 Let's call this meeting the order. Madam Clerk, would you please call the roll? So, good afternoon, Mr. Brunnan. Present. Mr. Rickerman. Aye. Here. Mr. McGowell. Yes. Mr. Duvall. Present. Mr. Vine. Here. Mr. Davis. You unmute, Sam. He nodded his head. He's here. Mayor Benjamin. I'm present, ma'am. Thank you very much. Thank you. Reverend McDowell, would you bless us with a word, Bubba? Yes, sir. Let us pray, create a God for your love and kindness. We ask for your grace and mercy to be with each of us. Undergird us as leaders of this city with a sense of sensitivity for times like these. We pray for peace. We pray, as Martin says, a greater sense of love and a realistic view of what it is to care for each other. Touch us and bless us in creative and spiritual ways. We ask it in your name. Amen. Amen. Thank you, Reverend McDowell. Are there any amendments to the agenda? Mr. Duvall. Mr. Mayor, I move that we amend the agenda in item 24 by deleting a venue license agreement and by adding legislative affairs. Thank you so much, Mr. Duvall. Any other amendments? Seeing none, there's a motion to, I guess, Mr. Duvall moved. I'll second the adoption of the agenda as an amendment. Discussion? I'll move the previous question and quote, Colorado. Mr. Brennan. Yes. Mr. Rickerman. Hi. Mr. McDowell. Yes. Mr. Duvall. Hi. Mr. Vaughn. Hi. Mr. Davis. Hi. Mayor Benjamin. Hi. Thank you. We have before us the minutes of the January 5, 2020 meeting. Is there a motion for approval? I move. Moved by Mr. Rickman, seconded by Mr. McDowell. Any discussion? We'll move the previous question and quote, Colorado. Mr. Brennan. Yes. Mr. Rickerman. Hi. Mr. McDowell. Yes. Mr. Duvall. Hi. Mr. Vaughn. Mr. Davis. Hi. Mayor Benjamin. Hi. Thank you, Madam Clerk. And thank you for expeditiously getting those done for the city. Madam City Manager. Yes, sir. Mayor Benjamin, a brief moment of personal privilege to recognize our own Chief Aubrey D Jenkins. I think most of you are aware that he was recently appointed as the new president of the South Carolina State Association of Fire Chiefs, which is a huge honor and really doesn't surprise any of us. I guess I'm surprised he hadn't been it before now and is over 40 years of service. But we're certainly excited for him. He's excited about it. And I think he's just a wonderful champion for the profession. His passion always shows. And we're just so proud of Aubrey Chief Jenkins. There he is. We're really proud of you. Thank you so much. We are incredibly proud of you, Chief. And we know we use the word pride sparingly. But more importantly, we're thankful for you. And your service and your incredible leadership. It's been one of the major reasons we've been able to make it through one of the most challenging periods in American history. So thank you so much, brother. I got a good moth. He's always kissing up. He can help himself. I'm surprised we got seven simultaneous fire trucks riding by our houses as we speak. That's the secret to longevity. Use it right on time. I think this might have logistically gotten the best of him, who knows. But you do have a great boss. And may I guess seven good sub bosses. He does. Well, thank you for your leadership, man. Always an incredible leader, incredible firefighter, administrator, and man of God. So we thank you. Yes, he is. Thank you, Chief. OK, Mayor Benjamin. At this time, we will have our normal COVID-19 situational report from Mr. Harry Tinsley, our Emergency Management Director. Unless, of course, you have any opening comments, Mayor. I'm going to yield to Director Tinsley and just again, thank you for the vigilance. We have some systemic supply chain challenges, but we're seeing some success across the state with our hospitals and with the Pfizer vaccine and certainly DHEC, great partnerships working to get the Moderna vaccine out. And hopefully, we'll start seeing more supply coming down from Washington and getting more of our people covered. So I want to thank Theresa, you and Harry for your leadership and making sure more and more of our citizens find access to the vaccine. We're still obviously unbelievably in the most dangerous period that the virus has seen. And we need to make sure that as we cling to hope that the vaccine will be uniformly, equitably, and aggressively distributed that we continue to be as aggressive on the things that matter, physical distancing and masking and sanitizing, they work. And indeed, we'll save lives. You've got some challenging days ahead, but we remain hopeful that we'll turn this corner in the not too distant future. So thank you. Yes, sir. Thank you. Harry? Mr. Wilson, we don't see where Director Tinsley has joined the call, and we're not able to reach him by fail. OK. Well, we will carry on and get back to him if necessary. Yes, ma'am. OK. Mayor Benjamin? Yes, sir. Ms. Devine had a hand up. Yes, ma'am. Yes, sir. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Ms. Wilson, I did want to I was going to wait for Harry's situational report, and I'm sure then Ralph gets up. He will talk a little bit about the stimulus funds that will be coming down, and I guess I'm proposed as well. But one of the things that I've been thinking about and hoping with our amazing staff, we did a great job at getting out our funds when we had funds that were available to small businesses. So I'm wondering, can we explore working with maybe some CDFIs or minority banks? I know particularly Optus is doing an amazing job with getting PPP funds out into the community, but we all heard there was a lack of funds that went to business in general, but particularly some minority businesses that we work particularly well with. So if we could explore looking at how can we partner with some folks who do have the PPP funds and utilize our resources and our relationships in the community to really make sure that the businesses in the city of Columbia can avail themselves of that resource as it comes down. Absolutely, of course. So let's aggressively pursue that. It's a great idea. Mr. Davis? No, I wanted to second that. That is a great need, and better we can do with that. I think the more we would be able to get the kind of assistance small businesses need in the city. So I'm behind that 100%. So let's pursue that. I'm sure working with Melissa and Ryan, we can get something moving and let's get a report back and hopefully some great progress between now and next meeting. All right? Absolutely. All right, thanks, Mr. Davis. We'll, when Harry joins, we'll take his report at that time. OK. So with that said, this is the time of year as the legislative sessions are beginning, both here in the state and a new Congress. We are so excited to have our Washington assistant, Mr. Ralph Garbushian from Capital Edge, joining us virtually to present his federal legislative update for 2021, followed by Mr. Cal Michelle for the state legislative update for 2021. Cal is with the Michelle law firm. Mayor Benjamin, we'll get started, if y'all are ready. Oh, absolutely. Let's do it. Great. Ralph, how are you doing? If you're talking, do I mute, Ralph? Hi, everybody. How are you? It's good to see all of your faces in person. I don't know if you know, but every once in a while, I'll start my video. There it goes. Every once in a while, your phone, hello, everybody. Your phone will, from the Photos app, will pop up some pictures from sometime in the past. And to remind you of that, in just this past weekend, it popped up December of 2019 when I was in Colombia. And Deborah and I were in Colombia. And I must have, well, I did, take some photographs of Main Street and the state capital decorated for the holidays. And so it's kind of interesting that that popped up. And knock on wood, hope that we'll be able to travel to Colombia again soon and see you all in person again really quickly. And I apologize for, I'll get to my formal presentation, but in response to Mr. Vine and Mr. Davis's points about the paycheck protection program and small business assistance, we have sent information to staff. Congress did take note of those problems with the first round of PPP. And they included a lot of provisions in this round of the paycheck protection program to help it get to the smallest businesses and to help it get to minority and women owned businesses, including the first days that the PPP application portal was open last week, only CDFIs, only loans submitted via community development financial institutions could be submitted. And Congress also set aside hunks of the PPP loan money, specifically for loans from CDFIs and loans from small banks and credit unions. So that's some of what they did. And then just this morning, we'll be sending this information to the city. But one of the things that was included in that pandemic release bill was the emergency capital investment program. And that's money to help community development financial institutions kind of help sustain them and rebuild them as we emerge from the pandemic. So we'll be sending that out as well. As well as what's popularly known as the Save Our Stages Act. Last week, SBA put out preliminary information about those grants. And those grants are for small independent venues, museums, theaters. Kind of the example in Columbia that pops to my mind is the Nickelodeon Theater on Main Street is kind of the classic kind of business that would be eligible to apply for Save Our Stages. So SBA has posted preliminary information about that and should have grant application info on that soon. And we'll be sending to that. We sent the city information about what SBA has out so far. And we'll follow up once they have the grant applications open. And I apologize. I'm going to share my screen. And can everybody see that? Yes. Excellent. Excellent. It worked. So this is a quick legislative update. And I'll try to go through this and leave time for questions. So I think you all are familiar with Capital Edge and with me and Deborah. But we've worked for the City of Columbia for over 30 years. Actually, it predates my coming on board. I started doing this right after I was born. So I think you know about us. We're a small firm. We only represent local governments and local government agencies. We know local governments and federal local government relations well. And our goal is to provide the city with comprehensive Washington representation. That includes advocacy, getting you and city staff, timely analysis about legislative and regulatory issues, always being available to quickly answer questions, both from Capitol Hill and from the city. If you ever do travel again, making sure that your visits to Washington go as smoothly as possible. And then, of course, most importantly, our goal is to make sure the city is aware of every federal funding and grant opportunity that is available and not only to make sure that you're aware of those, but we work closely with staff when the city chooses to apply for those grants, whether it's helping review applications, getting support for those applications from the delegation. Arranging we just last week, the city was unfortunately unsuccessful with our build application last year for the project down on a huge street to complete the street grid there. But we had a good debrief with the Department of Transportation staff last week. So we have a stronger application going into this year. And then why does he miss? There we go. So I want to just really quickly go through some of what we worked on over these past two years. And I think I have to start out with the CARES Act. That is one of the three pandemic relief bills that Congress passed early last year when the pandemic was just going. And I always like to put the CARES Act into perspective. It was a massive bill. It was $2.2 trillion. Just to put that in perspective, the regular overall federal budget in FY 2019 was $4.4 trillion. So almost half of the regular annual federal budget went into the CARES Act. And that included everything from assistance to state and local governments, assistance to small businesses through the Paycheck Protection Program, expanded unemployment insurance and direct payments to individual taxpayers, transportation assistance to airports and transit agencies, K-12 and higher education assistance. And then of course, probably most importantly, a boatload of money for public health. And of all that, there was over $2 million that came directly to the city and millions more that came to city's partners like CMRTA, the airport, your public health agencies, your museums, your libraries. And that kept us pretty busy March, April, May, June getting the city detailed information about all of that funding so that the city and its partners could take advantage of that. I would be remiss if I did not mention the Columbia Canal. We and city staff fought. I say a hard fought. I had to put that in the slide. A hard fought $42 million from FEMA for repairs to the canal. For those of you who worked getting this through FEMA and particularly for the staff who was in close negotiations with FEMA, there was a great headline in the Washington Post this morning. I'm not sure if people in the rest of the country are aware, but a lot of the costs of dealing with what's happened in the past two weeks, security-wise, in Washington is being borne by local governments, by the District of Columbia and by our neighbors in Virginia and Maryland. And there was a headline in the Washington Post this morning. FEMA denies DC, Maryland, and Virginia requests for reimbursement for inauguration security costs. So I think those of you who worked on it, I'm getting that money from FEMA over those many years. We'll appreciate that, not to make light of that situation. But if you can't make light of it, then I'm not sure how you get through. I will, these next two slides, I'm mentioning them. And I think they're important going into next year. And I'll hit on that. This gets a little bit into the weeds. And I'm trying to keep it simple. But over the last four years, Congress has included extra money for infrastructure, including extra money for highways. And we worked with the House Appropriations Committee and the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee and led efforts with conference of mayor's staff to say, hey, Congress, that money should go through the surface transportation block grant, which means that rather than going to the state DOTs, that money went to metropolitan planning organizations, including the Central Midland Council of Governments. That was a good one to work on. And I'll get into this a little bit later. But I think it sets the stage for maybe building on that this year. The next is the, for those of you who were around in 2009, you might remember the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant. The one time that program was funded, it's similar to the Community Development Block Grant program, Columbia received a direct allocation of $1.4 million. The House passed the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant twice in the 116th Congress, including just last month as part of its major infrastructure package. So I think that that sets the stage to have that included going forward in the 117th Congress. And then this was my favorite slide to work on because of the firefighter photograph. I think that's the most fun photograph I found. But this was a priority for Chief Jenkins. The major pandemic release bill that Congress passed last month made the tax credit for volunteer firefighter equipment and permanent. It did not expand it, so we still have some work to do there. But it did make it permanent. We were able to increase or maintain funding for all core local government programs. And Congress finally, finally, finally passed the Great American Outdoors Act, which will significantly increase money to state and local governments for parks and conservation programs. And that's guaranteed funding every year. And so getting into the 117th Congress, and this is, it's hard to put a preview of the entire 117th Congress, especially it's going to be very, very busy, I think, these first six months. But I've boiled it down to the first 100 days. The biggest thing from the city's perspective that Congress will work on is pandemic relief, including fiscal assistance. The pandemic relief bill that became law last month did not include fiscal assistance to state and local governments, not due to a lack of effort on the part of local elected officials lobbying for that. Mayor Benjamin, I think you'll remember twice you spearheaded about 50 South Carolina mayors to sign letters asking for that. And then I think after pandemic relief, from the city's perspective, the important thing that things that Congress will turn its attention to are surface transportation, reauthorization, and infrastructure, climate change, energy, and environment. Of course, they have to do a budget, FY22 appropriations. And then what I call the regulatory roller coaster, the Trump administration had a very aggressive deregulatory agenda. And I think that we're going to be kept busy tracking the next administration's efforts to undo a lot of that. So that will certainly keep us busy. Going back to the two slides I mentioned on transportation and energy, and I put this in big letters and bold, as we look at fiscal assistance and stimulus, I think the big message from local governments has to be localize the money, localize, localize, localize. And that's pretty easily boiled down into three priorities. Increase funding for the community development law grant, that I think that is a long overdue. And we can make a strong case that if Congress wants infrastructure money to get out quickly, CDBG is a great way to do that. The Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant, like I said, the House passed that as part of its infrastructure package. And I think we're in good shape to get that included and get that as an ongoing program that Congress funds every year. And then as Congress works on reauthorization of highway and transit programs, those have to be reauthorized by September 30th. Increasing the local share of the surface transportation block grant, I'll add in there also increasing the size and the local share of the transportation alternatives program. So localize, localize, localize. And I think that that has to be our message going into this year. And I think the conference mayors in the League of Cities have done a good job laying the groundwork for that. And then there's me and Deborah. And I'll I guess leave it open for questions or comments. I went through a lot and I probably left out a lot. So I'm so happy to take any questions. Thank you. Thank you, Ralph. Thank you so much. Questions for Ralph? Ms. Devine? Just a couple, Ralph, thank you so much for you endeavor for all that you do. We talk about you often. And I'll tell you that you guys are just really great for everything that we need. And we appreciate all that you do. Couple questions. I was making some notes. Go back to my first note. The energy, I know it only passed the House. That block grant funding formula for the energy grants, do we know what that may be yet? We do. It would be the same as it was last time it was funded. And it's essentially a formula based on a combination of population and daytime population. And the daytime population factor is one that's particularly good for Columbia. And Debra, my colleague, Debra worked for the, she was the energy lobbyist for the US Conference of Mayors at the time, so she knows more about this than anybody. But the idea there was that, of course, particularly for central cities like Columbia, energy use is not just based on your resident population, but all the people who come in Mondays through Friday to work there as well. So that's the formula, it's a combination of population and daytime population. And then my last question really is, do we have any idea? I know it's all just being proposed right now, but out of some of the things that President Biden announced last week as it comes down the pipeline, and of course, it would have to go through Congress, but is there an opportunity or a possibility for that to come directly to local municipalities and counties and just what we've gone through before out it would be great if we were able to get some direct allocations out of some of those assistance programs so that we could help our residents. So one of the more disappointing things about the pandemic relief bill that became law last month was it did not include state and local government fiscal assistance. We just, the Senate just declined to include that and they weren't going to include that. And President-elect Biden, part of his $2 trillion, it's just shy of $2 trillion, but I'll say $2 trillion, it's a nice round number, includes $350 billion in state and local government fiscal assistance. And we are already working to make the case that that money needs to come directly to local governments. The first round of fiscal assistance back in March was states and then cities and counties over 500,000 population. The entire state of South Carolina has one jurisdiction over 500,000 population, that's Greenville County. So we've, I think successfully speaker Pelosi's plan and Senator Schumer's plan always included getting money to all local governments above 50,000, essentially using the CDBG formula. And I think that's the case we have to make going forward is include the $350 billion in any subsequent pandemic relief bill in state and local government. Don't forget the local government piece of that. The only other thing I would add to that, so I know about that part, but what I'm also thinking about is like the amount that he has designated for, you know, food assistance, rental assistance, all that stuff. I know it has to go to larger agencies, larger groups, but we locally have so many amazing nonprofits who are doing the work on the ground. I know Councilman Dow has been out in handing out food boxes himself with some of these groups and they have not been in the position because they're so small. But, you know, we have the infrastructure as the city because a lot of these groups get our community development money or our community promotion. So we have a process in place and if we were able to be the correct designee and then get it out into the community, I think it would get to the families that need them more. So just as a thought is that process goes through, I know you and Deborah will be on the ground, you all be watching and listening to that, but just making those cases for those of us who have the infrastructure to get the money quicker into the community would be best. And that's local government. Absolutely, and that's the message we always, always, always share with. I have spent the last, any Capitol Hill staffer who will listen to me, one of the things that the pandemic relief bill did was extended for one year. Originally states and cities and counties that got direct assistance in the last bill were supposed to have spent that by December 30th of last year. Congress gave them a one year extension and I've never tired of telling Capitol Hill staff that cities and counties that received an allocation of that fund have run track to meet that deadline, generally speaking. And most of the laggards are state governments and you're absolutely across the board, money that went first to the states and then had to go down to local entities. A, like you said, leaves out the smaller local entities and B, it just takes so long to get down there. So I think that's an important message to always share with Capitol Hill. So, I think very clearly, and if there's language of one paragraph you want to specifically share with us, Ralph, we want direct financial assistance, direct to cities, no 500,000 population cap, straight to cities and the language in the Heroes Act is great language, CDBG plus. It was as much latitude as possible. So this is specific language that maybe that we all need to share in our communications about federal officials. Let's just make sure we got that tight paragraph that'd be very helpful. And Mayor Benjamin, I would add, which is certainly a testament too, to you all having the foresight to continuously have Ralph and have his assistance for us on the ground here. A recent example, I think Missy and Gloria and others can attest to this too is that I think Ralph and Gloria Ralph and Deborah made us aware of some treasury money. So it goes across agencies. And I want to say that had to do with rental assistance and emergency rental assistance program, Ralph. So the funds are there as direct allocations both Richland, Lexington counties, neither of them from what I recall in the email trail seemed to know the money was there. And they were very thankful that Missy reached out to some of her counterparts in both counties after Ralph brought this to our attention. So it's that kind of collaboration too. And I just say that because we're on the ground every day here but we're not always seeing that. That wasn't a direct allocation to cities. It went to counties and the counties didn't seem to know about it necessarily. They were very thankful and want to collaborate to make sure that the incorporated area of the city is included. But it's so necessary to have our boots on the ground in Washington. And I hope I didn't misspeak about that funding, Ralph. But I think it is direct emergency assistance. Correct. The emergency rental assistance program, which goes to states and the cities and counties over 200,000 population. So they're getting there slowly. Let's go to Mr. Brandon to Mr. Rickman. Great. Thank you, Mr. Mayor Ralph. It's great to finally meet you. Look forward to working with you for a couple of years. It sounds like the Capitol Hill staffers do listen to you. You get a lot done for us. So I appreciate that. When we talk about the potential infrastructure money that could possibly come and become in our way, talk to us about shovel ready projects. To our advantage to have a short list of needed, desired shovel ready projects to get at the front of that line to get those funded, I know it can often be very difficult. Always makes sense to have shovel ready projects. Always made sense back in the day, way back in the day now, when we had earmarks and Congress could direct funding to specific projects. But it still makes a lot of sense to have your shovel ready projects kind of lined up. And particularly this year, I think one thing, and I'll try to give a quick answer here, but if you read a lot of social media and a lot of that, a lot of people seem to think that the elections in Georgia mean that this torrent of liberal legislation is going to flow out of Congress over the next year. And the reality is that legislating is going to remain very, very difficult. And they're going to focus on a few things. And one of those things is infrastructure, because I think it does have bipartisan support. And I think the president-elect views a big infrastructure package as a way to goose the economy. And frankly, as a way to address what needs to be addressed, we've neglected infrastructure. So there's probably going to be a focus on, even without earmarks, on getting money to projects that can move quickly. So yes, it makes a lot of sense to have shovel ready projects identified. Perfect. And I guess one request would be keep your eye out for some land water conservation grant funding that we can work with our wonderful parks and rec department here to get some much needed work done, if you could do that for us. And I mentioned the Great American Outdoors Act. That was one of the more exciting things that it was lost in a lot of other news. But that was one of the more exciting things that happened last year. And just to put it in perspective, we're going from about the state and local portion of the Land and Water Conservation Fund was generally funded at about $50 million a year. And that's going to be $440 million this year. And most of that goes to the states by formula. And then the states make it available to local governments. But there are competitive grants in there as well. And that's just. And would you say shovel ready is the same application for that process? No, I think that's going to be an ongoing annual process. But again, the state and then for the national competitive grants, they're going to fund projects that are ready to go, obviously. Great, thanks, Ralph. Hey, Ralph, thank you very much for all you do. We really appreciate it and thanks. I really had a simple request, which was the next 90 days are going to be very interesting in Washington and how it's going to play out. And I think it'd be very beneficial for us if we could kind of maybe have once a month, 10 minutes, Zoom with you just to get an update, especially with. We start talking about infrastructure. We're talking about COVID relief, small business relief. Who knows what treasuries put out. And we just have so many facets. And a lot of our small businesses have been hit pretty hard. And so it'd be great if we could kind of spend a little more time than we normally do with you and Deborah over the next 90 to 120 days, because I do think that's where the bulk of the legislature is going to happen. And I think it'd be great for us to be a little more informed and together. So if I could put that request in, Ralph and Deborah and Teresa, that we just get maybe 10, 15 minute brief monthly on where we are. Because I think there's going to be a lot coming down the pipe. And it's going to be a lot for us to absorb. And so I think we need to really be on our A game going forward. So we got you up there running the show. And that's great, Ralph. I think we need to know so that we can be supportive and make sure that we're getting you the proper information to make sure that we secure a lot of the funding and possible programs that we'd be eligible for. And let's also, Ralph, I think me and Tamika, let's be more intentional. Whenever we have open calls, comps and mayors, just kind of full update. Maybe if there are open calls, let's get as many ears. So I'll endeavor to make sure everyone has information just to log in and listen. And Tamika, when you have your NLC calls, if there are opportunities just for updates or advocacy requests, what have you, Ralph has wired in with all of them and works very closely with USCM staff in particular. I know that helping shape things there. But I think as much information as possible. You're right, there's going to be a lot of stuff, new stuff, revamped, old stuff coming back. And we want to make sure that we're set up properly and take advantage of every single opportunity on behalf of our citizens. And let's make sure we do that. So thank you. Thank you. Mr. Mayor, can I add, we do have open calls. Also, Irma sends out a weekly newsletter on Fridays. I'm pretty sure that Wanda keeps that. But Ms. Wilson, if Wanda could maybe make sure that all council members are signed up to receive that so we can get it in. Everybody can get in their inbox or she could forward that. That's usually very helpful, Council Member Rickerman, because they break down kind of everything. And then Ralph and Deborah know how sometimes forward them and say, tell me more about this, it's snippets, but then they can give me the meat as it relates to us in Columbia. So I would strongly encourage all of y'all to get on that list. And that's the NLC list, Ms. Dillon? Yeah. I'm not going to get said. I don't know exactly how you get on it. But just make sure everybody has, it has everybody's email address so they can get it. I'm on it. And I'm glad you mentioned Wanda. I was remiss without, as we opened up for both of these updates, so Wanda, Bob Knight is still doing a great job working with Ralph and Deborah and also Kyle, just trying to manage and get information out and keep y'all updated even on the daily happenings, particularly with state government and legislative items as they are moving. So she will definitely follow up with that too, Ms. Devine. Yeah, Ralph, you had something else? I just wanted to, and I think building on what Mr. Rickerman and Ms. Devine said, the next 90 days, I agree, and probably more, probably through July 4th are gonna be, there's gonna be a lot coming at us and there's gonna be a lot of action alerts, whether they come from the Conference of Mayors, the National League of Cities, or us. And I think given who represents you in the House of Representatives and how close he is to the president-elect, there's gonna be a lot of requests for you to weigh in as well, and I think Columbia has an opportunity to be particularly effective between now and July when all of this legislating happens. And I think it's gonna be important that we are active on all of those issues. And getting back to what I said in my presentation, the message of localizing the dollars, we just need to keep pressing, pressing, pressing that message. And I think we're well poised, but we need to kind of follow that through and make sure those things happen. Thanks, Ralph. You have the questions for Ralph? We're gonna wrap up your presentation. We started, Ralph. We thank the world of Capital Edge and you and your team. You guys do great work for us and we look forward to an even longer and more fruitful relationship. Let's keep fighting. Let's bring home the bacon this year, okay? Absolutely, thank you. All right, thank you. Okay, well, we will switch gears to the state legislative update and discussions going into this new session. Kyle Michelle is with us. Hey, Kyle. Hello. Hey, Caroline. Hey, Caroline. Caroline Boakash is here with me. I'm gonna share my screen as well if I can make it work just right. Let's see if everyone can see that. Can you see the, yeah. Yes, you got some copyright money on the flag there, yeah, that's a dollar pop. Every time you use the buck, it's a buck, man. That copyright, I mean, that flag is widely available, which we very much appreciate. And my designer very much appreciates our designer. I want to start off by saying thank you for the opportunity to work for the city of Columbia. We love that opportunity. Caroline Boakash is on the line with me. We work together. It's always hard to follow Ralph because Ralph always such a great job and there's two zeros on the end of everything that Ralph talks about compared to everything that I talk about, because he's at the federal level. But appreciate the opportunity to be here today. I think we're gonna follow a similar sort of tact that Ralph took, which is we're gonna, we've got a presentation this year that uses many fewer words, which is always a challenge for me. But I'm gonna go through that and then look for the discussion that we can have afterwards if you guys have any questions. So this sort of summarizes a lot of the things that we do in addition to just being at the state house, that sort of is sort of the middle, I mean, the heart of what we do is being the advocate for the city. But we also connect people to the city and connect people in the city to the state government. And we also help the staff at the city understand what's going on, put things into context. This bill was introduced. Is this bill really got a chance? This bill seems to be going fast. Are they gonna take any amendments? Can we get some things in there? That's a lot of what we do is not just reading and writing legislation and writing reports and talking to the delegation, which we do a lot and other members of the legislature. So let's go, let's look back at 2020. And the thing that I have said for months is if you read the newspaper, they talk about the truncated 2020 session, the 2020 session that was cut short, the 2020 session that didn't accomplish much. But if you were a municipality, the 2020 session, especially for the city of Columbia, the 2020 session accomplished a lot. We've been trying to get business license reform passed since at least 2015. It might have been 2014 when former representative from across the river started talking about how they were gonna decimate the business license tax for businesses and how they were gonna have a $100 cap on it and how this was an unfair tax, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. The bill that finally passed into law this year, which was a great compromise that we worked on for three years on the language. It standardizes the business license tax renewals. You've gotta go down to, you gotta go to the city to get your first one. The renewals can all be done online. They're all due at the same time. When you do your renewal, you're in the same business class in every municipality or every local jurisdiction that you are in the other jurisdictions. And there's an appeals process that's set up. It's a boon for everyone. We made sure that it's revenue neutral for the city and you can adjust rates in each standard business class. You can raise a rate in a business class or lower one, but it's revenue neutral overall for cities. That was huge to get that done. We passed a bill that allows using a portion of hospitality taxes on flood control and remediation. Think 2015 flood, think damages, you have the option, whether we do it or not, now to use some hospitality tax funds for restoration of those public works projects. That bill started out as being on the coast just for rising sea levels. We made sure that it covered people inland who also have issues like what we've had. Affordable housing, I don't think that there has been a year and you guys have given us the charge. Go out there and do whatever you can to make affordable housing easier to build and own. There were two huge bills passed this year. The first one gives a state tax credit equal to the federal tax credit for all affordable housing. The second one essentially takes away the property tax on low-income housing tax credit projects for any affordable housing development that is taxed with tax credits. Both of those things will make it much easier to own and maintain affordable housing. And I expect to see the effects of that in the city of Columbia and Richland County in the next five years without a doubt. Back last year at the beginning of the session, I think if I can refer to my notes here, the city had sent a letter or Mayor Benjamin provided a letter of support to Ways and Means for this bill that created the South Carolina Resilience Revolving Fund Act. It provides state money in a fund to pay for the local share of buying out flood-prone homes and businesses, I believe, flood-prone properties that passed this year. So we're up to that many things that passed already this year. In addition to that, the Firefighter Cancer Health Care Benefit Plan passed which provides an additional amount of money to firefighters who get cancer while on the job or I think it's within five years after they're no longer on the job. Something that the Chief Jenkins had been very much in favor for, something that we worked on just advocating for it and talking to different members and saying, the city's in favor of this, please try to pass it, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. Okay, now we also go up there and try to take care of problems. I had a call a year ago from Chief Holbrooks, one of his assistants saying, Kyle, they've got this mental health patient transport bill and it's a disaster for us. If they pass that bill the way it's written, we're gonna have to implement these new regulations, buy this new equipment, assign new staff to this, and we just don't have the bandwidth or the money to do this. So there we were in meeting after meeting on mental health patient transport. Building pass, we've had discussions, we've tried and we've got our champions who are trying to move it in our direction. It'll be back next year. We're still working on that one. Bill came out of the upstate. We're gonna, I've got a bill that says, you cannot have a stormwater rate that is any higher than the property tax paid on the property. Well, that's a problem because I get a call from Clint Shealy says, Kyle, does this thing have legs? Well, it's gonna be in subcommittee next week. So there we are testifying in subcommittee to say, Mr. Chairman, this is a bill that will decimate the city's stormwater revenues on which we have bonds passed, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. The last one that's on the screen here is child care. There's been an effort to have child care licensing to tighten those rules. And the way that the bill was written, and I'm not sure where it is right now, but the way the bill was written, it would have affected our ability to hire part-time staff to staff our summer camps. So we work for things and we work against things. And then we look for money. And we look for money, either where money's available or where legislators would like to put money. And so those kind of, we kind of try to marry those things up. We did get in the last budget year money for the All-Stars baseball field. We are slowly but surely constructing over behind the old Bethel Bishop Apartments. And we worked a pretty good bit on money for a convention center expansion. And there's now $15 million in the governor's budget for that for the next budget year. But it's not in the legislature budget yet. We secured money to extend this to Greenway. There was additional money in that in the budget that didn't pass this current year. I think everybody knows about the quiet zones money that we got and we talked to Ms. Gentry. Those are, we're moving forward on that quiet zones implementation. There was a lot of money coming down out of the CARES Act that Ralph talked about, a couple of less zeros once you get it down to us through the state. But we had numerous discussions with city staff and with state officials about how much money, how can we spend? Can we spend money on this? Can we not? Health equity course was another program that we tried and are still working to get money out of the CARES Act or some other state funding pot from for a health equity core that would be a project between the city, USC, and DHEC. So this is just, we just threw this up here as this is the kind of thing, this is what we get. Where is, what is that bill? Where is it going? Are there any state, any ways to get funding for this? I'm writing, I'm working right now with Mr. Shealy to try to get delegation letters in support of a federal grant that would give us money to assist in water system expansions. And so then other people from the city call and say, I got this from the state, I don't know what to do. We wanna be the city's first call and I hope we always are. And we take off after those things. On the other side, it comes the other way. DHEC calls and says, I need somebody from the city of Columbia because we've got this thing that we're working on and we need to get in touch with the right person there. And then we help them. People call from the legislature. They say, I hear you represent the city. I've got a problem. Can you help me do this? Can you help me take care of this? Can you tell me what to do or where to go or how realistic it is? And then we get calls from legislators. We got a call from a legislator just in the last couple of weeks with an issue that they said, well, you know, they've contacted us with this but it's really a city issue. It's really not a state issue. Is there any way you can help? And then I jump into action. We jump into action and go talk to the city and try to get those things solved and then tag back up with the legislators and make sure that those things work. So next year, the city has had a priority for passing hate crimes legislation or at least a number of council members have pretty strongly for a number of years and this is coming to the floor. There was a subject of some off session meetings and the legislation has been introduced. I expect more to be introduced and we will be working on hate crimes legislation. The abandoned buildings tax credit runs out at the end of this year. So we have been asked by staff at the city to work on getting that re-chartered for another five years. At least small business assistance is always something that I know is important to the city. The governor has proposed $123 million for small business assistance, $123 million of one-time money for a small business assistance program for COVID. I know there was a period in time not long ago when we as a city were, we had gone out and reacted to the pandemic and issues that businesses were having the federal government had and the state had not done anything. And we communicated that we've worked with them and now the state is with the CARES Act money, some of the CARES Act money and then with this one-time money that's in the budget for this coming year, they're talking about helping small businesses. Criminal justice reform is also a topic that we will be keeping an eye on and working with Chief Holbrook and the city on to make sure that we're all aligned in passing criminal justice reform that comports with what the city's priorities are. There's emphasis on officer training in that criminal justice reform. There's, they're taking a look at sentencing reform. They're taking a look at criminal statutes and reviewing them and looking at proposing statutes such as the hate crimes statute. And then they're looking at civil asset forfeiture. Affordable housing will continue to be a priority and we look for ways to amplify bills and push for bills that will make that continue to be easier. Local revenue flexibility is always something that is on our radar like the one this last year that helped us have the ability to spend hospitality tax on flood damage repair. I know that Chief Holbrook always wants us to try to get to a point that it makes it easier for him to hire more public safety officials that have retired. That is legislation that's already been introduced this year. Gun violence measures are always a priority. They're always a challenge in our legislature but we're always looking for opportunities to find something in that realm that would help with what we deal with in Columbia every day with gun issues and then property tax reform. There's the property tax reform. There are, there is a bill actually that Chris Hart introduced to raise the 15% property tax cap. We also are regularly in discussions with people about how to crack the Act 388 nut. So that we don't stay trapped in this same property tax situation that we're currently in in the city of Columbia as has been discussed in the wake of the recent report that was done. We will continue to work on bills like the stormwater rate bill, which was already reintroduced. We will continue to work on mental health, patient transport and then I can't see that last one up there because my Zoom screen is having you guys block, your block, it's blocked with my Zoom screen, but I'll figure it out. But we will, oh, the tort claims act raising Ms. Wilson will remember that two years ago, there was a lot of issues that there was a lot and Ms. Knox will remember there was a lot of discussion of doubling the tort limits. We pushed back on that in coalition with a number of other people and that kind of went away and then we kept it away this last year because it was sort of ran out of time with COVID. So we'll be working on that and I'm sure there'll be other legislation that will jump up. Funding opportunities, we're gonna spend money, the state's gonna spend money on broadband. I'm not sure how much of that is gonna be in non-rural areas, but we will be all over that. Convention Center, as we talked about before, we're gonna try to recapture some of that money for the VISTA Greenway expansion that did not get passed in the budget. Public safety priorities, if we could find any that would meet our needs. We know the urban farms and some of the other local projects that might be able to be funded with some of those land and water conservation funds. I don't know whether that would be one but these are things that we're looking out for potential and talking to people for potential funding sources for. Obviously there's gonna be more COVID-19 funding coming down the pike from the state to the local governments and then we'll keep working with water insurer on the canal issue as we can, where we can to support in any way we can. That is kind of a quick wrap and happy to have the discussion now. Really appreciate being able to work with the city. I think it's been a great partnership. I don't have 30 years like Ralph, but I haven't been doing it since right after I was born like Ralph. But we very much enjoy working with the city. The city has such a great staff and you guys are such a good council. It is exactly the kind of thing that we like to do in what we do with clients all the time. Thank you Kyle. Thank you very much for a comprehensive report. Questions for Kyle and Caroline, Daniel? Yeah, you're on mute still, right? Yeah, I just wanted to see if Kyle could forward us the bill that you said Chris Hart was worth on removing the 15% cap? Yes, absolutely. Thank you. It was not removing the cap. It was adding to the cap, wasn't it? I'll take a look at it. I'm always a little reticent to be conclusive on something like that right here. But my understanding was that it would remove the cap. The 15% cap is in the constitution, I believe. There's part of it was allowing the citizenry to have a vote on removing the cap. That may be what it was. But in fact, I'm happy to send you guys, we do a legislative report every week for the city staff and I'm pretty sure that they send it out to council, Ms. Wilson does, but happy to take a look at any of those bills and send a separate report on bills that have to do with anything that would impact Act 388. Give us, thank you, Kyle. Any other questions for Kyle? I just wanted to know your thoughts. So of course, due to COVID last year, we were really not able to have something with our legislators that we've had in the past and of this year due to social distancing and we as a city, certainly leading by example, we're not posting anything, but I certainly don't wanna lose opportunities. I know several of us talk to legislators individually, but I don't think there's anything like us collectively having an opportunity to meet with them and go over priorities and actually now, I think everybody's kind of tired of Zoom meetings, but I think they also recognize that Zoom meetings can be more efficient because they're not traveling from place to place. I would love to know your thoughts regarding some kind of interaction with our delegation. I spoke to Chairman Howard last night actually about some particular issues and he said that he certainly during his chair and ship wants to do more with us. So can we think about what that could look like and even if it's some kind of Zoom presentation or something for us to talk to them about, our successes and our challenges and what we need their help on? Absolutely. And I agree with you 100% that it may be easier to pull this off via a, now in the age of Zoom because one of the biggest challenges we have is getting everyone to show up when we have a meeting and then of course we have the limitation so we have to deal with on council having a majority et cetera, et cetera, when we have meetings. But it may well be possible that we could get greater attendance with the Zoom with an online meeting, especially since people are so constrained right now. And as you know, no one is doing, no one's doing receptions or anything. Even the House and the Senate are on week to week as to whether they're gonna be here or not be here. And when they're not in session in the chamber which the House is not all week this week, they're doing committee meetings and some committee meetings but they're doing them online. Well, you and Carol, I can maybe think through that with Juana and Ms. Wilson and give us some suggestions but I certainly would be in favor of us doing that to keep our dialogue going about where our priorities are and actually really what we're working on that sometimes they don't even know the successes we are having. Yes, I'm happy to do that. And like I said, I think that they're, well, I'll work with Ms. Wilson on it. It can be kind of optimistic about that. And Juana. Yep. Are you all getting your legislative updates on Fridays from Juana? I mean, I know she's sending them. Yes. We're just wanting to ask and I'm sure Juana's on the call. I know she has, I see her name there but if there's anything else you need and done any differently but between Caroline and Kyle sending some updates, she goes over and sends them out to you. That seems to work really well. Great. Any other questions for Kyle and Caroline and Juana? Well, Kyle, thanks so much. Thank you. We really appreciate all the hard work. And like I taught you this morning, I'm sure I'll talk to you again this week. We'll talk soon. Okay, thanks. Thanks so much. Reverend McDowell, I know Mayor Benjamin has some calls coming in. So if you're ready to proceed to our next item, I can move along. Your own mute, sir. I think Ms. Devine has her hand raised while you're getting off mute Reverend McDowell. I was just gonna say, Mayor Pertin McDowell, if I could offer for consideration and I guess maybe Ms. Hammond can let us know if we've got several people online but I just didn't know how long Mrs. Pertin would want to be and if that is just a program update for us, if possibly we can consider moving the zoning public hearing because it's at three o'clock now and I know because we're doing this, we don't advertise it for a separate time. So if we've had people on the phone since two and it's a lot of folks, I would ask if we consider moving that up, having that and then coming back to the hospitality tax update. Thank you, ma'am. Could we do that? Can we do that? And if we could, could we consensually approve that? No. Whatever you all prefer, Reverend McDowell. Could we consensually, there he is. Okay. Is our prerogative, yes. Okay. Let's go ahead and do that. That's Madam City Manager. Yes, sir. At this time, Mayor Benjamin, now do you all want to go straight into that particular item? Do you want to take up the public hearing and first reading for all zoning and planning matters? Starting with item 14, would you like to go straight to item C17? Wait a minute. Item 20. 20. Okay. So there are 20. Well, with that, Mayor Benjamin, I'll at Ms. Hampton is on the line. And if you could open up the discussion for the public hearing on that particular item. All right, we're going to open up the public hearing on the unified development ordinance, the adoption of a new Sea of Columbia zoning map. I think as it may have been stated already, this is a official public hearing, but we do want to make it clear as I think it's been articulated by several of our council members that this would be a very deliberative process. It has been a long time coming. Staff has been working very closely with the community and they're very engaged in transparent process. But obviously the challenge is presented are limited accessibility because of COVID-19. We want to make sure we spend some quality time answering questions and being available to the public for all the questions that might come about recognizing the very intimate nature of property ownership and what it means to each and every one of us. So we're going to be very intentional about ensuring that this dialogue is ongoing for a period of time, but we're opening this public hearing. So please, Madam City Manager, Ms. Hampton, please. Good evening, everyone. Greetings, I'm Krista Hampton, the Director of Planning and Development Services, and I, along with our City Zoning Administrator, Rachel Bailey, are pleased to be here today to present the new zoning map for your consideration. As the Mayor mentioned, it will only be a public hearing and a vote will not be taken. My first order of business, so I can make sure it gets into record, is to say thank you. Thank you to Council, to the City Manager, Theresa Wilson, to my direct boss, Assistant City Manager, Missy Gentry, to our Planning Commission members over these past five years and the citizens and stakeholders who have kept up with the project and provided valuable input. The project is better because of all of you. We had a terrific consulting team and clarion and associates and planning next to help achieve the vision laid out by our community. And finally, I want to especially thank our amazing staff. Although some have moved on before the completion of the project, our staff worked tirelessly through many drafts of the code and subsequently mapping over 46,000 parcels doing some of the most arduous and grueling work I have experienced in my years at the City. If you subscribe to what Teddy Roosevelt stated and that nothing in the world is worth having or worth doing unless it means effort, pain, and difficulty, then this ordinance and map are surely worth having. We usually keep our presentations on zoning matters brief, however, because of the significance and to help answer questions received by staff and council, we will take a bit more time on this matter tonight to provide needed information. So let's first review the agenda for the presentation. During this presentation, we will provide context and background to the project to include a brief history. We will move into an overview of the uniform development ordinance. So while the matter before council tonight is consideration of the zoning map to implement the recently adopted UDO, for those who may be new to the project, we want to provide information on this new code. The intention is to obtain input and allow for additional questions over the coming weeks. We will then review the new zoning districts that are illustrated on the maps. Next, we will review how to navigate the maps to see what the current and proposed zoning is for a given parcel. We will go over a proposed schedule for council consideration to complete the project and finally, we will allow council to conduct the hearing and be available to answer questions. So how to comment tonight? In addition to viewing the meeting at the city's website, the public may listen to audio and participate in the meeting via telephone by calling 855-925-2801. When you're prompted, you can enter the meeting code which this evening is 9907. At that point, you need to press star one to listen. Stay on the line until public input portion of the hearing is announced. That will help our clerk immensely, just stay on the line. If you are not able to stay until the end, however, you can press star two and leave a voice message. Comment time is limited to three minutes. So when the public input portion is announced, you can do the aforementioned star two or if you want to speak live, you can press star three to be placed in the speaker queue and staff will unmute callers during this time. Callers are limited to three minutes. And please, if you are participating by phone, make sure you turn off any of the other audio on your devices before you speak to avoid feedback. So let's review some context and background by answering some questions. So what is the uniform development ordinance that this math is implementing? The unified development ordinance, finally known as the UDO is a combination of the zoning and the land development ordinance for the city of Columbia. Zoning is the law that determines how land or property can be used in the city. It regulates the uses and the size and location of buildings and a host of other development related items like parking, landscaping and signage. Zoning does not require you to take an action. It sets the table for projects and development, but it's up to the property owner to do the work to make that happen. So what is the role of the zoning map in this ordinance? To enact zoning regulations in the text, the UDO establishes varying districts, residential, commercial, industrial that each have different sets of uses and standards. These districts are established by ordinance and the official zoning map identifies the location of these districts, thereby specifying the land use and development requirements. This is what is under consideration by city council. So why do we need this rewrite? I can tell you it's not because we just woke up one day to decide we needed to change the ordinance. And the ordinance has been needed for at least 10 years, if not more. The current ordinance is over 40 years, which in and of itself does not make it obsolete for those of us who are over 40 years would attest. However, over time, piecemeal changes have created a code that is contradictory, difficult to understand, and does not necessarily reflect the development patterns desired. The UDO resolves these issues and is intended to simplify and streamline development review, providing an easy to understand set of rules while creating a more modern code. And so how did we get to this point? We've been working to get to this point for quite some time. The first step in this project actually was in 2014 when we rewrote the land use plan. We called it Plan Columbia. It provided the needed policy guidance for this new ordinance. Directly after adoption of that in 2015, we began the process to rewrite the code. We had numerous public meetings at various stages of the project. The first was a community workshop to obtain input on what the goals of the code should be. It was followed by meetings on the assessment of the code and drafts of sections as they became available. The timeline looks like this. And the graphic illustrates the beginning of the process with Plan Columbia through drafting the modules. The drafting of the code was completed in 2019 with the adoption of the text in August of that year. Soon after we began to apply the new districts to the over 46,000 parcels located in the city. We completed this task in early 2020. We're excited about getting started with some public meetings and published those maps in March of 2020, which was of course impacted by the pandemic. So we've established the context in the background. Next, we're gonna take some time to provide an overview of the ordinance that was adopted and this map would implement. The key themes and goals during the Plan Columbia process and the ordinance process, we received input on what the code should address. And they led to these key goals here. To create a user-friendly code is the primary goal of this project. This has been accomplished by a complete reorganization of the document, better use of flowcharts, tables, clarifying language. It's more logically oriented, organized, easier to understand, it's streamlined procedures. And it provides flexibility in the appropriate context. Because ordinances are intended to implement the comprehensive plan, this also works to implement Plan Columbia, which has become a part of the Columbia Compass that everybody's aware of in aligning these regulations. It's intended to modernize regulations to strongly encourage context-sensitive infill. That was most of the city is developed and most of our commercial development is infill and we need to have regulations that support and encourage that in appropriate locations. Finally, support green development practices, clarifying standards for alternative energy use and enhancing urban agriculture standards. So right here, you see the nine articles of the ordinance and this is the structure of the ordinance. With the newly reorganized code, it's logical. It makes information easier to find. We are going to go briefly through each of these sections to describe the purpose and the impact. The first general provisions article is really the housekeeping section of the ordinance. It sets out the authority. An important part of the section is the transitional provisions. These establish the rules for how developments recently approved or in the process of being approved during the code will be handled, so that's predictable. The administration and the geeky part of me just loves this section. This section creates simple but a very impactful change in this code. It's to consolidate and streamline all procedures for development review into one article. It's intended to improve the efficiency and transparency of the review processes by consolidating and standardizing generally applicable procedures. It streamlines existing review procedures and adds more flexible procedures where appropriate. It's organized into five sections, so now a reader can go to one place to see who is involved in the process and the steps needed to complete it. To save my voice, I'm gonna turn it over to Rachel for a section here. Rachel? All right, so next we have article three, which is our zoning districts. This article establishes the basic standards for the various base planned unit development and overlay zoning districts. The base districts include residential, activity and corridor, institutional and campus, and industrial districts, consistent with the structure of development types established in Planned Columbia. In addition, the lineup carries forward several current zoning districts and also modifies and adds new districts to better align the structure to policy direction that's set out in Planned Columbia and to make the current regulations more user-friendly and efficient. We have often heard that the use of paper tables, the format of the district regulations is greatly enhanced with the use of 2D and 3D graphics. These photos are there to show example development types as well as tables to concisely summarize the standards. So while it is longer, it should be easier to understand which we thought was a pretty valuable trade-off. The new zoning districts consist of nine residential districts, nine mixed-use districts, five institutional and campus districts, three industrial and one PD. Now PD was formerly called PUD. Residential districts have largely stayed the same and we'll discuss that a little bit more on the next slide. A notable change in the non-residential districts is that many more are mixed-use and the use and dimensional standards are based on the context of the development instead of a one-size-fits-all approach. The context are neighborhood, community and regional. It's also important to note that our historic and design district overlays are remaining the same. They just have that name change. There are new institutional-use districts to reflect the heavy presence of these uses in Columbia and we also are retaining our industrial districts. We would like to take a moment to review the residential districts specifically since we've received quite a few questions about these in particular. So we have the TC, which is the Transitional Conservation District. The LLR, which is a large lot reserve district. We have our residential single-family districts which are the large, medium and small lot districts. RD, which is two-family, as well as the RDMV, which is the Mill Village Districts, RD, two-family district. We also have our RM mixed districts. So the RM1 and the RM2. In all but a handful of cities throughout the city, the classification of parcels in residential districts has stayed the same. If a parcel was RS, it is now RSF and if it was RG, it is now RM or RD. The same with our RD, those have remained RD. In addition, the standards and uses permitted remain largely the same. An important thing that we do wanna note is that RM, those mixed residential districts, that does not mean mixed use. It means that as in the existing RG or general residential districts that we have now, if there's adequate lot area, setbacks, lot coverage and other factors, then different types of residential uses could be permitted. The principal change in the district regulations across the board is that front setbacks have been reduced anywhere from five to 10 feet and the permitted lot coverage has increased. We should note that a few of these changes from RS to RM, such as parcels on Azure around Rear, those were not intended to be changed and are being changed back. That is a frequent question we've got so we just wanted to make that clear. And the chart on the next slide will illustrate the regulations for our current and proposed districts for a comparison. So as you can see from this chart, the regulations have generally stayed the same. Where changes have been made, it was because many of the existing structures in our neighborhoods did not conform to them, such as front setback or lot coverage. So as you can see on this table, it has the current district versus the proposed and it goes through lot area, lot width, density, depth, lot coverage and our setbacks and height regulations. And just to note again, we do carry forward all of our historic design and community character districts. They remain in the same location. They just have slightly different names. The next article is article four. So this contains our use regulations. So it consolidates our principal accessory and temporary uses. It includes use tables that identify what uses are allowed in what zoning districts. It also includes standards that apply generally across the board, as well as specific standards for specific uses. This section has been streamlined considerably. It consolidates the 305 uses we currently have from the obsolete SIC code into 123 uses with specific definitions at the end of the code. Article five, that is our development standards. So this article consolidates all the development standards related to the physical layout of new development. So there's also, it differs from our land development subdivision standards, which will come up in article six. But in article five, it's divided into 12 sections for parking, landscaping, tree protection, open space, et cetera. And article six contains those subdivision standards. Article seven through nine, so article seven, that is our non-conformity section. It greatly improves on the current code in that it consolidates all provisions related to handling non-conforming uses and structures into one area. There are new provisions for dealing with non-conforming site features, including street parking, landscaping, and signs. It builds on the partial compliance provisions in 17, 4, 11 of our current ordinance that pertain to expansions and renovations of existing buildings. Article eight consolidates all enforcement provisions for the zoning code. And article nine contains the standards rendering interpretations, rules of measurement, and definitions used in the UDO. This section greatly enhances the ease of using this code, that consolidates each of these tools for administering and interpreting in one location. Terms are clearly defined and consistent with usage elsewhere in the regulations and they're written in plain English. So that concludes the overview of the UDO. We'll now go over how to navigate the map of the current and proposed districts. The link to the draft map is on the project webpage, which can be located at www.weplannedtogether.org slash Columbia review. At this site, you can also review the project background and view the text of the UDO. We are available to make appointments to meet with those who need access to a paper copy of the map. You can call the zoning office during normal business hours at 803-545-3333 to make an appointment. Once at the site, you can either pan to explore the city as a whole or you can type a specific address in the upper left search bar. On the right side, you'll see the layer list. You can choose to see the current or proposed zoning by selecting the zoning district in the layers in the upper right. Selecting a parcel will provide the zoning district information. The important note, if you're searching for a specific parcel and it does not have a classification that comes up, that means that the parcel is either split zoned or it has been recently annexed and hasn't had a district assigned yet. Please contact the zoning office for information. From here, you can click on the district name to be taken to an information sheet on the new district as shown on the next page. A new window will open showing you the information on the district. This is the page exactly from the text of the ordinance so it gives you the purpose of the new district as well as intensity and dimensional standards. Our overlay districts, as we mentioned before, a lot remain in the same area but we do have three new overlays. Those boundaries can be viewed on the zoning page at columbiasc.net slash zoning. That's our airport height overlay, 80-30 height overlay as well as our setback overlay. At this point, we were going to go to an online map but I think in the interest of time we'll have that available to review once council has some questions on the map but that was a great way of reviewing it. So Rachel, we'll go onto here. Okay. So your step, oh, go ahead. Sorry, Krista. That's okay. Yeah, I'll go ahead and take those steps to determine the basic regulations. So if you have a house, first go and you find that zoning district within the viewer. Then within that text of the document that's also located, you can download that or view it online at that same location. Navigate to those pages in the district page in article three or you can just pull it up as Rachel showed you to show the regulations for that specific district. Then to see the use tables that are permitted within that district, you go to the uniform development ordinance and navigate to article four and it will show you it's a table that shows you the uses that are permitted. We'll have a P, a C means it's conditional. So there are conditions for you to have to have that use and S means it's a special exception from the Board of Zoning Appeals. And if it's blank, it means it's not permitted. In addition for commercial developments, we'll review the development standards in article five that Rachel mentioned. And I was remiss, you saw all of those, the fabulous map with the links and to the charts and to the district pages. We could not have done that without our amazing GIS team. They worked really hard and were very solution-oriented, helping us to get that viewer out there and we are greatly appreciative for all of their work. So we've reviewed the background, the history, we went over the uniform ordinance and the districts in particular. So here is our proposed schedule and council. This is a proposed schedule to find a way to forward to get this project to completion while allowing for additional input and meetings. So we'd have this public hearing this evening. We will have available and I'll bring that to your attention on the next slide, one-on-one appointments. So we would schedule those over the next week. If we need more, we'll schedule more. Through February 26, we'd have this period for additional input stakeholder meetings with the neighborhoods or any other groups. We need to amend the effective date of the ordinance and the code. It's currently set for March 31st, so obviously we have to defer that. We would put that back to August 30th. We would bring city council the reading of the new map to you for first reading on April 6th. Simultaneously, we'll be bringing the changes that are identified through this process to planning commission on their May 3rd meeting. That would then have a city council second reading of the entire map on June 6th, however, it would not be effective on that date. July 20th, we would bring you the changes to the map, thereby amending that map prior to the effective date. And we would have the second reading on the revisions on August 3rd, and then everything would become effective on August 30th. We need that lag time in there to allow us time to reconfigure our software, work on some of our forms and the like. So as I mentioned, we have opportunities for one-on-one meetings. These are either by phone or a teleconference. To schedule those, you can go to our website at columbiasc.gov slash zoning, or the We Plan Together website, or you can email us at zoningmap.columbiasc.gov. Those are the preferred ones or during the regular business hours, give us call, and we will set up an appointment for you. And Mayor and Council, that concludes our public hearing information. So just as a reminder, you may, if you want to at this point in time, either press star two to leave a voicemail if you need to go, or press star three to be placed in the speaker queue. And staff will unmute the callers as they come up. Note there is a short pause as the call is admitted and callers are limited to three minutes. If you are participating phone by phone, make sure you turn off any audio on other devices before you speak so that we can avoid feedback. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Hampton, very much the entire team for the comprehensive presentation, even more so the comprehensive process that we've gone through the importance of obviously recognizing where we are now and everyone's slowing down a bit so everyone can fully understand and have the ability to fully engage with the process is so important. So thank you for the proposed next steps and an updated schedule as well. Madam clerk, who do we have up first? Would you reset the rules for folks, please? Yes, sir, as Chris has stated, callers will have three minutes to speak. If you haven't already done so, please press star three to join the speaker queue. At this time, we have two individuals who are in the queue. The first individual, I do not have a name, but your phone number ends in 2970. We will proceed to add the caller into the meeting there. Thank you, sir. You're welcome. My first caller. I have a question for Rick and then back at the start of all this covered stuff, you said that you believe that cover restrictions are unconstitutional. Why do you support them now? And I apologize, we need for all callers to state their name for the record. Michael Bailey. Oh, Michael Bailey. Michael Bailey. Well, just in the interest of preserving the focus of the public hearing before us, Mr. Bailey, if at the end of the agenda, if Mr. Rick and then wants to take up that question, he can, I think he may dialogue with. Oh, wait. So, as far as you guys ever gonna talk about this again. Now we're talking about the proposed regulation before us. So I wouldn't have the opportunity to ask about it and otherwise I would ask. No, you would actually I'm asking everyone. Obviously we want to make sure that we remain focused on the issue before us. That is a legitimate public policy question. Mr. Bailey, not the issue before us right now. When am I gonna be able to ask it? At the end of the agenda, when we have opportunity for public input and obviously if we're able to possibly get through the agenda, that should be very soon. So I would encourage you just to maybe be a little, a little bit more patient if possible. I would really appreciate that. Okay, I'll wait. I'll ask him again then. Thank you, sir. Thank you so much. Thank you, Mr. Bailey. We have next on clerk. Okay, right now we have a Mr. Haynes Paul or Paul Haynes who will add the speaker to the meeting now. Thank you. Welcome. Mr. Mayor, council, dedicated city staff, thanks for hearing me out today. I have a rather nuanced request slash question. I am a property owner in the Victory Gardens neighborhood. And I noticed that the designation proposed for this neighborhood is that of a RSF-1 large lot. And I had spoken to Hope a little over a year ago about possibly changing the designation for the neighborhood to allow for more development. This neighborhood has not seen any new construction in over 27 years. And that's due to the high cost of construction combined with low property values in the area. I personally have been working diligently to help turn the neighborhood around. There is no functioning neighborhood association that I can tell I've spoken with the former secretary. Myself and several others in the neighborhood would like the council and zoning administrators to consider allowing for a less restrictive zoning policy so that more new lots could be created in the neighborhood and hopefully spur development and bring positive changes. All right. Thank you. And Chris, can someone help answer that? Yes, we've actually been in contact. So we will, I think we can have that conversation offline with him, Ms. Divine has assisted us in making this connection. So we will continue those conversations. Super. Super. Perfect. Thank you. Thank you so much. And thanks for your leadership in helping get things organized in the neighborhood. Strong neighborhoods associations make a strong neighborhood and strong neighborhoods make a strong city. So thank you. Yes, sir. Thank you for taking the time to listen. Yes, sir. Madam Clerk. Okay. And there have been a minute this time. We have a voicemail message from Ms. Diane Wiley that I would like to play into the record. Thank you, ma'am. Welcome. My name is Diane Wiley. Our telephone number is 803-404-1070. I'm still waiting to talk to somebody. We need to talk in these meetings because this is concerning us. You all work for us, not we work for y'all. And we don't, we don't have the time to sit and listen to the meetings all through because we got our day-to-day duties to do. But anyway, when this is over with, then we can do what we need to do as far as our communities. In our communities, 29203 and four, they need some uplift. These are people that's on fixed incomes. You need to be trying to do things like that. And then zoning map, we need to be looking at the zoning map to see what's going on. Because it will stop certain things coming in our neighborhood. You know, these people don't have nowhere else to go. And they, and another thing, a lot of houses, every time you turn around, somebody want to buy a house, why you want to buy it now? Because we are in this city and it's not fair. So we need to wait until this COVID is over with to get some things done, stop doing things under the table because we need to talk to each other in face-to-face. All of y'all on city council know what I'm going through. Been out of my house going on six years. We can't get anything done. So I'm gonna pass the word on to everybody I know about what's going on. Thank you very much. Thank you. I know we'll have an opportunity to dial Ms. Wiley. Thank you so much, Madam Clerk. Anyone else in the queue? No, sir, we don't have anyone else in the queue at this time, but I do have a message that was left on the web portal but I would like to read into the record. Please, would you? Yes, sir. The comment says myself and some other residents and property owners in Victory Gardens would like for city officials to consider changing the zoning designation for the neighborhood to allow for small lot sizes to spur new construction. No new homes have been built in the neighborhood in 27 years despite available lots. This is due to the high cost of construction and low property values. A zoning designation of RSF-3 would conform to many already existing lots and be in keeping with the character of the neighborhood. There is no functioning neighborhood association but I am willing to petition residents and owners to gauge overall opinion. I personally own seven properties in the area that currently has an RSF-1 designation accounting for one tenth of the total properties affected. Please consider making this change to allow us to revitalize this neighborhood, returning it to a safe, vibrant place to live. And I do not have a name for the, oh, and that again was from Mr. Paul Hainster. I apologize, I didn't pick up on that. Sure, sure. Okay, well, thank you, ma'am. Thank you very much. And I know that you said Ms. Devine already closed the loop there on victory gardens. And again, I want to, if there's no other no one else who's popped into the queue, Madam Clerk, let's go ahead and continue moving. I do want to highlight again for interested parties who are paying attention that there's not only the extended calendar that Ms. Hampton referenced earlier, but there'll be constant communication, online accessibility, snail mail, phone accessibility. There'll be a number of different ways that our staff will aggressively communicate with folks. Everyone will have an opportunity to have their say. Obviously, I'm sure it's already anticipated, Ms. Wilson, but let's make sure that this presentation, the calendar, the ability for folks to easily understand how to contact folks is on the front page of the city website. And we continue to push that information out. Any questions from council now from Starr? All right, let's... Mr. Mayor, I'm sorry. I see Ms. Devine, I see Mr. Rickman. Just Ms. Hampton, can you just repeat again? I just want to make sure it's clear because I think there's been some confusion that there can't be any changes that based on your proposed schedule look like if there are input that requires changes that will go to the planning commission and still keep us within the schedule, but things can be changed, is that correct? Yes, ma'am. We have already identified a few changes that need to be made. Those were mentioned earlier. In addition to a couple others, with 46,000 parcels, you're gonna have a few that you identify. So those along with others that we will actually bring back as part of that process to a work session to council to make sure those are aligned with you all's goals and not so that we don't have to do this more than twice. So we will gather those up over these next days, bring those back to you at a work session type meeting, and then bring those changes back on those dates that were listed with July. So we are going to make changes and we will make additional changes as a result of the feedback and direction from council. Thank you. Daniel, Daniel? Yes, I just wanted to ask Christa what the best way is to connect. I know that you've gotten several phone calls and you were very helpful with the Wood Creek folks and other folks who had questions. Do you want to continue to use that platform that we did with Wood Creek and some of the other neighborhoods where the people were able to log on and kind of have a point person ask questions? If necessary, and I know you made some corrections and clarified some things for the Heathwood neighborhood and others, but just wanted to see if that if that was your preferred way to handle some of these questions that may still pop up. Certainly, if it's kind of neighborhood wide, if it's more general like that, it's best if we can get as many people together as possible to go over those questions. Once we get into the weeds and maybe property specific questions, that's where these one-on-ones are useful as well. So we'll be flexible in how we get this information out but for time's sake, it's best if we can get a bunch of people in a call or on a teleconference. And then if people have things that they need to dig into, we can set up a subsequent meeting. Mr. Mayor. Yes, sir, Mr. McDowell. Yeah, I'm sort of in agreement with Daniel. You did a presentation for the Lion Street community and it was well accepted. And all questions were answered. So if we could do something similar to that as we push forward, that would be tremendously helpful. Absolutely. This is gonna be a masterclass and constant communication, y'all. So I think every question you get, whether big or small, any neighborhood, from a group or from an individual, let's make sure we have a seem amount of transmitting those messages to our staff and they are ready, willing and able to try and address those concerns. And as Mr. Pines question indicated, if changes need to be made, we have the ability and authority to do so. So let's just keep on, Teresa, again, just recognizing that people get all the information from so many different sources right now. So let's just endeavor to be fully transparent as we make this very important step forward, which indeed is what it is. So if there are no more questions of Kristen and the team, then I'm trying to make sure we're understanding where we do call this public hearing to an end, right? Or do we leave it open? I'm trying to remember. We've got some more things in the public hearing. Okay, okay, please, I'm sorry. Let's keep on going. Guys, thank you. Thank you, Ms. Duvall. Keep on going. Starting off with 14. So are you all done with this item, Mayor? Yeah, we are. We are, yes, ma'am. Yes, ma'am. Thank you. And I want to say thank you to our wonderful sign language interpreters. And Krista was thanking all of you and us, but we certainly have to thank her and her team. This has been quite the undertaking. They've done a great job. All right, good deal. Let's go on. Let's go on back. I apologize though. We had the whole thing done with 20 since that was a big one. Going back to 14. Yes, sir. And Krista, are you prepared to switch gears back to these? Hope y'all can see my screen. Yes, ma'am. All right, so we have an annexation with future land use map and zoning map amendments for a .478 portion at 680, it's Kandy Lane. It's a request to annex, assign the land use classification of UEMR and assign a zoning of C2 with the flood protective area. All right, is there anyone here to speak in favor of or against this? Ma'am, clerk? No, sir, not at this time. We would ask that if someone would like to speak in regards to this matter that they press R3 to join the speaker team. All right. No, sir. All right, thank you, ma'am. So moved. Moved by Mr. McDowell. Is there a second? Second. Any discussion? Seeing none, we'll move the previous question. Clerk, call the roll. Mr. Brennan. Yes. Mr. Reubenan. Aye. Mr. McDowell. Yes. Mr. Duvall. Aye. Mr. Weiss. Aye. Mr. Davis. Aye. Mayor Benjamin. Aye. An annexation with future land use map and zoning map amendment at .509 acres on the south side of Kandy Lane, a request to annex and assign the land use classification of UEMR and transitional sensitive lands and assign a zoning of neighborhood commercial that C2 with a floodplain overlay. Again, this is a small donut hole. All right, super. Madam clerk, we have anyone who signed up to speak on this matter? No, sir. All right. Move, Mr. Mayor. I'm moving by Mr. McDowell. Is there a second? Second. I'm moving probably second. Any discussion? Seeing none, we'll move the previous question. The clerk called her off. Mr. Vernon. Yes. Mr. Rickerman. Aye. Mr. McDowell. Yes. Mr. I. Mr. Davis. Aye. Mayor Benjamin. Aye. Thank you. Duvall would also like to be recorded as I. I suppose so, sir. Thank you. Good deal. All right. An annexation with a future land use map and zoning map amendment for 103 acres near Circle View Road and 21.9 acres on the west side of Circle View Road. It's a request to annex the signed land use classification of UEMR and transitional sensitive lands TS with a zoning of RG2, general residential with a flood protective overlay. All right. Location. Madam clerk, do we have anyone who signed up to speak in favor of or against this matter? No, sir. All right. All right. Is there a motion? The move. All right. Is there a second? Second. Any discussion? Seeing none, with the previous question, I'm clerk, call the roll. Mr. Vernon. Yes. Mr. Rickman. Aye. Mcdowell. Yes. Mr. Duvall. Aye. Mr. DeVine. Aye. Mr. Davis. Aye. Mayor Bensame. Aye. All right. Donut hole right near downtown, annexation with future land use and zoning map amendments, properties on East Broadway, Post Street, South Evans and South Assembly Street. It's a request to annex with a land use classification of AC-2 and UC-AC-1 and UCMR-3 scrabble. I just won. Assign zoning of light industrial, that's M1 with a portion in the flood protective area and C2 with a portion in the flood protective area. This is a much better way of describing it via a map. Right here on South Assembly, Capitol City ballpark is right across the street. That was pretty good, Krista. Is anyone who signed up to speak in favor of Oregon system? Madam clerk. No, sir, not at this time. All right. Is there a motion? We'll move. Second. Is there any discussion? Question, Mr. Mayor. Krista, can you confirm all these properties are currently owned by the University of South Carolina? Correct. All right. Thank you. Certainly. All right. All right. Seeing no further discussion, we'll move the previous question on clerk Caldwell. Mr. Brennan. Yes. Mr. Rickerman. Aye. Mr. McDowell. Yes. Mr. Duvall. Aye. Mr. Vine. Aye. Mr. Davis. Aye. Mayor Benshaw. Aye. What we have now is only a future land use map amendment. We recently had a request for rezoning, which was withdrawn, but it showed that the land use at this location, which is performance parkway at the Midlands Tech campus, this is to modify it from industrial to employment campus, which will permit a great many more uses. Again, it's only land use. It's not zoning. But instead of having to do a two step process, potentially in the future, this will facilitate a quicker development. So this is to go from the industrial into the employment campus. Madam clerk, is anyone signed to speak on this matter? Not fair. All right. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. There's a motion to approve. Moved by Mr. McDowell. Seconded by Mr. Davis. Is there any discussion? And y'all feel free to, I can't put the map up. I can't see everyone's hand at the same time. So if I miss you, please speak up. Seeing no discussion, with the previous question, the clerk call the roll. Mr. Vernon. Yes. Mr. Rickerman. Aye. Mr. McDowell. Yes. Mr. Duvall. Aye. Mr. Vine. Aye. Mr. Davis. Aye. Mayor Benjamin. Aye. Thank you. This is a zoning map amendment or a rezoning for parcels on Oak and Henry streets. This is a request to rezone the parcels from general residential, that's RG1 and RG2 and C2. So it's got a melange here to C1. This is the property that the second Nazareth church has recently been working to improve. Great. All right. Is anyone who signed up to speak in favor of or against this matter? Madam first. Okay. So moved, Mr. Mayor. Moved by Mr. McDowell. Second. Okay. Second. Mr. Rickerman, is there any discussion from council? Seeing none, I'll move the previous question to the park corridor. Mr. Vernon. Yes. Mr. Rickerman. Aye. Mr. McDowell. Yes. Mr. Duvall. Aye. Mr. Vine. Aye. Mr. Davis. Aye. Mayor Benjamin. Aye. And sir, that now concludes your zoning public hearing. Thank you. All right. Thank you. All right. I got to tell you, you guys are pretty cool but Ms. Hernandez is amazing. I want to find that. Okay. Is that what is that? It's still amazing again, Ms. Hernandez. Amazing. Well, that's what that's what you are. That's what you are. Thank you. Thank you so much. And her predecessor, Mayor Benjamin. I don't know if you saw, they switched out at once. Well, this is pretty cool. I think every opportunity we have to make sure that true accessibility is real to every single one of us citizens is important. So thank you so much. And Krista, your team, Teresa, excellent workers you. Yes, sir. Wonderful Clark Mayor for helping us get it all together and Ms. Yuzi with the interpreters. Mr. Mishinin, would you like to move back to the consent agenda? We have one... Absolutely, yes, let's do the consent agenda. Okay. And we have a budget presentation as well. It's not long though. There are no amendments to the consent agenda, right? No, sir. All right. Is there a motion to approve items 6 through 13? I move to approve items 6 through 13. Second. Moving seconded and I would encourage the public to pay very close attention to a number of very important infrastructure and quality life matters on the consent agenda. I know that Mr. McDowell is particularly excited about the lighting at the colony North Point All-Star ball field. That's something that our team at Parks and Rec and the Mr. Davis been working on for quite some time. So this is exciting but a number of significant quality life improvements, including some significant contracts awarded to local firms. Let's keep on being a part of the economic ecosystem of the Midlands. When we move to the previous question, we'll call it a roll. Mr. Brennan. Yes. Mr. Rickerman. Hi. Mr. McDowell. Yes. Mr. McDowell. Hi. Mr. Vines. Hi. Mr. Davis. Hi. Mayor Benjamin. Hi. Thank you. You're welcome. Mayor Benjamin and Counsel, we do have a resolution item 21 resolution number ARC 2021-005 authorizing the city manager to execute a first amendment to the venue license agreement between Hartwell Capital, LLC and the city of Columbia. All right. Is there a motion? Moved approval. Is there a second? Second. All right. In discussion with the previous question, we'll call it a roll. Mr. Brennan. Yes. Mr. Rickerman. Hi. Mr. McDowell. Yes. Mr. DeVall. Hi. Mr. Vines. Hi. Mr. Davis. Hi. Mayor Benjamin. Hi. Thank you. Mayor Benjamin and Counsel, you have one appointment, the historic Columbia Foundation. I'm sure Ashley is on the line to assist. Yeah, I think we, I think we, do we have, don't we want to push that back out for some more applications? I think we didn't have enough applications. Is that correct? You're still muted, Ashley. Is that correct? It is. Can we, can we go ahead? Can we go ahead? That's such an important board. And I'd love to cast a wide net again, see if we can get some more applicants for that. If no one disagrees, let's post it for another couple of weeks and encourage all of us to aggressively reach out to constituents just to at least gen up some more applications. All right. All right. Super. All right. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Ashley, for your great work. Can we go on back to the, to Missy's report? Partly, Mayor Benjamin. And while she's getting her presentation teed up, Director Tensley's situational reports and your inboxes for the second time. I know they're working on some things for tomorrow. And I don't know that he had anything else to report other than what's in your inboxes. Okay. All right. All right. I would, I would just, if there's any particular points of public import that, that, that not just right update. Obviously we'll read our dates, but I know a lot of folks rely on the Harry's report. I just want to make sure that that's available to the public as well in some way. So either, either a version of it also posted on the website or a very brief highlights for public. Consumption with you are involved, I think, as you had already noted, he probably would have spoken to the, you know, collaboration with DHAC and our partners on vaccine distribution. And they normally put those updates out on Fridays. They've been doing that on the website and, you know, all the platforms. So he'll do that. We'll share reports. We'll have, we'll have the responsibility of sharing with the public. I do know that, of course, that Director Tinsley along with Chief Holbrooke, never knows they're getting prepared for certainly making sure responsibly handle any crowds that might make themselves present tomorrow. The count along with thankful for his leadership at this time as well. This issue. All right. Thank you. Thank you. Yes. So as Missy is preparing, you all should have received a memo. We need a couple of actions taken today that she'll go through, which really have more to do with hospitality tax. Probably three action items there. And then I will just say that the budget process is beginning to get underway. I anticipate it being not much unlike what we went through this past budget season. And so with that, quite frankly, there's no need to take our staff and department directors through any unnecessary exercises. You know, the budget will be flat. And we hope to bring it to you probably in a more of a scaled approach that you can hopefully review. And approve well ahead of our normal schedule so that we can move forward with getting more accurate projections on collections. And if we are able to make some amendments in the fall, that's probably more realistic. So Missy's budget memo addresses that at the end and she can speak to it a little bit more. But that's the approach as of right now that I'd like to take. Mayor Benjamin and Councilman, of course, will be giving you more details very shortly. Also in your inbox, this is the CAFR, which is good and and all of the hard work that Jeff and Jan and the team have done to get that completed as well as monthly financials are in your inbox. Thank you so much, Teresa. Missy. Good afternoon. Thank you, Miss Wilson. And good afternoon, City Council. It's good to be with you today. I want this meeting should be this presentation should be very brief, as Wilson mentioned, we do have three items for action for City Council. But also while we're updating our hospitality tax program wanted to just give you a sense of where we are currently. Does everyone see our screen? That was a chart of collections when I think it's buildings in the city. That's right, it is. It was the city's buildings. So with regards to our hospitality program, City Council proved a budget last September of or actually the budget was proven in June of 7.1 million dollars. There was and also included allocation of carry forwards that was in the proposal passed by City Council in September for allocate grant allocations that included three hundred and three thousand carry forward. So we have a total, total working budget of 7.5 million. As of December 31st, we had collected 4.6 million for about 65% of budget collections. So that's the good news for today for certain is that while we are having significantly reduced budget compared to last year, we are on target so far the first six months in terms of collections. So that's a very good news. Of course, we have six more months to go to see, you know, where we end up, but that is promising to see. At the same time last year, we were at 6.1 million in collections and about 55% of the budget. Overall, that's still down about 1.5 million compared to the same time the prior year. Next, just wanted to talk a little bit about grant allocations. City Council awarded a total of $3 million in allocations for external groups. Again, that includes $303,000 that was, it was just reaffirming carry forwards that would be brought forward with those organizations. To date, we've paid about 1.1 million, almost 1.1 million. That's about 36% of the grant allocations. Normally you would have allocated about 70 different allocations. This year, it was about 32 allocations in total awards. So far to date, we've processed all, I'll pay request. We have about four pending for final payment for payment for payment at this time, but we anticipate will be processed either this week or next week in terms of outstanding. So with regards to just update, just to sort of give you where we are, the picture with regards to hospitality tax update, we do want to move it forward with a couple of action items based on some discussions that City Council has had over the past couple of months. The first being a City Council public art project that's been discussed in recent months. City Council included funding, there was an allocation already included in the budget of $50,000. So now this is a matter of taking action today to allocate those funds specifically to the Parks and Recreation Foundation who will be facilitating that funding in that project. Next, we wanted to talk about some discussions that have come up many times with regards to our guidelines and how to best facilitate these organizations that are currently having to adapt to their programming and services that they submitted for applications for the hospitality tax grant process for their awards for this fiscal year. Normally our grant process, our grant, all of our procedures follow state law of course with regards to funding that is related to tourism, cultural, historic and recreational use. City also adapts guidelines specifically for how we utilize those funds or how we administer those funds through these grants through this programming. One of the recommendations that we have for City Council in terms of adapting our current guidelines is to allow up to 50% of building a facility, the principle of items but the building a facility that the organizations are housed as well as up to 50% of administrative and operating cost of tourism related cultural recreation or historical facilities and buildings. Currently these are not allowed in our guidelines so we are recommending for up to 50% of the organizations cost to be allowed for this year through June 30th, 2021. Next, and I'm glad to entertain some questions before we move forward but just highlighting the final recommendation. I'm sorry, I can't see if you all are waving on or stopping me to speak so. Go ahead and get your last point, I have some questions. Okay good and so the last one is just discussions in terms of preparing for next year as Ms. Wilson said. Already we do anticipate that the budget that we bring forward, the City Manager's budget that she brings forward to you in the coming months will look very very similar to the budget that we have this year across most almost all of our funds. We we're not ready to give you projections yet for hospitality tax funding but we anticipate at this point that we look very similar to where we are today. With that in mind we wanted to keep our eye forward with regards to how council may want to allocate a hospitality tax grant program, what that may look like in terms of time wise as well. Normally you utilize obviously a tax hospitality tax committee process that normally would be meeting now or getting ready to meet here in the next couple of months so we wanted to know where city council is leaning in that direction as we look forward and then finally what we would look at with regards to allocations of dates for when we would allocate these funds whether it's through a city council process or through the or or or application process. So those are three items specifically related to hospitality tax. I do have I do have a quick update on accommodations tax as well as just the budget process that Ms. Wilson already identified with regards to next year's allocation and next year's overall budget process. I can either stop here and we can talk specifically about hospitality tax or move forward let me know your preference. All right I have a question. Let's go ahead and let's go ahead and take some questions first on H tax then we'll take Mr. Duvall. Yeah Missy I have a question on your number two there. Fifty percent for building and facilities rental that are prism related and fifty percent for administrative and operating costs. I want to make sure that that includes organizations that are supporting our tourism related industry such as the Vista Gill five points association city center partnership that that that sort of stuff. I think it's very important for us and that was one of the keys when we were drawing up this proposal for funding the group the 32 groups that did get funding this year is that we were trying to keep in operation those business organizations that were supporting the districts. I'm sorry sir what so yes I don't think we were limiting it to specific of the 32 if we open to all of all the organizations that received funding but 50 percent of administrative and operating costs of tourism related organizations you say tourism related cultural recreational and historical facilities and buildings but I want to make sure that we're covering the organizations that are supporting those tourism related cultural recreational historical facilities and buildings. Oh Missy this is Teresa we might want to talk about this we're getting into legal advice I don't know if you want to talk about it here you want to talk about an executive session because we've got to stick with the statute ill so I'd recommend we talk about an executive session. Understood we can we can discuss with everyone executive session we're going to comply with state statute I mean so that's that's not up for debate between give us a council and we'll take that council in executive session but we're going to stick with state law. Any other questions on the age tax recommendations again I can't see everyone with this with the screen up so if you got a question speak up otherwise we'll shift into the discussion around a tax all right please missy thank you next is just accommodations tax the budget for accommodations tax was 1.4 million again it was significantly decreased budget compared to prior years as anticipated so far we have only collected one quarter accommodations tax collections come in from the state and they are they are remitted to the city quarterly we've only received the first quarter so we do not yet know how we did on the second quarter but that one quarter is on target so that's a positive sign again we've collected 412,000 first quarter prior year by that same period was 680 the city's fourth quarter is the on average the highest quarter that we received so we'll see where we are as of in terms of payment we've only processed 125,000 we did receive a significant allocation or our pay request now that will move forward in the coming weeks as well any questions about accommodations tax no it's good to see trend lines improving and on in both of those areas so thank you any other questions all right all right and finally just as mentioned bringing forward a budget we look we anticipate to look very similar to the current year we are looking to get a compressed but a focused budget process specifically wanting to bring forward account a proposed budget a little bit earlier than we would in in prior years with anticipation of bringing back some additional discussions later in the year as we continue to monitor as always monitor our revenues and monitor where we are overall all right super all right any other questions or comments from Ms. Kaufman all right thank you so we got we got the staff recommendations need to require action is that right Teresa all right um is there a motion all right do we hold and do we want to hold do we need to hold the second item we'll go ahead and act and get received council later no let's hold that second item all right well we'll hold the second item and move on on on request one and one and three is there a second second any discussion with the previous question court call roll Mr. Brandon Mr. Rickman hi Mr. McDowell yes Mr. Duvall hi Ms. Devine Mr. Davis if Mr. Davis is an I I'm sure I'll look at his as the way the way he moves his head I am an I thank you thank you Missy I wanted to make sure your third recommend your third item read as a recommendation did it as far as committee process thank you Ms. Wilson actually three was asking if it was preference for a committee process or for city council allocations all right make the allocations directly so we're voting a committee process we're voting item one uh what is this so that's actually discussion item what what's the thought on uh on that any feedback from council I think if we're going to have the some amount of money the little bit amount of money that we had last year we need to keep it at the council level that is our recommendation mayor and council but again we didn't want to um I'm going to you ought to give us some guidance there but we can do it either way depending on your preference but our recommendation would be to well my recommendation would be to keep it um with the council I'm in favor of that have problem then when we can we can proceed as as such if things change and we we need that I of course I I always prefer the um the committee processes I know you all do with with ultimate say coming to the council at the end of the day but obviously these are extraordinary times so I'm I'm fine I'm fine either way seems like that's the uh at least a view of a preponderance of council at least and that that recommendation from me was after Missy had um been in consultation with the chairs and Missy I believe they agreed or I don't want to speak miss speak yes you're correct miss Wilson the the thought that being that if there's there's not as much funds available then there were this year that you're still going to be limited by how you could allocate your council could allocate um amounts as they like and then keep them with with the committee process later in the year that's another option that's that's encouraging that makes me feel like that okay thank you thank you all right all right um and we'll take up item two and I assume if any required action item two we can take up after executive session or next meeting no rush there that's correct mayor all right super all right thank you all right um let's keep it moving and thank you again missy thank you missy that you need or miss madame clarker are we good with the motions as that is the room and as I was coming back in you all were going through the roll call would you have a comment restating the motions just so that we're clear we move well on the list of recommendations um uh we approved item one uh we approved staff recommendations on item three and we're holding item uh two for executive session uh to receive a legal counsel thank you yes ma'am thank you thank you and with that mayor benjamin we can move into a period of committee reports or referrals we have uh any uh any items for uh council committee referral uh referral or report on miss the mr madal just um just to report the administrative policy sees committee met on the 14th uh we met with dr bobby donelson uh robert hughes robin weights and of course our two committee members howard and uh sam reference in the renaming of the park uh the meeting was very productive uh there were several uh several dr donelson did an excellent job in suggesting persons uh saved for for that honor uh we were most impressed with all of their presentations uh i think out of this comes uh there was a conversation with the hughes company to um perhaps help us to identify ways the community could perhaps get involved in perhaps suggesting names uh we are scheduled to meet again i think on the 28th of january the 28th of january and uh we will further discuss this process the process of course will involve uh the committee sort of decided on what that name or those names are and bring it to council for approval uh howard sam is there anything you need to add on to that you know we may bring with that we may bring more than one name and let the council that's correct here's a discussion and decide on the name that's correct thank you sam thank you have something no i i agree uh i think the reason we may end up with uh more than one recommendation uh that the information that was presented you know sometimes you really think you know the real story and you know you know but the enlightening thing is that you realize that you really don't know until you get that kind of information and uh there's a rich rich history uh behind that property and the impact on the uh on the society of the capital city and the state so i hope everybody gets an opportunity to uh maybe um hear some of the um information that's presented regarding the names that were put at the table howard if you would what's the name of the book and the thought yeah the the book was written by uh charles bryan on um dr babcock that's called the asylum doctor that's it and uh it has a lot of information in it uh dr donelson was familiar with it and um we we had i think from uh robin weightson historic columbia they had about 14 names 17 17 names that uh had significant influence in on the mental health facility and in richmond county uh most of whom i did not know a couple of them had already been honored on the facility with the street naming of streets new streets and we certainly need to get a marker on those streets telling the connection of the name with the property and the um efforts that that particular person did to to have that the reason we named that street after them the um thank y'all thank you thank you for your work there and thank you mr mcdonnell for laying out exactly how this process is going to proceed uh with obviously the ultimate um uh recommendations coming from the committee to council um the um you all may remember a way back when when we went through the process of even naming the fireflies uh there was a wonderful collaborative fund process that had the uh the input of folks like dr donelson and and um historic columbia and others that that um turned into something that was uh again a community building process which everything we do should be so thank you for your work and leadership there are there any other referrals or reports various committees mayor i would just um add that we had a one wonderful virtual mlk day program here today we want to thank you for your keynote thank reverend dahl for his participation um you know we had to do things differently but by all accounts it was well received so thank you all and the message of dr king and his leadership on nonviolent social action couldn't be more appropriate than uh anytime in a history that we're thankful and thankful to our wonderful staff for helping us pull that together theresa reverend dahl and and of course and of course mr mayor we are very appreciative that uh as you know yesterday would have been a a house filled with folk if we were not in this pandemic but of course we were able to do a food drive and that food drive was highly successful uh food came in um we had i think if hindry is on the line he could probably tell you over two thousand dollars in contributions and of course the food came in in a gigantic way so we're very appreciative to our acm hindry simon and randy davis um and all of those folk who helped us pack up that food and uh harvest hope getting it to them so job well done yes sir agreed all right awesome thank you any other referrals reports seeing none um do we have uh i know we had at least one um caller earlier i had a question for mr rick and then do we have any other folks in the queue madam claire yes sir um we have the gentleman who spoke earlier mr bailey he's holding on the line okay i can add him now if you're ready sure i want to thank mr bailey for his patience and please uh please add absolutely okay can you guys hear me yeah mr bailey thanks thanks again for your patience really really appreciate it well the question for councilman rick and then is back when the covet stuff started he said that all the restrictions that were going on are unconstitutional i'd like to know why he's changed his mind mr bailey you and i've had this conversation about a thousand times already and i've answered your questions i've listened to your your arguments and we didn't say all the restrictions you specifically today probably multiple times today had reached out to me and i've answered your questions around the mask and and some of your statements and we just simply disagree in that and while i appreciate that you know you have every right to reach out to us and i for all the time um i've had this conversation i think the polluter would like to know why you did that i appreciate your time and thank you very much are you on answer i've already answered your question mr bailey i have answered i want to answer to everybody else i mean you hear everybody can see it why don't you tell everybody who voted for you why you're doing that voted for which statement you you've given me seven or eight different statements which one would you like me to address hey you were against the masks originally why did you change your mind on them why did i change my mind because it gives us an opportunity to move forward in our community allow our businesses be open and be safe and so far it has been open anyways well mr bailey you and i are going to disagree you thought you thought you thought they were against you thought they were unconstitutional but now you're all for them i did not say i never said that to you it was on your twitter i never said that that it is on my twitter bailey please maybe i'll go look it up i can forward it to you go ahead thank you mr bailey thank you mr bailey and thank you mr rick and then all right um anyone else in the queue erica no sir thank you ma'am thank you very much all right mr duvall mr ma'am i'd like to move that we go into executive session for receipt of legal advice related to matters covered by a 20 client privilege pursuant to seco 30-4 s 78 to covid-19 canal recovery efforts landmark district designation discussion involved you could add h tax guidelines to that that item please and h tax guidelines thank you uh discussion of negotiations incidents proposed contractual arrangements pursuant to 30-4 s 78 to salute a river greenway and legislative affairs all right thank you very much um is there a second welcome is there any discussion all right with the previous question card call the roll yes mr rickamon hi mr mcdowell yes mr duvall hi mr zine hi mr davis hi mayor benjamin hi