e e e seven Michael's in here okay Council I'm Gonna Get Us started here welcome to your Tuesday May 7th Council work session I'll call us to order and turn it over to David Cook thank you and good afternoon everybody all right jumping right in we've got a few recognitions to do first I'm going to call on assistant city manager Fernando Costa who's going to recognize a group Fernando thank you very much Mr cook the staff in our neighborhood services department performs excellent work in promoting the development of portal housing and the revitalization of our lower inome neighborhoods in cooperation with for wor Housing Solutions and other partners in the community you know about their good work many of our residents know about their good work but it's good from time to time to receive recognition from peers in cities across the country and just last week the national Association of local Housing Finance agencies meeting in their annual conference at Las Vegas reviewed applications from cities across the country and selected the Fort Worth Housing Finance Corporation and the neighbor Services Department to receive their annual home Excellence award and we have a the U award to display uh for you today and we'd like to take this opportunity [Music] oops it's still intact but we're happy to to recognize employees in our neighbor service department uh for their uh performance uh they were recognized uh because uh they supported the cow and place uh project 174 unit senior apartments uh in the revitalizing stop 6 neighborhood uh the city council and uh as the council and serving as the Housing Finance Corporation board has been instrumental uh in the success of that project which is as of this month 100% U leased by eligible uh residents uh that's a great success story in a part of Fort Worth that for decades had been languishing uh uh uh in uh pursuit of U uh uh new investment uh and um the U the National Organization wanted to recognize Fort Worth because we were able creatively to combine multiple funding sources that uh usually don't uh go together uh into a single project to make this project successful uh sources such as the home investment Partnerships uh program uh the um uh Urban Development action Grant or udag uh Community Development block grant uh funds from the uh uh arpa the um uh American Rescue plan act as well as funds from the Housing Finance Corporation which included funding for permanent support of housing 9 units the permanent support of housing for folks who otherwise uh would be homeless uh not to mention the the choice neighborhood uh implementation grant that we received uh with Housing Solutions and and other sources so this is a great uh success story we'd like to bring forward the uh Community Development team from Neighborhood Services uh and if you would please come forward as I call your name Chad Laro Laticia Rodriguez Leah Brown Diane Anderson Justin mclin and Amy Connelly please recognize these outstanding [Applause] employees I just want to say I'm glad that Fernando broke the ward and not myself uh uh besides my team I have a great team we we work on several housing projects across the city uh and so I thank them they're great also in our department we have our our finance division our compliance Division and then I also saw Mary Margaret here so um you know definitely they're a lead partner and then Joanne P Joanne gun uh who's here who was the attorney on this at the time so she she put in a lot of hours as well so thank you [Applause] thank you somebody quickly secure that award next I'm going to call on chrisan Simmons to recognize a new employee in her Department thank you David I am pleased today to introduce you to the Fort Worth lab's newest assistant director chrisy lemon some of you might recognize christe from the number of roles she's held in the organization including in police community relations the old community relations department now CPE Planning and Development performance and budget HR uh and Library her work has focused on community organizing neighborhood association development process Improvement employee performance and training HR strategies and now budget uh and chrisy is brilliantly talented and embodies the curious and collaborative Spirit of the forth lab she has an absolutely Stellar reputation which is no small feet because she's been with the city since 2003 so we're so pleased to have snagged her for the assistant director of operating budget role at such a critical time for the for worth lab so let Christy say a few words thank you so much for the warm welcome um I'm really excited to work with such a talented team in the Fort Worth lab and I just celebrated my 20th year here um so I'm excited to take everything that I've learned and all the different parts of the organization that I've worked in and use what I know to try to improve the budget process and develop our staff for amazing careers for the future so thank you all all right next we'll call up assistant city manager Valerie Washington to announce a new department head all right thank you David mayor and councel I am pleased to be here today um after working with cpsh HR Consulting and doing an extensive executive recruitment um we were on the look for our lookout for a new environment mental Services Department director the inaugural director for this brand new Department um we were looking for someone who had experience in the seven key areas Solid Waste and Recycling tcq air quality and soil um quality testing brownfields and hazardous cleanups litter policy experience consumer health and landfill landfills and transfer stations and we were able to get all of that experience in Dr Cody Wittenberg and I would like to have him come up and say a few words thank you well thank you Valerie and and good afternoon and thank you to all of you I would say our city team is so amazing and I just want to say thank you for your collaboration and support over the last few months and for taking the risk to develop a new Environmental Services Department here in the city and to to bring that ethos forward really excited to see where we go from here and I just want to say also thank you to my Environmental Services team it would not be possible without them and all of you so thank [Applause] you Cody congratulations well deserved and I just want to tell management I told you so all right next up I'm G call on Deputy city manager Mark McDaniel thank you Mr cook so I have the distinct pleasure of introducing you to the first the city's first Veterans Affairs officer uh it was a very uh rigorous process we had over 600 applications um and a and a thorough process and so um he is one of our own I want to ask uh waen Castillo to come on [Applause] up so walk is um he was actually code en enforcement officer of the year he's currently working uh for Renee and his group or was um and now working with us and we're so delighted to have him on board particularly since he he is a veteran um and he's also has experience in Veterans Affairs uh work um in a previous position so uh please welcome aim thank you Mark I'm humbled and excited Ed being selected as the first city of Fort Worth Veteran Affairs officer as a combat Ranger I understand the unique challenges veterans face every day my passion was always serving the veterans and now I get to do it for the 42,000 veterans thank you for giving me this opportunity and David I just want to acknowledge Council rebec for initiating the process and to Charlie Lars dorf first sergeant on um on Zoom today um thank you for making sure this was made possible and to Martin M Daniel and your team for sheving it through I cannot think of a better person in walking to represent the city of Fort Worth with our veteran community so congratulations great work all right next up our informal reports the first informal report is agenda process for boards and commissions and Janette Goodall is available if there any questions moving on the second informal report is on employee entry wage analysis and Di gordano is available if 30 questions yes and as she's coming up um thank You' all for putting this um on the agenda this week um just to set the stage I think that it's important um that every city of Fort wor employee um earn a wage that allows them um to live a thriving life here in Fort Worth and um it's becoming increasingly difficult as we all know for forth residents and our employees to do um in Taran County um when we look at a two adult two children household each adult in that household has to make $16.20 just to survive and if for a single adult household it's $14.86 um when we look at that same household in order for that household to have a stable um household budget um each ad adult has to make $27.7 in order to maintain that more financially stable life um including a 10% savings for things we all need such as um savings but also emergencies like an EMS ride um and also for Education um and also uh to buy a home one day um so it's incredibly important that um we not only lead as we have on so many affordability issues especially um you know all the great work we've done on housing but I think especially it's important for us to make what is a reasonable investment as you'll see um to ensure that our um employees every employee um earns a wage and they can live here in the great city of forart so um di would you mind giving an overview um and then I would love for my Council colleagues to um have a discussion on what it would look like to get as close to $20 if not more than $20 an hour um for wages for our employees here and thank you Jared and as you walk through this di I might request because this is an IR and we have a pretty full agenda today that I hear clearly we have more to do on this so if if you're okay with it Council Williams let's walk through the IR get Bas lever information ask questions as needed and then put this on as an actual work session agenda items that we give it adequate time um and that so that staff may be able to be prepared to have that conversation as we head in the next budget okay we'll do so di Gano Human Resources Director and I'll provide an overview of the IR that's before Council today and so I want to start off with just the proposal that uh the human resources department is making for fiscal year 25 what we are recommending is to increase the current minimum wage rate of 1545 to 16007 and the reason 16007 is we're adjusting all of the pay structures by 4% so that moves the entire pay ranges for all of the city's structures equitably to include the minimum wage rate in addition in fiscal year the human resources department is proposing a comprehensive compensation study the last study that was conducted is in 2014 and just given the volatility of the market with people Supply demand wages we feel that it's important for us to advance a compensation study we also look at Market data when we make these decisions and so we do a biannual review of Market data and Market uh both public and private data the last review was conducted last year with implementations that went in 23 and so that data rely heavily upon to make these Market decisions to include the current proposal for fisal year 25 in addition just over historically since 2014 we've increased the minimum wage rate in in city of Fort Worth from 788 just 10 years ago in 2014 to the current 1545 so a significant increase over that 10-year period but a more significant increase in fiscal year 22 when we went from $ 1131 to $15 an hour which kind of disrupted our system in the uh non-exempt pay salary classifications we have just under 200 jobs that were comprised in 14 pay grades that is now collapsed to 11 so it's just something we have to be mindful of when you have entry-level positions that start to create compression vertically meaning that you have individuals with basic levels of education and experience bumping against pay with individuals in that same classification with higher levels of experiences or special experiences for those roles it also creates vertical compression so not not only do you have the compression in the pay grade you have compression in in jobs that are very different so jobs with entry classifications bumping up against jobs with even special licenses like a CDL or special certifications or even special experience um that even Garners kind of a a better wage in the marketplace and is that what you were trying to articulate in table B table a and table B will show you kind of those different types of jobs and where that vertical compression will um be created thank you the vertical and horizontal compression we also did look at some of the alternative minimum wage rates and so these are just some examples that were provided that are listed in the IR so we looked at everything from $18 to 2117 to $25.95 and with that the first thing that I want to point out is you'll see I can I just jump in really quick I'm sorry um there was also another T that I requested that did make it into the IR I andan it has wages at every 50 cents increments from 1607 to $25.95 and it also has the pay increased cost estimate on the budget and so that's something that's in your inboxes that didn't make it into the DI today correct and then that's also a minimum wage survey um that compares cities like um City of Austin at $20 city of Dallas at 18 city of nitton at 1825 City of Richardson at1 1889 and city of San Antonio at $18 Dallas County at 18824 yeah so two addendums that were included in your in that were sent via email um by Patricia Garcia so that is also included so the table that you have in your IR has four uh different types of scenarios the one that's being proposed as well as the 18 the 217 and 2595 but again just as a reminder you have available information from a recent survey or recent impact analysis to review the pay structure and the impact that it would cost to raise the individuals that would be impacted and then there's also a compression component so kind of two different bits of information there in addition what you'll see is kind of just overall impact to uh the salary structure and again that's just as we collapse pay grades and job titles uh we have to be mindful of those individuals that have committed to the organization and brought their experience so that uh information is noted there um one thing that kind of sets us apart from other entities in and around the metro area is just our pension contributions we have one of the highest in the state and so you'll see that reflected in the table um on the second to the last page and so that data there where we're looking at maybe paying someone $20 an hour the real rate is $30 an hour in that we have the pension contribution as well as some of the benefit changes so just something we have to be mindful of as we look at making modifications so we want to make sure that all of that information is presented to council member Williams point we did absolutely provide different scenarios so we looked at everything from 1650 to 17 to 1750 that information is available uh in the handout and then we did refresh kind of just the minimum survey data to include some of the large Texas cities the if you look at the refence in the closing of our IR we basically are still recommending the 1607 the information in the metro area is showing that the hourly minimum wage rate of our metro area cities is 14474 if you look at adding in the Texas large cities it's 1548 and we threw out El Paso because it tends to just kind of drag the numbers down and that's not really the market where we draw labor from and then the minimum survey data that's included there um you'll can dismiss El Paso and then we include the counties that are in our area only as a reference point so just wanted to make that clear as well and Jared you may have mentioned it when you in your opening comments but what was the minimum based pay rate that you were advocating for with staff um I was advocating for 20 I got push back from staff um but it's 20 is what you're asking for okay and I know that um mayor proon may have some to say to this as well but organizations in the city are starting to move to $21.7 okay thank you Gina I want to say I have the utmost respect for my Chinese eating food friend bana she's brought a level of professionalism to this department but I also want us to take a look at we we need to have the will to bring our employees up to a higher level of pay uh Mary Margaret is in the audience right now at for Worth Housing Solutions no one employed their makes under $21 an hour and that is not going to get you a vacation but if we have the will to do so we will get there and it's my desire that we do everything we can to make sure our employees don't have to job hop just to get to a better place we cannot tout retirement if they're at a rate where they can't afford to stay here that long and so that's very important to me and there is a very real example just around the corner at Fort Worth Housing Solutions who knows what they're paying at at DFW but that's important that we try to get there and I'm fine for studies but David I tell you about your priority based budgeting is going to unveil waste we know that it will and so there is money here we just have to have the will to find it and the will to make sure we're spending taxpayers dollars wisely and de thank you for your report Jared thank you for bringing this up any other questions from Council no go ahead Janette please I mean I know we're planning for a comprehensive Market study in fiscal year 25 can we not just find the money to do it now the comprehensive Market study I would have to defer to the for worth lab or to city manager it's about a I think again this is a really important conversation let's table this and bring it to a work session so that we're not rushing through the rest of the agenda that's set for today if we're okay with that but to council Martina's Point she'd like to bring that up as well at the top of the agenda when we do this in work session I don't know if it works this month but at least the very beginning of June as a work session item especially as we head into the budget cycle any other any other things you want added yes I just add that was the goal of the day was to get it to today we've been working on this for months and it hasn't that's very fair um and so I would like us to dedicate some time in June I know that staff has some time crunch with the budget and so June would give them enough lead time to be able to do what they need to do thank you for that mayor and any anything else that you want to make sure is covered during that session please make sure you send that to to Diana to to include thank you thank you very much all right the next inal report is on the municipal court and their Community engagement and William remley is available if there any questions William you have these flyers here can you tell us about this summer program how mayor and Council and staff William Rumley Court director so there is some flyers at your tables uh your your table one large table uh on the summer earn and learn program it's a great program that we partner with North Texas Central Goodwill as well as Texas Workforce Commission and that program helps individuals 15 to 22 so the city has been participating that for almost eight years now it was one of the original starting agencies that helped start that program uh I think Code Compliance actually was the first Department to uh reach and assist with Folks at the animal center and so since then the city has participated it's a great prog program is an opportunity for us to engage uh and include others in our community with other abilities and so that program there's two courts this summer um and so we're looking forward to participating that program again this year and then if I if I if you don't mind just Shameless plug there's other flyers there next week is police week and so we'll be doing an event next Wednesday uh to recognize our law enforcement arm in the court the marshals and um with that we'll have food trucks as always at the court we like to party with local community food trucks and so they will be there as well so we want to invite you to come participate with us and we do have a community tie as well as individuals coming to present the colors for one of the local middle schools as well as one of the former Marshall's uh fathers coming to do the prayer so uh invite you all to come as well thank you William thank you next informal report is on FEMA grant opportunities for fire pre prevention and eligible uses and chief Davis is available if there are any questions all right the next one is on urban area security initiatives otherwise known as yasi and the proposed projects in process to apply for the 24 yasi Grant funds and chief Davis and Christian are available there any questions we're rolling now next informal report is on the city of Fort Worth Residential charges Christian Simmons is available if there any questions all right and then the final informal report is on Workforce and business reporting for federally funded Housing and Community Development projects I I do want to hear a report on this Christina Brooks Christina as you're coming I don't want to give a complete history of section three but I would like for you to be able to communicate to the viewing public what the changes are to be eligible good afternoon mayor and councel uh Christina Brooks so just a a quick overview there was a rule change for section three which is a federal program so these are not programs that the city is directly responsible for enforcing um what we can do is report on that or request that uh our development Partners uh and contractors report on um their work with section three and the numbers and so there were a couple of distinct changes that um took place in 2020 in September of 2020 um these rule Chang has redefined what a Section 3 business uh is and um those are that the business either H has to be one of these three things either 51% or more owned by low or very lwi income persons the other way that you can qualify is a section three business is that um 75% or more of the labor hours for a project uh is performed by lower very lowincome uh persons or 51% or more is owned by a current resident of a public housing or a Section 8 assisted uh housing uh location so those are the the major roles and there are some calculations on how labor hours are uh are actually um calculated there and uh there are a couple of other things about what targeted Section 3 um Workforce look like uh one of those is within a mile one mile radius of the project uh all of the workforce that's within that um area that qualifies a section three or targeted section three um that's how they're defining it uh and youth build is also uh youth build participants would also qualify as section three Workforce and so for the public who wants more information uh should they contact you can they contact your office yes they can contact our office and we'll be happy to um give them kind of a a fact sheet okay of how to work with developers to um meet section three requirements okay thank you that that's all I need I'm going to wrap it up by looking to Mary Margaret in case I say something wrong uh in English in pure and simple plain English section three required if you were working on a HUD funded project if you lived in the area you could find a job within that area mayor Margaret would for with Housing Solutions hired a volunteer who was cleaning the park at no pay he was able to get hired he was a section three person so the changes there do impact geography and the makeup but if you are living within that range you need to know that there is still money available did I say that right okay thank you and for those of you wondering why I have this brick this is a brick from caval public housing that Mary Margaret and her team demolished and we are now rebuilding stop six thanks to Fort Worth Housing Solutions thank you for my brick yeah you can clap for the brick the [Applause] brick thank you thank you mayor council that's the conclusion of our IRS I'll move on any changes or questions regarding memberships boards or Commission or anything on MC logger zoning cases if not go ahead just on zoning case mayor on ZZ 24012 uh this case is in the Stockyards on West Exchange uh our newly minted Stockyards Inc is working with the developer there we're still waiting for um information right we're still waiting to see a s plan so a lot of these discussions are still in play including um waivers on height so that's do you anticipate continuing that item at this point if we don't get more information that's what I'm considering okay but talks are ongoing yeah got it thank you yes counc I have one as well on appointments um I'll be appointing kalicia Stevenson to the board of adjustment commercial because we have a vacancy there I'll be coming back with another appointment to fill her seat I know staff may be wondering what's going on with that so we'll be filling the Community Development seat we're just do a a switch thank you okay Council we'll move into our first um work session item which is recommendations from the ad hoc Council committee on Emergency Medical Response Val Washington ACM we'll kick things off as Val get started I have to say thank you to our members of council who served on our ad hoc committee it's been a long but important process and also incredible thanks to um the Fort Worth Fire Department chief Davis um MedStar leadership led by kin Simpson and their board and of course fire 440 and with that I'll let Val get get us started all right good afternoon mayor and councel thank you for this opportunity um I think you've kind of set the stage but if everyone in the audience will recall back last spring we started working with the Fort Worth mayor and Council um about potentially helping out MedStar fiscally for fiscal year um 24 and once we started having those conversations we determined it was to work together um we hired fit and Associates to come in and really do a deep dive evaluation of the EMS system um in addition to Mayor Parker forming this committee back in August um it's been a I'd say the last few months have been hard and fast and heavy as we've worked with Fitch and all of our partners um it's been a coordinated effort with MedStar with Hospital CEOs with member City elected officials and city managers their Fire Chiefs um many of which are here today in this audience to um support this conversation additionally we have Thomas Moore from fit Associates online so he's available as well to answer any questions um and we have Hillary shine who's been a critical part of the conversation and then I have some backup with Taylor Paris from the attorney's office who's also been critical to these conversations so today we will cover the following items we'll just briefly walk through the EMS ad hoc committee process the committee recommendations the fiscal impacts of the recommendations and the next steps for implementation and transition and mayor had already called out we had five council members that were tasked to serve on this committee um and I appreciate all of their time for the meetings that we had and the amount of materials that we sent and data um many times that we got to them late um but they were still able to really take that time to review just because there was a lot of material to share and make sure that we were passing along with this committee again the mayor established the committee back in August um through this committee the fit team came on site they were at just about every one of the EMS ad hoc committee meetings and provided a couple of briefings along the way to keep the committee updated so we were able to get to a point to offer recommendations by the proposed deadline in the resolution um which was by April 30th throughout the EMS um review process it was really important that we work with the many stakeholders who are involved um we had discussions with again with the member cities and set up a regular Cadence of meetings with them to ensure they understood um and were a part of the process as we work through EMS Services we met multiple times with Hospital CEOs who are also um a big part of this conversation as they get those EMS patients into their hospitals and it's important that they have a a good incoming flow um and that the patients arriving are um are ready to be prepped where a doctor could jump right in and start working on them we worked with tent County Medical Society who really raised some concerns about ensuring that we maintained independent medical Direction um which is important from just having good clinical oversight but they wanted to make sure that clinical piece was separate and we talked with them about that we also spent time with Ken the MedStar CEO U Dr Jeffrey Jarvis the MedStar uh medical director and then also with the local 440 as part of I think it was on our April 16th committee meeting we set up a a feedback opportunity for these uh stakeholders to come in person um staff we've been meeting with these stakeholders and having great conversations but it was important for the committee members to hear directly from these stakeholders so we created that opportunity excuse me um at the April 16th meeting and had folks sign up and they were able to share and express um concerns or hopes that they have with some of the system changes we're proposing again in working with the MedStar member cities there are 14 of us in the current member cities um we've been meeting with the 13 other cities um and really some of their concerns as we walked through this is making sure they understood um what an expense structure would look like moving forward they haven't we haven't been paying for EMS services so this is an new EXP expense for budgets um they wanted to make sure that we were looking at governance structures and that through that process they would have a seat at the table through advisory boards or some other way to make sure that we were hearing their concerns um and also sharing with information with them um and I would say the other thing that we talked a lot about were just the current Assets in the MedStar system and how through the current interlocal agreement we would need to work together to really keep a hold of those assets and make sure that those transferred in a way that we would be usable for an EMS system moving forward some of the strategies to address the member City concerns again in addition to setting up um Regular a regular Cadence of meetings we held some one-on-one meetings with them um we held a city managers lunch for city managers and elected officials to really have an opportunity to dig into some of the mechanics um and we think that we have developed some sol solons collaboratively that could really get us to a place where the member cities are in concert and moving forward as we make these EMS changes together I mentioned the hospital CEO feedback um I think it's important in meeting with them they praised MedStar for the high quality of clinical and patient care um they talked about some of the leadership they talked about making sure that MedStar was planning um but one of the items that came came up were challenges with the inner facility transport process and that's the process to transport between hospitals and nursing facilities dialysis facilities other Nur nursing facilities and so we spent a lot of time working with them on that item Fitch it was one of their early recommendations to the EMS ad hoc committee to look at removing the ifs from the 911 service calls and really isolating those and working with the the hospital CEOs to privatize that work um we are going to be working with the hospital CEOs and others um again the dialysis centers and others to really work through what that privatization process would look like what kind of guard rails need to be developed um and the timing for doing that we estimate um I don't know if I put it on the slide but we estimate a probably a 6 to 12 month time frame but again we're setting up an inter facility working group to sit down with those um stakeholders to really craft what that needs to look like I mentioned excuse me the tant County Medical Society and some of their concerns and really key Focus areas um I'd say as a result of their conversations we are setting up a stakeholder group to focus directly on the office of the medical director um and really making sure we're structuring that the right way and providing it with the necessary resources and then this is just kind of an overview of how we see that potentially being set up with an office of the medical director reporting up to the city manager's office um the same way as the fire department so you would have some Independence in that reporting structure so now to get on to the EMS ad hoc committee recommendations again the committee worked tirelessly over the past few months um and I'm proud of the work and that the committee was able to really boil down uh their month's work into some recommendations any I apologize I so hot in here today so I apologize um the so just a quick overview um of the EMS ad hoc committee recommendations as I go through this too please EMS ad hoc committee members feel free to jump in and provide additional context so there are 10 overall recommendations that fall into three categories inner facility transports governance and then EMS system changes all of those oh thank you all of those recommendations are based on the same Baseline assumptions they're based on a 0.50 unit hour utilization an 8 minute travel time 90% of the time it anticipates that there would be governance changes and then also that we would move the inner facility transports from the 911 calls so the first two recommendations are on inter facility transports and again that's to privatize the I process um remove those that call volume from the 911 system and then establish a working group to make sure that we're facilitating and setting this up the right way on and important there to go back one sorry about thank you any of the committee members should chime in here too but that second item was something that our Hospital CEO was asked for specifically to help with the process which I thought was a really good sign um that we have the right level of stakeholder engagement um just wanted the rest of the council to know that that was the case go ahead Elizabeth and in discussions about how um the current system works what we found was that the reimbursement and the cost with the ifs it didn't really make sense to continue to operate them internally um and so that's a big reason that's another big reason why we um opted to go out on that one yeah yes thank you and we really have appreciated the time we spent with the hospital CEOs who've been willing to um come together in meetings and really talk um as a as a really as a whole system um and their creativeness and willingness to come together and continue these conversations are are hopeful um on the governance recommendations there are four of those um and they focus on sorry excuse me here they focus on one making sure the governance of the EMS system is really under the control of the Fort Worth City Council um and we're working through the specifics of what that will look like um the EMS ad hoc committee meeting um let mayor Parker know it was okay if she continued having conversations with the current metstar board members and really working through what a transition period would look like and then that process for making any potential board changes throughout this transition process process um additionally we agreed that we would set up a board structure or an Advisory Board structure um where the member cities the First Responders and others would have a pathway to leadership to talk about issues um and other concerns that would come up we'll be working with Fitch and Hillary and uh excuse me Chief Davis to really set up that advisory structure and make sure we're meeting all of those marks we are going to are the committee um is recommending that we work to um memorialize the service levels for each of the member cities through service level agreements we are in the process now of working with City legal to see what that agreement would look like and the components of that and then we're continuing to work with the member cities on what they would need in that agreement to be comfortable and added additional information there on those last two items that we're working with member cities understandably many of them have not been as intimately involved with MedStar over the years and may not have realized there were any potential issues and so to mitigate any surprise Factor those conversations went back and forth staff did a great job Carlos spent a lot of time with member cities to get them to understand how important this transition was not just for the city of for worth but also for their residents and that fourth item is we also want to be really fair to some of our smaller member cities that have a much smaller budget impact and try to spread out some of that fiscal impact over several years if that's needed so those negotiations are ongoing and I in the in the meetings I've attended with management or Mayors they seemed grateful for that um out of fairness we still will make sure um all cities pay their fair share so to speak but I think there's some great Solutions on the table um that'll help mitigate some of that cost to member cities thank you mayor and we've committed to continue that conversation with the member cities and then reporting back and sharing that information with the mayor and counsel as we complete those conversations um and I do appreciate Mark McDaniel our Deputy City manager who's really been able to come in and help us navigate some of those conversations and come up with some really good win-win ideas um that allow the member cities to pay their fair share um and for also also us to understand some of the timing um that will be needed for them to do that and then lastly we have EMS system recommendations um and these recommendations the first one is to create a single roll EMS position within the fire department and that language is very important a single Ro EMS position secondly that the single rooll EMS Position will be classified as a civil service position we are working now with city attorney's office um with HR with MedStar with the fire department to really walk through along with the local 440 and what that process and timing looks like the other recommendation that we've mentioned before is to main that is to maintain the independent medical Direction and ensure that the office of the medical director is staffed appropriately to conduct their business and then lastly that staff will establish an EMS steering committee and a working group structure to ensure that these conversations are moving forward in the right way in a transparent way in a way that we can continue reporting back to Mayor and councel throughout the process um we're proposing that there would be working groups again to focus on in facility transports um working on the MedStar employee Transitions and culture and benefits and really making sure we're addressing that correctly um and that's a committee Dion and her team will help us lead up um we're going to fold in the 911 working group into the structure so we can continue to provide updates on that work um and again a committee that will focus on the office of the medical director and make sure we're setting up that structure appropriately Val let's pause on the other slide for a moment I'm just going to ask Council that was not a part of the ad hoc if there are any questions or needs of clarification for what we mean by single Ro EMS position and how that relates to a dual Ro firefighter and it's okay to say yes I need more clarification because we had several meetings over that topic so you would yeah absolutely as a member of the committee I I think we could all use so if you want to walk through that and if you need Chief Davis to also kind of give you real world examples that's too I'm actually gonna ask um either Taylor or Leticia and then probably Chief Davis maybe to give me some support on this um we did spend a lot of time talking through the right language because if you may recall when we were looking at the original fit models there was a fire civilian model and a fire sworn model and we've really landed somewhere in the middle um so they will not be civilians but they will be civil service positions that will be single role and that they only perform EMS work as opposed to a dual Ro position that is an EMS or an EMT they will do EMS work but they're also certified firefighters yeah thank you Chief did I explain that clearly or going to what else would you add because again we did have a lot of internal conversation making sure that we were categorizing this group the right way I think I think V nailed it I'd like to hear the chief talk about why that's important so if you think about the way the the current the fire department currently is structured they operate in a um a Readiness model there's 45 fire stations across the city that 24 hours a day seven days a week they are ready to respond right and they are dual Ro providers they are licensed by the state of Texas credential by the medical director and so forth they have a Texas commission on fire protection uh certification to be a structural firefighter and they also have an emergency medical technician certification or paramedic certification through the State Department of Health human services so they have two certifications that they have to keep up contining education on they're responsible for and Etc so with that Readiness model of 45 fire stations if you think about the MedStar model in a single role provider they do not have the structural firefighting certification they are licensed by the state credential by the medical director in a single role and that is to be an EMS provider it both the basic intermediate and advanced levels correct so if you think about taking them in a single role and embedding them on top of the structure of the Readiness model you have a hybrid system that is able to fluctuate with Peaks and demands of the day of the season of expected anticipated events such as weather or Mayfest those type of things and they can balance nicely to um work together to meet the demands of the of the community thanks Alan I think you had a question please so not on this particular topic but bullet number three I would like to understand the discussion about that since I think there's been past discussion about the medical director office sure we um engaged with and I'd say in engaging with the hospital CEOs the topic of independent medical Direction was raised it's something that's important to them um they not just to them but also to the Emergency Room Physicians and epab correct um and they really touted the work being done by Dr Jarvis and his team um so they really um made sure that was top of mind for us and then to follow up we worked with and heard from the tarant county Medical Society um who represents a lot of the uh who represents the doctors in tarant County U many of them have been involved in EMS work for a long time they're passionate about the work um and they've been involved through the current emergency physicians Advisory Board the epad board um that is currently in place through MedStar um we won't necessarily we may not call it epab but we will have some type of medical Advisory Board situated um but in talking with this group it was important again that the clinical and patient care um was separated from operations and to ensure that that was the focus um that patients were getting the best care um they were doing research to ensure that they were doing best care but it was really their sole mission to look at that um I'd say that was probably the main basis of the conversation additionally having a role in the hiring and U the hiring and selection of a medical director has been important um just in past just through past um history and I know that something that's important to them now to continue on with that um but they also referenced having a medical director a single medical director so there's not um confusion or or the need to coordinate in extra ways if there dueling medical directors with different opinions um so that was one of the other options or items that they brought to our attention um but really making sure the medical director was independent and had the necessary staff to fulfill their mission thank you Valerie I appreciate that and additionally the OMD is not it's really independent of MedStar it just happens to be housed in the same facility as MedStar but it's an independent office and if there's if there's no other questions at this point I'd like to have chrisan Simmons um come up to talk through some of the fiscal impacts of the EMS recommendations the Fort Worth lab has worked closely with our team and with the fit team to really ensure that we understood and agreed on numbers and calculations that are going into the analytics that we want to share today yes thank you for you or do you want the clicker yes thank you Val so um as mentioned you know part of the one of the roles of the lab is to ensure that City management and city council has good reasonable uh information upon which to make decisions and so part of ensuring that means that we're often engaging on models that are provided to the city um for our use by departments or Consultants or research groups and we you know often get tasked with sort of deconstructing and reconstructing those models to ensure that we're working from the base um and so as the ad hoc committee considered their charge you know we were working in the background in collaboration with Fitch uh MedStar the fire department and others to do just that so we deconstructed in some case reconstructed models um to come to our own conclusions and and present you with a number uh and so we use of course the same Baseline as Fitch for an Apples to Apples comparison so uh we worked from the optimized version uh of the contracted model including the goals around unit power utilization uh and response time goals and the Staffing that you know supports those goals um we dove into Revenue in the beginning of our work with Fitch but we didn't end up making any substantive changes so the revenue assumptions for us were consistent across any of the models that the ad hoc committee considered um we really focused on the expense side and particularly the administrative support functions sort of looking to apply a Fort Worth lens to fit's work um around the administrative Staffing um and finally we uh we pulled out the OMD and Communications from our analysis and then folded them back in just for transparency so just want to note that you know when we show costs it does include those functions of OMD and Communications uh so uh what I'll say is we we took a pretty conservative approach to administrative Staffing and when I say conservative here what I mean is Gen generous or gracious um so we've sort of modeled it as if most of the MedStar administrative compliment would come over to the city we didn't assume a lot of augmenting with existing civilian staff um and I say that because we're we're trying to be conservative in the costs that we're showing um we would think that as we begin our next phase of work with HR legal it you know FMS some of the other internal service departments um potentially you could see that that that 76 number go down um but we've tried to show sort of what we think at the max what the operations and administrative staff would look like so you see a Revenue uh from you know transport and non-transport revenue they 54.6 million um and the expense side between the operations staff administrative staff and all the operating and maintenance uh 65.5 million uh for a a cost to cover in the budget of about $10.9 million 10.88 7 uh which you heard referenced in earlier presentation today uh budget work session so that's where that number comes from and Christian I would just underscore what you shared that this number is really our high ceiling number and working with the Fitch team and coming up with this information it does not account for potential efficiencies that we may find as we're working to get um the transition completed so we do think this is a higher ceiling number um and it doesn't account for some efficiencies and other things that we may find as we work through this yes that's right we tried to be generous and careful in our analyses um and so we'll move forward and Contin you to sort of scrub that administrative number uh and then we've just included some specific follow-up questions that we received along the way from the ad hoc committee uh so for example we were asked you know how does the um the model compared to what MedStar EMTs and paramedics get paid today so this table sort of shows you that comparison um the MedStar figures you see here for EMT and paramedic pay are using an annual average in their fiscal year 24 budget for those hourly rates um and then you'll see what we've built into the um that single Ro model that Val described so 2320 and 3577 respectively um we use an average market rate plus 10% for our modeling and so this doesn't mean that this is you know exactly what they're going to be paid but that's what the model is built upon um and then we were also asked you know what do the Dual role firefighters today who are EMTs and paramedics how are they incentivized and so we've just shown that here for an example of course when you talk about a single role um you prob you know you wouldn't maybe see that incentive pay because it'll be built into their rate but that was just a point of information that we shared with the ad hoc committee we also looked at health insurance to see if there were you know vast differences in the different models and um when we were talking about the MedStar employees or you know new employees coming over as general employees um there was really no additional impact as far as the health insurance goes um with these employees perhaps getting represented by the 440 plan what we Budget on the city Side for the employer contribution is the same whether it's a 440 plan employee or a general employee um and of course employees then make their own insurance uh selections and so their employee contribution might change but as far as the models go those were pretty Apples to Apples between you know being civil service protected or not and of course the ad hoc committee recommended that they should be civil service employees so this was just a question we sort of explore during the process and then finally we tried to work with HR and legal to brain storm other civil service related costs that will come up um and so you know already that there's a cost to promotional exams when it comes to Civil Service methodology um and rules there are training exam costs um and then there's sort of this future cost related to collective bargaining which we don't have a specific figure tied to but we know there's a cost there um and so that's something we can you know sort of continue to explore and you'll see some other notes there about CE requirements that might be related for civil service EMS um and then questions around pen contributions um we're early in the stages of trying to anticipate what of that 10.9 million we'll actually need for fiscal year 25 we've modeled it as if we'll need the whole thing but that's probably not exactly reasonable when it comes to transition and implementation time and so we have sort of a placeholder figured here um but we know there are probably some decision packages coming with regard to the 911 working group and then we've sort of indicated here here are some of the person related costs that will begin to arise in fiscal year 25 um this year as you might remember in the fiscal year 24 adopted budget um we had we' budgeted $4.2 million for subsidizing MedStar or you know giving them assistance month over month or quarterly um we've we've carried that forward into fiscal year 25 in in the Target budgets of you've seen in other presentations we've we've modeled that 4.2 million coming forward into fiscal year 25 so that can help offset the cost of 10 .9 or 7 million you know wherever we kind of Land Based on the timing so we have a little bit of of buffer there um but you know we're in the early stages of trying to figure out exactly what we'll need for for fiscal year 25 as we're mid implementation any questions about fiscal impact I think um it's just important to have the conversation when we're talking about F fiscal impact it is a big impact to our budget it's one that the residents have gone 40 Years of um EMS service without having to pay for out of our city budget um and so this is a big a a big substantial difference um one that we now take the cost on because it's a service that we have to provide to our residents in the same way that we provide um police and fire and we pay for those um and so the the piper has has come and it's time we pay him on this one and so if you could just um really for the benefit of those that weren't on the committee and everyone listening and paying attention kind of talk about how medstar's um the model that we used under MedStar and that fiscal model it's not just MedStar but we're seeing it across the country kind of not work so that people understand that we're not just doing this because we decided one day we didn't like MedStar maybe they had a rough year but it was because um we're trying to get out ahead of something no I'm thank you for bringing that up um it has been I want to say since the mid I want to say the city paid a subsidy maybe up through the early 90s I mean but it's been a long time since we've had to pay for those Services MedStar has been fitting that bill um they used reserves and fund balance to do that and you're right now it's time that it's going to cost um public dollars for this necessary service and we're here um when we started working with MedStar specifically on some of the funding concerns um we really looked at what was going on Nationwide in EMS and a lot of many other EMS agencies are struggling um there are changes in federal government rules and regulations that impact U reimbursements and revenues that go to EMS agencies there have been changes at the state level that have cut down some of those Revenue sources and then additionally a lot of the work that they have to do now um in doing nurse triage and other community service related items don't come with a revenue source and so it's really identified a revenue source to pay for some of those services that traditionally haven't had a funding source tied to them any other questions Council thank you mayor I think it might be helpful we Breeze passive but I think it's helpful in the conversation on the fiscal side to talk about the value side um the goals that we've set for this new system are significantly um improved with the 8 Minute response time and a 50% utilization so I think it's important maybe I know we Breeze through that but that's a really major distinction between the system we're creating and the system that was no I agree thank you um part of working with the committee and working with fit was to make sure that we were looking and developing an EMS model that would even exceed what we currently had um in doing that and working with MedStar we realized that the MedStar EMTs and paramedics were working at a 67 unit hour U ization which is really high they go from run to run it's not enough time to do reports I mean it's a Daily Grind that could really wear you out um in working with fit and looking at all the potential models we did base it on a 0.50 unit hour utilization um so there is a more of a controlled workload with these models it's based on an 8 minute travel time so when we looked at travel times in city of Fort Worth and some of the other member cities they ranged anywhere um if I can remember correctly from like 9 and a half menes minutes up through 15 minutes just for the travel time piece and these models are all based or this model is based on an 8-minute travel time so you're already going to see an improved service level um and then that will be we will continue to work on the 911 side to see where we can cut down minutes and time and other pieces of the process um but you're right the model being proposed does have a 0.50 unit hour utilization which is going to be better quality of life for those EMTs and Medics and folks in the field um but it's also based on the eight a travel time which is an improvement to City of Fort Worth and all of the member City jurisdictions any other questions that was helpful Jared thank you you can continue thank you um so next we're just going to talk quickly through um Implement not quickly um it just kind of high level through transition and implementation timelines um we have engaged with fish fit and Associates to stay on board and serve as our transition manager um having their expertise they do this in other jurisdictions to help as we coordinate with Chief Davis and Ken Simpson and our teams HR to really make sure we're implementing and transitioning the right way um they will be our boots on the ground to help us with that process we're anticipating a 12 to 18month time frame we think 18 months may be um a little long but we really want to make sure we provide that buffer we want to do it the right way um and we want to make sure there's some room if we anticipate any um unforeseen issues that we need to spend time working through um we wanted to make sure of course that we worked with mayor and Council and once these recommendations are vetted through this body um we are prepared to continue working on implementation and transition steps the implementation includes a Communications and strategy plan um Renee I don't know if you want to speak to this directly you can um because our Communications and public engagements team along with cookie um and internal staff have been working to make sure we're firing on all cylinders from a communication standpoint um Renee if you want to maybe give a quick overview of the communications plan um I think it's really extensive and and meets all of the marks that we need to meet so we're just utilizing um the platforms that we have available to us to speak to different audiences as they may be interested in specific information um whether it be the employees that are transitioning over um General overview um videos for the public to understand always um pushing and asserting the fact that um the uh uh uh their safety and and being able to give them um patent patient Centric Care that's the words um are always going to be made available to them as far as our messaging to the public some of that will be um some paid advertising as well um in working with our neighborhood associations and pushing um those through um next store as well as the leadership um within those neighborhood associations so that they're comfortable with the transition was what has happened and here's just an overview of um many of the the town halls that have been completed um with the assistance of the HR department Valerie and our engagement group to serve as a facilitator for those that have questions from the the MedStar end of things as well as um to the public and a robust website at the end of the day where everything is being put up on so from The Fitch reports to the videos that we produce to the news releases we're releasing somebody could go back in time and follow the entire process if they'd like and we're spending a lot of care and attention in working with Chief Davis and Ken to make sure we're really coordinating with the fire teams and the medar teams to start looking at them working together and what are some of the things that we need to do as we look culturally at the two organizations and bringing them together um we're going to be working with Hillary shine um who has assisted with this project to really jump in and help the chief um and can really work through um some of the cultural changes and trainings that we may need to address um with MedStar we're getting a divorce a diverse Workforce sorry um a diverse Workforce um into the fire department so we're spending a lot of time making sure that there's no culture shocks I know diverse diverse doing great diverse um but truly and I appreciate um council member Beck has also mentioned this to us in conversations that she's with EMS and fire folks in the field um that this is something that we need to be conscious of and really be proactive as we make that change diverse diverse U some of the highlevel implementation items we have been working with Fitch and Di the Fort Worth lab Mark and others we have a task list now of about 143 items that have their own subtasks and we can provide those detail that detailed information to Mayor and councel um so you can see some of the specifics but some of the items include you know working on the board governance working with the lab to establish budget needs um working with fits to really nail down our transition plan once we have finalized recommendations and then putting the agreements in place that we need to to have the service level um with the other participating member cities we also are working to set an implementation date so this process isn't going to go on forever um we're working to set a date certain that we can plan for um as we're communicating and again we're also going to continue working with the member cities on cost allocation and asset options and we'll continue to share that information with mayor and councel uh we have an interlocal agreement in place now that governs our relationship with MedStar and the other 13 member cities we've been working closely with Dennis M Dennis mckoy Taylor Paris Laticia Leanne in the city attorney's office along with Ken Simpson and his team to make sure we fully understand how we need to navigate through making changes or dissolving that interlocal um if all member cities are in 100% alignment um it makes it easier for us to navigate and potentially dissolve the current Ila and then set up a service level um structure for future agreements um again we're working closely with the member cities on trying to get that 100% alignment um it's taken um you know just a lot of conversations and talking but we're continuing that um and I think we're hopeful that we can get there also on the Civil Service side um as we shared from a staff standpoint we really work to make sure we were calling this new position the right thing a single Ro EMS civil service position um there are some steps that we need to go through in order to implement that um and those steps include making changes to our fire collective bargaining agreement um and some of those changes to that agreement include updating the definition and adding the definition that would define a single Ro EMS um Civil Service employee um so we need to work with the local 440 the lab City management to really get that process moving um we've had some initial conversations with the local 440 and we're prepared to um approach it using anou um and memorializing some of this through anou agreement versus having to reopen the entire collective bargaining agreement um we've got a pretty tight timeline um that I'm sharing but give us a little Grace because it is super tight um but it has us really starting to work together in May bargaining in June and really coming back after the summer break with um some updates to the collective bargaining agreement that would accommodate this change and then um excuse me lastly um as I said we are going to set up an EMS steering committee structure we'll work with mayor Parker and the EMS ad hoc committee members to see how they want to participate in that steering committee um understanding that they've just invested a lot of time and effort into this process so far um and then we'll have other working groups set up the 911 working group and Office of the medical director working group um and the others that are listed here and I'd say with the working groups we're already starting to engage um Di and her team have already engaged with MedStar and fire employees so that working group is really getting started um and then we're hoping to get the inner facility transport working group beeting the week of May 20th um so we can get that work started our next steps include providing this presentation on the EMS ad hoc committee's recommendations to you today and then following up with the resolution on the May 21st agenda to memorialize um the recommendations and accepting the transition plan excuse me the transition plan to move forward and I think with that we can take some questions um and I appreciate your time and again I think I'm coming down with a horrible cold so thank you for as you present your patience that's not fun you did a great job Jared please yeah just to continue that thought um b as a member of that committee I just want to personally thank you um this was a very heavy task and it took a lot of um leg work and so I'm want to First just really thank you for your leadership and uh keeping us um wrangled if you will um and it was a really really thorough in-depth intentional thoughtful process um and you all do a lot of information as any information we requested yall provide it like the next day if not a few days after and so um really appreciate you also chair um Flores of the committee and and mayor Parker for y'all's leadership as well this was um a really um heavy lift but um I think we landed somewhere really nicely I even more importantly for our residents who depend on this um care in in really tough times um so thank youall for the hard work and everyone who was involved with this um I really appreciate what y'all did you thank you Jared any other questions or comments from Council no great job thank you and again to the committee to Carlos for chairing as well thank you okay Council our next presentation is by Richard Zavala our Parks and Recreation director to give us a briefing on the Gateway master plan thank you mayor Richard zala Park and Recreation Department uh this has been a year-long process and there have been a lot of people involved in this so I'd like to just recognize a few folks first of all there's been a a great group of interested citizens who have had passion for this and this is historic to this park because that passion you'll see in a minute has existed for over half a century our partners the tant regional water district uh the core as uh as well as streams and valleys and Stacy Pierce is here with us today uh we also uh the park board was very involved an Stetson from place four is here with us and I need somebody to pull up the power that's a point no it's not there uh while they're pulling that up I you know I want to thank the city manager's office too because they have really helped us and pushed us through this process which I think ends up with a better product uh with this our own staff in the Park and Recreation Department Dave Lewis Joel melany Scott Penn who's been the project manager on this and Karen stumer thank you uh uh John Fielder from Kimberly horn who was the landscape architect firm uh and overall just the the interest throughout the community so trying to set that up while I'm trying to get this going but let let me start with this a nation behaves well if it leaves its Assets in better condition and improved condition rather than impaired condition for future generations and that is appropo for this part Teddy Roosevelt said that in 1911 and you'll see in a minute why it is Zao because this has been a sewage treatment plant a landfill it's in the flood plane but we have a great opportunity Now to turn what's been impaired into an outstanding asset in the vision that came with that over 50 years ago uh when you look at your priorities the primary one is community investment uh but we can touch all of these uh with it so let me let me set the stage of the significance of this master plan in a community and I'll give it to you from a high level so if you think about the history of this city Lake Worth that was the beginning back in the early 1900s in 1936 we had a centennial Exposition that turned into Will Rogers and the Cultural District in 1941 we bought tan field 500 acres to the West that was a bomber plant and it also became a a a Strategic Air Command base we know it today is the joint reserve base in Lockheed Martin back in the 60s the Convention Center built by the county in 2000 we took it over put $75 million in it and this last Saturday and is going to enable us to continue to invest in that Community Asset that builds the city these are long range policy decisions that pay again and again for multi-generations from a park system standpoint over 300 Parks 13,000 Acres but these are really the big four beginning with the botanic garden which was acquired in 1937 and we're reinvesting in that Gateway which we're going to talk about today in the 60s the Nature Center came online and of course the zoo in the very beginning in 1909 as part of the park system so I say all that to say this is a significant policy decision for this community when you consider Gateway Park its size and and its potential let me just Orient you you could see at the bottom is I30 on the north is East First Street uh to the east is Oakland Boulevard uh almost splitting to the West is Beach Street running North and South I'll refer to the Oxbow area west of Beach Street a number of times but the main park there it began uh with 160 Acres it's our only Metropolitan Park the only one we have in the system U it's located in Count Council District 11 but it is a park that serves the entire city really the entire region just like those others and we know through uh Placer AI that we're getting over 600,000 visits on an annual basis so here's what it looks like today uh mainly athletic fields we have over a dozen athletic fields the improvements that are there uh Trail heads mountain bike trails observation deck a lot that goes along the river and really kind of the Catalyst of the new generation was Fort wo we put $100,000 built a 5 acre dog park in 2004 and that really began the Renaissance of this and you'll see how it ties together when you look at the history over 50 years ago the halpen plan identified this in two studies and right there you see the beginning of Ruth Carter Stevenson Phyllis Tilly and streams and valleys in general Generations has carried forward that they saw that vision and what they were looking at was a sewage treatment plant that had operated for 75 years a number of plans have occurred over the years uh and the ones I'm going to focus on is the 2002 and the 2009 master plan so in 2002 if you'll look at the map to to the West you'll see the soccerfield area that's the Oxbow area that is really was called the Phyllis Tilly plant it was commissioned by streams and valleys upon phyllis's passing so it could just continued the Legacy here and it was done by James toll um but down the middle of the park you can see there's 100 acres there that's not our property we've identified that for future potential uh the main stem of the park you can see where the ball fields are down the middle running north and south and as you go to the to the east you'll see additional ball fields and at the time we had a a youth golf course and the first te was planning on moving out to Gateway Park there's overlooks there's Trails a lot there but this master plan was done because of the beginnings of the discussion of working this part of the of of the this part of the Central City uh Trinity River uh Vision plan we updated in 2009 and this Incorporated that Oxo area to the West again the discussions were going on with the core much bigger project but this is now going to become part of that Valley storage was needed we had to we had to uh create that in that Western area which was actually owned by the Water District a lot of it went over to the landfill which is on the east side of the park but this plan created an update again more we introduced disc golf we introduced uh uh disc golf and and off-road bicycling working with uh a lot of volunteer groups but this is the plan that we're setting now and then as a change came with attorney year revision it gave us the opportunity to really activate the park so record we began the conversations with the core in 2008 we updated the plan in 2009 you can see the recorded decision in 2015 that was the huge game breaker there that incorporated it all as to the Trinity River Vision immediately went in and enter into agreement with the water district for that Oxo area which is about 135 acres and in 2018 we've finally eliminated the last of the Riverside sewage treatment plant out of the the footprint of the park immediately uh the voters approve uh $8 million in bond funds in the 22 Bond program to understand the site 70% of it is either in the floodway or in the 100-year flood plane uh the flood way is in the brown the 100-year flood is in the blue the 500-year flood is in the yellow and you can see right in the middle of the park that was the beginning those are the soccer field I mean the softball fields that exist today but we did Trails all along the other areas so when you look at it there's about 250 Acres that are outside the flood way in the hundred-year flood and about half of that or a little more than half of that is the landfill to the to the east which was actually a gift from aan Carter and Ruth Carter Stevenson so there is limitations here but you know half the park system is in the flood plane so that's okay and we we we can definitely work with that so what's happened in the last 20 years and I mentioned Fort wolf that seemed to be the kicker that we got things going uh with that dog park but synthetic Fields were put in on the soccer fields the reason those are there is because there of pcbs contamination in the park and we worked with the EPA and TCEQ and we were able to uh build fields that would encapsulate that gets inspected annually but it was the beginning of taking back that property you can see that the south end of the picture on the left th those were the digesters that was a Riverside treatment plant that operated for 75 years that's a $7.7 million cleanup and that was done in 2018 game Cher total Game Changer now we're in uh with with with the park because now all that has been removed uh over time we've done $22 Million worth of improvements since 2004 about uh six million of that was done up until 2009 since then roadways we got a state Grant uh we got soccer fields that were built that encapsulated the pcbs that was a $4.3 million project a lot of improvements have occurred in this part during that time but as you can see that clean sight now it's totally ours and it is no longer impaired it is improved and that's what we're going to be able uh to to expand on the park so here are the numbers the 22 Bond program also the water district with funding from the uh tax increment fi financing district will generate $14.6 million that'll be our first phase you can see the breakdown of that about an 80 20 split for design and construction so let me shift to the master planning process and and it was pretty extensive we've been involved in it over a year we engaged Kimberly horn and we had a number of meetings with the intent of getting an update educating and I just tell you every meeting the passion every email that followed every meeting everything that happened was this is a park that we want to make our Central Park in the city of for worth and you know what they're exactly right they're exactly right right that's what it is for us this shows you the planning timeline we had a stakeholder group that involved tarant Regional water district uh the core of engineers streams and valleys uh our own for worth lab with a central city project they met they met helped us with regulatory questions things like that we had three public meetings over a span of time uh average attendance was about 50 which is good for those types of meetings each one was followed by a survey we received over 300 surveys about a 100 per meeting people would react people would react to what they heard and then the consultant Kimberly horn would take that in we've been to the park board three times we went to them as a briefing last October uh and then uh in February as an information item as they do on these big policy decisions they'll hear it one month they'll come back the next month uh they took action in March and here we are today uh again this just shows you the meetings and the outs and we appreciate council member Martinez being at the meetings and in particular the last one at Victory Forest uh that was well attended so these are the planning areas this a planning thing a landscape architect thing so it breaks out the park in certain areas so if you begin to the to the far right which is the the landfill area you can see that's a high and you've got the river running down the middle where your sports and Athletics are going to go uh other facilities again remember there's there's only about 100 acres here that are outside of the flood plane the community Hub you'll see it in a minute uh lots of activity and development occurring there and then as you get to beat street and to the West that would be the Oxbow area that would be the record of decision the valley storage the soil that was taken over to the landfill and it opened up this whole area of the park so I need to thank Cameron Gorman who's not here with us the the Wizard of all videos and Karen stumer on our staff uh this video that you're about to see will give you an overview a couple of things one it shows a total project buildout of 170 million 140 million of that is the estimate but we're also uh projecting that we'll be there'll be public private Partnerships so about 15 to 20% of the development of the park the other thing is you're going to see numbers and visitations the consultant has looked at those provided us bu facility over a dozen facilities what we anticip at the annual attendance that it will create and you'll see in a minute uh it's over 200 million people 200 two million people that would be coming to the park we got all that off of place or II so if you go to Gateway we're going to know where you came from where you went after you left a lot of people go to waterburger I don't know why but that that's in there uh but but we know we know where people are coming home home work the demographics of the folks and everything else so great Intel for us in this design so if I can work this video and I can't backwards Karen stumer I know you're here what do I do next click it I did got it technical ulties my apologize apologies it worked every time it yes but it should click and then give me a video right click I'll take anything I can get so has Karen left you hanging is she in the room Joseph can you help okay so far Richard your presentation is fabulous YouTube YouTube it's not on YouTube yeah there's no link for to play embedded in there okay resend it sorry yeah I don't know how to do you know I was going to drop uh a trophy and then I was going to say divorce oh but instead I thought this would be better uh half Fai Richard if Joseph can't fix it you'll just have to sing I know and and let me tell you it's 1 minute 24 seconds okay uh and the staff really put together a miracle and we're going to expand on this and be able to continue to keep the excitement around the park did anybody pick this for their daily Trifecta got it and Richard while he's working how does this compare to New York um you'll see it in the video okay I knew you were going to ask that question thank you all right sound Alan can I see you for a minute yeah running [Music] sound all right [Music] n [Music] all right worth the wait I hope all right now I how to get out of here we'll still wait be back on Richard so do we know how many miles of hike and bike trails we're planning on having a total no we can get that inform information to you how many there are more bike trails there are boardwalks I'll go over that here in a minute uh more athletic fields and all those numbers are in the plan okay thank you yeah good thank you Joseph all right so everybody cover your left eye and read me the list that's up there uh so I want to give you the whole thing and I want to begin from the from the East and work my way to the West you'll see over by the land landfill area observation deck but on that tiny corner there's there's a destination playground like dream park at Trinity Park a splash pad restrooms we're going to activate that site and then we're going to protect the landfill but also use it for the beautiful views that you get downtown down the middle spine is the river so that's fairly limited but that'll be trails and we have disc golf and the um mountain bikers working through there the middle is the athletic fields uh that run up through the spine we also have the future an Amphitheater a service center that we'll need to go in there because we're we're going to have to dedicate staff uh as we begin to make improvements and then down the middle of the park is really the active area this is this is where uh we're going to put the most investment of O of of expanding the the the event space uh the Great Lawn this will be the Gathering space of the park and then as you go to the west across Beach Street that's the Oxo and that's where the focus of this is going to be this just gives you a lists maybe if you uncover your eye you can see this one but again every element is in there I had somebody earlier asked me you gonna pickle ball yes we're going to have pick a ball outdoor basketball courts we don't have that there U those types of things skate park is not there but so much can happen in this site and now I'm going to focus on the Oxbow area which is the area that we're want to uh concentrate on with the funding that we have uh beginning with an entryway that will be a cross entryway on your far right which is at number nine uh connecting the park on both the east and west side a lot of roadway infrastructure going in but athletic fields again if you'll remember the the legacy of that Tilly plan of sand volleyball courts uh tennis courts pickle ball courts basketball courts we even have an interpreted Trail and an outdoor classroom and ropes course through that area again this is in the in the flood way but nonetheless most of the time we'll be able B to utilize it so with that um here's our schedule going forward uh we would ask that we come to you with an MNC to adopt this plan in June uh at the same time we would bring forward the design and Engineering agreement on that same date and if we remember my last presentation time is money so we want to keep moving on this overall it'll take some time to design and we have to deal with the number of core and and floodway issues uh so it is an extended period of time but we would hope to begin Construction in the beginning of 2026 and have the park completed about 15 months later with a full reopening by this late spring or summer of 2027 um so with that um sorry about the the the the video but uh I'll be happy to take any questions and again we have a lot of folks here that have been very supportive of this throughout the project any questions of Richard Janette no questions just comments um thank you Richard thank you to Parks and Rec to your entire team for all their hard work that has gone into this and I hope I'm still around during the construction when construction begins but just Shameless plug I really really really believe that we need a pool in our only only metropol Metropolitan Park so that's it I heard that loud and clear Richard I hope you did yes ma'am as Chris would say Janette if you hope you're going to be herris would tell you to run your race any other questions of Richard I do want to acknowledge Stacy Pierce being in the audience with us thank you for your partnership and Richard I guess we'll see you on June 11th Richard okay thank you next moving on we're going to move to number eight David Cook is going to give us an overview of our capital projects under consideration in the excess funds from FY 23 I take it away David I was on the other side earlier now you guys look different you're at the good camera so be be good all right oh there we go all right my job here is to talk about a couple things one is we have capital projects in motion from different Bond programs and projects that aren't Bond funded that I think everybody knows over the last couple years with inflation supply shortages all that we have some gaps in capital projects so what I'm going to talk about is how we're going to try to keep those projects going and how we're going to identify some funding to do that I won't go into a lot of this you've seen it before inflation materials labor all have pushed some of these projects um up in the cost standpoint and again what I want to do is identify the funding shortfalls by areas and projects but we're also at the point Reggie I need you to know is just a Relentless guy so when when we're talking about arpa money does everybody remember that we have to commit it by the end of December 2024 and spend it by the end of December 2026 Reggie does not want to send any money back to Washington DC right not one penny so he is relentless on staff to make sure that we commit by 24 spend by 26 so one of the ways one of our strategies to address capital projects is going to be to shift arpa funds to existing capital projects that qualify and take other funding to back stop what we have previously dedicated to arpa do everybody get that so this is a two it's a two-prong strategy let's make sure we spend arpa and let's see what we can do to hit some of these Capital project needs okay the other thing before we get into the details is uh this is another thing we stress every Capital project has a scope a schedule and a budget right and so when you looked at Bond projects from 18 or 22 or even before that 2014 every every project had a scope every project had a schedule and everyone had a budget we get into trouble when we change scope or schedule right so if the schedule takes longer costs go up if we do things to a project that affect the scope sometimes that makes a project go up in C in cost so we're very particular in looking at scope schedule and budget and some of these things we'll look at why you we take change the scope down right so that's always a choice if we're Limited in money we could change the scope of a project down in most of these cases we're keeping the the scope the same because we believe that was a commitment we made whether it was an 18 Bond program uh Bond project or a 22 Bond project but we look at scope schedule and then the budget the other thing that we've done before we get to this stage so we don't just come and say we have a gap we need to take money and do it we look at any other available Capital funding source whether it's prior bonds whether it's the sale of property it could be impact fees or Park dedication gas well Revenue you get the idea and we came to you back I think it was in January or February and said we are going to have some savings from prior fiscal year spending and revenue that we set aside for capital projects so in a lot of ways that's really our last Source when we've exhausted the other options so here's what we know right now and these are projects that were in Prior Bond programs as well as capital projects that have been a part of an approved Capital Improvement plan and this is what we've identified projects that are currently in motion that will be the way I think about it when we're going to bring an MNC to you in the next 12 to 18 months we need to have identified how that project is going to be funded right so these are projects that are coming to you in the next lot some of these will be in the next few months but really when this the frame of reference is the next 12 18 months mostly driven on the transportation side but here are the other areas that we have identified current gaps in funding here is so that's here is what we need here is what we have at this point in time that will be allocating some of these funds to address some of those Capital needs so the first line there you see is we have at least $28 million from prior Transportation Bond programs right so our recommendation will be that we're going to use 28 million of those savings from prior bonds for transportation to current needs for transportation everybody got that part we sold the downtown library so we have the sale of the library that we're going to recommend to use right now for Library projects but the council can change how we use the sale of that property as well David if I can interrupt please yes okay so when we sold the downtown Library yes there was a commitment made to our residents that a portion of that sale would go to fund a new downtown Li we're not messing with that okay so that $15 million does not touch the money that we set aside for the new downtown library I'm gonna get to that in just a minute so what I want to touch on is where we know we have money okay and then we'll talk about the library needs in a minute okay thank you because we have a library need here of 3.4 yeah that's not a downtown library but we'll get to that that's the one I'm most concerned with so we've got prior Bond money we've got the sale of the downtown library you recently approved the tax notes for 2024 and then as we shared with you in I think it was January February we have $38 million from the general fund fund balance in excess of the amount we needed to hit our goals okay we put the arpus slash there because we're going to move some of the general fund money to arpa so we can free arpa money for capital projects that's why that is shown on the same line so we know what we need we know the money we have right now and now how do we recommend matching some of that up the 28 million from prior Transportation bonds would be dedicated to Cromwell Marine Creek which is a 2022 Bond project if I remember and Golden Triangle Boulevard so this will address the gaps from those two projects we're recommending taking part of the money from that Library sale for the Northwest far Northwest Library which will be 3.4 million short that will still leave 12 a. half million for other Library needs other Library needs are specifically a downtown library need well that is a that could be a policy choice we haven't all we haven't dedicated to specific use yet okay yeah so it goes the the balance would be undirected okay well we should then direct it to a downtown library which could potentially cost more than $12 million knowing what we know now so I'm I'm all for funding our libraries and shifting stuff around to make sure that we're covering our obligations um and that we're taking care of all the city all of the city's needs um but this Council made a decision based on some information I won even say it wasn't good information but just on some assumptions that we would be able to find a building rather quickly and and operate a downtown library again and we can't and it's becoming increasingly more difficult for us to do so and cost of land is not decreasing and so my concern in letting any of that money from the sale of the library go is that we will then turn around and not have the funds to have a downtown library so um how do we how do we assure me and the residents that I represent downtown and throughout the city that have been pretty upset about that situation that they're still going to have money for a downtown library how about if I go through the whole thing cuz what will be left un loated is the 12 a half MH but we're going to have a list at the end of projects that are still in need of future funding that we either have to really decide either through a budgeting process either through the 2026 Bond program or I'm trying to figure out what other options are right if we decide we want to just keep the full 15.9 million from the downtown sale then this would simply have to come out of another source of funding right and keep that available which is an option as well and then we had 2.7 million identified in the tax notes for the Northwest police patrol the Northwest police patrol will be it's about 5.5 million over budget and the this will be coming to ccpd or the crime control and prevention District to make up the other half of that increase so two half of it from the tax notes half of it from ccpd now let's get into the arpa fund balance swap we have two projects that were worried about the timing of whether we can spend it by the end of 26 one is Evans and rosale project which we identified 4.2 million from arpa and the Texas A&M Innovation Hub downtown which we allocated 2.2 million from arpa so what we're recommending is to take the general fund fund balance move to that money to the equal amount to Evans and rosale right this actually will give us more flexibility on that project as well because it'll be all general fund money it will not be arpa money and we'll do the same thing with the Texas A&M Innovation money we'll move general fund fund balance number to that project again will give us more flexibility as well and we're not held to a Time table on the money does that first part make sense there's two projects previously funded by arpa we're going to recommend funding it through the general fund fund balance and then we're going to take that combin combined amount of 6.4 6.5 million and do these arpa qualified Transportation capital projects that we know we can get done by the end of December 26 does that make sense so it's an arpa general fund fund balance swap we think it makes it better for both the A&M project and the Evans and Rosedale project and it frees up money so we can do these qualified Transportation projects Dave I have one question yeah um with the swapping the general funds if is that going to be for physical 25 or until it's actually complete so for if we move general fund fund balance money to Evans and Rosedale uh there is no timetable in in when that money has to be spent right so it'll be at the pace we need to go to do evid and rosale the right way am I saying that hopefully helpfully yeah yeah yeah I have a a question for you David but I'll let everybody else put their questions out there and I'll go last in any I'm looking at the the qualified funds and they seem to be North Side heavy you know I see Basswood North Beach North Beach Western Center is there any way you could show greater diversity Geographic diversity in identifying other qualified projects yeah I think we were going off the most of these have to do with pedestrian safety if I remember and they're when I look at the list um I think there were mostly pedestrian safety intersection Improvement projects that we went off of the needs that tpw has in motion right now so part of this is a timeliness issue part part of it was what qualifies as an arper project the other one the meadow Bri Golf Course [Music] um I think is the only non-transportation project in that list I I think we're asking the uh citizens to trust us to move this money around but in some cases especially the downtown library we may not have that earned trust because I hear quite a bit of feedback from that and it's not even my district I hear it at the beauty salon on huland and that's why I'm thinking if if you're able if you know if you're able to show greater Geographic diversity you can see everybody giving in some on this I I would think we want to look at that because this moving around it's too north centered and so I'd like to know what other projects would be qualified and we also need to have some type of language that promises the public you know we know we're moving this money around but we're going to commit to doing what we told you and I'm not hearing that I'm seeing Carlos taking screenshots which makes me think this information is new to him based on the feedback I hear from Beck I can tell it's new to her and so we might need to just kind of flush this some more Carlos well Gina uh to your point I can talk specifically with uh or or to the Long Avenue pedestrian safety uh project because that long has feel excuse the pong long reported a lot of crashes along that roadway East and West I get a lot of complaints about that um even running into newly planted trees you know on the uh on the grassy median so the intersection which is a very skewed intersection has a really terrible line of sight has been redone and that's part of that project it's just it just needs more to complete when you go to Basswood Boulevard and Old Santa Fe Trail from the last Bond program we got some partial funding for that and the rest came from uh development services money the reason there because a lot of uh motorists were taking u-turns that they shouldn't do and there were plenty of accidents we have video of cars tumbling right in front of the entrance of uh those communities there so what added cost to that because again that was already funded but now supply chain issues manufacturing slowdowns are coming into play um the scope of the project increased too because there were drainage improvements that needed to be made so all this stuff was committed to it and again I'm speaking about Long Avenue and Basswood it just needed more money to complete because as it stands right now they can't finish it yeah I go to the mall all the time at Basswood so I'm oh yeah you work out that way yeah I I'll just I'll just add to what Gina M Pro Tim alluded it is very um nothing against uh our council members up North but it is very North uh heavy and the um my concern is I would like to see that list and I think this goes back to the original question and concern that this city council had in the budgeting process of Staff picking and choosing what they want to do with the funds versus giving us a holistic list and letting us decide on what matters and important to our constituents cuz I can Ratt off a few streets right now risen Jero MC ferson Oak Ro that uh Ed Parkway the uh sidewalk uh prestan walk for our kids safety from Race Street to Forest Hill and the list goes on and on and so you know I I think when you want to I'm I understand moving the money I get that part but when you give us a list that don't represent where we move money from it just smells a little fishy that's my comments Alan so I want to Echo Carlos's comments for the two projects that are in my district well the three all of these were things that have been previously committed but due to issues they haven't been I mean they can't fund full completion so I I really don't want to see us go back on prior commitment and I'm not advocating that I I'm just curious as to if there are other committed to projects that are not reflected here I think we need to see the the whole list of opportunities so what I let me suggest because the we're not making decisions today okay right so part of this is to get information out there I'm going to show you a list of projects in a minute that will still need gap financing if it's not on that list it could be that it is already funded at the level it needs to be but you don't have that in front of you so I think what we should do is talk about the projects that we know that are funded without needing additional money right that's not in front of you there's this here's the projects that we need money in the next 12 to 18 months right and then you're going to see a list in a minute of and there's these other projects that aren't going to be awarded in the next 12 to 18 months but we already know need money because I do think just like you are saying our commitments are important yeah right and when we make a commitment in a bond program it's our intent to try to meet all those right and so we've got to still come back with more strategies that you'll see in a minute so and other than the we can slow down some of these projects slowing down though might drive up some of the cost and so we could be very deliberate thoughtful and we don't have to commit all the money today our reason of coming before you is some of these projects need to start moving forward here's our recommended way of doing some of them right but we don't have to tackle it all in the short term we're just giving you a picture and I think it'll be helpful if we can give you more information funded without that moving forward without additional money you don't have that list we can provide that and what we're talking about today and then the the uh third list that I mentioned and and David just to be clear it's it's not advocating to remove any of those it's just asking for the list of what else is qualified so that we have the full picture of what is qualified for ARA funding I call it co money so I don't want people in in Allen's or Carlos's District to think anybody is trying to say don't do that we just need the whole picture sure because sometimes staff doesn't get the community feedback that the elected officials get correct and I do think we need to provide more information to provide that Fuller picture going back it um we identified th these uses at this point in time for that general fund fund balance SL arpa swap again some of that going to Transportation projects some of that going to fire stations we have three fire stations that'll be coming forward in the near very near future that are all needing additional funding and then I mentioned that arpa swap which is two projects primarily um it's the Tex A&M and then the Evans and Rosedale uh we didn't allocate all the fund balance because there's some of the questions that have come up right now as well as there are still going to be projects a little bit farther out but then need additional funding which takes me to this slide when you look at a list of projects anything in that that's a text A&M type of color is a bond project right and then the last few there are nonbond projects but there are other capital projects in need of funding that just gives you an idea that includes fire station Community Center stop 6 Hub neighborhood streets and and some other the arterials that were in the 2022 those are primarily 2022 Bond program what we'll do is amend this next step slide because I want everybody to feel comfortable with how we're allocating the money there are some changes that we'll be bringing I think Rel our next presentation is on arpa because we're as I mentioned that Reggie guy's on on us to make sure that we're allocating by 24 committing by 24 and then spending by 26 but we can bring back that additional information that I think will help the conversation on how we allocate funds and how we meet all our commitments that we made in the 2018 Bond program primarily and the 2022 Bond program and and David I I would encourage staff to meet with council member Beck prior to you know that way she has a level of comfort and things will be good y any other questions of David thank you David and thank you for staff not wanting to send any money back we do not send money back they don't know how to spend it we do and so now we'll hear from that man who puts a tight grip on the money Mr Reginal Zeno again talking arpa thank you good afternoon mayor protim and council members this should be a pretty brief uh presentation on arper I think David address most of the issues uh in this presentation but we'll go through it uh and as the manager indicated you know we are continually reviewing the various projects that are funded through the arpa allocation uh to determine any residual amounts that could be available for reprioritization uh and we're in the mist of of doing just that we've identified uh several projects Mr cook just uh uh listed those out that would be utilized due to the reallocation of the two uh projects that were referenced uh that have been moved to the general fund committed fund balance and as indicated uh arpa funding must be obligated must be uh actually contracted uh by the end of the current calendar year and fully expended by the end of 26 uh generally just a brief overview the city received 1 73.7 million uh within that the City qualified for 86.7 million of the revenue recovery category uh and included within that category would be the provision of any government Service uh that could be utilized uh that would be utilized um and initiate utilizing these resources it's the most flexible category within the arpa allocation and then of course the non-recovery uh category which is the remaining amounts 87 million uh there's specific Federal guidance under the use of of that pool uh primarily public health related uh the negative impacts economic impacts of covid and then any very particular very specific infrastructure structure uh projects uh the revenue recovery category we've listed the various projects uh that we've allocated uh the monies toward uh we've indicated uh the colmer analysis here the remaining amounts to be obligated we've highlighted those projects that we are either transferring to the non-revenue category to free up more flexib revenue recovery dollars or transferred uh back over to be funded from the fund balance uh the only item really of note would be the capital projects uh Restorations within public events there still approximately 6 million to be obligated or contracted uh by the end of this year uh we did recategorize the forward Housing Solutions allocation of 1.6 million and we've moved that item from the recovery category to the non Revenue uh to the revenue recovery category from to the non revenue recovery category because it does qualify uh within that program and as indicated it does provide some flexibility in the use of that 1.6 million uh here's a summary of the available resources 3 point approxim imately 3.9 million uh and here we're we're showing the transfer of that housing solution to non-revenue and then the transfer of Texas A&M Innovation Hub allocation to the committed fund balance uh here's a brief analysis of how we are recommending to utilize that 3.9 million metal Brook Golf Course Maintenance building uh the CFA uh Intermodal Parkway partial funding of the 1 Point three and then an allocation for the North Beach Street Western Center Boulevard intersection improvements which would exhaust the the resources available within the revenue recovery category uh the next slide provides the various programs that are designated within the non-revenue category uh and we've highlighted those that we are using a portion or or exhausting the balance of the amounts that are remaining to be obligated uh and the item of note I guess would be the tpw uh solar street lights uh I think there was a presentation at the previous work session and uh utilizing that 10.5 million prior to the end of the calendar year uh there are some amounts to be obligated uh for various other projects as Child Care Associates there still 4.6 million to be obligated uh and then also for permanent Supportive Housing uh 3 million uh that's yet to be allocated uh the Broadband infrastructure project is pending and I'm told that 4.5 million should be obligated uh pretty soon so therefore there are resources still available unobligated but there are plans to have most of these resources in place so that the city doesn't lose any of these resources uh the summary of available resources approximately 3.8 million within the non-revenue uh category and then uh the listing of the recommendations and utilizing the 3.8 million and the projects uh Mr cook just uh referenced and and discussed and here we have now allocated the full amount of the non-revenue uh recovery category and all of these projects are shovel ready and we're we're we've been told by the various project managers that uh they would be able to have the funds committed by the end of the current uh calendar year uh and just finally we're continuing to evaluate projects with department leaders and project managers uh to identify any potential additional residual Revenue uh we'll be taking a pretty thorough look at the various programs at June 30th and and let let me interrupt you when when you talk about working with department leaders and project managers please incl include city council members in that equation sure sure conversation sure absolutely uh but of course we're still concerned about the various projects there are significant dollars that are still yet to be uh encumbered or or contracted with and so we're taking a very active approach with the project leaders uh and we're spending a a significant amount of time with the various uh departments uh with that and then finally uh we'll work continue to work with the project managers to fully obligate arpa fun uh by the end of the calendar year and if there are any additional residual revenues that are identified we will certainly be back to Council in the August time frame we'll be getting it pretty close to the uh timeline but uh we would be coming back to council with any further reallocations if necessary I only have one question of David or our Reginal uh do we see removal of cast iron pipes be El ible for this money since we're going to be we're going to be removing hundreds of miles of cast iron pipes uh Kate Perry is shaking her head yes uh but we would have to uh certainly take a look at it but I think offand she's indicating it would be an eligible use okay not not recommending just asking because I know that's a real problem sure sure Kate Perry is our expert okay whatever that was I still think y'all told me yeah okay yes we are we are okay thank you thank you moving on the the the Superstar of the the the entire month so far Miss Christian Simmons talking about my friends that being the over 65 and disabled category as we talk about property tax make me happy Christian I'm going to make you happy by introducing Brady Kirk so that work yes thank you so you'll recall that last week we uh came to you with a briefing on a potential exemption for child care facility providers and so um as another related topic today Brady's going to walk you through uh an analysis of what it would take and what the uh fiscal impact would be to increase again the over 65 and disabled property tax exemption um and so again Brady Kirk is a budget manager in the fort laa who specializes in Revenue so Brady take it away here well thank you and good afternoon I agree Christian is the Superstar I hope maybe you might be able to make some room on the all rookie team for me since you've heard from me twice today now now last year this city council made the decision that they were going to give some tax relief to our over 65 and disabled person residents now on the table this year are two different changes to our tax exemptions we're considering one of those is the child care property child care provider exemption and you heard about that a couple weeks ago what I'm going to walk you through today is what it might cost if we were to give a similar increase to the over 65 and disabled person exemption this is a quick history of what the exemption has looked like in Fort Worth so in the 1980s for whatever reason there was not a long lived but a strong interest in increasing the tax relief for over 65 residents in Fort Worth so that went up by 1984 to $440,000 and about seven years later it followed increasing the disabled person exemptions so that the two mashed to 40,000 then for about three decades not much was done on those until once again last year we took that up from $40,000 to $60,000 and if you just take a quick look at the city of Fort Worth's tax rate and the exemptions that it's offering compared to the other top 10 cities in Texas you could probably say Tech Fort Worth is roughly average or at least close to the medium on both the tax rate and the exemption that we're offering to those residents now I think by the end of the presentation you might see a number that will surprise you a little bit about what the total cost of increasing the exemption by another $20,000 of be so I'm going to spend a little bit of time talking about the two different benefits the for worth offers to over 65 and disabled person residents and and how those two affect each other so there is on one hand that $60,000 exemption but Fort Worth also which is not this is something that cities in Texas can elect Fort Worth offers the local frees or tax cealing for over 65 and disabled person so when you look at your bill and you've got your exemptions and you've got your freeze and and your ceiling whatever that ceiling is it's not going to mean that you can't pay less than that but you won't pay more so that has the final word on the matter and really in the long term if that exemption stays steady then that freeze has a lot bigger impact for you as long as your house is going up in value over time so this is a look at the entire tax process from the point where the appraisal district initially recognizes the market value of your house to where they've calculated your bill at the end so here I'm highlighting both a portion where they look at exemptions and then where they compare that to your Frozen Bill and that just shows you that that Frozen bill will override all those other stages if it's lower than what's calculated taking the same property tax process which goes from market value Homestead exemptions this time what's highlighted is everything in the process that the city has some control over as a governing body so we're talking today about exemptions we'll be talking all spring and summer I know about the tax rate and then like I said we have elected that we have that tax ceiling at at the local level and just in case this could confuse you sometimes people think that the tax ceiling is a is only for the school district so by default there's some tax cealing in play for the school district Statewide but at the local level you elect that so I'm going to take you through an example now just to illustrate this concept more concretely now we're not talking about a specific house or any individual property in for worth but it's kind of a typical one I want you to consider it starts out $250,000 in value and then it grows over time and throughout the process in years five and six there are a couple of increases in the exemption so first we're looking at a case in which the taxpayer is 63 years old to start out and then in year three they're qualifying for that local free so they turn 65 they get the $40,000 exemption for the first time but they also have their tax bill Frozen at $1,515 so as time goes on in year four the exemption is the same but their tax bill even though their house has gone up in value that's the same too because they've hit the ceiling then when we get into years five and six when the exemption is going up they do get some value out of that exemption and all of this is tax relief to this particular homeowner because if they didn't have the free or the exemption by the end of this period year eight they'd be paying over $2,000 so when you talk about the tax relief some of it is from the ceiling and some of it's from the exemption and in this particular case they do get value from the exemption it's just that by year eight their houses continued rising in value now they're just back at that ceiling so they're paying that 1,515 again if we look at a different example though consider another person who is a couple years older so this person even though they've got a house worth the same amount they've got the same exemptions they've got the same growth they hit that ceiling in year one and now their tax bill is Frozen at $1,412 and I know it's a lot of num numbers here but by the time we get to where the exemption is increasing in year five they're still just paying their seal because now their home value has increased enough the $20,000 does not get them below that and this is I didn't plan for the numbers to work out like this but when we increase it again then it goes up to 80 they get $1 off their tax bill and then the next year their home goes up in value again and they're paying the ceiling so just like in the other case this person is also getting a lot of tax relief but in this case it's all coming from the ceiling except for that one $1 that came from the exemption and then one last kind of conceptual item about this is something that it took me a little bit to wrap my head around is when I think about what these exemptions cost the city and the tax rols are going up by X percentage over time at first I was expecting the cost of the exemption to go up by that amount but that's not really the case because it's a flat amount per property it's more just about the number of accounts getting these exemptions and that's not rising in a super fast rate and then on the next couple slides you'll see the number $134 that's not a random number that's just the maximum amount from a $20,000 exemption that taxpayer could realize based on our current tax rate so we took the April tax roles all of our accounts with tan Appraisal District and we looked at what another $220,000 on the over 65 and disabled person exemption would do for these residents so the total tax relief offered across about $49,000 49,000 accounts comes out to $940,000 so that's the cost to the city that's lost Revenue if we were to increase that exemption you've got if we did not increase it about 8,000 accounts that would have a zero tax bill from the city maybe not necessarily a zero tax bill overall but to the city they would have to pay nothing and then after that increase that number goes up to about 9,300 so that's 1,400 more accounts that at least for one year would have no City Fort Worth property tax bill so we've also broken it out based on how much tax relief some different groups would get so I I would say this distribution it's really characterized both at the high end and at the low end by groups of groups of property owners that have homes that are above the average from market value so the vast majority they're paying no they'll get no tax relief and that's because of the ceiling so some of those might have a ceiling of Z or they're paying above the ceiling right now so increasing the exemption would not cause them to pay less and then a large portion of the value that we would be giving in tax relief is also to property owners that have a little bit more expensive homes and that doesn't mean everyone in that bucket that's realizing the full benefit has a super high net worth home but a lot of those do and a lot of them for whatever reason are just far below what their ceiling currently is that could be for a multitude of reasons they might have moved to a less expensive house but there's still there's a lot of tax relief at different levels some are getting $25 to $50 off their tax bill some of them are getting 50 to 100 and some of those that are in the the higher amount they are in more modestly priced homes right now so that tax relief would mean a higher percentage of their bill to them if they were to get that so just to sum that up with fewer numbers there there's several different groups if we were to increase this exemption that would be benefiting so the biggest one is people who are qualifying for the first time because then their tax bill would be Frozen at that lower level and that's a lifelong benefit to them and then those who similar to the the example if they qualified pretty recently their home might not have risen too far below where that ceiling was calculated so they would get some relief probably not as much and then there's a lot of people who if something about the nature of their property that they own has changed then they might not be right at their ceiling either and they should get some benefit but the biggest thing I think to take away is if they've qualified recently for the exemption they'll get something out of this otherwise they might have seen their home increase by too much value for $20,000 to change it so a week from now on May 14th we have a resolution or an ordinance prepared on both this and the child care providers tax exemption that the plan is to bring to you so that would increase this from 20 from 60,000 to 80,000 and that would Grant a 100% exemption to child care providers on their Fort Worth property tax any questions of Brady Macy thank you Brady um this is more of a request for next time I think as we're going through the budget workshops it' be helpful too to have a list of how these exemptions are going to impact the bottom line so we're looking at the revenue and the expenses but also liabilities if we have that if we do Grant these exemptions at 100% And then the additional for the over 65 and disabled just how that impacts the overall budget as we're looking at the big picture absolutely any other questions Council okay looks like we're ready to move on to our last briefing which is with B Washington and Cody whittenberg to give a briefing on Waste Management Service levels mayor and Council I'm just going to give a brief introduction and then Cody Wittenberg is going to give this presentation and we have waste management also in the audience who's available to um to comment and answer questions as needed and we understand some of those basic rules that um Society forms if you push someone you say excuse me you don't talk about people's mothers and you also don't mess around with residential Solid Waste pickup and we understand that and hear you loud and clear um I'd say since covid there have been some challenges with um our customer service and providing those services to our residents um we've come to Mayor and Council in the last couple years and talked about reroutes and other items that the team was using to address some of those service concerns um we wanted to take time today to really outline and acknowledge some of the service issues that our residents have been excuse me experiencing um and just to show that as we talked with mayor and councel we are not oblivious to those issues and we want to be really open um and transparent and also talk about Solutions we have in place to address those concerns excuse me those concerns Cody if I can turn it over to you thank you all right good afternoon again so I think Valerie is absolutely correct trash service residential trash service is one of those core services that we offer at the city and I thank you for a few minutes to walk you through some of the challenges we're having and a plan to correct those so this overview for the presentation we're going to focus on those goals and those guiding principles for our residential collection program talk about some highlights what the data is showing us and then stress some of those customer service issues that we are acknowledging today that need to be corrected and a plan to address those so when you focus on our residential collection programs we we center around four goals or four guiding principles one is to offer exceptional customer service and that's not just for City staff as a core value of the city of Fort Worth and our staff but that also extends to our contractors and everyone that represents our organization the second piece is a value to our Fort Worth residents we understand that we want to provide the best service and the best value possible in this space third of course is to create and maintain a clean and attractive City by properly managing our trash services our waste and garbage and others that also impacts how our city is is perceived and then finally promoting diversion and promoting a a landfill life that is extended to the maximum extent so we talk about our our residential trash program currently there are four lines of service garbage Recycling yard waste and bulk three of those are on a weekly schedule and you can imagine if everyone set out every line of service each week or month that could be over 3.3 million touch points that we have with our customers in that given month of course we know not everyone sets out every line of service each week or each month and so we actually have about closer to maybe 1.1 million touch points but our goal is always the same no matter how much a material is set out for collection our goal is to have zero issues and our goal is to have 100% collection on all of those lines of service of course we realize that sometimes misc collections do occur and recently we have to honor that we've we've gone above our goal of a 1% ratio which I'll talk about a few minutes in a minute but the goal is to to always manage our services and currently we are well above that goal at about 1,600 misses per month rather than even what industry standard would allow which is around 1,00 so as we've heard from our resident we as we've heard from complaints and and concerns that we've experienced or witnessed ourselves there is a concern for just the general disregard for customers and the standard of care that we're able to provide currently we have incomplete routes which we talk about frequently misc collections of course misc collections specifically for our customers that have carry out service and who are maybe disabled and then also we just have some standards of care for our equipment inadequate or equipment maintenance has has come to the the Forefront in recent weeks just to give you an example of data there's a lot of different ways that you can catalog or capture what is happening with our our services this is one way that we measure the number of misc collections with respect to the number of households we're serving that number at the bottom at 1.52 that should be below a 1.0 again perhaps even more alarming is the misc collections for our customers with carry out service again these are individuals with disabilities who cannot push those carts to the curb or out front and you can see that that ratio is currently at a 29.1 ratio again that ratio should be below one for this group of of customers as well and if you think about that 1.0 ratio just to familiarize you with this particular chart the blue columns or bars on this graph show the number of households that we've served over time that red line again is that magic number in this in this scenario that orange line should be at or well below that 1.0 at any given time you'll notice that over time it's cons our misc collections have gone up and that's what's causing that ratio to also go up you'll see in 2020 and 2021 during co uh for perhaps covid was was driving the workforce and and other factors to ensure a little bit better service but you can still was see it was still above that one and since that time we've considered to to have an incline I will notice 2024 is only reporting 6 months of data but currently it is still trending to be at that higher category so we as staff our contractors we wanted to come together to come up with a firm plan to address these issues and here are seven steps that we are working together to to complete one is we want to reaffirm customer service expectations with staff and contractors we want to improve daily Communications to to everyone about those incomplete routes when they're going to occur for the day maximizing efforts to help our residents with report reporting any misol it's very important that we we know if a misol has has happened number four we want to resolve misc collections quickly and efficiently leverage technology and and change up the route monitoring that we as staff provide specifically for those customers with disabilities setting a priority with Waste Management to repair all equipment with within their own Fleet or within our subcontractors Fleet and also adjusting some contract requirements to support WM when they need to flex to cover those routes so finally just as we continue to move forward it's it's become a new normal that your trash is missed and we want to undo that new normal I think that term has come up frequently and go back to the way that things should be with respect and and excellent customer service and one way you can help us and all residents can help us is If you experience any Miss whether it be recycling or Garbage or yard waste or bulk let us know preferably the next day that way if those routes are needing a little bit more time to get complete on the that existing day but please reach out and let us know because if we we may not know it's been missed until you reach out to us and and reaffirm that and you can do that through the call center it is the best way to get your your task order into the system by going through the call center their system goes directly into our ISM task order system to help clean that up and get that corrected as quickly as possible and of course if there's any challenge certainly reach out to staff and happy to take any questions oh you did sorry questions from Council Charlie do you have anything I don't uh we had a good conversation over the weekend so I really appreciate uh Valerie and the rest of the for taking action on this and you know giving us information that we could actually take out to our residents letting them know that we not only know what's going on but there are solutions that are they're going to be coming forward soon uh to actually fix the issue thank you Charlie thank you thanks Cody Council that's the last of our presentations do we have any requests for future agenda items or reports Council M Beck uh yeah I would like an I on um when our folks call uh 911 we have different categories of calls how they're prioritized so I think it would be helpful if we had a better understanding of what types of calls are prioritized um and then I'd like to know um in the past 90 days how many calls calls have gone unanswered by uh for wor PD and what priorities they were and what our standard is for um when we're when we're just unable to answer a call council member bons and then counc just to reiterate last week I got some input from citizens last night about an IR that I asked for that they didn't know about but again I want to make sure Code Compliance puts together some kind of training for the convenience stores the local retail Community people because they need to know how to deal with pan hamers and they need to know from co- compliance what what can be done in terms of training council member bons and I my office is actually working to put together a training with MHMR um we're going to roll it out first and the near Southside to kind of see how it goes and then hopefully um expand it but it's a deescalation training so that um our service industry and those folks that are dealing with people that um until police can get there what what they can do to help smooth that over that's very very gracious but some of these people don't need that kind of training they just need to be moved Council Martinez I just want to add to councilwoman Beck zire um I'd like to hear how many um false alarms we're getting from PD I see reports that you know people call in and then it's determined to be false alarm wish spending all this money on them going out there are they intentional F false alarms I don't know just what's that history or just if we can get a number Hill Williams um this is a request for any work session or council meeting I feel like we get our packets last minute um staff is scrambling around the night before to get our binders put together and that's not fair to them it's not fair to us I don't want to read at 9:00 at night or get up early the next morning to read so I think we just need to be a little bit more resp F on time frame and if we can get reports in at least 24 hours before the day of the meeting that would be very helpful councilor Williams um yes I have one today um it's on um I want to know from Neighborhood Services the number of uh single family properties in Fort Worth o either own or occupi or either owned by an individual or owned by a corporation and so if they could give us that breakdown of what percentage of our single family properties are now owned by corporations that would be great and then I've already put this request in but just following up um I know we had requested from legal department to um give us some um Solutions on what to do about certain uses and proximity of one another um and so just want to bring that back to the top front of mine thank you any other future agenda items from Council okay with that meeting is adjourned