 Good afternoon, Mr. Brown, Ms. Herbert, Dr. Bustles, Mr. Brennan, Mr. McDowell, Mr. Duvall, American man thank you. Lord for this day and for all you've done for each one of us. For the blessings of this city as we continue to expand, bless each person around this table. We thank you Lord for another day. We thank you for her elite building. We thank you for her energy and for what she does for each one of us. Particularly, we thank you for her birthday. You don't know the number of years, but you know her heart. And because of that, we are grateful. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Amen. Amen. I still don't know how old you are. I am 44. Thank you. You're welcome. That's a good year. Great. It's been like a long time so long. It's been like a long, long time so long. It's been like a long, long time so long. There's two more to here. Mr. Palin. Yes, sir. Shall we yours? Next up is the adoption of the agenda. We have a motion. We move. Second. Second. Any discussions, questions, concerns? Hearing none, sing them out of heart. Mr. Brown. Here. Mr. Herbert. Hi. Dr. Bustles. Yes. Mr. Brennan. Yes. Mr. McDowell. Yes. Mr. Duvall. Hi. Mayor Rickman. Hi. Thank you. Great. So our first item of the city council discussion is a budget program. Good afternoon, everyone. Good afternoon, mayor and city council. Mr. Palin. Thank you for the introduction. So we are bringing to city council on your agenda for this evening is resolution two thousand and twenty three fifty five, which is asking city council to not accept the American rescue plan funds along with adopting a proposed spending plan for the budget. We're bringing this forward today in terms of helping to make sure that we're meeting some timeliness with this budget or with these allocations along. Thank you. Along with just with some conversations over recent months with the federal government with regards to unallocated funds, we want to make sure we stay again in compliance and timeliness for the for the American rescue act funds. So I'm going to start a little bit with just a review of what the American. See if I can move forward. All I'm getting is a. There we go. Thank you. So just as a reminder, the American rescue plan act was passed into law March 11, 2021. Adopting the American rescue plan act or ARPA as we often know it allocating $350 billion to states, territories, local and tribal governments to mitigate negative impacts from COVID pandemic through utilization of the state local federal recovery recovery funds program or SLFRF, which is technically the program that we have received these funds, but everyone refers to them as ARPA. I think it's easier to say and memorize. So we refer we across the country in other places just refer to it as our ARPA funds. The funds were allocated or proven in 2021. Compliant and reporting guidance started in June of that year. And then the U. And which of course spelled out the requirements that we must follow. Like with all other federal funds, we have to follow the to 200 CFR the reporting requirements and other uses such as procurement purposes and sub recipient monitoring and so forth. Of course, we have to also do quarterly reporting requirements for which we which started immediately as well. Finally, US Treasury released their final rule in January of 2022, which provided the outline and outlines of eligible uses and administrations of the funds. So just in looking at the allocations of the funds, there are five major categories that the ARPA funds are are categorized for use. One of which is replacement of lost public sector revenue. This is sort of a general purpose catch all if you will in order for local governments and states and others to utilize these funds for maintaining government services in order that were could have been otherwise reduced. As a result of impacts on revenue from that that we're seeing that we're seeing impacts on revenue from the from the pandemic. Support of public health expenditures address negative economic impacts caused by the public health emergency provide premium pay for essential workers and invest in water sewer and broadband infrastructure. Those are the main categories. The city specifically received $27 million over a two year period. We received the first half of 13 million in June of 2021, second half in June of 2022. We also received an allocation from home through CDBG, the home ARPA funds of 2.5 million specifically administered by community development specifically for affordable housing. In addition, the state of South Carolina comparatively received 2.4, 2.5 billion, which a lot of that allocation was used for the infrastructure investment program referred to as the skip grant. And so far the city has received an award of $10 million for the lower Crane Creek equalization storage project. So that's 40 million in federal dollars alone that the city has received through this program. Of course we established some goals that we wanted to try to make sure that we maintained or are you in terms of utilizing these funds we wanted to acknowledge that these are one-time funds. So we wanted to treat them as one-time funds and accepting them so that they we utilize them in a way that we have minimized or limit the burden on future budgets. We also want to make sure we are covering any deficits from our as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. We wanted to address immediate needs focus on those things that have the most immediate impact and restore city services, create sustainable solutions. We're pride to prioritizing this funding for existing programs and avoid ongoing financial commitment. Of course we, as with all of our federal dollars and grant dollars, we wanted to make sure that we were compliant in our administering these funds as well as staying on top of our reporting. And then of course, we achieved long-term benefits, considered one-time projects with higher ongoing positive impact. Since 2021 City Council has allocated a variety of these projects or these funds to a variety of projects. So what's before you today is a full schedule of all allocations that reflect both currently approved or allocated funds as well as proposed funds. So far we have allocated $17.5 million has been approved. So the remaining 9.6 is what's before you today in terms of proposed allocations. Some of those allocations we've spent so far have been or proposed or allocated so far have been under the categories for public health, include our vaccine incentives, along with the police department's pathways unit, which is alternative approach for police calls, utilizing a partnership with Department of Mental Health for embedded clinicians within our police department. We also have the Columbia Police Department demolition of vacant and abandoned hazardous properties help remove blight. The Richland County School District 1 JAG program, which was the jobs for America's graduates at City Council approved last December. Then the Mayor's Office of Violence Prevention, which was allocated and has now been established and has been staffed. And then of course we had COVID related expenses that were reimbursing. And we've categorized these allocations based on the way that the federal government has categorized them. So that's the way we were presenting them in this fashion. Negative economic impacts on the food and security solutions initiative that has also been approved. Rapid Shelter Columbia, that incorporated both the initial setup of the Rapid Shelter Columbia and some ongoing operating costs. Premium pay for essential workers during the pandemic. It was a one-time pay to pay for the food and security solutions. And then of course revenue replacement, we've utilized both in the general fund as a $2 million allocation to the general fund and some specific projects that don't meet one of the other categories to include our grant consultants, police facility renovations, fire department, station renovations, second set of bunker gear for the fire department and for some other exhaust and other types of equipment. So that's the way we do it. Yes. Okay. All right. Okay. We can make some adjustments. Okay. We can adjust that so far. And then we'll have some funds from last year that we can carry forward into this year. So we'll look to see what the deficit is to make up that difference. The items that are proposed today really is a continuation of some existing projects but some of these projects we've actually had over different iterations of the budget or proposed spending that we've brought to City Council but this will be the first time we're actually asking City Council to approve these funds to commit these dollars in total. We've brought these forward before in a variety of ways or various different conversations. So of course we want to continue to fund the budget. We want to do some additional now that the police department code enforcement office is preparing for demolition of homes. This will be another round for additional properties to be demolished to continue to reduce or remove blight. This will help with catching up some case backlog if you will in terms of case properties for demolition that will make sure that the property owner does not own the properties. The city doesn't own the properties. So the property owner is able to redevelop that property if desired. What's proposed is an affordable housing construction and rehabilitation program some of which would be administered by the community development department. Some of this would allocate additional projects towards the shine program but some other things to improve the functionality improvements to include some lighting that's highly needed a variety of our parks along with some additional playground equipment and some bleachers, some other things to improve our park systems and continued revenue replacement looking at a continuation of our grant program, our grant consultant contract for additional terms and for some additional work to make sure that we have some additional funding and making improvements of our fire stations. I would add to this what's also contributing to this is that the federal government has required that these funds be committed by December of 2024 and actually be expended by December of 2026 and as slow as we know some things do move that time will actually be here pretty quick so we won't be able to make any improvements to the intention of the federal government. Just to demonstrate graphically a little bit this is just allocating how we've allocated these programs by fund again showing 17.5 that has been approved or committed and expended some of which expended and then of course the total proposed is 9.6 million rounding up the 27.1 million for allocations. I would also add the other things. I would also add an allocation for the two of them that actually missed one is for the city's commercial retention and redevelopment program the CRR program that is administered by our OBO office this would help to expand that program for a few more years utilizing these funds and then also to the assistant nonprofits for the Lori center and senior resources commission. A commitment of $150,000 over the next three years that was actually brought forward from a committee recommendation from last June. So that's being brought forward as a recommendation from the committee to full city council utilizing these funds to help support that commitment which would help of course expand programs to seniors and promoting healthy lifestyles. My apologies for overlooking the the the revenue and the revenue and I would add that the revenue replacement is a specific we took the federal government gave an automatic $10 million sort of threshold that you could consider so we accepted we're proposing to utilize the $10 million cap. The only adjustment I see is the JAG program. That's a three year program. We need two more years at it so it's 160 that we need to adjust somehow in here. We do have a little bit of contingency in here and stuff like that that we can make some adjustments to. If there are no questions. Thank you. Thank you. That was our only item for discussion. The executive session is next. Mr. Neval, our favorite time of the day. It's the executive session. I move we go into the discussion of negotiations incident to propose contractual arrangement pursuant to SECO 30-4-78-2 so the city and family part proceed to lead the advice relating to matters covered by attorney and SECO 30-4-78-2 her and Polly Peepus. Peepus. The dirty word. Peepus is expensive. Is there a second? Second. Any questions, concerns, any add-ons, hearing none, seeing none. Madam clerk. Mr. Brown. Aye. Yes. Aye. Aye. Thank you.