 They've been screaming, I'm trying to fix it. How you doing, Ruth? How you doing? Well, looking well as always. Oh, nothing else, but I'm enjoying it. I've enjoyed it. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. OK, yeah. I appreciate that. I'm going to eat dinner. Oh, that's going to be a problem. On my time. No, that won't happen. I can cheat. How are you? And green beans and salad. How are you? So good to see you. Me too. I'm great. I'll be great already. Hello, how are you tonight? Good to see you. OK. Thank you so much. Fine, I mean, Bill's going to handle that. So I have. I told him that you were going to be asking for additional time. In fact, I forwarded him your letter this morning, so he's aware of it. Hi, Jillian. I'm so glad. I should have just said, I should have just said, just go. Just go. I put some in the fridge for later, too. I didn't need to explain it. I should have just said, go. Just go, but if you had said something I didn't want, then I would have just driven a little bit. I know you wanted that. I know you wanted that. It's awesome. Of course you didn't want that. Did you get some of the mac and cheese, by the way? I've got it. I hit that twice. What are the green stickers? I'll not. What the dead? I just see it. OK. Good evening. We'd like to call the Durham City Council meeting to order. Tuesday, September the 5th at 7 o'clock PM. And certainly, I want to welcome all of you that are here with us this evening. We could just take a moment of silent meditation, please. Thank you. I'll ask the clerk if she would ask for this. Thank you, and I don't recognize Eddie Davis. May we rise? 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. I ask the clerk if she would call the roll, please. Mayor Bell. Present. Mayor Pro Tem Cole McFadden. Present. Council Member Davis. Here. Council Member Johnson. Here. Council Member Moffitt. Here. Council Member Reese. Here. And Council Member Shul. Here. Several proclamations to do this evening. But first, I would like to acknowledge a very honorable visitor with us today. As many of you may or may not know, Durham is the sister city for many cities across the nation, one of which is Arusha, Tanzania. And tonight, we're fortunate to have the mayor, Arusha Tanzania, visiting us. He's here for a week, and we have a lot of activities planned. But I would ask Mayor Bukai, if you would join me, either that roster over there over here for any comments that you might have. Good evening. My name is Kalisti Lazaro Bukai. I'm the mayor of Arusha City Council, Tanzania, East Africa. And I arrived here Saturday evening. So, his Lordship Mayor, ladies and gentlemen, greetings at large from the United Republic of Tanzania. Warm greetings from the city of Arusha. I'm very happy and feel honored to be with you today. For those who are not very familiar with the geography of Africa, especially Tanzania, I'm from Tanzania, as I explained, which is the land of Kilimanjaro and Zanzibar Island. And my city is between Cape Town, South Africa, and the city of Cairo. That's Missouri. That is our history. And if you come to Arusha, one of our monument in the city, it shows the distance from the Cairo and the Cape Town in South Africa. So for this, then I will say from the beginning, you need to see that center of Africa. That's Arusha. Mr. Mayor, honorable Mayor, economically, Arusha is a strong city. I think even the dam is a strong city. Since I came here, I've seen a lot. And Arusha is host of more than 13 international institutions that are based in Arusha. I can name a few. One is Arusha International Conference Center. East African community is based in Arusha City. We have an institution of Pan-African Post-Union based also in Arusha. We have Nelson Mandela University of Agriculture. We have a Monduli military that comprises a lot of military academician from different countries in the world. We have African court that are based in Arusha also. Regional Health Secretary, East and Central African Management Institute. ICTIara. Arusha used to be ICTIara is an international criminal court that was based especially for the running criminal issues. The famous Serengeti National Parks is a gateway, Gorongoro Crater, Kilimanjaro Airport. If you want to arrive in Arusha, we have Agakani University College. These are just a few. All these couple, which is well connected with the network of roads, railway, and airport, this make Arusha City to be a center of economic activities. This being the case, a lot need to be done to cope with this international situation. Station analysis just to mention few. Guided as am I and going through the structure of our government budget and what the city can collect from its own source, one can easily conclude that a lot need to be done to cover the gap. It is on the strengths of all these basic factors, why we need and have taken trouble to present to you the structure of our budget, of our council budget, our commitments, our vision, our mission statement. This have enabled us conclude that a lot to be done, but also we are hopefully and optimistic that with good friends like this city of Durham, we expect the city to bail us financially or academically by introducing new technologies at our city council. On behalf of the people of Arusha and indeed the city dwellers, I welcome you to join hands with us. What we want to do and achieve will be handed to you after this speech. I need also to draw your attention to welcome you to Arusha, especially those who want to invest in the areas of interest like tourism, agribusiness, light and heavy industries, farming, and mohasbandri. That's just a few areas that you may be interested. The city have a data bank of professionals who can assist you and guide you to invest professionally, profitally, but within the habit of the law. Honorable Mayor, ladies and gentlemen, thank you for your kind attention and God bless you. Welcome to Tanzania, indeed, welcome to the city of Arusha and I'm happy to be here. Welcome to Arusha, the Geneva of Africa. Thank you very much and I'm happy to be here. Honorable Mayor, we certainly appreciate that you've chosen to visit with us. Next, we want to recognize Hispanic Heritage Month's proclamation and I'm going to ask Annabelle and Ricardo if you would join us. They're members of the Mayor's Hispanic Latino Committee. This proclamation recognizes Hispanic Heritage Month. It speaks to the fact that the National Hispanic Heritage Month is celebrated annually from September the 15th through October the 15th to celebrate the histories, cultures, and contributions of American citizens, from Spain, Mexico, the Caribbean, Central and South America, whereas persons of Hispanic and Latin heritage has had and continues to have a profound and positive influence in the city of Durham, whereas the theme for the 2017 National Hispanic Heritage Month is shaping the bright future of America, whereas the Mayor's Hispanic Latino Committee was established in 2002 to promote cultural understanding and inclusion and became an official committee of the city of Durham by the unanimous vote of the city council on October 5th, 2015, whereas today many Hispanic Americans are thriving, others are still struggling to overcome obstacles including language and cultural barriers as well as discrimination, whereas the city of Durham is committed to seeking to improve existing opportunities to open doors for Hispanics and Latino residents in the city of Durham, thereby fostering inclusive communities with equitable resources and opportunities. Now, therefore, I, William V. Bilbell, Mayor of the City of Durham, North Carolina, do my proclaiming September the 15th through October the 15th 2017 as Hispanic Heritage Month in Durham, hereby urge all citizens to honor the distinct heritage of the Hispanic community and the contributions of our city, our state, and nation by participating in relevant ceremonies, activities, and programs, which is my hand, Corporate City of Durham, North Carolina, this is the 50th of September, 2017, and I'm going to present this to you for the comments. Good evening. The City of Durham's Human Relations Division is Damos out within the Department of Neighborhood Improvement Services, and we're pleased and honored to serve as the liaison for the Mayor of the Hispanic Latino Committee and to present this proclamation which articulates the city's commitment to fostering communities that are not only inclusive but are rich and equitable opportunities for all residents. To further knowledge the Hispanic Heritage Month, the Mayor's Hispanic Latino Committee will host a free event on Thursday, September the 28th at 5.30 p.m. at the Durham Arts Council. Please join us for the viewing of the film, 120 Days, followed by a discussion. 120 Days is a brilliant documentary about immigration and deportation. Based on a family right here in the triangle, there will also be a cater reception. For more information about this event or other current events under the Mayor's Hispanic Latino Committee, you can contact the Durham Human Relations Division. Thank you. Hope everyone can join us. Gracias. Next I would ask Paula Harrington. This proclamation speaks to National Recovery Month proclamation given things that are happening across the country. Very appropriate. Whereas behavioral health is now recognized as an essential part of one's overall health and well-being, whereas the cause of not encouraging mental health and substance use recovery is significant for individuals, families, neighborhoods, hoods, and the community at large, whereas people in recovery strive to achieve healthy lifestyles, stable homes, meaningful daily activities, stronger neighborhoods and contributing positive ways to the larger community, whereas American Society for Addiction Medicine, known as ASAM, reports that drug overdose is now the leading cause of accidental death in the U.S. With 52,044 lethal drug overdoses in 2015, opioid addiction is driving this epidemic with 20,101 overdose deaths related to prescription pain relievers and 12,990 overdose deaths related to heroin. Four in the five new heroin users report that they started out misusing prescription pain killers where SAMHSA reported that in 2015, 43.8 million adults experienced mental illnesses and only 14.6% received mental health treatment and another 22.7 million adults were in need of a substance use treatment while only 10% received treatment. But given those statistics, we must strive to reduce stigma, shame, embarrassment associated with brain disorders, help individuals, families, and the larger community to learn to view them as we would say any other medical condition. Whereas to help more people achieve and sustain long-term recovery, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, the Hot House Office of National Drug Control Policy, and the Recovery Community of Durham invite all residents of Durham, North Carolina, to participate in the National Recovery Month. Now, therefore, I, William V. Bilbell, Mayor of the City of Durham, North Carolina, the hip-hop acclaimed the month of September, 2017 as National Recovery Month. Hereby I urge all residents to observe this month for programs, activities, and ceremonies to support this year's theme. Join the Voices for Recovery, strengthen families and communities, and witness my hand at Corporate City of Durham, North Carolina, this is the 50th of September, 2017, and I will present this to you. So thank you, Mayor Bear and Bell, and we're glad to be here. And he gave my speech, but that's good. He gave all the statistics. So my name is Paula Harrington, I'm a board member and financial officer for the Recovery Community of Durham, and so I wanna thank the mayor and the city council members for this proclamation. And you're ongoing and consistent support for recovery in Durham. We actually won the reward last year for the national event. But the Recovery Community of Durham was formed to promote the fact that that people can and do recovery from brain disorders. As you are aware, SAMHSA designated September as National Recovery Month for Mental and Substance Use Disorders, and we're hosting an event on September 30th at the Durham Central Park from two to six to celebrate people and recovery. And we invite you, the mayor and city council and everybody to come to help support us. This event is for people in recovery, people interested in recovery, friends and family members of people in recovery and the larger community. And it is the larger community I wish to address tonight because without the support of the larger community, it would be difficult to reduce the shame and stigma associated with brain disorders. And that's what this is, it's brain disorders. The Surgeon General recently reported the fact that substance use disorder on a medical condition, not a sign of moral failing or weak will, but still people don't seek treatment. Why? Because of the stigma. So I think people would be outraged if someone had diabetes and was not getting treatment. But we're okay with people with substance use disorder or mental disabilities not getting the help they need just because they're afraid to speak up. And so what we're learning with brain disorder that it's all about learning how to manage symptoms and make lifestyle changes to stabilize and recover from these chronic but manageable disorders. So therefore I stand with you, stand with four years of personal long-term recovery. That means I haven't used any drugs since April 26, 1998. And as a result of that, I was able to retire from UNC Chapel Hill, raised my daughter, I have a daughter. There was a Mo'Head scholar, went to UNC, went to law school at NYU. Right now is the special assistant and counselor to the president of the Center for Responsible Lending, which they have an office right over here. Just got back from Switzerland. My daughter went to North Carolina State and she's a research engineer from Merck. My son is graduated from Wake Forest and he has a big church in Augusta, Georgia. But the point I'm seeing is that they said the most important thing to them was their mother's recovery. I would not have been able to do any of those things had I not got clean and sober myself. So I, the RCOD volunteers stand to be behind me and also we have Kela over there. We are here to speak out and be a face and a voice. We're tired of people thinking there's people on the street and there ain't just people on the street, people that look like me. And this is what recovery looks like. We invite you to give us a chance that if you know someone that suffers from this disease, you can go to our website. We have a website, Recovery Community of Durham. We have an office over at Haytai Heritage Center now. We do yoga classes, we do art classes. But the most important thing is that we'll try to make people understand that they do not have to hide. And what we don't want to happen is our vision statement says that we envision a world where recovery thrives in supportive communities and provides innumerable opportunities to heal, to grow, and to be of service to others. We believe Durham is a supportive community. So we ask you to join with us and enjoy live music, dancing, free food, inspiring speakers, information about community resources, child-friendly activism, and with your help, plenty of hope to go around. If you know someone suffering with this disease, we ask you to talk to them and send them to us. Thank you. You gave them a lot more information than I did. That was great. We'll ask Del and Madiola if she would join me please. This proclamation speaks to life insurance awareness month. We've done this annually and today the proclamation speaks to the fact that according to LEMRA, International Life Insurance Consumer Studies, 52 million people who make between $50,000 and $250,000 in annual income don't have any life insurance. Whereas the study shows 613 million income people die every day without enough insurance to adequately take care of their families. Whereas between 2004 and 2010, the number of people with life insurance dropped from 78% to 70%, according to CEO and President of LEMRA, Bob Kersner. Whereas almost 75% of Americans agree that life insurance is the best way to protect against premature death of a primary wage earner. Whereas 6 in 10 Americans say their own life insurance, while only half of them have sufficient coverage to address the financial needs of their family. And whereas 29% of Americans would like to discuss life insurance with a financial professional, yet 3 fourths of American households do not have a personal life insurance agent or personal financial advisor or planner. Whereas analysts said the industry hasn't solved the puzzle of how best to reach middle income households in a cost-efficient manner in a way that enables consumers to feel comfortable making financial decisions. Whereas life insurance provides financial security for families in the event of death by helping surviving family members to meet immediate, ongoing, and future financial obligations and objectives, as well as emphasize your personal commitment to the core value of the importance of providing for the family in this trying economic climate. Now, therefore, I, William B. Bilbell, Mayor of the City of Durham, North Carolina, do never proclaim the month of September, 2017 as life insurance awareness month in Durham. And hereby urge all citizens to take special note of this observance and to encourage all concerned to be more aware of their life insurance needs, seek professional advice, and take the actions necessary to achieve the financial security for the loved ones. What's my hand? Corporal City of Durham, North Carolina, this is the fifth day of September, 2017 that I'm gonna present this to Dale for the comments you might have. Good evening, everybody. This is my associate financial person that works with me with Matteo Lina-Sosis and I must tell you that I'm passionate about saving families. Life insurance is the only commodity out here that will replace loss of income. Can you think of anything else? No. Okay, the experiences that I've had with lack of life insurance has been detrimental and persons now feel that they cannot afford to do life insurance. Here's what I have done, research. There are three ways to do life insurance. Some underwritten, meaning you go through the channels of getting approved. There is another product now that I have discovered within the last couple of years that is free life insurance for eligible parents that will yield $50,000 to their children should they pass. There is no premium for that insurance. You can go on my website and get more information about it. Now I do know from my 30 years of experience that when there's life insurance left behind, there is peace, there's family cohesiveness, there is love, there is a continuation of the paradise that the breadwinners or the persons bringing in the monies will have. It's a permanent decision. The third issue is policies are available for seniors or you may consider yourself a senior if you're over 45, 50 or whatever but these products are available in different ways too. You can have different tiers for persons who don't want to do a medical. It's sort of first day coverage. Then there's another one where there may be a graded coverage and then there's another one that's guaranteed coverage. All these products are available. So there's really no excuse for anyone not to seek some form of protection for the most valuable commodity that you have and that's your heart beating. And when your heart stops, that's it. I have seen families fight and choke each other when there is no life insurance. I thought you had done it, I thought you. So I could tell you lots of testimonies in my career but I'm passionate about this and I really appreciate the mayor and the city council and I did have a presentation and I did a presentation with councilman Steve Shwell and councilwoman Cora Cole McFadden a couple of years ago about the free life insurance for parents that have children. If we get our children educated, we can definitely help to alleviate some poverty. Education is the key and that's what I was raised, oldest of nine, my parents used a switch and made us get education. So all of us made it. And Henry, would you like a word to say? First of all, no, the last time I was here experienced a death in my family but since that time my grandson died. So life insurance is not just for the old, it's not just for the middle people, it's not just for high schoolers, it's for everybody. He was eight years of age and in one day he was with us and the next day he was gone. Fortunately for us we did have life insurance and as Dale said it gives you so much peace, so much continuity, so much, it's nice to be sitting there at the power knowing that you don't have to be concerned about how am I going to take care of this child. So life insurance is passionate, it's very important and we thank you for giving us the opportunity to tell you about that. Thank you and have a good evening. As most of you know, we just celebrated Labor Day yesterday and I'm gonna ask all of us and Councilor Steve Shewell, if they would join me at the podium. This is speak to Living Wage Day in Durham. Thank you very much, Mr. Mayor. This is, as the Mayor said, regarding Living Wage Day in Durham and I have here with me Carl Rist from Prosperity Now, the new name of his organization which does a lot of work on this and Carl I'll read this and then give you a chance to respond. Whereas chronic poverty is the biggest challenge to sustainable, diverse and healthy communities and whereas according to the latest census data over 17% of residents of Durham have incomes below the poverty line and whereas the minimum wage in North Carolina is the same as the federally mandated minimum of $7.25 and whereas the purchasing power, the minimum wage has lost one third of its value and inflation adjusted dollars since 1968 due to the cost of living increases and whereas the cost of housing, food, childcare and healthcare have increased substantially in the eight years as the federal minimum wage was last raised in 2009 and whereas data from the Census and American Community Survey indicate that one in four workers in Durham or over 70,000 residents are in low wage jobs that pay less than $15 an hour and whereas the living wage can lift workers out of poverty and towards greater financial security and whereas the city of Durham is a living wage employer and is on a path to paying all city workers at least $15 an hour by 2018 and 19 and whereas more workers with higher incomes can afford to live in Durham and spend money locally and whereas employers who pay their workers a living wage reports substantially less turnover excuse me, better job performance at higher levels of positive customer engagement and whereas the mission of the Durham Living Wage Project is to support worker livelihoods by urging employers to pay living wages, to certify and publicly recognize living wage employers and to promote living wages as a matter of conscience within our community and whereas the Durham Living Wage Project has certified 97 employers who voluntarily pay all employees a living wage and whereas the Durham Living Wage Project plans to drive on Labor Day, a national holiday and throughout September to collect pledges from consumers to spend their money with employers that pay a living wage. Now therefore I, William V. Bill Belt mayor of the city of Durham, North Carolina to hereby proclaim the first Monday in September as living wage day in Durham and hereby urge and encourage local customers to support businesses that pay their workers a living wage. Witness my hand, the corporate seal the city of Durham, North Carolina this the fifth day of September, 2017 and Carl I'll turn this over to you for any remarks you might have. Thank you so much Mayor Bell, Council President Shul and city council members. I just wanna say three things real briefly. First of all I wanna thank the city of Durham for being one of the first living wage employers. The city of Durham first passed a living wage ordinance back in 1998 and it's that living wage ordinance that really sets the framework for the living wage project in Durham. It's your standard of living wages that we apply to firms that voluntarily pay all the employees a living wage in Durham. So we thank you for setting the framework for this project in Durham. Secondly I wanna thank the 97 living wage firms in Durham. It's everything from coffee shops to website firms and everything from contractors to daycare centers to do well by paying their employees a living wage and doing right by their employees. And lastly I wanna thank all the citizens of Durham that support living wage firms in Durham. I wanna encourage everyone in this room along with all the folks in Durham to support living wage firms with your dollars to make Durham a living wage community. Thank you so much. I'd like to recognize any comments from council members. Okay, that's councilor Reese. Thank you Mr. Mayor. As the city council's representative on the board of the Durham Arts Council it's my happy privilege to make the announcement that a center fest is returning to Durham in less than two weeks. Saturday, September 16th and Sunday, September 17th will mark the largest center fest celebration of the century here in Durham. Which is fitting because as Senator Mike Woodard is fond of saying, Durham is the cultural and arts capital of North Carolina. This year's center fest features 146 juried visual artists who will showcase and sell their original handcrafted work in clay, drawing, fibers, glass, painting, photography, printmaking, wood, jewelry, mixed media and sculpture although hopefully not all at the same time. Over 74 performing acts on six stages throughout downtown and a new project this year, the Durham Arts Village, a special space set aside exclusively for Durham nonprofits, Durham food vendors and Durham's rising artistic talent. The other new thing this year, Mr. Mayor, Saturday night will feature expanded entertainment, a downtown through 11 p.m. The main stage at CCB Plaza will feature two live musical performances followed by, believe it or not, a movie and popcorn and not one or two but three beer trucks. We have all the appropriate licensing in place. So encourage folks to head out and see the best that Durham has to offer on the 16th and 17th. The second announcement I wanted to make is that tomorrow afternoon at one o'clock I will be hosting a Facebook live session that will, in which I will walk through the process of reviewing the work session agenda for the following day or work session, of course, is Thursday at one o'clock. I'm not sure many folks in the general public have a real sense of how items appear in our agenda for these Monday night meetings, but it's after a considerable amount of staff work and some often informative questions by council members that we arrive at the agenda items that you're about to read off to us on the consent agenda. And so tomorrow afternoon at one o'clock I'll be doing this Facebook live session answering questions about the agenda and anything that folks want to know about the process, even though it's not on the agenda, I'm also willing to discuss the fact that I'm wearing seersucker the day after Labor Day. It's something I feel strongly about and tonight I'm living my values. So if people want to share their thoughts with me about that tomorrow, I'm happy to do that too. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you, Charlie. Are there other announcements? I want to take a point of personal privilege this evening, as all the council knows, the administration knows and maybe the city knows that each year we do a budget and there's a budget document that the staff produces. They gave us the budget document, I guess it was a week ago and I really hadn't had an opportunity to thank the management administration for whatever reason. I don't know if it's because I'm a survivalist or 16 years or maybe I did contribute certain things to the council for featuring me on this year's budget. People don't generally read budgets, documents, but I can tell you I read this one to make sure I understood why they had me on the front page. But in a serious matter, I've been attending several community forums for city council candidates, mayoral candidates, and I've really been sort of astonished here are some of the comments that have been made by some of the candidates that are running for office. And it's painfully aware to me that they haven't done the homework. With some of the numbers they throw out about like the city's invested a billion dollars in downtown Durham, we spent 70 million dollars for the Durham Performance Arts Center, just a whole lot of things that aren't factual. And I'm almost of the opinion that maybe one of the requirements to the run for city council is you ought to read the city budget. Because if you look at this document, it pretty much lays out the whole operation of city government. Where did money comes from? How has it been? The process that we go through with the administration to derive this budget. And it's a wealth of information. And I would recommend it to anyone that's seriously considering running for the city council on the office and in a particular time. I want to congratulate again the administration and the budget office as you constantly get commendations from other members of this council on how well you do in preparing this budget, the things that you go through to get the final product. And it's been really a pleasure for me to be a part of this. And more importantly, to learn and see the process evolve ultimately to the final budget that we get. Notwithstanding that this year you decided to put me on the front of the budget. You guys have done a super job in past years. And I hope this isn't a bump in the road. You continue to do so in future years. So again, thanks to the manager and administration and members of the council. Thank you for allowing me to make those few comments. Let me ask you other prior items by the city manager. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Good evening everyone. I'd appreciate Mayor your comments about the budget. The staff works very hard at putting that together. But it's a collaboration that takes all of us working together. The mayor, the council members and the community to do this work. I don't have any priority items this evening but I would be remiss if I didn't congratulate you and your alma mater, the Howard Bison on the greatest upset in NCAA college football history with their win on Saturday against the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, I believe it was in Las Vegas. So congratulations, 45 point underdog, the largest underdog upset in the history of the NCAA. So congratulations. I'm just sorry I didn't place a bet on it. $100 would have gotten you 50,000. Now can you be the end season? Don't win all the time. Thank you. Recognize city attorney. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. No priority items. And likewise, city clerk. What did you do? Okay. We're proceed with the agenda and the first item is the concern agenda. I read the heading of each item on the concern agenda. If a member of the council or person in the public pulls it, we'll discuss that later. In the agenda night. Item one on the concern agenda is Durham City County Appearance Commission Appointment. Item two is the mayor's nominee for reappointment to the Durham Historic Preservation Commission. Item three is the Raleigh Durham Airport Authority Federal Aviation Administration grant offer, FAAIP grant number three dash three seven dash 0056, that's 048, that's 21, 017. FAAIP grant number three dash 37, dash 0056, that's 049, that's 217. Item five is the development ventures incorporated request for the subordination of home declaration of restrictive covenants. Item six is the interlocal agreement among the city of Durham, Durham Chapel Hill Carver Metropolitan Planning Organization and the city of Graham for the NC54 West Corridor Study and grant project ordinance. Item seven is the agreement with the Durham Chapel Hill Carver Metropolitan Planning Organization and North Carolina Department of Transportation for the US 15501 Corridor Study and grant project ordinance. Item eight is the 2017 downtown Durham parking study. Item nine is July 2017 bid report. Item 10 is the grant agreement with North Carolina Department of Transportation in the city of Durham for the R. Kelly Bryant Bridge South Trail Project. Item 11 are amendments to fair housing ordinance and rules and amendments to human relations commission ordinance. Item 12 is the National Legal Cities Financial Inclusion System and city leadership grant project ordinance. Item 14 is adoption of aquatic facilities master plan as an addendum to the 2013 city of Durham parks and recreation master plan. Items 15th or 18 items that can be found on the general business agenda is public hearings and entertain the motion for the approval of the consent agenda item. He'll move the second. He's been properly moved to second. Madam clerk, will you open the vote? Close the vote. Thank you. It passes seven is zero. We'll move to the general business agenda for public hearings. Item 15 is consolidated annexation for Pickett and Garrett. Good evening, Mr. Mayor and members of council. Pat Young with planning department. Jacob Wiggins of our staff who usually presents these items is on a brief and well-deserved vacation. So you are stuck with me tonight. I can first certify for the record that all public hearing items before you are have been advertised and noticed as required by law and there are affidavits to that effect on file with planning department. As the mayor called the case to his BDG 1600010 which is a request by Doc Nichols partners for utility extension agreement, voluntary annexation and zoning map change for an approximately 71 acre set of parcels actually six parcels at the southwestern quadrant of Pickett Road and Garrett Road as shown in attachment one of your staff report. The applicant is requesting an exact translational zoning which means it's the identical zoning that's found currently in Durham County for the property but with a city designation which would allow up to 105 residential units if approved. This request would become effective on September 30th, 2017, also if approved. The public works and water management departments have performed the required utility impact analysis and for the utility extension agreement and determined that the existing city of Durham, water and sewer mains have capacity for the proposed level of development at the site. The budget management services department performed a fiscal impact analysis which determined that the proposed annexation would become revenue positive very shortly after annexation. Two motions are required to approve this item. The first is required by law to approve the utility extension agreement and the voluntary annexation and the second is to approve the consistency statement and the zoning map change. Staff recommends approval of the item and we'll be happy to take any questions. Thank you, Patrick. This is a public hearing, the public hearing is open. What I asked first are their comments, questions by members of the council. Hearing none, we have two persons that have signed up to speak. I'll designate five minutes on each side. We have Jared Eatons and let me ask, does anyone else who wants to speak in support of this item? Well, Jared is the only one that's signed up to speak and then I have one person that has signed up to speak in opposition, John Robbins. And is there anyone else that wants to speak in opposition to this matter? I'm doing this to make sure I allocate enough time. That being the case, I recognize Jared Eatons. Good evening. Jared Eatons with Eatons Land. Here representing my client, Dot Nichols Partners. Appreciate Pat's summary of our project. I'm just gonna point to a few specific items that are unique with this project. If council is to approve annexation, what we would be able to develop a project that is unique in that it won't be masqueraded, which I can say from over the past four or five years, this would be the first project that we've designed that where the property wasn't clear cut and masqueraded. This is actually an R20 zone project, quarter acre lots or greater. And so it won't be masqueraded. The streets have been designed with an alternate street section as shoulder and ditch. This accomplishes two things. One, it makes this project look much more consistent with Garrett Farms next door. And it also provides an added environmental benefit because shoulder and ditch sections naturally filtrate water more than curb and gutter will cause curb and gutter won't infiltrate at all, obviously. The utilities are existing and actually on the property, the sewer that serves the property runs along the property north south. Water is existing in Garrett and Pickett Roads. And the one thing we're doing with this project, we were made aware months ago that there were some stormwater issues with the Garrett Farms development south of us. There's floodplain that runs across our property and the Garrett Farms property. So what we've done, we've designed all three of our ponds on this project to detain the 100 year storm, which is RxC is what ordinance requirements are. And as a result of that, when you compare post development, the amount of the 100 year storm leaving our property, when you compare that to pre development at that Garrett Farms connection point, we're gonna reduce that flow by about 60% from what is currently there now. And we're also diverting about 12 acres of drainage that's currently draining directly onto Garrett Farms and those property owners along our southern boundary. We're diverting 12 acres around those lots, taking it to the pond and around the rear. So we think that this is a good, unique project that's gonna do some good for our neighbors and I'm glad to answer any questions you have. Thank you. Other questions for the opponent? If not, recognize John Robbins. Mr. Robbins, President. Mr. Robbins, you have five minutes. Thank you. I'm not sure I'm in opposition to this, but I do have a few questions. One is, if you approve this rezoning tonight, are you also approving the project? Good evening, Pat Young with the Planning Department. So what this would do is allow the applicant to get additional entitlements, meaning approvals for development. They'd have to get a site plan, which makes sure that all the city's site development criteria, such as the stormwater facility you heard Mr. Eden's describe, is designed and constructed exactly as he described, as well as construction drawings, which are detailed engineering drawings. But what it does is allow them to pursue additional approvals, including building permits, that would allow them to put the development in place. Could you tell me why the people in the community were notified of this request until now? Sure, so they were notified in accordance with law. This is what's called an initial zoning. Initial zoning means that it's the exact same zoning that's in place in the county, it's just being gonna be taken into the city limits. And that has a different notification standard than other types of approvals. It's a 100-foot notification range rather than a 600-foot pursuant to law. So those folks were notified directly via US mail. Well, I'll just express my concerns in by saying, one, I don't know if anybody's taken into consideration the people who live in this community who already are overtaxed with automobiles coming down Pickett Road. I almost need to hire an off-duty police officer to get me out of my driveway. We've got three schools. We have several churches. We have two retirement centers. We're now getting a project going up on where the old Carlson property is to do retail and some other office spaces. And we're inundated with traffic. I see some traffic measurements going on, but it's always after school clubs. And it's not getting a true measurement of how much traffic we do have out there. The other thing is, why not? We have a large herd of deer out there. We have coyotes. We have red fox. We have a whole family of owls. And they don't do too good in the city. But I guess we'll find out whether they survive in the city or not. We also have a new 130, I think it's 128 unit old folks home going up in the other side of the Pepsi Cola plant. It's amazing. I mean, you need to come out there and sometimes stand on the street corner and watch how much traffic we have to deal with. And I just don't think that a sufficient study of the traffic patterns has been done to add another 129 houses. I'm sorry, 99 houses. It also doesn't take into account that the Lila Garrett property is also going to be quest to be brought into the city. And I think 14 or 15 houses are going there. It's incredible. Thank you. You're welcome. Again, this is a public hearing. I would ask, is there anyone else that would like to speak that has not signed up to speak on this item? Let the record reflect and no one else asked to speak. All the public hearing be closed. And matters back for council. The consistency statement for us. It's the utility piece. Utility extension agreement is first. Okay, so move the utility extension agreement. It's been properly moved in second. Further discussion and recognize Councilman Schuhl. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. And I appreciated the comments by the gentlemen. So, Mr. Young, question for you. This is an exact translation of the county's existing zoning. Is that right? Yes, sir. So we're not adding any density to this property by approving this in terms of what is allowed to be built there. Is that correct or not? That is correct. So I'm sympathetic to, I'm sorry I don't see the gentleman now. I'm sorry, thank you. I understand your concern about traffic and growth. But what we're doing now is not changing the developer's ability to build this number of units at this location. We are not adding to the density. Sometimes we do. We're often faced with situations where we have to make a decision whether or not we're gonna allow more density. But we're not in this situation. The developer can build this number of units by right already. So just wanted to make that clear. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Well, I guess, I don't know if I'm gonna comment on when McCulloch say something, but I suspect if you didn't have Ward and Sewer, you wouldn't be able to do this project at this density. I mean, so that's really the issue. That's why I suspect that they want to be annexed into the city so that they can have utilities. Otherwise, I doubt they could build this project at the level that they're talking about without Ward and Sewer utilities. I just wanted to make that clear, I think quite a bit. Fair enough. Fair enough, Mr. Mayor. Are the other comments, questions on this item? If not, the public has been closed. We had a motion, a second, to approve the utility agreement. Madam Clerk, will you open the vote? And close the vote? It passes seven to zero. Move the consistency statement. It's been proper to move the second that we approve the consistency statement. Madam Clerk, will you open the vote? Close the vote. It passes seven to zero. Thank you. We'll move to the next item, which is a solidated annexation for 730 Dulara Drive. Good evening again, Mr. Mayor and members of council. This is Case BDG 1600017, which is a utility extension agreement request. Voluntary annexation and zoning map change request received from Javad Kargar for an approximately 0.61 acre parcel located at 730 Dulara Drive. What this is is a request to do an exact translational zoning. It's currently rural residential in the county. The request is to have this annexed into the city to allow for the construction of a single family home on the site. And this would be effective September 30th, 2017, similar to the previous item, if approved. The public works and water management departments conducted the required utility impact analysis for the utility extension agreement and found that the existing water and sewer main capacity at this location was acceptable for the proposed level of development. The budget management services department performed a fiscal impact analysis and determined that the proposed annexation would become revenue positive shortly upon following annexation. Just like the last item, two motions are required to approve this item. The first would be to approve the utility extension agreement involuntary annexation. And the second is to adopt a consistency statement and the initial zoning. Staff recommends approval of the item and will be happy to take any questions. Thanks. Again, this is the public hearing. The public hearing is open. We'd ask other questions of the council of the staff report. No one has signed to speak on this item, but I would ask is there anyone who wants to speak on this item either for or against a comment? Let the director reflect and no one has to speak on this item. I would declare the appointment to be closed as a matter of court council, Mr. Mayor. I recognize the councilman, Mark. I have a question for staff. And this is just making sure I understand this. This lot would support one house. Is that correct? Correct. One house and one lot. Correct. Thank you. Further questions? Again, to entertain a motion on the item, of course. Move the utility extension agreement. Second. Unproperly move is second. Madam Clerk, will you open the vote? Is it open? Close the vote. It passes seven, is he? I don't think it was open, really. Can you open it again? Well, let's do this. All in favor of the motion and get by saying aye. Aye. Those opposed, the motion passes unanimously. Entertain the next motion. Move the consistency statement. Second. It's been properly moved and second. Madam Clerk, will you try to open the vote this time? Close the vote. It passes seven, is he wrong? Let's move to item, Mr. Mayor. I recognize the councilman, Mark, pardon me. I heard a motion for the consistency statement. I'm not sure I heard one for the annexation ordinance. If I didn't hear it, I apologize. If it hasn't been moved yet, I'll move the annexation ordinance. Do we need to do the zoning ordinance too? Excuse me. Yeah, Council Member Moffitt, the annexation portion was included with the utility extension agreement, so we thought it was in the same motion. Sorry, that's a solid idea. Move to item 18, no, it's 17. Consolidate annexation for Jacob's Glass, BDG 17000001. Good evening again, Mr. Mayor, members of council, Pat Young again with the Planning Department. This is a request, Mr. Mayor called the case number. This is a request for utility extension agreement, voluntary annexation and initial zoning designation proposed by LR Jacobs LLC for an approximately 9.9 acre parcel located at 4915 Hellsboro Road. This would be a request to extend the city limits. It's immediately adjacent to existing city limits, and if approved, would take effect on September 30th, 2017, just like the previous two items. The subject site is divided between Orange and Durham County's, and it's primarily in Orange County. There is existing development, light industrial and warehouse development on this site. It is a glass wholesale concern. There is the proposal at this location is to add an approximately 30,000 square foot warehouse building on the Orange County portion of the site, and that has necessitated a new water service connection, which has led to the requirement that annexation be sought. So the public works and water management departments perform the utility impact analysis required for this proposal and determine that the existing city and water, city of Durham water and sewer utilities, although only water is being requested, have the capacity for the proposed development, and the budget management services department perform the fiscal impact analysis, which determine that the proposed annexation would become revenue positive post build out. The Durham Planning Commission at their July 11th meeting recommended approval of this item by a vote of 11 to zero, and they only commented on the rezoning, which was to the IL Industrial Light Zoning District. They don't review annexation items. Two motions are required, just like the previous items. The first is to approve the utility extension agreement involuntary annexation petition, and the second is to approve the consistency statement and the initial zoning. Staff recommends approval and I'll be happy to take any questions. Okay, this is the public hearing. The public hearing is open. I would ask other questions by members of the council. If not, I have one person that signed up to speak. They were signed up as a proponent, and it's an opponent, Chad Abbott. Did you mark the card incorrectly? No, it's a very confusing case. Okay. Hopefully I don't confuse you the way I confuse the planning board. Yeah, three minutes initially. Perhaps I'll give you a little history here. Mr. Jacobs. Oh, I'm Chad Abbott with Summit Design, 504 Mental Land Drive, Hillsborough, North Carolina. We represent Jacobs Glass. I'm Mr. Larry Jacobs. I appreciate your time tonight and the opportunity to speak. Back in 2014, we started a process of rezoning with Orange County. This was a two parcel. It was two parcels. Original Glass Factory was on one in Orange County, receiving City of Durham services, I assume through some extension agreement between the two because it's in an economic development district. So at that time, he had an operating facility in Orange County paying the additional fees for water sewer services, but was not annexed. He then, at the urging of Orange County, combined a parcel he acquired behind it that was owned by Duke Forest. He acquired that parcel so he could relocate a warehouse. He was leasing somewhere else to this facility, built his own plant and stopped leasing the warehouse. He did recombine them. So now as a consequence to requesting this annexation, his original parcel that was in Orange County will now fall into Durham County. And the only reason we are requesting the annexation is because we're required to add an additional water service for the new building. And there's a section in your ordinance that allows you, it's your sole discretion, section 70-129, number seven, which reads, a limited exception to the voluntary annexation requirement may be provided to the property located in an economic development zone that is established pursuant to an interlocal cooperation agreement. And so, and it continues on and I don't wanna bore you by reading the whole thing, but it is in your ordinance that allows him to request a utility connection, however you not formally annex him. And I don't know how that comes into play, Patrick, and how that, that's why I put a probe on it because I want you to do something but we don't wanna be annexed because like I said, we started on this in 2014, sit in the County of Orange County says they sent courtesy reviews to Durham and I guess maybe things just don't get connected sometimes when it's that early on in the process, but he might have pursued this whole project in a different fashion, such as not recombining the two parcels, et cetera, had he known this would be a request and a requirement at the end to just have a water service. All being that the assumption was he had water and sewer service then and he recombined it to his property and just needs another service for the new building, assumed it would always be in Orange County and would not have to go through that process. So I don't know if you would wish to exercise that exception, number seven, but that is our request. What would the new building have water and sewer or just water? Yes, the new building would have water and sewer but there's possibility we can use the existing sewer tap to connect both buildings being that it has to be recombined in one parcel and he owns both buildings. So the rate that you pay now, the rate that you pay now for water and sewer for the building that's inside the city that's in this area, do they pay the regular rates that he's paying outside city rates? So you've paid outside city rates, okay. And outside city rates. I didn't know if the staff has some comments. Mr. Robert, just to comment and certainly Mr. Young can follow up but the provision in that being referenced was put in place so the council had the flexibility that this is that area of the Orange County industrial park extension. We added that the language used to be automatic that you had to annex if you wanted utility service but because of the kind of linear westerly direction that this industrial park goes we came back and added some flexibility so that if we had a parcel that was further out and not adjacent to the city limits the council would have the flexibility to not annex but to provide the city would have the opportunity to not annex but provide the utility service. In this case the property is immediately adjacent to the city limits and that's why we would recommend to move forward with the annexation if this property was, I don't know how many miles out is that extension could be a long way out from a service delivery standpoint would be very problematic. In this case it's immediately adjacent to the city limits. So they would receive all of the, they'll receive all of the city services. Correct. If we're annexed, please fire. Correct. Obviously all of that stuff, okay. And plus you would get the rates would be inside. Correct. I would ask Patrick if this, like I said we started in 2014, went through a whole site plan approval permitting process with Orange County and I've been told by planning that that site plan would remain valid because it was approved. Is that not true? So if the property is Pat Young again with the planning department, if the property is annexed the site plan would not have to be approved in the city of Durham. We've done a cursory or preliminary review of the site plan that was reviewed and approved by Orange County. And there would only be I think minor changes, but you'd have to get a Durham site plan because our zoning jurisdiction would be and that was the reason we've already been held up over a year trying to work through this process of getting this, because he assumed he would have service just like he did on his existing building that was not in the city. And now he's been held up almost nine months trying to get the annexation plat prepared to get the legal description. Just to get in front of you, we started this about in January when we submitted DOT permits to tap the line. And we've had a site plan approval from Orange County since 2016. He could have went ahead and started hoping that he would get water service approval because we have the grading permits and everything else needed. Now we would have to delay him further and he's leasing a building and he's already gotten an extension to cover this time period. And so that site plan approved, that would be required to come through the city and then construction drawings because of the infrastructure. It could be any storm water ponds and so would have to go to construction drawing review. That would take another six months or at least. So I would expect. And that's the reason he's requesting for council to exercise this exception because the Orange County told us, we asked why did this not come up before now and said they said they sent cursory reviews, et cetera. I don't know, but I just know that that's what they told us starting in 2014. And it's kind of at the end of the road where he's ready to build and paying extra lease modifications and extensions on his other warehouse, he's leasing. So he can build this. Recognize councilor Reese. Sir, can you help me understand? You may have explained this at the beginning, but obviously I didn't understand it why, why, why is this here as a voluntary annexation and not just utility extension agreement? Because since we're outside the city, we can't request for utilities, even though it's just a service, no new calls to the city on any main or infrastructure, it's just a service. We cannot request a tap or service without requesting voluntary annexation. If I may, Mr. Council member Reese and members of council, that's precisely right. And I think as the manager said, you all have the discretion to authorize only the utility extension agreement, but it's required that voluntary annexation be sought. But again, as the manager said, the criteria that council has suggested to consider is service delivery impacts. And because this is immediately adjacent to city limits, there are no negative service delivery impacts to annexation. As the manager suggested, this is a linear, several mile long linear economic development zone following I-85 into Orange County. If this property was on the end, Western end of that, there would be substantial service delivery impacts, but because it's immediately adjacent, we staff and all the service delivery departments didn't recognize any. I'm sorry to be dense, but don't we often, doesn't the city often enter into utility extension agreements outside the city limits? Don't we? Not since 2012. Not without annexation. Okay. I'll take another reason to tell me. Didn't the city staff just jump through hoops a couple of months ago to help a nice family just on the other side of the city limits get connected to? Those are the only exceptions if they have a contaminated service. Okay. So that's the level. So thank you. I appreciate it. Just to learn the job things. Recognize Councilman Schuhl. I think that council member Reese's problem is he's wearing seersucker after every time. So. I'll allow it. Mr. Young, the gentleman, I'm sorry, sir. Mr. Chairman. Chad Abbott. Asked about the, or talked about the time that it would take to go through the process is necessary to get a site plan and so forth done. Can you give us an estimate of that? Sure. So if I might quickly add to a point of information before I answer your question directly, the right. The process Mr. Abbott described was that he and his client went to Orange County. Orange County did a full review without notification or disclosure of this requirement. I'm not criticizing my colleagues over there. It's not their utility system. But when, as soon as they came to the city, the city said, you have to go through this process. So I don't think there's been any undue delay at that time. However, as you're suggesting, he would have to get it. And I said earlier, a city of Durham site plan. That process can be completed within, well within 90 days if there is a high quality submittal in a minimum time between resubmittals, if there are any comments that are non-compliant with the ordinance. The average is about four months. Okay. And we would then have to go to construction drawings after that. Which would add an additional. Thank you. Mr. McMurray. I recognize Councilman Schubert and Arice. One day maybe. I don't have a question, but I didn't want to speak to the mayor's of the proposals. Is this the appropriate time to do that? Sure. Great. What, you speak to whose proposal? The staff recommendation I wanted to talk about. I just wanted to talk about what we're here to do. I didn't have any more questions for anybody. I understand the staff's position here. I think it's well thought out. I think there is good reason, there really is no good reason not to proceed under volunteer annexation. There's no good reason to make use of the exception, except that I think we shouldn't annex people if they don't want to be annexed. This, these folks had a reason to use the volunteer annexation process because they couldn't access city water and sewer in any other way. But we, but I think it should be a principle of how we operate in this area that if someone doesn't want to be annexed, we ought to figure out how not to annex them. And we gave ourselves an out here. It I think wasn't intended to apply under this circumstance because this particular piece of property is right up against the city limits. And as I understand from the city manager's description, it was intended to apply in situations where the annexation would pose service delivery obstacles, mostly in a situation where the new property is not contiguous with the city limits. Having said that, I think they will be, what, actually, Pat, can you tell us what relative rate for water and sewer they would be paying if we made use of this limited exception? So I can't quote the rates that I had. I believe it's double the rates, double the rates. I just want to make sure, yeah. So the city is getting its, getting its due. If we make use of the limited exception, we're charging the property owner double rates for water and sewer, the way we do for other utility extension agreements. And we don't, we are not in a position to be providing other types of services that annexed properties provide. I think this particular situation is such a narrow subclass of situation that it's not likely to ever come up in quite this configuration again. And so I think it makes sense to use the tools we have to give effect to the will of the folks who own this property, which is to pay double for water and sewer, but not necessarily be part of the city. And that's, I intend to figure out how to vote that way. I will, thanks. Okay, Rick, nice to come for sure. Mr. Mayor, while I'm sympathetic to the applicant's concerns, I think that, and no one has to be, if you don't want to be annexed, don't apply for these things is what I would say. We're not forcing anyone to be annexed here, except that they want our services. And so I think that when they want our services, they also ought to be part of our tax base. And so I'll be voting for the staff recommendation. I guess the other part of this is, the General Assembly took away our authority to do annexation. So it's the only way that we really can do annexation now is if somebody volunteers to come in. So when we were down the road, we felt that it was appropriate to annex this property after having given the ordinance sewer utilities. And the person said, I don't want to be annexed, we couldn't do it tonight. And so I think, I'm trying to balance the two. And I guess I come down on the side, again, that their services are going to be provided by the city if he's a part of the city. He gets the same inside city rates, ordinance sewer that everybody else gets. Additionally, he gets the fire protection, police protection, I guess garbage and all that stuff that comes along with it. So you can't have both ways, I guess that's what I'm saying. And it comes with a penalty, depending on where you are. When you ask for this type of request from the city. But we've had, is there any more discussion on this item? The other thing I would just add, Mr. Mayor, when we have our agreement with Orange County that provided for the extension of water and sewer service out to this area, that was clearly a discussion that was agreed to by Orange County as, you know, and I mean, aware of by Orange County from the beginning of these discussions which had probably been going on for seven or eight years now. Okay. Public hearing is closed on this item. Entertain a motion on item. I'll move the ordinance annexing Jacob's glass and Sea of Durham. Along with the techniques. Was that a second? Second. It's been a problem to move the second. Madam Clerk, will you open the vote? Close the vote. Can we just clarify, Pat, is that correct? Or should it be the approval of the utility extension agreement? Yeah. Thank you, Mr. Manager. The first vote is for the utility extension agreement and voluntary annexation petition. It's combined. Combined, I'm sorry. We want that again, Mr. Mayor. Along with the reckless clue, do you want it again? Madam Clerk. The motion passes six to one with council member Reese voting, no. Yeah, but the motion included annexation. But it didn't include the utility extension agreement. And if you modify your motion to that. Happy to do so, Mr. Mayor. He's amended his motion to include utility extension agreement. And we'll make it with the second. Okay, given that, open the vote again. Can you open and close it? It passes six to one with council member Reese voting, no. Mr. Mayor, I'll move the consistency statement and the proposed initial zoning. Second. It's been properly moved. Second. Madam Clerk, we open the vote. It passes seven to zero. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Can I just follow up to make a just record to ask the planning department to be sure and follow up with Orange County to be sure that there is no future confusions. Maybe you've already done that, Pat. But if not, that we have some follow up with their development review folks in Orange County so that we don't have this overlapping review again. I can't. Yeah, certainly will, Mr. Manager. Thank you for bringing that up. I did talk to Michael Harvey, who's the current planning manager over there and had a lengthy conversation about procedural improvements to ensure that we're getting notified when these are proposed so that we can let them know when they would be subject to this request. So thank you. Okay, let's move to item 18. The request for reduction by owner measurement incorporated and it's related to an affiliated entities to remove property from the existing downtown municipal service district. Mr. Mayor, members of council, my name is Andre Pettigrew. I'm the director of the Office of Economic and Workforce Development. The Office of Economic and Workforce Development recommends that the Durham City Council hold a public hearing pursuant to GS168-538.1A on the request to remove from the downtown business improvement district. Properties owned by Measurement Incorporated, Measurement Durham LLC, Measurement Building LLC, 711 Washington Street LLC, and 715 Washington Street LLC. The Office of Economic and Workforce Development further recommends that Durham City Council vote to approve the following motion. The City Council of the City of Durham finds that the following parcels of the 21 parcels listed in the agenda memo are not in need of the services, facilities, and functions of the service district, the bid services, to a demonstrably greater extent than the remainder of the city, colon none. If the council wishes to find contrary to the administration's recommendation that one or more of these parcels are not in need of the bid services to a demonstrably greater extent than the remainder of the city, the above motion would be changed by deleting the word none and replacing it with a list of parcels that are not in need of the bid services. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Okay. Again, this is a public hearing item. You've heard the staff report. We recognize. A question of staff just will correct. I was gonna say if you have questions. On exhibit six in the attachments for this matter is the ordinance to remove property. Were you suggesting when you were reading it just now that the word none should appear under section one? I'll let Fred Lamar exhibit six. Good evening. Fred Lamar with the city attorney's office. If I could respond to your question, Councilman Rees, that is just a sample ordinance that if you did identify any properties then and you wanted to vote on that tonight, you could have that form. It doesn't have to be tonight if you decided on a property on one or more properties then that would be the form of the ordinance that would have to be adopted at two meetings of the council. So tonight we're just here for the public hearing. Is that correct? That depends on what the council decides at the end of the public hearing. Okay. Thank you. I can ask Councilman Moffitt. Fred, I want to follow up on that. Do I understand that if, this is going to ask if it's our determination that none of the parcel should be removed then do we take no action or do we have a, is there an action to be taken? So it is in the discretion of the city council that if you do, if subsequent to the public hearing you do make the finding and identify parcels that would apply. You may then take the next step if you decide you want to do that to actually remove some or all of the parcels but that has to be done by ordinance. You name the parcel and the owner name and then you have to adopt that ordinance at two of your meetings. That's if we determine that one or more parcels should be removed from the bid. That's correct. I was actually asking in the event that we feigned find that no parcel should be removed. Does that require, is there an action that we take? No. Okay. That's the purpose of that motion to find none, the motion that was presented. That's all you just. Then there is an action. There's take a motion. I mean make a passive. Except that finding that was read by Mr. Pettigrew. Okay, thanks. Okay. The other question's been moved to the council. I'm trying to determine the amount of time to allocate for this item. What I need to understand is from the opponents. I see you have one, two, three, four, five, six, seven persons that are signed up to speak. Mayor Bell, my name is Bill Bryan. Good morning to our law group. I am here as the attorney for the proponents or the applicant as I'll refer to them. We actually have four speakers including myself. We have three in reserve in case somebody needs to yield their time because we were not given a good understanding as to how this process is gonna work. What I would like to do, what I would propose is that we put on our presentation. I'll make a short opening statement. Three other witnesses will testify or we'll make their statements. And then I'll make a brief closing statement and then you can take folks in whatever order you want to in opposition to the application. Does that make sense? Let's try it this way. We have 12 persons that are signed up to speak in opposition to it. How many? 12. So if I allow each of those persons three minutes, you've got 36 minutes for opposition. So I would then say those that are proponents, you have 36 minutes. We should be able to do it in that amount of time. Okay, but I wanna make sure that we've got, I've got all the people here. I've got William J. Bryan, Geoffrey Rother. Rother? Rother. Bryan Schreck, Herb Scherrick. Hank Scherrick, Hank Scherrick. Hank Scherrick. Well, he said, he does, Hank, okay. Joe McClintock, Don Timberlake, and George Davis. Right, there's our intention that only myself, Mr. Rother, and two Mr. Sherricks will actually speak. All right, so we'll proceed with you in 36 minutes. All right, we're ready to go? Sure. All right, good evening. My name is Bill Bryan with the Morning Star Law Group, and I am the attorney for the owners who are seeking to have their property removed from Durham Business Improvement District pursuant to section 1683538A1 of the North Carolina General Statutes. That statute provides that the council should remove property from the bid on request of a property owner if it finds, based upon the materials presented, that the property in question does not need the services provided by the bid to a greater extent than other portions of the city. All of the properties in question shown on the map in the first two slides, here they are, and go ahead, next one, Jeff, are either owned by or affiliated with Measurement Incorporated, and therefore we are going to refer to them as the MI properties. I'd be remiss if I didn't point out, our position is that this issue should not be handled through a public hearing of the type that you're holding tonight, but rather should be presented in a quasi-judicial hearing in which all the fair trial standards for the preservation of our clients' rights to due process are preserved. However, the city attorney disagrees, and therefore we have lodged a formal objection for the record with his office and the office of city manager, but that said, we're prepared to proceed tonight and we'll do so. The question before you tonight is not whether you want the MI property to be a part of the bid. The question is whether you can find, based upon the information presented to you, that the MI properties are in need of the services provided by the bid to a greater extent than other parts of the city. In this regard, you should keep in the back of your mind the services that the bid is supposed to provide. First is cleaning, including sidewalks, sweeping litter removal, emptying trash cans, graffiti removal. The second is maintenance, including snow clearing, weed removal, and targeted landscaping. The third is safety, including trafficking, tracking unusual activity and being the eyes and ears of the police. The fourth is marketing and public relations and economic development, which includes the ambassador program. The speakers you'll hear from this evening will present information showing definitively that the MI properties are not in greater need of these services than other parts of the city. In fact, there are many parts of the city in much greater need of these services than are the MI properties. Therefore, the applicants are questioning, we'll grant it. With that, I'd like to introduce the speakers in favor of the application. My colleague, Mr. Jeff Rother, and Mr. Brian Sherrick, and Mr. Hank Sherrick, both of whom are associated with the ownership and the operation of the MI properties. We are, of course, available to answer any questions that you may have throughout the hearing. One thing I would ask the clerk to do, we have put all of our statements and the exhibits and the various letters and objections together into a thing, and it's asked to be handed out. Thank you very much. With that, I will introduce Mr. Jeff Rother. Before you stop the clock, since I want to make sure that your own minds are clear on this, the proms have 36 minutes. I'm going to ask each of the people who signed up as a part of that, do you agree to limit yourselves within this 36 minutes? So I don't want you guys to get down to 36 and somebody says, well, I didn't get a chance to speak. Clear? So we have Brian, Jeffrey Rother who's speaking, Brian Sherrick, Hank Sherrick, Joe McClintock, Don Timberlake, and George Davis. All of you agreed to the rules that you allowed in the 36 minutes, is that correct? Is anybody disagrees? Okay, for the record, everybody agrees to that. Thank you. Good evening. My name is Jeffrey Rother. I'm an attorney from Morningstar Law Group. My purpose for being here today is to introduce evidence we collected which shows that other areas of the city are in greater need than the MI properties of the clean and safe services being provided in the bid. First, I collected and organized crime data using the Community Crime Map feature available from LexisNexis. This is a resource that's also available to the public through the City of Durham's website. The Community Crime Map is a tool that allows a user to search or identify reported police events occurring within a specific distance of a particular property within a specific period of time. For example, you could search 101 City Hall Plaza to see the reported police events occurring within a certain distance of City Hall within a defined period of time. When I say a police event, this data includes everything from violent crimes and weapons violations to things like towed vehicles and general calls for service. First, I ran a search on the Community Crime Map website to identify all police events in the last year within 500 feet of each of the MI properties. The results are reflected on this slide here. As you can see, the results vary with some properties having as few as three reported events within 500 feet and others having as many as 32. The average across the MI properties as reflected on the bottom of the chart was approximately 14 reported police events for the entire year. Second, I ran the same search for other addresses within City Limits. This search included properties inside the bid as well as business centers outside of the bid. The results of those searches are reflected on this next slide. Outside of the bid, I ran searches on 3438 Hillsboro, which is University Shopping Center, which reported 87 events. 1804 North Point Drive is the North Point Shopping Center, 55 events. Next is the Hope Valley Shopping Center, 80 events. The Shopping Center at 2220 North Roxboro Street, 87 events. 2000 Chapel Hill Road is the Lakewood Shopping Center, there was 71 events. And then also inside the bid, 309 West Morgan Street is Carolina Theater. There were 57 reported events. 321 West Gear Street is the Pitt barbecue restaurant, there are 58 events. 409 Blackwells at D-Bap, 22 events. 112 East Main Street is the two floor building that houses our law firm, there are 65 events. And 101 East Chapel Hill Street is the cupcake shop on the corner of Chapel Hill and Main, there were 75 events. I have all the underlying data here and separate documents with us, we could provide that upon request. From this data, one thing is clear, that MI properties are not in a dangerous location and there certainly is no greater need for the safe services on these properties than in other parts of the city. Next, I wanna address the clean services that are provided to properties in the bid. On the morning of August 25th, 2017, I traveled to certain business areas in the city and took pictures of conditions which I considered to be in greater need of the cleaning and maintenance services provided in the bid. These pictures were all taken over the course of two hours. I did not have to search far to find business areas that are in need of additional cleaning and maintenance. This first slide was from Old East Durham, corner of Andrew Avenue and Driver Street. You can see overgrown weeds that are pervasive on the sidewalk and throughout area. Next slide is in the same location. You can see the weeds again and the refuse on the side of the storefronts. You can see the litter that is collected along the curb on the right-hand side there. I went to the Lake Wood Shopping Center off Chapel Hill Road. In this first picture, you can see the litter and the dirty conditions on the walkway. There was also graffiti on the side of the building. There was a pedestrian area with a broken picnic table, a non-empty garbage can surrounded by crushed beer cans. There was trash throughout the parking lot and the public sidewalks were covered in pine straw. I then walked down the sidewalk in a business area at North Roxborough Street. In this area, you could see the significant amounts of litter near the roadside. Again, in the same location by the public sidewalks, the landscaping was dead and there was also a significant amount of litter. These slides are not meant as a knock on the quality of these properties or these neighborhoods. The point is that the need for services like litter removal, weed removal, maintenance and landscaping are common to all businesses in the city. And most importantly, that there are many areas in the city which are in greater need of the bid's clean services than the MI properties. Accordingly, what's submitted is not possible for you to find that the MI properties are in need of the services provided by the bid to a greater extent than the other areas of the city. With that, I would like to turn things over to Mr. Brian Sherrick, who will discuss the operation of the MI properties. Thank you. Good evening. Good evening. My name is Brian Sherrick. I'm the director of real estate for Measure Incorporated. I'm responsible for overseeing facility operations for each of the MI 21, each of the 21 MI properties. Those properties are identified by address and parcel number on page nine of the letter sent by Morningstar Law Group on July 14th, 2017. That is exhibit four to the agenda packet. Most of the MI properties are office buildings, but there are a couple of retail businesses operating from MI properties as well. The purpose, my purpose here tonight is to discuss the clean and safe services that are made available to properties in the bid, including the MI properties. Those services are listed in exhibit three to the agenda packet. Generally, there are two types of services being provided in the bid. One, services designated to promote public safety, i.e. the eyes and ears of the police. And two, services designated to promote cleanliness in downtown, sweeping, trash removal, weed removal, emptying trash cans. As a person responsible for operations on the MI property, I can say clearly that MI properties are not in need of clean and safe services provided in the bid. MI properties certainly are not in greater need of those services than other portions of the city. First, we provide our own clean services for MI properties. Our staff, we have 10 full-time janitor employees and five full-time maintenance and facility maintenance and landscape employees. Our staff already perform all of the clean services that the bid is supposed to be performing. Our staff monitor and clean sidewalks on the MI campus daily. They remove the public litter found on the property. In the winter months, our staff remove snow and ice from the sidewalks and handicap cutouts. They empty public trash cans and clean the public benches daily. And they maintain the landscaping in and around the public sidewalk. We take pride in the appearance of our property and work diligently to make sure they're clean for our employees, our visitors, and the public. As you will see from the pictures in the PowerPoint, the sidewalks, trash cans, benches, and other public areas near the property are clean and well maintained. This picture is of the north entrance of the measurement building and shows typical landscaping on our property. This picture is looking south on Morris Street near the intersection of Corporation and Morris. Sidewalks are clean, grass is well kept, no litter. This picture is also looking south. It is close to the measurement building up near the corner of Hunt Street. Once again, well maintained and clean. Other things you will find, you will notice that these pictures, there's very little public foot traffic in and around the, in my properties. These properties are located in the northernmost section of the bid, or most of the office properties, and do not receive heavy foot track traffic you will see in other areas of the bid. I have lots of restaurants, bars, hotels, retail shops. Each of these pictures were taken between one and two p.m. on a Friday afternoon. You can see that no one else is on the street. With less public foot traffic, there is less litter and thus less need for a clean services as compared to other parts of the bid and the sitting general. This photograph was taken on the boundary of the bid district on Washington Street. The picture, oops, let me do one more. The picture on the left looks north into the area outside the bid with no clean and safe services, where no clean and safe services are being provided. The picture on the right looks south into an area where clean and safe services are provided. You will see there's no material difference between the properties in the bid and those just outside the bid in terms of the cleanliness. With respect to graffiti removal, Exhibit three of the agenda packet states that the graffiti removal services are provided only for public infrastructure. We have not experienced much graffiti on our buildings. The last event I can recall was 2013. It was the backside of the Brody Duke building before we cleaned the undergrowth from the belt line. However, we do not see the value in the service if it does not apply uniformly to all properties in the bid. This property in the picture was spray painted over a year ago and has not been cleaned. Overall, MI properties are no greater need of clean services than properties in other parts of the city. We keep our properties clean, we keep them well maintained. They're not located in high traffic areas that need this level of enhanced service. I would be briefly regarding the safe services because Mr. Rother already shown a number of place events in the vicinity of our property is very low compared to other parts of the bid and other parts of the city in general. In the last nine years, I've been working at these properties, I can only recall a handful of crime related events across all of our properties. For example, on occasion we've had cars getting broken into, had to call the police for assistance with panhandling. We've had a couple of breaking and entering incidents. We take public safety very seriously. Our properties are safe. We are certainly not in greater need of a security than other parts of the city. First, we have our, too far. First, we have our own security staff that monitors MI property. We have five full-time employees, security employees. So we have at least one person on campus, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year. There is no need for the ambassador to serve as the eyes and ears of the police because we have our own eyes and ears. Our security team is equipped with a mobile battery starter and can provide jumpstart assistance to any driver in our parking lot who needs assistance. I'm not aware of any stranded drivers on our property because we are always there to help. With respect to the public relations checks provided by the bid, they appear to be redundant, a redundant service provided by the downtown bike patrol. That being said, we also have people on site 24-7 to help tenants and assist the public. In addition to our security, our janitorial, our maintenance and landscaping staff that I already mentioned, we have three separate people on the property management team. That's 23 people on the MI property ready to help. In summary, we have our own 24-7 to monitor activity to help those in need and contact the police if necessary. The MI properties are not in greater need of extra security services than the rest of the city. I would like to address one last thing in closing. It has been suggested that we are providing duplicate services to what is provided by DDI in the bid. And the fact that we are doing this work ourselves shows that we need help. I strongly disagree with that view. We keep our properties clean, safe, well maintained because it's good business. We take pride in our properties and our community. In other words, we do not need services designed to revitalize this area of the city because MI, along with other property owners in our area like us, have already revitalized this part of the city and our businesses are thriving. Thank you. Next, Hank Sherrick will speak. Hello, council members. I'm Hank Sherrick. I live at 11 Barrington Place in Durham. And I'm the person and owner of Measurement Incorporated and I speak on behalf of all the properties listed on their thing, whether it's with Measurement Durham or LLCs. So I said to say that I have opposed having the bid properties and that's been well known. But I don't want to go through all that here tonight with you. I think that the services that are provided by the bid would do not benefit MI properties. I believe that has been proven true here tonight. Tonight, you have heard that safe and clean services provided by DDI for MI property are minuscule and redundant to those provided by our employees or our employees for our tenants, for our clients and by association with other property owners in our area because our security drifts over into the other properties in our area. According to the DDI financial records provided to us by the city on August the 25th in response to our request for documents, approximately 46% of DDI's budget is spent on safe and clean. Our previous speakers have shown that this service for MI is insufficient and unnecessary and should be discontinued. My purpose here tonight is not to rehash that but to address the other services that DDI is supposed to provide of economic development and marketing for the properties in the bid. Economic development and marketing services portion of DDI constitutes about 11% of their budget. I can clearly say that MI properties are not in need of any of these services, even if they're provided by the bid. MI properties are certainly not in greater need of services, these services than other portions of the city. As shown by Mr. Roster's slides, there are many areas of our city which have severe economic needs. Of course, you already know this. Downtown Durham, by contrast, is doing very well. It has reached a point where, from a marketing standpoint, it is self-sufficient. In real estate terms, it's one of the hottest areas in the research triangle. Additionally, many other public and private entities market and otherwise promote economic development in the bid area. For example, the Chamber of Commerce, the Durham Visitors and Convention Mural, Brightleaf Square, Durham Central Park, and many others market to downtown area, and all promote growth in downtown. Private real estate agents also provide this service. From the standpoint of MI properties, we engage in our own marketing of our properties that are vacant or that are underdeveloped, and those that are already occupied do not need any marketing or economic development. While our properties or vacancies are very few, we spend more each year in marketing than DDI, and certainly the value of our work with the Durham ID is greater than DDI spends on all of its economic development functions. Frankly, the city's willingness to engage in public-private partnerships such as the one it entered into in order to assist the Durham ID district is much more efficient from an economic development and marketing than anything undertaken by the bid, and it is more helpful to MI properties because it actually gets projects started. The form of marketing done by the bid is diffused, it's untrackable, and has no value to MI properties. Finally, find your cool grand that bid has worked so hard to establish is of no benefit to MI properties. It may benefit other parts of the city where bars and clubs are located, but it is not the type of slogan that applies to business tenants of any kind who occupy MI properties. In short, there's nothing in the economic development and marketing effort of the bid, which benefits MI properties, and it's certainly not possible to say that those properties are in greater need of those services than any other part of the city. To the contrary, all one needs to do is consider the materials presented here tonight, and you will see the other areas of the city where those efforts could be better spent. Thank you for your attention. Once again, I'm Bill Bryan, I'm the attorney for the applicant. As you consider the information that's been presented to you tonight is important to focus on the statutory standard that applies. The question again is not whether you want the MI properties to be in the bid so the taxes they pay can subsidize activities that are occurring in other parts of the bid. That is not how the bid is supposed to work. The services provided are supposed to be provided to all the properties in the bid equally. The fighting that you must make tonight is that the MI properties are in need of the services, facilities, or functions of the bid quote to a demonstrably greater extent than the remainder of the city. Unquote that as a direct quote from section 168, 538.1a1 of the general statutes. What you've heard tonight shows clearly that the MI properties are not in need of the bid services to a demonstrably greater extent than the remainder of the city. To the contrary, the MI properties do not need any of the services provided by the bid at all either because those services are not relevant to the use of the MI properties or because the owners already provide those services for those properties at a level far in excess to what the bids applies, supplies, excuse me. All of the services provided by the bid are needed to make to a much greater extent in Northeast Central Durham. They are needed to a much greater extent along North Roxborough Street. They are needed to a much greater extent in Lakewood and they're even needed to a much greater extent in other parts of the bid that they are not needed by the MI properties. The purpose of the bid is to charge extra taxes to property owners who need and will receive enhanced services. It is not to charge extra taxes to property owners who do not need those services in order to subsidize the provision of services to other property owners who do need those services. The bid is not supposed to be a means to redistribute wealth from one property owner to another property owner. We all wanna clean and safe downtown and our clients already pay substantial taxes which are used to provide services to ensure that we will have a clean and safe downtown. They should not be required to pay extra bid taxes because they neither need nor receive the extra services the bid is supposed to provide. In short, the owners of the MI properties have shown definitively that the MI properties are not in need of the bid services to a demonstrably greater extent than the remainder of the city, again quoting from the statute. Therefore, they respectfully request that their properties be removed from the bid, pursuant to NCGS 160A-538.1 print A1, close print. We'll be glad to answer any questions you may have about any of the materials presented this evening by the speakers, either for or against. I suppose we will retain whatever time we have if we need to answer questions or otherwise or buy things that others may say. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you. Can you stop the clock? Let me ask other questions by members of the council of the proponent this time. If not, we'll proceed with those who are sound speaking opposition to the removal. As I call your name, if you can come to the podium to the right. Each speaker has three minutes. Nicole Thompson, Lou Meyers, Michael Goodman, Tucker Hartnett, Adam Klein, Justin Parker, Larry Tillery, Alice Sharpe, Seth Gross, Jeff Durham, Scott Harmon, Melissa Muir. Is anyone's name who signed up to speak this name? I didn't call. I thought I saw your name in here somewhere. Well, if you could just, and who else was? All right. So if you can begin speaking, if you state your name and address again, please. Good evening, Mayor Bill, honorable members of city council. My name is Nicole Thompson. I'm the president CEO of downtown Durham Inc. at 115 Market Street in downtown Durham. Downtown Durham Inc. DDI respectfully submits this response in opposition to the request by Measurement Incorporated MI to remove its properties from the Municipal Service District, MSD, known as the Durham Business Improvement District bid. DDI, a nonprofit corporation operating the bid under contract with the city of Durham, urges the city to preserve the bid intact for the benefit of the citizens of Durham. It is DDI's position that MI's request is improper for essentially two reasons. First, MI cannot make the statutorily required showing regarding the bid's services, facilities, and functions. This failure warrants the denial of the request without further consideration. Second, even if one assumes that MI can make such a showing under the statute, the council has broad discretion to disallow a request from removal from an MSD. The legislature has provided guidance concerning how the council should consider requests like the one now presented by MI. The city's statutorily prescribed duties are as follows. The city must hold a public hearing and determine whether the property owner has made the required showing in light of all of the comments received at the hearing. At that hearing, the property owner bears the burden of providing that the tract or parcel in question is not in need of the services, facilities, or functions of the district to a demonstrable greater extent than the remainder of the city. This is the statutorial test. Two, if and only if the city determines that the requester has made the required showing, the city must exercise its discretion in ruling on the request. Regardless of the requester's showing, the city has absolutely no obligation to remove any parcel from an MSD. If the tract or parcel is found to meet the test, the council may but is not required to remove the parcels from the MSD. MI has shown neither that its land was erroneously incorporated in bid or that circumstances have changed since the bid was created. MI does not argue in its letter that its properties do not qualify under the MSD statute, and it offers no legitimate basis for changing the bid now. To create an MSD in North Carolina, a municipality must find that the district is in need of one or more services to be provided by the MSD. In 2011, the city of Durham specifically found in connection with its adoption of the bid that the district is in need of one or more services to be provided by the MSD. MI presents no arguments or evidence for disturbing that decision now would be a change in circumstances that renders the decision inappropriate after the passage of time. MI has merely stated that its parcels meet the test. Its argument, excuse me, MI bears the heavy burden of showing that despite the lack of error or change since adoption of the bid, its parcels nonetheless meet the test. In its letter to this council, MI's arguments boil down to two points. One, that MI's own services are provided by the bid, and two, that certain services provided by the bid are also provided by other organizations. The landowner's decision to provide duplicate services does not address the land-based test. There are two primary reasons for the statutes focused on the track or parcel of land rather than the need of individual landowners. First, the public benefits of an MSD are tied to its geographic contiguity without a reliable basic standard of additional services within a contiguous area. The benefits of an MSD become too inconsistent to provide assurances to workers, residents, and visitors that the MSD area is reliably maintained and serviced to district standards. The MSD statute contemplates that an MSD may provide services. Thank you. Thank you for your time. You're welcome. Thank you, Mr. Mayor, members of council. Lou Meyers, I'm chair of the board of DDI and reside at Tui Riggs v. Avenue number 104. The city should exercise its broad discretion to deny the request. Despite MI's failure to show its parcels meet the test, DDI also addresses below why even if MI had met the statutory test for removal, the city of Durham need not and should not remove the MI parcels from the bid as a matter of policy. As DDI must maintain contiguity to provide consistent benefits, the DDI benefits to downtown Durham include economic development as was stated earlier. Our bid marketing services focus exclusively on the downtown bid area. Our marketing efforts center on establishment of strong and robust entertainment, retail, food, and art environment and attracting new investment and development opportunities downtown. Should this message be altered to remove delete or refrain from mentioning specific parcels and addresses, it weakens the entire message and distorts the overall image of the bid. Revitalization includes areas of downtown. Our services are commensurate with increased users. The bid area continues to grow as a primary destination area and as a result downtown has experienced a marked increase in pedestrian activity. There has also been significant increase in the number of downtown residents drawn in part by employment opportunities to better nurture these activities within the bid and effectively support the increases in pedestrian activity. There is a demonstrable need to ensure that special enhanced services are offered such as increased street level appearance and hospitality services. The success of Durham's downtown has been very as well documented since creation of the bid. Since 2011 there has been a 58% increase in the number of street level businesses 170% increase in the number of hotel rooms a 66% increase in the number of residential units and property and value has increased by 90% from just under 900 billion to now 1.7 billion. Fairness requires that the MI parcels remain a part of the bid. The services and activities are provided within the bid are paid by all and benefit all. The removal of an individual parcels within the bid increases the possibility of benefits being enjoyed by non bid paying entities and diluting the overall impact of the services offered. This becomes an equity issue. Is it just and fair for a property owner to benefit from the allocation within the heart of the well maintained downtown area and that property owner not be required to provide its proportional amount to the bid sustainability. Thank you. Evening Mr. Mayor and members of council thank you for giving us a few moments here. Michael Goodman 3900 Hope Valley Road also unfortunately 3718 Eaton Road if you need a house give me a call. That's really the only reason I'm here. DDI has been critical to what we've all all of us in this room have gotten done in downtown Durham over many years and while it used to take the form such a beautiful form of Bill Calcoff you know it now takes a form of Nicole our fearless leader but not only her but these great people right here who work hard every day in our our community to help make it safer and cleaner and we're grateful for that and while the scope might have changed and the focus might have changed somewhat you know the core mission is still there. When Bill Calcoff asked me to co-chair working on getting public support of the bid some years ago I surprisingly was excited to do it surprisingly because I knew I'd have to listen to Bill's pontifications more so than I usually would have to one Bill's probably watching hey Bill but number two because I knew that it played to our greatest trait and that is that are all of our beliefs that we're in this together and it does in fact float all boats and I think that's really our fundamental trait as a community that's made us the passionate and caring community we've become today see I love the concept of the bid the bid's perfect for me because at the end of the day what the bid represents is that the greatest form of economic development is in fact community development that's what we're all here doing right and the notion that we as the community understand reinvesting in our community and the power of that for all is really a critical thing and for us to be here actually begging to pay you taxes is a funny thing but the notion that the property owners in downtown get together and say this is important we're willing to reinvest that's something that can't be overlooked you know without a doubt everyone's benefited and we know that and the bid's not about keeping score if that's the goal then we're working on the wrong things whether it's about the success of the whole downtown success of all and in turn the success of us individually this is what I know to be true downtown Durham has come a really really really long way and we have some very very important debates and some very important discussions to have as we move forward that's for sure but to say it simply the value of the bid isn't one of them thank you good evening I'm Tucker Bartlett live at 705 Cobb Street and work for self-help at 301 West Main Street I first want to appreciate and thank Hank and your team Brian for all that you all have done downtown as the recent new book came out called Becoming Durham, nicknamed Hank he was the first so real appreciations to everything they all done tonight unfortunately I've got several points to make we're not in agreement on our respected friends here on this issue and basically three points as a real estate professional who has developed and financed many properties inside the bid and outside the bid to try to think of yourself as an island and to say that these 21 properties do not benefit directly from all of the bid services and are not part of a larger location that is in need of the bid the existing campus in the emerging innovation that direct beneficiaries of the success of downtown Durham just like the rest of us self-help currently pays 6 cents per square foot for the bid we receive a benefit at least 10 times greater than that for the fact that we are in a clean safe and vibrant downtown and we are all equally in need of being in downtown for our businesses to survive to be financially sustainable so it's absurd to think that that measurement ink does not need to charge the rental rates that are consistent with rental rates downtown you can't think of yourself if this if measurement inks properties were not located downtown but were some of the areas that we saw in the photos to say that they would be able to succeed in charging those rental rates to justify the new development they're doing it's silly to think that the tenants in their buildings are not requiring the life of being able to walk out of their door and go get a cupcake from Anna or get a panini from Kelly at Toast they are part of a larger environment just like the rest of us that benefit from what we've created in that environment the second point is because they're large like self-help we employ janitors, maintenance, security all ourselves as well that doesn't mean we think we should pull out if each of us as large property owners decided hey we do this ourselves we have economies of scale we don't need it and we pulled out we would put the whole burden of our larger downtown on our smaller businesses we went Dorian and Ryan and Anna to be the people that pay taxes were the larger people hey we got it on our own we don't need you that to me seems unfair it's like being part of South Point Mall or a condo association and say I don't want to pay my dues I don't want to pay my common area maintenance but I do like being part of this overall nice community the other argument has been made that we don't need DDI anymore that this downtown is done services are redundant with other organizations that have done that it's a best practice across the state across this nation to have a group that is full-time focused on our downtown the minute we stop focusing on our downtown is the minute our downtown starts to die so we're all in this together we're happy to pay our taxes and we hope others will too good evening Mr. Mayor members of council my name is Adam Klein I live at 1916 Biven Street and work at the American Underground we have three locations in downtown Durham two on Main Street and one at Blackwell Street I am the chief strategist at the American Underground and we're a campus for entrepreneurs that houses about 275 early stage startups we've had some good success in the past few years in terms of telling the story of the entrepreneurs who are here but much of that success has been due to the fact that they're part of a bustling downtown they are part of a larger story that's happening in Durham it's not just the entrepreneurial community itself and they're here because entrepreneurs and creatives want to be part of a lively, vibrant and authentic downtown exactly the kind of place that DDI in partnership with the city has led in creating from fantastic restaurants and bars to budding retail to lively music in the streets downtown has come a long way we still have a long way to go our voice, American Underground's voice in marketing and sharing these wins and these stories have been largely about the startup community but DDI's voice is about the entirety of downtown and the entirety of the downtown story and we're grateful for their marketing and their expertise in doing that downtown is hot and that we need not spend more money there but I'd suggest that in the world of marketing when you're hot you want to put more resources and more effort into that we've got a good thing going it's not time to let up on the gas our future lies in a collective group of businesses, city officials and nonprofits working shoulder to shoulder to build a downtown in a city that is diverse, robust and dynamic we cannot do this in isolation and we cannot do it separately we will do it by working together there is much work to be done and the bid is a key component of getting to where we need to go, thank you good evening Mr. Mayor, members of council my name is Justin Parker I'm with Blexford Science and Technology and I'm here tonight to speak in support of the bid and we're located at the Chesterfield Building 701 West Main Street in Durham since purchasing the Chesterfield Building in 2013 we have seen very significant and tangible benefits from the bid tonight I'll speak about those benefits that we have seen I'd like to say I think that this conversation is much less about one individual property owner's benefits one business's benefits and about the benefit of the whole of downtown since we purchased the building downtown Durham Inc has been an incredible asset and ally and partner for us from our first days of community engagement through working through design and planning through all of the twists and turns that occur during a development to now preparing to open the building to the public later this year they have been a staunch advocate and ally as they have for a number of businesses and property owners that are represented here tonight we believe that the services that the bid offers are critical for creating one cohesive downtown with one image and for first impressions as we bring investors or tenant prospects or future business partners into the city it's critically important that downtown is cohesive and clean and safe and we believe the bid does an excellent job of ensuring that throughout downtown we've talked tonight about how downtown is hot and it is and we're all in here benefiting from that but to suggest that because we've seen success means it's time to take the foot off the gas we think is very misguided we think in fact it's quite the opposite and when you're seeing the type of success that we've been blessed and lucky to have in recent years that's when it's time to put your foot on the gas and look around and say you know what we've been doing is working and it's time to take it to the next level and we think the bid and DDI and the services are critical to that thank you very much for your time Mr. Mayor and members of the council my name is Larry Tilley I live at 1012 West Markham my business is Acne Plumbing we're located at 636 Foster Street my business has been in Durham since 1947 I didn't start that my grandfather did but we moved downtown in 1964 and bought property in 1984 and located where we are currently in 1984 the downtown area was doing pretty badly and since DDI started and since the downtown started moving forward and the bid ultimately got passed I've seen dramatic improvements in that area when back in 1985 1986 Walker Stone came to me and said we got a higher security guard just to keep our individual properties protected and so a group of us paid money to hire just a security guard to ride around our properties back in the 80s early 80s we don't have to do that now we still have a lot of people that we've attracted because of the developments and I think it's a great benefit for the area I intend to develop my property there on Foster Street hopefully in the near future and I think the bid is a tremendous asset for any development down there thank you Good evening council mayor my name is Alice Sharp and I live at 208 Riggs B Avenue where I own a small condo you have heard or will hear how downtown has changed for the better transformation revitalization our words heard a lot these days much of that success and thanks go to Hank Sherrick and his early belief in downtown as a location for his business measurement Inc Hank has not been just a good community neighbor Hank has been a great community neighbor for every one thing you hear that Hank has done for our downtown neighborhood there are one or two things that he has done quietly unselfishly for all of us so it pains me that I find myself on the opposite side of this issue from Hank but I am I'm not here to talk about downtown's past I am laser focused on downtown's future and you can help with that today a future that will not be fully realized unless we keep an intact bid if council approves and any exception to the bid for property owners there will be a flood gate of property owners leaving the bid and this will set a president that we won't be able to recover from owners will remove themselves from the bid while we have come a long way downtown is not there yet let me repeat that downtown is not there yet by a long shot if we judge ourselves from where we've come from anything looks good and we already know we can do much better than anything downtown can be so much more than we can even imagine today an intact bid helps us to realize that good enough is too low a bar for Durham and for downtown with an intact bid all benefit from increased economic development a broader tax base creation of good jobs for Durham citizens and a safe desirable community in which to live, work and play this body has made historic decisions when it comes to how downtown has evolved and that starts with Durham Bulls Athletic Park the Durham Performing Arts Center and then the business improvement district. Please let this not be the day when the vision of a great downtown began to fade. Thank you Good evening Mayor Bell Mayor Pro Tem, members of city council my name is Jeff Durham I spent a fair amount of time about three years or so working with downtown Durham Inc. and I'll work across the street at the greater Durham Chamber of Commerce it's a pleasure to be here with you all this evening I actually kind of see the other side of this coin I see it as downtown Durham continues to grow I think there's an increased need for the bid services really to safeguard the billions billions of dollars of public and private investment that have occurred over the past couple of decades. Bid services like street cleaning and maintenance public safety and hospitality beautification projects think of them less as clean and safe services more as like asset management and they provide a protection for the past investments that you all have spent in addition to these important place making programs bids provide advocacy and business development services specifically to the downtown district simply put downtown Durham still needs a champion and the bid specifically fills that need I heard a little bit about sort of the duplicitous efforts between some of the marketing and economic development initiatives that the Durham Chamber and DDI take on Durham Chamber and DDI work in a hand and glove relationship as it pertains to marketing and ED work and while the chamber does inform like of demand generators growth sectors business recruitment retention and expansion think of DDI as sort of the entity that provides the structure that ultimately will be populating those entities with so DDI and the bid market to structure and the chamber actually markets to what end up populating that DDI is focused on providing commercial inventories exclusively to the downtown while the chamber has a more broad county-wide focus the bid serves a critical niche in marketing business development and advocacy and I encourage you all to support the bid and vote against the exclusion of any parcels within the district any removal of parcels with the district will set an adverse precedent that would undermine the decades of downtown investment thank you everybody good evening and thank you for your time tonight my name is Scott Harmon my business partner and I own a small architecture studio at five points 107 East Chapel Hill Street I have been either working or living in downtown for 17 years I'm thinking back to 2011 and before the public trash cans were not emptied regularly the green rolling garbage carts live permanently on the sidewalks are recently completed streetscape improvements were deteriorating from lack of maintenance trash leaves and weeds were a dominant feature of our streetscape the impact of illegal dumping was felt in empty lots behind buildings and around our garbage facilities it's important to remember what that downtown was like because that is not the downtown Durham we have today and it is precisely because of the work of DDI and their clean and safe subcontractors our studio is by any measure a small business we have four full-time employees when the improvement district was proposed in 2010 myself and the vast majority of other small businesses and small property owners saw an opportunity to come together and make an additional investment in downtown by pooling our smaller resources with those of larger landowners we could create something more powerful than the sum of the parts we enjoy services that small businesses cannot afford on our own we can reinvest some of the rewards of our increased property values back into our community we can support the tireless work of our economic leaders to make sure that we continue building the homes, workspaces stores, parks and jobs that are foundational to any great city the improvement district is a fair effective system it is the best practice utilized across North Carolina and the US the community debated the matter openly and fairly not everyone agreed but the consensus was clear and we made this decision fair and square as a community the improvement district not only works but for some of the people in this room it has worked to a staggering degree creating wealth and security the likes of which most of us in this room will never see and that's okay because we're in this all together thank you again for your time and for supporting the small locally owned businesses that depend on this improvement district in the numerous ways it grows our community, thank you Mayor Beall, Mayor Pro Tem members of city council, I'm Melissa Muir with downtown Durham Incorporated our office is located at 115 Markin Street here in downtown Durham today I am here to read a letter on behalf of Mario Mirobelli president portfolio asset manager for LLC properties Dear Mayor Beall and city council members, LRC properties believes that the downtown Durham business improvement district is an invaluable resource and tool for the ongoing revitalization of downtown Durham LRC is obviously new to Durham but is a big believer and investor in the bull cities renaissance the golden belt project and mill number one represent over 50 million dollars of investment on the east side of Durham is the historic renovation of the last tobacco warehouse in downtown Durham LRC always works with local groups wherever we invest and DDI is the bid management organization is a perfect example of what we look for through the bid DDI the only organization solely focused on downtown development brings tremendous energy and experience to their work and is always putting the best interest of downtown Durham first DDI has a thorough understanding of the issues both good and bad confronting the downtown area and has the experience and knowledge to find solutions the bid through its economic development marketing events and clean and safe services will continue to make downtown a place people want to invest in LRC recognizes the value of coordinated marketing and promotion events clean and safe services and the continued economic development work and because of this we feel very optimistic about our investments in downtown Durham thank you for your leadership in creating the downtown Durham bid and for your investments in downtown I personally look forward to working with the city and DDI as LRC further advances the renaissance on the east side of downtown Durham sincerely Mario Mirabelli thank you good evening mayor and city council my name is Seth Gross I own and operate three businesses in downtown Durham it's a pleasure to be here and I'm here to support the bid and the folks there I love railway shirts I love the ambassadors and what they've done I have retail businesses that depend on a lively city foot traffic cleanliness all of the things that they provide I'm a huge fan of what they do they keep the the streets clean they keep the trash out they are really important to keeping downtown going I often talk about how our businesses are looked at as a thread in the fabric of Durham I love being part of the fabric of Durham and I think a big part of that fabric is turquoise. Thank you. Good evening Mayor Bell and City Council members. I'm Shelly Green. I'm President and CEO of the Durham Convention and Visitors Bureau at 212 West Main Street. In 2011 the DCVB board voted to endorse the bid proposal and that was not a slam-dunk decision. We heard from Bill Kalkoff of course then president of DTI but we also invited several other downtown property owners to speak to our board including Terry Sanford Jr Rodney Allison and Hank Sherrick and Hank took us up on it and he came to our meeting and spoke very passionately about why he didn't think the bid was a good idea. Our board eventually voted in to endorse the bid which we did at the time but the reason that we did that is sitting in front of you in turquoise shirts and these men and women have done a really phenomenal job and I'd just like to thank you how great you are to our visitors that come to Durham and they talk about you a lot. We get anywhere from 600 to a thousand people in the Visitor Info Center every month and I can't tell you how many times they tell us who are those people in those blue shirts. They helped me with my car and since February they helped me figure out the parking meters. How many times have you done that? So I don't know if there's enough funding to continue the ambassador program if you exempt individual property owners and that really concerns me because of what a great job they're doing. Downtown is our living room, it's our front porch, it is the heart of our community and it's where a lot of visitors come when they go to Durham and these men and women in the blue shirts have really provided great great service to us. We call them a lot for visitors that have car issues, we call them when somebody needs a safe escort to their car that includes employees and visitors that are here at night and another thing is we host a roundtable of festival owners and managers. There are 80 festivals that sit on that event with us and many of them you're gonna hear from one in just a minute have commented about how helpful the ambassadors are cleaning up the waste so that when the festival begins the next morning things are cleaned up and it's just a really great atmosphere for us to work in. So in conclusion I want to thank you all for what you've done. I hope that the ambassador program can continue because it provides a clean and safe environment for all of us so thank you very much for your time tonight. Good evening Mayor Bell, Mayor Pro Tem and City Council members. I'm Sisley Mitchell and I am a resident here in downtown Durham. I live at 500 North Duke Street number 54209 at the Bullington Warehouse and I just recently moved there and I lived downtown for four years before that at West Village and I think that's very important to the discussion today other than the fact that I'm the proud co-founder and president of the Art of Cool festival. I've lived near these parcels for about four and a half years. Art of Cool is a local grassroots nonprofit that has a very strong economic impact and drives tourism here in downtown Durham each spring. We've gone from doing pop-up concerts in 2012 to in 2017 bringing 10,000 visitors over a weekend with a $1.8 million economic impact. Part of the success of Art of Cool is our ability to put on a fun safe clean and hospitable event that is facilitated and marketed with partners like DDI. The ambassadors provided by DDI are essential to making sure the festival is clean. The bid assists with resources providing for the ambassadors and without these services and bid resources it would be difficult for Art of Cool or any other festival for that matter to offer the same level of cleanliness and quality that our visitors and artists have come to enjoy within the past four years. I do want to state because I originally came up here to talk about my role with Art of Cool and how the bid does affect that but I do live near Measurement Inc. and so I do need to make a statement. I'm a resident, lives very near these parcels and I've lived there for four years at West Village and recently moved to the Bullington and although the MI Vans cruise very near to these places late night I did experience a break-in in my car just this summer. Who doesn't need more eyes and ears? We always need extra eyes and ears and so I do want to make the statement that they said they've got it from here and just living there that's one break in too many even though they do have many Vans that come around at night my car did get broken into. Thank you. That concludes the persons who would sign up to speak in opposition. We added two more speakers six minutes so I've asked the clerk to add six minutes to the opposition to the proponents if you care to use them. Just very briefly Mr. Mayor Bill Bryan, attorney for the applicants again. It's very important there was a lot of talk in the statements that were made by the people opposing the application about what happened in 2011 and how the bid was put together in 2011 and what the status of the law was in 2011. The law changed the law changed and the statute that we've been operating under here tonight NCGS 158 538.1a1 was enacted which specifically creates the standard that you are supposed to be fine making findings in accordance with this evening that standard being that the property in question is demonstrably in need greater need of the services provided by the bid than other parts of the city. So what I didn't hear much of in the opposition was any reference to the standard or any evidence about the standard and about why the MI properties which are the properties in question here tonight are demonstrably in need of greater services of the services that are provided by the bid. It's important this is an important point to focus on because this is not about bid per se it's not about whether the bid should exist or the bid should not exist this is about whether these properties should be within the bid and whether and I would go back to what you said Mr. Mayor earlier this evening as well as what some of the folks who spoke here tonight said you said nobody who doesn't want to be a part of the city should be made to be a part of the city. Well I would suggest that you extend that analogy to say that nobody who doesn't want to be a part of the bid should be made to be a part of the bid. That's essentially what the statute says. The statute says that if you don't want to be a part of the bid you have the right to ask to be let go and that's what we're doing here tonight we're making that request. The other comment that was made was that if you if you let MI go and the MI properties go from the bid that there'll be a floodgate of people who want out of the bid. If that's the case then why do we have a bid? Apparently people who are in it don't want to be in it. We've heard a lot from people who are who are the leaders of the nonprofits that that are paid for with the money that's that comes from the bid here tonight but we haven't heard much from the property owners in the bid and therefore that argument doesn't seem to me to be very relevant. Now the last thing I would do and I have to do this for the record I have to I was told by the city attorney that it was not appropriate to lobby you on this matter and so I would like to ask whether the members of the council have received communications from other from any of the people from outside communications outside of this outside of this hearing relating to this matter and I'm asking that for as a matter of for the records because I have a feeling that this matter is going to continue on. Let me well if the city attorney wants to say something go ahead I'll yield to you since it's a legal question but I do have a comment. I just because Mr. Bryan said that the city attorney said that he couldn't lobby council I'd like to know if he's talking about me or Fred it was it was you and Fred you and specifically wrote me on an email which is part of the objection that said it was mature advice to the city council members is that it's not appropriate to to lobby people up caring matter okay that that's not accurate and I did accurately state in my email this had to do with the work session and whether or not there was going to be conversation well if you you can reread my my email because I was pretty clear about that that I did not tell you couldn't because that was the issue with the quasi-judicial nature which is in a situation like that the first question that you would ask in the quasi-judicial hearing is whether or not councillors had been lobbied so that was that was a very different question about whether or not substantive comments would be heard at the work session on Thursday and my response to you was that it has been the historic advice from our office that we would prefer that we don't have discussions substantive discussions about during about a public hearing and during the work session that the appropriate time is it's an email it's specified so the appropriate time is at the public hearing is that correct yes so is it also inappropriate to have discussions with with members of the community outside the public hearing you can you can do what you want outside of the public hearing I'm saying that at the work session it's it's in the email that I sent to you my knowledge nobody has been lobbying the city council on this I don't think that would be appropriate that's the email from Fred Lamar on August 23rd 2017 so you just you just said that I said it but never mind you said it later but I made it's the mayor's meeting your office well I'm just trying to clarify for the purposes of the record since what whether that has in fact been going on with there's been a lobbying which is current let me speak for myself it's been my practice that on public hearing matters if a person wants to come to speak to me either for or against it I listen but I make it very clear that I don't make a final decision until the public hearing lobbying comes in various forms people come come to me personally they can write me letters such as your client did when this first came up I got a letter saying why you wanted to get out of it out of the bid so lobbying comes in different forms for me well you you excuse me mr. mayor you received a request yeah this matter on the agenda which is the way that was just procedurally the way that it but it came with why it came with the details of why you shouldn't be a part of I went out you came in and told I'm not saying you I'm saying the letter I got from your law firm yeah I wrote it came very specific requests as to why you wanted to come before us and why you shouldn't be a concerned about it you did in writing you could have come to me and said the same thing but to me that's still a form of lobbying I think what's important is for me personally no one can can say that they had a conversation with me and they left with the impression that Bill Bell was going to support this and I support it so that's been my practice so if you ask him was I live it live it in the form that just just indicated sir turning ask a procedural question here is it appropriate is it it's appropriate is it incumbent upon members of this council during a public hearing to respond to questions from one of the proponents or an application like this that's that's really up to you all it's unusual but it's well let's say this since I'm running a meeting we have constantly had I've raised a question from each of the council members you have further questions of whoever even at the time limit is going out if you choose to call somebody up that that's allowed this is a question that was raised and I think I have the prerogative of answering or not answering so I was answering for myself on this particular case since he was doing it for the record I appreciate that and again my question is for the record and if you choose not to answer that the other I'm sorry I'm gonna have to interject since my email was I quoted this federal law with city attorney's office and I don't think that the substance of your request to the council should be based on the statement I made my email which at that time if you read my emails I I insisted that this matter was a legislative policy judgment decision not a quasi-judicial decision and when you asked about speaking my response had to do with whether or not staff members or city city staff would be lobbying the council in my opinion that's not something that is is appropriate but not because it's a quasi-judicial hearing just because it's not something that you know I typically will see staff do in any case it the statement you're hanging your hat on my statement arguing that in some way this is a quasi-judicial hearing but we've made it clear to council me and Patrick that in our opinion it's a legislative decision and I think it's unfair for you to ask council whether or not they spoke to other people let that be something to argue in spirit court if you decide to to try to take this up that's what I would recommend mr. Mayor that's council mark I'd like that just make a quick statement which is that I think we're all pretty familiar with quasi-judicial procedures and when an item is on the agenda as quasi-judicial we respond in a particular manner this item was not on the agenda as a quasi-judicial matter if you wanted to take your and I believe that you probably understand the difference between those two and that if you want to take your direction from the city attorney that was your prerogative but I will tell you that on the I will tell you two things the first is is not any legislative matter when anyone in the city asks for my time so that they can talk to me about an issue I always say yes if they send me an email I try to respond to that email letters just the same as because I'm believe it's incumbent on us to be available to the people of Durham that said I will tell you that I've had no conversations regarding my properties and the bid prior to this evening thank you thank you I mean no offense by asking the question but I we have considered throughout the entire process and it's at some length that this is a quite should be a quasi-judicial matter and that's why I'm we have to make the record and I sometimes when I have to make the record I have to be unpleasant my apologies are the other questions the comments but council mr. Sherrick would like to make a couple of last comments if you have any question any other questions or comments before I sit down hey thank you mr. Mayor and counsel I want to just make a couple of statements first the members of the ambassador team that are here I have no I applaud them for what they do I've seen them I think they're a hard working group and so you guys gals thank you for all you do in Durham I know that when you come down our streets you have an easy day so enjoy your easy days when you come down our streets but thank you for the hard work you do we have no question about your efforts we appreciate that second I want to assure Alice sharp that there's no hard feelings I don't have any hard feelings and we have no disagreements all of us people all people can disagree on issues and this is an issue that we disagree on but we'll be friends and have a hug when this is over I hope I hope and then finally I want to comment about people invoking the legend of Bill Kalkoff because Bill Kalkoff was the leader of DDI he brought this almost by himself he brought DDI up and and during the time that it was a member driven organization he and I had no issues as a matter of fact I serve as chair of the board of DDI for several and and was on the board for several years where Bill and I disagreed was when the bid issue came along and DDI changed from being a membership supported organization to be a tax supported organization and we still disagree on that but once again Bill Kalkoff and I serve together at this point in time on another board of directors in in in another effort in downtown we disagreed on whether DDI should be a tax supported group which it is now or whether it should have been a membership driven group which it was when I served on the board so there there are there's places for us to disagree I think that we've made our points as our attorneys have pointed out we have a right under the under the law to request and we have done that and so thank you for listening I appreciate the opportunity attorney Brian good evening ma'am when did the statute change 2016 I believe and could you quote it again for me I did not realize that this process had madam pretend what attorney Brian is talking about and feel free to correct me if I'm wrong this is the addition of 168-538.1 which creates this very process for a property owner petition the council to be removed from the statute that's that's the change of the law is what we're doing here today there was a request from the general assembly to do this to create a process by which a property owner could addition to be removed. I did want to hear from the ambassadors but then Hank said that they do come down his street and I was going to find out if how do you chart your work during a given day you just somebody answer that for me and if you come to the microphone please thank you Mayor Pro Tempere can you please just repeat the question to me here how do you determine where you go within a given day could you state your name for the record I'm sorry my name is Eric Neistrom I'm the operations manager for the ambassador program with TDI each area or each zone which we call in the bid is assigned to a particular ambassador during the course of a shift and so someone touches the entire bid every day correct correct thank you I just want to thank you recognize councilwoman Johnson thank you mr. Mayor I just wanted to make a couple of comments the so for clarity I'm not sure if this has been clearly stated but the ordinance that we've been referencing 168-538.1 has the operative word in that ordinance is may that a property owner petitioning a request may submit a request to city council to remove that property and the city council may redefine the service district by removing that tractor parcel but it does not say that we are required to even if the standard that the that the property does not need the services facilities or functions of the proposed district to a demonstrably greater extent than the remainder of the city is met we just have the option to once that standard is met that being said I don't think that standard has been met and the argument that other areas in the city need these services more than downtown strikes me as very similar to the argument that people make against vaccines that we don't need to vaccinate people anymore because people don't get those diseases anymore when actually the reason they don't get the diseases anymore is in fact the vaccines we can't we can't compare the clean safe services we can't compare downtown services with the bid to other areas of the city without the bid that comparison doesn't make any sense I wanted to comment on the foot traffic issue because the majority of the buildings that are being talked about right now are in the ID district which is currently under construction phase one is under construction also that's the tax publicly supported project received a five point two my two five million dollar tax incentive from the city back in 2015 and these buildings are being sold as part of the DI just the ID district and there's two points I wanted to make about that I think I would argue that the services of DDI funded by the bid that without those services and without the public support funded by the property taxes of all the residents of Durham that this project would not be happening and that therefore the sale prices of these buildings would be quite a bit lower so I don't think that we could reasonably argue that measurement hasn't benefited from the economic development services of the bid either and as the properties are about to be transferred I was hoping that if the new if the new owners for the property were present if they would be willing to tell us about their plans and desires for the area and whether they would support the bid going forward I believe the transfer of the property is happening very soon and I think hearing from the new owners would be helpful thank you hi thank you for having us Jessica Brock Longfellow real estate partners and we are the developers of the downtown Dermi the transfer of the property that is currently under construction has already happened so we are now the current owners of that project along with a couple others in downtown Durham we do support the bid we will continue to support the bid we believe that the influences of downtown Durham were instrumental in helping us get that project out of the ground and ultimately successful and we also believe that the downtown needs a two and a five and a ten-year long-term strategy focused on downtown thank you so so the properties that we're talking about now are some of those no longer owned by measurement or those all owned by measurement they're all owned by measurement but some of those are also part of the ID they're gonna be transferred in phase two and phase three okay thanks there are other recognized council I was gonna start by asking mr. Baker we've we've heard the attorney for in my properties characterize the statute and now we've heard council member Johnson characterize the statute or and read it but I haven't heard anything from the city attorney's office on what the council should be or not should be doing or what we should be taking into account here and I would love to have a little of your guidance so our guidance was included in the memo which includes the statutory language now we didn't set it out specifically but but I will read it's just a couple sentences and it and it certainly goes along with councilwoman Johnson's statement if the city council finds that the tractor parcel is not in need of services facilities or functions of the district to a demonstratively greater extent than the remainder of the city the city council may by ordinance redefine the service district by removing their from the tractor parcel so that is she was essentially reading verbatim what the statute says okay so and I would take it then that what I heard mr. Bryant say is that somewhat like Johnny Cochran if the glove don't fit you got to be moved from the district and I'm hearing that language in the statute and what you're saying is that's not the way it's written that that's correct the city council retains the discretion it's a new statute I would say that it's not as I wouldn't have written it this way if if that's what I was trying to to accomplish but but the the statute as I've read it says that that if you find if you make the finding that that's been presented by a measurement anchor that were the opponents here the city council may by ordinance the um thank you and so I wanted to say that in looking at the map of in my properties it's clear that that am I and Dr. Sherrick have been acquiring properties whenever it seems like I'll say whenever possible I was particularly struck by 711 715 Washington which are small properties and remote from their campus and and it just strikes me that am I as has seen the values of property values in downtown increasing in value and and that and that at this point they're trying to divorce that from the bid and the impacts of the bid and then second thing is is that there the argument is being made that that because of the state of their properties compared to properties in other parts of the city that the that the services being rendered aren't necessary when it would seem like those services would be having the very impacts that they're illustrating if they have if there's weeds and trash in other parts of the city and not where the bid is in operation then it would seem that there would be some impacts logically from providing the services within the bid and then I find it really hard to separate out for myself what would the what would it be like and I realize that am I making the case we've got a big staff and we can do all this ourselves but they're arguing that that the state of the properties is I have a hard time separating out what the state of the properties would be without the services that are being offered in other words they're trying to point to the state of the properties as they are with the services being rendered which is different than saying what they would be without the services so I'm I am and then I heard a major downtown property owner saying that this is somewhat different than the case at MIs making but that the that the value that property owners in downtown have particularly large property owners particularly large property owners who act as landlords that they're getting 10 times the value return to them in terms of increased rents and so so far I remain unconvinced that am I is not benefiting from the services being offered within the bid thank you any other questions comments recognize council mature yeah I'm a close up came I was trying to no one else is speaking in the public I'll close the public hearing matters back for the council recognize council mature thanks mr. mayor I do have a few comments well first of all say that when mr. Sherrick said that he was going to offer a hug to Alice Sharp I would just say sir that you pick the easy case there's some of the people in this room that are not as probably not as friendly as Allison you know so I hope I'll all be hugging afterwards but you know pick a harder case I also want to say seriously to your attorney mr. Brian I have said this to you probably before but I just want to say having nothing to do with this that you have most recently offered our community's very very exemplary public service chairing our board of elections in let's just say at incredibly difficult time and did so and you brought honor to yourself and to Durham and so I've been hoping to have an opportunity to say that around other people and just want to say that tonight but I don't agree with you I think I think my problem with your case is that the definition of of the service is offered so narrowly as the service is offered directly outside my building on the side I think that the folks that have made the case and my colleagues I think have done so very well but also other people who have spoken tonight particularly well I think that am I needs these overall services for the support of its assets to a demonstrably greater extent than the rest of the city not because of the particular sweeping that goes on outside of your buildings but because the the small businesses and the restaurants and all of the other businesses that downtown they're also receiving these services are making the value of your assets rise and the bid is necessary for this and you know the festivals the restaurants the small businesses that receive these services I think is more kind of accurate way to think about what the values of these services are than do they occur then the ones that occur particularly outside of your business so those are my thoughts and I'm again I don't I don't see myself supporting removing the building from the bid I think my last statement I'll make is I do think it's a very legitimate concern whether or not you know it's certainly up for debate whether or not we ought to have a bit you know that whether or not we tax businesses for this is you know or people not just businesses people in this area for the bid is certainly very much up for debate I think you know I think we're doing the right thing but I do think that's legitimate there that's a very very legitimate debate I just don't think that in this case taking these business you know taking these buildings out makes sense given given the fact that I do think the benefits are great and demonstratively greater than than to the rest of the city thank you for me fortunately the way government operates is that taxpayers don't have much of a choice in terms of what they pay for and don't pay for me we subsidize the bus system I dare say probably very few people giving the total population use the bus system but we subsidize with their taxes and they don't have a choice of saying well don't use my tax to pay for the bus because I don't use it we sponsor swimming pools people live in homeless associations where they have their own pools they don't need pools that we sponsor but they don't have the luxury of saying don't use my taxes to pay for those those pools the city was able to define what we call downtown Durham I mean that was in the realm of what this body legislative can do we can define the limits of what we want to call downtown Durham we've done that and as part of that we made the decision to invest through partnerships and etc. to help for the renovation redevelopment downtown Durham I mean that's but not for that a lot of these things wouldn't be happening I mean we've had had the public sector to come in we've had that private sector to come in but we've created those partnerships to allow what we call downtown Durham to to flourish and we didn't go in and say well your building might be in downtown Durham but we're gonna take it out it just so happens you happen to have a building that was in the area that we call downtown Durham and I think personally that all the buildings that are in downtown Durham have benefited from investments that the city has made that other private sectors have made that you've made to include the benefits of the bid I mean if you didn't have the bid and you didn't have these persons cleaning up outside of your properties what would downtown Durham look like we've seen what the difference is here so I just don't feel based on what we've done based on what we define based on the fact that you can't pick and choose how you want your taxes to be spent there's no different than the bid I propose early on in one of my state of city addresses that I think it'd come a time where we needed to have a business investment district and I felt that way at that time I still feel that we might argue it's the tax rate right I've had those kind of arguments we might argue whether or not blue shirts are doing as much as they should be doing we can continue those arguments but to say that once we define what is downtown once we've made the investment in downtown that suddenly you say you don't want to be a part I'm not knocking hank I mean I like hank too we noticed in person it could be anybody else that came to us with that same type of an argument that I'm in downtown I don't like the services that you provide so therefore I want to get out of it it just doesn't work that way at least from my perspective based on what we've done so I would not be in support of not just this organization saying I want to be removed anybody else that was in this area we find it's downtown you came to this board and I say ops I want to get out of it based on whatever you have and we've already made the investments to move move downtown to where it is I'll be on opposition to it so I recognize councilman Reese I guess I had a question for the city attorney my reading of the memo indicates that that we're required to hold the public hearing which we've done the mayor's closed is that correct it's all right and that we have therefore discharged our responsibilities under this agenda item assuming no other motion is made is that correct that's a very good question we're I am struggling with what you're supposed to do next if you don't want to move forward I know what to do if you wanted to exempt parts or all of the requested parcels out and I don't fret if you I know that the language here specifies things not being in need of services or facilities or functions to a demonstrably greater extent than the city but with the the the discretionary language that of the May in there do they even have to find that if they don't want to go forward and I don't know the answer that either is I think this goes back to mr. Moff it's original question do we have to right act the recommendation in the by staff under number two is that you do make a finding but that that none of the properties should be that in the negative that the properties do need the services to demonstrably great extent than the others and that's why you have worded that way with none at the end if you choose to identify individual one or more properties then you fill that blank in but the statute the actual wording the statute if I if I could read it the operable languages upon receipt of the request from the property owners the city council shall hold a public hearing as required by subsection a we've done of the section if if the city council finds that the tractor parcels is not in need of the services facilities or functions of the district to a demonstrably greater extent than the remainder of the city the city council may by ordinance redefine the district the service district by removing their from the tract or parcel you'll notice it says if the council finds well what if you don't find one way or another does it say you must make a finding there's nothing in here that says there must be a finding of x y or z so so I I I don't know the answer to the question I think that's something that might be up to the judiciary but the record the recommendation lease from council is from the from the staff is is the motion number two but what if we what if we took no action and adjourned a meeting I don't think statute requires you to take an action I'm asking what if we took no action just adjourned a meeting I think that I think that answers the question that's couched in this right if you have no I don't it doesn't say that you have to take an action it says if you find then you may take an action so I don't I don't have an answer for you recognize councilor Davis and then councilor she'll move we adjourned a meeting second improper move the second is the furthest question of discussion and I'm gonna call a question madam clerk will you open the vote open the vote close vote it passes seven zero thank you any further items to come before the council thank you everybody for coming tonight thank you for tonight during it channel 7 p.m. thank you mr. mayor