one two three four five good afternoon I'll need legal to confirm a quorum since they count better than I do okay and with that a quorum is established I'm calling to order the city council work session agenda for this February 18th meeting a quorum is established we're going to have an abbreviated work session starting with our organizational updates uh we will skip the IRS but if you have questions for the IRS you can direct them to our city manager because the first presentation will be from best and with that we'll take on organizational updates the abbreviated way so Leanne has the first if you're would Leanne and you've been updated you can join her at the podium mayor protim and council members of the public I am proud today to use this opportunity to recognize and celebrate Harvey fry he is a senior ass assistant City attorney for the city of Fort Worth and he has reached the distinguished Milestone of 50 years as an [Applause] attorney so Harvey was recognized with other attorneys you see they're at the top at the Taran County Bar Association luncheon this month and then the mayor was gracious enough to come to our office for our in-office celebration for him and present him with a recognition and he keeps joking that we're only celebrating him because he got old but I've have assured him that is absolutely not the case we we have so much uh respect and honor for Harvey he attended Ferman University and graduated from the University of South Carolina law school in 1975 and then was licensed to practice law in the state of Texas that same year he actually came to work for the city attorney's office in 1976 uh believe it or not the practice of law was very different then uh and then he stayed through 1985 went to private practice for a little while and returned in 2006 and has been with us since for a combined total of 28 years and counting in service to the city of Fort Worth he's a top tier litigator he keeps his cool he practices law with high ethics good character consumate professionalism I hold him up as an example to all of the young lawyers in our office I I've heard it said that once you reach a certain level in your career and in leadership everybody's got the same amount of knowledge everybody's got pretty much the same amount of skill but what matters is how you how you practice and how you do that and Harve is one that just exemplifies this point just about better than anybody he does it with such character and so please join me in congratulating Harvey for 50 years in the law and for his service to the city of for [Applause] worth thank you thank you Leanne you far too kind and thank you mayor protim and councel and hary you know I call you the street fighter that's right we have had some U some good experiences yes we have indeed the chapter 125 area absolutely so it's it's far more than I deserve but thank you very much congratulations Harvey next up I'm calling uh Jess mcin I said that right close maakan I haven't got it yet to uh to bring up our new park and rec director thank you it's the second time today but we're going to get there we're going to get there for sure mayor and councel I'm going to introduce Dave Lewis in just a moment but before I do that um I really want to recognize to Richard Zavala so we all know the infamous Richard Zavala he has been leading the parks and wreck department for 33 years and last fall he decided you know it's really time to retire and focus on his golf game so Richard is with us through the end of April um but he recently in fact has come up to the city manager office you'll hear more about that here in just a moment but first let me thank Richard we are also going to recognize him at a later date so we're going to give some more attention to Richard but please join me in thanking him for his 33 years of [Applause] [Laughter] service got a hler from the C so we knew that replacing somebody with 33 years of leadership to the park and wre Department was a very big critical decision for us we hired Mosaic public Partners to lead um a recruitment National recruitment they brought us some really outstanding candidates and we put them through a very grueling and intensive interview process because we really knew it was important to make sure that we find the best and the brightest to lead our parks and rack Department into the future and so today it is my absolute honor and privilege to introduce to you our new parks and recck director effective yesterday Mr Dave Lewis [Applause] to tell you a little bit about Dave and then I'll turn it over to him for a few remarks so da Dave joined our city in 2019 as the assistant director over the golf and Athletics division um he has served in several roles though since that time including serving as interim director while Richard was on a special assignment for the city when I first got here in fact I worked with Dave for the first year that I was here and then Richard was able to come back um and take the Reigns of the Department um most recently Dave has been serving as the deputy director where he oversaw Administration Golf and Athletics and Recreation he also brings a wealth of experience and ideas from his prior um positions most recently or right before with the U Metropolitan Park District of Tacoma Washington where he was deputy director he also worked for a professional baseball team at one time as well and so I've really enjoyed hearing a lot of the stories um from Dave in his past Dave holds a Bachelor of Science degree in communic from Eastern Washington University uh but he quickly realized that Texas is his home and that's where he came came to be uh Dave serves on several State and National associations related to park and wreck uh industry and he also was instrumental in working with our Parks team to achieve our Capra certification that we recognized to y'all uh just last fall you will hear more from Dave in the coming months ahead about the new vision for the parks and W department and about a lot of the initiatives that have been underway uh most notably which we're going to share with y'all in April I believe about the green print Fort Worth our new parks recreation and open space master plan that we're very excited to unveil um and then just a reminder about what a big portfolio this is and and the importance of our city our parks department right now maintains 305 Parks more than 13,000 acres and public spaces Citywide they also provide recreational um activities and educational programming that make Fort Worth an amazing place to be Dave thank you thank you mayor protm council Mr city manager I am incredibly honored and humbled to have this opportunity she mentioned when I came to Fort Worth five years ago didn't take me long to really understand this is a special place and I am honored to be able to play a bigger role in the future we've got some incredible opportunities coming together as she mentioned with green print our new Department master plan the N the mayor's good nature greens space initiative as well as some new aspirational strategies we really looking forward to that and and we know it's going to take a lot more Community involvement for our Park system to get where we want it to be and that is our vision is to be recognize as the number one Park system in the country no small task but we can get there the opportunity is here and our time is now so I look forward to working with each of you [Applause] more congratulations Dave next up I'd like to invite Roger venables to come up and give us a little information about meum and some of the recognition coming there good afternoon mayor proam members of city council city manager choa no doubt you may have peaked into those bags to see that we are celebrating 100 Years of Aviation at meum International Airport established in July of 1925 we're going to be celebrating a A Century of providing Aviation Services to the community um you know I could talk at length about some of those achievements over that Century right the early mail delivery and passenger service that we've accommodated at meum right through the jet age and where we stand today really poised to take in the next evolution of Aviation and Advanced Air Mobility but there are some other folks that wanted to share some of their thoughts and tell a little bit of the story of of me marport so when we think of Texas and we think of you know cowboys and cattle drives and and that's all true and all good but the aviation Heritage here at meum and in the surrounding area is incredibly Rich aviation in itself is only 121 years old and we've been here for 100 years I think first you have to talk about the context of the city of Fort Worth being 175 years old and the importance of Aviation to our entire history as a city that it's Inception um mayor meum of course creating this place it's now 900 acres really one of the most successful general aviation airports in the entire country built by Texans built by you know those people in Fort Worth and in the rounding area Aman Carter was very aggressive in getting both air mail and passenger service into into meum to help Fort Worth grow and compete with Dallas my parents had a a company here that they started in 1939 called American Flyers it was a flight training company and I grew up around airplanes this hanger the most famous hanger in the entire state of Texas is essentially the birthplace of American Airlines it was built in 19 33 shortly after American Airways became what they are today this airport exists only because of the private public partnership that exists to make it successful the businesses that call meum home the other Aviation hubs and fbos we wouldn't be here without their partnership and certainly because of the leaders that came before me that were dedicated to making sure we protected meim no one thinks of Fort Worth Dallas area as an aviation Community we yet one in every five jobs is Aviation related Fort Worth was very Cooperative all the owners felt like this was their private airport so you know they would eventually they build their own hanger we started in 1978 with two hangers and now we've grown to 25 honestly any major artist that's now flying in to play at Dickies arena is probably flying in to meum as well but then importantly we've hosted some very important Business Leaders across the globe and when they come to Fort Worth and they land at meum and they see this place in the middle of the city that's been protected and also has such a rich history it really does contribute to their overall visit Fort Worth is a dynamic city therefore the airport has to be a dynamic airport meim over the years has evolved into a center for Business Jet Aircraft the world's changing lots of opportuni for corporates want their own private airplanes so just that that opportunity alone is unmeasurable really we continue to get federal grants that enable us to improve existing airfields make extension to those airfields and in fact in our upcoming airport master plan we're going to replace the current air traffic control tower and that's a big investment and again it points to the future of more operations here at N I think the sky the limit quite frankly pun intended right as you kind of think about the future of meim and it success that we've built in the last 100 years and where it goes into the [Music] future I've seen commercial airlines go from propellers to Jets from small Jets to very large Jets from transonic to supersonic today almost everybody I know takes an airplane ride for granted and so we become kind of passive and Blas about progress the progress in the future will be stunning we'll be flying faster and further and higher all we have to do is be committed to the Future [Music] I'd like to take a minute and thank visit Fort Worth for helping collaborate in the making of that video um I think a lot of things were summed up in that video over a short period of time right and we think about meum today when you look at the 2600 general aviation public use airports in the United States meum ranked 16th busiest air airport those general aviation airports so it's a pretty remarkable achievement to go from a dirt runway on 100 original 100 acres of the airport to where it is today but the celebration doesn't stop here we've got a number of events planned over the course of this year um the first of which is coming up on April 26 we are partnering with the Fort Worth Aviation Museum they hold an annual event their Hops and props event uh this year we're going to be kind of the Marquee of that event uh to celebrate mum's 100 years years um I would like to take a minute and thank Jim Hodson I think Jim's out there with the Fort Worth Aviation Museum a couple of things for Jim one uh in January he gave us a Wings award the city of Fort Worth and the aviation Department to recognize what they do every year they give out a Wings award to recognize individuals and organizations that have made a significant contribution to Aviation particularly in Fort Worth uh and again they've provided us with that award this year in recognition of mum's 100 years and again for his collaboration and partnership and allowing us to be a part of his event in in April so hope everybody comes out it's a great event lots of music food uh happens from noon to 5: we'll have more uh come out a little more detail about it we've got another one planned in October we have another Aviation Museum out here vintage flying Museum uh they have a hanger dance every October and uh M Chucky Hospers has allowed us to CL at we be part of that event and then maybe something in between a little bit special so um again I like special recognition the cookies that are in your bag pretty amazing right well those are provided voluntarily by our real estate manager in the aviation Department she's extremely talented Barbara Goodwin and so she provided those cookies today and made those so K thank you [Applause] I've got the last item so I just wanted to quickly provide uh um an overview of the email that I sent out to the city council last week with the reorganization of the of the city's organization um and and basically what you see there is I've uh changed the portfolios for the assistant city managers uh to be tied closely together with how departments um where the Departments work so in essence um growth and infrastructures together Public Safety is together internal service funds closely together um and um you know community and neighborhoods departments oriented departments together the idea is to potentially get more Synergy across those have one uh one assistant city manager over all those like departments so they can maybe look from a higher view of what those departments are doing and see how they can better collaborate and then this is an interim step uh because currently now I have 11 direct reports to the city manager so it's a little fitting that I have 11 bosses and then 11 direct reports so it kind of balances it out but really long term that's it's probably too many direct reports to deal with uh but as we go go forward uh um I will be making additional changes as was mentioned earlier Richard Savala moved to the interim assistant city manager um until uh he does retire and moves moves from away from the city uh in the meantime we will be opening that that position up to uh to fill it um I just wanted to share that so that the public would see that there was a the reorganization happened and I don't know if the council has any questions or yeah Jay is that on the website yet where the public can see I am not sure we will put it up if it's not okay I think that'll be good any questions from Council and then this next item I wanted to touch on is a I think is one that more more of you would be interested it's just a quick update on the police chief search with a overall uh timeline for fulfilling the position uh the RFP the request for proposals is out on the streets it'll close on the 4th of March um it has gone been sent out to dozens of uh potential search um groups once we get that in um we will go through those narrow that down to to the search um Team outside search team that will start the process we'll have um time for them to meet with stakeholders meet with council members develop the profile uh that we'd want to see in the the next police chief and then they will put that out and start start to search um this could go faster than it's listed but we I wanted to make sure that we had a realistic timeline so that we do our due diligence uh but you can see here that um we're thinking that sometime in the summer is when we'd actually finish the process um as we go forward so I'd answer any questions you may have yeah Jay I have one question um with this timeline I believe our chief would will be gone by then is that correct uh yes sir do we have a process of uh having having a a chief step up in the inter room process so I I think our our Police Department's really well equipped right now and so and we have a an executive chief that would more than likely I would be asking to fill in as an interim okay as we go through this process thank you okay that's all I have thank you thank you Jay oh actually I have one more item I just want to uh make it public and I I think it's already out there but uh Robert Sterns I'm not sure if he's here or not he will be leaving the city short time and uh he wanted to congratulate him publicly on his uh uh being appointed as the N uh tan County Workforce board executive director and uh we will have to go through that process as well as finding a a new economic development director as we move forward so thank you congratulations to Robert thank you sir okay okay we've got a presentation from Casey on the neighborhood Improvement program announcement Casey beess all right it is Nip announcement day um we're going to try and build this up like Signing Day or draft day um bring some excitement around it so 2017 was our first um first nip area program and since that time you all the city council have invested over $35 million in um as of this year 10 neighborhoods um back in 2023 there was a effort to bring some structure around the neighborhood Improvement program and so out of that effort came this three-year program and so the idea was that we would start off identifying all of the neighborhoods and ranking them in year one we would focus on the basics we call it the clean and safe activity so doing Clash um trash TR cleanup also looking at security cameras and um low cost low effort projects like that in year one in year two we would um take some of the input that we were getting from residents and do more Capital intensive projects and then year three which is this is the effort where um kind of the area where we have a lot of room for improvement is where we really engage the community and having them take on um the the revitalization of the neighborhood long term and So based on that um in terms of ranking all of our neighborhoods right now we have three categories we have the financial hardship category which includes poverty and house burden households we also have our opportunity category which looks at how many um bachelor's degrees or above are in the neighborhood and then our neighborhood condition which um includes crimes um substandards structures it looks at sidewalks and so all of these categories right now are um equally divided 30 points each for a total of 90 points I will be sharing later um we have a proposal for revising this um Matrix because one of the things that we we wanted to to put more emphasis on is the neighborhood condition and the safety of the community and make sure that we were really targeting those neighborhoods that are really distressed and so that I will be sharing with you in a little bit but based on the current Matrix right now this shows the three different categories in so when we're looking at the reds or the pinks or the purples that identifies our more distressed neighborhoods and you'll see as of now in terms of financial hardship we have that spread out across the the city the um the areas that are in orange and highlighted in red those are our current nip areas and so you'll see that we're we're slowly gradually attacking all of those areas that are distress and um bringing some revitalization to those communities our opportunity score again this looks at education and so in this um category you'll see that there are a lot more neighborhoods that are in the Reds purples and pinks um particularly on the east side um and that's north and south and then as far as our neighborhood condition score this is the one where we don't have as much red or purple um red pinks or purple but we do have some Pockets there and then finally when we combine all three those categories together um we ended up with kind of our top four most critical neighborhoods and just going clockwise we have um Wood Haven which is in the top right corner we have I'm sorry yes Wood Haven is in the top right Bear Haven is in the bottom right and then morning side and then North Side North and so we did have two neighborhoods that tied for second place um northsite North and Wood Haven Bear Haven was the um number one ranked as far as those different categories and then morning side and So based on that for 2025 the neighborhood that we are proposing to focus on is Fair Haven this is our first neighborhood um that we are working on that actually crosses two council districts so we have council member Martinez and mayor proen Biven districts um and then it shows what one of the things that you may notice is that within this area there aren't a lot of City amenities with in the actual neighborhood there are some surrounding you have Eugene McCrae um Community Center and park and then you have a number of different Parks but actually within Fair Haven there's only one small um Park which is Edgewood Park and um I'll be talking about later because one of the things when I was talking to the staff is wanting to identify when we're going into a neighborhood what are the resources that are available there um not only just from a city amenity perspective but what are the grocery stores where are the bus stops where the churches and all of those different organizations that could potentially help us long term with bringing revitalization to the community and so they have been able to develop a tool that we will be able to see some of those resources and um be able to find out more learn more about the neighborhood and then we have a quick present um quick video that we're going to show the Fair Haven Neighborhood has been David frell's home since 1970 he's seen 55 years of growth and changes in southeast Fort Worth it was a very very clean neighborhood now it's it's got has gotten bad and it's getting better better David likes the changes he's seen lately he loves the Eugene McCrae Community Center and has enjoyed seeing trash abatement in the last in the last three or four months it has improved improved maybe more and I'm glad to see that this tract sits between two council districts District 5 north of Barry and District 11 south of Barry while meeting with other residents at the East Berry Branch Library they express concerns of stray dogs like this one we found at a local park although Ed has only lived here for a few months he has the same insight as longtime residents like David I would say beautification without necessarily gentrification beautification without gentrification summing up simply what the city plans to do the city of Fort Worth is spending $4 million that will go towards Capital Investments to improve the quality of life for residents that live here by engaging with the residents and developing their dreams and ideas into neighborhood Improvement we've seen the success of this program before last year the city of Fort Worth's Neighborhood Services Department went into two neighborhoods they've also been seen improving the Las Vegas Trail neighborhood check out our videos to see the progress like the cleanup of the streets litter sidewalk improvements and intersections that make it easier to walk and get to school they have added roundabouts and cameras to prevent crime fix anything that needs to be fixed so look out for Community meetings and survey takers in the coming months who want to hear your opinions we'd love to see you at an upcoming block party event because Fair Haven has charm and now it has help so I want to thank our um Communications team who was able to put that um video together and then I also forgot to mention um the neighborhood Improvement program this isn't an effort that is just handled by The Neighborhood Services Department we have some really great Partners um co- compliance Park and Recreation Environmental Services transportation and public works and so they are all really great Partners in making sure these projects get moved forward the next few slides I have are just some representative um examples of things that could be done in Fair Haven or some of the things that we could potentially look to tackle and again we always want to make sure we include resident feedback in as part of this um program but you'll see as far as um litter abatement Alleyways that are um grown over we also have some sidewalks that have been grown over and are hard to walk on um and then also just looking in terms of the condition condition of the homes and some of the Bulky Trash that are located in front of those homes so kind of what's next so we are going to be kicking off our clean and safe activities those will be underway um those are typically the same across all of the different neighborhoods and they allow us to um do some quick activities that are visible to the neighborhood they see activity happening fast we will also be as we have with all of the previous neighborhoods be forming a um nip stakeholder group and that's where we bring in the residents together to talk about what they want to see happening in their neighborhood as well as the council members to provide some input as well and then um going forward into the spring and summer we will be having various um block parties kickoff events and we'll use those events as an additional way to collect feedback from the residents and then based on the feedback we will put together a summary of these are the top projects that our neighborhood wants to see and then we will provide that information to the department so then they can begin as far as year two which will start in October 2025 making some um progress on those activities one of the things that we are also looking at I mentioned about um reviewing our processes and procedures we are working with our staff to figure out how can we cond condense these timelines um so that we're we're moving faster we're getting the the nips closed out quickly and in addition to that I do want to um discuss some enhancements that we're looking at so as part of the data that we use American Community survey from the Census Barrow it comes out every five years and so we received new census data back in December and so we will be rescoring so all of the census tracks that are remaining we will be rescoring those and as I mentioned we will be looking at um revising the scoring methodology and so that although I showed you kind of our top one two three four neighborhoods those may possibly change based on the revised scoring the other thing I mentioned to um you all a few months back is that we are looking to bring on an implement consultant that will help on the not on the um Community engagement side of it but they will help on more of the delivery the program delivery side of it and they will be working primarily with Park and Recreation Department and transportation um in public works on getting their projects um on board the other thing and Brian will be here from the C- compliance Department to talk about a brand new program that we're going to be piloting not only with The Fair Haven project but also with our fiscal year 24 um neighborhood Improvement projects and that is a new mobile tool sharing sharing program and so that will allow residents who may have some um code violations related to uncut grass they will have an opportunity now through the city to um get some tools and so Brian will come up in a second to talk a little bit more about that I mentioned our asset mapping tool which I'm really excited about um and then I would like Robert paw to stand up so Robert paw is our new neighborhood Improvement coordinator he has been located in the city of Fort Worth for almost a month now he comes to us from the West Coast from California he has experience not only in neighborhood development and similar programs like this but he also has an economic development background which will be important when we're looking at that year three activities and really seeing how we can um improve the neighborhoods long term his experience will be helpful for that and so I will bring up on Brian how's everybody doing good good they're really good you saying it we're good right we're good it's great we woke up that's the hard part um no no um I'm pretty excited to partner with uh with Casey and whenever they had seen previous presentations when I first got here and many of you have reached out to me um because previously we I had worked programs with my team and one of them was you know a a tool shed and so I was like hey what a great spot to Pilot it and so we'll be doing Fair Haven we'll also be doing Seminary and worth Heights um right now that's the most I could allocate resources on the fly to Pilot it but it's exactly like it reads um there is no deposit it is free it is a mobile tool shed so they go online they need a mower and a weed eater they fill out the form check it out our staff goes out drops it off walks them through it and we come back and pick it up on a Monday and it's uh I'm pretty excited about it um when you Empower people amazing things can happen and so many of these people in these neighborhoods it's not a matter of of will they have it it's they don't have the resources available and so I'm really really excited uh this is our flyer uh we're going to flood the neighborhoods and go around and give out the handout to every single one it'll have a QR code that will take them right there to be able to check it out and we'll be tracking the success and uh don't be shocked if you see a budget presentation for the whole city to do it um but no I'm I'm pretty excited and it's uh it's it's a it's a good way to connect and we also are going to coordinate with Casey on sort of whole neighborhood cleanups and so don't be shocked if I'm bugging y'all to come out and help clean up these properties with us Cu uh it takes all of us and so I'm pretty excited about it and Brian if you can share our Community Partners who are helping to support this program yes yes we've already got tools donated to us from Home Depot and from Lowe's and we've also just got some monetary donations from Walmart as well so uh that's the other part is uh they're also invited to these cleanups and we went to all these businesses and explain to them like y'all are in this community too I realize you're a private business but you're in the community um and luckily they've all been very receptive and they plan on attending the cleanups and everything else and so it's uh I'm pretty happy thank you Brian Brian before you step down council members Martinez and nettles and I are hosting an event on March 22nd and I think it would be very beneficial if you plan on being there especially with your Flyers we're doing this with frost and I think it's going to be a real good partnership or Chris if you guys want to add anything well since you're putting that plug in I have a town hall on February 22nd if you could bring those there too I will be at both of them I I have a question yes I see your pilot program for uh physical year 24 and 25 um when this hits the fan I'm sure there's going to be other uh communities that want to participate uh in this program uh what is your implantation timeline to bring more on board is this a cost that is affecting is this a cost effect to the city of forart so there's a few different angles to look at that um tangibly we will be able to look at it where um I'll I'll I'll tackle the cost first um so on average about a third of the properties that we have to deal with high grass that were actually posted for abatement we will end up mowing um obviously if people are able to take care of their own violations uh you you don't have a dollar for dooll but it will expand the capacity that we can mow because we now have these whole groups of people that are taking care of it um so there will be some expand on capacity offset and yes uh it will take more more resources and more employees that we'll have to put in a budget request for uh we're piloting it for a reason I hope for it to be successful but if not we're going to track that the same way uh but yes it would ideally uh if you wanted to do the entire city it would it would be a pretty big budget ask of you know depending on it's probably additional three trailers and maybe eight other people something like that but again I I got to see the capacity I got to see what we're dealing with I got to see how receptive the public is to it um I can't guarantee that they're going to want to do it um they may have some trepidation or what have you but I can tell you that uh the effort that the staff has already put forward and what we're going to do in these neighborhoods I'm I'm already so excited and I I really think it's going to be successful and and I'll probably roll out a couple of different packages because I I'm going to ask for the Moon that doesn't mean I'm going to get it but you'll definitely have options but no uh in a perfect world yes I want to expand it Citywide I want all these tools to be available for them right now it's only these Street neighborhoods yeah well I'm certainly supporting this project uh this pilot program um I believe there's other areas and I don't know we've done a a heat map uh to kind of figure out where these violations are mostly but I know in the southern part which is right uh neighboring worth Heights morning side area uh fur Haven close to uh Miller other areas that also need this program so if there is any additional thing that the city of for workk can do I'm speaking for district a we can help push this in other areas I'm asking for it uh none of those I represent uh but I appreciate what you're doing thank you I have one more question logistical so where are you going to store these tools and you know just access-- wise to the different neighborhoods or you going to put them at the community centers or the it's uh oh sorry can you no go oh no at the the mobile Tool Shed is just that it is a trailer full of them so we are we are taking the shed to these properties and they'll be stored at you know if if we are able to do every District it'd be stored at the code office of each district but yeah that's one of the the biggest things that uh because this isn't the first time this has been done um however when you survey other cities there's two really big hurdles that I've seen and it's a deposit and then it's not mobile well when you're dealing in these underserved neighborhoods what are our two biggest hurdles is it money is it transportation I mean what are we doing let's take those away and uh I it's it you know at previous locations it's been very successful and I have no reason to believe it it won't be here so I'm pretty excited thank you any other questions before Casey wraps up okay oh I I have a couple more slides and then um but what I do like about the tool sh program um sharing program is that it ensures that the NP program doesn't become stale um we've done done a lot of the same projects every year and so this is a way to bring in some new things to the program and make sure that each year we're doing something new and really taking it um to the next level so this is the asset mapping tool and this is only just a few of the um different categories that we can look at but one of the things for example on bus stops we can see where the bus stops are in FA Fair Haven and so we can use this information when we're planning our um popup events and things like that we can make sure that we are scheduling those or hosting those and areas where people can access them um one of the other things that we looked at is Banks and finance and so you'll see that there's only one Green Dot for banks and finance and that is actually a Payday lending place and so when you look at this neighborhood they don't have any ATMs any access to banking facilities and so again when we're looking at the three years out and some of the long term we can look at what are some of the other resources the this area looks at um and then also it identifies our local businesses and our churches and so when we're planning activi and doing cleanups these are the groups that we can now make Outreach to and get them involved in the neighborhood program and really make it a community effort so I talked about the revised um scoring and so I'll just jump ahead so um one of the things that you see here we've have now combined so in the financial hardship category we have added in the bachelor's the education component to financial hardship and we've also added unemployment um as a measure of financial hardship we have separated out safety and neighborhood condition only because we again we really want to find those neighborhoods that are um hard pressed in terms of safety and the neighborhood conditions and by separating them out into separate groups um they could potentially rank higher or get more points assigned to that one of the other changes is previously under the scoring Matrix there was a total of 90 points that a neighborhood could get now they have a maximum of 100 points that they can receive based on this new scoring Matrix and that is the end of the presentation with the Matrix that you have uh on this slide was this used for no this one um was used for previous scoring so previously we didn't include um unemployment and we included crimes and neighborhood condition all in one category so the new matx will be used for the next year correct for 2026 okay and I think that's a good idea I really app I really appreciate your presentation it was very thorough um uh highlights of the neighborhood and I'll go back we had this conversation with Dr Williams and I about we used to do two neighborhoods and I believe it's vitally important uh that we continue to do this Improvement to these neighborhoods because so many neighborhoods have been uh improved such as Ash Crescent Las Vegas Trail uh and other areas um and I want with the Consulting that's coming online will they also be looking to help us improve improve our ability to go back to two neighborhoods that is not part of their scope at this time no but we are planning to as part of the fiscal year 2026 budget process we will be sending submitting a request to make sure to request that the second neighborhood be added to the 26 budget and so that will be part of um the neighborhood services Department's budget request okay uh so I'll be looking for that I think it's important that we get back to two neighborhoods uh I know we had some discrepancies of getting the job done for those and can we get and I know this maybe um a future agenda item but can we get an update uh I you did maybe a year ago on the the um neighborhoods who are still have money to be spent yes we will do that we are actually doing a um neighborhood Improvement uh program newsletter twice a year and so as part of that next version of the newsletter we can include that information in there okay any other questions comment just Jette comments Casey thank you so much um I'm really excited for ha Fair Haven I assume they already know do they know there has been some soft Outreach to I think the stakeholder groups but overall the neighborhood is not aware so this will be their unveiling so they will get to know and we will post the video and start pushing it out on our social media channels as well as there will be a city news article on it that was such a great video whose voice is that are they on staff that is yes that is Scott Daniels and and he is a former news reporter so that's yes well I look forward to working with Robert um you know District 11 is here to work with Neighborhood Services in any capacity so uh very excited and and and just this is such a great opportunity for this neighborhood thank you thank you case thank you next up we'll have jealous Mr Zeno with an annual comprehensive financial report and external audit result Mr Zeno good afternoon mayor protim and council members join today sorry we lose quum at 2:30 and so I know you guys really get excited about numbers we'll try to make it brief get to the punch time uh I'm joined today um with uh Tony uh Russo from uh Finance the deputy director of Finance uh today we'll we'll just go through a really brief we'll go through this uh very briefly but here we're trying to touch on uh primarily the accomplishments as well as the actual financial performance of the various funds for fiscal 24 and then we'll touch on the external audit results that were provided to the audit committee earlier this morning uh and as you know the annual uh financial report is used by several veral uh individuals uh outside of the city of fortart and it's obviously Bond rating agencies potential uh Bond investors uh really pay close attention to the annual report as well as residents and Maring Council uh a couple of highlights for FY 24 uh the city uh continued the award for the certification of uh distinction for its investment policy of course we ended the year with an unmodified clean opinion from the external Auditors uh we also during the year uh were we were awarded achievement for excellence and procurement this was the first time uh the city has ever received that award congratulations uh also the typical gfoa awards for financial reporting which is handled uh in the finance department and then of course the distinguished budget presentation that's also uh hand L by forwart lab of Allan so Reggie Tony uh once again want to thank you for the tremendous effort made to get the external audit done in a timely manner uh while David Cook was still here to participate and the incredible activity you and your team went through to ensure it was a smooth seamless process and uh congratulations all around appreciate that thank you uh uh the financials uh that you have at your desk are based on what's called a gap basis and basically uh it's ProMag through various rules through the gby uh organization uh and their revenues are recorded when they're earned versus the budgetary basis uh which is the basis that we typically use on a regular basis you'll see those reports coming out of Finance as well as the fort word lab uh those have a different uh measurement focus with revenues and expenditures recorded as they occur uh on an entity-wide basis uh we ended the year with a positive 7669 uh billion in additional resources million I'm sorry uh we uh this is uh primarily uh due to you know several factors some additional Revenue uh we had some decreases in uh the pension and OPB liabilities uh we had some expenditures that actually increased which all to Total approximately 7669 million in additional net position for the city of forward as a whole uh from the standpoint of bonded debt 2.5 billion of current outstanding bonded debt of which over 50% of that is related to sewage and water board sewage and water board Water and Sewer uh General fund at a glance you've seen these numbers these were presented by David Cook uh back in January uh but uh generally the fund balance increased by 51 million uh there were some um gby adjustments those are non-cash adjustments uh but generally an excellent year within the general fund uh you've seen this the the First Column the budgetary basis actually David Cook presented this uh back in January AR and we showed this as a crosswalk between the budgetary bases that we typically provide to council uh versus The Gap bases which is a requirement uh through the accounting uh rules and there within the Gap bases for the general fund we make the Gap adjustments as well as we include the endowment gas lease uh culture and tourism positive year an additional uh 38 million in fund balance from uh various uh revenues uh and transfers uh ccpd again uh slight increase to its uh net fund balance and that's the on account of excessive revenues over expenditures and that's offset by some Capital uh transfers out uh risk financing uh still an issue uh we ended the year with a 10.3 million deficit has shown quite of improvement over the last three years uh we are if you recall Council approved an additional $5 million transfer from the city's general fund uh which actually will result in the deficit uh during 25 uh to be recorded at 5.3 million there'll be additional discussions and information on the risk fund uh during the budget process uh water and SE as I indicated a really great year additional uh fund balance fund uh net position of approximately 277 million uh it's primarily at a result of some additional Capital uh contributions uh pension in uh the uh OPB opep being the retiree healthare uh we saw a slight decrease in the unfunded liabilities for both uh pension as well as well pension is on this slide uh slight increase slight increase in the funded portion uh but as you know know uh the annual actua report really will provide a better sense of the health of the of this fund and the that report will be finalized presented to the Retirement Board and then uh presented to council at the Joint meeting uh sometime in either May or June but good news on pension uh opab uh which is as I indicated retiree Healthcare we've seen again additionally a slight decrease and the unfunded uh liability and here with OPB we actually provide the the healthc care benefits uh as a as a budgeted line item uh primarily in the general fund uh just briefly Reserve compliance uh we have ended 24 uh with the 22% un unassigned fund balance approximately 2326 million uh within the governmental funds all special Revenue funds are in compliance uh within the governmental Debt Service uh category all of the funds are in compliance uh within the Enterprise funds uh we have the all actually all funds are uh in compliance uh within the internal service fund we I just briefly talked about the risk fund uh the only uh area that really sits as in a deficit posture as it relates to the working capital would be the it operations and it moved to the internal service fund uh in 23 I believe uh and uh the director will be presenting a restoration plan during the budget process audit results and I'll turn it over to Tony this should be brief okay so the audits are performed in compliance with both Texas and Federal Grant Management St standards and relevant laws the city received an unmodified or clean opinion from the Auditors which is the highest level of assurance that they can provide and there were no audit findings which are no material weaknesses or significant deficiencies um noted or found so here's the audit history you can see we in 2022 we had one finding then we zero findings last year in 2023 and then zero findings for 2024 again and a material weakness is just a deficiency in internal controls such that there's a reasonable POS possibility that the that there's a material misstatement in the financial statements and they're not caught and a significant deficiency is a deficiency that not as severe as a material weakness but yet it needs to be um improved so and then to the right there's just some grant information so we have 288 active grants managed by 76 people in 20 different Departments of the 151 million in Grant expenditures approximately 147.300 agreed upon procedures that are in that are currently in progress and we don't anticipate any any issues from from those and I think in closing uh you I just really like to uh celebrate the efforts of the finance department as a whole but in particular the financial reporting and accounting divisions uh within the finance department and if you guys could just stand up just for a second yeah for sure [Applause] really an outstanding performance but also uh great work by all of the various department heads and assistant directors and acms and those Finance officials who perform their duties within the various departments have done a great job as well as those Grant managers who go through a lot of scrutiny with the single audit and in particular the external audit and just a great job done thank you thank you and thank you for no significant deficiencies great to hear next we'll hear from Chris Harter again talking about the Ford Worth Water System expansion and capacity Improvement good afternoon again Chris all right good after afternoon mayor protim and councel I'll move uh fairly quick through these uh these slides uh I'm going to prepare uh three things uh one is usage projections uh service area growth and I'm going to be relying on a lot of the slides that we've already prepared for our impact fee study that's will be presented to you here pretty soon uh talk about some infrastructure improvements on the west and the north side and uh also talk about their conservation ordinance so let's talk about some of the historical usage uh the numbers you see uh at the bottom of those bar charts those are in billion gallons and that is what we produced on an annual basis so you can see from uh fiscal year 21 to fiscal year 22 our annual uh pumpage increased by about 10 billion gallons the the chart that you see in the middle that shows our average day usage so when you see like in 201 24 29.5 that's 219.50 million gallons per day and then when you look at the the orange chart that's our Max day for the year so we go from like an FY 23 a 224.107 gallon per day max day and to kind of put this in perspective what our usage is during the winter is about 140 to 150 so it just goes to show you how influenced our usages on uh by irrigation so again huge jumps between uh fiscal year 21 and fiscal year 22 and I will tell you that you know we've really scratched our heads about this when you look at 2022 and .3 on an on the average uh precipitation for the year we are under 30 in in both of those years which drives a lot of the overall annual usage and then on top of that we had some really high uh usage during the Summers which are generally driven by uh July and August precipitation I'll say that that number in 2021 that actually may have been the max day set during that winter storm in Fe February 21 uh which was just four years ago so these are some of the charts that we prepared as part of our impact fee study these are the population projections we look specifically 10-year growth uh both uh retail and wholesale and you can see here that we are anticipating over 300,000 uh increase in our population our service are population over the next 10 years so think about the challenge of that providing water and wastewater service to an additional 300,000 people in a 10year period so what we do as part of the impact fee study is we actually uh take that population and and create uh number of equivalent units and an equivalent unit is equivalent meter is normalizing population into an equivalent 3/4 by 5 meter that's what uh is normally serves a residential lot so those 300,000 population when we normalize it it's equivalent of providing service to about 158,000 residential lots so substantial challenge in order to meet uh our uh population growth and I will say when you go between the water and the sewer one of the reasons why uh it's uh a little bit higher on the water side is we have 23 wholesale customers on the way water side and we have 33 wholesale customers on the water side so let's talk about uh service area I think what I want you to focus on is the pink areas and actually this uh presentation came out of a council request and the request was to kind of look at the west side and the north side and that's where we see most of the growth and it's not just growth that is in our city limits or anticipated to be in our city limits a lot of is at etj growth so I I mentioned that we had 158,000 potential equivalent meters that are uh planned for our service area growth I can count over 25,000 lots that are in some T some type of a development uh negotiation right now so that that growth is here so that's kind of my lead in to what are we going to do about it so so let's talk about the Westside system um you may recall that in in 2012 we uh uh op opened the Westside water treatment plan and so the way that we designed that is we designed a 35 million gallon per day structure and we put in the equipment and the membranes for 12 MGD and what it allows us to do is it expand uh fairly quickly in modular uh fashion by adding membranes that plant currently is rated at 18 million gallons per day and we will be uh coming to you with a council agenda item to buy another 8 million gallons per day of membranes to increase the plant capacity up to 26 MGD we plan on doing that fairly quickly like this springy Chris on that map what's the difference between the red and the blue so the blue is our existing lines and what I had our GIS people do is just highlight the existing lines that are 24 in and above in terms of diameter so just our trunk mat the red lines are the ones that are either in construction or being proposed so I I I started off with the uh the plant we have a pipeline that goes all the way from the plant to this Pump Station this pipeline is all in construction except for this one Gap here and we've bid this job and we anticipate that going to council for approval on March 11th Council date so that would allow us to have an expanded plant a new 42in line that goes to a pump station and a ground storage tank this is basically done you can see it as you drive along I20 this line here uh goes over to our existing line that's done these lines uh through here go to two ex uh elevated storage tanks that are pretty much done as well now this this whole system has a capacity of uh close to 40 million gallons per day so significant capacity uh I threw in a couple of other lines through here these are uh projects that we're coordinating with development where the development uh may actually be taken the lead so uh significant investment on the west side over hundred million do invested in the system and the the good news is that this system can probably come online in 2026 I need a customer in order to keep that system on online because we can't put major transmission Mains in service until we have Demand on them you would have problems with water quality but we do know that there's a lot of uh uh plans in V Ranch and Walsh Ranch and some of the surrounding areas so we're hoping that all this lines up pretty well in terms of develop needs our capacity so I consider this to be good news on the water side Wastewater side is a a different ball game but I wasn't asked to present on the Wastewater side you you know that we have a significant investment that we have to make on that Mary's Creek uh Wastewater Plant as well as lift stations and pipelines to get Wastewater to that plant so let's go on to uh I call this the north side system but what this really is is a way to get water from our downtown to our north side that provides additional capacity it allows some of the stranded capacity that we have at the Holly plants to be moved to the north side and it provides additional redundancy so who here remembers the main breaks that we had on Coler that was I think that was last summer uh so we now are in construction actually I was meeting with council member be about it uh yesterday 20 million dollar projects to replace a lot of the cast iron transmission Mains downtown in order to move uh water from downtown to the north it requires us to pump at much higher rates which increases pressure which puts a lot of stress in our cast iron pipe so what we've what we've done here is right now we have an existing 54 in line that goes to this North Side Pump Station and then is pumped from there up to the north single feed single point of failure and actually we just we had a uh a main break on this 54 in just last week um some contractor drilled into it so it wasn't wasn't a pipe problem what we have here is we have a a dual uh functional plan that will replace cast iron and give us a loop that we can then uh use to pump water through this Pump Station to the north so this will provide us much more capacity and it provides us much more reliability and redundancy to our system so this gets rid of this whole single point of failure uh situation and on top of that by having all this transmission uh loop it will result in reduced pressure coming out of Holly which will put less stress on our cast iron pipe so this is the plan that we've been working on for the last two years I really like this plan it is expensive but it eliminates a lot of the risk related our cast iron it gets more water to the north so let's talk about the far north we have uh the Eagle Mountain Water Treatment Plant which is currently rated 105 million gallons per day we have advertised a project we are going to be taking bids on the project on April 3rd to expand this facility by 35 million gallons per day and what we've done is we've used that Westside Water Treatment Plant template where we're actually building a structure for 50 million gallons per day and we're going to put 35 uh MGD of membranes in initially as as development occurs in this area we can add membrane skids to quickly increase capacity there's a 54 in line that's planned to go out of the eagle mountain plant that 54in line has about 70 million gallons per per day of capacity this facility is Master planed for 200 million gallons per day so you can see that the investment that we're going to be making in the near term is going to uh allow us to surve a a customer base for the next 20 years this this project alone is in the $200 to $250 million range this pipeline this 54in pipeline is about $100 million cost we've actually bid uh from um fm220 up to bonds Ranch Road over 18,000 ft that goes to Council on the 25th of February $32 million price tag we have we have uh already um bid out and in construction on this elevated tank on this elevated tank there's a 5 million gallon ground storage tank that will be company an existing ground storage tank in the cindera uh facility that will advertise for bid on March third I believe and then this right here is a 24in line that will allow us to be able to pump directly from this Pump Station all the way to this tank here which will significantly improve our capacity so you heard Reggie talk about uh the Water and Wastewater system was about 51% of the city's total debt obviously we're going to be spending a lot of money to uh plan for growth in the next uh just a couple months so one of the one of the issues here is that you saw those demand uh charts on the first slide that I I showed there we went up by 10 billion gallons just a couple years ago the demand on the North side is critical so you know when we're bidding this this project out we're actually when we do the evaluation we're going to be giving extra points for early completion right because getting these uh facilities installed as quickly as possible is critical and just how critical uh right now we actually have developments that are dependent on this 54 in line so they want us to get that line installed as quickly as possible possible and you know you have these demands that are stepping out you have this population growth that is just uh substantial one of the things that I've talked about uh with Council before is we've had a a water conservation and irrigation ordinance that have been on the books for 10 years previous to the remote read meters the really the only way to enfor for it is to actually put eyes uh on the customer showing that they're in violation of the ordinance this is just the violations that we saw on the North side this is only the north side pressure plane just the north side pressure plane and one of the things I thought I'd mention is you see these red dots here this is from June of 24 to August of 24 100 greater than 100,000 cubic feet used that's 750,000 gallons of water that was used contrary to the conservation and irrigation ordinance are those the people who got the little nasty postcards yes those are the people that got got the postcards and you you may recall that um this last year uh you all approved our ability to provide administrative fines for uh irrigation violations those aren't meant to be punitive those are meant to correct Behavior and those fines are $25 for the first offense $50 for the second offense $75 for the third offense thank you for the clarification and we're hoping that what what we will be able to present after the summer of 2025 is a completely different uh graph than what I'm showing you right now or chart than what I'm showing you right now take any questions any questions of Chris hearing none thank you for the informative and educational presentation Chris thank you next the riveting report from tanion Farley on the update at what we call NCH that being new city hall where the elevators now work I expect you to confirm that thank you I I can confirm that it's great I wrote them this morning hi ton thank you thank you for having me uh mayor protim Bivens and um Council and this is my first work session with Mr Choppa over there instead of over here so it's good stuff it's good to have everybody together um it's been a little bit since I've been back in front of y'all um I you know appreciate all the support and patience over the last uh you know few years here as we worked through the program uh we're at a very exciting point of our project which is uh you know the majority of the city has moved over um the council chambers that is outside and you our future home for these these meetings is nearing completion so lot to cover today um I'll give some time for questions as we jump in but you know feel free as always to to jump in along the way so um our presentation today is going to cover uh the project goals uh for some of you it's been a little while since you've seen those uh project updates uh cost overview and savings path to the first council meeting and then upcoming events so uh for some of yall you remember these sessions way back in early 2021 we worked with you guys City staff and the public to come up with project goals from which we could drive the program to make decisions against uses our basically our litmus test for if we were making the right decisions with our steering committee and otherwise uh those goals came back is an inclusive and engaging public space maintaining the class a look and feel of the facilities creating an equitable uh efficient and flexible workspaces uh sustainable and cost efficient building which is important as we drive forward uh transformational delivery of city services which we'll talk about that a minute and then vision for the next 50 years so um here's where we are today so uh you know coming out of uh the um you the work that we had with the tant regional water district and the core of engineers uh we are now uh you know we're able to get our permit at the end of um July of 2023 and have now been able to uh proceed with build of our council chambers facility so it's a new roughly 35,000 foot facility it will have a public session room a work session room um public session rooms seats 250 people work session like this will seat 150 so significantly bigger than the space today there's a dedicated executive session room so if we avoid snfo like we had today and then a number of other green room and supporting spaces you're also seeing um a a very tailored and created outdoor space for the public and otherwise so over here on the right is our Plaza that'll be planned for Gatherings uh events food truck events and otherwise Chris Is that real or is that AI this is real this was taken um this week could be AI no this one's real um and so uh you yeah this one's real there you go you have my word okay so uh we're pouring in the new steps going up and down on this side the roofing is complete um the chambers itself is progressing really nicely um we are putting up the New Media wall today so the projector and system and otherwi that we have here will go away we'll have a new state-of-the-art media wall you can see uh the cement pouring is happening for the plaza but also through the new sidewalk throughout the site to uh the mobility throughout the site which is great and then the screening on the garage over here is almost complete so that's scaffolding be coming down shortly so a lot of progress um I'm really proud to say that you know since we cleared our 408 permitting um conversation we have been tracking to a March 2025 council meeting and we've hit a March 2025 council meeting as what we're planning on so that's really exciting so we can go back to my deck here and let the record State the mayor has joined us okay awesome fantastic um so as we move forward so uh Lobby finish out was one of the things that we wanted to make happen so you've seen we wanted to keep a lot of that beautiful Lobby space uh there was a wonderful Class A facility um adding new furniture and features here for the public to sit as they come to and from but also going up and down in the facility uh for the development services function as you may recall uh part of the building's plan was to cue people for development services and other functions on the lobby level first through the qless system and then bring people up as needed right to really reduce congestion and otherwise on that floor and I think that plan is working uh really nicely to date uh you also see on the far right here that the um future living room of the city is coming together here it'll have the council meetings and an announcements running on it and it's just outside the entrance to the new Council chamber so new furniture is in there and uh progressing along um as far as overall Tower progress so we have moved at this point in time uh 13 of the plan 15 floor as you may recall um you know 18 the building is 18 floors so the Terrace and the lobby really no one occupies I guess the Marshalls technically occupy that um you know we moved 10 and 11 this weekend um we have 16 and 17 which is water and diversity inclusion um happening just after the council chambers facility so uh progressing along the only floor that'll be left at the end of our project will be level 18 um which is currently half occupied by a private tenant and half by our construction team so that'll be something that will have as a future use going forward um the floors water 16 and 17 fa a couple different delays um Furniture has been really tough uh to get the last couple months um from our vendor at steel case that's mostly been due to a um a series of issues cascading from Hurricane Helen in North Carolina the laminate Factory that supplies steel case globally is based in North Carolina and um it was severely damaged during that causing some significant delays and so we've been navigating around that I think our construction team has done a great job of you know trying to find other things they can do to keep the project moving in the tower specifically but um something to note for those floors uh our food service program uh with Fuda is currently uh planed to move down into the cafeteria um which is on the Terrace level next to the um main Chambers uh of the building um that'll happen once the chamber facility and site construction are done so we have the service currently running the lobby and it's basically 10 per V1 capacity and it'll be relocating down to the cafeteria after the chambers is complete um from a uh you know additional project updates the elevators themselves so lowrise pe8 and pe7 are now complete so both elevators are running to and from the customer service floors which is fantastic um our high-rise elevators one through three as mayor proen Bivens mentioned um is running as of uh yesterday so we have new destination dispatch elevators running on a gearless system so uh we'll be much more efficient um and much more uh you know safe for the city going forward with the new system and so you know we'll work through some Kinks this week on that as we kind of turn over the new systems but uh elevators 4 through six which are the Legacy elevators are now under modification um and those will be closing up in the next couple week or next couple months as we work through those we had some delays on the elevator side mostly from a software integration to bridge the city's access control system and the destination driven but we were able to work through that with the first set of elevators the second set of elevators will go uh significantly faster so the garage elevators are last piece that we're working through those are tracking to completion uh before the first council meeting in late March that'll run from the ground level all the way to the fifth floor of the parking garage uh from a parking garage expansion perspective so we are in this phase six down here uh which is really that um everything except the fifth floor is open we're waiting on the elevators to be complete once those are complete we'll be able to expand the garage to full occupancy um today on a daily basis um the garage is about 60 to 70% full of the existing floors so still plenty of capacity uh for folks to go in and out we anticipate to have plenty of capacity once the full garage opens um we'll be putting in the new gates and related systems um towards the end of this month in the first part of March so really by the first council meeting you'll have a fully renovated and new garage with the expansion as well from a uh rooftop lighting perspective obviously something that we heard a lot from the public but also from City staff and elected officials about um that project was completed just before the Christmas holiday and is now functioning you can see a number of different lighting configurations that were done during the testing process uh the new system is fantastic because it can be controlled from a web interface um I can tell you that uh Terence King is a member of the property management team um and previously on the old system he had to physically go up to the 21st floor of the tower to turn those lights on so when TCU won on Friday night in a big game teren got the call to go over there and make that happen so um you know he's an incredible member of the team we're excited he gets to do it remote now so um that's uh now complete uh there's a policy for kind of what the city accepts and puts up on those lighting components that's still in the works and um you know we'll be kind of run through CMO going forward but some really great opportunities going forward uh for the city there from a security perspective so you know we've talked about security as a continually evolving function in a facility like this and so um we've come to you a couple times before about the different programs that are laid out in order to you know provide security to the facility and really the answer has been a multitude of deterrents uh today we have Marshall and security team presence um Advanced camera systems state-ofthe-art Access Control programs the new destination driven elevators and then weapons detection system so a joint effort to provide security in the facility um I'm happy to say today we've had really minimal incidents we've been able to move through the facility in an efficient manner and really the Destin a driven elevators will be the next step to really drive that along from a um overall kind of uh security implementation perspectiv so obviously you've seen the new information desk in the lobby if you haven't been over to the new uh City Hall to see this um you know there's a new Marshall sitting there at that station or security staff presence that um is really not only supporting uh you know visitors to the building but also providing protection um but we've brought that forward we've also um brought to life the new uh command CER Center on the lobby on the Terrace level for security which has visibility throughout all the cameras um and then driving with Access Control Panic buttons and otherwise there are some things we still have to do as part of bringing the facility online um we'll have the uh Lo loading dock cameras uh in integrated C intercom systems sorry a lot of integrated stuff intercom systems that will be going in and then site patrols for the Marshalls as well as well as Weapons detection system for the new Council chamber facility itself one of the things that um you know when we set out on this project uh I heard loud and clear from our elected officials as well as our public was finding a way to engage more vendors in this community that hadn't historically been engaged in public sector projects and I'm really proud to say that you know we set out um the city set a 30% goal for our uh semar contract with lindbeck um as our construction partner and we are currently tracking a 39% which is fantastic on a project of this nature something uh you know so public and complex it's a testament not only to the work that um lindbeck in partnership with our team has done to break up the scope into smaller pieces but I do want to call out um you know Christina Brooks um and Gwen Wilson and a lot of the DV team that had worked throughout the course of this project to really work with us in Partnership to reach out to the community um and find ways to get people involved so really great news there you we'll continue to update on that as we go along but you know we've had more than a 100 different contractors participating in this project and so I think that's a testament to the commitment not only that y'all made uh to make this a community project but to what you've put on us to drive uh going forward from a cost perspective um you know our project still continues to track against the budget that was laid out uh many years ago at this point you we're sitting at about $288 a square foot of of work in that capacity uh we're sitting right about the class a average in the region so continues to be a really great opportunity for the city continues to be economically efficient especially as we see continued inflation and new build construction especially in North Texas and so something that we continue to focus on not only in the initial design but uh components we're putting to help you manage it going forward all right so everyone's favorite part uh the council chamber facility so um this is one of those things that uh you know going through the four-way process following a lot of the permitting regulations we had to go through um it's taking longer than anticipated but uh I'm really happy to say that you know we're cruising along at this point in time with our chamber um we are we've started our av install and commissioning um we'll be working working with the city team starting February 3rd to commission the devices on the city Network um we're doing acoustic testing and refinement to make sure that everything sounds good not only in the chamber but for people participating remotely um we'll be doing AV team training and City Secretary training the first week of March to run the new control systems and otherwise not only for public session but for work session and executive session then we'll be doing mock meetings the week of March 10th um potentially the week of March 17th as well uh finalizing the switch over so that the broadcast will run from the new facility and then our first council meeting will be March 25th so uh dress rehearsal March 24th first council meeting March 25th so exciting stuff um these pictures were taken uh from Monday of this week so I just want to orient everyone kind of what they're seeing here so in the upper left is the hallway into um the work session right so you can see the wood that you guys remember from some of the original renderings uh this is our new main chamber so this is seating 250 people we'll have uh 200 plus inch Samsung monitors on both sides here that will have great pixel pitch quality for folks all the way up to 90 ft back of the room we also have hearing Loop we have Ada seating accommodations uh we have a sit stand Ada Podium as well as other Podium options so you know we heard from you how important being welcoming inviting was going to be in this chamber and I think we've really accomplished that with what's coming forward here so excited to get yall in there and this bottom photo is our new work session room so this is the new room 2020 uh I'm sad to say there's no columns in the middle of the room like you have here but we're going to have a pretty ornate inlaid ceiling as well as multiple locations for um the council staff and supporting staff to see presentations so we'll have uh this presentation will be running in the sopit as well as you'll have visibility to two video walls on both sides so lots of flexibility in that space the hope is that large department meetings boards and commissions other functions can take place in that facility and then we also have an executive session room there as well so all things that are progressing but key dates for you guys like I said March 24th will be a dress rehearsal day and then March 25th will be that first uh council meeting in the new facility all right so upcoming events so garage elevators and Gates like so will be fully complete um just before the first council meeting uh we'll have our ribbon cutting and first council meeting on March 25th there'll be uh formal invitation and calendar Place holds and otherwise to follow uh level 16 and 17 which is water and diversity inclusion at this point I'm having Furniture arrival in April and hoping to get them in in the May time period and then uh final site work and project closeout uh should be in June and that includes some of our planting and otherwise uh you may recall that as a part of our uh 408 permit we have some specialty um grading requirements as well as some specialty grassy Swale and green storm water things that cannot be done until post uh April 15th because of the planting season restriction so some of that will finish out and then you know we'll be on on our way and it'll be your new New City Hall at that point in time so what questions do you have for me questions for tanion Jared thank you for the presentation T I'm excited about March and the ribbon cutting and thank you to the you and the team and our staff for all the hard workor that went into um this project um I know we had talked about this during the tour that you um um provided for me um the food program in particular um I bought food once or twice and it was really expensive and I can only imagine you know our employees as are working in a building who may not bring a lunch and want to get lunch from the city and the cost be a barrier especially for those you know not making um as high of a wage as we'd like to provide and hopefully we'll get there over time sure um anyways um it's not necessarily a question but I think it's important for us as we navigate kind of going forward and establishing that program in The Culinary space downstairs to think about you know what our employees are being charge and is there an opportunity in upcoming budgets for employees to get an employee discount they are serving the city and to pay $20 for example for um a salad is a lot so anyways um what what um based on your experience what have you seen other cities do um to help employees that you know that want to eat lunch um on on the premises yeah great Point um so so one thing I'll note before I answer the rest of that question is uh the contract that you have with Fuda that's the vendor to today it was intentionally set up as a onee plus 3 one-ear option type contract so that you can work through scenarios like that if there's subsidy or additional vendors or otherwise that would like to take place so that's being continually monitored on a monthly basis on kind of performance what feedback we're getting from City staff and otherwise so duly noted kind of on the cost and otherwise is something that's I know the group that's working with fos has had that conversation as far as other options that exist out there um I can tell you from our experience and working with other clients around the country food service programs in general for municipalities are really tough um uh for a number of reasons number one if you go the subsidy route there is a pretty significant cost sometimes that's somewhere between three and $6 a meal per person per day and you start to add that up over you know the course of a year that becomes a pretty expensive subsidy but it's something that's definitely doable and you know depending on staff and otherwise is something that you know could be explored in future budget Cycles um the other thing that you know can be done as well is we've Set uh typical thresholds with Fuda around kind of base price obviously if you do add-ons and otherwise that goes above but that's something that could be explored as well right if there's other lower cost options out there to support it the one thing I will just and you know Michael Crum from public events has been fantastic about this and we've talked about it before but one of the reason that public food service programs historically don't succeed is because they're stagnant it's the same vendor every day the food gets old people get sick of it and so it kind of dies off so it's something I think you know dynamic becomes important and so I think a a model like Fooda really works but continuing to work on not only what type of vendor but the cost points and otherwise included is something I think is something to look at going forward that's really helpful thank you especially um with the Fooda program and you know we think of for worth potentially through this program being able to Kickstart restaurants corre um right here in Fort Worth um I don't see it as a subsidy in that regard I see it as an economic development incentive right and so and also the additive effect is it helps our employees our employees shouldn't have to pay one hour worth of their wage to be able to afford to eat at the city they're serving and so I think that's a discussion that future the future Council will need to have um but it's certainly one I think that's worth having yep no good point maybe you can hook us up with the territor your food bike for some food displays of popups any other questions I do owe you four Oreo cookies I tried to pay it wouldn't take my card okay well I haven't gotten a phone call about that one yet so yeah I mean I felt the shame when when J was talking ton thank you so very much thank you appreciate it we will move right along if I can see where we are on this thing oh we're going back to the IRS now I think okay so the first IR any questions on 25-30 from DJ on the annual development activity report going going gone okay hearing none moving on must a report on the release of area from the extra extr territorial jurisdiction the etj by Petition of land owner or resident DJ any questions on that you guys are easy okay next one city of Fort Worth background check process okay Chris that's SC been your name uh Lilia peoples from HR if you don't call for it Elizabeth okay yeah it was my it's actually my art but it does scream um Chris's name you're not wrong um I just really W to brief um understanding of what we do uh specific to jobs that relate to working with children um at the city and what type of um background checks are available to us and how we can maybe um improve that process thank you um so today we run a general background check for all employees new and internal if they are switching Department I have Victor esav here with me so he can also give a little more detail if there's any specific questions um and so with that background check we check social security we do a DMV we do a criminal background check for the previous seven years um and in a few other like Federal and other items that kind of just Encompass a full background check if anybody is working with Parks or um any of the areas that have children or um sensitive population per se then we make sure that those are done more frequently does that answer your question or a little bit so just because I'm I see the um list here the seven-year State and County criminal record check the seven-year National criminal history and I know uh councilwoman bivans really worked hard on ban the box and uh my concern is um not that we're keeping people out of employment but maybe there's certain types of offenders that we want to make sure we're keeping away from children and so um for the sex and violent offender registry that would be is the onus on them to maintain that registry or or to register or how do we check against that because that that's actually the one I'm most concerned of you know theft petty crime that kind of stuff but if you've committed murder or some sort of sexual assault I want to make sure that that box is banned from if you're interacting with our children yeah so for the uh sex offender registry we do check the registry itself now if they're not maintaining that registry it'll still come up on that search okay and and what violent crimes are listed as part of that um so it could be it's it's it's um the registry itself it's sexual in nature so if the whatever the the offense that was occurred they're they're required to register it was oh so it's only for sexuals so for example if I um if someone committed murder if it was more than 7 years ago that wouldn't show up on a background check it would show up under the Texas DPS search okay gotcha all right those are my questions thank you okay thank you council member Beck next we'll hear from Robert Sterns notice I didn't ask if anybody had questions Robert you still here this way we we we squeeze the blood from the turnip Airy as long as you're here we want to see your face at the podium Robert's going to give us an overview of the Tiff annual report thank you Robert and again congratulations on that new move what you say thank you m mayor protim bons I will uh I'll just get to the headline to say that the Tiff District's had about a 4.9% increase over uh last year's value uh and overall you know the report that uh the overall taxable taxable value from all the tiffs has resulted about $5.5 billion of increased since Inception excuse me so the tiffs are continuing to per perform well uh we will have an action item in March to terminate Tiff six we're continuing to analyze and assess tips that aren't performing or have met uh all of their criteria and so we're continuing to work through a few of those that we can uh go ahead and get off the books and is that the only tip you're proposing to close as of right down okay okay any other questions of Robert before you leave Roberts let's see if there are any questions for the proposed near Westside PID I don't have any questions Robert but if you could just spend 30 seconds um letting folks know what this is and why we're doing it yeah so we uh have been working towards establishing a PID for the west side is really to continue to support security efforts within the West 7th District the ambassador program uh at we've been going through a petition process have had some limited successes in getting the signatures required to establish a pit and so the IR outlines a process where we would one uh hire a consultant to uh help us in that process to secure the necessary signatures for the PID and it outlines a reduction in the PID boundary so we have heard from some of the uh business owners particularly on the Northern edge of the previously proposed bid that uh PID that they had some objections to being included so we've reduced the boundaries to uh to exclude them from that uh new proposal thank you thank you thank you Robert next item calls for city code updates for health safety and sanitation at food establishments and Child Care Centers any questions of Wendy Turpin on that from the council moving right alone regulations for nuisances related to portable toilets and events on res residential property any questions from City legal or others on that okay finally proposed Council initiated zoning changes for certain Keller ISD properties to community facility zoning District in Council District 4 7 and 10 any questions for Leandra on that okay all right any for let's see next item questions regarding changes in membership on boards and commissions for February 25th council meeting hearing none now we're back to the MNC log any questions on the MNC log for February 25th that brings us to Future agenda items I have one Chris council member N I want to get a irr presentation on um the contracts for the cutting grass I think we only have one contract uh Citywide and how we can explore uh bringing uh additional contractors on to keep the grass cut a mode through the parks department sure I have seen those mowers mow asphalt on Hempfield where there was no grass so thank you council member Hill uh can we get an IR on the actually follow up to Chris's presentation with Wastewater expansion and improvements any other future agenda items council member florides I'm watching you I see no text okay hearing none is there a motion to adjourn and with that we're out of here until go we go to exe oh we're going to go back to Executive session and hopefully it'll be a true executive session with just council members attending and staff apparently to e at I