Mr. Miller has long been and continues to be the organizer, leader, spokesperson, Grand Puba, an unofficial parade marshal for the city's oldest Fourth of July parade in the Watts Hospital Hill and Dare neighborhood. And whereas Mr. Miller's service on the Planning Commission has been of exceptional value to our community and to this council. And whereas council members frequently begin their comments or questions on a zoning case with the phrase, can you respond to these remarks by Commissioner Miller? Or I don't really agree with Commissioner Miller or I learned from Mr. Miller's comments. And whereas Mr. Miller's expertise in real estate, land planning, the UDO, the comprehensive plan, there's only questions of all sorts has won him the respect and admiration of all of his Planning Commission colleagues as well as every member of this council. And whereas Mr. Miller has guided neighborhood leaders from every corner of Durham through the planning process, meeting with them and advising them year in and year out. And whereas Mr. Miller's written comments are complete, sometimes over complete, erudite, argumentative, sometimes over argumentative, informative, wide ranging, sometimes too wide ranging, historically informed, unafraid of philosophical byways and the arcane and fun to read. Whereas Mr. Miller's comments often possess independent literary merit, as with this question from a recent case, why must our planning process look like a tumble down the stairs? Now therefore I, Stephen M. Shull, Mayor of the City of Durham, North Carolina, do hereby proclaim July 4th, 2021, in addition to being Independence Day to be celebrated this year as Tom Miller Day in Durham. And hereby I urge all residents to observe this day. Witness my hand in the corporate seal the City of Durham, North Carolina, this 7th of June, 2021, Stephen M. Shull, Mayor. Mr. Miller, congratulations and thank you for your extraordinary service. And if you would like to take a couple of minutes to make comments, we'd welcome you. Thank you very much, Mr. Mayor. Mr. Mayor, the only thing I can say is shucks. I have to say that it's the greatest privilege of my life to serve the people of Durham from one end of the county to the other. I really have enjoyed the service. I'm looking forward to, quite frankly, a time off the commission for a little while. Who knows, I may apply for another spot on another agency. All of that remains to be seen, but you've been especially kind to me tonight. I have to say I didn't do anything other than what I thought was my duty. And I will point out that there are lots of people on the Durham Planning Commission who do their duty as well. And so I feel a little sheepish about receiving your honor today, but I do receive it and I'm very, very grateful. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you, members of council. Thank you so much, Mr. Miller. As I said, one of the prerogatives of being mayor is to be able to issue these proclamations. It's really a wonderful part of the job. And your service has been exceptional. And we're so grateful for it. So thank you for being with us tonight. And we look forward to Tom Miller Day on July the 4th. Colleagues, we will now hear the proclamation for National Waste and Recycling Workers Week. Councilmember Freelon will be delivering this proclamation and it will be presented to Jim Rinegruber, Assistant Director of Solid Waste Management. I see Mr. Rinegruber is with us. Councilmember Freelon. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Whereas the Solid Waste Services provided in our communities are an integral and essential part of the everyday lives of our residents. Whereas support of an understanding and informed community is vital to the efficient operation and collections of garbage, recycling, yard waste, bulky items and waste disposal services. And whereas the City of Durham Department of Solid Waste Management services over 77,000 homes and downtown establishments weekly. And whereas the men and women of the City of Durham Department of Solid Waste Management work diligently each day to keep the neighborhoods and communities of Durham clean. And whereas the City of Durham values and celebrates the many drivers, collectors, equipment operators, site and scale, house, attendance, crew supervisors, customer service, which was my job back in the day and administrative personnel employed to serve the residents of Durham. Now therefore, I, Stephen Shul, Mayor of the City of Durham do hereby proclaim the week of June 14th through 18th, 2021 as National Waste and Recycling Workers Week. In Durham, we hereby urge all residents to acknowledge the many services provided through Solid Waste and recognize the contributions that sanitation workers make every day to our health, safety, comfort and quality of life. Witness my hand in the corporate seal of the City of Durham, North Carolina on the seventh day of June, 2021. Thank you very much, Council Member. And Mr. Ryan Gruber, welcome. And if you would have some remarks, we would appreciate them. Thank you, good evening. And thank you, Council Member Freelon for that. Perfect. Mayor Shul, Madam Mayor Pro Tem, members of Council and Madam Manager. So I am Jim Ryan Gruber, Assistant Director of the Solid Waste Management Department. Donna Long is traveling this evening, so he did send his regards. And to say hi to everybody. You know, as I was trying to develop my thoughts about what to say tonight, I realized how difficult it is to have perspective in the midst of a whirlwind. And as we all know, the past 15 months have been a whirlwind. But even without the benefit of having that perspective yet, as we celebrate waste and recycling workers, I think we can all agree that their status as essential workers was cemented during the pandemic. On the collection side, as the country seemingly stopped operating in late March last year, the garbage and recycling collectors kept moving. On March 18th last year, fear and uncertainty were growing, not only in the city, but across the country and the world. A Durham resident poignantly tweeted, one way I know it's not the end of the world is that our garbage was picked up as usual yesterday. And you know, as the most visible city employees in the community, the presence of the employees were a comfort to people across the city. We never missed a week of garbage or recycling pickup throughout the entire pandemic. And Mr. Mayor, as you're well aware from your course of duty, acting as a collector on our trucks, it's a very demanding job even on normal days. And we ended up having to ask more during the pandemic from our employees. So most employees ended up working more over time, working over time consistently. Operations had to be significantly altered and resources stretched to continue to provide services with COVID-19 precautions in place. And down at the Waste Disposal and Recycling Center, we had to temporarily halt some services, but mainly just for a few weeks. And the dedicated men and women of the department just put on their PPE and got out there every day. So much was asked of the frontline drivers, collectors, supervisors, site attendants, equipment operators, our contractors, which we don't wanna forget, cart delivery personnel. We have one code enforcement officer who's been out there every day, scale house attendants. They all rose to the occasion showing their dedication, not only to their work, but to the city of Durham and its residents. These de facto ambassadors of the city consistently go the extra mile from waving and honking horns for the kids to being helpful and friendly with residents who have questions or need help. These everyday heroes are on the job helping to keep Durham safe and clean. And finally, I do wanna acknowledge all the excellent work of the few administrative staff in the department that support the operations through budgeting and finance, human resources, our technology needs, and council member Freelon Specialty Customer Service. They immediately adapted to the new normal and did not miss a beat. We appreciate the wonderful support of the city council, the city administration, and of course, the Durham community. Thank you. Mr. Wrenger, thank you so much. We really appreciate those remarks and we are so glad to be recognizing tonight our frontline workers in solid way. So thank you very much for being with us. Thank you. All right, our next proclamation is for National Gun Violence Awareness Day and council member Caballero is going to share this proclamation. It will be presented to Sylvia Burns from Mom's Demand Action for Gun Sense in America. Madam Clerk, can you make Ms. Burns available to be seen and heard? Great, Ms. Burns is a relatively new resident of our community but has jumped right in on the work against gun violence and for common sense gun legislation. We appreciate her being here. Council member Caballero. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Good evening, everyone. Whereas every day more than 100 Americans are killed by gun violence alongside more than 230 who are shot and wounded and on average, there are more than 13,000 gun homicides every year. And whereas North Carolina has an average of 1,388 gun deaths every year with a rate of 13.3 deaths per 100,000 people. North Carolina has a 23rd highest rate of gun deaths in the US and whereas cities across the nation, including in Durham are working to end the senseless violence with evidence-based solutions and whereas protecting public safety in the community, they serve our mayor's highest responsibility and whereas support for the Second Amendment rights of law-abiding citizens go hand in hand with keeping guns away from people with dangerous histories and whereas gun violence prevention is more important than ever as the COVID-19 pandemic continues to exacerbate gun violence after more than a year of increased gun sales, increased calls to suicide and domestic violence, hotlines, and an increase in city gun violence. And whereas in January 2013, Hadea Pendleton was tragically shot and killed at age 15 and on June 4th, 2021, to recognize the 24th birthday of Hadea Pendleton, people across the United States will recognize national gun violence awareness day and wear orange in tribute to Hadea Pendleton and other victims of gun violence and to the loved ones of those victims. And whereas we renew our commitment to reduce gun violence and pledge to do all we can to keep firearms out of the wrong hands and encourage responsible gun ownership to help keep our children safe. Now therefore, I, Stephen M. Shul, mayor of the city of Durham, North Carolina, do hereby proclaim June 4th, 2021 as National Gun Violence Awareness Day in Durham and hereby urge all residents to encourage all citizens to support their local community's efforts to prevent the tragic effects of gun violence and to honor and value human lives. Witness my hand and the corporate seal of the city of Durham, North Carolina, this seventh day of June, 2020, 2021. Thank you very much, council member. We will now hear from Ms. Burns. Ms. Burns, welcome. Thank you and you have a couple of minutes to address us. Thank you for being here. Thank you so much. Mr. Mayor and members of the council, thank you for your support. Those words just resonate so deeply for me because Wear Orange is all about honoring the victims of gun violence and the families they leave behind to mourn them. Durham has seen more than its share of that and it traumatizes the whole community. So together is the only way we can end gun violence and I'm very grateful that you're giving me a couple of minutes to make that point that you've already made pretty eloquently. Yes, I'm Sylvia Burns and yes, I'm brand new to North Carolina. I live here in Durham, but I am not new to the organization I'm here to represent which is Mom's Demand Action for Gunsense in America. We have grown to six million strong since the Sandy Hook tragedy in 2012. You're gonna see us everywhere. We have 30,000 right here in North Carolina and if I have anything to do with it, that number is just going to grow in terms of supporters and donations. It's a somber thing to have to celebrate and we have a tremendous amount of work to do, but we can only do it together, but we can. We can tackle this problem of gun violence and we wear orange to demand a future free from gun violence. I have mine on today. By the way, Durham looks beautiful in orange. City Hall looked amazing. I took pictures Saturday night. Carolina Theater was lighted up, Deepak lighted up the trees in orange. We're so grateful, so grateful of that and many, many other places in the triangle did too. So it's a unified effort and that's the only way we're going to be able to handle this challenge and this crisis. And you already mentioned that it is a crisis. We're coming slowly away from the pandemic that we've been in, we pulled together and we're still pulling together to end that, but gun violence decreased incredibly more during COVID-19 in 2020. We saw 40,000 murders from gun violence and that's the highest number in over two decades. So it is a crisis, it is a epidemic, a public health epidemic that I think we're getting increasingly aware of that we have to do something about. And that's, for me personally, I'll just serve this in. I have another second, four weeks ago, my niece, one of my nieces took her own life and took the life of her boyfriend in Lake Tahoe. So this year, I thought I was not part of this club. I've just been a very diligent volunteer for five years, but it affected me very personally. So I approached Wear Orange weekend in a much more kind of humbled state. So again, I'm very grateful. I hope there's a chance we can meet and maybe you can tell me the best forum for getting to know some of you all in City Hall, some of the council members and to discuss this issue. Thank you so much. Ms. Burns, thank you for being with us tonight. We really appreciate it. We appreciate your efforts and we're sorry for your loss. I'm so sorry to hear that, but thank you for being with us. All right, one more proclamation tonight and council member Freeman will be doing the honors for the Juneteenth proclamation. And this will be presented to Professor Andre Van. Madam clerk, can you make Andre Van available to be heard and seen please? Yes, ma'am. Can you be heard? Professor Van, are you with us? Yes, I'm here. Yes. Right, thank you. All right, council member. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Whereas June 19th, 2021, best known as Juneteenth or Freedom Day marked the 156th anniversary of the arrival of the Union General Gordon Granger in Galveston, Texas, where two and a half years after the emancipation proclamation, African-Americans learned of the end of enslavement. And whereas since its federal enactment in January 2018 through its sunset in June of 2021, the 400 years of African-American History Commission, 400 YAAC authorized by public law, 115 public law 115-102 will fulfill its charge to recognize and highlights the resilience and contributions of African-Americans since 1619. And to acknowledge the impact that slavery and laws that enforce racial discrimination had on the United States. And whereas on August 25th, 2020, we wrote new history as we acknowledged another year since the 400th anniversary of observance of the first documented arrival of Africans in the African colonies, by looking forward to confront differences between the concept of freedom versus the reality of freedom. And whereas America must never forget or repeat its vivid and tragic examples of African-American history, of this African-American history, which exposed the dehumanizing impact of racial violence from childhood enslavement to convict leasing from lynching to racial massacres like Tulsa, Oklahoma in 1921 and Rosewood, Florida in 1923, from segregation to voter disenfranchisement, which is occurring now, from mass incarceration to wrongful inflicted violence upon the innocent who fought for their freedom in Selma, Alabama at Edmunds Pettus Bridge or the images of children who in Birmingham endured the bites of unleashed dogs. And whereas we must collectively strive to close the gaps of immeasurable distance between us and affirm the promise of a declaration of independence that all people have the rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness and hold that the purpose of the American government must be to secure these rights for all. And whereas we must reject acts of violence and expand opportunities to understand and learn from our frank and complex conversations and whereas Juneteenth through August 25th, 2021 will serve as benchmarks to encourage individuals in collective reflection and transformation. And whereas it is through leadership and courage that we each have a responsibility to confront entrenchments which perpetuate injustice or a threat to America's true greatness. Now, therefore, I, Steven M. Schulmayer of the city of Durham, North Carolina do respectfully join municipal leaders across the country and the 400 YAAHC in spirit and solidarity and hereby encourage all citizens to honor Juneteenth through August 25th, 2021 as a period of reflection, cultural and public education, earnest assessment, planning and commitment to end systemic racism and all forms of dehumanization which threaten equality and freedom for all. Witness my hand, the seventh day of June 21st, Steven M. Schulmayer, thank you. Thank you very much, council member for that very important proclamation. Thank you for sharing that. And now we'll hear from Professor Van, we're glad to have you. And if you'd like to take a couple of minutes to address the council, we're pleased to hear from you. Sure, thank you so much to Mayor Schul, Madam Pro Tem Johnson, members of the Durham City Council, especially Councilwoman Freeman for helping us out here, City Manager Page and the Durham community. Let me say indeed what an honor and privilege it is to be here to accept this resolution in honor of Juneteenth, 2021 on behalf of the Durham community. This is such an honor. But yet it is also emblematic, I think, of the Durham way, as I call it, in recognizing and bringing into the public consciousness that the pride, commitment and resilience of a determined people, the city of Durham and the African-American community here have both blossomed and bloomed together since emancipation. This resolution is a tribute to the thousands of newly emancipated African-Americans who migrated into Durham to work in the tobacco factories as they sought self advancement, purchased land, created families and vibrant communities. Further, this Juneteenth resolution really helps to widen the Durham narrative by weaving in the stories of the enslaved community, Black Wall Street, the role of women, North Carolina Central University, civil rights, heroes and sheroes, and certainly many underrepresented populations and communities that oftentimes do not get such exposure. While many African-Americans migrated into other spaces to escape Jim Crow, many families in the city of Durham stayed and learned to live within confines of segregation by working to bring about a better day. It is from this group that a strong and vibrant people flourished in Black communities group. They used the tennis of self-help for their communities and promoted uplift for the race. Many of them went on to found early Black neighborhoods that served as safe places and great centers of social, economic, and religious endeavors for the African-American community in the city of Durham and Durham County. Although Hattie was that residential center and social center of much of African-American life, there were other communities such as the West End, the East End, Hickstown, Crest Street, Bragg Town, the Bottoms, Pearson Town, the Merrick-Moore community, and later College Heights and the Stokesdale communities that served as a destination for some and yet home to other residents. So lastly, on behalf of the Durham community, I want to thank you all for this great opportunity of noting the significance of this great milestone in the life and history of African-Americans here at Juneteenth. But also understanding very much and importantly that Black Lives Matter in the past and they said it matters today. So on June 17th, I want to invite you all as well at North Carolina Center University. We have a Jamesy Shepard Memorial Library. We'll be hosting a conversation, virtual celebration entitled Juneteenth, looking back while moving forward at two o'clock. So we invite you, encourage you to come and join us. And so with that being said again, I say thank you so much. Professor Van, thank you. We appreciate you for being here. Thank you so much for the history lesson and we are just so very appreciative of your work. Thank you so much and thank you, Council Member. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. All right, colleagues. We'll now move to the announcements portion of our meeting and I'm going to first call on Council Member Freelon who I know has an announcement tonight. Thank you. Excuse me. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I've got two announcements. I'll be brief because I know I have a long schedule tonight. The first and foremost, actually maybe there's three because part of my first announcement is about you, Mr. Mayor, I want to congratulate you on your retirement and thank you for your service to the City of Durham. We haven't had a chance to gather publicly since you made that announcement. You've been a great mentor and friend and I appreciate all that you've done for our city. And I also want to take the opportunity to inform the public that I will not be running for public office this fall either. I was appointed in September to serve out the remainder of Representative Bernetta Alston's term which ends this December. And after that term wraps, my wife and I will be moving out of the city and into the county. It's been a privilege, the privilege of my life serving on this council and I'm really proud of the work we've done and we still have six more months of good work left to do. So I'm excited about that. And I've already had the chance to talk with all my colleagues and city manager Paige and appreciate those of y'all who shared affirmations and words of encouragement but also just wanted to share that with the general public here today. So thank you very much for that. Another really quick announcement. I just wanted to share that this weekend. Saturday morning, I was in McDougal Terrace in the Mac where there has been a lot of violence in recent months and years. I marched the streets with residents led by several organizations including Stop Killing Us Solutions Campaign, The Nation of Islam, Black Vote, North Carolina was there that Memorial Quilt for Victims of Violent Death that Sidney Brody was there. It keeps getting longer and longer. And I just wanted to thank my colleagues who were in attendance, commissioners, Howard Tenon Burns were there. I saw council member Freeman, the Durham Committee on the Affairs of Black People and many others. Folks with different, I had groups with different ideas for solutions on how to make our community safe but the dedication to standing up against violence and in solidarity with a Durham community that's been really impacted was very clear. And for me, especially now looking at the six months of runway that's left in my term, it reinforced the conviction within me to fund programs like We Are the Ones and to create the strategy for Black Boys that I've been talking about. I wanna make sure as we move into the summer that we have robust youth programming and activities and mentorship available for Black, young Black men and boys especially. So I just wanted to, again, just say some words of gratitude and thanks for folks who showed up in the community this weekend and just reinforce to the public that this will be my biggest priority is dedicating my time towards leveraging resources to end violence in Durham. And I feel like this weekend was a great moment for me to reflect on that and to really deduce some brainstorming and dreaming about how that can be accomplished. So those are my two announcements. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you, Council Member. That's a momentous announcement, both momentous announcements but we so appreciate your service. Looking forward to continue to serve with you for the remainder of your term and thank you for all the great work you're doing. Really, really very grateful for it. Much, much good work. You're still gonna be doing. Thank you. Allen in the future. Thank you. All right, colleagues, other announcements? Council Member Middleton. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Good evening friends and colleagues and everyone watching. Mr. Mayor and Councilor Freelon and those we get closer to that day we'll have another opportunity to say more and to fete you both but suffice to say I'm sure I speak for thousands literally thousands of people in the city that you go with incredible love and affection and regard for the service you've rendered and will continue to render to our city. And I know we'll have more to say in coming months. Mr. Mayor, I wanted to say very quickly just two things that I'm, I think it's rather poetic that on this evening we had a proclamation for both Juneteenth and National Gun Violence Awareness Day. Firstly, with respect to Juneteenth the whole Juneteenth celebration is, I was going to say Shakespearean but maybe I should say a Baldwin-esque kind of framing of the delay, how justice has been delayed for black people in this country. You know, we found out two years later that the Abed Spaceship Proclamation had been signed and that's just kind of part of the course of us kind of being behind when it comes to being served and to receiving justice. And I think that in the city, particularly with our upcoming budget and with discussions and echoing what my brother Pierce has said tonight that we have a wonderful opportunity I think in Durham to display what it looks like not to delay things anymore. I believe that with our upcoming budget, I believe with the talks we're having in terms of injecting racial equity into our CIP that we can have a period in Durham that reflects or kind of mimics what happened after World War II when the United States poured massive amounts of money into Europe under the Marshall Plan. I think it's time for a Marshall-esque type plan for Durham, particularly for our legacy neighborhoods. And I think talks about the CIP, some of the things that Councilor Freelon has mentioned about bulking up our youth program. We have the opportunity as we've demonstrated creativity and the willingness to move things and create things in other areas in our city life, we have the opportunity to exercise that same creativity and energy, I believe in a Marshall-type plan for legacy communities final once and for all here in Durham. So I'm gonna put that out there and challenge us. My government, my representatives, my fantastic representatives who serve me as a resident of the city on really thinking about as Juneteenth with Juneteenth as a template, no more delaying what is needed to do right by many of our equity, by many of our legacy communities here in Durham. Secondly, and very quickly with respect to national gun violence awareness, I think it's timely that we had this proclamation tonight. Ms. Burns, I think touched on, she didn't say it exactly, but I believe she captured the spirit of the emergency that we face as a nation and that we face locally as a city. We know that America is a washing guns. We have the most heavily armed society on the face of the planet. So we know it's an American, a uniquely American problem. But as a local official, my first and foremost task, my job is to ask what's going on in Durham and what are the Durham data points for the issue? I'm gonna challenge us as a government to do more. I think last week, it's safe to say we crossed the threshold. We had a mass shooting in Durham. Five people were injured in one shooting. I know it's uncomfortable to say and to entone, but I think every rubric I've read, it meets that definition. It meets that standard. Thankfully no one was killed in that particular incident, but we've crossed the threshold in Durham while we're reopening and it's getting warmer. I want to say tonight, Mr. Mayor, some months ago when North Carolina Central University came with some recommendations for interventions on their campus and around their campus, at that time we remanded the consideration of the free trial of ShotSpotter back to the administration at that time. I had telegraphed at that point that I believed we should have an up or down vote on that proposal. I let it go because it was bundled with the considerations of North Carolina Central. Tonight I'd like to ask for an update on those recommendations and those requests that North Carolina Central made and also on the staff's recommendation with respect to the offer for ShotSpotter. If not, I intend to call for an up or down vote. I think the people of the city deserve for us to have an up or down vote on it. I say this because we have now demonstrated, I think with our upcoming budget, our willingness to try pilots. We are pilot friendly here in Durham. I think that if the standard is applied, if we can find an example where any particular pilot that we're trying did not do well in any particular city, then we shouldn't do any of them. And if we're not going to apply the rule uniformly that there's one city it didn't do well in, be it Cahoots or anything else, then we should apply that standard to every pilot. If we're gonna use the one pilot went bad in one city or didn't do well in one city rule for one pilot, then I think we should apply them to all or try them all. I say this because I believe that the headline in Durham, what people are talking about actually in Durham outside of city hall are the number of shootings that are going on in our city. I believe that pilots are wonderful because I believe in science. I believe we should get data. I believe we should get facts. I believe they should be Durham specific data and Durham specific facts with any pilot. I believe that if pilots don't work in Durham that they should be left off. But I think they should be tried. So on tonight, I want to, in light of the headlines, the actual headlines in Durham, actually what people are talking about, again, on behalf of the black and brown boys and girls that are being trained to jump in their bathtub with no water in it each night that since we are trying a whole bunch of pilots that we should also try a pilot to see that if dispatching help directly to gunfire in our cities is something that could be helpful in terms of saving lives and in terms of muscularizing our investigative capabilities. We are soon installing cameras at every DHA property in the city. Cameras, you know, are the universal symbol of surveillance in the world. If we can install cameras that look at people and capture videos, but don't do anything except give us high resolution videos of victimization the next day, then I think we should also be able to install something that will send help when it's needed. If we arrive at that great day when we're able to truncate the list down to the absolute bare necessities of the top two or three reasons we still need police, my suspicion is that gunfire will still be on that list. If we get it down to the last thing we need police for I would think that gunfire would probably be it. So with that said, I think that as a government it will give us moral authority and credibility with our people, not just to pilot and to experiment with things that send out mental health responders on our mental health responders, which I support that send out violence interruptives, which I support. But I think it's time for us to flood the zone. I think we ought to put everything on the table. I think we should demonstrate to the city that all voices are being heard and all voices matter. I think we should respect science as we're doing with other pilots. If the pilot doesn't work, we should take it up. Especially if we can get one for free. We should take it up and we should try it. We have crossed the threshold. The gauntlet has been laid before us. We are in a state of emergency. There are children whose lives are in danger. And I think we should try everything and anything that we can within the law and within reason. And if we're afraid of the government overreaching or having government surveillance the last I check, I am the government. We're the government. We're responsible for every tool that's deployed in Durham whether it's a car or a fire truck. We're the government. I trust you and I trust myself to safeguard abuses, to put the standard in place that will safeguard against abuses and to punish them and act if there are abuses in any area, be it finance or be at the police. We're the government. I think it will give us credibility amongst our people. I'm asking us to act. Tonight I'd like to officially ask the administration in due time or whatever time they determine to bring us back that report and an update on the request from North Crown and Central University. And I intend to call for either up or down vote whatever happens, up or down on the opportunity to try gunfire, detection technology in our city for free. So thank you, Mr. Mayor. That's all I have to say on that. Thank you, Council Member. And I appreciate your asking for the information for our administration on the NCC requests. Let me just say that we do have an opportunity to talk about this if we so choose on next Thursday at our budget work session in the morning. This could be added to the agenda and I think that would be an appropriate place for Council Member. Thank you, Your Honor. All right, colleagues, other announcements? Council Member Freeman. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I'm not sure, but I think you meant this Thursday. I just want to make sure. But I definitely- I think you're right. Yes. Thank you. I want to make sure I associate myself completely with Council Member Middleton's comments and just note that I think that it's high time that we do more than just talk about what we can do in the future and do something now. I also wanted to take a moment, Mr. Mayor, and apologize because I feel like our last meeting, that tension that kind of spurred up also took the attention away from acknowledging your moment in the sun and that you are retiring and I do want to congratulate you fully and completely on the expectancy of a grandchild. I'm not sure if they came already or not. I know it was like three days or so, but I do want to say congratulations and I wish you all the best. I want to thank you for your service. And I do want to note that over the next six months I look forward to making sure that your legacy does continue and live on. I also want to take a moment and just thank Council Member Freelon for reaching out and following up. I did appreciate catching up with him at the event on Saturday. And I want to note for the public that it is going to be necessary because of the great length and the weight that Mr. Sidney Brody has been carrying for us to find a space for that quilt because that memorial needs to live somewhere. And I think it's high time we figured out where. I think, I'm hoping to have conversations with Durham History Museum, but I do think that it may need to be a one-off space. And so I just want to put that out there for folks who might have some information so that you can share if you do. And I also wanted to note that I did have a forum. So in addition to the shootings, a lot of folks in the Black community have been experiencing a high displacement rate, acknowledging that the pressures of gentrification have been unbearable during COVID for many in our community. It's been even more harmful for people of color and ways in which that have surfaced and the conversation has been lacking around the industry and the kind of income aspect. And so I have taken the charge to make sure to have those conversations with folks in the community. And I'll continue to have those conversations with folks in the community. I'm hopeful that this summer we will have two students working through a collective group of folks in the community interning to try and come up with a plan around what that might look like. And I look forward to including any and everyone who might be interested in having that conversation. And so I want to make sure that I share that here. And at the other end of this, I do want to just step back and just note that it was stated at our last meeting that the DERM-CAN host event similar to what was proposed at the DERM beyond policing and DERM for all group. And I wanted, I was advised to make it clear that the DERM-CAN group hosted candidate forums. They did not host here or host demand meetings during a budget cycle and so there's a huge difference there. And I just want to make it very clear to folks that that is where some of this inks might lie. Other than that, I think I am mindful that there's a lot of pain in our community. And I do want to note that my neighbor is doing much better. She's recovering. And I'm mindful that that tension is in a space of like how emotional it is to experience something like that, not close to home. She almost, I mean, a bullet went over her head and she didn't bump into her granddaughters. Her granddaughters, she could have been killed. And so I want to make sure that I clarify that a lot of the tension from last week was mainly around that. And it had nothing to do with council member Freelon. I do want to thank council member Freelon for sharing that he's seeking to just end this all strong these next six months. And I look forward to helping you do what it is that needs to be done to make sure that these black boys and men do have something to do this summer because as I stated last summer, how hard it would be to go through the black artistry program project is just one thing. And I'm hopeful that we'll get the We Are The Ones program moving forward. So thank you. That is all. Thank you very much, council member. Colleagues, any further announcements? All right, thank you all so much. We'll now move to priority items. Madam manager, any priority items tonight? Good evening, Mr. Mayor, Madam Mayor Pro Tem, members of the Domicile Council. I do have two priority items for your agenda this evening. Agenda item number 30, Development Agreement with Lambert Development, Hutch Street 2, LLC. Pursuant to city council's request, additional information has been provided in attachment number nine. Agenda item number 38, Greater Triangle Commuter Rail Study Update. Pursuant to city council's request, additional information has been provided in attachments number two through number four, located under the priority items by the city manager, city attorney, and city clerk section of the agenda. That is all I have for you this evening. Thank you very much, Madam manager. Madam attorney, good evening. Do you have any priority items tonight? Good evening, Mr. Mayor, Madam Mayor Pro Tem, members of the Domicile Council. It's good to be with you all this evening. The city attorney's office does have one priority item this evening, Mr. Mayor. We would ask that council at the conclusion of tonight's business entertain a motion to hold a closed session, pursuant to North Carolina General Statute 143-318.11a3 for attorney-client consultation in my request, concerning the handling or settlement of litigation in the following cases, Darrell Howard versus the city of Durham at Powell, and Deborah Friedman and Mark Reden versus the city of Durham at Powell. Thank you very much, Madam attorney. We will wait till the conclusion of the meeting to make that motion. Thank you so much. Okay, thank you. Madam clerk, any priority items tonight? Good evening, Mr. Mayor and Madam Mayor Pro Tem and council members. The city clerk's office has no priority items this evening. Thank you very much, Madam clerk. Colleagues will now proceed to the consent agenda. The consent agenda is consists of items that the council has previously worked on. And those items can be approved by a single voter to the council. Council members are members of the public can pull an item from the consent agenda at which time it will be heard at the conclusion, in which case it will be heard at the conclusion of the meeting. Before we go out here, I've just been getting lists all day of people that want to speak. And I see that Laurie Fox has signed up to speak on item one, but I do not see Ms. Fox amongst the attendees. Can we confirm that please before I read the consent agenda? Mr. Mayor, I do not see Ms. Fox in the queue. All right. I don't either. All right. Thank you very much. All right, colleagues. I'm going to read the consent agenda. Item one, approval of city council minutes. Item two, citizens advisory committee appointments. Item three, Durham board of adjustment appointments. Item five, Durham planning commission appointments. Item six, Durham sports commission appointment. Item seven, housing appeals board appointment. Item eight, human relations commission appointments. Item nine, mayor's council for women appointments. Item 10, participatory budgeting steering committee appointment. Item 11, neighborhood improvement services and IES lean process performance audit dated April, 2021. Item 12, amend the fiscal year 2021 budget. Item 13, amendment of operating agreement with volunteers of America Carolinas Inc. VOAC to provide services for homelessness coordination, coordinated entry with diversion. Item 14, contract for habitat for humanity of Durham. We administer the city of Durham minor repair program and application intake for the substantial rehabilitation and home consortium rehabilitation programs. Item 15, contract for homeless management's information systems, HMIS lead agency. Item 16, less hazard control application intake and eligibility screening services contract with the partnership effort for the advancement of children's health each. Item 17, land hazard control marketing and outreach services contract with the partnership effort for the advancement of children's health peach. Item 18, 2020 bicycle pedestrian advisory council feedback annual report. Item 19, interlocal agreement with Durham County for consolidation of access services. Item 2020, 2021 lift station improvements group a gravity sewer, professional engineering services contract and McKim and Creed incorporated. Item 21, 2021 lift station improvements group a lift stations, professional engineering services contract to high field infrastructure engineering per PC. Item 22, 2021 lift station improvements group B lift stations, professional engineering services contract with Kim Lee Horn and Associates Incorporated. Item 23, amendment number three for engineering services from Raymond engineering, Georgia for various department of water management roof replacement. Item 24, Newman street waterline construction contract award. Item 25, Southgate water reclamation facility administration building renovations amendment number one for DTW architects and planners limited. Item 26, water treatment plant residual and water reclamation facility by assault services. Amendment number one to contract with Synagra of central limited liability company. Item 27, annual insurance plan FY 22. Item 28, FY 2021 third quarter financial report. Item 29, resolution approving the application of the local government commission for the issuance of water and sewer utility system revenue bonds. Item 31, lease with salon lofts group LLC at the Morgan-Riggsby parking garage. Item 32, contract renewal with Saab of subscription and services agreement with Saab of software Canada Inc. Item 33, contract ST 317C utility locate services. Item 34, contract with WK Dixon and company incorporated for stormwater municipal separate storm sewer system MS4 program review. Item 35, partition process assessment rate revisions. Item 36, residential septic to sewer cost share project for the Northeast Creek watershed. Item 37, contract renewals, granticus LLC DBA, granticus SAS LLC. Yes, thank you. Just checking on. All right, yep. Colleagues, you have now heard the consent agenda and I'll now accept the motion for its approval. So moved. Second. Moved by council member Friedman, seconded by council member Freelon to approve the consent agenda. Madam clerk, will you please call the roll? Mayor Sewell. Aye. Mayor Pro Tem Johnson. Aye. Council member Caballero. Aye. Council member Freelon. Aye. Council member Freeman. Aye. Council member Middleton. Aye. Thank you. Thank you, Madam clerk. And the motion passes six to zero. Well, now we move on to the general business agenda. We have one item that is not a public hearing on this general business agenda. Item 30, development agreement with Lambert Development, Hunt Street to LLC. And we will first hear from a member of our planning staff. Good evening, Mayor. Mayor, pretend city council members. I am Robin Parrish with general services department. This item is a proposed development agreement between the developer Lambert Development, Hunt Street to LLC and the city. In exchange for easements within Durham Central Park, the developer has agreed to make proposed improvements as well as making profits to the city. During work, during work session, the developer gave a presentation about the proposed development, which is the Vega and is located at the corner of Durham Central Park. There were, there was feedback given from city council regarding the proposed development agreement. The first was an increase in the amount of the affordable housing fund from 57,000 to 285,000. And the second was to offer prospective purchasers of the residential units, educational material or information about what to expect living in an area like Durham Central Park and an urban area. The developer and staff have met and the developer has agreed to those changes within the development agreement and pending council's concurrence. We will upload the revised agreement reflecting those changes. I am here along with representatives of the developer to answer any questions you may have. Thank you, Ms. Parrish. I said we're gonna hear from a member of the planning staff but of course we heard from a member of the general services staff and thank you very much. I'm sorry. One year falls my fault. Thank you very much for your presentation. Let me just be clear then the, as this is not a rezoning in which case we're prohibited from dealing in terms of asking for affordability, contributions to our affordable housing fund. This is not such a situation. This is not a rezoning. This is a deal, a business deal. They want easements and we are asking for changes in the business deal. And so am I to understand then that the developer has agreed to proffer, you used the term proffer, I suppose here it's really to include as part of their purchase price as an element of this purchase, $5,000 per unit to our affordable housing fund. Is that correct? Yes, sir. Thank you. All right. And then there were also concerns raised and you mentioned them Ms. Parish about the educating tenants. This was raised by council member Freelon and other members of the council, Mayor Pro Tem and others that these apartments are downtown and that we've had in the past situations where some of the residents of downtown apartments have complained about certain kinds of activities in the park, drumming and these kinds of things. And we want it to be clear. We, as we said in the work session to the developer, we want it to be very clear that these activities do happen and that their tenants need to understand that. So I would like to hear from you or perhaps from the developer about how they're planning to make that clear as so we can understand exactly what they're offering here. The developer has agreed to place material around the development itself as well as give perspective residential unit owners information, it's a flyer regarding things that they can expect, events that they can expect to take place at Durham Central Park. It does refer to the skate park as well as the Durham farmers market that there's a lawn there that people congregate there and there are things to be expected that happen within the park and they'll hear things while living that close to the park. They are here, they can speak. Mr. Coon is the attorney for the developer and he can elaborate on that a little. Thank you, Ms. Parrish. I really appreciate it. Let's hear from Mr. Coon. Mr. Coon. Yes. Are you available to be heard? I am, hello. Hi, Mr. Coon. Would you like to talk to us about this education of the tenants? Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Mayor, Mayor Pro Temp, fellow council members. Yes, we listen closely to the input and comments from the last meeting and I would point out that the existing website, thevega-durham.com has already had a page on its website that's dedicated to a discussion of what the neighborhood and the surrounding area is all about and the vibrancy of that neighborhood. We worked with Molly Barnes, the marketing person we're working with and she helped us put together a, what I would say is an educational marketing document that we are using to provide to prospective purchasers into existing reservation units, people who was reserved existing units that basically discusses and the features and attractions of Durham Central Park and the vibrant urban park environment around it and the desire and need to obviously be good neighbors to everyone in that nearby community, essentially to highlight the vibrant park atmosphere that they're going to be living next to. When I did speak with Molly Barnes, she expressed absolutely that they have focused on that as part of their marketing to outline that amenity, so to speak, and the unique community in the area. And so that is one thing that is being highlighted in the marketing materials and on the website and so forth. We've also took to heed the comment from council member Freelon in terms of the idea of placing perhaps some signage around to make sure residents know of non-emergency numbers to call in case of a non-emergency park related matter so as to make sure that the appropriate level of response is brought down in particular matters so as not to heighten it unnecessarily, so to speak, which we have agreed to do in the development agreement. And so we think we've gone a long way and have accomplished that effort to do that, to bring that kind of educational information that's part of the marketing materials and package that we'll be providing to everyone who looks at these units and who has already reserved units at the bank. Thank you, Mr. Coon, and thank you for taking that seriously as well as the inclusion of the $5,000 per unit to the Affordable Housing Fund in the development agreement. We appreciate that. Colleagues, are there questions or comments for Mr. Coon or for Ms. Parish? Councilor Middleton. Thank you, Mr. Mayor, and thank you, Mr. Coon and I want to echo the Mayor's thanks for the contribution to our Affordable Housing Fund. Living in an urban environment comes with some stuff. I have some experience growing up in an urban environment. It took me a long time when I moved to North Carolina to get to sleep because I could not hear fire engines and noise, but I got accustomed to it living in the suburbs here. So I want to thank you for your efforts in telegraphing and communicating to folks what it means to live in a city center in a growing urban environment. And if you need any help, let the folks know what it means to live in an urban environment. I'd be more than happy to help Grotis. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you, Council Member. Any other comments, colleagues? Council Member Freeman. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I appreciate the developer sharing those updates as well. I just want to note for the public, I did raise the question about what it looks like to plan open space and just acknowledging that an opportunity to bring on staff that could focus on open space has been brought forward by our DOS commission or committee. And I really would like to pursue that, acknowledging that this $6.6 million, I think it's less than an acre, maybe just shy of an acre, but the price of land is gonna get more and more expensive and it's gonna get really, really hard to plan our open space as more development is trying to kind of pack in around our downtown community. And just noting like I live in downtown or right outside of downtown. And the very few spaces that we do have to actually go out and enjoy, I'm not in the suburbs, Council Member Milton, I still have gunshots and fire engines and police cars in the background to keep me asleep at night. I will note that I think it's gonna be important just noting that for staff as well to figure out how to understand what that means for their departments because we do not have specific folks aligned to just focusing on citywide what that looks like. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member. Mayor Pro Tem. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I just wanted to appreciate the developer team for the increasing their contribution to the Affordable Housing Fund. And I hope that other folks who are coming to downtown who are seeking easements from the city or other concessions from the city to build their developments will follow this example. We need more affordable housing in our community in downtown especially. And it's great to see a developer, especially a developer who's building downtown be willing to contribute more significantly to that. And I hope that we continue to see developers step up to meet more of our community's needs in that way. And I also wanted to just appreciate the conversation that we've been having about downtown and inclusiveness and making sure that the community that we're building is a community for everyone and making it very clear to new folks who are coming into Durham and into downtown what the expectations are for being involved in that, for being involved in that community that there is already a community in downtown. There are already people there using this space. And we welcome newcomers, we welcome people to join but we want people to know what they are entering into respect the existing community and culture and space that they're coming into. So I just wanna appreciate us having that conversation and really making it clear what our values are and the development team for taking it really seriously and making sure that the people that they're bringing in are on board with downtown Durham and everything that downtown Durham is. So thank you. Thank you very much, Madam Mayor Pro-Tam. Any further comments? All right, colleagues, we need emotion on this item which will be to receive the presentation which we already did at the work session. To authorize the city manager to execute the development agreement with Lambert Development, Hunts Street, LLC. To authorize the city manager to execute an easement agreement that is not inconsistent with the development agreement. To authorize the city manager to execute, record and make changes to any documents related to the development agreement consistent with the manager's delegated authority. Can I have a motion to add effect? I was gonna say some moves to all three. All right, moved by Council Member Freeman, seconded by Council Member Middleton. Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll? Mayor Schuyl. Aye. Mayor Pro-Tam Johnson. Aye. Council Member Caballero. Aye. Council Member Freelon. Aye. Council Member Freeman. Aye. And Council Member Middleton. I will die. Thank you. Thank you, Madam Clerk. The motion passes six to zero. Mr. Coon, thank you for being here with your team. We're looking forward to really good work and I appreciate also what you'll be doing to enhance the skate park in that area as well in the park. So thank you so much. Alrighty, we'll now move on to our general business agenda public hearings. The first item is item 39, fiscal year 2021 budget and fiscal year 2227, capital improvement plan, CIP. And we will first hear from Mr. Allure. Good evening, Mayor Pro-Tam, members of council, John Allure, Acting Budget Director. This is a public hearing to receive comments regarding the city manager's proposed fiscal year 2021-22 budget and fiscal year 2022-27, capital improvement plan, CIP. Thank you very much, Mr. Allure. This is the final public hearing on this item before we will be voting on our budget. And we're glad to have everyone who was signed up to speak as well as other people that may wanna speak as well. Let me just let everyone know how we're planning to do this. Looks like we'll have at least, well, in the area of 40 speakers, I'm going to give each speaker two minutes. So every speaker has two minutes. And the way I have a list of people who signed up prior to the meeting, and I'm gonna start with them in the order in which they signed up. After that, what I will do is I will call on, make sure that, I just wanna let everybody know, everybody who is here who wants to speak on this item will be able to do so. I don't want you to worry that I'm gonna miss you or that you're not gonna have a chance. I promise you that you will get a chance to speak and to be heard tonight. I'm gonna read the first thing I'm gonna do, and this will help me and the clerk and everyone, I think, is I'm gonna read a group of names in the order in which they've signed up. And so you can be ready for your testimony. Let me also just say, we really appreciate you being here. We know how important this is. We know that the budget is probably the most important work that we do. And we are very grateful to all of you all to be here and offer your input. It's really important to us and we will all be listening very, very hard. We have some more discussions to have about the budget and what we hear from you today will definitely inform those discussions. So thank you for being here. All right, the first five speakers in order will be Stephen Nill, Hilary Ensminger, Larisa Seibel, Jim Svarra and Latasha Gibson. And we'll begin with Mr. Nill. Are you available to be heard? You have two minutes to speak, sir. Yes, I am. Can you hear me? Yes, we can. Thank you for being here. In 2019, Durham residents voted overwhelmingly for a $95 million affordable housing bond. That bond will be issued in two parts in 2023 and 2025. Part of the reason for the tax increase in this new budget is to pay the debt service on the bond with an increase at the rate of 1.38 versus starting next year at a rate of 1.50. I got that information from David Boyd, the Durham Finance Director. I have two questions. Why is it taking this long to issue the bond when the mayor and council have discussed affordable housing even tonight as one of our top priorities? Going so far as to press developers to contribute to affordable housing funds instead of contributing to infrastructure in the areas the developments are being built. And second, given the economic damage COVID has done to many residents, why wouldn't we ask them to pay more this year when the bill isn't even due yet? Why not give them more time to get on their feet? Thank you very much. We don't answer questions as the hearing goes on. We like to hear from everyone, but your questions are duly noted. I'll also say that at the end of the hearing, some council members may have comments and I will take the opportunity to answer that question. So thank you so much. All right, now we'll hear from Hillary Endsfinger. Ms. Endsfinger, I know that you have to use special technology to be heard. Are you able to be heard tonight? I think so. Can you hear me? Yes, welcome. And you also have two minutes. Good evening, everyone. I'm not going to lie to you. I took a lot of inner strength to come forward and speak before you tonight. I'm coming as a disabled person, specifically with vision, a visual disability. And I'm hoping to speak and advocate for a larger community which often is hidden. I know that the city has made inroads and I have been barking and screaming for 15 years. And I did come recently, there were some changes and I thank you all for that to the webs, but there's a lot more that needs to be done. I know Beverly Thompson put forward a note, but it's kind of misleading. There's some misinformation in there. The blind, unlike the physically handicapped have very different and very specific needs. They're completely unique. And as far as I can tell, no budget has been money, has been set aside to address those specific needs. And this is on many levels, health and other issues, healthcare, for example, I'm perfectly physically abled. I don't need somebody to wash me. I can dance, but I can't see a thing. I can see some with assistive technology. I need the kind of help I need when I have somebody come into my house is somebody to help me read or help me pay my bills. There are people who are sighted who go blind in a day and are sent home and the system is not set up properly. It was designed by sighted people who were well-meaning sighted people, but don't know what it is that our needs are. Mostly we need some money set aside to address these needs for the physically handicapped. They're ramps, there's building codes, there's all this sort of stuff with a long range plan. There is no plan for the blind. And I'm asking, please put aside some funding to come up with some plan and with someone to oversee those needs. That's all I have to say. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Ensminger. And we appreciate hearing recently from you at greater length and we are taking this very seriously and appreciate you being here. Thank you. Next, we'll have Larisa Seibel. Ms. Seibel, are you able to be heard? Yes, can you hear me? Yes, welcome. And you also have two minutes. We're glad to have you. Thank you. Ms. Seibel, I'm People's Alliance Housing Action Team. And I just want to summarize some of our requests to fund emergency rental assistance to prevent evictions and homelessness with legal aid and to continue and expand long-time homeowner grants to stabilize property taxes. We need everyone in Durham to keep their homes. The new county tax program will not help all the homeowners who are currently being helped by the city's long-time homeowner grant program. As you know that those neighborhoods were gentrified in part by city development, but there are other neighborhoods in addition to South Side, South West Central Durham and Northeast Central Durham that need help. Homeowners have rising taxes in Waltown, Braggtown, Merrickmore, and other historic African-American communities. And gentrification is a race equity issue that needs to be addressed by the city. We also support Braggtown and other legacy African-American communities in planning and investing in affordable housing, safe streets, sidewalks, transit, and community spaces. And we hope you will also increase transit buses and paratransit vans and staff to meet the needs of people with disabilities who are not being served. People are still waiting for transit to get to dialysis. Other people will be addressing these in more detail. And I appreciate your attention to these issues. Thank you. Ms. Ible, thank you so much for being with us. We're now here for Mr. Jim Savara. Mr. Savara, are you available to be heard? I am, can you hear me? Yes, so we're happy to have you and you also have two minutes. Thank you. I understand that property tax subsidy proposal developed by the county will be presented to you at your budget hearing on Thursday morning. It provides a grant to cover half the property tax bill up to a cap of $750 for households with income up to 30% of the area median income and at least 10 years' residency. The general approach is sound and we are grateful to see that the county recognizes that it can approve a program of this kind. The program would be even stronger if several changes were made. And I encourage you to consider recommending these changes to the county. Last year was difficult for many low-income families, not just the extremely poor and only one household received assistance from the county deferred payment program. The People's Alliance Board and its housing action team recommend that the county expand eligibility to homeowners with up to 60% of the area median income and increase the grant cap to $1,000. The coordinating committee of the Coalition for Affordable Housing and Transit supports these changes and also proposes making owners of habitat houses eligible for grants without the 10-year residency requirement. The county intends to use American Rescue Plan Act funding to cover any costs that are higher than expected for this pilot program that will give us a clear picture of the amount of assistance needed on an ongoing basis but the city's contribution is needed as well. The PA Housing Action Team recommends that the city council also approve extension of a long-time homeowner's grant program of the city for one more year to cover the increased tax paid by homeowners and targeted areas in 2020 when they received help from no other sources. Thank you. Thank you very much, Mrs. Havar. We very much appreciate you being here. We'll now hear from Latasha Gibson and Madam Clerk, after Ms. Gibson, we will hear from Shalisa Howard Martinez, Gina Uppchurch, Janet Betger, and Marie Hill Faizon. So those folks can make themselves ready for their testimony. But first we'll hear from Latasha Gibson. Ms. Gibson, are you able to be heard? Yes, can you hear me? Yes, thank you for being with us and you also have two minutes. Thank you. I'm Adon Kostitut and I'm a chapter leader of Triangle ADOS, which stands for American Decence of Slavery. And my statement is in reference to the increase in property tax as it pertains to gentrification. I have prepared statement, but I'm going to summarize since I have two minutes to talk. So basically I don't think Durham City Council or Durham City is doing enough regards to gentrification and I know other people have spoken on it. But one thing that I or a couple of things that I want to mention pertaining to gentrification is that we do need to look at the history of redlining. Outside of redlining ADOS deals with discrimination in terms of mortgage practice, whether it's pertaining to high interest rates, paperwork being held on to seek out high interest rate or just subprime lending in general. And my proposal, I think Durham City Council needs to do an audit in terms of tracking mortgages practices, doing a comparison in terms of ADOS as relates to looking at assets, credit history and even job history and see how that contrast to other people who have gotten mortgage documents under better terms to see what has been the influence of one's particular lineage or ethnicity. So that is my comments. I do think that the gentrification that is an issue that needs to be addressed, especially given the rate. And other than the gentrification, I don't know whether it relates to the budget, but I think there needs to be research in terms of hiring discrimination, particularly within the IT industry now that the triangle region is a region that's being sought at. We know that companies like Microsoft, Apple and I believe Google have had poor records in terms of black Americans that they hire. So that basically concludes my statement. Thank you, Ms. Gibson. Thank you. Ms. Gibson, thank you very much for being with us and raising those points. Ms. Gibson, I just want you to know that you can email us if you have more lengthier remarks. You can email them to us. I can tell you that I will read them and I know that this is a council that reads its email. And so if you send that to us, we'll be happy to read your lengthier comments. Thank you for being with us. All right, we're now here from Shelisa. Howard Martinez, Ms. Martinez, welcome. Are you available to be heard? Yes, I am. Thank you for having me here today. Thank you so much. Welcome, we're glad to have you and you also have two minutes. Thank you. So I'm here to speak in support of the city of Durham providing funding to implement the Durham master aging plan and the FY 2021-22 budget. We know like the rest of the nation, Durham is experiencing a significant growth in the number of older adults. But we also know this increase in number of adults will have a significant social and economic impact, but it's also an opportunity to embrace older adults as a vital asset. So back in 2019, both the city of Durham and the county of Durham recognized the importance of developing a master aging plan for Durham. And as part of that commitment, they agreed to join the AARP network of age-friendly communities and the rural health organization's global network of age-friendly cities and communities. Led by the Durham partnership for seniors, we over 10-month period in 2019, a multi-sector group of stakeholders, including community-based organizations, public health, Durham City and County government agencies, as well as individual older adults, many of whom are from legacy communities and our long-term Durham residents, develop the plan. And I served as the plan's facilitator. The plan has lots of priorities in it and many of the priorities that have been spoken about already things around housing, concerns around transportation, outdoor spaces and buildings, were part of our planning. We've completed the plan now and we also wanted to include things that looked at special cross-cutting issues that are important to Durham, such as social economic status, racial equity, dementia, LGBTQ issues, social isolation. Now we are ready to implement the plan. We had to delay our implementation because of COVID, but since then, we have continued to work together to collaborate around improving the health of well-being of older adults, particularly during COVID. And so now we're turning towards you and asking you for support and funding initial implementation of the master aging plan. I also wanna say that while this is called a master aging plan, this plan is really about making Durham a more age-friendly community for all ages, races, ethnicities, gender identities and abilities, because we know that when communities become more age-friendly for older adults, that all groups benefit, especially people who have disabilities, families with young children and youth. So that's why I'm asking you tonight to please support implementation of the Durham master aging plan. Thank you. Thank you very much, Ms. Howard Martinez. We appreciate you being with us and thank you for your work on the aging plan. So now I'm here from Gina Upchurch. Ms. Upchurch, are you available to be heard? I am, thank you so much. We're glad to have you and you also have two minutes. Thanks for being here. Wonderful. First of all, thank you all for your service. You do a tremendous job for our city. I'm Gina Upchurch and I'm the Executive Director of Senior Pharmacist, but I'm actually here tonight on behalf of many, many agencies that have signed a letter to support the master aging plan that you should have all received the actual master aging plan as well as the people who sign on to endorse it. There are many, when you read, if you had a chance to look at the document, many times it'll say the Durham's Partnership for Seniors or the Durham Community Resource Connections for Aging and Disabilities. And I just want you to know it's a very loose connection of agencies doing the best we can to try to work together. We have a 12 hour per week coordinator, but that is it. So we're trying to formalize our work together. During COVID, many of the folks have been gathering. We started out by helping people who we knew were going through scary and isolating times. It was called Durham's Partnership for Seniors and more COVID response. And we actually got a lot of things done during these scary times. We are now proposing to merge many of these groups together to create a nonprofit organization to implement the master aging plan. And we want to do it using the principles of an accountable care community. Central to that is making sure the individuals most affected by the issues are helping steer the work. That includes individuals from more marginalized communities that have often been excluded from planning. We want it to be transparent. We want to use our racial equity framework and we wanna hold each other accountable for moving forward together. We're trying not to reinvent wheels, but to get the Durham wheels supporting older adults and adults with disabilities going in the same direction. We want a coordinated system that can leverage many opportunities that come our way. Why should you trust us? Because we get things done. During COVID, we managed to get a Durham grant. It was just $50,000. Senior pharmacist was the fiscal agent. We hired 24 community health workers and a coordinator. And it was very impactful and meaningful work where we had natural champions speaking to their neighbors and friends. And we did it with many community partners, Project Access, the Durham Housing Authority, Inhunger, Durham, El Centro Espano, Community Health Coalition and Care of the Healing Place. This is what we're asking you and the Durham County to each contribute $150,000 a year for two years to help get this work formalized and moving forward. We need to be intentional, not playing whack-a-mole with one program at a time, but building a coordinated system that also goes upstream to change policies, procedures, and cultures that are hurting or at least not helping our older neighbors, especially from, again, marginalized or excluded communities. Thank you very much. We appreciate hearing from you, Ms. Upchurch. Thank you. All right. Next, we will hear from Janet Betker. Ms. Betker, are you available to be heard? Yes, I am. And thank you for this opportunity. My name is Dr. Thank you. And you also have two minutes. Thank you. My name is Dr. Janet Betker and I'm an associate professor at Duke University in the schools of medicine and nursing. And I'm the director of the Duke Roybal Center on Aging Research and Evidence Implementation. I wanna acknowledge how much we value our academic community partnership and particularly the engagement with the city and the county. With input from the city and county agencies, community members, many community-based organizations, as you've just heard, a Durham Master Aging Plan was established with 33 goals in nine areas. These areas are critical to the health of our community. And I was really pleased to hear them raised in so many different discussions already today. We're asking for your support now to operationalize this plan because recognizing that we each bring unique expertise and resources and assets, we can have a different approach if we come at this coordinated and together. Having these assets and resources coordinated toward improved health equity, we'd be able to provide Durham a stronger foundation from which to build because with your support and intention to operationalize this plan, we as academic partners could more equitably bring forward additional opportunities for funding, program development, implementation and evaluation. We had a couple of opportunities, particularly during COVID, but because of the loose and somewhat informal infrastructure that we had to build from, it was really challenging to choose just one organization to leverage funding for a partnership that spans so many different groups. And that really impacted our community more broadly. Duke University has the oldest and only continuously funded center on aging that was actually first established by the Surgeon General in 1955. And we now have hundreds of faculty, staff and community and clinical collaborators that want to continue to partner with the Durham community. So I'm here to request and speak to the need for Durham City and County to have a collaborative focused on aging because the issues and opportunities are larger than any one of our organizations or offices. With your support, we would all be stronger together for addressing health inequities as we age. Thanks for this opportunity. Ms. Betker, thank you very much. Dr. Betker, thank you very much for being with us. We appreciate you being with us tonight. And I want to assure you all and everyone here who's speaking that we are listening hard and we very much appreciate what you're bringing to us. All right, next we will have Marie-Hill Faizon. Ms. Faizon will be followed by Meg Librand, Donald Quick and Michael Reynolds. And first we'll begin with Marie-Hill Faizon. Ms. Faizon, welcome. We're glad to have you. Can you be heard? Thank you. Can you hear me? Yes, welcome. And you also have two minutes. We're glad to have you. I'm glad to be here. And I just wanted to speak on behalf of the transit and the paratransit service that we provide here in Durham. I'm just asking that the budget would allow an expansion of buses and vans and also bus stops to improve service and to improve the safety of the people. We've had, we could do so much better in that area. And I don't know how that's gonna filter down. I'm a paratransit driver and I have been for 19 years and that's a long time. And I've been advocating those years. And I hold my head up high because I represent a group of people that are proud of the service that they provide to the community and would like to see it improve. And I would ask that we have an oversight committee and more transparency as far as how things are ran and who purchases things for our community to use. This is equipment as mentioned before by Ms. Insminger that needs to service the people with a special needs. And from my experience, we don't have that. I don't know, you've got people that don't have special needs picking out equipment. And it's not working for the people that are servicing the community. And so if we can get an oversight committee to look at possibly picking out the equipment and when purchasing it, and that it's just not under the table deal and somebody's pockets are being lined for this particular thing. Because I can't understand why we get, we love the new. Thank you very much, Ms. Faizon. We really appreciate you being with us. And we also really appreciate your service as a paratransit driver. You've done it for a long time and I've heard many times from you about this. I just wanna thank you for your great work. All right, next we will hear from Meg Librand. Ms. Librand, are you available to be heard? I am and actually I'm Meg's husband but that's whose name is on our Zoom account. So that's what we put in there. My name's here. So I forgive me if I am out of place in terms of out of place, excuse me, in terms of the agenda item, but I read an article that talked about the city council's plan to move up to 15 police positions to- Sir, excuse me one second. You're fine talking about that item but can you tell us your name first? Yes, I'm sorry. My name is Brett Librand. Great, Mr. Librand, welcome. That's perfectly good topic and you all have two minutes. We're glad to have you with us. Thank you and thank you all for the good work that you do. I know you have a tough job but I wanted to express concern about that plan to move up to 15 police positions to a community engagement team simply because of what's been addressed tonight already the rise in violent crime. In fact, just near our house over the last three months, we've had one shooting about a half mile away. We just this past week had a neighbor whose door was kicked in by a group of folks in the middle of the day. They shot up the downstairs of their house by God's grace. No one was down there but apparently there was a two year old and a caregiver upstairs. And so anyway, it concerns me to think that with growing crime and a growing city that we would reduce the number of police officers that we have. Now, I don't think that we don't need to have conversations about policing and how we do that well but to put funds into an untried plan, I don't think as wise. And so I wanted to raise that concern. I know that Chief Davis, I think of several years ago asked for more officers and was not granted that. It would seem to me the wisest move going forward would be to think about how to increase police presence. I know I'm a pastor of a church and several of our members live in underserved sides of town. They want increased police presence instead of not. So that just wanted to bring that to you all's attention. As a citizen of Durham, that concerns me and I don't think decreasing the number of positions as wise at this point, especially for a program that's not tried yet. Not that it shouldn't be tried but I don't think it should be tried with funds that would normally be available for the police department. Thank you. Mr. Library, and thank you for being with us tonight and we very much appreciate your remarks. Next, we will hear from Donald Quick. Madam Clerk, can you make Donald Quick available to be heard? Mr. Quick, are you able to be heard? Mr. Mayor, there's no Donald Quick in the queue. Okay. I know Michael Reynolds is here. Can you make Mr. Reynolds available to be heard? Mr. Reynolds, I believe you can be heard. Are you with us? Yes, can you hear me? Yes, we're glad to have you and welcome and you also have two minutes. Yes, I want to say thank y'all for having me on tonight. My name is Michael Reynolds. I'm at General Services at Maplewood and Beechwood Cemetery and I just want to make a couple of issues known that first of all, thank y'all for the bonuses that we're gonna receive. And it's really been a tough year working through the pandemic. We have been, unfortunately, we have not had no days off from the pandemic versus a lot of folks was off, maybe the first two, three, two months or whatever. You know, we bury people so we don't get no time off. We work mostly six, seven days a week. And with that said, that we're pre on the hazard premium pay is appreciated and deeply needed to retain some of the staff and recognize our service for what we do. And speaking on behalf of other city departments, we deserve to be recognized and for the hard work that we do because even though we should be equally, I don't know why we're not equally to the police department and fire department because when we get raises, they get a step more than we do. And I thought that we was on a step plan which we are behind on our step plan because we got no raise last year. So that's basically what I'm speaking on and speaking about the gun violence. As me working over there at Lakewood and over Beachwood cemetery. On just a couple of weeks ago, we seen somebody get killed and shot across from the cemetery. Two days later on a Saturday, that was a Wednesday on a Saturday. We had a funeral service, a birthday funeral home. And right during the service, while people was at the grieving, they had another shootout and drive by in the same place. So we feel, you know what I'm saying? Every day that we work, that we got to watch our backs and you know, and we're about, if we're going to get hit by a bullet because all the violence that's going on. So that's just my concerns and everything. Mr. Reynolds, thank you so much. We really appreciate you being with us. Let me say first of all, how much I appreciate you and the work that you do at the cemetery. You've always been incredibly dedicated to that work and I want to thank you. And in terms of the premium pay, again, I'll adjust that at the conclusion of the public hearing and can talk about what we have included in our budget. But thank you for being here. All right, Madam Clerk, we'll now hear from Stephanie Burrell, followed by Barbara Jacobs, followed by Nina Plosek, followed by Carmen Kwan. And I apologize if I'm getting those names wrongs or friends, but we'll begin first with Stephanie Burrell. Ms. Burrell, are you available to be heard? Ms. Burrell, are you with us tonight? Mr. Mayor, I don't see a Stephanie Burrell in the queue. All right, thank you, Madam Clerk. Madam Clerk, I want to thank you for all the management you do this process. It is hard and you do a great job both before the meeting and during the meeting. And I want to thank you. And also to our Deputy Clerk, Ashley Wyatt, thank you so much. We're now going to move to Barbara Jacobs. Ms. Jacobs, are you available to be heard? I am available. We're glad to have you, Ms. Jacobs. Thank you for being here and you also have two minutes. I'm very concerned about the proposed property tax increase. Two cents sounds like a very small increase, but it is a 3.8% increase in property taxes for the city of Durham. Plus the County of Durham has proposed 1.4% for a total 5.2% increase. The city council seems to think that they can pass whatever spending bills they desire and then use the taxpayers of Durham as a cash register to fund the spending. The tax increase should be limited to 1%. Remember, these tax increases impact everyone, not just property owners, but renters too. Landlord will increase rents to offset the increased property taxes. Are you proposing that we send unarmed mental health workers to a minor traffic accident when one of the drivers may overreact and pull a gun out of his car? Or send them to confront a panhandler who may have a hidden knife? And we have already seen a welfare check literally blow up in the face of police. It is a team effort and we need both police and mental health workers. I would suggest we pilot a small plan to send mental health workers out alone. The city manager has suggested moving only five police vacancies to the new department. This is a reasonable plan. We had a wonderful police chief, but the council turned down nearly every request she made. Will this make it more difficult to find a replacement? Do we have trouble filling vacancies because police recruits hesitate to join a city police force that is being continually reduced? Now, how else can we moderate this large property tax increase? The budget document states that salaries and benefits are projected to grow four and a half to 5%, a rapid increase. Salaries and benefits represent 40% of the budget. Could each department or area cut 1% of its workforce? 99% would remain. We can't spend whatever we like, unfortunately. To end on a more positive note, I have a suggestion for a new source of revenue. Transfer tax is charged whenever a piece of real estate is sold. The state of North Carolina charges zero point. Thank you very much for being with us, Ms. Jacobs. If you have further comments, please email them to us. We will read them. We're happy to get them. And thank you for being with us tonight. Unfortunately, transfer taxes, we're not able to charge that in the state of North Carolina. Localities are not able to levy those taxes. All right, next we will hear from Nina Plosek. Ms. Plosek, have I pronounced your name correctly? Ms. Plosek, are you with us? Madam Clerk, do we see Ms. Plosek in the queue? Yes, she's in the queue and she's been approved to speak. All right, Ms. Plosek, can you unmute yourself? Are you able to hear me now? Yes, we are. Okay, great. Hi, my name is Nina Plosek. I live in Northgate Park in Durham and I work as a licensed clinical social worker with queer and trans individuals and families. As both a survivor of domestic abuse and a trained mental health provider, I've witnessed firsthand the violence that comes with policing in previous professional roles and through my own politicization and lived experience. I've also experienced the healing that can happen when we work together to build alternatives and reimagine community care. Not only do we need to begin divesting from police departments and reallocating funds, we also need to stretch ourselves in our imaginations to create community programs that respond appropriately to interpersonal conflict, drug abuse and other crises. Peer support programs, harm reduction efforts, community crisis centers, mutual aid efforts and educational initiatives are some places to start. Reallocating a small but significant portion of public funding is a place to start. During my time as an advocate in recent college grad, many years ago, I had my first experience of learning proper care and de-escalation strategies at the community center where I worked. As I watched the mental health response team tend to a psychiatric crisis without relying on police or other tactics rooted in power and control, something shifted inside of me. I wish we could revisit this moment in my memory together because it shaped me in ways I didn't know were possible at the time. The individual experiencing distress may have been characterized as unsafe or unpredictable through a different lens or in another setting. What I do know is that they were profoundly scared, disconnected and in need of support. I was struck by the care worker's methodical, thoughtful approach and how mutuality, respect and self-determination were at the forefront of their practice. Simply asking what happened and what you need to feel safe can provide the foundation for connecting an individual to emotional, practical and interpersonal resources they might need. I hope it's clear that I'm speaking to urge you to reallocate the police officer vacancy positions to the Department of Community Safety and Wellness to hire unarmed skilled responders. We simply can't remain complicit any longer and every one of us deserves to feel safe and cared for. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Plosek. Thank you so much for being with us. Colleagues, Council Member Middleton has suggested and I agree, just that I inform everyone that the two-minute limit is a hard limit. When we're in the council chambers, there's a clock that we can go by and that I can watch and I can call time on people. That's not available here. So the clerk will be cutting you off after two minutes not to be rude, but to be fair. The only way we can be fair to people is if everybody gets the same amount of time. If you have longer comments, please, I beg you, send them to us. We are happy to hear them. We are good at reading more complex things and you can hear in two or three minutes and we would welcome anything further that you have to add. All right. We will now move to Carmen Kwan. Have I pronounced your name correctly? Yes, you have. Great. We're glad for you to be here. Welcome and you have two minutes. Thank you. My name is Carmen Kwan. I'm a bike Durham board member and advocacy committee chair. Thanks for this opportunity to comment on the budget and the capital improvement program. Bike Durham advocates for a transportation system that is safe, affordable and sustainable for everyone. We want to express our support for the following items in the proposed budget that align with this vision. Extending fare free transit through June, 2022, funding and additional position in the transportation department to manage transit projects so that more projects to improve safe access and schedule reliability can be completed more quickly. An initiative to complete a vision zero action plan and deliver on speed management projects. Vision zero was adopted as a policy by this council in 2017. Yet an action plan has not yet been adopted. We are concerned about the staff's capacity to complete a vision zero action plan this year without new funding for a full time dedicated vision zero coordinator. Over the past three years from 2018 to 2020, since the vision zero policy was adopted, the rate of pedestrian deaths in Durham has more than doubled. Seeing vision zero achieved will require dedicated staff. With regards to the capital improvement program, we want to express support for the additional half cent dedicated for equitable green infrastructure projects. We support a review of the projects to be funded to ensure that they are advancing racial equity in Durham. We further support the council discussion to focus the projects on construction of sidewalks, trails and other projects to make walking and biking and access to transit safe. Finally, we see this funding as a down payment toward a larger funding package to create Durham wide networks of safe walking and biking facilities in support of the city's strategic plan. Thank you again for this opportunity to speak on the proposed budget and the capital improvement program. Thank you so much, Ms. Quarner. We appreciate you very much for being with us. Thank you. And again, I want to reiterate, we're listening on all these subjects and we're very, very appreciative. Next speakers will be in order, Ashley Robbins, Nancy Hupplitzel, David Morgan and Herman Spurling. Ashley Robbins, Nancy Hupplitzel, David Morgan and Herman Spurling and Madam Clerk, could you make Ashley Robbins available to be heard? He has time. Are you with us? I am, can you hear me? Yes, thank you. Welcome and you have two minutes. We're glad to have you. Thank you. I'll make my comments brief. I just wanted to show my support for diverting the police positions to the community safety wellness task force and just express that I think it's incredibly unfair to continuously ask organizations to demonstrate certain outcomes with a fraction of the financial resources that we provide to the police. We have vacancies in the police department, which is indicative of a national problem. So people don't even want to be police at this point. So I think it's time we take some of those funds and invest into the people. Thank you. Thank you so much for being with us. We really appreciate it. Our next speaker will be Nancy Hupplitzel. I'm sorry if I have got your name wrong and maybe you could tell us how it is pronounced and we're glad to have you. Are you available to be heard? I am and I thank you. It's Hablitzel and you got closer than most people. Okay. Welcome and you have two minutes. We're really glad to have you. Thank you. I'm glad to be here. And I first I want to thank all of you for the work you do. I'm on our HOA board here and I know really what it takes to respond to people on a daily basis, whether you want to or not. I'm a member of the Leesville Road Coalition. It's an alliance of approximately 4,000 potential voters from communities all over Southeast Durham expanding on a daily basis. Our focus is to identify issues of common interest and engage the city and county officials in dialogue to make all of Durham a safer, more secure community. And I will preface this by saying that we moved here from Chicago. So when I see some of the things that are going on now with juvenile crime in particular and the shootings in Durham, I'm basically horrified because it's stuff that we left behind us, we thought. And because I worked in the juvenile court system there, I got to see this on a daily basis. My concern is the 70 open positions on the Durham Police Department. City is planning a signing bonus and a 4% raise to attract candidates and retain existing staff. But with a salary that is $11,000 lower than caries and that's the second lowest paid police department, how are we going to attract and keep the best and the brightest? Particularly at a time when we've just lost our very wonderful police chief and we'll be looking to recruit another one. And my other encouragement would be because of my experience in Illinois with the social workers getting shot when they went out without police, think carefully about where it is that you send unarmed people without a police backup. Thank you. Thank you very much for being with us. We very much appreciate your comments. All right, next we'll hear from David Morgan to be followed by Herman Spirling and then Chris Titus. Mr. Morgan, are you available to be heard? Yes, Mr. Mayor, can you hear me? Yes, welcome, we're glad to have you and you also have two minutes. Okay, thank you. Thank you, Mr. Mayor and the members of the city council. I'm also a member of that Leesville Coalition. I'm also a planning commission member appointed by the county and representing the Oak Grove Township. As part of the staff's efforts in updating and applying this Durham comprehensive plan, the planning commission is embarked on small area plans such as Southeast Durham and Brighttown and since development is skyrocketing and planning is needed in these areas. From reading the initial draft and actually attending some of the small area meetings, there's a clear bias in the resident engagement survey response and whether they're included or discounted those recommendations. The study has no additional activity beyond September, 2021 and the comments have made that the study is to help city council and city county planning to evaluate zoning better. Compared to Brighttown, the study seems to be void of extensive community involvement, especially in this area. And the perception is that the community is properly representative. What we're seeing is that there was a lot of emails in Brighttown that actually put a halt to some of this development to be able to better understand the neighborhood. And we're seeing a similar type of involvement here in Southeast Durham. Certainly most of the demographics of our community is over 55 and many are recent transplants like Nancy had mentioned, coming from other areas of the country, but it is a developing community in the last six or seven years. If you come to our Fridays at five, you can see there's a really growing group of community there. And certainly we are open to inclusive this and diversity in that, but we believe that these approved and potential new developments are really going to defeat that purpose. So the value of this study with more community involvement would help provide the direction for this growing Southeast Durham community. I Googled the word equitable in the 2021-22 budget and it came up 42 times. And so I really don't see what we need. Mr. Morgan, thank you for your comments. If you have further comments, we would be happy to receive them by email. We're glad to have you and we appreciate your being here. All right, we'll now hear from Herman Sperling to be followed by Chris Titus and then Pete Turner. Mr. Sperling, are you available to be heard? Hi, I'm sorry about that. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem. Thanks to members of the city council. I'll call you Steve because as you retire, we're going to spend more time together. I'm looking forward to talking about grandkids together. I am also a member of the Leesville coalition where so far we have 4,000 members, we expect that to increase to about 6,000 likely voters by the time the primaries roll around. And also I chair our Board of Government Affairs here in Carolina Harbors. We have vacancies on the 9-11 staff and there have been recent reports about the need to forward calls to Raleigh to handle those calls. As best we can tell, the plan is to take staff levels back to the pre-COVID levels. That said, the proposed program for enhanced public safety will complicate 9-11. As instead of just EMS, fire or police, it will now have to figure out if it's EMS, fire, unarmed police, armed police, mental health or mental health with police escorts. Doesn't 9-11 need more funding to be able to support the plans that are being proposed in this budget? Mr. Sparrowling, I'm having a hard time hearing you. Does that complete your comments? Yes, sir. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. We appreciate that. We very much appreciate that input. We'll now hear from Chris Titus to be followed by Pete Turner and then Camilla Faust. So, Chris Titus, Pete Turner and then Camilla Faust. We'll begin with Mr. Chris Titus. It's Chris Titus. Is that Mr. Maynard? Mr. Maynard, do you want to pause for the nine o'clock? Yes, I do. Let's hear from Mr. Titus and then we'll do that. Thank you, Council Member. Yes, thank you so much. Mr. Chris Titus with us? Mr. Mayor, no. Mr. Titus is not in the queue. All right. Council Member Freeland and also Deputy Clerk Wyatt have both reminded me that we take a break after two hours for our closed caption folks to be able to rest. And so we're going to do that now. We are going to take a five minute break. We will be back sharp at nine o'five and the first speaker when we come back will be Pete Turner. So, colleagues, remember to turn off your microphones. We are still on the air. Thank you. All right, good evening. We're back again from our brief break to give our closed captioners a rest. I want to say how much we appreciate our closed captioners and the work that they do to help make our meeting successful. We're so appreciative. Our next speaker is Pete Turner. Is Mr. Turner available to be heard? Mr. Mayor, there's no Mr. Turner in the queue. All right, thank you, Madam Clerk. Next we have Camilla Faust. Is Ms. Faust available to be heard? Mr. Mayor, Ms. Faust is calling in. Okay. She needs to dial star six to unmute herself. All right. Ms. Faust, have you been able to do that? Yes, I believe you're unmuted now. Can we hear you? Yes, hello. Welcome, we're glad to have you and you also have two minutes, welcome. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor and City Council members. My name is Camilla Faust and I'm a representative from Southside Live Here Association. And I just like to speak about the Long-Town Homeowners Tax Grant for the Southside because majority of the people, majority of the Long-Town homeowners are seniors with a fixed income and also the neighbors that justified also throughout the city. My main concern is are we going to continue or do an expansion for the Long-Town Homeowner Grant? Mine is very brief. Thank you, Ms. Faust, brief but to the point and thank you so much. We very much appreciate you being with us. All right, our next speakers will be in this order, Benita Green, Waldo Finner, Marcus Southern and Vanessa Evans. Ms. Green, are you with us? And can you be heard? Ms. Green, Benita Green, are you with us? I see that you are, can you be heard? Ms. Green, you're unmuted, can you speak? Well, we'll come back and see if Ms. Green wants to speak later. We'll now move to Waldo Finner. Madam Clerk, can you make, Mr. Finner, it looks like you're available to be heard. Can you be heard? I'm not sure. I'm not sure. We'll be heard, can you be heard? I can hear you, can you hear me? Yes, we can. Thank you, welcome. And you also have two minutes. Thank you for being here. All right, let me be very brief. We keep talking about property tax of this grant. If the county and the city got together and did a proper assessment of property tax, we won't have to do these grants. We should have come to the city council or county begging for relief when our property taxes haven't been assessed properly in the first place. Think about this. How does a home increase in value of a hundred and some thousand dollars in one year? There's no way. And this is what's going on in every neighborhood in the city of Durham. If we can make those adjustments and change that platform, then we'll have to do all these grants. That's one. Two, they talk about the police department. Well, how about telling them to stop standing in the parking lot, chit chatting all the time of the day and night and do their job? Answer 911 calls within a timely frame manner and not an hour to three hours later. I would miss Johnson on that. I haven't seen anything they've done to get a raise or to hire even more police officers. There's no need. As far as the shock dictator, you've got enough people in the city of Durham that can call in when they hear gunshots fire. And half that is not gunshots. They're messing with these cars. That's backfire. Just yesterday, it wasn't so bad going loud. Almost made me hit a pole, a bridge over here on a guest road. Guest road. So it's not so much as if people have to come out here and beg so much is that we elected you all officials to appropriately use the funds that you've been given to you. And you're not doing that. You're not doing that. It's unfair. Third is that the light rail, go to the county commissioners and ask them, what have they done with over $180 million taxpayer money and not have accounted for it? If you do these things, then you can understand, put the money toward other things. Mr. Feather, thank you for being with us. I do wanna say that all the tax assessment is done by county government. So I think the city doesn't have a role in that. I appreciate your comments on that and please address them to your county commissioners. Those are important comments. It looks like Ms. Green's microphone is working now. I see in the chat, Madam Clerk, can you make Ms. Benita Green available to be heard? Hello, can you hear me? Yes, we can Ms. Green. We're glad to have you with us. And you also have two minutes. Okay, thank you very much. And thank you for allowing me to this time to speak this evening. I am here supporting the Walltown's proposal for the City Long-time Home Omen Grant Program. And I'm also asking that this program be available to assist, you know, Meritmo Community, Braggtown Community, and all of the heritage historically black communities in Durham, these communities have residents that have basically worked to develop the city, to bring a sense of community and family to this city. And now with recent developments, their homes are being placed, they're being put at risk, they're being put in harm's way. They're having being displaced and they can't afford to live in Durham. And, you know, these people have been paying their taxes. So we should be concerned about the human element when we're developing and the lives that are being put under pressure. So I'm asking that we, you know, you know, include this and vote in favor for that Walltown Long-time Home Omen or Assistance Program. And also I would like to say, as far as police go, is that I feel we need to take a look at this as not divesting in the police with Durham, growing as a metropolis, we're gonna need the police force even more. I see it that we need to retrain the officers from their current practices. And I think we need to go back to a community policing system. You know, with the crime rising, we need our police force, but they need to be retrained. Okay, thank you very much. And I appreciate your time. Ms. Green, thank you. We so appreciate you for being here with us tonight. Next, we'll hear from Marcus Southern, followed by Vanessa Evans and Shanice Hamilton. So first we'll hear from Marcus Southern. Mr. Southern, are you available to be heard? Yes, sir. Thank you for being with us and you also have two minutes. Thank you. I wanna thank the council members for their time this evening. I'd also like to congratulate Tom Miller. This evening, I urge the city council to expand the city's long-time homeowners grant to the Walltown neighborhood. The city is undergoing a massive transition as many of us have observed. Durham County, I believe, was the fourth-fastest growing county in the United States. However, the rapid expansion of the city has not been without growing pains. The influx of newcomers to Durham has driven up the price of real estate in town. This in turn has led to a sudden doubling and even tripling of property taxes for long-term residents in the city over the last five years. And this will continue to accelerate. The abrupt rise in property tax threatens to push out many long-term residents. And I ask the council to recognize the historic moment we are in. Inaction will surely hasten the displacement of long-term residents and accelerate the destruction of historic black communities like Walltown. I'd also like to remind council members Johnson and Mayor Shul that you actually met myself and other members of the Walltown community association in Northgate Mall's food court well over a year ago where we asked for this grant to be extended to the Walltown neighborhood. And another year has passed and many long-term residents grasp on their homes has become even more tenuous. So I hope you all seize this opportunity to extend the grant to the Walltown neighborhood. And with this grant, the city can preserve at our estimates nearly $12 million of black and native Durham wealth. And thank you. Thank you very much, Mr. Southern. I appreciate your being with us tonight. Again, we're listening to all your comments. We take them very seriously and we're grateful for them. Now we'll be hearing from Vanessa Evans followed by Shanice Hamilton and Julia Springer. Madam clerk, can you make Vanessa Evans available to be heard? Good evening Mayor Shul and city council members. Ms. Evans, thank you for being with us. And you also have two minutes. We're glad to have you. Thank you. First like to say we the Bradtown community association on support of Merrickmore and the Walltown community and all black communities that have been underserved here in Durham. We ask that the city and the County of Durham be transparent in what they are doing within the black, brown and indigenous communities of Durham. Let communities know what's going on when we have problems with developers not one to engage with communities. And they want to come in and develop within the communities that they're working in. I'd like to see that displacement stops long life, long residents, hardworking residents of Durham taken out of their homes and to have a system where people are paid living wages. And this way people can be able to pay for their homes and stay in the spaces in which they live. Bradtown wants a guarantee that there will be affordable housing in our area after raising taxes in all black communities of 100 to 300%. It is time that we get back what taxes have been taken from us. You all have stated that y'all are wanting to raise a two cent tax, but we haven't even used the previous buying monies of affordable housing. But then you're wanting more monies from residents that are still in the same fixed income or dealing with the pandemic that was still in but not out of it yet. From 2010 to now over $64 million has been taken out of taxes out of just Bradtown residents. We would like to see some of that money put back into our community as well as other communities that have been underserved and they too can go to data works to find out their information of how much taxes have been taken out of their community. Durham speaks of equitable services to all communities but whereas the true equitability in Durham. Ms. Evans, thank you for being with us tonight. We very much appreciate it. All right, now we'll hear from Shanice Hamilton. Ms. Hamilton, are you available to be heard? I am. Thank you for being with us tonight and you also have two minutes. Okay, thank you. So I would just like to clarify the city demands for a team to transform is to reallocate the currently vacant 10% of the DPD police officer positions to the department of safety and wellness and invest in unarmed roles for responding unarmed folks to respond to 911 calls specifically mental health calls and traffic stops. And so there's over 60 vacancies right now for sworn officers in the police department. We're asking for the funding for those 60 vacancies to be reallocated to the department of safety and wellness and hire unarmed compassionate care responders. We're not asking to move actual police officers from DPD to the department of safety and wellness. Our goal is to actually create more safety measures for our community and please do not keep us safe. Also please do not stop crying. Also just want to share that like you have no idea how many times I jumped on my own child because I hear the gunshots and they're literally right outside my window. And I'm like terrified that one of those bullets will come through my bedroom wall one of these days. I've also had a start to meet against me. I was more afraid to call the police and deal with the situation as is. And yet I still believe that we need to divert from policing and invest in care in our community and so do so many of our residents. I shared my lived experiences and meetings with city council members. I also know that there's stuff going on in the streets because our folks are struggling and in need of help. Our community has the resources that, if we have the resources that we actually need to get folks, like the help that they need, stable housing, resources, food, insurance, medical, health, transportation, like all of the basic needs, like our community would be better situated to thrive. Bringing a more surveillance to neighborhoods that are already being over-policed is not the answer ever. We are tired of living in fear. As far like the work that we've done with this campaign, we've met with each member of city council, each of you, as well as our city, as well. Ms. Hamilton, thank you for being with us. We have heard from you previously and we'd welcome hearing from you again. Thank you so much for being with us tonight. And if you have further comments that you'd like to extend, please feel free to write them to us. We'd be happy to read them. Now we'll hear from Julia Springer, followed by John Milazo and then Jacqueline Wagstaff. Is Ms. Springer available to be heard? Mr. Mayor, Ms. Springer is not in the queue. All right. How about Mr. Milazo? Is John Milazo here? Yes, he is, Mr. Mayor. Mr. Milazo, can you be heard? Mr. Milazo? Mr. Mayor, he's no longer here. No longer here, okay. Thank you. Ms. Wagstaff, Ms. Jacqueline Wagstaff. Ms. Wagstaff, are you available to be heard? Madam Clerk, is Ms. Wagstaff still with us? Yes, I'm here. Can you hear me? Yes, Ms. Wagstaff, thank you for being here and you also have two minutes. Okay, thank you, Mr. Mayor. Good afternoon, Mr. Mayor and council members. Let me just start by saying one thing about this notion that Durham does not need more law enforcement. That's got to be one of the most acidine notions that I've heard in a long time. I had the privilege of just two weeks ago standing in the middle of the street with a mother who lost her 26-year-old son who laid in the street for six hours with her watching him. And I didn't see one of those mental health people there. I'm sorry, Mr. Mayor, I'll call her back. We lost her, Madam Clerk. Yes, noting, I just want to take a moment and appreciate former council member Wagstaff's service to this board and also to the Durham Public Schools Board. Thank you, council member. We're gonna just wait until we can get Ms. Wagstaff back. She needs to unmute herself. All right, Ms. Wagstaff, could you unmute yourself? Ms. Wagstaff, are you back with us? Can you unmute yourself? I'm muted, and then, hello? There you go. Yes, we can hear you. Thank you, and you can go ahead and start again. You have two minutes. Thanks for being with us. Okay, Mr. Mayor, it's always a pleasure and an honor to be in your presence. Thank you, always a pleasure. Always, but to go back to my previous statement, I think it is the most acid-dying notion to think that Durham does not need police officers. One of the things that I'm clear on, I know these streets very well, and just about two weeks ago, I had the privilege, and I wouldn't even say it was an honor, but to stand in the middle of the street with a mother whose son had just walked around the corner on his way to work, and he was murdered in the streets at the same time that your group was discussing cutting the police budget. Now, my understanding is that when we have these incidents that occur in Durham, I don't think anybody's gonna be called in mental health workers or unarmed civilians to come to these type of incidents. I wouldn't call an unarmed civilian to even go to a traffic violation, because those incidents can turn volatile in a matter of seconds, and you have to have someone there that has the authority. When you create these positions, who's gonna be responsible for the authority that has to be given to these people when they show up at these incident, and then something occurs that gets out of hand, and then they're lost students? Who's gonna assume the liability? All of these questions have not been answered yet. And to hear four members of this council pledge a commitment of 20, getting rid of 20 positions this year, 20 next year, and 20 in the third year, just it makes my skin crawl to believe that if you were looking at what I see in these streets from these people that are suffering every day at the hands of the crime that's going on, and we say we don't need law enforcement to help us out, there has to be something wrong with your mental psyche. But if you wanna invest in something, start investing in these youth. Start putting some of these youth programs back together that we had years ago that kept our kids out of the street and kept the guns out of their hands. We have to do that. We have five people shot at 2 a.m. on Fayetteville Street. Thank you very much, Ms. Wackstaff. Thank you for being with us. And if you have further comments, please feel free to email us. We are happy to hear them. We'll now hear from Danielle Doman, or Doman, I'm not sure how that's pronounced, Madam Clerk, could you make Danielle Doman available to be heard? Can you hear me? Yes, we can. Thank you for being with us and you have two minutes. Perfect, thank you so much. I'm speaking in support of two items this evening, the long-time homeowner's association program and funding for transit. So as a well-town resident, I urge all of you to add well-town to the long-time homeowner's association program and ensure that there are sufficient funding not only for this year, but for years to come for income eligible residents. NC Data Works estimates that just an investment of $100,000 will protect long-time homeowners in the historic well-town community that as you are well aware, and as others have said, is under ongoing threats from unchecked development and justification. So including well-town in the program is one way that you all, that city council, can take meaningful action to support my neighbors. And I agree with a previous speaker that the assistant cap should be raised since the average long-term homeowner of color in well-town, again, according to NC Data Works, saw their property tax at least doubled from 1,500 to an average of 3,000 in just past three years. So a $700 grant is not enough. A related request for more updates and transparency around what actions taking place on the affordable housing bond since it was passed in November, 2019, there's been very little publicly available information. And finally, I urge you to please invest in transportation that is safe, affordable, accessible and sustainable by extending free transit for the next year through June of 2022, funding, staffing that's needed for associated projects and also committing those resources to end pedestrian deaths and develop and implement a vision zero action plan. Thanks for your time. Thank you, Ms. Doman. We appreciate you being with us. Thank you so much. We'll now hear from Donald Hughes and Mr. Hughes will be followed by Charlida Burrus. Mr. Hughes, thank you for being with us. Are you able to be heard? Yes, I am here. And I just wanted to take a moment of personal privilege to ask about accessibility. I tried to open the closed captioning feature on the Zoom and I'm not seeing that option. So I would just encourage you all to think about that for future meetings, for those that might be hearing impaired or have other disabilities. Thank you. All right. Well, good evening, Mr. Mayor and members of the council. I'm going to keep this pretty direct. Over my last three decades living in the city, I'd have to say that this is probably the most disappointed I've been in our elected members of the Durham City Council. I have sent multiple emails to the council regarding the FY21-22 proposed budget and ideas that I think could address the many social ills that are plaguing our city. Only one council member has responded to my email and that is council member DeGreionna Freeman. And I've tried through multiple mediums to reach council members, Jillian, Javier, Charlie and Mr. Pierce Freeline, but I've gotten no response. I've even gone to Zoom meetings and sent direct messages to these council members and still receive no response. I guess we live in a time where council members choose to ignore those constituents who they feel don't agree with them on the issues of the day. But tonight I'm here to request that the council really considers adding more funds to the Youth Works program, the summer jobs program for our young people. Currently a mere 550,000 is proposed for the program only providing summer employment opportunities to less than 500 youth in Durham to gain much needed employment and job skills. While there seems to be a singular focus from council members, Johnson, Javier, Reese and Pierce to take money away from local law enforcement, which I think is a reactive response, I have not seen much innovative thought from the same council members in the way of proactive solutions that provide opportunities for black and brown youth in our community. We must do better and we can do better. Research shows that summer youth employment correlates and is particularly effective in reducing violent crimes such as gun violence, something that we know Durham knows a lot about recently. I encourage you all to read my proposal, which has the support of local community members and state representative Hawkins and vote to double the youth employment program to $1 million provided in about a thousand opportunities for black and brown youth in this community. And similar to council member Middleton, if we're gonna pilot programs such as council member Johnson's pet project, the participatory budget program, where we've given over $2 million to just go to any type of program, maybe we should consider direct investments into our young people by providing them with opportunities to gain. Mr. Hughes, thank you so much for being with us. We're happy to have you. And if you have further comments, you may send them to us. I assure you, I read all of your emails, like all of my colleagues, we get hundreds and hundreds of emails and unfortunately aren't able to respond to all of them. But very much appreciate your being here. Ms. Charlida Burris is next up in the queue. Madam Clark, is Ms. Burris available to be heard? Ms. Burris, can you unmute yourself? Yes, I can. How y'all doing tonight? Thank you for being here with us and you have two minutes. Okay, real quick and fast. I had gun shots fired right at my place, right at the entrance of Edgemont, Alms on Saturday morning at 3.58 a.m. Now I was ducking gunfire. Also, I tried to call 911 in the middle of the day, no response. Now I sent two emails to two of the councilmen as Freelon and Freeman. And this bothers me when some of y'all are not in our areas, you say you want it, you're in the community, I don't see it. But I'm grateful that our councilman Freelon and Freeman did go to MacDougal Terrace. But MacDougal Terrace is not the only place that is having gun shots fired. Now, as far as you're concerned, Julian Johnson, cutting police, really? And you got social workers, you taught my CIT workers and I am a social worker. I would not go to a door by myself, not knowing what's on the other side of that door that somebody could kill me. Let's use common sense at what we're doing. So after y'all get off this meeting tonight, I really think y'all need to consider what would you do if you was in a situation I was in this weekend past? That's all I'm gonna say, because y'all know y'all will hear from me again. Y'all take care, God bless you. Thank you, Ms. Burris. We appreciate you being here with us. All right, is there anyone else who would like to be heard on this public hearing? Okay, I'm seeing some hands being raised, good. I'll just take it from the top. Rue Davis is, Rue Davis available to be heard. You can unmute yourself and let us know that you're available to be heard. Can you be heard now? Yes, I'm here. Great, thanks for being here. You have two minutes. Thank you so much. I'm speaking tonight as a Durham resident to urge the city council to reallocate funds for 60 vacant police officer positions to instead hire unarmed skilled responders this budget cycle. I support this demand because since March, I've been a part of a phenomenally skilled team of organizers and volunteers with Durham for All and Durham Beyond Policing, making weekly phone calls to Durham residents of color. Collectively, we have had over 550 conversations of which 80% of people we talk to have expressed urgent support for this demand. When I asked the question on each call, when was the time you felt deeply safe and taken care of? I have never had a phone conversation in my experience where someone answered that question responding the police kept them safe because surveillance, punishment, criminalization and social control, all tactics the police execute are not methods to keep people safe. Instead, I've heard answers such as when surrounded with trusted people such as family and friends when having access to good and affordable healthcare, when being able to just freely be themself or when feeling connected to neighbors. When I ask a follow-up question, how do you think all communities can experience safety and care? I then have heard answers such as having more resources, all healthcare, especially mental healthcare is free and accessible, higher wages, having someone to call that is not the police when they need help in our experiencing emergency. And so from these conversations, it is certainly clear that we have a profound collective responsibility in Durham and across the country to reimagine safety beyond policing. With this budget vote, it's an incredible opportunity for the city council to commit to this shared responsibility with us to center care and the decisions we make for our city and reallocate those funds for 60 vacant officer positions to instead hire unarmed care workers. Thank you. Ms. Davis, thank you for being with us tonight. We very much appreciate it. Next, we'll hear from Brandon Williams. Mr. Williams, are you able to be heard? I really so. Thank you. We're glad to have you tonight and welcome. You also have two minutes. Thank you, Mr. Mayor, members of the council. Yeah, just direct to me, I wanna echo comments tonight about including Waltown and other legacy black neighborhoods in Durham in the long-time homeowner grant program. And I wanna echo just the concerns about the current proposal to have that combined with the county program, whereas the city's program for the last several years had an AMI threshold of 80%. The 30% threshold is too low. So just wants to advocate to have that raised higher and to also think about the distinction between grants and deferred payments for many of the folks that this program would benefit, deferrals will not help if you are a fixed income person. You know, that you're just not gonna be able to stack up to pay that off when the bill comes due. And I think the grants just allows for us really to wipe that slate clean. But also wanna make sure that that funding is there in consideration as we go into this budget year. Waltown as we suggested, you know, this small investment we really think, you know, for the amount of wealth that can be preserved, looking at the number of long-time homeowners we have, $100,000 in property tax assistance can help preserve 12.2 million in black owned wealth in our neighborhood alone. Many other neighborhoods duly deserving of the same kind of assistance and treatment. So thank you for the consideration tonight and look forward to hearing what happens further on this action. Mr. Williams, thank you very much. We're very glad to have you. Next we'll have Stella Adams. Madam Clerk, can you make Stella Adams available to be heard? Ms. Adams, are you available to be heard? Yes, I think so. Can you hear me, Mr. Mayor? Yes, we can. Thank you for being here. Welcome, and you also have two minutes. Thank you. Thank you so much, council members. Tonight, I am speaking as the housing chair for the Durham Committee on the Affairs of Black People. You have heard from heritage communities across the city. You have heard from Southside, Merritt Moore, Braggtown, Waltown, and Historic Haytie about their needs from this council. I am here to ask you directly to put $1 million out of the CIP and the transit fund for improvements on Route 9, which serves the Braggtown community. I am going to ask you on behalf of the people of Waltown, with $100,000 in long-term homeowner's assistance grants that would allow them to preserve the $12.2 million that they have in equity and wealth in their neighborhoods and communities. I am going to ask you to expand that long-term homeowner assistance program throughout the city and to all of the heritage communities. I am going to ask you to put the dollars where they need to go. This is not, it is unfair and unequitable to tax these communities in a disproportionate manner where they are seeing valuation increases of 150 to 300 plus percent that are getting no benefits or services. They should not have to enter into a lottery in order to get service. They don't have to beg you, should not have to participate in surveys and enter a lottery to have the services. Thank you very much, Ms. Adams. We appreciate your being here with us and for making those important points. All right, we'll now hear from A.J. Williams. Madam Clark, can you make A.J. Williams available to be heard, please? I'm here. Thanks for being here and you also have two minutes. All right, thanks, Shaw. I'm not here for a political agenda. I'm here because my liberation is bound up with every single person here who considers themselves part of the Durham community. So if you're a child or your parent or your sibling or your cousin or your grandma is having a mental health crisis, you'll have an option to have somebody show up in compassion and with care without a weapon, without the possibility of them being killed in the process looming in the back of your mind. By divesting from the Durham Police Department we're reducing the overall number of interactions between our folks and the police and in turn reducing the probability of our people being killed by police. And I've heard that to some of our elected officials that police killings aren't an issue in Durham. But let me be clear, policing in the prison industrial complex as an institution is a manifestation of structural racism that has plagued this nation since its inception. Prince Fanon said, each generation must out of relative obscurity discover this mission, fulfill it or betray it. And we can make bold choices today and secure the promise of moving towards a vision for our city that invests in more than just a little something in its people, but is willing to take the dare I say risk of trusting that communities can self-determine for ourselves and is willing to push back and divest from systems that have not served the needs of the people who have been subject to the conditions that we didn't create, were created by our oppressors. Conditions like poverty, mental illness, poor education, poor housing, that are actually the root cause of gun violence when people are in a state of desperation. Let's make the decision that fulfills our mission and our generation's mandate to transform the ways we address harm, the hill generational trauma, and show it for each other and keep each other safe. We've seen enough police shootings on social media over the last decade to know that police do not keep us safe. Let's not betray the people, let's make the investment in Durham communities and honor the tender transform demand by transferring 60 positions from the Durham Police Department to the Office of Safety and Wellness over a period of three years. Thank you. Thank you very much, Mr. Williams. We appreciate your being here. All right, we'll now hear from Stephen Abrams. Is Stephen Abrams available to be heard? Yes, I am. Thank you, Mayor, and to the council members. Thank you. We're happy to have you, Mr. Abrams. Welcome, and you have two minutes. Thank you very much. I just want to make it very short. I think many of the statements that I was going to make tonight have already been said. I believe totally in what the council in Middleton has already put forth as far as the going through, as far as research and the pilot programs. I can't believe anybody would invest money into something that they really haven't done the historical research on and to get the open hearings that's needed for the community to understand what's going on. Just to jump into something that you saw in some other state or some other city makes no sense whatsoever. So I totally agree with him. And with the former councilwoman Wagstaff, clearly what's going on in the city needs to be addressed. And I don't think you have the time in what I see and what's happening in the community to invest immediately in the community as far as their use is concerned, that has to be done along with it. It can't be done separately. You've got to find the funds to do both. You can't possibly just do one. So that's all I want to say. Most of my comments have already been said by others. So I want to thank you all for your time in this matter. Mr. Abrams, thank you very much for being with us. We very much appreciate it. All right, next up will be a Mab Segrist. Ms. Segrist, welcome. We're happy to have you. Can you be heard? Thank you, I think so. Yes, we hear you. Thank you. Welcome and you have two minutes. Thank you, Mr. Mayor and Councilpeople. My name is Mab Segrist. I live off Umsted Road in North Durham. I'm here to urge you to reallocate those 60 vacant police off of positions over three years to the Department of Community Safety and Wellness in order to hire unarmed skilled responders for 9-11 calls. These responders can both help deter violent interactions with armed responders and keep people in mental crisis in treatment and not in jail. The Department of Community Safety and Wellness is now in place to redirect these resources from sheriffs and police departments to underfunded resources for mentally ill people. According to a 2014 joint report between the National Sheriffs Association and the Treatment Advocacy Center, today jails and prisons have absorbed 90% of state psychiatric beds, a situation which these facilities are neither equipped or trained to do according to the National Sheriffs. The report calls the situation untenable and unfair to inmates and officials. The report lists these problems associated with incarcerating mentally ill persons. One, jail prison overcrowding, resulting from mentally ill prisoners remaining behind bars longer than other prisoners. Relegation and grossly disproportionate numbers to solitary confinement, which worsened symptoms of mental illness. Jail prison suicides and disproportionate numbers. Victimization of prisoners with mental illness and disproportionate numbers. As they go without treatment deterioration and psychic conditions of inmates with mental illness. The National Sheriffs Association report concludes, the ultimate solution to this problem is to maintain a functioning public mental health treatment system so that mentally ill persons do not end up in prisons and jails. And I agree with this report. The jail is under Durham County commissioners jurisdiction of course, but it's the city of Durham's police officers whose actions bring many of our residents to the county jail. I believe that the choice to deploy these 60 positions in the Durham police department, the unarmed skill responders begins to shift the conditions in our nation that our jails and prisons are all we provide for 90% of the people in psychic. Ms. Segros, thank you so much for being with us. I think we got to the end of your comments, but if you have further comments, we're always happy to read them. I and my colleagues read everything that we receive and we'd be happy to have it. Thank you for being here with us tonight. Next we'll hear from Manju Rajendran. Are you available to be heard? Hello. Hello, how are you? Welcome, we're glad to have you and you also have two minutes, thanks for being here. Thank you. My name is Manju Rajendran and I live in Durham. I urge you to support Durham for all and Durham Beyond Policings tend to transform campaign call to reallocate 60 vacant police officer positions to the Department of Community Safety and Wellness over the next three years to hire unarmed, skilled, compassionate responders. I grew up in a working poor family with an undocumented immigrant single mother and I come to this work as a violent survivor. I'm an organizer with Durham Beyond Police and Coalition. Durham spends more on the police department than on any other city department and the police department has the most staff, 681 full-time staff. The average cost of each police officer position is over $91,000. Between 2019 and 2021, the police department increased by 50 positions costing an extra $4.6 million in public dollars. Between 2019, 2021, the police department budget increased by 3.2 million, a 5% increase. $32 of every $100 of the city's general budget fund is dedicated to policing and I share these facts lest we believe the hype that the police are struggling for funds. I mourn every gunshot and every act of harm that takes place in our city and county. Durham has been talking about crime prevention as long as I can remember, but we rarely talk about the fact that police officers and sheriff's deputies cannot prevent crime. Police investigate harm after it's taken place and they drive cycles of imprisonment that our nation urgently needs to break. What a victory to see a city budget proposed this year that builds up the infrastructure of true safety and wellness. I was excited to see investments in affordable housing, home ownership, green and equitable infrastructure, free bus fare, legal assistance for immigrants, language justice, refugee services and continuing the Durham Expansion and Restoration Deer Program. These are the kinds of investments that actually prevent crime by creating long-term stability and meeting resident needs. Durham Beyond Policing supports the city worker union call for 5% retroactive hazard premium pay. I hope you'll also meet our city workers request to fully fund the general employee step-pay plan rather than what's current. Ms. Regendron, thank you so much for being with us tonight. We appreciate your comments and are, again, happy to hear more if you want to send them to us. We're happy to get them, thank you so much. We will now hear from Robert Heights. Madam Clerk, can you make Robert Heights available to be heard please? Hello, am I coming through? Yes, you are. Thank you for being with us and you also have two minutes, welcome. Good evening. My name is Robert Heights. I would like to yield my two minutes to Herman Spurling who spoke earlier. Thank you. We don't yield, Mr. Heights. You're welcome to have your two minutes but we don't yield here at the Durham City Council. But you're welcome to your two minutes. Would you like to take them, Mr. Heights? Mr. Heights, would you like to take your two minutes? Okay, I guess not. Madam Clerk, we'll move to Paul Winecoupe. Mr. Winecoupe, can you be heard? Can you unmute yourself, there you go. Can you all hear me? Yes, we can. Welcome and you also have two minutes. Can you all hear me? Yes, we can hear you, Mr. Winecoupe. Welcome and you have two minutes. Great, yes. I'm here speaking in support of the Durham Beyond Policing and tend to transform campaign to reallocate the 60 vacancies in the Durham Police Department to the Department of Wellness and Safety. I think we've seen this past year a lot of movements pushing back against policing and it's been frustrating but also optimistic to see that some things are being made and we've had a number of city council meetings where we have a lot of people talking about how you wanna change things and ensure equity but it's time to put your money where your mouth is and really support this call to change the way that we address harm instead of investing in systems that we know don't help people. And it's really time to take up that call for equity and inclusion, support this movement to divest away from prisons and towards real communities of care whether it's home ownership or mental health, youth programs, it's time to make a change and I'm excited at the possibility of starting that change here today. Thanks, that's it. Thank you very much, Mr. Winecoupe. Madam Clerk, we'll next hear from Constance Wright. Ms. Wright, are you available to be heard? Yes, I am. Thank you for being here with us and you also have two minutes. All right, good evening. Bradtown alone has paid $64,102,917 in tax dollars and $64,102,917 has gone out of Bradtown over the past 10 years. That does not include water and sewer taxes and Bradtown has nothing to show for all the money that we have paid into the Durham City and County system. It's robbery. There's no good infrastructure, streets are carmeling, sidewalks in most areas of Bradtown are non-existence and the sidewalks that do exist are barely functional. Potholes and ditches are everywhere. Most bus stops are not comfortable or safe because of where they are situated. Bus Route 9, which includes 9, 9A and 9B has practically no amenities. I rode bus 9A and afterwards drove that route just to see what is there. It's hard to see when you're riding the bus what shelters or benches or whatever is there. So there are very few shelters and they are far apart. I counted only six ridiculously small benches on Route 9A. As I have stated many times, bus 9A, 9B and 9 go through the predominantly black, Hispanic and Latino communities. There are ditches, no sidewalks and many, many potholes. Although I do not want to see a tax increase and I'm struggling with the tax increase from the past two years. If one is granted, the increase should go to the communities like Bradtown, Merrickmore and Waltown and other underserved legacy communities. Our communities should be prioritized over communities that have consistently benefited from tax dollars and have been historically included in all previous budgets. Newcomers to Durham seem to benefit from our taxes more than the original and long-time residents of Durham. The city manager's budget also should help, as she stated, pay for new sidewalks bus stop. Ms. Wright, thank you very much for being with us tonight. We appreciate it. If you have further comments, we're glad to receive them by email. I know you've sent us many of these comments before and we appreciate you being with us. I want to emphasize we're listening to all comments. We appreciate that. We've got a huge number of comments tonight on a wide variety of subjects and we're very glad to get them and we'll consider them all as we move into the budget last few weeks of this budget process. The next person I see is simply Chavis. I'm not sure of that person's name. Can you identify yourself, please? Yeah, can you hear me? Yes, who is this? Mr. James Chavis? Yes, it is, sir. Mr. Chavis, good to hear from you. I haven't seen you in a long time. We're glad to have you with us. I'm welcome and you have two minutes, Mr. Chavis. Well, thank you. You know, my comment is, I do not want to hear y'all say when these doors really opened up, that it was a COVID problem, okay? Because as I see you all, you all are the problem and the problem is you are not listening to the people. Why would you want to get rid of something and you surely ain't got the right thing to put back in the place? Why you want to give away our taxpayer money to what uneducated people to get out into our community and do what with the money? We don't know today. So you were talking about a $1 million money that you already given out, but other people are saying what their community needs and y'all are not listening. So start y'all a bull and get on ball to find out what the people really need and do something because y'all are intelligent and you all got the sense. Take that politics of trying to get somebody to keep y'all in those seats and get out here and do the work and you shall stay in those seats. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chavis. Thank you so much for being with us. We're now here from Mr. Antonio Jones. Madam Clerk, can you make Mr. Jones available to be heard? Mr. Jones, can you be heard? Yes, can you guys hear me? Yes, thank you for being here. Welcome and you also have two minutes. Yes, my name is Antonio Jones. I am the Chair of the Durham Committee on the Affairs of Black People. Now I want to make just a few comments on this public budget. What is clear in my professional experience is that Durham has become a Petrie dish for social experiments, for people to vote for their future political aspirations at the expense of Durham residents. So for this budget, this budget speaks a lot. You have heard the voices of the community and we have to tell you a solution as for Durham, not for national politics. Our communities are hurting. The vast majority of people in the city council has yet to attend the funeral of anyone that's been shot and killed in Durham. Okay, we can call the roll if we need to. The vast majority of people in the city council have not visited communities that are directly impacted by the policies you continue to ignore. Okay, we literally have citizens dodging traffic to get on the bus. Let that sit with your spirit for a minute. Citizens are dodging traffic just to get on a bus. We have citizens that are dodging and ducking in tubs because they hear gunfire at night. While many of you have the luxury of deciding what brunch venue you're gonna go to tomorrow morning. This is a real for Durham right now. So this budget, what it says to me is that you are ignoring the pleas of the citizens. Average people in Durham, but yet you tend to want to follow groups of people. Many of them don't even live in Durham, but they're here for political agendas. So this is a moral document. This budget is a moral document. I think the citizens have clearly seen the direction this council is wanna go. So, and I'll say this in closing. Make sure that this budget speaks to Durham. Not the courts of Durham on what you sit, but the true core of Durham. And I'll leave it at that. Mr. Jones, thank you for being with us. We appreciate you very much. Colleagues, let me just ask now if there's anyone else who has not spoken yet who would like to speak on this item. If so, could you raise your virtual hand? I'm going down the list here. Madam Clerk, I don't see anyone else. I think we have gotten to the end of the list. All right. Okay, I'm now going to declare this public hearing closed. I want to appreciate everyone that's been here tonight. I'm gonna make just a couple of brief comments. And Colleagues, if any of you all want to as well, I'm gonna keep them brief because we've got, I believe three more public hearing items in a closed session tonight. I expect this is gonna be an extremely late night. I do want to address a couple of things very quickly. Raised early on by one of the speakers, why has it taken so long to issue the bonds? We are the housing bonds while we issue them now when the money is not needed later. So two different kind of questions leading in different directions. But let me just say that we were planning to, after the voters approved this in 2019 and the 2020 budget, we were planning to fund it as we told the voters that we would. We didn't do that because of COVID and we were very concerned about our budget at the time and we didn't want to raise taxes for any purpose. And so even though the voters had supported that, we waited until this year to put it in the budget and to meet the request of the voters. The funds by issuing all the, by increasing the tax all now for the affordable housing bonds, we can do it more cheaply than we could if we did it over a two year period. And also we are in that way prepared for all the large projects that are coming down the pike in the next couple of years. So that the timing is related to when the big affordable housing projects that are getting underway now under design are going to be realized. I wanted to mention there've been a lot of discussion about the transit fund expanding bus routes, bus stops and so forth. It's super important. We're doing a lot of that. A lot of it was made of the transit fund. I just want to emphasize that the transit fund as a county is run by the county. We have influence on it and we exert influence on it and we are being able to do a lot more things for our bus system that way. But I just want to say that for the transit fund the county is really critical. I also want to just address the situation with the youth works internship and appreciate all the discussion we've had of that for Mr. Hughes and others. The 500 young people that we'll be including in the program this year is an enormous increase over what we had last year. It's huge. I agree that we want to get to 1,000 youth in our program but we're not ready to put 1,000 youth into that program yet. I'm very grateful to our city manager for proposing this large increase and figure out a way to manage it and make it happen quickly this summer even coming out of COVID. So my gratitude and with agreement. Our goal is 1,000 and I believe that we will get there soon. All right, there are lots of other, a lot of other issues were raised that we're going to be discussing in our budget work session. But I did, while we had a couple of people on those questions, I do want to address them. The issues such as the long-term homeowner issue will be being discussed at our upcoming budget work session on Thursday and many of the other issues that were raised today. Okay. Other comments? Council member Cavalletto. Just real quick, I was curious if we were going to discuss the master aging plan at all since several residents on Thursday or not? We hadn't planned that. This is one of the first times the council's heard about the master aging plan in a long time, the manager and I discussed that. If you want to discuss it, though we certainly can put it on the list. I'm willing to follow up with the email and just curious about the county and any commitments that they have made or not. Yeah, thank you very much. And I have had a discussion with a couple of our county commissioners about that and I'm happy to share. I'll just say that I know the county is very interested in it, the county has been very involved in it and we haven't been. And I've urged the folks with the master aging plan to start educating us about it if they want to get our funding. And so I think tonight was kind of the first public for either. Thank you. But certainly can discuss it further if that's the desire of the group. Council, Mayor Procep. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I also just had one clarifying point that I wanted to make. I think it wasn't clear from some of the emails and comments that we've gotten recently about the long-time homeowner grant program, whether it was continuing the current program. And so I just wanted to make sure folks know that that program is active and continuing. Applications are open. The application period ends at the end of the month on June 30th. So that program exists in addition to the county program that the city will also be participating in that spinning up this year. And I look forward to talking more on Thursday about expanding that program to additional neighborhoods. Thank you very much, Mayor Procep. Any other comments or questions, colleagues or rather, I guess, comments we're talking about here? Carol Silver-Middleton. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you, colleagues. Let me thank all of our friends and neighbors who abided us tonight and came out tonight to give their comments. This is perhaps one of the most important conversations we have in the life of our city where we sit back and be quiet and listen to our neighbors and residents. So very briefly, I just want to make a couple of comments based upon some things I've heard tonight and some things I've seen in the chat as well. And I want to talk as a brother, as a neighbor, as a resident of Durham. I know I'm on the city council, but I want to channel just being a part of this community tonight. First thing I want to say is that every single person on this council said yes to our new community safety department and having on our mental health responders. Everybody said yes. So what exactly are we fighting about? What's the disagreement? We've said yes, everybody said yes, but there's almost kind of like a coming to America Prince Ikeem kind of thing. Must we jump up and down on our leg and bark like a dog too, in addition to saying yes? Can we not take yes for an answer? I want to make a confession. I've done the exercise where I close my eyes and think about what makes me safe. And I want to confess to you, every time I've done an exercise, I never thought about the police. That's true. Never once. But it occurred to me as a governing person that the list isn't really exhaustive because I also didn't think about smoke detectors. I didn't think about airbags or penicillin either. But those things are kind of important in their place. And governance can't be done by kind of imagining a list trying to come up with an exhaustive list before things happen. That's just not the way governance works. You have to govern for what's happening and govern also for contingencies and what might not happen. Most leaders have to think about what may happen, eventualities, as do parents raising kids. So I just want to say tonight that I've seen some folk raise the name of Adam Toledo in Chicago. And I just want to caution my brothers and sisters that me, all of us be very careful about invoking the names of victims to buttress and forward our particular addresses in an issue. I grew up in a neighborhood that was a crack capital of America that we went to sleep that night, loved to sleep by gunfire and nobody called the police because we had just become sensitized to it. I want to raise the name of people who bled out in the park because they were shot and nobody called the police. And I don't know their names, but I want to raise their names in spirit. Just a few months ago, I'd like to raise the name if I knew it of a person in Wilmington, North Carolina who has shot spotter, by the way, who had lifesaving aid given to him, not because people called 911, but because shot spotter sent responders there and they found somebody bleeding in Wilmington and they were able to save their life. I don't know their name, his name, but if I knew it, I would raise it. The Chicago Police Department would dispatch to the incident that led to Adam Toledo's tragic killing because gunfire actually did occur. I can't raise the names of the people that were in the car that were shot at because I don't know their names, but the system did what it was supposed to do. To conflate Adam Toledo's death to shot spotter is a very dangerous slippery slope. And I just want to caution all of us to practice some self-discipline when we're trying to score points, particularly when all of us agree on the end result. As a person that governs as an elected official, when we say police don't make us safe, from a governance point of view, I don't know what that means. I don't, listen, firefighters don't prevent fire. I don't think buying fire trucks stops fires. But we keep buying fire trucks and we keep hiring firefighters because part of our responsibility as a government is to respond to a multitude of contingencies, which includes the ability to send unarmed mental health responders, which I called for last year. The answer is yes, we support that, but there are other contingencies we also need to deal with as a government. So for me as a leader, when I operationalize a statement or try and operationalize a statement, police don't make us safe. What does that mean? Does that mean that if we got rid of all police tonight, that there would absolutely be no difference in the number of shootings we have, there'd be no difference in homing, we'd see no effects whatsoever because police don't make us safe. So just remove that factor and everything would remain static. That our gunfire levels wouldn't go up or down, homicides wouldn't go up or down, home invasions wouldn't go up or down because police don't keep us safe. And I'm not the brightest bulb. I'm not the sharpest knife in the drawer, but from a governance point of view, I don't understand what that statement means, operationalize it. We're a government and we have to do things. We have to respond to a bunch of contingencies. You might be right that they don't keep us safe, but the question that becomes, so if we got rid of them, what would things look like? We wouldn't listen at all? I don't think that's the case. We have the opportunity to say yes to a whole bunch of people and rarely in politics and governance do you get an opportunity to please everybody. Respectfully, the only people I hear saying no to anything in this debate are not the people that are most impacted by gunfire. The people that are most impacted by gunfire say yes, we want unarmed mental health responders and also yes, we want folk to be able to respond if our city center gets stormed by white supremacists. The only folk I've heard saying no in this debate are certain people that are entrenched who seemingly won't take yes for an answer. I believe that our city manager has done an excellent job in presenting to us a balanced and reasonable approach where we as a growing metropolis, as a city that does not have the luxury of turning off all of the things that governments respond to. I believe that our city manager has put us in position to say yes to almost everyone in this. We need black and brown people and mentally challenged folk to stop having death encounters with police. I want the ability as an elected leader to send unarmed mental health responders in situations where we need them. But I also as a leader have to imagine if that situation escalates to something else as they often do. And then we have to call for help. We're now calling for help from a department that we've been downgrading but we're still asking them to respond. And as from a governance point, so I would just ask everybody to do the exercise. Don't just do the exercise of closing your eyes and asking what makes you safe. Do the exercise of putting yourself in a city council position. Put yourself in charge of 300,000 people and try and figure out how one decision in one area impacts not two or three, but 15 other areas and what the outcome will be. Because if Adam Toledo was killed by ShotSpotter, what do we say when the day comes and God forbid when the day comes when a mental health responder an unarmed mental health responder dies at a call? Do we then say scrap the whole program? Are we gonna put that on on our mental health responding programs if one person gets killed or injured, God forbid? We're on the same side. We all want the same thing and we all want the same outcomes. It just seems like we're talking past each other on a lot of these issues. And I hope we get to a point where all of us realize that we're not trying to score political points. We're not trying to engage yourself in aggrandizement. We're not trying to put people down or look better than the other. We're trying to save our baby's lives. We're trying to save our brothers and sisters lives. That's all that matters. Not whose name on it. Now we're trying to save lives. And I hope that we can get past the point where we're talking past each other and talk to each other because we all want the same thing. I'll be Council Member Middleton now after the rest of the meeting. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Appreciate it. Thank you, Council Member. Colleagues, any more comments? Council Member Freeman. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you, Council Member Middleton. And I just wanted to just agree and note that I want to make sure that we're acknowledging as well that conversation around the long-term homeowner grants that could be available, which also could save or preserve residency for some folks here in our community. And then also just noting that, I think committing to the 1,000 summer jobs for next year is a really good focus point. It moves us towards more of what we know will have an impact in making sure that folks feel not just safe, but are also getting to a point where they're having shared economic prosperity. There's an on ramp so that there's a greater quality of life here. I think my predecessor in the seat is say great things happen in Durham all the time. And I would challenge her on it because there were so many things that weren't great. And so I'm acknowledging sitting in this seat today, just to hear a visually impaired person talk about how horribly our website was set up, it feels long. And so figuring out how to address some of the equity issues across the board is important to me. And I noted that around the visual, the aging, and the housing equity aspects. And I will be making sure to focus on that. I also noted, I think I live in the weeds of these conversations. And so the comments I make are regarding actual implementation and actual like governance as Council Member Middleton mentioned. And so I think for some folks who are at the like, high level understanding of it and some folks who are not, it really comes across very differently. I know for sure that we can't police ourselves out of all the gun violence, that is very clear. But I also know for sure that when you pick up the phone, the call 911, you want someone to show up. And so as folks fear, starts to envelop them with this conversation, as I said last year, we've got to be mindful that that doesn't decrease folks wanting to purchase guns and respond for themselves. And so I'm just trying to keep it all in the road on this conversation. And I really, really want us to be successful at finding ways to wind down how much we have to be dependent on police. But I'm at the same time, I'm very clear that if I need to pick up the phone and call a police officer because someone's coming into my house, I want someone to show up. Whether that's an investigation, whether that's not, whether it's an unarmed person, whatever that looks like, I want it to be effective. And so I'm just, I'm grateful to be in a city that so many folks are dialed into this conversation at such a level that they would spend countless hours. I can't say over and over again, I'm so greatly appreciative of so many folks who've really tried to pour in on these issues and come up with solutions. But I do want to note that there are some areas that just haven't quite gelled yet. And so I'll also note that the, I'm very proud of where we are at this point in our budget, acknowledging just how much is in there, but you can always be prouder. And so I'll be pushing in certain areas as I mentioned, but I do want to make sure I take the time to thank staff for getting us to this point. And as council member Middleton mentioned, our city manager, who is what like 90 days in to the official role, we're moving and the things are happening. And I would love to get to the point where I can say, great things are really happening here in Durham, but I'm really feeling uneasy about it right now. And thank you. Thank you council member. Any further comments? All right, colleagues, thank you all. Thanks for everyone who attended this public hearing. And now we'll move on to our next item. Our next item is item 40, plan amendment Camden Avenue tier change. And this time I do think we'll be hearing from someone playing. Good evening. Good evening, Mr. Cahill. Good evening, Mayor Scholl, Madam Mayor Pro Tem Johnson, honorable city council members, Alexander Cahill here with the planning department. First, I do want to state for the record tonight that all planning department hearing items have been advertised and noticed in accordance with state and local law. And that affidavits of these notices are on file in the planning department. The planning department did receive an application from Dan Joule of Coulter Joule Intems with a proposal to change the tier boundary designation of 11 parcels of land totaling around 38 acres. And this is located at or around Camden Avenue, Midland Terrace and Interstate 85. The present zoning on the parcels is industrial light and the parcels are also designated as industrial on the future land use map. The applicant is not proposing to change the zoning designation or the designation on the future land use map at this time. The current tier for the parcels is designated as the urban tier of the comprehensive plan. And the applicant is proposing to change the tier to the suburban tier of the comprehensive plan. These parcels were designated within the urban tier on the future land use map of the comprehensive plan when it was adopted in 2005. Staff has determined that this request would be consistent with the comprehensive plan, including the future land use map, if it is approved this evening and other adopted ordinances. Staff has determined that continuing this pattern of development is not detrimental to the immediate area and offers flexibility for renovations and improvements to existing industrial sites in this area. The planning commission by a vote of 12 to zero at their March 25th, 2021 meeting did recommend approval unanimously for this tier boundary change. There is only one motion this evening required to approve this case. And that is to amend the future land use map and the tier boundary maps of the Durham comprehensive plan by changing the tier boundary from industrial to urban to industrial suburban. Thank you very much. Staff is available for any questions as is the applicant. Thank you, Mr. Cahill. We appreciate it. Colleagues, you have now heard the report from staff on declare this public hearing open. And first, I wanna ask if there are any questions for staff by members of the council. All right, Madam Mayor Pertin. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I remember reading this and I remember there being a good reason, but I don't remember what it is. Can somebody remind me why the applicant wants to make this change? Absolutely. So the applicant has a couple of different industrial users in the area and they're looking to expand their existing facilities. In order to do that, they need a different placement and setbacks for both their parking and the way they're gonna access in and out of the sites. In the current setup, the way the setbacks are set up is hard for them to meet those requirements for their industrial services. Thank you so much. You're welcome. Any further questions for staff? Councilor Middleton. Yes, Mr. Mayor, very quickly. I was just flipping through my notes. I wanna thank Madam Mayor Pro Tem for channeling my exact question. Thank you. Great. All right. I'm gonna now ask, is there anyone who would like to be heard on this item? I see Mr. Dan Joule has signed up. Mr. Joule, would you like to be heard? I would, Mr. Mayor. Good evening to you, Mayor Pro Tem and the Council. How are you this evening? Fine, thank you. We're doing fantastic. Very good. I can tell I've been sitting through the whole entertaining years. This is what we live for. That's right. I can tell, I can tell. So, Dan Joule with CJTPA here at 111 Osmain. Thank you, Alexander, for a good presentation. I'm gonna give a few remarks, but I would guarantee they are a third the length of what I gave to the Planning Commission. An excellent question, Mayor Pro Tem and Councilman Middleton. The reason we're asking for this change is that industrial uses are just not a good fit in the urban tier. As you know, the amount of our industrial land has been dwindling in Durham because there have been many requests to rezone to residential. We think it's important though that we maintain all of those industrial lands and make it possible for development, industrial development to happen because this is important. These projects create space for businesses and these are businesses that hire employees, particularly employees who don't need a college degree and in many cases don't need a high school degree and we need to help those folks in Durham. So why is being in the urban tier problematic? Well, it's because industrial facilities are designed with the car parking in the front and the trucks in the back and there's a very important reason for that. This separation is for safety. The tenants have customers, employees and visitors coming to their place of businesses and imagine a visitor or an uninitiated driver trying to vie for a position with an 18 wheeler backing up to a loading dock on the same side of the building. The urban tier requires that the buildings be built close to the street and it does not allow parking to be built between the street and the building and these requirements are contradictory to the separation that I talked about and as a side it puts tall, long buildings right up against the street. I was actually involved in the creation of the flume back in the early aughts and looking back, I don't know that there was a lot of thought about whether industrial zones were or were not captured in the urban tier. There wasn't much industrial type development going on in Durham back then and I don't think there were really any people on that comprehensive planning committee who really thought much about that. So we would simply like to correct that oversight as Mr. Cahill mentioned in the presentation our proposal is fully congruous with the existing development patterns in the neighborhood and the change to the tier line we are requesting will not affect any of the other UDO requirements other than requiring more open space. In March, the planning commission voted unanimously to recommend approval of the request and we respectfully request that you consider that strong statement of support and hopefully can also find in favor of this request. So thank you that ends my presentation. Thank you Mr. Joule, we appreciate it. Mr. Public Hearing item, is there anyone else here who would like to be heard on this item? If so, could you raise your virtual hand? All right, seeing none, I'm gonna declare this public hearing closed and the matter is back before the council. This item requires a single motion and that motion is to amend the future land use and tier boundary maps to the Durham comprehensive plan by changing the tier boundary from urban to industrial suburban for the resident. Just a minute. Second. And moved by council member Middleton and seconded by council member Freeman. Are there anyone have any more discussion? Just council member Freelon. Just a quick comment. We do have Tom Miller Day coming up on the 4th of July and I just wanted to acknowledge that this is one of the many instances where his planning commission notes singularly by word count outweigh all his colleagues collectively and very helpful comments and shouts to Tom Miller. But I'm enthusiastically gonna be going with his endorsement on this one. That's it. Exactly, exactly what I was trying to capture today. And thank you for that. You're right. All right, although on the next one I'm finding myself not in total agreement. Okay, colleagues. We have a motion. Madam clerk, will you please call a roll? Mayor Schuyl. Aye. Mayor Pro Tem Johnson. Aye. Council member Cada Giro. Aye. Council member Freelon. Aye. Council member Freeman. Aye. Council member Middleton. Aye. Thank you. Thank you. I'm hearing some kind of echo. I don't know if anybody else is hearing it. Madam clerk, here's some kind of echo. I think it's off now. I think that a couple of us had our, one of my areas of expertise over the last 15 months has been figuring out these echoes. And I think it's because two or three of us had our, we were open at once, but I think we're good now. Yeah. All right, colleagues. We'll now move to item 41, zoning map change, Rollingdale 2. And we'll first hear the report from staff. Welcome, Mr. Kultra. Thank you. Good evening, Mayor Schuyl. Madam Mayor Pro Tem Johnson and honorable council members. Dating culture with the planning department. The request for a zoning map change was received from Josh Swindell of Rollingdale Investment LLC, the applicant and Neil Gauch of Morningstall All Group acting as agent for the applicant to change the zoning designation of two parcels of land totaling 6.651 acres and located at 602 and 606 West NC 54 highway. The site is within the city's jurisdiction and presently zoned plan development residential 3.940 or PDR 3.940, which allows for a maximum of 25 residential townhouse units which was approved on August 6, 2018 through a development plan case Z1700040. The site is located within the suburban development tier and the Falls Jordan Watershed Protection District B or FJB and currently designated low density residential at four dwelling units and acre or less on the future land use map or flume. The applicant seeks to change the zoning designation to plan development residential 5.189 or PDR 5.189 for a maximum of 33 residential townhouse units and to change the future land use map to a low medium density residential at four to eight dwelling units and acre. At the planning commission's March 9th, 2021 meeting the motion for approval of this request was denied by vote of four to eight. There are two motions required for this application tonight. The first is to adopt an ordinance for the rezoning and amend the future land use map and the second is to adopt a consistency statement. Thank you very much and staff and the applicant are available for any questions. Thank you, Mr. Kaltra. Colleagues, you've now heard the report from staff I'm going to declare this public hearing open and I'm going to first ask if there are any questions for staff by members of the council. All right, seeing none then we have several people who've signed up to speak on this item. We have Mr. Patrick Beiker, Landon Loveless Cam Morrison, Elizabeth McCain and Ralph Cook have all signed up to speak on this. And for those of you all who've stuck with us, thank you. We appreciate you. We know it's been a very long night. I'll ask now, it looks like Mr. Beiker and Landon Loveless are signed up as proponents. Ralph Cook is an opponent. Cam Morrison and Elizabeth McCain, if you all could put in the chat whether or not you are opponents or proponents because I have to figure this out to make sure we're doing the fair thing with our timing on the public hearing. So, Ms. McCain and Cam Morrison if you wouldn't mind putting in the chat whether you're proponents or opponents of this rezoning. And if you're not quite sure, you can put that too. Okay, I'm not sure that we have them here. We'll find out as we go then. All right, Mr. Beiker, you and Landon Loveless are listed as the proponents. Is Landon Loveless part of your team? Yes, Mr. Mayer, can you hear me all right? Yes, Mr. Beiker, how long will you need? Five minutes or less, sir. Okay, go ahead, Mr. Beiker, thank you. If I could ask Mr. Kulture to pull up a PowerPoint that I sent over earlier. If you could pull that up, Mr. Kulture, that'd be wonderful. Thank you, sir, appreciate that very much. Mr. Beiker, hang on one second. I saw Ms. McCain's in the chat, I just wanted to say. Ms. McCain, don't worry, that's fine and we're gonna get to you at the appropriate time. Sorry, Mr. Beiker, go ahead. Good evening, Mayor Schull, Mayor Pro Tem Johnson and members of the City Council. I'm Patrick Beiker with Morningstar Law Group and I live at 2614 Stewart Drive. I'm here this evening representing Rollingdale Investment, LLC for this agenda item. With me this evening are Josh Swindell of Rollingdale and Landon Lovelace, our project engineer with Underfoot Engineering. The rezoning we are discussing tonight seeks to allow for up to 33 townhomes as opposed to the currently approved 25. Next slide, please. I'd like to address briefly traffic issues as discussed in the staff report for this agenda item. In regard to traffic on NC 54, that road has been a concern for the 30 years that I've been around here. In response to the concern raised at the Planning Commission by Mr. Michael Martin, who is a member of Triangle Grace Church, I wish to emphasize that this project will add a left turn lane at a cost of $365,000. You can note the location of Triangle Grace Church at the bottom of this slide on Tudor Place. That turn lane increases capacity significantly for this segment of NC 54 when there is no NC DOT funding available for any other improvements to this section of 54 in the near future. Of course, the main reason we are here this evening is to create a more affordable infill project on this 6.6 acre site. Next slide, please. While the proposed rezoning seeks eight additional townhomes, most of the other zoning commitments from three years ago will remain. I want to emphasize that the architectural commitments are for the most part unchanged from our previous development plan, with the only noteworthy change being to switch to the modern transitional style away from the craftsman style. While the undisturbed area along the southern boundary has changed from 40 feet to a variable width ranging from 20 to 40 feet, this is more than compensated for by increasing the previously required 50 foot buffer along the intermittent stream to 100 feet on account of the impervious surface being over 24%. This 100 foot buffer plus the 10 foot no build zone is a significant improvement because it preserves more of the mature trees on site. Many of these mature trees are taller than our proposed maximum building height of 50 feet. We want to be upfront that the building set back along the southern property line went from 70 feet to 50 feet and the separation between buildings went from 30 feet to 20 feet. There is no additional disturbed area proposed nor are there any additional adverse stormwater impacts from adding these eight townhouses. Nevertheless, we took into account the concerns expressed by the Woodcroft neighbors at the planning commission, especially Jeff Brandeburg and Elizabeth McCain in regards to stormwater runoff. In response to Mr. Brandeburg's and Ms. McCain's concerns, we added a text commitment to utilize a double row of silt fencing during site construction. In addition, we will commit on the record this evening to constructing stormwater control measures that will treat up to the 100 year storm. Next slide please. I would like to highlight briefly the increased open space on the proposed development plan we are discussing tonight relative to what the council approved about three years ago. In regard to open space, the development plan before the council this evening increases open space from 1.03 acres to 2.08 acres. In addition, the development plan tonight increases the tree save area to 1.71 acres, almost a third of an acre above the 1.42 acres that the council approved of a prior development plan. In conclusion, the focus of this agenda item is to do what we can to increase the open space and to be a better neighbor, as well as to address Durham's profound need for housing, especially on infill sites that are close to the employment opportunities at RTP, South Point Mall and the other office parks in Southwest Durham. This is crucial since I recently heard from a good friend of mine who is an active realtor in Durham that we have less than 270 homes for sale in Durham right now. Accordingly, increasing the number of townhomes on this 6.6 acres from 25 to 33 actually does move the needle in regards to Durham's housing inventory. I think that reality was appreciated by the three newest members that the city council appointed to the planning commission, commissioners Kimberly Cameron, Dairy Cutwright and Tony Cease, all of whom recommended approval of this zoning map change. For all these reasons, we respectfully ask for your approval. We thank you for your time this evening and our team would be happy to answer any questions. Mr. Biker, thank you very much. There's several other, hang on a second, let me get into my, okay, there's several other people who would like to speak on this item and I'm going to first call Mr. Ralph Cook, who is lists himself as an opponent. Mr. Cook, are you available to be heard? Mr. Cook, thank you for being with us. Would three minutes be enough time for you? I haven't time it, but it sounds about right. All right, we're glad to have you. Go ahead, Mr. Cook. I post this because it doesn't seem to me that it fits the overall nature of the area and the plan that Durham had and for it. The whole point of zoning is to say, okay, we're going to put this type of stuff here. And the developers come in saying, okay, we're going to change that so that we can put different stuff here. But I really don't see any sufficient reason for it. I'm afraid I'm a little suspicious about his desire to help Durham's housing situation with it. At the neighborhood meeting, he explained that the city requirement for cul-de-sac reduced a yield from 25 units to 20 units. And somehow that led to a request to increase zoning so that they can put 33. And that doesn't make any sense to me. If he can put 33 on it, he can put 25 on it and keep the zoning that he got a few years ago. That kind of explanation just doesn't give me any great confidence in the explanations that they're giving me. The previous plan buildings were more limited in height. The new plan calls for buildings that are going to be taller. And this is particularly significant to the people that live in Woodcroft because the site backs up to Woodcroft on a hill so that the buildings here are going to be sort of standing over the Woodcroft houses. The ground slopes down sharply at the back of the lot. And so they're going to be taller at the back than they are at the front. So taller buildings are just going to loom over Woodcroft houses. It wasn't what we talked about back when they made the request three years ago. I also wonder whether the impact of these units has been adequately investigated. I've read in the documents that they've given and I don't see much there to give me confidence either. The original plan somehow decided that out of 25 units that they would put that there would be some number of children, I think three or four, evidently these eight additional units will only have one child as an impact to the school. I don't have any idea where somebody came up with these numbers. Also according to the new plan, putting in these eight additional units will actually reduce the number of car trips on Highway 54. I'm waiting for someone to explain that one to me. We add more units and we get less traffic. The site, this particular place on 54, you come around a curve and down the hill, you come out of an area where you are naturally going a little slower. There are a lot of curb cuts, a lot of commercial developments as well as entrances to places. And after you go past Grace Church on your way down towards Chapel Hill, people tend to speed up. And as soon as they hit a car that's slowing down to turn into this, well, we're gonna have more accidents. It's just gonna happen. Mr. Cook, are those the end of your comments? Have you completed your comments, Mr. Cook? I think so. All right. Mr. Cook, thank you very much for your comments. And now we'll hear from Mr. Jeff Brandenburg. Madam Clerk, can you make, I see Mr. Brandenburg is available to be heard. Mr. Brandenburg, will three minutes be enough for you, sir? Yes, that will be fine. All right. Thank you for being with us. Thank you for your time. As Ralph already said, we have several concerns about this development. We're aware that with this rezoning proposal, this continued inch further and further away from the original proposal that was received favorably a couple of years ago. Feels like someone is slowly turning up the heat on the pot, hoping that we will not get alarmed enough to jump. We naturally welcome changes to the plan that increase the depth of the wooded buffers around the proposed development. And we do understand that this land is going to be developed one way or another sooner or later. We're very, very concerned about the proposal to increase the number of units, decreasing the spacing between units, which was a center point of discussion the first time around. And also to raise the structures from two to three stories, which from our perspective behind the development will be raising them from three to four stories. That is close to double the height of most of the houses around here. And it is going to be situated on a hill, so it is going to completely visually dominate the surroundings. There are mature trees between us and the proposed development. Since those are mature trees in a mature forest, they do not have a lot of low branches. So the shielding that they will provide is going to be quite limited. The proposed evergreen buffers that are discussed for being planted particularly along the southern border have the opposite problem. They will not get that tall and will never reach up high enough to conceal these buildings which are perched high on the mountaintop. We also have heard mentioned several times of providing more affordable housing stock that's obviously required in Durham. And we question the idea that these $320,000, $330,000, $340,000 townhomes really constitute a breakthrough in affordable housing. It seems to me that the reason for this change is simply to change the profit that's available out of this development to increase the profit that's available. And it doesn't really seem like that should be the goal of zoning policy and zoning changes. I would strongly urge the council to reject this proposed rezoning and to avoid ratcheting up the heat further in this area. Thank you for your time. Thank you very much, Mr. Brandenburg. Madam clerk, can you make Cam Morrison available to be heard? Cam Morrison, are you available to be heard? Can you unmute yourself? Cam Morrison, can you hear me? If you can, can you please unmute yourself? And we'd love to hear from you. All right. Well, we'll move on then to Elizabeth McCain. Madam clerk, can you make Elizabeth McCain available to be heard? Hello. Hi, Ms. McCain. Thank you for being with us tonight and for hanging in with us so long. You said that you weren't sure, I believe, whether or not you were an opot or a proponent. So we're happy to hear any comments that you might have. Will three minutes be enough for you? Sure. Yeah, I'll make that work. Thank you. Guys, my husband and I moved back to Durham after the birth of our daughter to raise her near family. And we learned about this development. So I'd like to thank the city planners and the stormwater control measure staff who have been patient and informative and responsive and treating and teaching this newbie best practices in stormwater management. Others, I think others, and I think we might have lost a couple in a long way, we'll speak to the zoning and affordability and traffic. I'd like to speak to the environmental and human health impact of the development. As you all know, the post development is on a pretty steep elevation that leads to an intermittent creek where kids play and stomp around and that leads to the Falls Jordan River watershed. And that's kids here in the neighborhood as well as the park, the departments. And so my first, I have four environmental concerns in priority order. My first is the, and I'd like to thank the engineering team for also responding to some of the concerns raised at the planning committee meeting. I have some new things that I've been learning in the interim. My first and primary concern is putting in a wet pond. The reason for that is the pond captures nitrogen and phosphorus, which is with increased impervious surfaces, it puts residents at risk for algal blooms. So we know that where algal blooms are increasing worldwide and here locally, and we've seen this at nearby Jordan Lakes. So in one study done by NC State researcher, toxins were detected at 86% of the tested sites during 44% of sampling events. So really increasing in frequency worldwide as well as locally. But what's so bad about this algae? Well, folks have found that researchers in Italy has found that those living near water bodies in the past 30 years had a 30% greater odds of developing ALS. New Hampshire, in New Hampshire, they found those around water bodies with these algae had a 10 to 25, which times more likely chance of developing ALS. Researchers regarding Parkinson's have found that the polygrain algae affects the genes linked to Parkinson's and Alzheimer's researchers are exploring similar paths. So there's a link between these algae and neurodegenerative disorders. My second concern is the monitoring of ponds. So we currently monitor ponds that are not water, that are not like water source ponds once a year from my understanding. But the problem is that these algal blooms are increasing in frequency because temperatures are rising and they're seasonally affected when you have hotter temperatures. So once a year is insufficient to be able to detect for current, future, all ages of residence, the frequency of algal blooms. One of my concerns was addressed, which was the storm management. But the other concern that I have is the visibility into other storm water control measures as this intermittent creek is headed to the Falls River Jordan Basin. So what are we doing about peltrace, groundwater filtration, rainwater, plants leading to the pond or any retention cell? In summary, I wonder about the possibility of a bioretention cell instead of a wet pond or a bioretention pond in a combination with other storm water control measures. And I know I will speak to something that can worsen has raised to me, which is the concern about height. But overall, my concern is regarding the wet pond, the increased risk of algal blooms and the risk that poses to current and any future residents. Thanks so much for the time of this committee to listen as well as the staff to explain to me more about traditional storm water control measures. Thank you very much, Ms. McCann. We appreciate your comments. It looks like maybe Kim Morrison is ready to be heard. Kim Morrison, are you ready to be heard? Can you unmute yourself? Hello. We're glad to have you. Will three minutes be enough for your remarks? More than enough. This is actually Bernard Weissman, Kim Morrison's husband. I don't know if I'm still signed up or not. You are. Mr. Weissman, you are, we're glad to have you. Thank you. But I'll save you some time speaking for both of us. We actually live next door to the previous speaker. Sorry, we have two computers open. We're hearing some feedback because you have the two computers open. Yeah, I'm trying to get rid of it. For all the reasons that the previous three speakers presented, we, I'm just worried this is their second bite at the apple. And if they find a year from now that they're not gonna be making enough money, they may come back and ask for more units with higher going to four stories. And I think you've already, we're kind enough several years to go to grant them an exemption to the plan. I think what they have now is sufficient. I don't see any benefit to the neighborhood of having an extra eight units. So I appreciate your time. I know it's late. And I hope you'll listen to the neighborhood. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Weissman. This is a public hearing item. And before we have questions for the applicant, is there anyone else that would like to be heard on this item who's attending, who hasn't been heard from yet? I don't see anyone else. If so, you can raise your virtual hand. Okay. Mr. Biker, you heard several concerns. I would say that the height of buildings and the algal blooms were two that were prominent in terms of what the residents had to say. Could you address those in any other, any, you have some time remaining. Is there anything else that you would like to address? Yes, Mayor Schruel, Patrick Biker again speaking for a Rollingdale. We do appreciate the concern about building heights. So on the record this evening, we would like to reduce the height of the proposed townhomes from 50 feet to 45 feet. I believe that will be below the tree line and the elevation differential between our proposed townhouse community and the homes in Woodcroft that have been there for, oh gosh, 35, 40 years. In regards to the stormwater issues, we have a very experienced team working on this. And again, we've committed to treat the 100 year storm onsite. And it's certainly my experience that the stormwater services division within our public works department, they run a tight ship. And we will, we're looking forward to designing this to control for a 100 year storm. And I think the other changes that Ms. McCain or were, that she was bringing up, really get into technical issues that are best left with the folks in our public works department, Shay Ballak, Ian Peterson, Jennifer Bunson, worked with all of them for many years and their first class public servants. I've enjoyed working with them and I'm confident that this will be a site that is done correctly and preserves everything that we need to have preserved on this site in addition to making sure that the post stormwater is basically identical to the pre-development stormwater conditions. Lastly, again, regards to the traffic that I do not wanna minimize that this turn lane will be added, will be a significant increase in capacity on NC 54. And that's reflected in your staff report, as well as the fact that there are apartments and townhomes only one or two-tenths of a mile away from this site. So it really does fit in with the area on Highway 54. We need housing on these infill sites close to the jobs at RTP and South Point and the other office parks in Southwest Durham. So we think it's a good set for the program and we'll be happy to answer any questions. Mayor Shul, I hope I addressed your concern. Thank you, Mr. Biker. Colleagues, any questions are at this point for the applicant or for anyone else, Council Member Middleton or for staff? Yeah, Council Member. Thank you, Mr. Mayor and thank you, Patrick and all who were speaking on this issue tonight. So a couple of questions. Obviously, it's no secret that we, this body rezoned this parcel with 2018, a few years ago. Could you just give us directly, Patrick, the rationale for coming back and asking for it to be rezoned? One characterization has been that it's purely profit-driven. What's if that's the case, that's fine, but would you just kind of give us a sense as to why we're revisiting this? Yeah, it was the $365,000 turn lane is a significant issue when we got to the site plan phase and we could only fit about 20 town homes on the site that you can do the math that equates to $18,000 per town homes for each townhouse, just to cover the cost of the turn lane. If we can increase the density to 33 town homes, that makes that cost of the turn lane be just slightly more than $10,000 per townhouse, which is a much more easier number to work in for the pricing of these town homes. There's been an awful lot of media coverage of lumber or plywood costs going increase significantly, what hasn't been covered so much is the cost of other infrastructure costs, especially resin and concrete, everything that goes into the sewer, sewer lines, the infrastructure for this site. And just to have that infrastructure burden be divided by 33 town homes as opposed to a number in the low 20s makes it a much more, I use the term affordable as a relative term, not as a UDO defined term. It is, I can't tell you exactly what the prices are gonna be, but I can tell you that the 33 town homes on an individual basis would be much cheaper than if we can only build 20-some town homes. So that's really what is driving it, is trying to build smaller town homes, increase the number from 25 to 33 on the zoning, and that enables us to handle the infrastructure burden that has to be handled even with only a dozen town homes. It would be the same infrastructure burden. Thank you for that clarification. And yeah, it's not a perfect science, I've obviously been nailing down with the price, but your working range is 315,000 to 350,000, is it not? Yeah, that's a good ballpark, but it's just, I go to, many of you know, I've been a member of the home builders for many years. The cost of lumber, plywood, building supplies, appliances is just off the chain right now. So we'd be hesitant to give you any projections on sales prices when these units are actually available for sale. But given that, it's not gonna be south of 315,000, right? 315,000. I think that's a fair statement. I can text my folks and see if that's the case, but obviously if there's only 20-some, if it's in the low 20s, the townhouses would be way more than that. So I think we'd be in the low 300s at 33 units. If we can only build 20-some units, the each townhouse will cost significantly more. Well, obviously this isn't an affordable housing project. Right, right, right. But I'm wondering how, could you tell us how the developer, given these price points and given that this is our second visit, at this in terms of a zoning request, how did they arrive at $25,000? Could you just tell me what the calculus was to arrive at that amount for the affordable housing? Oh yeah, that was last time. Council Member Middleton, it was simply based on $1,000 per unit. Okay. So was that 25,000 reflective of the new unit request or the old unit request? It stayed the same. It stayed the same if that's an issue. It's, you know. I just want to understand the calculus. Yeah, that's all it is. It remained unchanged from the previous application. You have any ideas to why? Can you speak to what the developer's mindset was on it? Just curious. It was something, to be honest with you, we didn't think about it because it was, the other issues related to infrastructure dominated the calculation of how this project could move forward. I mean, we can sort of, let me, if I could just confer my clients right quick. Sure. And with that, Mr. Mayor, I'm going to yield to my other colleagues if they have any questions, not a couple more, but I'll yield at that point at this point and throw back to you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you. And I'll await that information, Patrick. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member. That's a good question. Colleagues, other questions for either the residents, the applicants or staff? All right, we'll come in approach him. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I don't have a question, but I do have a comment, which is given the situation that we have with the housing shortage in Durham, there are now more, there are more realtors than homes for sale in the city, which I'm sure is a bizarre situation for people who work in that industry. I feel like if you can fit more homes on the same piece of property and even preserve more open space while doing it, that sounds good to me. And I want to generally encourage people to do that. Like my main question is why didn't you do this in the first place? If you can fit more homes on one piece of property and preserve more open space, I think that seems like generally something that is good for the city. And so I kind of just want to encourage people when they're thinking about designing projects like this to maximize the amount of housing on them in the first place because we need more housing in Durham, of course, and having, yeah, like this is the kind of, this is the kind of project where I think the more units, the better. And I would love to see more attention paid to, just creating, bringing us as many units as possible because I think we're, yeah, we're dealing with a really difficult situation right now with housing in general, of course, affordable housing is our primary goal but the more housing we build overall, I think we're also solving the broader problem of the housing shortage that we're facing, thanks. Thank you, Madam Mayor Pro Tem. Colleagues, we are past the 11 o'clock hour, but I'm going to go ahead and try to finish this. I don't think we have long to go and then we'll take a five minute break, okay? I'm going to ask Mr. Ralph Cook again, if he would like to speak. Mr. Cook, do you have some additional comments? Thank you so much, Mr. Mayor. Sure. Mr. Riker said that the cost of the turn lane helped drive the extra units, but the turn lane was planned back when there were 25 units. So I don't understand why suddenly he wants eight more units to pay for a turn lane, they had planned to pay for the first place. Secondly, I really can't agree that the more units the better. If we follow that to its logical conclusion, we put another big green pickle on this six and a half acres and just park everybody underground and to heck with the storm water. The planning commission did turn this down. There were a set of minutes that got out in the wild. I got a copy of them that was very confusing over whether the planning commission had turned them down. So I would like to reiterate the fact that the planning commission defeated the motion to recommend this eight to four. As far as storm water is concerned, I agree that gets to be a very technical issue. So I want to quote something about it. The quote is, with more than larger buildings on the property of flooding issue, it's a worry neighbors lose larger. The developer has promised to catch a 100 year flood. This is good, but the way it must be done must give the reviewer any reason. But it reads it to be worried. Ponds must be carved from the steep hillside retaining wall above it, cut into a gashed slope and a burn raised to hold the water. This construction would eliminate a good portion of the natural growth of trees on the developer side of the stream. If it works, that'll be good. But if it doesn't, it'll be difficult or impossible to correct. That was an evaluation by Tom Nutter. So I'll just give him a word on this subject. I'm not impressed with the cost issues. The price of housing is skyrocketed. They also talk about the cost of materials when they're talking about the price of the housing. So I really can't see that as a reason for the council to alter the zoning yet further. They altered it once three years ago and now they're being asked to alter it again. This is not in keeping with the rest of the area. This is moving it further away from what's in the area now. So I really recommend that the council deny this extension on the zoning change. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much, Mr. Cook. Mr. Beiker, do you have an answer to Mr. Council Member Middleton's question? Couple things. Yeah, we apologize for the oversight and we're happy to increase our profit to the Affordable Housing Fund from 25 to 33,000 to reflect $1,000 per unit. I do have to emphasize that when we started planning this development, say, four years ago, we thought the turn lane in the infrastructure was gonna cost roughly a third less than it did and it turned out to cost. And that, again, is something with all the discussion about two by fours in plywood, that's been sort of lost, but that Mr. Cook's issue, the infrastructure costs have gone up as dramatically as the lumber cost. And that's why we're asking for this increase in the number of units because that infrastructure cost has to be divided among 33 units in order for them to be a town home to be able to be sold in the low 300 price point. So I know it's late, I know your folks need a break on the closed captioning. I hope that answers all your questions and we respectfully ask for your approval. Thank you, Council Member Freeman. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Initially, I was thinking I would agree wholeheartedly with Mayor Pro Tem's assessment if this weren't close to the Jordan Lake watershed. I think just noting to Patrick Biker's point is interesting that we're talking about a piece of land that was mass graded and clear-cutted of all the trees that were on it and the lumber prices are the issue. I just wanna note that this site and the plan itself is inconsistent with the area that's clear. What strikes me even more is, and I'm just checking with staff, isn't this the case where we had a commissioner who voted on the item and then came before us to actually bring the item forward and as a representative, like as the attorney for the client? Good evening, Grace Smith here with the Planning Department. It could have been, my recollection is fuzzy. It's late at night and it's been a few years but I'm thinking you might be right, Council Member Freeman, I think you're correct. Just noted, it is late and I'm noting that this is the type of development that pushes folks away from the conversation and like North Durham and many other areas because this is how the deck is stacked against the residents in the neighborhood. They know what's in their neighborhood. They know where the water runs. They know where the flooding happens. They know how our stormwater requirements can underserve them and ways in which that other communities don't often get to speak on. And so I'm really leaning into what Ms. McCain laid out in acknowledging just how much of this is environmental and health and how we miss an opportunity three years ago and we'll likely miss it again because the focus is on affordable housing so to speak that won't be affordable to any of the residents we've been talking about this evening in our marginalized communities. But I was just noting specifically that this reminded me of a case that we had previously that it just ring a bell in case we saw it previously and I was just checking. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member. Colleagues, any further comments or questions? Council Member Middleton. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. So thank you, Patrick, for clarifying getting that information on the amended proffer to the affordable housing fund. I'm gonna ask Mr. Cook if he's still on. The applicant, the developer has proposed reducing the height which will affect the sight line of the property. Does that in any way address any of your concerns? I don't know if we've captured that as that's an official proffer or that just being floated but Mr. Cook, does a lower height affecting sight line in any way address your concerns? Well, I suppose it addresses it but it does not in any way satisfy me because I don't have nearly enough to tail to know what that involves. I don't know how low 45 is. I don't know where that's gonna go on the property. He said something about below the tree line. I'm not sure what trees he's intending to leave where. So I'm afraid just a comment like this even if it's binding that he makes, just, you know, oh, okay, we'll make it this high. I don't know exactly what that will do. I think it requires for somebody to say yes, this will satisfy my concern about that would mean that we would have to know, okay, where are those buildings? Height from what? From the back of the slope or from the top of the hill where it is? Are there gonna be trees between those buildings and the Woodcroft houses? I just don't know enough about what it means for it to satisfy me. The planning commission turned this down. I'm really thinking we should go with that. Well, the planning commission is definitely an important touchstone in our deliberations but there have been times when our votes have been divergent. I didn't wanna ask you one other question. So from 25 to 33, is it your position that those, I don't know if you even supported it when it was 25, but could you just once again, just for the record, how in your assessment will those eight additional units substantively change the nature of this project and any impact if that makes sense? Once that I understand something about traffic, a left-turn lane is not gonna do anything for the people that get rear-ended when they've stopped to turn right at that intersection which I estimate will happen twice a month if they actually get this built at either 25 or 33. I think it's gonna happen either time. No, I didn't support the other change either. But the other thing that it seems to me that the additional eight units does is that it sets the tone for what's gonna happen around there. What's gonna happen to the next person? What's gonna happen to the land across the street if that becomes available? What we're doing is setting what's going on for a larger piece of land than just the six and a half acres. That's what zoning is supposed to be for. And once he takes this infill and changes the nature of what's going on in that plot of land on Highway 54, then he has set the tone for what's going on. One of the changes that happened was, I read in documents that he put up in a neighborhood meeting, is that it turns out that the city will require him to put a cul-de-sac on the property instead of a T-road that I saw planned for. The T-road was gonna run right into the next person which they don't know yet, it belongs to the Barbies. That seemed to me to indicate clearly that they had plans to develop more property that was next to this year. If they hope to connect to other properties or they thought other people would develop properties that are next to this, I don't want all of them to be done at the higher density rate. Thank you, Mr. Cook. Mr. Mayor, I'll yield back. I do want to just say that I recall the incident that Council Member Freeman is alluding to, but I do just wanna say on the record as part of this body, I'm gonna be very careful. I don't think that ultimately any impropriety or malfeasance was attached to Mr. Goche. The issue was vetted and it was brought on record, but I just wanna be very careful and not suggest or have that out there floating like he was something, because I don't recall any sanction or any action being taken against him as well, but I just wanna say that that was vetted. And I don't recall that any malfeasance was officially a lay to it, not withstand of the optics of the whole matter. Just wanna put that out. I don't remember any malfeasance either, but it didn't work good. Optics, yeah, I hear you. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you, Council Member. All right, Council Member Freelon and then Council Member Caballero. Yes, just very quickly. I was curious if Mr. Biker could, I know we're dealing with estimates here, but I'm curious if it's only 20 some low 20s units, what the price point would be at that density. Or probably talking around 400, Council Member Freelon, because you're talking about, there's also the time value of money, but you've got to take all that infrastructure, water, sewer, road improvements, and divide that by a much smaller number, 20 in the low 20s. It would be well over 400, I would say. Okay, so we're looking at a scenario where we do 33 units at, you know, 315 to 350,000 versus 20 units at well over 400,000. Okay. Special Mayor Freelon. Yes, sir. Okay. Thank you, Council Member. Council Member Caballero. I'll pass. I'm looking at the time. It's okay. Okay. Any other questions, colleagues or comments? I see Ms. McCain has her hand up. Ms. McCain, you have a brief comment. We're happy to take it. All right, very brief. I would just like to say that I appreciate folks hearing me about stormwater management. And I think that there was one comment that suggested that it would be best leaving this to the stormwater management authorities. And I just wanted to let folks know that I am happy to run fast and learn to keep up. If residential input are there, I'm not the smartest, but I'm pretty diligent. And it impacts me and it impacts people that I care about to have good stormwater management. And it impacts current neighbors, but also future neighbors. So that's what I'm thinking about. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. McCain. And thanks everyone for being here. Colleagues, I'm now going to declare this public hearing closed. I don't want to ask if there are any comments by members of the council. And then I will take a motion. Any comments, any final comments? Council member Freeman. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I was just going to note, as in the last case, I agreed with council member Freelon that commissioner Miller's advice is usually something that I take and just acknowledging in honor of Tom Miller Day. I'm going to be voting against this item. Thank you. Thank you, council member. Any other comments? Council member Caballero. I just had a quick question for staff and it's come up before, but I'm planning commissioner Mondolia's comments about him being a renter and how, because he's a renter, he didn't get a notice. And that conversation has happened before on there. So don't want to spend too much time on it this evening. But I would like to hear from planning staff at some point about how we deal with that because it is unfair and he's correct and we've had that conversation previously. Grace Smith with the planning department. We actually just brought an item forward to JCCPC last week that included some updates to article three that addresses that. We've been working on that for quite some time even prior to his comments and how we would actually be able to successfully pull that off and make that notice requirement and meet those notice requirements. If we make that an ordinance requirement. So we did bring something to JCCPC last week and you will see that in the near future. Thank you. You're welcome. Thank you, Ms. Smith. Thank you, council member. Colleagues, I'll just comment that I don't want to say to the residents. I want to thank all the residents who are being here today. Really appreciate your input. You know, this is one of those situations where I understand that the people that live across the stream and across the buffer and near this would rather have this not be as dense. I understand that. And we always have to make the judgment about those kinds of considerations versus what we think is good for the city as a whole. In this case, I think that more housing is good for the city as a whole. And I don't think that there's any significant damage or any really, I think that in fact, I think that there's more open space, stronger buffer and more units, which I think is a good combination. I actually think that that open space and larger buffering is positive. And I've just said to Ms. McCain, thank you for your comments about the stormwater. I have never heard any, you know, anything before about a stormwater facility like this having any significant impact in terms of algal blooms ever. And I know that I feel a lot of confidence in our stormwater department, that were there any such thing that would cause significant health effects, they would be all over it. I'm very confident of that. Yeah, so I'm planning to vote for this. I agree that, yeah, this is not affordable housing. Let's don't pretend that it is, but it's housing. And, you know, as Mayor Pro Tem said, we just, we have an unbelievable housing, we have a shocking increase in housing prices in this town right now because of a lack of supply. And we have got to do everything we can to increase supply within the important environmental concerns that people have raised here. And I think this does meet that standard. I thought this, my, I agree with Tony Cease's comments Plain Commissioner Cease, I thought he had it right and appreciated that. Other comments before we take a motion, Council Member Middleton. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I want to associate myself with your comment. I plan on supporting this development for many of the reasons you said. I resonate with what the Mayor Pro Tem said as well. And I don't think she in any way was implying that we density to the point of absurdity, but within reason. And I think that's an important point to make. I do want to just make sure that staff codifies the proffers, the amended proffers from the developer with respect to the commitment to affordable housing fund and the height as well. But I plan on supporting this development. Thank you. Well, I think that's probably a question worth asking staff. Ms. Smith or Mr. Kultra, you all receive those proffers. You heard those proffers, have they been appropriately offered? Mayor Schuyl, yes. And in fact, I was going to reiterate the three proffers. Actually, the extra proffer was the commitment for the 100 years storm water SEM commitment. And the other was the reduced height to 45 feet, which was originally committed at 50 feet and the increase from $25,000 to $33,000 for the affordable housing fund. Thank you, Mr. Kultra. Colleagues, any further comments? All right. Thank you all. And I'm sorry, Mr. Mayor. Just go ahead, go ahead, sure. 45, I didn't catch that. 45, 45, yeah. Because I knew that Councilman Middleton mentioned 35 feet earlier. Yeah, 45, I think you just misheard, yeah, 45. Okay, colleagues, to approve this, we would need a motion to adopt an ordinance amending the UDO by taking property out of the planned development of residential 3.940, Falls Jordan Lake Watershed Protection and establishing the same as planned development of residential 5.189, Falls Jordan Watershed Protection District B and amending the future land use map from the low-design residential to low-medium-density residential. I move is read. Moved by Councilmember Middleton, seconded by Councilmember Freelon. Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll? Mayor Shull. Aye. Mayor Pro Tem Johnson. Aye. Councilmember Caballero. Aye. Councilmember Freelon. Aye. Councilmember Freeman. Aye. Councilmember Middleton. Aye. I vote aye. Thank you. Thank you, Madam Clerk. Thank you, colleagues. The motion passes five to one. Next motion would be to adopt a consistency statement. Move to adopt consistency. Second. Moved by Councilmember Middleton, seconded by Councilmember Freelon. Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll? Mayor Shull. Aye. Mayor Pro Tem Johnson. Aye. Councilmember Caballero. Aye. Councilmember Freelon. Aye. Councilmember Freeman. Aye. Councilmember Middleton. Aye. I vote aye. Thank you. Thank you, Madam Clerk. The ayes have it and the motion passes five to one. Mr. Biker, we're looking forward to you all doing a great job with this development and doing all the things that you have promised that you would. We wanna thank the neighbors for being here for your input. These things are often very tough calls and we so appreciate what you had to offer us tonight. Thank you so much. Thank you very much for your time tonight. Good night. Thank you. Colleagues, we're now gonna take a five minute break. We have one more item and then a closed session. So we got a long way to go tonight, but I think for our closed captures we'll take another five minute break. It's 11.26, we're back here at 11.31, up to 11.27. We're back here at 11.32 sharp. And please mute your microphones. All right, colleagues, it was 11.32. And we're back at it. We have one more public hearing item before we have a closed session. And I'm going to call on, I believe, Mr. Reginald Johnson for this item. There he is, Mr. Johnson, welcome. Well, thank you, Mayor and Mayor Pro Tem, Reginald Johnson, Director of the Department of Community Development. And this is a public hearing on Second Substantial Amendment on COVID funding. And Matthew Snars will be reading the particulars into the record before you begin the public hearing. He's our Senior Planning and Performance Manager. And we also have Ms. Monica McGee, who will be providing the sign language interpretation. I would just take this opportunity though, it's late to share for many years, Will McConeus has played this role in this event, but she's retired now from the city of Durham. And so we are making transitions in that regard. And so I just wanted to share that with you. Mr. Snars, I'll turn it over to you. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Mr. Johnson. Good evening, Mayor Schulte, Members of Council. This is my name is Matt Snars with the Community Development Department, Planning and Performance Manager. The purpose of this public hearing is to receive citizen comments on the proposed amendment to the FY 2020-2021 Annual Action Plan and the 2020-2025 Consolidated Plan for Coronavirus Aid Relief and Economic Security CARES Act funding. The CARES Act Public Law 116-136 was signed into law on March 27th, 2020 to provide additional funding for communities in their efforts to prevent, prepare for, and respond to coronavirus pandemic. In total, the city of Durham expects to receive a total of $2,716,217 in Community Development Block Grant, CDBG-CB, $2,662,000 in Community Development Block Grant $668 of Emergency Solutions Grant, ESG-CB funds, and 70,340 in Housing Opportunities for Persons with AIDS, HAPA-CB funding, which totals altogether $5,449,525. The additional supplemental funding through the CARES Act requires an amendment to the FY 2020-21 Annual Action Plan, the 2020-2025 Consolidated Plan. Public hearing for the First Amendment was held on December 7th, 2020, and addressed a total of $1,875,324. Tonight's public hearing is for the Second Amendment and addresses the remaining balance, $3,573,901, which consists of $1,513,616 in CDBG-CB funds, $2,060,285 in ESG-CB funding. Additionally, the Second Amendment proposes a reallocation of 100,000 of CDBG-CB funds, which was approved for housing counseling on the December 7th, 2020 First Amendment to be added to the proposed micro-analyzed business activities as part of the Second Amendment. The proposed Second Amendment was made available for public review and comment from May 10th, 2021, and will be available for comment through June 10th, 2021 on the Community Development Department's website, and was also distributed via a general listserv. Citizen participation plan contained in the adopted 2020-2025 Consolidated Plan requires that a public hearing be conducted for formal amendments that add, delete, or substantially change the Consolidated Plan or annual action plan. Notice of this meeting was properly advertised on the K-POS and newspapers on May 10th, 2021, and posted on the Community Development Department's website, and was also distributed via a general listserv. Comments from this public hearing and a summary of written comments received from citizens concerning their proposed amendment will be included in the final document. No comments were received during the comment period to date. In closing, after this public hearing has closed, we ask that the city council vote to approve the draft second substantial amendment to the FY20-21 annual action plan and the 2020-2025 Consolidated Plan for submission to HUD. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Schnars. We appreciate your being here. And Mr. Johnson, please pass on to our congratulations to Ms. Conyers. I didn't know she'd retired. Please give her, sir. Warm regards. She did a really good job for a really long time. Colleagues, you have now heard the report from staff and I'm gonna now declare this public hearing open. And I see that Ms. Dell Adams is here and has a comment. And Madam Clerk, can you make Ms. Adams available to be heard? Ms. Adams, welcome and you have three minutes. I just want to speak and say that I am opposed to moving money from housing and counseling resources to the micro enterprise fund. We have both rental and foreclosure crisis coming up and we need those housing counselors to have the resources that to assist people with their housing needs. The moratorium will end at the end of this month. And so we really need to take advantage of the CDBG of it related funds to provide counseling and legal services to folks who are going to face immediate evictions and closure. And so I again would caution that we not move money from housing counseling towards micro-interpress. Otherwise, thank you and good night, hopefully. Hopefully you're right, Ms. Adams, thank you. All right, any further comments? All right, I'm going to ask the question that Ms. Adams implied to staff, Mr. Schnarrs or Mr. Johnson, can you talk about why these funds, the funds had originally been approved, it had been programmed for housing counseling and now our program for the micro enterprise fund. Can you talk about why that change was made? Yes, I'll be glad to Mr. Mayor. So at the time, if you remember when we planned these funds, it was during last summer, it's actually a year ago, that when we first approved the emergency rental assistance funding and we had at the time thinking that there was going to be additional funding coming from folks that basically focus on home ownership. Well, it didn't quite materialize like we thought that it would. And one of the things we have to be concerned about is how we deploy the funds and whether we can deploy the funds. And so we thought that was probably in the best interest, well, in the best interest that we not to do it because we didn't have a companion funding to go along with it. And also the other piece is that when the federal government comes with additional funding, it sort of makes our funding go to the end of the line, which is what happened with the hope funding. If you remember that we initially put in funding for emergency rental assistance with the county that was last year, almost a year ago now. And then hope funding came in the midst of that and the funding that we approved first went to the end of the line as all the funding for the hope had to be spent first. So that's one of the things that we are also concerned about because this has to have a COVID tie and the longer we wait, the less tenuous it becomes. And so with these comments and the feedback that we had from the inner community engagement that the two areas that we have rate pretty strong. Thank you, Mr. Johnson. Mr. Johnson, you and I corresponded a little bit earlier in the week about the Micro Enterprise Fund. And could you talk a little bit more about that? That's an important component here. It's not one that we have previously been had programmed. And it's definitely in the direction of meeting some of our important goals. So if you could talk about that and particularly talk about their racial equity implications and I know this is not fully developed yet but anything that you could tell us would be helpful. Well, I'll begin and share a little bit of information about the Micro Enterprise. It is one of the eligible activities under the Community Development Block Grant program with Coronavirus. A Micro Enterprise is defined according to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development as a commercial enterprise that has five or fewer employees, one of whom owns the enterprise. The other piece of that is that it's still the CDBG qualifications that it still has to be in the low moderate in the area apply. And the goal of the program is to strengthen and foster development, support and expansion of Micro Enterprise businesses within the city of Durham. So it is a targeted program that we're working with the Office of Economic and Workforce Development on and they're actually taking the lead. My colleague, Andre Pettigrew is on the call if they wanna get into more details but we're still working through the details of this but the main purpose is to be able to support businesses in these targeted areas low moderate income areas. I'm sorry, I do have one more question. Thank you about that. Not a really need a lot of detail and I'm not sure right now I could actually take a minute at this point anyway but the timetable when we set up, how long do we have to spend that money? So I'm going to defer to Mr. Snars on the actual time that we have to spend this money. You will. Okay. Yes, yes, Mr. Mayor. The answer to your question is we have six years from the time the grant agreements are signed. Okay. So the fact that we don't have a program up and running yet I was worried that there was a fast timeline but it's not and so we can spend a little time planning and getting it right. We can Mr. Mayor but also remember one of the requirements is with this funding there has to be a documented demonstrated COVID tie. Yeah. And so if it's 12 months from now and we're coming out of the pandemic, we pray that of course we will that tie becomes more tenuous. Got you. So, and that's part of the reason that you switch the money from the housing counseling you're saying as well. Okay. Those are my questions. Colleagues, any question, any further questions for Mr. Johnson or Mr. Shars? All right. Seeing none, I'm gonna declare this public hearing, I'm sorry, closed. We would need two motions to approve this. One is to approve the draft second amendment to the FY 2021 annual action plan. So move. Second. Moved by Council Member Freeman, seconded by Council Member Middleton. Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll? Mr. Shool. Aye. Mr. Pro Tem Johnson. Aye. Council Member Caballero. Aye. Council Member Freelon. Aye. Council Member Freeman. Aye. Council Member Middleton. Aye. Thank you. Thank you, Madam Clerk. The motion passes unanimously. And then second to authorize the city manager to execute all administrative requirements and attractional documents for the implementation of the amended annual action plan. So move. Second. Second. Moved by Council Member Freeman, seconded by Council Member Caballero. Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll? Mr. Shool. Aye. Mr. Pro Tem Johnson. Aye. It's Member Caballero. Aye. Member Freelon. Aye. It's Member Freeman. Aye. Mr. Middleton. Aye. Thank you. The ayes have it. The motion passes unanimously. Thank you, Mr. Johnson and Mr. Schnars. We appreciate your being here, Mr. Pettigrew. Thank you all. Thank you so much, Mayor and members of council. Colleagues, we now have a closed session. I'm going to call on our city attorney to give us the appropriate motion. Good evening again. So the motion, Mr. Mayor, is to hold a closed session pursuant to North Carolina General Statute 143-318.11a3 for attorney-client consultation concerning the handling or settlement of litigation in the following cases. Daryl Howard versus City of Durham at Al and Deborah Friedman and Mark Rodin versus City of Durham at Al. Thank you. Thank you very much, Madam Attorney. Colleagues, would someone like to make that motion? I'll move. I'll move and state it. Moved by Council Member Freeman and seconded by Council Member Middleton that the motion that the city attorney read. Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll? Mayor Schuyl. Aye. Mayor Pro Tem Johnson. Aye. Council Member Caballero. Aye. Council Member Freelon. Aye. Council Member Freeman. Aye. Council Member Middleton. Aye. Thank you. The motion passes unanimously. Thank you, Madam Clerk. All right, we'll now go into closed session. Madam Clerk, will you want to remind us what we need to do here? Mr. Mayor, I just removed the attendees and now we need to make sure that everyone in the closed session is here to attend it and then all the others are to depart. Council is to remain City Attorney Raeberg is to remain Assistant City Attorney Roseboro is to remain Finance Director Boyd.