 It's fine. Good catch. She's not going to have any in her pocket, Lord. I mean, what? Oh, you got a new pen? No. That'll be next week. Oh, you got a regular pen? Yeah. Did you try on a one-on-one? Yeah, I have one. I was like, here, wear mine. She's like, no. She said, I got 20 in my office. If she had any on me, I was like, oh, OK. How does she have 20 in her office? She asked. She couldn't ask. Kermie should give her a handful. I only have one. Oh, is that right? The key is you've got to buy different backs. The current backs stink. I bought these little rubbery backs. You can buy like $105 on eBay. Oh, the microphone's wrong. Hi, everybody. Everybody wants to hear about my lapel pen backs. And there's Cora. There's Jean. Oh, my gosh. She asked me what she got in orientation. I said, oh, yeah. Yes, sir. Can I help you? Ah, I will do it right now. I'll do it right now. Yeah, I'll take care of it. How are you? Good. How are you? Wow. It is old home week here. I like your time. All our rowdy friends are coming over tonight. I'm very excited. I'm going to recognize all those fine citizens aren't you, Mr. Mayor? Pardon me? I'm going to recognize all those fine citizens aren't you, Mr. Mayor? Oh, yeah. All right. Say it. Is this the reunion? Yes, I invited them. You are the man. I invited them to be here. Ian, great day. Oh, good. I didn't hear it from you, Jane. Yes. Yeah. A whole former council over there. Perfect. Yeah, that's great. Council members. This meeting will please come to order. Seven o'clock. This meeting will please come to order. Call this meeting. The Durham City Council to order. Seven o'clock on January the 16th. I want to welcome everyone here today. We're very glad to see all of you all and have you here for our meeting. I want to ask first that you please join me in a moment of silent meditation. Thank you. Council member Reese, would you lead us into the Pledge of Flag? Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Ladies and gentlemen, if it's your custom to do so and if you're able, please rise for the Pledge of Allegiance. 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. Amen. Madam clerk, would you please call the roll? Mayor Schuhl. Here. Mayor Pro Tem Johnson. Here. Council member Alston. Here. Council member Freeman. Present. Council member Middleton. Here. And council member Reese. Here. Thank you very much. We're now going to have something that is very special and doesn't have happened very much in the life of this council, but I know that we're all looking forward to very much. We've gone through a long process to choose a new member of our Durham City Council. And this process is, I think, been a great exercise in democracy and a really wonderful chance for our community to express itself in all its wonderful variety. And I am pleased to say and honored to welcome our new council member who will be sworn in, will be administered the oath of office in a moment, Javier Caballero. Javier. Javier. Can you please step towards the clerk here and you can bring your family with you and she will administer the oath of office. Family members, you can come right on up and stand with her and enjoy yourself. I state your name. Do hereby solemnly affirm that I will support and maintain the Constitution and laws of the United States and the Constitution and laws of North Carolina, not inconsistent therewith and that I will faithfully and impartially discharge the duties of my office as council member of the City of Durham. Javier, why don't you come on up here and take your seat with us and then you can make your remarks. Thank you. Welcome to this podium. Mark Anthony is sitting next to you and he will reveal the secrets of the microphone and so forth. Absolutely. Don't pull it toward you. Yes, don't pull it towards you. Right. Very quickly. First, I want to thank everyone who supported me along the way. It would have been impossible to make it to this point without your support. This has been a historic moment for Durham and I am proud to be part of this process. I'm also proud to be part of the Latinx community. I look forward to fighting for all of us. Thank you very much. Welcome. Thank you very much. Welcome. welcome. Her Spanish is better than mine, isn't it? Of course. Not a high bar, Mr. Mayor. Council Member Rees, that really hurts my feelings. Well yours is a lot better than mine, so. We are now, actually we made that motion at the, we have already officially appointed Aviera, so we're good. Yeah, we did that at the special meeting. Thank you. Let me just say that we have had a request by someone to speak concerning an item, not on tonight's agenda. We will hold that item, Ms. Lofton, until the end of the meeting. Thank you. We will now have the ceremonial items. We're going to start with the neighborhood spotlight recipient, the recognition of Terry Parker. I'm going to read now concerning Terry Parker, who is the neighborhood spotlight winner for this month, which is a great honor that the city bestows, and we're really pleased to have you here. Terry Parker is the recipient of the neighbor spotlight for the month of January 2018. The Neighbor Spotlight Award recognizes community members that have gone above and beyond in volunteering their time to serve the community. This month, Terry Parker, a resident of the Rochelle Manor neighborhood, was nominated and selected because of the wonderful work she has done in her neighborhood, including, but not limited to, providing free childcare to parents going to work or running errands, loaning household items such as brooms and cleaning supplies to other neighbors, conducting door-to-door outreach to community members to share knowledge of resources and organize meetings and events. Congratulations, Ms. Parker, on being the January neighbor spotlight for the city of Durham, and thank you for all the great work you do to support the Durham community. We really appreciate it. I'm going to ask, are there members of her family or neighborhood who are supporters from Rochelle Manor? If you would please stand. Great, thank you. Ms. Parker, why don't you say a few words? Okay, I just want to thank everybody for this recognition, and just greatly appreciate it. Jacob, you want to take our picture? How do we look? Congratulations, Ms. Parker. Wonderful. Let me also ask, this just Thank you. And now we are going to have another special recognition, one that some people have been looking to for about 33 years. I'm going to ask some of my, I sent out a special invitation to our city clerk, our retiring city clerk, our retired city clerk, V. Ann Gray, has worked with how many council members? 54, council members, 54. I did not invite all 54, but I invited all the council members with whom I have served during the last six years, as well as our mayor. So I would like to ask all those council members, if you all would please come up to accompany D. Ann Gray, up with you to the podium here. So you all recognize this, I won't say illustrious group, this, this group, and I'm going to ask, I'm actually going to give you all if you might have one little quick thing to say about D. Ann Gray, if you want to, you're going to have to keep it quick. I know Mayor Bell will keep his quick, but if any of the rest of you all have something to say after we do this presentation, it would be great. I'm going to read the proclamation and this is a very, very special day for all of us who have known Ann and worked with Ann for so many years. I learned a secret, by the way, that D. Ann Gray has apparently arranged all these years. We have an official proclamation that we give to folks, but then there is the larger print version that was specially arranged for Mayor Bell and now is arranged for me as well. I'm very appreciative of it. That's the kind of work that the City Clerk does. Whereas a graduate of North Carolina Central University, D. Ann Gray received her Bachelor of Business Administration degree in 1982, 1982, was hired by the City of Durham as Assistant City Clerk in 1984, rose through the ranks to become Deputy City Clerk in 1989, was appointed City Clerk February 1, 2000, and whereas she demonstrated her commitment to and knowledge of the City Clerk's office by receiving the designation of Certified Municipal Clerk in 1999, Master Municipal Clerk in 2008, and North Carolina Certified Municipal Clerk in 2012, and whereas with many of her tasks dictated by law or statute, to name a few, she was the official keeper of historical records, responsible for ensuring transparency in local government, ensuring that public meetings were properly publicized, providing an accurate account of actions taken by the City Council, providing access to public records and keeper of the official corporate seal, and whereas, doing her employment with the City, Ann had the privilege of working with 54 council members, eight mayors, five city managers, and three attorneys, and whereas she was an active member of the International Institute of Municipal Clerks, the North Carolina Association of Municipal Clerks, serving as District Six Director for four years, Chair of the Membership Committee, a member of the Program and Education Committee, and was the recipient of the Good Government Award May 2017, and whereas she strongly believes in giving back to the community, being a supporter of the Durham Rescue Mission, and campaign for change, a non-profit organization in Durham committed to community service efforts to educate and empower, and change the negative mindset of today's youth, and whereas, Ann is universally respected for her organizational skill, attention to detail, thoroughness, commitment to service, love of the City of Durham, and for her sense of humor. Now, therefore, I, Stephen M. Shul, Mayor of the City of Durham, North Carolina, do hear my proclaim Tuesday, January 16, 2018, as D. Ann Gray Day throughout the City of Durham for the services she has given to the City and its residents for 33 years and wishing her the fullest enjoyment of her retirement. Witness my hand in the corporate seal, the City of Durham, North Carolina, the 16th day of January, 2018. Congratulations, Ann, and here's your proclamation, and say a few words to us. I'd like to thank Mayor Shul, Mayor Pro Tem Johnson, and other members of the City Council for this proclamation, and also I'd like to thank the former members that were serving in February 2000 for appointing me City Clerk and giving me that opportunity. In addition, I'd like to thank former Mayor Phil Bell and the previous Council members, Cora Comet Fadden, Eddie Davis, Don Moffitt, Diane Cattati, Eugene Brown, and Senator Mike Wood, for your assistance during the years that I worked with you all. To City Manager Bondfield, City Attorney Baker, and their respective staffs, thanks for your assistance. And finally, last but not least, I want to thank the staff in the City Clerk's Office. Diana, Tanetta, Laverne, Sheila, Evelyn and Juliet for their support, making the City Clerk's Office an important resource for the City Staff and the citizens of Durham, and for upholding the principle that we had in customer service, that our customers do not care how much we know until they know how much we care. Before I exit the chambers, Council memories oftentimes reminds us of how many days he has served on the City Council since being elected in 2015. With that in mind, my 33 years of service equates to 396 months, 1,716 weeks, 12,045 days, 289,080 hours, 17,344,800 minutes, and one billion, 40,688,000 seconds. Thank you again for your support and friendship over the past years. I am so grateful for having had the chance to work with an incredible group of people and serve in the City of Durham, and the citizens also. And now we'll get out of your way and let you proceed with the City's business. Thank you. I'm going to ask first if Mayor Bell would like to make a comment, Mayor Pro Temp, Cole McFadden, and Council members to follow. So Mayor Bell, do you want to start us off? Let me first say that it was a privilege to serve, but it's also a privilege to be able to work with DeAndre. You hear about Tom during the talk about how hard he works. This is the hardest work in City Clerk. If anybody comes after her, she's at the pace. I didn't try to figure out all these numbers you had here, but I don't really count it that I saw your car parked here in the evening, Sundays, and all those type things, but seriously, Anne has done a super job for all of us. She served us well, but more importantly, as she said, she served the City of Durham well through her office and home, personal contact. So Anne, wish you the best. Thank you. And it was a blessing working with you. I'm a singer, so I can sing a song for you. Oh, freedom. I had the honor of working with Anne for 12 years, and I cannot say enough good things about her, but just two tidbits that I think speak volumes is that under her leadership, there was virtually no turnover in the office of the City Clerk, and so she has a happy team and they provided excellent customer service. I wish you all well and wish you some happiness and retirement and take care. Anne, thank you so much. It was really a pleasure to work with you over the 12 years. Enjoy not only your freedom, but your well-deserved retirement, and hopefully we will see you someday on an ocean cruise, maybe to Alaska. Thank you very much for giving me the opportunity. Congratulations to our newest member of the City Council. I want to thank Anne for all of the wonderful little tidbits that she's shared with me over the course of time. I had the opportunity to sit right beside her at work sessions, and she gave me lots of history, lots of good advice about things I needed to do. So I really appreciate her and the work that she's done and her entire office. I wish her well, and I look forward to learning more about Salisbury. I loved working with Anne. I really did. One day is not enough. Thank you. I was elected on a Tuesday night in 2005, and I came to the Council Work Session that Thursday because I realized very suddenly I was going to have to vote on those items at a Monday night meeting coming up. So when I walked into the Council chambers that first Thursday, I remember Anne coming over and introducing herself and very quickly handing me a big packet. You'll get one of those soon, Javier, so get ready. From that day until I left at the end of 2012, Anne Gray was taking very good care of me and all of us, as she took care of this city for 33 years and all the citizens. Every citizen who walked through the door of the clerk's office, who called or emailed, was treated with the same consideration and care and compassion and professionalism every single time. And Anne mentored and trained an incredible staff. The one adjective I didn't hear in this proclamation was unflappable because that's what Anne was. Y'all know that. No matter what crazy idea we had, what crazy thing was going on with citizen or whatever, Anne would always just take it and deal with it and handle it in the best way possible. I told her, don't cry tonight. I'm getting ready to cry. She says she wouldn't, but I am because it's just been an amazing time and working with you all these years before I was elected and during my service. Congratulations to you. Godspeed and thank you so much for making Durham such a wonderful, wonderful city. Anne, shall we get a group photo? One, two, three, cheese. Perfect. All right, everybody. Enjoy it. Thank you. I am. Good to see you, Jean. Hey, Jorge. Nice to meet you. Patrick Baker. Nice to meet you. Hi, Jean. Good to see you. Oh, really? Oh, great. Maybe people will listen. Council members. I have been reminded that Jackie Wackstaff, who is here tonight, was also a council member when Dan Gray I was appointed, I believe. Is that true? Thank you for being with us tonight, Ms. Wackstaff. And thanks to my colleagues, my former colleagues for being here this evening. Now we will move to announcements by the council. Council members, are there any announcements? Any announcements? How's this mic doing out there? Can y'all hear me? Thank you. And now are there any priority items by the city manager? Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Good evening, everyone. And certainly on behalf of the city administration and all of our city employees, we too would like to congratulate Council Member Caballero on her appointment. Look forward to working with you and getting to know you better in the very near future. And with that, we have no other priority items. Thank you. Thank you very much, Mr. Manager. Mr. City Attorney, any items? Thank you, Mr. Mayor. No priority items. Thank you, Madam Clerk. Thank you very much. And now we'll move to the Consent Agenda. I'm going to say this by memory, Patrick. You helped me. The Consent Agenda are items which have been previously approved at a work session and can be approved here tonight by a single vote of the council. They can be removed from the Consent Agenda by any council member or any member of the public. Can I get everything? Thank you very much. I've had a script for the first couple of times, guys, and I'm working blind tonight. The training will see how it goes. I'm going to read the Consent Agenda items item 1, 2017 Municipal Primary Election Item 2, Award of Home, Community Housing Development Organization, CHODO funds to CASA, formerly known as Community Alternatives, for support of abodes for permanent affordable housing. Item 3, Approval of Dedicated Housing Funds to the Durham Community Land Trustees, of an affordable rental housing unit located under 30 Kent Street. Item 4, Approval of Home, Community Housing Development Organization, CHODO funds to the Durham Community Land Housing unit located at 12-7 Kent Street. Item 5, Grant Agreement for the Downtown Durham Wayfinding Program. Item 7, 2018-2021 Employee Benefits Recommendation. Item 8, Request to amend the 2016 High Intensity Drug Trafficking Areas. Grant Project Coordinates, number 15178. Item 9, Contract SW62 for 2018 Sidewalk Repairs. Item 10, Contract ST285 for 2018 Street Repairs and Repaving. Item 11, Environmental Systems Research Institute Software Maintenance Service Agreement. You've heard the Consent Agenda to have a motion for approval. So moved, Mr. Mayor. Second. You've heard the motion and the second. Madam Clerk, will you open the vote? Maybe leave it open for a little bit longer for our new council member to have an opportunity to learn the technology. Close the vote. Well done, City Clerk for getting Javier Caballero's name on the list already. Well done. Thank you very much. And now we'll move to General Business Agenda Public Hearings. We have one item, item 12, Consolidate Item for 2101 House Avenue. And we will hear first from City Staff. Good evening. I'm Jamie Sanyak with the Planning Department. A request for future land use map amendment and zoning map change has been received for a 5.65 acre parcel of land located at 2101 House Avenue. The future land use map amendment would change the current designation of medium density residential at 6 to 12 dwelling units per acre to medium high density residential 8 to 20 units per acre. The applicant requests to change the zoning of the subject site from residential suburban multifamily, residential urban multifamily, commercial center, commercial neighborhood with a development plan, to residential urban multifamily with a development plan. Key commitments on the development plan associated with this request include a maximum of 78 residential units, easement to adjacent properties where encroachments have occurred, extending the waterline in Meramech Street, covered bicycle stalls in addition to site access points, building and parking envelope, tree coverage locations, and the project boundary buffers. The Durham Planning Commission considered this request at their November 14, 2017 meeting and recommended approval of the request by a vote of 12 to 1. Staff determines that these requests are consistent with the comprehensive plan and applicable policies and ordinances. Action on this item will require three separate motions and votes. One each for the FLOM amendment, the consistency statement, and the zoning ordinance. I'll be happy to answer any questions that you have. Thank you very much. I'm going to declare this public hearing open and I'm going to at first ask if there are any questions by members of the council. I just want to make sure that it's noted that it was 11 to 2 and I'm not sure where they got 12 to 1 in the vote. Jamie, could you answer that please? Could you repeat the question? I'm just trying to figure out where you got the 12 to 1 as opposed to 11 to 2. There were two separate votes, one for the FLOM and one for the zoning map change. And can you explain the vote on each please? Sure. The FLOM, let me just make sure I have it correct. Could you explain what the FLOM means? Sure. Thank you. The amendment to change the future land use map designation was a vote of 12 to 1 and the zoning map change was 11 to 2. Thank you very much. Any questions by members of the council? I want to believe it will be for the developer. I think we'll wait then. Any more questions at this point for staff? All right. Thank you very much. Did you have something else? Yes. I failed to mention that the certification has been met and the application has been properly notified in accordance with the ordinance. Thank you very much. All right. We will hear from the opponents and opponents of this, for this rezoning. And I've got four speakers or people who have signed up to speak. Dan Joule, Phil Saab, Lizzie Ellis Furlong and Lanier Blum. I'm going to say that each, first of all, can I ask those folks who have signed up to speak? Is everyone here, have you signed up to speak for or against? Let me raise your hand if you've signed up to speak for so I can understand the timing. Okay. And then I didn't see Phil. Phil, are you for? Okay. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to ask everyone who's speaking for this to please come over here now and we will begin with the proponents. And Lanier will let you speak in any queue that you would like. I'm going to give each side 15 minutes. And I'm going to begin now with Dan Joule. Each person 15 minutes. Thank you, Mr. Mary. I'm sorry. The manager asked me, each person 15 minutes. No. Each side 15 minutes and you can divide your 15 minutes any way you would like. Thank you. Very good. That's reasonable. Yes, thank you. Good evening, Mr. Mayor. Council members, relatively new council members and extremely new council member. I am Dan Joule. I'm president of Culture Jewel Thames. We're landscape architect civil engineers here in Durham. And we've asked, been asked by our clients, the Broadmont group to assist them with the land planning and rezoning of this project. With me here this evening is our project landscape architects in the office. Wendy Ramsden, who I think many of you know, Ken, Steve and Matt with Broadmont sitting behind her. They are a local development group working primarily on small projects in Durham and Orange County. We are here tonight requesting rezoning of this parcel to allow for a modest sized multifamily residential rental community. This parcel was part of the Lakewood shopping center development. If you go to the open Durham website that Gary Kieber keeps up, you will see photos from the early sixties of this property being graded and leveled as part of the rest of the shopping center. But what it became was nothing. For 55 years it is sat vacant. But what the property is now is a mess. It's a mess from a physical standpoint, as it's overgrown with weeds and brush. There's trash strewn around from where it blows off the adjacent properties. And food line shopping carts seem to be, this seems to be the destination for them as people walk by and through the property. Most importantly, it's also a mess from a zoning standpoint. As Ms. Sonjak mentioned, there are currently two land use designations on the property, commercial, medium density residential. But there are four, yes, four different zoning designations on this one small site. So absent to rezoning, the hodge podge of zoning districts would make it challenging, if not impossible to do anything on the site. As each zoning boundary requires setbacks and, in some cases, landscape buffers. We think this has become too important to site to leave alone. Many of you know that this neighborhood is becoming the next Durham DIY district between the commercial investments that have been made up and down Chapel Hill Road and the old shopping center and the extremely exciting proposal that the scrap exchange has come forward with the use arts district, which is an extremely creative use of the old shopping center buildings. We are now on the verge of this becoming a great walkable neighborhood with restaurants, small offices, a grocery store, churches, and other services all within close proximity to this property. We think a modestly scaled multifamily development would be a very appropriate addition to this mix of uses. If you're familiar with the WalkScore website, this neighborhood would rate very high in walkability and bikeability as the vacant properties come to life again. Therefore, what we'd like to propose is a new multifamily facility on the site and the zoning and the flume request that is before you. These will not be luxury apartments. This will not be one of those many large 200-plus unit apartment complexes that have been built recently up and down West Main Street in the Durham Freeway. Rather, this will be in the spirit of the neighborhood scaled to provide a reasonable transition from the existing multifamily and single-family homes to the north and west and the existing commercial development to the south and east. Remember that the bulk of this property is actually currently zoned commercial. Even though the RUM zoning designation we are requesting would allow up to 20 units to the acre, 112 units, we are committing to only about two-thirds of that density, 78 units. That's all we think the property can comfortably support and that's what we think is more appropriate to the neighborhood. We held a neighborhood meeting at the scrap exchange back in February where eight neighbors attended. The main discussion points that they brought up were traffic impacts, of course, cleaning up the trash and the undergrowth on the property and coordination with the redevelopment of the north end of the shopping center. Relative to traffic, the staff report shows that the projected traffic generation impacts from this proposal are about one-fifth of what the current zoning on the property would allow. In other words, we are reducing the potential traffic generation from the site. Also keep in mind there are multiple directions that folks will be able to go driving to and from the site. Moorhead, Chapel Hill Road, the shopping center to the south, so on and so forth. The staff report also shows that Chapel Hill Road is currently well under capacity. Also to make it a tad easier for folks to think about riding their bikes instead of jumping in the car, we are committing to at least eight of the bike parking spaces being covered. That was a request by BPAC, and we have made that a committed element that's on the plans in your package. We've also committed to allow foot traffic to pass into, through and out of the site as it does today from and into the site in all cardinal directions, all directions of the sun compass. And we will certainly be cleaning up the site. As soon as the project moves ahead, we'll get out there and clean up the brush and the trash and that sort of thing in advance of any construction. And keep in mind where no stormwater control exists today, we will be installing the required runoff controls that the city requires of all projects. And yes, we have been communicating with the redevelopment of the shopping center, particularly Scrap Exchange folks. Our firm is actually working with Scrap Exchange now in the next iteration of their master plan, which makes communication nice. And I have some history with the shopping center. I did the last design of the last facelift back in 1988 when we all still went to the theater there when it was a theater. And I suspect that was the last time those owners spent any money on this property, which is why it is where today. And most importantly, we are committing to provide a substantial amount of workforce housing with this development. What is workforce housing? Well, the planning commission had the same question and so did we. That was the primary topic of their discussion. We promised them that we would work that out before we came in front of you. And we believe we have. We have defined workforce housing is that which is affordable to entry level teachers, nonprofit employees, policemen, firemen, first responders and other public employees that desire safe housing options near their workplace. We have done a detailed analysis of those salaries in Durham of those work categories and have concluded that those folks fall somewhere between the 80 and 100% of area median income as determined by HUD if you're all familiar with that. And to put that in real numbers, these would be rents of approximately plus or minus 900 a month for folks at 80% AMI and maybe roughly $1100 a month for those at 100% AMI. To further put that in perspective though, it's easy to figure out what the average rents on all those other new complexes are and those are $15, $1800 a month and up. So those renters would be in the 150 to 200% of AMI range to make those affordable to them. One person at the neighborhood meeting said she was concerned about gentrification in her neighborhood which is going on all over in Durham. We would therefore like to make a strong commitment not to be adding to this concern or the cause of this by adding committed element number six to the plan in your packet and I would like to read that into the record and I also have a hard copy of it that I can give to the planning director. Here's our commitment. 25% of the dwelling units shall be available at an annual rental rate that is equal to or less than 30% of 80% of the annual median income. It's recognized that folks should be able to pay about 30% of their income toward their rent. Further that 25, another 25% of the dwelling units shall be available at an annual rental rate that is equal to or less than 30% of 100% of the area median income for the Durham Orange County MSA. This amount shall be recalculated on an annual basis using the income limits published by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. The rental rate shall be maintained by the owner of the property for a period of 10 years which shall begin on the date of the city of Durham issues the final certificate of compliance. The property owner shall provide an annual certification signed by a representative of the owner with legal authority to bind the owner to the city of Durham Planning Director stating that the rental rates are being maintained. This certification shall be provided to the city on the anniversary date of the issuance of the final certificate of compliance for the development. Further, those units will be reserved for and actively marketed to employees of the city or county of Durham and Durham Public Schools for the pre-lease period starting 90 days prior to initial occupancy. The owner will work with the human resources departments of those three organizations to identify and pre-qualify potential tenants who are eligible employees. The owner will also advertise on their website and through social media that those units are available and to whom. This program will be updated annually to identify new potential tenants and provide annual certification again to the city of Durham Planning Director that the program is being maintained as committed. We think this is a very unique and a very strong proffer to provide housing for those folks in our community who do the hardest work for us and need it the most. And could you read that proffer again? Yes, I can. 25% of the dwelling units shall be available at an annual rental rate that is equal to or less than 30% of 80% of the annual area meeting income for the Durham Orange MSA. 30% of 80% Well, 30% so that no more than 30% of their income to rent if they're at 80% of AMI. And further, another 25% on top of the first 25% shall be available at an annual rate that is equal to or less than 30% of 100% of the annual meeting income. So 25% at 80%, 25% of 100. I can go on if you'd like me to, Mr. Mayor. This amount shall be recalculated on an annual basis using the income limits published by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. The rental rate shall be maintained by the owner of the property for a period of 10 years which shall begin on the date that the City of Durham issues the final certificate of compliance for the development. The property owner shall provide an annual certification signed by a representative of the owner with legal authority to bind the owner to the City of Durham Planning Director stating that the rental rates are being maintained. The certification shall be provided to the City on the anniversary date of the issuance of the first certificate of compliance for the development. Further, those units will be reserved for and actively marketed to employees of the City or County of Durham and Durham Public Schools for the pre-lease period starting 90 days prior to initial occupancy. Further, the owner will work with the human resources departments of those three organizations to identify and pre-qualify potential tenants who are eligible employees. The owner will also advertise on their website and through social media that those units are available and to whom. The program will be updated annually to identify new potential tenants and provide annual certification to the City of Durham Planning Director that the program is being maintained as committed. Finally, we hope you can agree this is a strong proposal for providing housing for those public servants that is a reasonable proposal for the neighborhood that it creates an appropriate transitional use between the existing residential and commercial that surrounds it and is a more appropriate use than the commercial that currently is the bulk of the property rezoning. And most importantly that is a very appropriate location for a little more residential density in order to add to the mix of vibrant walkable place that is quickly emerging from the tired old shopping center. The team and I are happy to answer any questions you may have and we hope you can find to support our request. Thank you. Thank you very much. Yes. I'm going to go ahead and get Mr. Saab and Ms. Ellis for a long to speak and then we'll have questions from council members and I note that you all have a total of about three minutes and 40 seconds left. Thank you. Appreciate it. I encourage the council to support this rezoning request and reviewing address. I'm sorry. I'm Phil Saab, my address 618 East Hamas Street in this great city of Durham, North Carolina and reviewing the current proposal. I see this development simultaneously helps to address multiple concerns that are facing the city of Durham. This makes residential development is indirectly relieving a portion of our housing crisis by committing 50% of its units for the city's entry-level employees for the next 10 years. Having the private sector take a volunteer role in increasing the affordability of new housing is a priority for our city and this project aligns with the city's housing goals. This particular project can be a shining example of how private development can create answers to part of the housing problem without using subsidies. Special considerations are creating new major traffic congestions. This project is committed to making the city an attractive option for municipal workforce professionals in the public service sector by focusing a large portion of its marketing efforts to leasing to Durham school teachers police officers firefighters emergency service responders and municipal employees. Creating affordable housing for teachers police officers and community support staff creates a bond between the employee employer and the community they serve. It is equally important that the city focuses on the impact of gentrification to our historic neighborhoods. By keeping 50% of the total units reserved for potential tenants at attainable AMI levels, this project would not significantly change in my opinion would not significantly change the profile of the current neighborhood as a positive step to reducing the gentrification of the Lakewood community which has been historically made up of young families of similar level of income and age. In my opinion, the transition of this space from vacant lot to thriving young housing would significantly enrich the Lakewood community. I Thank you Mr. Sack. Thank you very much Ms. Ellis Furlong. Good evening. Thank you for allowing me to speak. My name is Lizzie Ellis Furlong and I'm the Executive Director of the Durham Literacy Center which is located at 1905 Chapel Hill Road just two blocks away from House Avenue and I'm also a resident at 2620 Laundale Avenue. And so thank you all for your leadership of this city and congratulations to Council Person Caviera. I'm here in an unusual regard. Usually I'm speaking about the Durham Literacy Center and the importance of our mission for we are rooted in the Lakewood community and we serve hundreds of adults and out-of-school youth here in Durham in the Lakewood neighborhood. And the reason I came is because Matt Springer for full disclosure is a longtime supporter and partner of the Durham Literacy Center and he told me about this project and I got excited about it frankly because I'm already seeing some concerns with my employees. So normally I'm speaking about the individuals we serve and of course I want to know about our mission and how important I think it is but I've already had one employee pushed out of Lakewood as a resident she's now her rent was doubled and she's now living in substandard housing and she's staying she needed to stay in Lakewood so she could her kids could go to the same school and I have three other employees who are I'm concerned or at risk for being displaced due to excuse me I'm surprisingly nervous about the notification that's going on in the Lakewood community and so as an employer of individuals who make a modest living and who are dedicated to this community and have given many many many years of service three of these employees have been there 10 years and I'm quite concerned. Thank you. We appreciate you being here and now we'll hear from the opponents with the one opponent Linear Blum the opponents have 15 minutes I got to admit I'm a pretty weak opponent I actually think that the proposal to rezone this property for residential is the best possible use for the land but I do have some concerns that I would like to identify yourself oh I'm sorry my name is Linear Blum I'm a resident of 11 Upchurch Circle in Durham I do have a couple of concerns first off could I ask a question regarding the proffer of affordable housing could you please tell me what would be the rent for a one or two bedroom apartment for a person who's income is 100% of area median right now Linear why don't you ask your questions and then we'll get them back up okay thank you address us and then we'll thank you sure that's the question that I have because I am pretty sure that rent is above market for much of Durham's market and certainly above fair market which would exclude Section 8 tenants and I don't know if they would accept Section 8 tenants anyway but I do have a concern that these kinds of descriptions are kind of hard to translate into the actual rent it's a noble thing for what it would be today but the reason that I came down our two one was when I read I only found out about this a few days ago so I'm really sorry to only be bringing these comments at the last minute before this public hearing when I understand you know that there have been occasions to talk about it before but I was concerned frankly about the staff report and some of the other process because I know that our city values and our professional ethics as city planners demand that we go the extra mile to help empower and find the voices and consider the impacts of low-income people in our decisions and the welfare of the public not just the welfare of people who own land and people who might live in new developments but the public around and we don't notify tenants we don't notify renters of major changes like this in their neighborhood and in this particular neighborhood almost all the surrounding residents are tenants and so like them I didn't know about this even though I worked for an organization that owns land and rents to tenants next door to the adjacent to the effective property one site off if 450 the site report the staff report says that 560 cars and trucks a day would be added by these 78 apartments and it sort of magically imagines that they all show up on Chapel Hill Road where there's a lot of capacity forgetting that the only way they can get there from the site is on Shopper Street or Merrimack Street which are the short little streets that go between Shopper Street and House Avenue and Moorhead and there are no sidewalks there which is already a problem and there aren't going to be any sidewalks proposed in this report and right now if you go over there and I would really encourage you to spend a little time over there before you vote on this proposal you'll see the dirt paths strewn with litter which someone owns that site now and is obviously not taking care of it and you have to go through these rutted paths that go through creeks and stuff just to get your groceries your children and your laundry from your house to Lakewood and that's just not Durham can do better than that and if you have to work go around in a wheelchair you have to ride your wheelchair in the road that's how it is over there right now and the staff report just kind of overlooks the lived experience of the people who live there now and only imagines how people who are driving and not a walkable neighborhood would find their way to one quarter that had capacity in 2015 and it leaves out any projection of whether that road is going to have capacity in the long haul so I feel like we could do better at looking at the public welfare and the public safety of this rezoning or any rezoning which is the whole point of zoning is public welfare and public safety there are no sidewalks so what I really hope that will come out of this proposal is an opportunity for the owners of the property to work with the city to build a sidewalk for one block and I also would like to ask you to please move the entrance to this new apartment complex from Mary Mac Street which is a tiny little one lane road with no sidewalks when people park now on both sides because it's a multi-family neighborhood when people park there on garbage trucks and it's on garbage day it's not safe now to use that street to walk which is the only way to walk in that neighborhood is to walk in the street adding 560 cars a day to that little street is not a good idea if we could move the entrance just a block over to Shopper Street or House Street at Shopper Street then all the new traffic would join all the Lakewood traffic on Shopper Street which has two lanes and a line in the middle and which is the perfect place for sidewalks but if we don't move that entrance then could you please build sidewalks on Mary Mac I work for an organization whose tenants live on Mary Mac and they don't all have cars and some of them are disabled and adding traffic to that street would be not a positive impact for them and yet this is supposed to be and we really want it to be and there's great plans by everyone to make this a walkable neighborhood but we just need to do this tonight and get that one block to have a sidewalk please thank you so much I really appreciate the notion of saying that these will be garden apartments they're not going to need a parking deck they're not necessarily going to have to have a swimming pool and a club and a concierge and all the things that make them $15 and $1600 a month for a one or two bedroom but even $1500 a month is actually over the affordability of people whose incomes mean that they have nowhere standard and decent to live now without subsidy and at least a few of these apartments could help them and if they increase if they accept Section 8 it would help a lot more so thank you so much and I do really support the notion of rezoning this for affordable at the right time and with the right residential at the right time and with the right conditions thank you very much thank you all members of the council I'm going to ask if you have questions of any of the speakers or comments thank you Mr. Mayor I'd like to ask a question for the developer the landscape architect for the developer but I'll give it a shot did you all do a traffic analysis at all we did not we're well under the threshold there is a traffic impact analysis okay could you talk a little bit more about sidewalks and you mentioned a lot about walkability in your presentation could you go over a little bit what your plans are and if there those plans include sidewalks sure absolutely so the ordinance requires that we build sidewalks along all of our public street frontages which of course we will and that's not on the development plan because as a UDO requirement we have to do that anyway as I said we know that there's foot traffic that goes through this site obviously we want folks to be able to walk easily to the scrap exchange into the future re-use arch district to the south there is another apartment building hard on the west side of this actually their parking lot encroaches on this property but we're our owners decided they were okay with that you know we've worked our building envelopes so they won't have to go through an expense to build that so we'll provide the access to and from through our site we'll build sidewalks along our property frontage but typically and this is I'm a little surprised you know we had a thorough review by the transportation department and through BPAC and BPAC only asked us to do things covered by parking and access through the site and both of those are represented as committed elements so we have not made any representations to improve sidewalks off of the property not associated with the property frontage thank you so where do you imagine the entrance is going to be into the site is it going to be on house so it will be on house where we have shown on the development plan we're required to show where a driveway access will be there's not much flexibility with that so as linear rightly said we have lined it up with Mayor Mack getting over to shoppers would be challenging shoppers is actually not a public street adjacent to this property it's actually part of the shopping center the scrap exchange is it not so coming out at the intersection of shoppers and house would be challenging because we'd end up with a five-way intersection or something like that Mary Max not a huge neighborhood street but it's paved improved and I think we calculated Wendy there's only actually two houses that front on house and use that as access so certainly we're not going to be overloading that street or making it too challenging for folks to get in and out at least that's our thought you're welcome council member Freeman thank you I just had a couple of questions I just wanted to make sure I'm clear it's 20 units pretty much 80 and 20 units 100% so that would leave you with 48 units well no it's it's 50% so 79 let's just round it to 80 40 24 and a half units at 80% 24 and a half at 100% so we'll play that as it comes out and the remaining 39 units would be at market rate and then on the 90 days prior to the HR or pretty much sharing with HR could you increase that by chance to 180 days I mean just to get folks enough time to start working towards I know that the process has hurt in the past it's a good question just a matter of making sure folks know the sizes because if they're coming out of a lease or not making sure you have enough time to plan that out just being mindful of that we had a long conversation about that originally we started out at 60 days after some conversations with folks we determined that 90 and on top of the 90 we would be working with the HR departments with the county and the city and DPS well in advance of when that leasing period opened up so we would have folks lined up in advance to do that and yes you're right there some folks it may not work out for them because they're tied up in an existing lease or something like that but we think 90 days is a good number just a matter of making sure that there's enough information available to know how many units how many sizes in advance of that 90 days that's pretty much what I'm getting at absolutely we will put that package together in advance and then you mentioned I think I got a little confused the rental rates would remain the same for 10 years 10 years or 5 years 10 years and they would be locked in at the AMI so if the AMI went up or down every year that would be adjusted I believe HUD adjusts AMI annually so we're pegged to that amount okay thank you and then I had a question for staff and mainly the question is on how we would track this proffer and making sure that those units were 25% the 80% income or 80% AMI versus the 100% AMI for the 25% so Jamie Sanyek with the planning department my understanding is that the information is going to be provided on an annual basis to the planning director okay and can you I would like to see something that coordinates with the community development and this we're actually tracking the units so I understand we're using the workforce conversation and workforce housing conversation and making sure this attempts to give units to the 80 and 100% so just making sure we're noting for future reference okay thank you thank you councilmember freeman any more questions Mr. Mayor Councilmember Middleton for the developer I wanted to ask Mr. Blum a question please come up linear could you come to the podium please better looking this project for me kind of crystallized as part of the challenge in talking about affordable housing and we saw it during the campaign that is oftentimes we conflate low income affordable workforce into the same phrase and we need operationalizing and part of the challenge for me in terms from a governance point of view is just every project can we make every project accomplish satisfying a piece of that puzzle with every projects in other words workforce and low income section 8 and all the other stuff and full disclosure you and I have worked on this stuff for years together if all of the things that were proffered by the developer were met and were guaranteed met and I heard very specific questions about the sidewalks and let me also say this is why we need a comprehensive strategic kind of housing plan rather than because on a piecemeal basis we want to make every project satisfy every constituency this again underscores the need for a strategic plan based upon and I thank councillor Freeman for a very pointed questions if the proffers are met in this plan would that satisfy you in terms of the concerns you've raised? I would like to know what the rinse would be because my assumption is that almost that 80 percent around 80 percent of area median is actually market rate for apartments fair market rate in Durham so a basic standard apartment should be in the market affordable to people whose incomes is about 80 percent so anything that's over that rent is actually market rent for a garden apartment in Durham if I'm not mistaken it depends on how many bedrooms and how many people you think live in the house and so forth well I don't have it in my head I didn't hear this proffer until tonight so I didn't come prepared to talk about it your definition of that 80 percent is actually 80 percent and 100 percent of area median in Durham is up in the 50s so it's quite a bit of income and it means if you have 80 or 100 percent of area median in Durham you can find plenty of places to rent right now if your income is below that you start having real trouble finding any safe and standard place to rent and I don't expect them to provide subsidized housing but it's just sort of specious I think to say well we'll provide rental homes for people whose income is 100 percent of area median all it really means is that you wouldn't be taking in people who can afford lots of other choices so you see that's why I'm asking what the rents are I don't have those numbers in my head but just generally it's not you know it's only affordable then to people whose incomes are well over $45,000 a year so it doesn't really much matter to be whether they say that or not whether we track it or not because it's not really addressing the issue of who needs and can't afford to pay or housing with those which are the people we did battle for for the Jackson Street property those all have to have all tax credit residents have to have incomes below 60 percent of area median and some of them have to be below 30 or 50 percent of area median they're talking about people whose incomes are 80 percent up right now in Durham so it doesn't really offer last question how would how do you think this council should operationalize workforce in whose workforce and how much do they make um I don't really know I think that's a whole big question that I can't answer tonight and I you know I don't think that is our focus right now I think our focus because the real need in Durham is for people who can't afford a place and at some point once you get a full time stable job you can afford a home in Durham but we just have so many people who don't have a full time living wage job and all those people right now can't afford a decent home so that's our focus as a public agency I think over that point you know it's great the parts of the rental market offer homes to people who can you know you can make profit doing that it's not you know it's not reaching to be able to provide homes for people whose incomes is 100 percent of the area median or more that's a profitable enterprise and it's a market rent so that's in Durham that's not a problem really that we have to solve as a city I think our problem as a city is people who really can't afford a decent standard house or who can't find one thank you thank you for asking me questions I would also just mention while I'm here that the whole frontage of the lot on Shopper Street because it's not a public street would not necessarily have sidewalks under the site plan so that's another reason I'm here is that the whole Shopper Street frontage from where you can catch a sidewalk and a bike path and get up to the buses all that block both you know that's owned by the apartment complexes on either side and the whole frontage that this site has are not public so they wouldn't have to provide a sidewalk they may be planning to but it's not in the development plan it's not in the UDO that they would have to provide a sidewalk even on their part of Shopper Street since it is not a public right away thank you council members comments comments or questions so I have some questions for Mr. Joule um the actually let me hang on there Mr. Joule let me ask staff for a second but stay right where you are you're good um staff question is um the traffic on on Merrimack and Shopper I guess most will actually be on Merrimack as I understand the proposal can you talk to us about that and your any estimation any thoughts that you have about that traffic yes bill judge transportation we do not have like ADT traffic volumes for those because they are considered neighborhood residential streets um the additional traffic should um would not create a capacity problem along those roadways so that's why they were not included in the report but typically it's probably less than a thousand vehicles per day on both of those streets shoppers maybe a little bit more because it's serving as a driveway into the shopping center a thousand vehicles per day on Merrimack well I would say it would be under a thousand shoppers would be probably closer to a thousand Merrimack probably just yeah maybe a hundred if that many typically about 10 you can assume about 10 trips per unit so even with the 79 units it would be less than a thousand okay thank you very much Mr. Joule the sidewalk on Merrimack I know it's not on your property what is your thought about proffering that Mr. Joule Mayor Joule again this is coming at us very late after a year's worth of review by the various city departments I've caucused with my clients we were made aware of this just this afternoon I understand and our thought on it now is that we are going to be making some fairly expensive infrastructure improvements there's a a failing storm drain that runs under the site that we're going to have to be replacing to make this work we're going to have to extend water into the site down Merrimack which will mean we'll be doing some improvements to that street anyway and with the very much the pencil sharpening that has been done to make what we think is an unprecedented proffer toward workforce housing we think our dollars are better served putting into the project and providing the amount of workforce housing that we are committed to in the proffer I do know though that all of my projects in past years have contributed many many tens of thousands of dollars to the city sidewalk fund where sidewalks have been challenging to do and we would certainly work with the city to try and figure out one if there's enough right of way we don't know that there's actually enough right of way on Merrimack to do that and figure out if there's a way that some partnership with the city could be done to get that sidewalk out there because that neighborhood was built back in the days before sidewalks were common we know that talk to me a little bit more about what that means in terms of working with the city towards that so I think we'd be willing to do and make a determination whether a sidewalk could fit on the site and if one can we'd work with staff to identify funding that could be done to install a sidewalk on Merrimack identify funding keep going city funding in our sidewalk fund identify public funds okay alright okay any other questions with council members any comments let me just say something about the housing here's a way I feel about the housing it is true that the focus of our housing work here in the city is people who are 60% of the area median income below and especially 30% of the area median income are below and that is the group that all of our subsidies, all of our efforts are geared towards that's the money we spend is for people in that population and so I think that is our focus that should be our focus I think that there is however a need that is a kind of I think that there is a need for housing for people between 60 and 100% of the area median income and that that need is and that I hear about that need a lot there are so many people saying to me I can't afford to live in Durham because I can't pay $1,500 or $1,200 or $1,300 and these are not people who need to live at 60% of the area median income they don't need a subsidy for their rent but they need cheaper rent than they can afford for a nice place in town and I think that need is significant and I think that this is an attempt to meet that need I like that I think that's this is certainly not but we're not spending our money on it and so I think that this is a really excellent aspect of this plan I hear what you're saying linear I understand that it's not our target but this is not our project I think that we ought to be encouraging people in this kind of missing middle part of our of our housing this is happening all over America this missing middle phenomenon is really happening everywhere that we are getting we are having especially inside cities where we're having either people can really afford it or subsidize housing and I think this is an effort to hit that missing middle and I think that that's very valuable so from that standpoint I appreciate the proffer I wish it was longer than 10 years on the other hand it's 10 years and it's gone up from the original proposal and I think that that is valuable I think that when I think about affordable housing I think of the HUD definition and just thinking about your question Mark Anthony I think about when I think about affordable housing when I talk about affordable housing I talk about people at 60% of the area median income are less HUD definition and I think that that's an important thing to keep I like that definition and I think we all ought to keep that in mind workforce housing is a vague term I agree but I think that they've been pretty explicit right here what they're talking about they're talking about people between 80 and 70% of the area median I think those people are going to be priced more and more out of the central city and that this is an attempt to ameliorate that situation so again I think that's valuable you can call it workforce workforce might be a valuable word for it but I think workforce is a much vaguer term than what I I think when we talk about affordable in the city we ought to keep our mind focused on people at 60% of the area median income are less especially people at 30% so from a housing standpoint I think that this is a positive contribution and so quite a positive contribution and an unusual contribution I don't think this is mostly what we're getting and so I like that you sure you don't want to build that sidewalk though no Dan you want to make any more comments about the sidewalk or the 10 years I'm not getting a yes had not on that one Mayor Schuyl are you sure let me caucus with my that would be great do you have a comment go ahead Lenny just to the point that sometimes our analysis leaves out renters and lower income people when people said that the block of Merrimack only has two houses on it as far as I know it only has one house on it which is intermittently occupied however it has three driveways for multifamily apartment complexes including the one owned by Durham community land trustees and each of those have multiple residents and all of them use Merrimack and Merrimack may or may not have easement but I feel sure that it would be relatively inexpensive because it's nice and level I feel sure that DCLT would donate its easement in order to get a sidewalk although I haven't asked anyone and then I think that the other part of that easement for one side of Merrimack comes from the same person who owns the two watts that do have sort of intermittently occupied home on it's sort of a very, very substandard space and I imagine he would appreciate the money. Thank you. Mr. Jill. Mr. Mayor of Caucus and my clients are of the mind that they have sharpened their pencils so much on this project that it's scratching the table through the paper so they still would not wish to do the sidewalk with all the other known and unknown infrastructure costs that they have on this site. Appreciate you asking. Any other questions? Thank you. I did have one thing I forgot to mention that Ms. Bloom brought up which I think we should think about with our staff which is how our notification procedures omit renters. I recently had a call from another renter in a different neighborhood who was interested in a project going on close to her home but hadn't received a notice because a notice had gone to the owners. I think it would be great to think more about how we can include renters in our process for notifying people about projects that are going on in their neighborhoods because especially in neighborhoods like this I think a lot of people who would be interested are not getting the notices and we need to figure out. Mr. Young, was this property posted? I think that's a motionable thing. A good evening Pat Young with the planning department. It was. It was what? Yes, the property was posted. There's a three and a half foot tall sign. We don't send direct notice to renters and you are correct about that and we can certainly explore alternatives in that regard but it is posted and there's a legal ad run and direct notice is sent to property owners. Part of that challenge is that we don't know who the renters are necessarily we would just send them to addresses. Correct. That's how we'd have to do it. State law does not require that. There's very few peer studies that do that but it is possible so we will explore that and bring something back to JCCPC in the near future about costs and alternatives. That sounds great. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you Mr. Mayor. In light of the Mayor's comments I would like to thank the community that this conversation brings for the community and for this council to create some clarity around what I think are our needs around workforce housing both now and in the future. I think this is going to continue to be an important conversation to have and we can be clear about our goals in this area. Thank you very much. Any more comments? I'm going to declare a motion. I hear a motion. Mr. Mayor. Three motions don't we that we need. Thank you. Thank you Madam Mayor Pro Tem. Do I hear the first motion? Yes I move that we adopt a resolution amending the comprehensive plan to establish medium high density residential as the site designation on the future land use map. Second. You've heard the motion. It's been seconded. Madam clerk will you open the vote? The motion passes 7-0. Thank you. I'll move we adopt the consistency statement. Second. It's been moved and seconded that we adopt the consistency statement. Madam clerk will you open the vote? Close the vote. The motion passes 7-0. Thank you. I'll move we adopt the requested zoning change. Second. It's been moved and seconded that we adopt the zoning change. Close the vote. The motion passes 7-0. Thank you very much. I want to say that I think that the sidewalk issue is an important issue but it is also very late in the process. I understand that the concern you raise is very valid and important and I understand Mr. Joule you're going to be considering what you're going to be doing on Shopper Street and we would let's just say urge you to do the right thing. Yes sir. Thank you. Thank you all for your time. Thanks for serving. Thank you very much. Council members we have one more item which is not on the agenda but we're going to hear from Ms. Barbara Lofton. Ms. Lofton you have three minutes. Good afternoon. My name is Barbara Lofton and I'm on behalf of the seniors Ms. Lofton. Durham. Please state your address. Oh I'm 1305 Timothy Avenue Durham 2707 I'm here tonight on behalf of the seniors of Durham and Durham County a lot of our seniors don't have sufficient heat in their homes. I have called all the agencies they do have a program here with social service but you do not have been heated all before they give you the heater. I have had over five families two in my neighborhood to have five since January using those unsafe heaters what I am asking I know we don't have a program right now but I'm asking the city of Durham if they would just help me get some heat into these homes doing this bad weather we're having now Dr. Sheriff Lane at the Sheriff Department say that they would house the heaters so we could get them and they would deliver them to the people for me. I'm asking the churches like anybody that can that's listening to me please I know we do a lot for kids but we get old too and we got to think about that everything is for nobody thinks about the seniors with me but I know that's not true so if you will carry back to your churches and your neighborhoods and please ask the people to go around to the neighborhoods and check and see these people have heat you tell them you tell them to cut the heat down the seniors are going to try to do it and it's already cold and the houses it's not sufficient the windows they need help with that I know operation breakthrough helped me year before last Habitat have helped me but it's a lot of work and they don't have the money they work by grants so I'm asking I'm pleading that you all will help these seniors in the next week because it's going to be really really cold next week and I know churches you can ask your members don't give a five dollars a piece everybody give five dollars you can buy at least three heaters and that's all I'm asking and I'm pleading I really need it everybody doesn't have a son like me to take care of me and I know that seniors need help please thank y'all for listening to me thank you ma'am I was really trying to help thank you after you called me last week I did have some discussions with some of the county commissioners about this you know they're the ones that traditionally provide these services and suggested that they might provide some of the other kinds of heaters that you discussed haven't heard back yet but I did make those phone calls and I hope that they will be listening to that do you have some memories Miss Lofton did I hear you to say you're looking for are we talking about space heaters not the electric heaters not those little electric heaters something they have a safety sense they fall or something when you use protein glass and cursing that's not safe so how many of those were you looking for I called the censor off the date asked how many seniors do we have in Durham she said I need to call her next week they don't know all I want to do we know we can't do all the seniors because everybody don't need it but if they called I would like to have some heaters that I could I've already passed out some my church helped me and my family have helped me and I gave out that people need them before you can get them so it's really really kind of sad and Durham's supposed to be Durham is what is it good place to live and all this let's prove it to the seniors that you all want to help us and I really I'm begging real hard this time for that I'm not asking for no money just heaters thank you miss Lofton how do we get in touch with you if I were to go to my church and scrounge up five or six heaters you go right ahead why don't you might not want to advertise your telephone number right now I'll stick around after I'm going to find you you can call her and her number is 0242 thank you miss Lofton thank you for bringing that to us it's very important and appreciate all the work you do in the community on behalf of the seniors and everybody else thank you miss Lofton and I served for six years together on the housing authority board council members I believe we are at the end of our of our business and I'm going to declare this meeting adjourned at 8 30 p.m. thank you Mr. Mayor