it's a party in here today I will call the February 20th 2024 city council work session to order and turn it over to David Cook thank you good afternoon everybody well thank you that was good good let's go how about first we'll do some employee recognitions I'm going to call on William Johnson William he's going to do a couple employee recognitions good afternoon mayor and councel um I'd like to start with uh special recognition for that'll go to our Economic Development Department um this late last year uh there was a recognition by business facilities magazine for the new seens project that went in here in Fort Worth it was recognized uh as a uh man for and Advanced manufacturing facility this magazine is a national publication utilized by site selection uh companies all over the all over the country and uh we were Seamans would was awarded was was recognized and awarded um and big Thanks goes to our economic development team uh led by Robert Sterns and Sheree Gordon as our project manager congratulations [Applause] and I've got one more um on last week uh during visit forth wor annual meeting um they awarded the Beyond award now the Beyond award goes to uh the Frontline employee who exemplifies exceptional customer service uh to our visitors and our guests this is an annual award and it's a major recognition this year the award went to uh one of our public events team members MERS and the convention and visitors bureau I mean the convention center uh events coordinator Maria Herrera Maria [Applause] congratulations William I know you're going to let me brag on Maria a little more than that now please do all right well mayor and count good afternoon as you know travel and tourism is a significant piece of Fort Worth's economy over 31,000 residents work in the industry generating over $3.1 billion dollar per year Mitch did I get that right yes sir thank you very much uh visitors to our community have great experiences in Fort Worth and return again and again not because of what they get from decision- making wonks like us but because of the service that they receive from Frontline employees in the industry every year visit Fort Worth honors the best of these professionals with their Beyond award the winner of this year's Beyond award is Maria Herrera who serves Maria serves as an event coordinator at the Fort Worth Convention Center she was nominated by her supervisor Fort Worth Convention Center Senior public events manager Alison mnam Allison wave rest of the Fort Worth team who is here to support Maria wave cool all right in her nomination uh Allison noted that Maria's clients routinely compliment her for her dedication and enthusiasm to provide an excellent customer experience Maria in turn passes credit for those compliments to the team at the convention Center for their execution of those events at the highest level Maria has been a member of the Fort Worth Convention Center staff since 2021 she previously worked at the Worthington Hotel in a variety of positions we are fortunate to have her on our team it's important to note that this is the second Beyond Award winner in the public events Department in the past three years Claude Humphrey who serves as field operations supervisor at the Will Rogers Memorial Center won the award in 2022 please join me in congratulating Maria as this year's Beyond Award [Applause] winner obligatory fot okay awesome thank you thank you Mike thank you William next I'm going to call on Richard Zavala and he's going to announce an award of a grant good afternoon Richard zala Park and Recreation Department uh I am pleased to share with you that in January the Texas Parks and Wildlife Commission awarded a $1.5 million local park fund grant for the Sycamore Park Community project you may not know but we closed a golf course there a few years ago and we master plan the Northern end of the park north of B we had $2 million in the 22 Bond program uh allocated an additional 2 million in general gas Capital took that money to Austin leveraged it for another million and a half dollars we're going to do a $5.5 million project on a park that was one of the original eight parks in the park system Trinity Forest caps and those including Sycamore so we are reinvesting in that and because we're using a Parks and Wildlife Grant we're doing a lot of natural habitat within the the park besides Trails uh Wetlands things like that it'll give us a a start to connectivity up Sycamore Creek to the Trinity River so it's a really Lynch pin project for something that we're doing here so I want to thank you I want to thank the council because throughout my tenure here councils before you and this councils have supported Land and Water Conservation fund have supported the local park Grant fund which comes from State sporting good sales tax we're pretty good at it since 2015 we've gotten eight grants totaling $8.1 million the last one was at the Nature Center and we're going to dedicate that in April and we're going to kick off with Sycamore uh in 2024 so I wanted to let you know the good news congratulations Richard I think council member Bivens has a comment good afternoon Richard how are you outstanding this is this is not a trick question I do I'm going to start with a compliment okay I want to thank you for your people showing up in moer Valley over the weekend for a meeting there and for folk who don't know moer Valley is where the first freed slaves settled in Texas and we have built and continue to work on a park there but this is my effort to help you out uh from time to time people want to donate land and they want you to take it up as a park what kind of land do you not want generally we're we're looking for standards based on our part Park recreation open space master plan and we do it by population and neighborhood park units and Community Park units so that's the first test we always run our land to see does it fit that criteria and if it does we'll explore it further uh generally our smallest size parks are about 5 Acres we shoot for that but we do have in our plan the ability to do smaller Parks uh more in the downtown area in micr Parks yes ma'am I understand ma'am termin thank you Richard uh for your hard work um I truly am grateful for the investment that we're doing at sore Park I know represent Ramon Romero is going to be excited about it he talks about that part quite often the ply community and so uh thank you for your support and we glad and I love the master plan I look forward to seeing what we do over there apprciate appreciate it thank you Richard all right now I'm G to call on Valerie Washington and she's gonna recognize thank and congratulate somebody who's going to retire soon all right thank you David and mayor and counsel um I think I'm a little sad to say this a lot sad um to bring up Brandon and Henry as they um are on their way to retirement together um I think is Henry with you today Brandon um but I wanted to take an opportunity to let Brandon and Henry have an opportunity um just to for you Brandon to share all that you've done here in the city of Fort Worth um with code enforcement or sorry Code [Applause] Compliance and I know Brandon you'll get emotional um but that's okay though because I think we we we know that um but if you want to take a minute and just um really talk to us about your retirement and your plans and what you and Henry planed to do um we'd really appreciate it so with that let me introduce Brandon Bennett and Henry thank you thank you Valerie so if I get the staff kind of crowd up around the the other Podium here just kind of bring it all in so I I brought I brought some real critical staff with me today um I probably will forget to recognize them uh and I really only brought them so they could see the pain that Council has to go through every time I give a presentation so um you know this is the A Team here and I I I will not forget to uh to mention them so this is this will be um after 43 years 20 with the city of Fort Worth it turns out I'll I'll finish to the minute at 20 at 20 years I started on February 23rd of 2004 so it's been a it's been a good ride so but we're here today not to talk about me but to to talk about uh my best friend and um a great coworker and um I brought notes to keep me on track so uh so I have an article here I think this is a good place maybe to to start this will be a quick presentation I promise um so uh it's from January 20th 1981 and it's it's not much of an article it's just about um a kid and a horse um 16 years old regular Suburban kid uh lives in a Suburban neighborhood doesn't know anything about farming and ranching and uh he comes across this m nourished horse and um comes a time when he says I just I just can't can't walk by this horse anymore and he gets a job washing dishes and when he's got enough money he heads out the door to go buy that horse and you know he thinks that all figured out but about halfway there he realizes he doesn't have a way to bring the horse back so he goes back home and cuts down his mama's uh dry in line in the backyard and makes a halter and a lead rope and takes the horse home puts it in the backyard and a few hours later Mom and Dad show up and of course now they're curious why there's a full- grown horse grazing in the backyard um and dad asked this kid he says uh um probably 100 questions you know what does it eat what about vet bills how long does a horse live and you know this kids I don't know I don't know I don't know and so finally dad says what do you know and the kid says um I knew I couldn't walk by that horse not one more time and I know I'll figure it out and that horse lived another 25 years and they figured it out that uh he taught the horse how to ride in the back of his pickup truck and they took him off to school and uh when he graduated college traveled halfway across the United States his first job and uh raised four beautiful kids taking care of that horse and um you know um but the other part of the article probably the most significant part of the article and it's it's really in the last paragraph is they ask him kind of what his dream is and his dream is that someday he'll work in animal animal welfare and uh almost 30 years to the date of this article um he gets a call from the city manager city manager says hey would you like to to run animal welfare and um and then the city manager says oh by the way uh there's no money there's no staff we're in the middle of a recession you're just going to have to figure it out you know the live release rate uh at that point was less than 30% we were one of the lowest in the nation um just everything was working against Animal Welfare here in Fort Worth and um it uh but the one thing that wasn't working against us was was was the staff you know they were they were small in number but but big in heart and um they they got that live release rate up to about 40% but they struggled with um trying to get it trying to get it higher because there were so many sick animals in the in the shelter and not a good way to isolate them or a good way to care for them so uh one day the this boy now a man is is walking through the shelter and uh he comes across this uh pitiful looking dog uh it was on the youth and Asia list for that afternoon uh it had been running with a pack of aggressive dogs had been chased for for weeks uh and finally gave in to malale nutrition uh dehydration monia uh you name it he had it um you know his ribs and his hips were sticking out his belly kind of hung down on a very frail uh frame um but there was something about that dog that that this this this man saw and when he looked into his eyes it reminded him of that horse of his Youth and the potential and the life and and the opportunity so uh he said we're going to save this one and uh uh the medical staff again reiterated to him how bad the dog was maybe wouldn't even make it through the night and maybe pick a different one and and you know this man if you know him you never know what the hell is going to come out of his mouth but um I I think this time he got it right because he said we're gonna call this dog Henry um and we're gonna save Henry and we're going to save a lot of other animals just like them and staff did just that so the medical treatment Ward um uh Henry became the face of all that is possible working with former council member John Stevenson local businessman Bill Baker uh and the Community Foundation of North Texas Henry and the team raised a million dollars to build a state-of-the-art uh medical treatment facility and I'll tell you Henry we spent $2,500 getting Henry back to health um over the course of his career he has raised $4.8 million for Fort Worth that uh from a financial sense it uh he he is the best sales uh uh person that we got on staff so it was the first of a kind in a public shelter uh but has since become a a national best practice we also uh working with our business Community were able to reach out to PetSmart and PetSmart Charities we were the first ever adoption center in a PetSmart store and not only did we have one but we very quickly added a second one uh one South one north um they uh and that continues to operate that that they allow us the the space free of charge and then they make donations of of goodie bags and food and things like that when people adopt uh we get a little fee back from them or a little bit of money back from them uh but it was a first kind of improvement uh it got the live between the the medical treatment Ward and PetSmart we got the live release rate up to 70% so we went from 30% to 70% uh and the momentum started to really push the program forward so uh we uh we then really adopted very Progressive rescue Foster and Outreach programs uh animal care and control uh revamped its adoption or reclaim policies making it less expensive to adopt an animal uh or reclaim a lost pest the city implemented mandatory microchipping so when we find a dog in the field today we return it right back to the owner Animal Control staff dedicated uh or animal control dedicated staff to be an outbound team focusing on getting even more animals uh into rescue and ginger leech is here a part of the team Ginger uh she has been instrumental in in running that outbound team um her and the team were able to push that from a 70% live release rate uh up to an 80% live release rate and the story continues that we were one of the first adopters of a national uh transport program through using grant money uh we were not taxpayer money using grant money we had a Fort Worth truck and a Fort Worth trailer and we took our pets that we couldn't find homes for all over the United States to shelters that had capacity and could find homes for us we went as far as Maine and as far as Canada um today Fort Worth coordinates with Transfer Partners who uh do it for us including as you can see using airplanes to to transport uh some of these homeless pets so that pushed our live release rate up to 90% And even uh during the pandemic we got as high as 97% so we went from from 30% to 97% and you know no program uh you know is is is good without brand brand recognition it's got to be part of every business plan Henry became the K9 face for the city working with area Healthcare Credit Unions food service and National corporations to participate in community employee programs so I like the picture to the left Cook Children's Hospital one of our greatest Partners has been and continues to be uh Saving Hope uh that is a great organization and and we work step in step to to save animals uh we also drew the attention of local and national animal associations uh there's a picture there of a disaster trailer that was donated from Fort Worth Kennel Club uh and that trailer has gone all over the state during hurricanes and tornadoes and things like that provide Care for Animals uh and then kind of the picture I like is this one here to the right um that's Henry at the van kurn Performance Hall Where We snuck him in so uh at times he could be a little Noy too so uh in 2018 uh the voters approved a overwhelmingly approved a bond package for new a new North Animal Shelter we wasted no time in getting it built open it up in early 2021 it's been featured in a number of trade magazines uh for its pod design uh both matching our Western culture and providing a much better environment for animal shelter pets and it's also recognized as a national best practice so uh so I get into the final couple of slides here probably the thing that Henry is most famous for um is being the K9 Ambassador for the City you name it Hen Henry was probably there he never missed a single state of the city presentation morning news shows blue zones cow toown cleanup ham radio storm spotters NASCAR Habitat for Humanity ice storms pandemic West Nile Virus dunk tanks you name it he did it in fact the the kind of the fun story about the dunk tank is we put him in a dunk tank and people paid good money and intentionally missed the target uh because they couldn't stomach the idea of a lab going into water I don't know um but I'll tell you the two favorite things uh for Henry over the years by far the two favorite uh first was table scraps at the Fort Worth club right he'll tell you those are the best table scraps ever and second is the time that he spent in schools that Henry spent day after day with hundreds and then thousands of of of children and we have Kayla Gonzalez here today Kayla was the the Handler that that facilitated did that and in fact this past uh Thanksgiving we had pets giving at the shelter and there was a mom that came up to me and she was going through her phone to find a picture because when her boys were in elementary school Henry had come to the school and they had taken a picture with them and there at the shelter that day the kids are in their teens and still doing Animal Welfare thing and she wanted to get an update photo with with with Henry that that anywhere he goes there's always somebody that says I remember Henry because he was here and he was there um now I will tell you that that there's some intentionality to all of this um because really um that story about the kid and a horse and a dog wouldn't be a story at all if it weren't uh for these folks that are that are standing here to to my right and your left Joe riny Tony Hiller Benny Hunter Smith and um William cop right you guys raise your hands right here these are the rock stars of the shelter the you know I have employees over here that have worked over 20 years these guys work with with with with you know a heart of gold where they're smiling they never stop uh they're always taking care of the pets always taking care of the customer they Rock uh of course I I intro introduced Ginger leech uh Jerry Capshaw was the shelter manager for a number of years we got Barry Alexander um to show you how hard Animal Control is on a person um you know and he looks like he's 62 years old and he's only 29 so [Music] um um we have Chris lorett um in here we have Anastasia um and we have uh I see we have Chris McAllister there in the back Chris raise your hand Chris is new right and we didn't expect him up there today I think he just snuck in with the group to to try to get a little extra attention so uh Chris thanks for for joining the group um but when I say that that that that with with with all intention I I I think that that as I conclude my final presentation um after all these years that I wanted to make sure that my retirement wasn't about me because truly I've done very little in my life that I wouldn't be where I am today if it weren't for all that these folks and the community and all of you did to support me along the way that I am a reflection of the good things about these folks and the place that we live and finally none of this would have happened never would have happened if it weren't for a special place called Fort Worth Texas where great things happen and dreams come true on behalf of me and Henry thank you for all the wonderful years [Applause] thank you I bet you're not going to get away without mayor ptim saying something I'm just gonna say N I don't want anybody to move Brandon I really appreciate the way you celebrate and lead your staff there's not a Time I can't call and someone is there like Clark Kent jumping out of a phone booth that takes a lot and what what I can tell you is I don't I was very angry when I read the Star Telegram expose on the kill rate and I don't know if the reporter is here but I did tell her you can't talk about how many animals we have and how many may have to be euthanized without talking about pet owner responsibility the animals just don't get on the bus and get to the shelter they're there because you guys care enough to try to rescue and I I will always tell people how important that responsibility is uh when it comes to abusing animals I know when you guys get a call you're there on the spot and I just acknowledge you I don't know what Dana's going to do when you retire but I hear retired husbands sometimes get in the way so you may be able to volunteer we'll we'll we we'll know before you and in closing I do want to get up there and take a picture with my beautiful flowers but in closing I will tell you every member on this Council asked me where did I get my code compliance shirt and I told them I could hook them up that's right for a fee for me that's right thank you for all the years and the dedication the commitment I don't know who is going to replace you but whoever it is tell them get ready for calls on the weekends because we know no five day but they're the ones who who make those calls thank you for your your service your commitment and uh thank Henry as well thank you so much thank you thank you any other comments from Council no I think you're the example of Public Service what else can you say Brandon and you're a ton ton of fun to work with um today you just went through the things that you've accomplished uh with Animal Care control but um in a emergency Operation Center usually the one that's on point but also trying to bring levity to really difficult situations um during covid your very lengthy presentations we gave you a hard time about but you took very seriously the responsibility that you had for public health for the city of Fort Worth we will miss you we'll see you later but we know we'll see you around Fort Worth eventually when you come home from Colorado apparently he's got a oneway ticket to enjoy himself and um kudos to you and what you've done with Henry as a great example of what it looks like to really Foster and ultimately adopt a pet like Henry you've been an inspiration to everybody else around this table my adopted dog does not quite act like Henry yet so I think I need to work with him a little bit more um yeah we love you so much thank you for taking the time to tell your story today it was beautifully done and to your entire team thank you for supporting such an excellent leader over the years yeah thank thank you thank you thank you all got to take a picture with G here hey yeah thank you Brandon and Henry there's also a celebration SLP party this this Thursday afternoon at Hazel rvy peace put it on your calendar all right next up we have um a few informal reports this might be the I don't want to jinx anything but this might be the the shortest list we've had in some time here we go the first informal report is and it's timely too it's on incentives to build dog parks in multif family development and DJ harell and Richard zabala are available if there are any questions I think Council M Flores has a few questions yeah no questions but I would like uh for you all to uh or you DJ if you can handle it uh to run through again what uh the thought process was before because I know with you Richard we've talked about that before ways to incentivize developers to do it I articulated that in this s request so uh kind of sketch out for us what that might look like you know for us when we make decisions on multif family developments again the thought being we want to encourage responsible you know pet ownership right how do we increase that well one logical place to look is in multif family developments yes sir the the neighborhood and Community Park dedication policy allows us to negotiate uh dog parks within either multif family or single family developments they can get a credit if they keep that public and open to the public we've listed about eight in there there's a couple of them that are open to the public others are for residents only that don't get credit towards the policy uh but we've seen a lot of interest from developers with that every Park master plan we do everybody wants a dog park we're focusing those as we uh listed in there zbones and Fort wolf are larger Parks is where we want to have those Gatherings because you gotta have parking lots and fences and those kinds of things I'll let DJ talk about how we can promote it even more effectively through the uh PDC see so our job in development services is to make sure people know about it that knows about these opportunities to dedicate uh special areas for our uh four-legged Friends u so uh one way we do it is through PR predevelopment conferences another way we're we're trying to look at doing it during site plan review for zoning cases uh and also we are developing uh communication materials that we will circulate throughout the community to tell what we're doing in Fort Worth and we'll include uh this on the on the radar as well generally when it comes to the reaction from the development community and I've had these conversations before and probably you know many of us here at the table have had similar ones but when you bring up the idea of a dog part for example uh there's usually the initial you know interest level right maybe even a little further preliminary buying but then when you start maybe well you know getting some uh some slower well just some reduced interest in it when it comes to the maintenance of that has the city ever thought about maybe having some sort of public uh private collaboration with maintaining such dog parks with the development Community has there ever been that kind of discussion we not from our perspective if it's uh open to the public then we can talk about adopt a park uh Arrangements things like that if it's closed to the public except to thing I mean what I'm goingon to say to them is you're trying to fill your houses and your multif family sites what's going to expand your potential for for customers and if you have that additional element that's going to be uh help with occupancy rates it just stands for reason and and DJ when do the discussions about the inclusion and incorporation of a potential you know dog park uh come into play in the development uh application process right so in general right U all of our multif family projects and our single family projects have a park dedication requirement and so when they're coming in to do their either uh early consultations or predevelopment conferences whichever uh track that they choose we we we we discuss you know the best potential path for their development right and options that are available for them and so that's that's the opportunity that we have to share about you know um you know regular Park dedication as well as dog park medication okay so at the PDC level final question uh potential connection with uh the mayor's a good-natured uh initiative do we see that perhaps as being something to boost this uh type of effort well um as a matter of fact uh there was a meeting we had with the Real Estate Council this morning and U they want to talk to talk to us about how we tie all these efforts together you know our uh uh repairing areas our uh open space initiatives our dog park initiatives we want to have a more collaborative conversation about how all these things fit together and maybe we can have one policy to promote and in incentivize all of the things all right thank you both thank you all right DJ don't go anywhere the next informal report is the monthly development activity report and DJ is available if there are any questions Hey DJ um could you just give us a rundown of what developments looking like across the city and where we're trending okay so um U over the last year year uh residential has slowed a bit however commercials remain steady I think we we ended up up 133% on Commercial volume a residential volume I think we were down uh a good bit but we weren't down so much that we were behind 2020 2019 levels uh we were right between 2019 and 2020 levels with regard to to residential volume uh with a uh a strong U suggestion that it will be increasing in the uh fall okay and when you said say residential do you mean uh multif family and single family yes ma'am okay um and so you said overall we're doing well yes ma'am okay and there's no particular District or area that we're worried about no uh not necessarily U overall you know again commercials been you know really strong you know a lot of our um you know small businesses have kept kept us afloat uh we have some pretty large businesses that have come in as well District N9 in particular um I think last month about 20% of our commercial value came from a project that was in District 9 and so you know across the city in in in every District we've seen activity in commercial in our commercial areas uh we're just you know hoping that our residential areas will pick up as well I appreciate that thank you so much that had come to my attention that at least one of my colleagues was worried about development in District 9 so I'm glad that to hear that the numbers bear out that we're doing well um I would like to point an error that I think on page seven of our development activity report um proud to boast $ 72.6 million in District 9 just as a little pad on our back but I did notice there seems to be an error and that is um 2151 Green Oaks Road is um noted in District Four but it's actually the single project for district three on this list so I'm sure Michael crane would like that fixed thank you app and thank you any other questions for DJ no thank you all right I think you get to stay there again yeah he does and then the final informal report is a monthly report on Senate bill 202038 which is uh release of areas within our etj by petition and DJ is available if there any questions any questions on this no thank you DJ mayor that concludes my report okay thank you moving on any questions to changes in memberships or boards any questions on the MNC log great I will move on to our presentation on economic impact of the for worth film commission I think Robert Sterns is going to kick things off and invite our guests up to join him thank you mayor members of council um I'm sure if you've been cruising the Press lately you've either seen the headline or the tagline or somewhere in the article that Fort Worth is having a moment I've seen that a number of places but when I see it in Vogue not that I'm looking at Vogue that often but when when I see it in unexpected Publications like Vogue I think it's true to say that we really are having a moment uh and when you think about unexpected places that really aligns with the tagline that visit for wor has given us as the unexpected City uh part of that moment that we are having is the growth in our film industry and the work done by visit Fort Worth and the Fort Worth film commission I can't tell you how many times I've been watching TV or going to a movie and I see a Fort Worth Landmark I hear Fort Worth's name being mentioned it is a a leap from where we were years ago when the film commission got started uh and so that is indicative of the work that both M Mitch and Jessica have been doing and we thought it would be really good to have them come to council today to outline the great things that our creative Community is doing across the city uh and the great work that V Fort Worth and the Fort Worth film commission are doing so with that I would like to welcome Mitch Whitten Chief Operating Officer for visit Fort Worth and Jessica Christopherson VP of marketing for visit Fort Worth and Fort Worth film Commission Executive Director thank you Robert and thank you Council for giving us the opportunity to update you on our growing Film Production in Fort Worth and under the direction of our CEO Bob Jameson who's here today and with the support of Taylor Hardy also our associate film commissioner it's been growing um and as you know visit for worth has been adding to our tourism story built on the foundation of conventions Sports commission um thank you Macy for your support on that and others restaurants music uh and other ways to promote our city um film Mak is economic development and we've been at this for eight years but we've the economic impact is over three of a billion dollarss that's not just about hotel rooms it's about sales taxes it's about visibility given to our city our locations guide on our website includes uh locations from each of your districts so really is a Citywide effort Jessica is going to tell you why this is now involved in education with new Partnerships with tarant County College as well as a recent great workshop with the Fort Worth Metropolitan Black Chamber of Commerce and now a network of Studios Texas A&M uh new Studios up at Hillwood Alliance and now um Beyond just tourism Movie Maker magazine says we are a top 25 place for filmmakers to live and I just want to emphasize Taylor Sheridan has been a big part of this moment but it's not just that Jessica and Taylor answer hundreds of calls from commercials we were working with Toyota the other day as well as independent films like Miss juneth and some exciting ones to come but a l really a lot of this effort has been um really Jessica has picked this up on on her back uh as an additional job in addition to Leading our marketing effort is saying I want to be the film commissioner and make make a film commission here in Fort Worth so I want to recognize you Jessica for all your effort and what you've done to carry this forward thank you so much good afternoon and thank you all so much for your support of the film commission and visit Fort Worth over the years um the fourth film commission is one of the family Brands under visit Fort Worth we launched the film Commission in 2015 we were the only major city in Texas without a commission and we were losing out on opportunities to Dallas and other Texas cities along with neighboring states um over the past eight years the film commission um has seen um film television and the commercial industry in our area generate a $655 million economic impact creating over 20,000 jobs these Productions utilize our hotels our restaurants um our retail and more our priorities as a film commission is to attract projects here and then support them once they are in Fort Worth making sure they have all the resources they need um to build community connections and create a film-friendly city to become a yes town to film uh film Productions require a lot of problem solving and Fort Worth has become known as a city that makes things makes things happen for film projects we advocate for diverse media production and create positive Community impact so our core focus is to create opportunities some of those include jobs through Productions publicity through stories placed about Film Production giving additional positive National exposure for Fort Worth film tourism opportunities through self-guided location tours um film is a very collaborative business and we like to try to bring the fourth Community together as much as possible to become engaged and learn more more uh we provide local businesses and homeowners the opportunities to become film-friendly locations produce quarterly mixers allowing the community to come together to network and learn more about the industry um this year we're implementing a series of workshops as Mitch mentioned um for example the one we partnered with on the for worth Metropolitan Black Chamber of Commerce to create a um directing and producing Workshop let see oh here we go um once a project is here in Fort Worth the film commission serves as a hub to connect filmmakers and their crew with all the partners and services they will need to have a smooth experience um the city permit office neighborhood and District Representatives forth PD and Fire have all made Fort Worth an easy place to film I want to give a special shout out to the film permit office here at the city they have been incredible to work with and been able to turn permits in a very quick um way which is really important um because Productions have a lot of last minute requests so thank them for all of their I'd like to thank them for all their hard work um last August we launched a program with tarant County College in 101 Studios to address the need for crew members particularly in construction lighting and electric as we continue to get more Productions to town we need a strong crew base so Productions will be able to hire local um this micro cred credentialing program um is Affordable and it's a four-week course the goal is to create a direct line to employment after receiving certification from tarant County College to 101 Studios projects along with other Productions in the city um the the program will continue to grow over the next year adding hair makeup location management camera and accounting um certifications we actually have an event tonight at Taran County College um Northeast Campus to promote the event we have over 500 people rsvpd so there's definitely interest in the program um investing in local Productions creates a one to five return and economic impact with a wide range of businesses such as Hotel spending equipment rental catering dry cleaners and more um as mentioned before it also creates opportunities for film tourism and creates well-paying jobs with transferable skills tarant County ranks fourth among the top 20 counties ranked by the um number of projects according to to the Texas film commission we recently worked with olsberg SPI an international creative industry consultant that specializes in the global screen sector to undergo a study of the impact of film in Fort Worth in Taran County the study results reported that Fort Worth is considered to have the most film-friendly proactive film Commission in Texas um Fort Worth has the hotels and Catering options needed to support Productions Productions have an overall positive experience in our city and we have strong location options Taylor Sheridan and 101 studios are creating positive impact and opportunity ities for locals and our Education and Training initiatives well received by Productions and the overall quality of life in for worth is appealing to Productions to come here and stay and eventually uh move and become part of the permanent crew base um hotels are starting to see the impact more and more particularly with Taylor shared in 101 Studios Productions this is a snapshot of the last two Productions where land and where we are so um far with landman so as you can see our hotels are definitely being utilized by film and television Crews um with uh working with olsberg we we were also able to provide a breakdown of distribution across Industries um so you can see a major television show not only affects the screen production sector but also hospitality and Catering Finance legal health and medical Safety and Security fashion and Beauty so these are all the different types of industries that are touched here in Fort Worth when a production sets up in our city and um finally forth led the charge and efforts to increase the film incentive program this last legislative session so thank you again for everyone's support on that um to get this program higher than it's ever been in the state's history uh the key will be able to keep or grow the program to continue to be competitive with neighboring states and to ensure we can keep productions here uh the media production development Zone in for worth is another opportunity to attract long-term business here so thank you Robert Sterns for all your work on that initiative um as of now Fort Worth and Austin are the only designated mpdz Zone cities in Texas happy to answer any questions Jessica I you what you didn't do is brag on yourself which doesn't surprise me necessarily but and I'm being I'm being sincere that when you talk with any of these producers no matter big or small one of the top things they tell me is that you are an excellent leader for this initiative and it started so small I know that you have a great team and Taylor and others so just thank you for for leading the charge and you're so well respected in Austin as well so Fort Worth LED there but because um because of the things that you've done here for the city of Fort Worth so just wanted to note that thank you um the only other thing I think I'd ask you is what next right and whether it's a legislative priority that we need to work on together um or anything that this body can do to help continue the the success of the for film commission thank you so much I appreciate that the initiative with tarant County College is huge we need to continue to have a really great crew base in Fort Worth to attract projects here in addition to a state incentive but the more we can support that program and provide opportunities for people to learn and um become trained crew then um the more we'll have an advantage over other cities I believe I would just add to that we have to keep telling the story and Jessica you certainly do that in Austin and because this is not an automatic renewal we have to continue showing the benefit to our city and reminding our lawmakers to keep this going in the next Bal thank you we appreciate you being thank you thank you so much Council our next update is from Texas wesland University Dr Emily Messer president of Texas Wesley is here to present Emily thank you well good afternoon thank you mayor Parker city manager cook and the council for allowing me to present today I am a newcomer to Fort Worth and so it has been a wonderful experience for myself and my family we have now been here just around seven months so still very new but it has been just a wonderful experience I had a chance to speak with the mayor last night and Fort Worth is officially home for us I'm from Alabama we went back over the holidays and my kids and husband and myself were ready to get back home to Fort Worth so we are truly enjoying ourselves um I want to spend just a few minutes to today to give you an update on what is going on at Texas Wesley University let's see if there we go um moving right along for the sake of time I just want to thank everyone around this table around the room for the very large Texas welcome that I have been presented with it has been a wonderful experience you can see we are um we were pleased from the University to have the support from the Fort Worth report and the fort wor Star Telegram for a welcoming opportunity for the me as the new president of Texas Wesley and uh the picture at the very top is really what I am here for I am serving Texas Wesleyan University for the students and that is the utmost priority to me we are here providing an educational opportunity for students that may not have access and other avenues and I'll tell you a little bit more about our student body later on um here at the bottom uh right I guess we uh had our first holiday event at Texas Wesley and we had Light Up Texas west and I want to say thank you to city council woman Martinez and city council man Nettles for attending that event it was a wonderful event for our students faculty staff and their families to come and fellowship together and then the photo at the top that was the most frightening thing I've ever done in my life so um even though I am from Alabama I had never even sat on a horse before so uh until the week before I did take a riding lesson to at least be familiar with a horse but a wonderful opportunity and thank you to he's scared too I guess um well it was a new experience for me but thank you to city council one Martinez and Hill they guided me through it and I made it and it was a wonderful experience so um definitely check the box of a Fort Worth experience right I didn't have boots or a hat I had to do the whole thing great thank you thank you a wonderful experience so a little bit about Texas Westland strategic plan so we are currently in in the middle of a 5-year strategic plan engag 2025 which will be ending at the end of next year engage in community engage in learning and engaging leadership are the priorities and so that is why I was so elated to have this opportunity to come here and speak to you as representatives of our community and the leadership that you assist through um through your efforts for Texas Westland also want to give a huge thank you to Fernando Costa he is the one that actually recommended that I come and present to you he is on our president's Advisory Board and has been extremely helpful to me during my transition as well I also want to point out the photo right here so one of the exciting things going on at the University currently is that we had our largest incoming class at Texas Wesley and in the 133 year history and this is a photo of our new students this past fall semester so we have an outstanding trajectory of serving the students of our region just some infographics I'll highlight just a couple of these obviously many of you know that Texas westlan is a very diverse Community 59% of our students come from diverse backgrounds one of the key components to our student body is many of them are first generation college students 47% in in in fact um in addition to them serving as first generation college students and Texas Wesley and providing that opportunity I myself am a first generation college student so I'm very passionate about serving that student population but right there at the bottom 100% % of our students that are undergraduate full-time students receive some sort of scholarship or Grant to attend our University that is extremely important for our student population and I will also ask that we are the only University that is an HSI in Fort Worth so we're proud to say that uh 81% of our students are from Texas and as I mentioned earlier we had one of the largest enrollments we had 2,653 students this past fall semester a little bit about where our students come from so the new students in our fall 2023 class came from these high schools Fort Worth ISD schools with Northside High School being our largest feeder these are schools that we we'll hear more about later probably but um outstanding students that are able to come to Texas Wesley and stay in their local area to pursue their education a little bit more about our new student in particular and I think this is so important and important for you to know 72% of our new students are from tarant County so that means we are educating our students here in tan County here in Fort Worth they're graduating with a college degree and they're staying in our area to work so we are providing the workforce for our area 98% are from Texas in particular moving on down 67% of our new students this past year are pale eligible so that means they come from lower income families so it reinforces the fact that those scholarships and grants are so important to providing access to the students from this area and we're very proud that the average high school GPA was a 3.47 for our new students a little bit more of an update on enrollment this spring semester we had the highest spring enrollment since 2015 but even more exciting highlighted in the yellow is that we are 28% ahead for freshman applications for this upcoming fall than we were this time last year so not only did we have a historic new student class last fall we're trending 28% ahead of that for this upcoming year a little bit about economic impact we've heard a lot about that but even the small school on the east side Texas wesle university has $148 million economic impact for our region with direct spending and induced spending and so we are pleased that our friends at the independent colleges and universities of Texas provided us this information I'm going to keep moving for the sake of time we have many different alumni and Community engagement opportunities but before I move into those how many Texas wesling alumni are in the room yes yes well we'll count we'll count that so uh we do have our alumni weekends coming up in addition to alumni weekend which will be April 19th and 20th that will actually kick off the new president's inauguration activities so we we hope that you're able to come celebrate with us I have been told that the Wesley and Wine Walk is a lot of fun who doesn't love wine right and it's an opportunity to see our campus and this year will we we will be adding the president's office to The Wine Walk so you can come and visit me in the president's office during that as well Fort Worth business Hall of Fame we are always pleased to host that many of you have participated in the p in that in the past Main Street Fort Worth we are active partners with Southeast Fort work Inc on the um on that project and then the Texas Rangers Foundation we'll talk a little bit more about that in a few moments we have an event coming up to serve our community in East Fort Worth that's the Wesleyan 5K it's March 2nd so if you don't have plans we hope you can attend that with us I'll run if Chris will run it's 8:30 8:30 he not gonna be there H Chris come on now he's a board of trustee member work so I do want to spend a little bit more time this afternoon talking about our comprehensive campaign engage Inspire and invest so that is a for we've got a lot of chatter going on about Chris running in a 5k we're terrible yeah keep going we're Focus Dr M keep going um we have a $40 million comprehensive campaign currently going on with the key components of that being athletic Excellence endowments facility enhancements and programmatic opportunities of that 40 million we have achieved 31 million already but we are still needing assistance with the academic athletic e excellence and the endowment portion of that so I want to spend a little bit more time on the athletic stadium that we are working on and let's see here we [Music] go [Music] [Music] [Music] so that is a brief snippet of the Karen Kramer athletic Stadium while the video is very football focused this opport this Athletic Facility will also provide opportunities for both soccer and track in addition to many different other opportunities so I want to spend just a little bit of time on this so this is a major project that we are right in the middle of so we've divided the project into different phases so the first phase was the field and the track the lights and the uprights so those are there now if you drive by campus at any time of the day there are students out there on it whether they're practicing track or soccer or football so it's already being utilized the second phase of that will be the meritz Fieldhouse and we do hope to plan um hope to break ground on that probably late spring early summer time frame and then the last phase will be the grand stands the Press Box the concessions Etc so city manager cook at the beginning of this meeting he said let us know how we can help well Mr cook it's right here um in all honesty we are working on many different avenues for completing this project so it has been a fundraising goal of ours I also want to introduce Senator Beverly Powell I don't have to introduce her everyone knows her right uh Senator Powell uh not only has served on our Board of Trustees for many many years she has taken Hiatus from that and is working for the University she is serving as Special Assistant to the president for external Affairs and working with many of you around this room we've already had some meetings but we are hoping to be a partner with the city on this project so that we can continue the economic development of East Fort Worth the rosale Renaissance made so many great strides and the progression of that community and I think this is going to be uh just an addition to that the opportunities to bring people to the east side of Fort Worth continue feeling the retail space that we have on the rosale um property Partnerships with Fort Worth ISD hopefully we have some club soccer teams interested in partnering with us so that they can that can be their home field many different opportunities that will continue to revitalize e for East Fort Worth community so more to come on that we will be reaching out but we're very excited about this project and what this will bring to not only our University but the community other improvements through the comprehensive campaign Martin Hall improvements if if you've been in that space it's outstanding this upcoming summer we will be renovating some of our science labs on campus the Texas Rangers Youth Academy wanted to briefly speak on that I know I've had a chance to speak with count councilwoman viven on this project we Texas wesle and was approached maybe a year or so ago prior to my time from the Texas Rangers Foundation about creating a Texas Rangers Youth Academy in Fort Worth many of you know that there is a facility a very nice facility in Dallas and so they want to show the love to Fort Worth we've been working with partson wreck the city of Fort Worth Texas Wesley and and we met with the Texas Rangers foundation on August 2nd which was my second day here it was interesting um we are looking to move forward with that but they kind of put a pause on it because they had just found out at the time that they were going to be hosting the All-Star Game this summer so you can see the bottom bullet is that work will begin in August 2024 for technically discussions will uh we will revisit discussions on that in August 2024 so the current site that we're looking at would be East over Park which I'm I'm hearing is um a perfect opportunity because there's a Boys and Girls Club there already so we're looking forward to how we will move forward with this so more to come on that project uh Leadership Academy Network many of you are very familiar with that with our partnership with Fort Worth ISD we have six campus that we're working with currently and it is going very very well those scores of those schools have increased significantly upperbound program oh I just moved right along uh we have one of the largest actually the largest Upward Bound program in our region we have four Upward Bound grants and we have the most students of any other Upward Bound program lastly I will just say many people ask me what can we do to help Texas Wesleyan University I would say share our story you know what our mission is you know we're serving students St and providing access and opportunities for them to better them themselves change their lives change the lives of their families their communities and change their future trajectory as a whole so tell our story tell people about Texas Wesley and and then join us on social media Facebook Instagram Tik Tok and YouTube lastly just a little bit of information about the inauguration events we have a full week of activities scheduled beginning with an alumni brunch on Saturday April 20th concluding with the inaugural Gayla on Friday night April 26th so we hope you can attend participate in some of our events that concludes my presentation I'm happy to answer any questions you may have any questions for Dr Messer yes Dr I mean Dr Council Martinez I just gave you an upgrade I got another degree yeah no I just want to say just congratulation congratulations again on your new role it's been a pleasure working with you I look forward to a continued partnership and to celebrating you at your inauguration a ceremonies and um Chris we can do the one mile Wily walk if you want to do [Laughter] that right uh so I me it's not about the walk I will do the walk just about the time uh thank you Dr Mera we we really appreciate working with you um and I know that we're looking forward to working with you with Southeast Inc and poly Main Street how we refigure um that whole District over there it's been a pleasure even Beverly pal and so I've been in those meetings about the football field uh I'm excited to say I mean I don't know did they win a championship did we win last year the championship oh we were so close so close so close but the last two to three years they have really been showing out for a program that started back in 2017 we went nine and two this year so you know let the coach know I used to play runningback I mean he was a quarterback I mean if we need to get across the Finish Line we can help make that happen we still have four years worth of eligibility left what time is practice what time does practice start if y'all are going to play we're all gonna be there don't you age so but again thank you uh is Richard still here yeah okay Richard I don't know how that guy from District a to District 5 I know it I know it uh the Texas Ranger thing we'll talk offline about that supposed be District n may protim may Pro Tim talks have ended it's over and it was contingent upon you agreeing to one of those morning walks and so that's how okay okay okay Dr Messer it it's you you are people kind of wondered after you know Fred was leaving what's the new president going to be like and I can tell you you've hit the ground capturing the hearts of all of Fort Worth U my mom and sister graduated from from wesle and I only stayed for a year but I will be attending as many events as I can and if anybody gets a commitment from council member Nettles to participate let me know because I will show up and cheer you I'm going do it you want do it he woke up this morning to be with me but it was in your own District so he only has so many mornings he can can do that but thank you for all that you you've given so far thank you for riding the horse yeah thank you so very very and welcome to Fort Worth words of encouragement for Jared for oh hey if I can do it anyone can do it so yes yes I just make sure they put you on a very nice horse I talked him through it his name was Dave I said Dave take care of me I'm gonna ask for Dave next year any other questions for Dr Messer no excellent presentation thank you very much appreciate it okay Council our next uh update is from 4D Dr Ramsay will present on behalf of the district Dr Ramsey I'm gonna need this hype group to follow me everywhere mayor council city manager and staff uh thank you for allowing me to be here and and especially thank you for your grace for rescheduling when I wasn't able to come due to a death in the family in January so I really appreciate that so oops well that's not going to come in but that was supposed to show just the comparison between Fort Worth ISD boundaries compared to the city of Fort Worth this our Council knows this that U there are over a dozen school districts within the city of Fort Worth and for us a challenge has been that most of the growth that's happening in the city does not coincide with our attendance boundaries just a quick update on our demographics um as we continue to lose students we've been having declines in enrollment for the last 13 to 15 years um as our neighborhoods age out as we do not replace the seniors that graduate with incoming uh kindergardeners um and of course due to Charter Schools um we continue to have an uptick in uh students that have the most need so fewer students but students that are higher in free reduced lunch we're inching up uh pretty soon we'll be at a place where we're serving nine out of every 10 students uh that are free reduced lunch in Fort Worth ISD we do provide free breakfast and free lunch to every child in our school district uh you see the inching up of our students with special needs and then we're about four out of every 10 students that enters our school district in our school district that is emergent bilingual um again just some interesting data on student poverty rates and you can see that in Fort Worth ISD we have uh significantly more students in that uh under 20 $25,000 a year Family income and 25 to $50,000 uh income and so our teachers our staff are doing God's work um providing services for the students in our community to ensure that not only are they receiving a high quality education but sometimes that we are the largest food service provider in the city right we're the largest transportation business in the city um we have food banks at several of our schools we make sure children have shoes and jackets and and even families have social needs taken care of including mental health supports and so as we continue to have needier students uh we meet the needs of those families so last year when I came I spoke to the council about um the listening tour that I was on um we had a a swad analysis that you can see there this really helped be the seed for our uh strategic plan so we are in the middle of our strategic plan um if we haven't gotten you the dates we have 13 Community meetings beginning next week uh please help us communicate that out so that we can have the diversity of our city come and be a part of our strategic plan at the end of day we want that plan to Belong To The City because our schools belong to our community but I'm really excited to talk to you a little bit about our test scores um last week we had the opportunity to present to our school board all of the efforts that our students our teachers and our campus and District leaders are are have been embarked embarking on in the last uh this school year and in the spring as we worked on reorganization one particular test is called NWA map it is a test that is given Across the Nation and not going to go too nerd on you because I can nerd out on data but the RIT scale it's a rash unit and that's how the test tells us how our students are doing both on performance and on growth what it does is it tracks a student beginning of the year middle of the year end of the year and we're able to see national mean data from across the country not like school districts so maybe not School District serving 85% children in poverty it could be school districts that have a small number of students in poverty and yet our mean and the national mean this year is very on par you'll see that mean that national mean down at the bottom but what I'd like to point out is at every single grade level had growth from the beginning of the year to the middle of the Year down at the bottom you can see what that national mean is and we're right on par kindergarten 146 14 6 that's amazing it's great news for the city of Fort Worth when we look at our uh reading for our Spanish speakers also huge gains beginning of the year middle of the Year all grade levels and that mean also right on par this is for our math so those were reading these are math look at those gains from beginning of the year to middle of the year all grade levels and Algebra 1 these aren't scores we typically get to come and share we don't get to share out even with our own board and so last Tuesday night was definitely a night of Celebration because we want to continue that growth we want to ensure that a complex organization you know 10,000 employees over a$1 billion dollar budget 140 schools that has a lot of needs has really thoughtful Solutions and so for us we want to ensure that our strategic plan is has short-term midterm and long-term goals so that we can meet the needs of our families not just today but far into the future obviously we want we have we want to prioritize those needs we want to have a strength implementation process because if you have a plan but it's not implemented there is no point in having a plan uh a a way to monitor that progress so that in increments during the school year and in the summer we report out publicly at board meetings what did we say we were going to do and how did we meet the mark there and any course Corrections that are needed and then continuing that two-way communication so that on an annual basis it is a living document and if there are changes needed we can take care of those on an annual basis I think the council's aware that we're also in the middle of a master facilities plan so we embarked on that plan this fall um we believe that the plan will be completed by December uh the point of the plan is to have a 10year plan on um any maintenance any proactive kind of Maintenance that you need we also know our newspaper likes to talk about possible school closures I'd like to State publicly we're nowhere near any of those conversations because we're have a master facilities plan that won't even be done until about December and so until that time then that next step is here are the recommendations from the plan what next so we don't have a list I know I saw a headline this morning but then I clicked on it and I was like whoa we're closing schools news to me and then I clicked on it and I was like oh it's about a school district out of state as we continue to communicate we want to make sure that our families understand where their students are and how they can assist them one of the ways that we've implemented that this year is a change to the report card system in Early Education a regular kind of grade for a parent so if you tell a parent you you have a your child has an A in math that doesn't actually tell you what are the standards that they're doing really well in where are the areas where they need some improvement so we went through a process that was really inclusive to get to a new early Ed report card that is very clear clear for parents very early on where can they lean in and where are the areas that their students may need some additional assistance it's also really great internally because as a staff you can then create intervention plans and provide support to students on an individual basis we're working on the next Next Step which is to do that exact same thing but at the elementary level because same thing if you're you have a second grade student and they have a b in Reading you don't know if they're doing really well and understanding the main idea and maybe they're struggling with inferences so moving to a standard space report card provides parents on a scale of kind of a one to four an better understanding per Texas Standard where their child how their child is do doing we've heard over and over again an area of improvement needed is communication with parents so that parents understand where their CH child is we've heard you and we're making those changes so that we can continue to partner together uh in the success of your children we've heard a lot about Economic Development and how really our linked economies you know beyond our over over a billion dollar budget we have a 1.2 billion Bond program happening right now and so we have the ability to provide a lot of economic Vitality into our city so it's really important to us from that side all the way down to ensuring that our students graduate college and career ready so our last graduating class we're inching up to 90% of our students graduate on time and over 60% of them graduating college career ready that's huge we have over 18,000 students right now taking an advanced placement course leading to college credit this spring we're close to about 500 graduates this spring that will receive their associates degree before they ever get their high school diploma there are some fantastic things happening in Fort Worth ISD where we really have endless opport opportunities not only for our students but our entire community and there are always places for us to partner and assist uh one is communication we hear a lot you know our our our schools are not safe and I want to let everyone know that our schools are very safe we continue to be audited by the state um as a part of that Pro the program they come and check to make sure they cannot seek to get into our schools we're doing great but more than that I wanted to kind of differentiate between a hold and a lockdown it's pretty common that our schools are in AO on a hold for a variety of reasons today we lost power for a little bit Encore was amazing it immediately let us know they got the power turned on pretty quickly but out of an abundance of caution we put the school on a hold that just means that we're not going to change students aren't going to go out into the hallway um we as best as we can we're going to kind of keep the kids in the classroom we also put the schools on hold when there's any police activity in the area that is not a lockdown that does not mean that there's a safety issue at the school but we know that the difference between a lockdown and a hold sometimes especially in the age of cell phones we we we send a message and say we're on a lockdown we communicate with our parents anytime that happens when it's lifted but for the most part those holds happen out of an abundance of caution because there's police activity in the area so we want to make sure that our families know that our schools are safe housing this is an Ask um if there is any way we can continue to work on affordable housing and in our boundaries this the council has done an amazing job of growing our city we would like to see if there's any way where we can partner and partner is a part of that Master facility plan and as we get down that road to continue to find ways to have affordable housing uh for our families we began the process of doing an exit process when a family exit the school district and the overwhelming reason why they leave us is to find housing in another community so they're leaving our school district to go to another school district um as they look for special for apartments and and housing that may be not as high when it's time for them to renew their lease just overall health we have some amazing Partnerships if you haven't seen we have not only uh food pantries at our schools but now we have at OD Wyatt the first uh really grocery store including with fresh fruit and vegetables I mean is amazing uh for our families in those kind of food deserts and so any ways that the city and the school district continue to partner I love the wellness the wellness run know that we have a groups from Fort Worth ISD that will be participating uh because it's important that our students gain healthy habits early on so we don't have to Unbreak them later so if there are any ways of continued partnership so that we can uh ensure that our students feel healthy safe and connected at school and then the poverty rate we need to continue to ensure that we are paying a living wage across the city um all organizations all businesses I think I recently went to a luncheon where it was said that in order to afford a two-bedroom apartment in our city you have to make about $22 an hour and that's to afford the housing that's not Child Care Wi-Fi transportation and everything else and so we have to continue working together and if there are any innovative ways we want to be a part of the solution so that we can start increasing our students getting into the community having their families have gainful employment so that we can keep our students here and so that we can build generational wealth in our communities and ultimately that is my goal my goal is to build generational wealth in the city of Fort Worth and how do you do that man start with high quality Early Education programming free after school care which we have a great K12 system and keeping our dollars local as much as possible so I'm here really just to say that we are here to work with you I appreciate all of your support um we continue to feel like the community is wrapping their arms around us um your city staff have been wonderful and we just appreciate the upward trajectory that our students are on and I hope to be able to continue coming to present to you the amazing academic a achievements that our students and our teachers are are gaining thank you and I am open for questions thank you Dr Ramsey questions from Council Chris go ahead thank you uh for being here today um I was one of the ones that asked for you to come and bring these reports I think it's important for the city of forward to uh understand education and how we can support our education system and so it was good to hear uh from number one say that no no schools on the list closing I mean I got a I got an email the other day and said hey you know I heard about a school in your District Clos you might want to get involved in that and so the chatter around the city is different from what's actually happened in our school district and so it's good that city leaders needs to know the information and so thank you for sharing the information I think it's also great that that Dr Messa and you and you are here at the same time uh to see the list that she provided those who are coming to uh Texas Westley are from the fourth ISD school district um OD wide and north side and others I saw and so um we are a partner here we want to uh be a partner and get involved um I have been listed to sign up and volunteer at some of our for ISD schools just to show uh my support to the school district and the the school system uh um and so thank you Miss Thompson uh for helping put all this together and I saw the list and we'll be I'll be working towards how we can help you in those regards so thank you for being here today thank you fortim Dr Ramsey thank you for being here good to see you uh one thing that I want you to know at a real local level is a few years ago I was trying to get an effort where we would have a daytime meeting to allow students to see how government really worked uh we were going through a very difficult time this was after the murder of George Floyd and the protest to come and most of our speakers were coming to chasti council members and so with the entry of this mayor we have a formalized daytime meeting and I don't want to see just students from fourth ISD you know we touched so many districts and so I want I'm glad that LT is here I met him at the why but I just wanted you to know if there are any schools that you think really need to see this feel free to call the principal let us know because it's really important to me and this entire Council that we grow new leaders and they can grow if they get a chance to come watch us work and see how we engage in discourse and how we handle conflict as well so thank you for being a partner with that effort and I think at the last meeting of the month we'll have about 50 or 75 students I picked up another Child Care Center yesterday and those are kids who will be don't tell my mother I said kids but these will be young people uh who are prek in kindergarten so I'll shocked staff with that they don't know that yet but I'm glad to see forth ISD participating in that effort we have some amazing Scholars coming next week from Dunbar High School and we're ridiculously excited about the opportunity because we need to engage our students in Civics education outside of the classroom so am a wild cat and thanks to council member Becka I have a dog tag that gives me the definition of wild cat it described me perfectly so I'll wear my my dunar jacket wonderful thank you Elizabeth well I'm a Raider because I am a for Worth ISD uh product of fourth ISD and both of my children attend fourth ISD schools and I really just want to take a moment to publicly thank you for making the change to come here to Fort Worth and um you knew what you were getting into you knew that we had to roll up our sleeves and um I would expect nothing more from an army vet to get it done that's right did you hear that um um I can tell you as both a member of counil and a um a parent of fourth I um you can see a difference in the community in the pride that we have and the growth that we've had to for our public education system so thank you thank you for coming um every person at this table wants to see you succeed so please don't forget that on the hard days know that look at our faces and remember them um some of them are easier to look at than others sorry Chris and so and so um but know that we're here and please don't ever um hesitate to pick up a phone and call I andan we heard you about affordable housing and I can promise you that you have a um Council here that is really dedicated to making sure that happened or that happens but thank you for that lens about um School scho districts because we often get um discussion at this table about well how is it going to impact the ISD and we hear neighborhoods talking about we don't want them because of the schools and so to have our superintendent say that you need affordable housing within the boundaries of your jurisdiction um really goes a long way so thank you for that thank you Jared yeah hey Dr Ramsey thank you so much for today's presentation thank you for um the charge to us to focus on housing safety um as well as health um and poverty um and know for me personally I stay and committed to continue um to work with this body to do everything that we can um the I just want to just touch on the poverty piece I think it's so important that organizations like ours pay wages where folks can live in the city that they serve um and so know that that's a particular um point of interest for me and my work on council with the rest of our colleagues um and I'm just really grateful for today's report and homework know that we're rolling up our sleeves and working with you thank you Carlos Dr Ramy thanks for the presentation and uh I know that you and I have talked here in the recent past about uh you know specific uh ways that we can help parents communicate better I'm a parent of two kids in the ISD I consider myself you know reasonably informed but at times I even have difficulty wrapping my head around all that information presented and Mary parents that I talked to incidentally tell me they're not sure how to access it even if they can how do they correlate or compare you know data uh I know that improved test scores and and growth measured here that you showed in your presentation uh are correlated I guess going forward and uh and I'll look at your uh District strategy because I I haven't read it through uh is at what you know you're making measur measurable gains and that's an achievement into itself but when it comes to strictly test scores when does growth start you know becoming achievement I guess that's the kind of thing that I'm looking for right now you know Co had its impacts to Public Schools yall are working through that totally understand that but as you continue making growth it's at a certain point that growth will translate you know hopefully that's that's a plan into that achievement so I would be curious to learning more about that sure um what I didn't present today was excuse me some of the data that we presented last Tuesday on actual achievement for DreamBox which is mathematics and then our Lexia which is our reading so the state test both in reading and math are content tests and a lot of people confuse reading on grade level or the test the reading test thinking that it means whether a student is reading on grade level or not it's a Content test there standards so the reading test tests things like um can you infer based on maybe colors that a character is wearing whether the character is sad or happy that's content not actual are you reading on grade level our Lex scores halfway through the year showed that at every the minimum growth that students have made in Fort Worth ISD for Lexia is eight months of growth for some grade levels it was nine months 10 months and a year of growth So reading levels in the school district are improving that's where we hit achievement um so we love to talk about growth because we meet every child where they're at and with 40% of our students being emergent bilinguals I always use me as an example I was an emergent bilingual student spoke Spanish going into school I did not pass my third grade reading state test that did not mean that mean that my public school was doing a bad job I was growing I was just developing my language I did not pass it in fifth grade I passed in eth grade I don't think that it's hindered me the opposite so bingu right yeah um and sometimes our state scores only look at one thing and with 40% of our students being emerging bilingual I kind of wish that we said let's give them a test in their native language we have 93 languages that we serve in our school district and then give them the English test and combine those scores because if you get a 50% in the English and you get 80% in your native language hell I say you're at an 80 like you're above you know if you're 50 and 30 excuse me you're at an 80 you're probably doing better than some of our monolingual students um but I am happy and thrilled and if uh I if you would like I can send Lawrence some of that information on both mathematics and reading so that you can see the achievement levels that are growing and thank you for the question thank you caros any other questions from Council along those same Dr Ramsey when you look at if you go back to the slide on map scores I'm just curious there's there's that bottom number is national average and I realize this is not an Apples to Apples question but I'm curious national average let's say first grade 166 does that mean at 166 those students across United States are at grade level or is that just simply saying that that's the national average yeah that's a good question so there isn't a comparative to grade level with map because map the way the test runs is it it's a checkin right it's not comprehensive throughout the whole year it it is but it doesn't so what it what it measures is an individual student's ability to get harder and harder questions with higher difficulty levels correct and so we may all be taking a we may all be in third grade let's say but our test actually is going to look different because if I get the first four Incorrect and you get the first four correct yours continues to move up and so there isn't a grade level comparison for map what map does is it looks at where is a child when they entered that school year beginning of the year and how fast are you growing them so that at the end of the year they've you've seen growth of at least a one school year what we're seeing that's great here is that that mean at the national level is all kinds of schools traditional public charter private schools all varying socioeconomic and student groups and yet we're not far off you do see kind of a curve and that's because that is how the test is set up at the kinder level you're pre-learning so you're going to score a little bit lower it is made so that as you get higher in grade levels you do score higher yeah that's helpful thank you and then I'm sure you have this broken down by bright spot schools so some of your schools I'd be curious to see that data if you don't mind sending it just because I think you do have some schools that are exceeding even above your average scores and I'm sure you're digging into why those schools despite all the same ecod disc numbers are higher performing so and what we can do as council members especially the council members that those schools are in those districts continue to support them um as they continue to to thrive in in those respective districts my pleasure to provide that information um next question is it's my understanding you're going to do an RFP on mixed delivery prek this spring is that correct we're working on it I could clap out loud what that means ladies and gentlemen is the school district is willing to partner with community- based Child Care Facilities that's right it is the most important thing you could do for Quality Early Learning settings and not break bankrupt our community based care and so thank you for being willing to do that I know you're in partnership with a lot of organizations across Fort Worth so I'll be watching closely and and really kudos to you for being willing to do that we've been begging the district to do this for our goal is for every three and four yearold in our city to have high quality Early Education yeah and draw down the money that's available to them to do so right yes um also wanted to say thank you on your partnership for T3 you assumed that partnership and kept it going it has been immensely successful um and just wanted to say thank you to your team um last is um 1882 Partnerships Dr Messer mentioned our partnership with Texas weslan we need to do more of those I'm sure Texas wesling would do more schools because we know it's working I just wanted to publicly state that we think that that model does work in certain settings and I think Texas wesling has proved to be an excellent partner um especially in their school of education so thank you to Dr Messer and Texas wesling Leadership um and then lastly you came last year thank you April 25th we'll do another Workforce ready Graduate Ceremony for all school districts in Fort wor Earth including your fourth ISD graduates as a reminder of my council members those are graduates that are graduating maybe with a credential an associates degree from TCC they are Workforce ready many of them go straight into the workforce making money more money than all of us here at the table um and we're so proud of them and Dr Ramsey was gracious to to come and attend um last year which I thought was a really a big Testament to your commitment to us recognizing those students so thank you very much thank you thank you to you mayor and the entire Council we appreciate it and any other questions or Dr Ramsey oh I do have one more I'm so sorry maybe this is clarification that's helpful you mentioned school closures and I think when things were reported originally your board approved a study on school facilities yes ma'am but it sounds like that's more on the infrastructure of the school rather than on the under enrollment numbers correct it's both okay um so for transparency our board the same evening that they approved the contract for the master facilities plan they approved a resolution because we wanted to be very clear open and transparent with the entire Community with all of the aspects that we were looking at so we're looking at preventative maintenance for 10 years but we also are looking at not only today's enrollment uh but what enrollment will be far into the future and so when I received those phone calls about is a school this school has x amount of students it should close I always remind them that we can't just look at the data today because without the city's master plan without knowing about the wonderful work that our alliance is doing with building mixed income communities even if a school has low enrollment today in four to five years it may be much higher May double and so we we're not going to make quick decisions with shortsighted data but we're going to look far out and ensure that we make the right decisions for this for our School District not just for today but for the long run that's helpful thank you very much thank you Dr Ramsey okay Council our next presentation is on infant and maternal Health Report Satie Funk best place for kids National director and Sarah Readington who is with Miles Foundation are up as they kick things off I'll um start the presentation by saying thank you um we started this work over a year and a half ago to really tackle what has been a perplexing problem for tarant County in Fort Worth for quite some time which is our abysmal numbers and outcome especially for mothers and young infants here in Taran County um Sarah and sad have done remarkable work in a short period of time they'll fly through this presentation not because of abundance of time I think they're so familiar with material how many times have you presented this at this point um but I do hope that you find this helpful and this is a new Lane for the city but something that I feel very strongly we needed a coalition to work on this and fortunately the the seat that I'm in currently the bully p of the mayor's office what did have convening power to put these players at the table um but we wouldn't be here today without Sarah and sad so with that the floor is yours thank you thank you mayor I'm Sarah Readington with the miles foundation and I'm Satie Funk with best place for kids and we are so excited to be here today to share with you the ongoing work of the tarant county maternal and infant Health Coalition a little bit about the history of the co coition mayor Parker just mentioned um the Coalition was first convened in September of 2022 when mayor Parker wanted to explore a more more Collective and cohesive way to approach improving the quality of care and wraparound supports for tarant County mothers before during and after giving birth and why this is so important again as the mayor alluded to tarant county has the second highest maternal mortality rate for black women in Texas and as a community we know that we can and should do better so to build a coalition that could truly enact lasting change here in Taran County we brought together all of the local large Health Care System leaders all of our maternal and infant Health Care Providers and our philanthropic partners that were already dedicated to ensuring A Healthy Start and a strong future for every mom and baby in tarant County the Coalition engaged in key Discovery activities in 2023 to determine the current local resources that already exist along the perinatal Continuum that's pren to onee post birth and to identify keyas of opportunity to address together of the success metrics that the Coalition identified together a few rows to the top one connection between providers themselves two building a United Community of resources for moms and babies three creating creating a cohesive and closed loop navigation system that can a enable hospitals to talk to each other and other Community Partners about key maternal Health referrals and lastly to align on data to track the coalition's collective progress now I'll turn it over to Satie to talk about the coalition's progress to date thank you Sarah and as mayor alluded we have a lot of material to cover so I'm going to go quickly and I'm not going to touch on everything you see on the slides um so I'm very quickly going to walk through these first two which um first two pieces of progress to date so initially our very first Milestone was really to go out and interview do deep interviews with key health and Hospital partners in tan County to better understand what resources and services did they have and what was the capacity of those resources and services all the way from prenatal through that first year postpartum and then we developed this Continuum which really outlines it I know it's probably hard to see we're happy to send a more detailed um option later on and then we verified this with each of those stakeholders for accuracy to make sure we were appropriately representing what they communicated to us and based on that Continuum it gave us the opportunity to hypothesize about three three key opportunities for this Coalition the first was awareness and access so understanding we really needed to focus on lifting up awareness and access of critical Services while recognizing that those that are already connected with some sort of service in the community are much more likely to then connect with other services so if you're already connected with Wick or you're already connected with Medicaid it means you're more likely to then connect to other additional Services second was the recognition of really high referral rates but low post activity so what this meant was really good news that no health or Hospital partner felt they were a single uh felt they were like the Silver Bullet we have 88% of providers referring outside excuse me I'm suffering from allergies but referring outside of their boundaries for key referrals but only 75% really knew what happened once that referral made 7% yes thank you 75% didn't really know what was happening and then lastly was the recogn that Health was much more than just what was happening within the healthare system itself and really looking broader to the impact of social determinance of Health one of the things we came together on early was aligned messaging you may remember we had the Medicaid renewal campaign that started last spring hospitals coming together Healthcare Systems coming together to really make it easy for individuals in the community to understand that Medicaid renewal was coming for the first time in a long time where they could go for assistance and what that for them we also integrated all of the resources from this Continuum into the parent pass app which was developed locally with families here in Fort Worth and now has 8,500 users um but what I really want to spend the bulk of our time on is talking through the maternal Health interview results and key findings so um with that last summer we conducted 53 interviews with an additional 29 surveys completed um with mothers who had given birth in tarant County within the last two years there were 1hour long interviews they were paid for their time um and that information was then deidentified and sent to the University of Michigan um School of Medicine the zero to thrive Center there which is a leader a national leader in perinatal infant Early Childhood mental health um with a focus think may had a quick question yeah I I don't want to disrupt anything but I don't want you to feel rushed going through this because some of us you I haven't given birth to a cat and so there there are some of us who may I was asking Alan are you understanding this and so please don't feel rushed and I just need to be able to grasp you know absolutely thank you for that I will slow down okay thank you thank you um and with that so I really where we're going to build the bulk or build where really where we're going to spend the bulk of our time is talking through what we learned from these maternal health interviews and how we're going to use those findings moving forward in partnership with our major health and Hospital systems for hopefully healthier more successful moms and babies here in Teran and so do you might mention why University of Michigan before any Alma moders get ruffled feathers here there's a real reason why we partner with University of Michigan yeah so University of Michigan was identified because they really are not just a national expert but an intern ational leader in the infant in the perinatal so that would be early pregnancy and kind of early parenting infant and early childhood mental health space especially with a special focus on families who have faced a wide range of adversity so that includes families who have um experienced abuse families who have experienced neglect families within the child welfare system as well as military families um and other families kind of facing a a large um scale of diversity of of adversity and so we thought it was really important one to include them because of their expertise but two because we really wanted an independent perspective so someone who didn't know everything that Taran County had going on to really be able to help us evaluate and understand what are our strengths and weaknesses here and how does our data align and differ from the National Data around maternal and infant Health um and how can we learn from National efforts but where might we have a unique opportunity to lead here in Fort Worth in tarant county and then at a national stage so um with those interviews as we mentioned 53 total interviews 29 um surveys completed more than 9,000 um data points that were codified and then evaluated by the University of Michigan I'm not going to detail the exact um demographics of those who are interviewed you can see on the screen I I'm pretty confident all of you can read but I do think there are a few things that are important to highlight first is up here with regards to race and ethnicity um what I do want to point out is um that we did an over sampling of our Hispanic and Latin our our um Hispanic and Spanish speaking mothers as well as our black and African-American mothers when you compare those in our sample with the actual population of Taran County so there showing up at a higher degree and that was intentional because we really wanted to make sure that those stories were lifted up and that that we were being held accountable for their experiences the second piece I think that's really interesting to point out is here at the bottom in the middle when you look at unplanned pregnancies 60% of all women interviewed had unplanned pregnancies and this was across all demographics so it didn't vary by age there wasn't a higher rate of unplanned pregnancies focused on teens or 45-year-old women it was really uniform across it also didn't vary by race or ethnicity or income level so it's just across the board about 60% of births here in tarant County were unplanned pregnancies looking ahead at some key takeaways that I hope to illustrate through the data in the following slides overall really really exciting 93% of women in tant County were were satisfied with their pregnancy birthing and early parenting experience so we looked at those three critical periods and overall families were really satisfied with that experience however there were really important differences that varied by Race So that satisfaction level was lower for our black and African-American mothers and it was actually higher for our Spanish speaking mothers additionally 80% said that they found some sort of service helpful during their pregnancy and additionally as already highlighted we know that those who were already connected were more readily connected to other resources looking ahead at opportunities 20% one in five mothers didn't access prenatal care until after their first trimester so that would be what we consider late prenatal care not until your 13th or 14th month when usually doctor would want to see you make sure everything's going okay that rate also varied by Race by uh ipv status so uh interpersonal violence status as well as um medical home status so those who had a medical home were more likely to access prenatal care during that F first trimester whereas those who has experienced interpersonal violence we're more likely to offer it about 10 weeks later than the sample overall we also saw hypertension and traumatic Birth really spring up as key opportunities for tarant County to focus on within um mothers one in five mothers that had experienced one in five mothers experienced hypertension overall but what we know specifically is that among mothers who had hypertension prior to pregnancy so hypertension would be high blood pressure those who had hypertension prior to pregnancy 80% experienced a traumatic birth that's critical and we'll highlight this later because we know that mothers who experience a traumatic birth have a tougher time forming that initial mother and infant attachment bond which is so critical to early development as well as a tougher time being successful in breastfeeding which we know is really important to health overall we also saw that overwhelmingly mothers wanted more support after birth that's what we heard what's the number one thing you would ask for I wish I had more support after birth I wish there was more available I wish everybody had access to more support after birth so that was an overwhelming take um takeaway from all the families yeah what defines support support had a wide range so in kind of a low touch support was the opportunity for a more formalized way for new moms to get together in settings outside of their home with their babies the levels of depression postpartum depression and anxiety are very high here in Taran County as they are across a lot of the country so additional mental health supports not just therapy but even some low touch parent cafes that type of situation um and then other supports like I needed help accessing food or my husband lost his job and that really threw our whole early parenting experience through a loop I would have liked to help finding diapers um I will also point out this was during the the majority of mothers we interviewed had experienced the formula shortage so that came up too and that showed up differently for mothers whether they were breastfeeding or on formula you may remember there was a national shortage about 18 months ago two two years probably yeah yeah what shows over here is when we asked mothers what it and this is all statistically significant so we asked mothers about you know what was your experience during pregnancy during birth and that first year postpartum and we looked at that also in conjunction with what else was going on in their life what other stressors or protective factors were showing up and so what you see here everything here as they say in the social sciences is statistically significant that means they really do have um an inclination to being like causational or whatever um very technical here right um but what we want to highlight is everything in Red made it a less beneficial experience right so it made the experience more negative for that mother at that specific time period whereas everything in green made it a better experience and why this is important to understand is because if we look look at prenatal experiences and we see incarceration and adverse job experiences this is not where we generally zero in our conversations within health and Hospital settings when talking about maternal Health but they have a huge impact on the mother's experience and ultimately the health and well-being of that mom and baby and so what this highlights for us as a coalition is the importance of involving non-trad traditional stakeholders in this work and involving non-traditional stakeholders as entry points to better focus on mom and baby early on especially when we think about okay we know that those who are experiencing um economic stress incarceration are also more likely to have um their F to have late late care so to receive prenatal care after that first trimester but then we see other things like child Medicaid receipt that continues to show up as a protective and connective factor for families throughout their experience so that means that families who had Medicaid had a better experience overall with birthing and better early parenting experience and they were also more likely to connect with services and as a reminder this is before this was done before the State past 12-month postpartum um maternal care so for for Medicaid and so it it'll be It's Curious to me what that impact could be positively for moms that are eligible to stay on their insurance for a full 12 months after giving birth having given birth twice I can't imagine losing your insurance within three months of giving birth and then trying to navigate Health Care system if you don't feel well even if your child has Medicaid so there's some positive um result out of that too that we haven't even seen in this um work yes and that that does spring up when we talk about what supports were they looking for well postpartum you know they were losing medic their their chip pretty quickly those pregnant mothers and so that meant they couldn't go access Mental Health Services they couldn't access some of the other services they wanted to because they'd lost that coverage so these next few slides look deeper at each stage and once again it's St statistically significant so here all of these all of the bars in red are showing things that adverse or negatively affected mom's experience during pregnancy um so there's many factors here I do want to highlight anxiety because you're going to see anxiety and depression continue to play a role and you'll see anxiety and depression prenatal so anxiety and depression that mother had while she was pregnant pop back up as affecting her experience in early parenting so this is what what factors were statistically significant in affecting mother's experience during birth um and so just to highlight you see you continue to see depression and anxiety but then you also see these protective factors child Medicaid makes it a better experience Spanish speaking that would indicate that they're more likely to be a more recent immigrant and we see that across immigrant communities across the country that they're more likely to look favorably upon their experience often as a sense of gratitude for being here that's not necessarily what we're seeing here but I will say that Trends with National Data and then looking at early parenting so this would be that first year of life that first year of infancy once again we continue to see depression pop up we also see other new challenges coming through Child Care challenges right economic stress and what they're showing is economic stress during pregnancy as well as economic stress during early parenting both impact their parenting experience and then we continue to see child Medicaid and whether or not they interviewed in Spanish to continue to be a protective Factor so we also were curious about where mothers go for trusted information and while 88% of mothers indicated that they know where to go there was no single source that was over whelmingly endorsed by the majority of mothers and you can see a majority that the highest rated was family and friends that's where I'm going for trusted information about what's happening with my body where to find additional resources or services in the community but other thing that popped up that was really critical is that 25% 25% of mothers said healthc Care Professionals were where they go for trusted information and this was a really good thing to come from the interviews because what it tells us is that Healthcare can play a really critical role as an entry point for families to then be connected to Avenues that they can better access resources and services and we understand that our healthcare partners are often overwhelmed with the needs of the clients they're seeing and so it creates a real opportunity for healthcare partners to have a smooth handoff with other resources such as Help Me Grow which really offers a handholding experience for families to connect to services and ensure those connections are made so what this tells us is this is a key opportunity in making sure mothers get the services they need and then going back to building on what do they need and thinking about social determinance of Health you can see that social determinance of Health ac across a variety of factors and indicators continues to pop up and play a role we also talked to moms about what what factors were important to them in a provider and on the left side in green you'll see the full sample and in green when we talk about the full sample really mothers centered around this idea of ease of access right is it close to my home is it free or inexpensive but then when we dive deeper into some of our specific populations such as our Spanish speaking mothers and our black and African-American mothers what pops up is really this yearning and desire to be listened to and understood does my healthc care provider see me do they understand me are they going to listen to what I have to say so that really really emphasizes some of the differences that we need to understand in the delivery of healthcare then we looked at understanding what families say they want what factors actually affect whether or not they know about services and then whether or not they access services and so on the top it's whether or not they knew about a service and on the bottom it's whether or not they actually used the service or accessed the service once again in Trend with the rest of the presentation red makes it less likely green makes it more likely and so what you see up here is our black mothers and our Spanish speaking mothers are less likely to know about lactation supports so what that does for us as a coalition is it says loud and clear we need to change this communication we need to change how we're communicating the benefit and the opportunity of lactation supports to our Spanish-speaking mothers and our black and African-American mothers because however it's being done or maybe it's not being done isn't working so we really need a zero in on that also then I'll highlight anxiety and depression mothers experiencing anxiety and depression were more likely to use lactation Support Services okay I got it yes he's got four kids he didn't know what is lactation support yes breastfeeding support okay I S good yep so during D yep breastfeeding support so someone will come into your hospital but then also afterwards someone will come to your home and help you with latching and all that good stuff and so just highlighting anxiety and depression knowing that mother is experiencing anxiety and depression are more likely to seek breastfeeding support services that creates a cre key opportunity to screen for anxiety and depression right if we know they're more likely to go after those Services let's screen so we can connect those mothers with mental health supports or peer groups because we know and the research is very clear that maternal depression impacts healthy infant brain development right so those are key links that we can make in thinking about how how do we identify and then link to needs and services of the mothers coming through um through our buildings any questions before I move on yeah I feel like just stational diabetes should be up there just because you know it's you know I I had hypertension but you know uh my sister had gestational diabetes and you know she that is one thing that prevented her from having another child how how is that attributing to or how are these mothers also experiencing that onset condition that's a great question so we did question about um gational diabetes whether they had diabetes whether they had gestational diabetes that did not come up as a statistically significant factor in how the data played out hypertension did in certain areas but specifically gestational diabetes did not have a statistically significant impact on pregnancy on birth or on early parenting great question and there's a whole host of slides in there I also just want to offer or available after you have we'll give yall our emails I'm happy to dive deeper into this um and provide additional background if helpful so the next step that we did was to map the mother's experiences against that early Continuum and the big takeaway of this is that the knowledge of additional emotional and wraparound words was low and the usage was lower we also talked about which providers were cited as most helpful and you can see there's a lot of great providers up here cited as helpful but there's really no consensus and Wick that received the most was only named 15 times out of nearly 80 mothers who went through this survey looking ahead to areas of concern things that popped out for us 35% of mothers in the sample reported having a traumatic birth this Trends nationally nationally the rate is about 33% of mothers experiencing a traumatic birth locally it was 35% and as I mentioned earlier the experience of a mother having a traumatic birth goes on to impact and affect that early maternal infant Bond or attachment which lays the foundation for brain development it lays the down foundation for early Health the development of the central nervous system so these pieces are really critical when we think about not just mom's health but baby's Health overall and the majority of women who mentioned having who who said yes I did have a traumatic birth received no no sort of treatment or follow-up or mental health support really important is that we were able to identify that 80% of mothers who had hypertension prior to pregnancy so pre-existing experienced a traumatic birth so knowing what we know about the impact of traumatic births and knowing that we know that 80% of those who have hypertension prior to becoming pregnant are likely to experience a traumatic birth it's a real opportunity for healthcare providers and those mothers to be able to form a strong team in man in and getting ahead so that they don't have a traumatic birth and I want to clarify something here The traumatic birth is defined in the eyes of the mother it is not defined medically medical traumatic birth is there is a medical definition but that's not what I'm referring to here and actually the research the statistical research links back to Mom's experience not to the medical experience and when you ask Moms about what made it a lot of it is not being listened to not being heard feeling like they were rushed like they weren't part of the decision-making team and so this was a real opportunity when we were talking with hospitals and Healthcare Providers about the need to really slow down and think about what is that experience for mothers during the birth and how can we get ahead and and start to address some of the core issues that are leading to traumatic births I also want to highlight we asked moms if they ever experienced disrespectful treatment and 18% of women did say yes I felt like I received dis disrespectful treatment based on race religion culture sexual identity or income level so while that's not a majority it's a very significant minority that we want to highlight and think about moving forward and then lastly because we spent an hour with each of these mothers talking through some some really intimate experiences we wanted to make sure that we didn't leave them hanging so if they said I had I had postpartum depression and I still do or yeah you know times are tough and we don't have access to food we wanted to make sure that we provide a clear connection for them to access resources so anyone who mentioned additional needs were refer directly to Help Me Grow which is managed by MHMR and was funded initially by Taran County um where a a navigator called that mother screened them for social determinance of Health screened them for depression talked to them about their needs and then continued working with that mother until they had successfully connected with services so this is different than 211 where you might be given a list and have to call through these mothers were held had their hands held until they connected with those Resources by this help me grow Navigator and of that nearly half of all the mothers we interviewed we made a referral for they were able to successfully connect with 64% which is pretty good and of those 91% had what we would call a successful closed loop which is just a fancy way of saying there that this help me grow person stayed with them until they actually connected with services not until they made that referral but until they knew the mom connected with services and was in a position that they no longer required that out Outsource of referrals so with that I'm going to pause and pass it back to my colleague Sarah to talk about what key opportunities going forward look like great okay so wrapping it up sort of looking forward key opportunities for the Coalition what they coal coales around were four key opportunities one was a awareness and access as we shared 56% of mothers were looking for additional support after birth but they were getting lost in the how of connecting to those Services second was usage and connectivity because we had a majority of Hospital providers referring Services out but 75% of them didn't know what happened after that third was mental health and again not actually just counseling but really peer-to-peer mechanisms that we could leverage existing programming and community supports um to build and then fourth utilizing Healthcare as an entry point as 25% of moms are using their healthc care provider as that starting point how do we leverage mom's interaction with Healthcare Providers but but not jeopardize hospitals capacity because we know they're at capacity currently and the tangible solutions that connected to these areas were a couple things that sades mentioned one was using Help Me Grow the fully funded um mechanism at my health my resources that is a OneStop referral phone line that hospitals and maternal health provid ERS can use um they have dozens of child specialist Navigators and over 500 Community Partners that they already work with in across tant County so Healthcare Providers are just one phone call away from being able to have a live person connect their moms whoops look we went over time oh oh it just it shut off on here it's still up if you're here good good good I thought that was our our calling to say to get get off the stage um so so that the Help Me Grow line was really that One-Stop referral source for Hospital be able to refer out the second was training labor and delivery nurses on the parent pass app which stie mentioned but we've spent the last two years building this app from scratch with 200 families across Fort Worth many of you here helped us do that with our local Community Partners we now have 8,500 families using that app to help connect to key healthc care providers vetted Community Services education opportunities from Cradle to Career so um that was opportunity number two and number three was really to continue to align all those healthcare providers ERS um to provide aligned communication so we're directing parents to one place to find this information so what does that look like as a next step we are excited to say that we are starting a closed loop referral pilot for Taran County working with those six major HealthCare Partners um that will scale eventually to address the 27,000 mothers that give birth in Taran County each year and 27 babies 27,000 not 27 um and through and and how we'll do that is really utilizing help me grow as that One-Stop referral Central Navigator and Clos Loop referral system that will report back to hospitals about what's happening with maternal Health referrals and then we're actually engaging TCU School of Medicine um medical students that will help to train nurses on the parent Pass App learn about this closed loop referral system and help report back on the data and really ultimately what we're seeking is to help providers understand the key trends and needs in maternal Health provide enable them to provide the full Continuum of Care that they really seek to provide to mothers and um we're really excited about building towards a more vibrant tomorrow through this this uh pilot and really believe that the dedication and work of this Coalition along with the leadership of Mayor Parker and and you all in this room will help to create the foundation for a healthier brighter future for every mom baby and family in Taran County thanks so much for your time and happy to answer questions thank you s mayor pend Bivens yeah I I like to keep things real simple you know in terms of uh trying to help get a key message out there and so when I started hanging out with Pete you know I basically would tell parents as your teacher as your kid reading a grade level that way I didn't have to become a teacher or anything and so with this effort what is the best message I can tell people I wrote down those two help me grow and parent past is that good to share with people before or after birth or or what absolutely I think the best message would be to download the parent Pass App it was developed by parents here and it really has comprehensive One-Stop shop of resources for families all the way to what what am I going to do this Saturday with my 15-year-old or my three-year-old what's free and happening in my community as well as a direct line to the Help Me Grow Navigator so if they have the parent pass there is a button that specifically says questions about your child talk to someone you can push that button call and directly connect with that help me grow Navigator who's going to who's skilled and trained to really ask those questions and navigate for that family to get them access to the resources and answers they need thank you any other questions Macy thank you guys this is really interesting um my question is more about the philanthropy piece of it because I know philanthropy play played a huge part in developing both a parent pass and help me grow can you talk a little bit about about and you said it's fully funded but how much does it cost to maintain um how is philanthropy uh rallying around this and how can we help in the future sure so the parap pass app was developed um you know certainly with support from the miles foundation and other philanthropic Partners I think to date we've spent close to one1 to $1.5 million developing that app that includes um the support we provided to parents so all parents were paid for their time um as you know technology is not cheap so a significant portion of that is technology not just the development but then the ongoing QA um and then additional Outreach and connection um with families here looking ahead and specific to the maternal and infant Health Coalition we are currently in the development process of a grant to North Texas Community Foundation to help fund um this initial pilot that that Sarah just detailed um and looking ahead we think there's an opportunity that if this pilot goes really well there's an opportunity to build and launch from there to really make sure it's um you know it's in the water and and really everywhere um for families to really easily access and I do want to thank you know certainly um mayor Parker city manager and and the city council because um you guys also supported the opportunity really to allow some of this initial landscape uh work to be done that is so critically laid out the pass forward um that we were were able to do especially with um with that feedback in Intel from mothers themselves another question Elizabeth thank you for all of that um my question is as you move forward and we go past just um sorry hi there you go sorry no no no no you're fine you're fine um every so as we move forward and you start the implementation process we have um firefighters and police officers that are in folks homes daily um and so I'd like you to think about what we can do to either arm them with information or be partners with with them as you move forward and collect data and start working on how we can improve those metrics yeah and we would also love to to get some time with those firefighters and First Responders just to share the parent pass app with them we you're in the right spot yeah yeah so absolutely because that can be one more tool that they have when they're entering homes and and seeing a lot of need and and opportunity for support right thank you yeah any other questions Council no um I'll just share two things in closing because it's hard when you put things in statistical numbers is so there was a really interesting AMA study that I can send to you if you want to dig into it um I think it was published in 2021 but it looked from 1999 like 2020 what numbers looked like across the United States for maternal Health it is more dangerous especially for black mothers United States to have a baby today than it was a generation ago which I find to be absolutely horrific and you look at numbers it was 26.7 in 1999 and when the study was published it was 55.4 now United States the number is close to 69 um mothers dead per 10,000 births and so rather than us kind of put our heads in the sand about what we should be doing here locally this is not something the city has ever really taken on public health usually is a partnership with the county and which should be mentioned here they have been a partner in this work and special thanks to um the public health department at Taran County but I think the work that SAR are leading is really Innovative because you've got every hospital system willing to work together along with your nonprofit agencies and the good news story is if you look at the map that's included in this deck all the resources are here we're incredibly resourc Rich how what a travesty it is if a mom or a family doesn't know how to reach those resources and so I'm hopeful that this pilot will demonstrate some active work that we could even take to Statewide at some point but you can't do that unless you have demonstrated proof so hopefully even um into this next legislative session and certainly in the session after that we have something to demonstrate to the state of Texas um and and really show tangible results to what has for whatever reason become a really perplexing problem and there are other real good B spots many of you may have attended the United Way women's luncheon that Leah King held an entire panel on the um the resource of doula care um in our community and the grant that they're making I've run into two women recently one was in finance and one was um really I think she'd had a background in plumbing which was interesting they'd all gone to Doula school to become part of this volunteer network of doulos one had actually spun off her own company so there are really good bright spots here um across Fort Worth that I'm just very proud of so congratulations and keep going thank you thank you okay we're moving through next presentation is um the proposed temporary closure of North University Drive from jaboro Highway 199 I'm going to stop reading Lauren okay can I see it on here per all right good afternoon mayor and Council I'm Lauren prier the director for transportation and public works today we're going to talk about the proposed temporary closure of North University Drive from jaboro Highway to Rockwood Park Drive so in support of the Central City flood control project the US Army Corps of Engineers Fort wor district has requested support from the fort wor city council to temporarily close North University Drive from jaboro Highway to Rockwood Park Drive during its reconstruction beginning in mid 2026 or later it's essential that we maintain access to properties adjacent and mitigate congestion During the Reconstruction University Drive is on the critical path for the central city project the Redway will be elevated approximately 10 to 15 ft to create the valley storage required so what does that mean well essentially this project must be completed before the North and South B bypass channels can be activated so to raise University Drive it will be necessary to construct either vertical retaining walls or Earth and slopes as seen in these conceptual images this important detail will be worked out during design which the core of engineers is now entering University Drive will continue to be three lanes in each Direction after the project is complete so although the rerouting of the traffic will happen in 2026 or later the temporary fullclosure must be known now to incorporate into the design this temporary closure will minimize the construction time and impacts on businesses in and around this project Corridor the closure will also provide for a safer construction environment due to the significant amounts of fill required here so this period of closure is anticipated to be between 12 and 18 months a city council resolution in support of a temporary closure during Reconstruction will be on the February 27th city council agenda for your consideration so act access routes and Detour routes will be finalized during the design phase City staff have been meeting with property owners immediately adjacent to the closure to share conceptual access and Detour plans we'll continue to reach out to all regional stakeholders as more details are known so while the core of engineers is leading the design and construction of this project we do have a forworth city project City of Fort Worth project manager assigned so I would encourage stakeholders business businesses and neighborhood associations to reach out to Doug ramaker to schedule time to discuss so it's anticipated that Rockwood Park Drive in the Clover Leaf will remain open during construction to provide access to businesses from the South if vertical retaining walls are used then the pink line could be an option for access to those businesses if Earth and slopes are incorporated then the Blue Line would provide access access so the access Concepts on the West Side include a temporary Connector Road between Rockwood Park Drive and Rockwood Lane the ultimate design will need to be mindful of slopes and turning angles to accommodate large truck movements so this is the projected traffic volumes on our local streets with a full closure of University Drive again the specific detour options and track traffic control plans will be developed by the core of engineers during the design of the roadway however it is anticipated that Henderson Street White Settlement Road Northside Drive and North Main Street will be key components of this detour so this is just a reminder for community groups and interested stakeholders to reach out to Doug ramaker if not we will be in touch mayor and council do you have any questions for me questions for mayor and Council Macy Lauren I wanted to thank you for the time you've taken to reach out to the Cal Town forward Stock Show and Rodeo Dickies you done really a great job in making sure they have a voice and understand what the process is and what's happening and I know this is going to be extremely disruptive to a lot of businesses and residents but you've done a great job this far thank you thank you and there's more work to be done we'll be reaching out to more folks involved thank you thank you Lauren Council our last presentation is a is the urban forestry master plan and Leandra Stringfellow is going to present okay well good evening mayor in city council I am Leandra Stringfellow assistant director for on the zoning and design review so this this is my first official presentation before you so go easy on me I will ask for that so I'm actually um just a messenger here today um there has been a lot of great work that's been done by folks um at your table um I would like to um go ahead and first acknowledge mayor proin Biven and council member block who have really um helped lead this effort and as well as we have some staff members that I am also going to introduce um a little bit later in this presentation as well as some members from our community and of course Texas trees Foundation who has um really helped us with drafting this plan and so also we have some supporters um who helped with the funding will forgo Atmos um the Nicholas Pon Jr Family Foundation and BNSF Railway and so as I was saying earlier mayor proin bons and council member block were the co-chairs for the steering committee um for this plan and this process um this is our entire steering committee so it included some members um from staff of course as well as Texas trees Foundation we also had three members from our development advisory committee um also on the committee and um I would also like to to point out um Parks and Recreation um has done a lot of heavy lifting as well Joel meckel Haney who is also um in the audience today and our own urban forestry officer Jacqueline Ingram as well as manager Mary wals and um Craig Fox our city Forester so um what we're going to cover in this presentation is a brief history of how we got here how the plan was developed the VAR Community engagement activities and how we plan to achieve our vision so why trees why now so the Cross Timbers region is um the area that really our particular um our particular area our region has the most mature trees um it actually traverses from the Southeastern um Kansas across central Oklahoma to Central Texas um it's named for repeated Crossings of Timberland before the open prairies to both East and West um and it's undisturbed land um today in the East Cross Timbers um and it's perhaps the most fragmented um vegetative region in Texas so one thing that we realized is that other than us being the fastest growing city in America we're also losing about 2500 Acres of natural open space to development each year and so as you all are probably aware we have a couple of other programs that are also really part of while we're doing this plan um we want to make sure that this plan and the vision and our recommendations the tasks that come after that are going to align with u the the mayor's good natured Green Space initiative and then we also have our open space um conservation plan and we're going to talk a little bit more about that at the end and the different efforts that we plan to undertake in order to achieve our vision so this process actually started in January 2022 um and so if cherry qu quar is in the audience is she in the audience today she's um I just want to make sure that I um give a huge shout out to her because she's I'm done a lot of work on this plan but this actually um started again in January 2022 the city did $50,000 um of the total um amount to get this plan done and then ttf was able that's Texas trees Foundation was able to help assemble um the rest of the funds for a total of 250,000 and in May 2022 um Council approved for us to move forward with this plan and so really what this plan centers around is four things um first what is it that we currently have what is it that we want to get how are we going to get there and how are we doing today so we we talked a little bit early about staff collaboration but as this plan went through the process these are all the different departments that have been involved so we want you to know that it has been fully bedded um throughout the entire process we also did did quite a bit of community engagement and just to um let you see the level of Engagement that has occurred there have been 61 participating organization so many that you know you can probably barely read them on the slide here but 61 participating organizations that have had some type of input at some point in this process and that included various um surveys and events um we we even had a b bilingual Community survey we had popup events Community workshops and six focus groups and this was the various distribution distribution methods that we utiliz and we didn't rely on just one um particular area we wanted to make sure that there was a way we could um get the message out to as many different people as possible so in all we ended up having over 2300 Community participants um and over a f month um engagement process so this is and overall what the community said they wanted you know and and I like to joke you know of course we want it all right you know we want the shade um we we want to add trees where they don't exist we want to be able to increase preservation and you know just for me personally that is actually something that is near and dear to my heart so um we're going to talk a little bit at the end about how we intend to do that because it's going to be a huge collaborative effort amongst all of our development ordinances um and then also increasing increasing funding um for programs that we currently have and being able for folks to be able to access information so this is where we want to be y'all we want to have by 2050 we want to have 30% tree canopy and we think that is very doable currently we're at 19% and we've actually been at 19% um for a while but let's talk about how we intend to get there so these are the goals the overall arching goals that have been established in order for us to reach this plan and then there are recommendations after this goal so first thing that we want to do is we want to continue to manage our Urban Forest we want to preserve and expand what we currently have we need to strengthen the programs that we also currently have and that also includes adding additional programs where that's needed and then this idea of Equitable engagement and that also came up quite a bit to um in some of our board and commission meetings especially Parks Board as we was as we were meeting with those um various Commissioners and board members so there are 10 recommendations here and the reason why I put this up here um initially we were going back and forth on should we just show you the recommendation well reason why we're not why we didn't is because we want you to see that there are many action steps that are involved in these recommendations and as we go through trying to um adopt some of these various ordinances and make amendments to them you're going to be involved in that process as well as the community um the boards and commissions uh this is not the end really this is um actually the beginning in my opinion so I feel like I got here for the fun stuff so um recommendation one we want to um first of course conduct a comprehensive inventory and that is actually already underway so we've already started this one recommendation two we want to develop and um implemented changes to tree regulations standards and best practices so one thing that's very important to point out here is that that we're just not talking about the tree preservation ordinance we're talking about the zoning ordinance and we're talking about subdivision ordinance and the reason why that's important is when we talk about being able to preserve trees looking at how we're developing now is going to be very important because I'll give you you know one example um say a developer has a 100 acre tract of land Maybe 50 acres of that is heavily treed the other 50 acres doesn't have as many trees one of the things that we want to really start looking at doing is what can we do to make sure that we preserve half of that right those 50 acres we want them to preserve as much as possible but now what that may mean is maybe an additional height maybe um more density on that other 50 acres in order to preserve you know the other 50 acres for where they're where it's heavily treed so that's one thing that um we're actually going to try to Embark up on first U recommendation two of recommendation three this is expanding and um strengthening cooperation amongst the various departments so that's not just development services but that also goes to um our public works department and of course our parks department um strengthening existing relationships and support new Partnerships with neighbor hoods and Community organizations throughout the city supporting and expanding plans for maintenance risk management and resiliency of public trees um coordinating and creating and implementing public Communications education and engagement focused on Fort W's um Urban forest and a lot of this too I believe will be Partnerships with the parks forward because some of the comments that came from the parks Ford was making sure that areas that maybe don't have as many parks or don't have as many trees that they how do we how do we support those areas so that they can um basically have the same level of of forest as other areas within the city recommendation seven is developing and implementing a strategy to maintain sustainable funding and resources to achieve desired levels of service recommendation eight is creating plans for tree planting preservation and maintenance in order for us to get to that 30% canopy cover and again that's kind of encompassing really a lot of some of the other recommendations that I've already talked about recommendation nine developing protocols for monitoring the forest because one of um I know Jacqueline one of the things that she gets the most frustrated about is um having to go back after the fact when someone has already cut down trees so what can we we do to let people know that don't cut down trees until you um talk to us get get some type of permit but then also after the fact um how can we have better enforcement in order to make sure that what has been done can be mitigated and finally um strengthening and and expanding and increasing the awareness of our programs so this is the approval process timeline after that engagement occurred starting on December 13th we had our first um board presentation that was with Parks Board we actually went to Parks Board twice um first time was to present second time was to get feedback um of course we presented to our city manager's office our Urban Design committee um Dak um that's our development advisory committee also had two various presentations we presented to the city plan commission um and we're here today so one thing I also want to tell you we're just presenting today if you all are you know happy about where this plan is going and and these recommendations we've presented then what we would like to do is um present to you a hard copy of the plan and have this on the February 27th meeting for Action so we do want to go ahead and let you know some of the comments I've talked to you a little bit about it but some of the comments that came up um from the various boards and commissions and these were answered and addressed during the meeting however um again we have a week if there any additional follow-ups that we that you feel like we need to um address we'll be happy to do that um but Parks and Recreation board wanted to know about current current canopy count we answered that um the inventory and how this going is going to affect current policies our Urban Design commission um they were happy to see plan being completed and the reason why um UDC is here is because this is actually the board that um will hear any type of variance to our current tree preservation ordinance and these are some comments um the the top to is are from our city plan commission and there was a discussion of um our ordinance and then how the process is going to proceed they this is totally a highlight right a summary they really had a lot of questions on what happens with the ordinance and how are we going to um enforce the ordance and how is the arance going to be crafted so again there's still a lot of work to be done um in order to get to that point and then the last one uh was the development advisory committee and they wanted to make sure that that there was Rec recognition that whenever they have especially these larger developments like I was giving you an example of the 100 Acre development those are really key opportunities where um we can expand the forest um on a larger scale and so we look forward to being able to um to to figure out what that ordinance looks like and collaborating with them in order to um achieve our goals so that concludes my presentation you see I listed Jacqueline as the person to go to for questions I always like to put her in the hot seat but but um of course you know I'm here to answer any questions today as well as as we go forward and look forward to your approval on um next week I've just got some some comments to share and Leandra you're you're new here and I appreciate the positive attitude you exhibited during this this presentation but I need to make sure the public knows where this came from and it predates I think you use the year 2021 it predates this and we have to know what brought this about so that we can understand the Public's expectations of what they want to see and what we vote on and at this point I'm really not ready for it to go to council yet this came about and I get really emotional about this if you just Google Gina Bivens and Dr Harden you you'll remember this came about because of a clear cutting incident that Dr Harden did in 2018 and after they did the clear cutting we got what I call the rains from hell and that's when the East Side flooded uh they had bypassed the development process and it just it was it was a very very bad time here for our city and especially the east side one thing it's important that you know as soon as that happened there were three people I called and their names should be included on those people who were thanking I called Louise Hart Louise Appleman Judy horon and Margaret deas because those were people I knew loved trees and felt the pain that we all felt this was devastating for us and so what the public is going to want to see is not so much all of the process but what are we going to do financially to keep this from ever happening again and so until I can read and make sure that I see penalties fines what have you that are significant and meeting the expectations you know I am I'm at a pause with this but you you have to be reminded how we got here and I think this Council has complet well Carlos was here but this Council has changed you know since that happened but I have not forgotten and so DJ you you know the drama you know the pain you know the anger there people were upset all over this city and so this was a very hard thing for us to have to bear but what the public really got upset about is that they felt that the fines were a pass through and we've made some some changes in how we penalize what have you but they called it a backdoor deal and I've met with Randle last week and he said he still felt the the stripes on his back but the idea was the department head had the option to decide on what the fines could have been and the Star Telegram headline was Dr Harden could face $1.58 million and it was nothing like that and so I know what the public expects to come from this work I just want to make sure that we're delivering that and not sugarcoating this because we finished something and I'm also concerned about how we audit you know the study that we paid for that was done so I don't have any questions DJ I'm just letting folk know where I am right now well I just wanted to let you know that you know this is just step one uh but I also want to point out that we have made some incremental changes uh since since that situation with Dr Horton number one the development services director is no longer able to make those negotiations with developers that has to come to the full Council for consideration so we did make that change and we've made some additional changes with with fees along the way but this work right here what it does though it it creates a a a meaningful step toward the area where you'd like to go uh for example I think one of the recommendations is to form an additional steering committee which will be comprised of our our stakeholders that you and I and uh council member block has been meeting with over the last couple years you know with that group as well as our our developers our Landscape Architects our you know our clear Cutters uh to to ensure that that everybody has a voice in the room and then we can go back and open up the ordinances to see where those fines need to be and where those penalties need to be for example some of the situations we've discussed were right instead of finding the property owners a lot a lot of the these clear-cut incidents are not developers they're they're generally some property owner that has a property and they don't understand urban forestry or they they're not apprised of our ordinances and they'll go and clearcut a lot of D that's that's true and I feel you I support you but we cannot forget how we got here because it happened before even 2018 when Becky H Haskins was on the council East Side got clearcut again and so you know even though I know the average John Doe uh DIY guy can clearcut some trees I just I feel obligated to make sure the Public's expectations are met on how we deliver this yes ma'am now the other question since I'm going to ask you a question anyway uh one big concern I had was inspections in the field you know so when when when we see someone and for you for those of you who are new we it was like a Vietnam flashback uh one morning I got a call from somebody in the John T white area somebody was clear cutting and in this case it was property owned by Huffines well it turns out they had an a permit dating back to 2017 so we couldn't stop them it was their property and they were legit but that's just how anxious you know the east side of Fort Worth became because we continue to lose trees and I just don't want this flowered up like look what we did and we don't correct what happened so that that's where I am I I really hope we can wait before we go to council I'm just very very paranoid about doing a wrong step that I know is going to give me Flack from people who I trust and who I turn to and I want to make sure that their expectations are met with what we delivered because they fought this battle before I got on the council absolutely I understand um I'll go to next question but just because we were talking about the situation East for or DR Horton remind me what the fine was for Dr Horton after that happened it was less than 300 Grand from what I remember it was yes ma'am that was a little bit before my time but I can get back to you on that do you remember anybody Dana or anybody what that was yeah I just remember it not being as significant as the damage that was done um and so I think that that mistrust still exists there for sure um anyway Carly yeah Carlos Charlie anybody you choose okay I'll go go um so I think one of my one of my I don't really have a question just a I guess concern as we move forward with this is line with uh May pretend Biven um it's unintended consequences um and I think that really goes back to making sure that the development advisory committee really is at the table because what I what I hate I'd hate to see us create ordinances that are great on paper but it prevents opportunity like you know we talk about housing and needing more housing something that's so restrictive that now let's say an affordable housing component came in now we have an ordinance that's so restrictive they're like ah it's going to be too it's not cost effective we can't make it work uh we're going to go somewhere else like and I know I believe it's Grapevine that has very restrictive uh policies so it almost makes Land I mean it's a devalued land in a lot of cases um so I really want to make sure like R Fort wor Builders Association Real Estate Council those folks are saying hey it sounds good but here's what could happen if you do it so that way we can make better decisions at the table absolutely council member we're uh trying to take a built-in suspenders approach so you know we've got the fines and we've got the penalties but we're also looking for incentives for them to preserve the trees for for example we can give them storm water uh uh credits you know on you know toward the water bill or we can also give development fee waivers uh you know we can give additional density bonuses with their zoning so we're looking at uh creative and that's the second the second phase of this is to get that stakeholder team together to discuss and brainstorm all these additional changes that we want to make to our ordinances to to incentivize as well as to penalize the bad behavior I guess I'm hurt from history because what happens when I hear a presentation that references 2021 as the start and I know that it's prior to that I'm I don't have the confidence right now and that's not in your staff's ability to deliver but you I need people to understand what happened and the other thing that that I will tell you with with certainty is when you take a look at what happened to the east side with with that clear cutting and then we had another cutting that that took place I do not want to have a perception out there that this Council has not hurt the people with significance and this is so flowery and and professionally done it doesn't have I don't hear what my public expects to hear and I don't care if that's phase one two or three you know we've got to be sure that we're not injuring ourselves because we say this is just phase one and you know we did have some difficulty and some conflict before Allan came on board in terms of you know who do we trust Who are the speakers and I'm just not there yet and this is mostly my district that got hurt from this and I will tell you people have not forgotten and so I don't I don't want to see anything that that's moving forth without being thoroughly vetted thoroughly projected and I can tell you right now the public is not going to feel that they were heard because the fine was the was it was described as a slap on the wrist and that's what it was it was a slap on the wrist and so we can't put something out there not looking ahead as to how it's going to be received by the public and I'm very uneasy about this yes ma'am question I'm sorry go ahead DJ I was going to say we understand it just means we got more work to do and and we'll go back and uh you know we'll follow up with you and those stakeholders to ensure that everyone understands what this this work means for the city of for worth as well as where we're trying to go Jared did you already ask your question I'm sorry I spaced out you did or you didn't no I did okay good deal Jared cool thanks mayor thanks for the presentation um similar to Mayor protim I think it's important also for distri six resident um we also have um um some battle wounds with trees with one of the recent um storms um and a lot of folks in several neighborhoods in our district are basically saying not all trees are created equal which they're not um and during the recent storm many trees got blown down and caused thousands of dollars of damage damage for individual residents because the developer planted a tree that ultimately wasn't going to be durable in this type of climate and got blown over and you know how that goes um so I think it's also important within this work to talk about um um um native trees and then also maybe a separate conversation that's complimentary to this is that and and one thing um one thing that I do want to make sure that I underscore with this and maybe I did not do I'm as good of a job as I could have but um this is a plan right and so if there are things like you were talking about that we need to bolster in the plan to make it clear you know um to have language that is um I guess more substantial that talks about we are serious about protecting our trees that's definitely something that we can add but a lot of well actually all all of the actual regulations are going to come with the ordinance so this kind really sets up this is what we want and if again if there's not language strong enough in this ordinance or sorry in this plan we can definitely bolster that and then once we get to the ordinance you know everyone's going to be at that table and this will and that'll be much more than than one you know presentation but um we'll definitely take these comments and um see you were fine you were perfect you you were fine you were perfect I mean let let it Let It Go okay I'll let it go what you got oh I was just going to say as far as Judy Harman uh Margaret deas and Lis appman I did speak with all three of them regarding the recommendations no no no no no I'm I I mentioned them specifically because their names were absent they put in Blood Sweat and Tears with me and the committee and the group and staff and what I said was I want their names on here yes ma'am and they are included in the the names I saw okay I'm sorry you want to have a debate here their their names are not here yes ma'am okay I believe they're in the full m yeah it is but here okay so um thank you okay qu no so sorry I got questions go to the slide that has achieving the vision and shows you a timeline of where our goals are if you don't mind thank you so much was was it this one or should I go no that one right there so I'm curious over the 20 this probably is um conservative I would guess correct because you want to achieve want to put goals on paper you can achieve okay yes and I don't know if oh let's see if Joel is still in the audience I don't know Joel if you can speak a little bit more to the survey and how that was developed is that kind of that's fun yeah I'm more curious about why 30% in 2050 why 202 23 we're only going to increase by 3% by 2035 okay I yeah I'm Joel mlan assistant director of Park and Recreation Department I that I would have to go back to that 30% of when that was first developed I know that percent just in the development of this plan we've talked about that percent that goal and it's uh it is what it is because of our that region that we live in largely Prairie so it's a little bit lower and as we go into different areas of the country tree more wooded areas that'll be a they would have a higher goal but in ours since we're Cross Timbers region and a and largely a a prairie uh type Community that's why that goal is at 30% but I would have to follow up with that information of why that was originally and that's okay that's helpful go ahead jar mayor that's what I was alluding to with the um Green Space complimenting tree canopy cover is because we're sitting in a prairie and so if we don't have standards that also speak to Landscaping practices Beyond trees get to the same that's that's helpful thank you okay yeah maybe we just dig I mean parse that out a little bit more because I think the general public is going to get stuck on certain things and that to me would be something that people get pretty fixated on and that's okay and um because we're in Texas people are going to compare us to other Texas cities and to the point that Joel just made different areas of of Texas compare us to City of Austin for instance it's in the Texas Hill Country very different tree canopy gold that's in place there than it would be here so I think just prepared to answer those questions um trying to channel mayor protim Ban's um concern I think what we could do with this presentation as a city is provide context for how we got here and a reminder especially for some of these more difficult circumstances that Gina actually pointed out today and there are other examples in every District probably and that may provide additional cover for our community members that are concerned like we're not trying to gloss over anything thing and we do need to be more aspirational and the DR Horton is just one really extreme example that happened not too long ago and I think it's okay to remind people of that and I think for Gina in particular she hears about that probably weekly from people that are still concerned so what's that yes exactly so maybe just helpful to provide some context for this report as it comes out to council the next few weeks Carlos uh Leandra yes sir this may be a study that's much larger than what you know you're presenting here in this plan and I totally understand that uh are you aware of any studies that maybe look at and correlate factors that pertain to trees and their cleaning of the air abilities because we're in a non-compliance area right now so back in 1997 we had this 40% goal now you know another few decades down the road we're at 30 we're growing as a state that's that's good news but you know we're trying to reach you know these EPA mandated you know compliance targets and is it 30% sufficient I guess well I didn't want to use that question because I think as you know it's an oversimplification but is there any data that correlates it so that you can kind of track it see you know how how how how these factors work let me look into that that's that's great question I know that's why you asked it but let me look into good thank you yes Alan so first I really enjoyed co-chairing this committee uh it was a great process thank you everybody for their role and and I have to agree with mayor proem uh we had a lot of voices involved from all sides of the discussion and we need to continue to do that we've got a basic framework of what we want now I think you can say the Double's always in the details what we do from here moving forward as we look at our ordinances and our plans we need to make sure those same stakeholders are involved so we come with the right approach moving forward and so I I I really want to commend the work so far and and acknowledge that we have a lot more still to do but thank you very much yes great presentation any other comments or questions Council thank you very much Council that's the conclusion of our briefings today are there any requests for future agenda items or reports Janette then Jared and me and then everybody so mine is for legal and PD um s sp4 or the anti-immigrant law if I'm not mistaken goes into effect March 1st I'd like to hear the city's interpretation of the law and how for wor PD will communicate its approach to the public um there are many many individuals and families who are worried about this new law and I feel we at least owe them a statement Jared thank you just following up on the tree master plan conversation I think it would be worth having an IR on what our current ordinance is around native Landscaping practices including trees Carlos okay um I'd like PD to maybe look at I don't want to just point out one thing but as an example uh mobile eye technology collision avoidance systems uh what a mobile eye it's collision avoidance systems you're teasing me I'm sorry uh you know for vehicles uh Technologies like that that you know might reduce you know those kind of collisions especially in Pursuit um situations okay I have one Gina I think most of us have if not seen we've probably heard about the burning rubber when kids are doing donuts and Willies when I saw one on 820 recently this is on a highway oneway it really got to me because that's getting a little bit too dangerous uh recently someone toted a car a few doors down from council member Frank moss and I've been getting a lot of emails about that I'd like to hear a report from tpw and I know that they're going to check with MedStar and fire and police why can we not consider speed bumps again I think we outlawed them in 20072 2008 but we're we're it's it's getting out of control and if we can't bring those back at least give us reasons why that I can tell my public because they see those as a way to calm traffic I think when William Johnson came he talked about speed tables I don't care what you call them but is there a way realistically the last Street I had had a report on it's too long for Speed hump speed whatever but what can we do to slow traffic down because now they're getting into residential communities and somebody's going to get hurt killed or mimed and I have one more mayor uh I'd like a report on neighborhood associations and these are the voluntary organizations I'd like to know how many we have and I'd like to go back five years how does that number change and I'd like to see that Citywide not just my district what I'm hearing is that there are we're losing neighborhood associations and that may be good that may be bad I don't know some cities don't even bother with them but I would like some type of history as to where we're where we're how we're trending and finally when it comes to Neighborhood alliances we have had a credibility factor and it's not just new but an alliance claiming more associations than they had and so I'd like to know a report from City legal do we really need to be trying to police or are manage neighborhood alliances and so those are my three J you might be interested to know talk to Chelsea St Louis about uh speed tables and uh speed cushions we're using those uh to mitigate that type of activity over in Rockwood uh uh parks parking lot is tpw putting them down or who put down they are just go through Chelsea okay because see we've had requests in but those requests have followed on deaf ears so what I need to ask as far uh well speed cushions or or you know are typically what you're talking about but uh I think there was also prior IR a few years ago on that lawren coming to the table so my favorite TP some paperwork here uh what council member Flores is referring to is our neighborhood traffic calming program if you Google it a web page will come up but essentially it's for residential areas only um where you might be getting a a less than favorable reply is on our IAL or other such streets right we couldn't put a speed table or speed bump whatever you want to call it on a major arterial or people well people are going 40 miles or above so these these traffic calming measures are really for those residential areas so if you have a specific location please I'll talk with you tomorrow about that and we'll look into that further Lauren you know I trust you with everything and they are encroaching in the residential areas so for sure we need to have a conversation thank you absolutely I normally can articulate these a little better but bear with me because it's tpw and water um we I would like to know the process on how we investigate standing water in the roadway because we've have a lot of complaints about that in District n and particularly as summer comes along and mosquito season hits and um my constituents and also my office tends to get it feels like Ping Pong turn we just get bounced back and forth between it's not us and um we need to figure out who it is and how we do that so that we can um navigate that for our residents a little better meeting adjourned all right good afternoon Fort Worth oh come on now you know this is a talk back good afternoon Fort Worth and welcome to diversity matters Black History Month my name is Christina Brooks I'm your Chief Equity officer and I took time before we before we get started with the program the formal program I have a poem that I want to share with you that I think sets the tone and the mood for what we will experience today it's called we summon something we summon hope with every sunrise seeing a future that has Us in it not to replace you because our space is not yours and your space is not ours our space is infinite and has no boundaries it is space that God created for us and all are bound to respect we summon hope with every sunrise hoping our sons rise hoping our daughters raise the bar because it ain't magic you dig it ain't isn't your way or no way we belong in the light we belong to the light that's why we rise with the sun in the son we summon we something we are afro future you dig you dig you dig that was awesome amazing thank you Christina and good afternoon everyone uh I'm Terence Hamilton uh I serve on the city's diversity and inclusion employee committee and on behalf of the committee uh I want to welcome you to today's black history month program I've had the great privilege of working with the employee work group that planned today's program uh which will feature uh a presentation on afro futurism Imagining the future while honoring the past as well as an original performance of music and monologue spanning uh more than 300 years of History infused with the ideology of Afro futurism before the term was even coined so before we begin and I know some of you are eating your food there and for those of you who joining us virtually hey hey to my office staff uh uh before we begin the program we have a message from our city leadership uh that will be delivered by assistant city manager Jessica macaran did I get it right good afternoon everybody and thank you so much for coming today um it is an honor for me to join y'all to welcome you here to this program I know I've been attending these for about 18 months now since I joined the city and I have learned so much each time we have one of these programs we know in the city manager's office that it is critical that we celebrate diversity equity and inclusion not only here in our Workforce but also in our community we know that that it's important to have multiple voices at the table and different points of view it helps us to ensure that we make better decisions that we learn from the past and we take our city thriving into the future I am so proud to be a city of Fort Worth employee where I know that diversity is a core value here in the city and I think that's just so important we're gathered here today to hear what I know is going to be a phenomenal program I was talking to Dr Mac right and telling her just how excited I was the title alone is exciting and I can't wait to hear what she presents with us today Black History Month is a time to recognize the significant contributions and enduring Legacy of African-Americans throughout US history as well as here in the state of Texas and right here in Fort Worth we all know the story of opal Lee who's right here in Fort Worth and just her incredible efforts at the national level to have juneth recognized as a Federal holiday I also learned the other day and and I'll preface this with saying basketball is truly my most favorite sport so when I learned the other day about retired coach Robert Hughes who is still the most winning basketball coach boys basketball